From The Faculty Chair

As we begin a new term, I am concerned about what happened at the end of the last one. There were again a significant number of violations of end-of-term regulations. These came directly to me or to the deans or the ombudspersons, or were posted on a password-protected Web page. As a result, there were some very upset people caught with great overload at the end of the term, which jeopardized their success not only in the subject where the violations occurred, but also in others that had to be sacrificed to meet the imposed overload.

An obvious response, one that I heard frequently, is: why don’t students plan better? There is certainly an element of truth here. But some of these end-of-term violations have their source in what happens at the beginning of the semester. Faculty regulations state that during the first three weeks of the term, faculty should spell out all assignments with their due dates, and provide students with the schedule of problem sets, quizzes, and exams, as well as the plans for a final. Students cannot plan without this knowledge. And adherence to this beginning-of-term regulation makes it possible to spot end-of-term violations at a time when changes can still be introduced - something that is almost impossible at the end.

Most of the violations reported at the end of last term led to more work for students than they should have at a time when they are trying to assimilate material from the whole semester for all their subjects. Faculty tend to think only of their subject and its needs, and neglect to consider the point of view of the student who has to deal with four or five subjects at the same time. For example, some faculty felt they were doing students a favor by extending the time a paper was due into the already extremely short reading period. But for the student who is trying to use this period to deal with all subjects, such an extension feels like an unfair burden from one subject at the expense of the others.

But some of the reported "violations" I followed up on were meant to serve an educational purpose. For example, some professors wanted to use quizzes and mid-term exams as a learning experience, not only for evaluation. So they gave students more time than is usual, allowed them to take the exam home so they could consult material without having to memorize - all of which is against current faculty regulations. Others wanted to support students who approached problems in very different ways from the usual, which led them into novel formats that seemed to be at odds with stated regulations.

It seems timely, therefore, not only once again to urge everyone to follow the existing regulations, but to consider them anew, with three goals in mind:

1. to protect the students from overload

2. to enhance the learning experience of students

3. to support educational experimentation.

Don Sadoway has kindly agreed to lead this effort along with Art Smith, chair of COC, and Paola Rizzoli, chair of CAP. Please convey to them or to me your thoughts and concerns on these matters. We want to establish a set of faculty regulations that we can, and will follow.