Two Science Depts. Revise Requirements

A month after the government department announced it would significantly modify its undergraduate degree requirements, two more of the College's largest concentrations--biology and biochemical sciences--are making sweeping changes to their courses of study.

The proposed changes, which were announced to biochemical concentrators in an e-mail message yesterday, significantly alter the introductory sequence of classes for both concentrations.

The changes will affect incoming members of the Class of 2004.

Current undergraduates will not be directly affected by the new requirements, though some course offerings will be modified as a result of the plan.

Professor of Molecular and Cell Biology William M. Gelbart, who is the head tutor of the biology concentration, said the changes aim to keep the curriculum up to date.

"Part of the discussion was rethinking what should be expected of biologists in the twenty-first century," Gelbart said.

Under the new plan, both regular and honors biology concentrators will be required to take one fewer course than the College currently mandates. The changes will also make the regular honors and neurobiology honors tracks more similar.

As a part of this change, both departments will also make significant modifications to the introductory classes taught by the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology (MCB) and the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology (OEB).

These departments jointly administer the biology concentration, while MCB is solely responsible for overseeing biochemical sciences.

Under the proposed changes, all current introductory biological science courses with departmental numbers below 50--such as Biological Science 10: "Introductory Molecular Biology"--will replaced with a new series of Biological Science courses numbered in the 50s.

Many of those classes to be replaced currently enroll several hundred students.

According Gelbart, the changes do more than give old courses new titles. Rather, the modifications reflect a shift in the courses' academic content.

"We looked at increasing the breadth and depth of the introductory requirements," Gelbart said.

While some new courses will have fairly similar material to the courses they will replace, others will experience more dramatic change.

For instance, Biological Sciences 11: "Basic Principles of Biochemistry and Cell Biology," which will be replaced by Biological Sciences 54, will omit material that is already covered in organic chemistry courses and will add more advanced material.

According to Gelbart, the changes come as a result of discussions among Faculty members within the MCB and OEB departments.

For the biology concentration, the specific changes were developed by an ad hoc Faculty committee and the standing Biology Undergraduate Committee.

The development of the new curriculum in biology did not involve student participation, Gelbart said. According to Gelbart, although the department would have liked to include student input, there was not enough time to do so.

He said that adding any more steps to the process would have required postponing the changes for a year, given the deadline for including them in next year's Handbook of Students.

"I think these are major improvements," Gelbart said. "I would have hated to wait another year."

Students who enter the concentrations by the end of this term--including first-year students who have yet to declare a concentration--may adopt the new requirements or continue under the old system.

The concentration offices will work with students using the old requirements to determine which newly-numbered courses fulfill the old requirements.

In addition, James E. Davis, head tutor for the chemistry department said the restructuring will mean that MCB 61: "Physical Biochemistry"--a course taken by both chemistry and biological science concentrators--will no longer be offered.

Instead two classes will be developed to replace the course--one designed for chemistry concentrators and one for biological science concentrators.

Several biological sciences concentrators contacted about the changes yesterday said they did not have enough information about the changes to comment.

In the e-mail message from the concentration, however, they were assured that the changes would "have only modest impact on [their] course choices."