Curricular Review Schedule Pushed Back

The timetable for the Faculty to debate and vote on curricular review proposals remains in flux, after professors spent all of last week’s Faculty meeting debating University President Lawrence H. Summers’ leadership and failed to address the scheduled agenda item about the review.

There are five more Faculty meetings planned for this semester: one tonight, one in March, one in April, and two in May. But several professors have expressed concern that more meetings will have to be scheduled to allow time to air proposals for revamping the Core Curriculum, overhauling concentration requirements, and instituting a January term.

Dean of the Faculty William C. Kirby said earlier this month that administrators plan to bring curricular review legislation to a Faculty vote by the end of the Spring semester, even if the process requires extra meetings.

Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures Tom Conley, chair of the January Term Committee, said yesterday his committee’s recommendations likely will not require excessive time, but many other issues would be hard pressed to fit in the current schedule.

“In view of the other issues that are on the table, yes, I think that we are going to need a lot of time,” said Conley, who is also the Co-Master of Kirkland House. “From what I’ve been told, the issue of the Core is an issue that’s really in debate and discussion.”

At last Tuesday’s meeting, Kirby and Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71 were to “report on the progress of, and the spring term schedule for, the Curricular Review,” according to the agenda.

However, this item on the docket was never reached, since the topic of Summers’ leadership filled the 90-minute meeting and is also spilling over into another meeting today.

“The Faculty have been understandably concerned with many issues in recent days,” Kirby said on Friday. “It’s not surprising that the curricular review has not been a topic of conversation.”

He added that it was important for the Faculty to be given ample time to discuss the curricular review proposals.

“The sets of recommendations that we have before us now are related to the fundamental mission of [the Faculty of Arts and Sciences],” Kirby said. “More than one hundred colleagues have worked on the several curricular committees over the past two years. We owe it to everyone to discuss the results of their work.”

The schedule of Faculty meetings is determined by the Faculty Council, a 19-member body that Kirby chairs.

The Faculty Council will meet tomorrow night. Professor of the History of Science Everett I. Mendelsohn, a member of the council, said that tomorrow’s meeting will attempt to clarify the semester’s schedule.

“We will probably be looking over the calendar to see what’s possible and what’s not possible,” he said.

Mendelsohn said the process had been pressed for time even before Summers became the dominant topic at last week’s Faculty meeting, and some curricular review proposals might have to wait until next year.

“There were probably going to have to be more meetings added even if we hadn’t dedicated all of the last meeting to issues of governance and leadership,” he said. “Its not clear that all the pieces will be in place this semester, at least to me.”

While acknowledging that a fast timetable and the focus on Summers’ leadership pose challenges to the discussion of curricular review proposals, Conley expressed confidence that the faculty will have a say in the end.

“Despite all this, we have a very cohering and active faculty that really wants to make itself known and contribute to the process,” he said.

—Staff writer Evan H. Jacobs can be reached at ehjacobs@fas.harvard.edu.