Expos in the Balance

In an initial effort to realize recommendations of the Harvard College Curricular Review (HCCR), the Committee to Review Expository Writing met Thursday with over 50 faculty and students to discuss the program and its current state. This comes at a critical time for Expos, considering the mixed reviews it has received recently, especially from seniors. We look forward to some substantive change for the program.

The College must not eliminate Expos from the first-year curriculum, and we are glad that the committee concurs. The offering of small classes is a key pedagogical reprieve from the typical large introductory first-year courses. Moreover, teaching writing to first-years prepares them well for future written assignments. Given this, Expos ought to be offered to all students in the first semester of their first-year. Writing a term paper in the first semester and subsiquently learning the fundamentals of college writing in a second semester Expos class greatly reduces the value of both courses.

The criticism of the lack of a public speaking course that surfaced at the meeting is appropriate as well. The HCCR suggested the integration of an oral skills component into Expos. While this would certainly be an effective means of ensuring students learn necessary oratory skills, we do not believe all students should have to participate in such a program. By offering certain Expos classes that incorporate public speaking in conjunction with others that do not, students with pubic speaking experience will not be mandated to relearn these skills, and others will have the opportunity to gain or perfect them.

While we advocate the addition of some classes with an oral component, we would like to see theme-based classes continue to constitute the majority of the offerings. Themes help to keep students interested in the classes and add an intriguing aspect to otherwise lackluster material. However, there are not enough themes for students interested in the sciences. Out of 35 different course offerings this spring, only three (“Mapping the Mind,” “The Medical Imagination,” and “Science & Society”) seem to engage in scientific reading and writing. Especially considering Harvard’s recent push for greater work in the sciences, the first-year writing course should offer more classes with a science slant. Finally, students should also have the option to take an Expos class that involves work in different broader areas, including the Social Sciences, Physical Sciences, and the Humanities. It will be difficult to make these classes to be theme-based, but the opportunity for students to experience a greater breadth of writing styles will compensate for the lack of a focus.

In order to ensure that more applicative skills are gained from Expos, the program should continue its work in coordinating with the concentrations. The Harvard Writing Project, which was created by the Expository Writing Program in 1995, has worked with concentrations in publishing booklets designed to advise students in writing for a specific course or discipline. Eight booklets, along with three shorter pamphlets, have been published thus far. We applaud this effort and hope for a prolific future for the program. We also encourage the integration of some of these booklets into Expos classes, which will increase the future applicability of the writing skills taught.

The shift of all Expos classes to the first semester and the creation of new class offerings will greatly improve the Expos program. We understand that these changes will require increased funding, but the money is available and ought to be allocated to this more than worthwhile program.