MIT
Reports to the President 1994-95
The HASS Office worked this year to streamline the "HASS -D Selection System"
to run more smoothly and efficiently, enabling over 90% of students to enroll
in their first-choice HASS-D subject. The staff also published the Spring
1995 MIT Student's Guide to the Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences
electronically, on the World Wide Web, increasing student access to this
informative document. The HASS Office happily welcomed Shannon Larkin as the
new Senior Secretary in the fall.
In addition, the HASS Office continued to serve multiple functions, including
the administration of the eight-subject HASS requirement, the HASS Minor, the
Harvard Cross-Registration Program, provision of statistics for the School of
Humanities and Social Science, and the publication of The HASS Guide each term.
This office has the responsibility, on behalf of the Registrar's Office, of
recording proposal and completion forms for both concentrations and minors in
the new MITSIS tracking system. Petitions for HASS credit for subjects which
are not so coded in MITSIS, such as Harvard and Wellesley subjects, graduate
subjects, etc., are submitted here for approval. Information concerning any of
the above, as well as HASS transfer credit and general Institute information,
was provided to the MIT community and in response to inquiries from outside the
Institute. The Coordinator, Dr. Bette Davis, again served as staff to the
HASS-D Overview Committee and the HASS Minor Committee.
The number of HASS subjects offered in 1994-95 remained constant - 443,
compared to 445 in 1993-94. The number of autonomous sections rose from 555 to
609. There was a slight increase in the number of HASS-D subjects offered,
from 105 to 111, with approximately 300 more students enrolled. The largest
overall enrollments were in the same fields as last year, in slightly different
order: 1777 in Economics, 1664 in Foreign Languages & Literatures, and
1026 in Literature; followed by 903 in Writing and 834 in Music. The following
fields showed the greatest increases in enrollments over last year, in terms of
percentage: Visual Arts (from 105-184), Linguistics (from 62 to 99),
Anthropology/ Archaeology (from 454 to 567) and Literature (from 887 to 1026).
Economics and Foreign Languages again topped the list of completed HASS
Concentrations: in 1994-95, 273 (compared to 269 last year) completed
concentrations in Economics, and 243 (compared to 254 last year) completed
Concentrations in Foreign Languages & Literatures. (For a breakdown by
languages, see Table II). Following Economics and Foreign Languages &
Literatures in the number of completed concentrations are Music (90),
Psychology (83) and History (70).
The number of HASS Minors was up this year, from 446 in 1993-94 to 476. The
three most popular fields in terms of applications filed are the same as last
year: Economics (139), Music (64), and Literature (36). These were followed
by Political Science (33), Writing (28), Psychology (25) and German (23). The
number of HASS Minors received by the Class of 1995 was up by 18% from last
year, from 171 to 201.
The number of MIT undergraduates cross-registering for courses at Harvard
remained quite stable from 1993-1994 to 1994-1995, after having fluctuated the
past several years. In 1994-95, 150 MIT undergraduates took 174 subjects at
Harvard, compared to 157 students enrolled in 176 subjects in 1993-94. Once
again, more MIT undergraduates chose to study foreign languages at Harvard than
anything else. Eighty-five of the 174 subjects were in 16 different foreign
languages. The two most popular languages were Chinese (27) and Korean(15);
apart from these two, enrollments were quite evenly dispersed among the other
14. The most popular fields outside foreign languages were Economics and
History, with 10 each.
In Course 14, Economics, 26 students received the S.B. Degree, while 10
students received degrees in Political Science, Course 17. During the same
time period, September 1994 through June 1995, a total of 30 students completed
the S.B. Degree in Humanities, or Course 21. (Two of these students received
two Humanities degrees apiece.) Of these, 11 received joint degrees, 6 in 21-E
and 5 in 21-S. Another 12 received degrees in a specified field within Course
21. Nine undesignated Humanities degrees were granted in June 1995. One
student received an S.B. in STS and two in Philosophy.
The Economics Department has 81 undergraduate majors, whereas 38 undergraduate
students (including 6/95 graduates) are majoring in Political Science. (These
are first degrees) As of March 21, 1995, 79 students had declared a major in
Humanities. Of these, 24 were joint majors (12 in 21-E and 12 in 21-S). Music
had the most majors (18), followed by Writing (15) and History (8). Three
undergraduates have officially declared a major in Philosophy.
Among the more notable honors achieved by SHSS majors this year were:
Boit Manuscript Prize: Paulo Pereira, `95, 1st prize; Ivana Komercevic, `96;
and Richard McKern, `95, Honorable Mention
Burchard Scholars: Cherng Chao, `96, Shane P.B. Crotty, `96; Edward Grauman,
`96;
Jonora Jones, `96; Yuna Huh, `96; Matilda Kamiya, `97
William E. Chamberlain Prize: Rebecca L. Berry, `95
Peter J. Eloranta Award: Ximena Leroux, `96
I. Austin Kelly III Prize: Edward Miguel, `96
Phi Beta Kappa: Oded Asherie, `95; Rebecca Kaplan, `95; Asim Khwaja, `95;
Edward Kohlen, `95; Stephen McNamera, `95
Irwin Sizer Award: Shane P. B. Crotty, `96
William L. Stewart Jr. `23 Award: Teresa Lau, `95
Louis Sudler Prize: Erin McCoy, `95
Truman Scholarship: Edward Miguel, `96
Gregory Tucker Memorial Prize: Jose Elizondo Cecenas, `95;
Laya Wiesner Award: Maribel Delfaus, `95
Bette Davis
MIT
Reports to the President 1994-95