Faculty Council Meets for Bok Talk

Derek C. Bok met with members of the Faculty’s 19-member governing council yesterday during his first known visit to campus since being announced as interim president on Feb. 21.

While general education was not addressed—a topic of serious concern at Tuesday’s faculty meeting—Faculty Council members said they expect the search for a new dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) to begin to take shape with Bok’s help.

Bok told the Faculty Council that “if invited, he would be delighted to be involved in our continuing work on the curriculum,” Faculty Council member and 300th Anniversary University Professor Laurel Thatcher Ulrich wrote in an e-mail.

Following his meeting with the Council, Bok met with the Department Chairs and was “very well received,” Classics Chair Richard F. Thomas said.

A small advisory committee culled from the Faculty Council will meet with Bok at the end of the month to discuss candidates to replace current Dean William C. Kirby, whose resignation goes into effect at the end of the academic year.

“[Bok] wants to hear not only about the characteristics of the candidates, but also about the names that might be suitable,” council-member and Weary Professor of German and Comparative Literature Judith L. Ryan said.

Ryan called Bok’s approach to the dean search a departure from the strategy of University President Lawrence H. Summers. Summers “felt that if one proposed names, there might be leaks, and it would be invidious to the candidates,” Ryan said.

Certain names have already surfaced for the deanship.

“The natural assumption is that [chemist] Jeremy Knowles would step in until a new dean is found,” Gary J. Feldman, the Baird professor of science said.

But Bok will not limit himself to appointing candidates who would only be willing or able to serve on an interim basis, Ryan said. While Knowles, who acted as dean of the FAS from 1991 until 2002, is an obvious choice for an interim dean, Bok may seek out a more permanent replacement.

The Council largely ignored the issue of general education at yesterday’s meeting.

In an effort to move curricular review forward, Cabot House Master and Wolfson Professor of Jewish Studies Jay M. Harris spoke in favor of allowing more departmental courses to count for Core credit at Tuesday’s full faculty meeting. The meeting revealed that “there seemed to be two different ways of approaching” general education reform, with one group calling for further discussion and another calling for progress this year, Ryan said.

Some professors see little chance that discussion will produce results this spring.

“Other than Bill Kirby, I think there was only one speaker who advocated going forward this term,” Feldman said of Tuesday’s meeting. “By the end of the meeting, I think even Kirby had given up hope.”

No votes on any aspect of the curricular review are expected for next week’s meeting of the full Faculty.

“[The Faculty Council] only had time to deal in a substantial way with the concentration proposal which will be presented at [the] Faculty meeting,” Ulrich wrote in an e-mail.

Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71 and members of the Educational Policy Committee recommended that students be required to meet with an advisor from at least one concentration at the end of their first year as part of a proposal that would delay concentration choice until after the third semester.

The proposal, which would be put into effect for members of the next entering class, will be discussed at next Tuesday’s faculty meeting and may be brought to a vote in April, Gross wrote in an e-mail.

“We’ll see what the Faculty decides,” wrote Gross.

—Staff writer Allison A. Frost can be reached at afrost@fas.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Samuel P. Jacobs can be reached at jacobs@fas.harvard.edu.