Please, Sir, I Want Some More

We are glad to see that the Harvard College Curricular Review’s recent report recognizes the many problems with undergraduate instruction and advising at the College. For a university that purports to be the best in the world, second-rate teaching—frustratingly common at Harvard—is simply unacceptable. Admitting there is a problem, however, is only the first step in solving it. Though the report has some solid suggestions, it does not recommend the thorough overhaul of undergraduate pedagogy that the College needs.

On the bright side, if adopted, the report’s solid recommendations, such as the suggested expansion of the junior seminar program, will do something to better undergraduate teaching. Junior seminars are a good way of increasing student-faculty interaction and encouraging the type of classroom experience that undergraduates ought to expect at Harvard. There is no reason why students at Harvard must necessarily be denied the kind of faculty interaction that students at small liberal arts colleges get simply because they chose to attend a research university. Other laudable proposals include requiring that all tutorial programs be headed by a professor and reducing section size from 18 to 15, both of which will help to ensure the quality of the undergraduate educational experience.

Nevertheless, the steps proposed in the report are inadequate. The committee’s recommendations for improving the quality of Teaching Fellows (TFs), for instance, are dubious at best. The report recommends that fellowships be created for outstanding TFs and that training in assisting with and evaluating written and oral presentations be required of all TFs. But while fellowships might inspire the best TFs to work harder, it is hard to imagine the unlikely prospect of a fellowship transforming indifferent TFs into motivated ones. Moreover, the type of generalized (read: fluffy) pedagogical training TFs are likely to receive as a result of the report’s suggested reforms will at best address only a small part of the of TF problem. We are particularly frustrated that the report did not do more to address the TF issue since so much of the learning Harvard undergraduates do is expected to happen in section.

A better solution would be to encourage professors to teach more and to make greater professor oversight of TFs mandatory. Professors ought to receive additional compensation for teaching above their required number of courses, because currently there is a strong incentive, both in terms of monetary compensation and prestige, for professors to teach as little as possible and to devote their time to research and publishing. As for the oversight of TFs, more sections should be taped, and professors should be expected to review those tapes, meet with TFs and provide written evaluations of their TFs that other professors would have access to. Increased contact with professors would improve TF performance not only by providing additional motivation to teach effectively, but also by providing feedback from those who know the course material best. With the hands-off approach that many professors currently take towards their TFs, one has more reason to be surprised at TFs who sincerely care about the quality of their teaching than those who don’t.

Finally, the report’s recommendation to make Freshman Seminars mandatory is unnecessary. While the program is excellent on the whole, and it could surely benefit from expansion, making Freshman Seminars mandatory will only reduce the quality of the seminars and the flexibility of first-years’ schedules. The quality of a seminar is entirely dependent on the enthusiasm of the students and the professor. Making Freshman Seminars mandatory would involve engaging faculty who are less eager to teach a Freshman Seminar and students who are less likely to get into one that they’re interested in.

To be sure, the report contained some valuable suggestions for improving the quality of pedagogy at Harvard. But in the weeks and months to come, as faculty and administrators finalize their decisions about curricular reform, we hope that they will come up with bolder ways to improve teaching at the College. Reforms that stop half way aren’t going to fix the problem.