To explore the role of the Houses, the Faculty, and others in advising. To review what sources of information students have about employment, graduate school and careers ..."
President Horner says her task force on advising will look into the overall problem of counseling, or what she calls "the dissonance between expectations and experiences at Harvard."
The task force has produced a plethora of both feasible and unfeasible ideas. The group recently voted unanimously in favor of four-year Houses, even though it's highly unlikely that the four-year proposal will be adopted. However, there have been numerous more practical suggestions. After months of tangling with the housing issue, the committee advanced to its more specific task and began to study the particular problems confronting the different classes.
Potential recommendations from the group include placing sophomore advisors in the Houses or hiring assistant senior tutors assigned to advising sophomores and coordinating advising in the Houses and departments to bring together a student's academic and social life.
A member of the group, who asked not to be identified, said recently the participants have agreed that the proctorial system of the freshman year "seems to work" and won't need radical changes. Additionally, the group has decided that any further centralization in the now limited counseling network "would create just another bureaucratic monster on campus," the committee member said.
Working in the shadow of the recent Strauch Report, this committee is finding it difficult to determine exactly what its role should be and what possible needs may have arisen in the few months since the implementation of the report.
Student Body Composition
"To review the present composition of the student body and to assess what alternatives are possible and what alterations might be made."
Working in the shadow of the recent Strauch Report, this committee is finding it difficult to determine exactly what its role should be and what possible needs may have arisen in the few months since the implementation of the report.
After examining in detail the admissions process and the composition of the class, the group is "still hoping new ideas will come up," John K. Fairbank '29, Higginson Professor of History, chairman of the committee, says, adding that "the Strauch report was so recent I really don't know if we can advance on it."
Equal access, one of the more salient issues in the admissions world, finds support in the committee, as does the admissions committee's basic premise that a diverse class is its ultimate aim. The group seems to be at a standstill presently, agreeing on the broad concepts and still too unaware of the admissions process to offer specific suggestions. As one committee member describes the situation, "We're just talking in shades of grey."
College Life
"To consider the extra-curricular educational responsibility of the College."
Responding to Dean Rosovsky's request for recommendations on the "housing issue," the Committee on College Life spent its first few months wrestling with the problem only to throw the question back to the Committee on Houses and Undergraduate Life unresolved. Getting a late start on its own work, the group adopted the remise that change is imperative and "started hacking it out," a member says.
The group, chaired by Stephen Williams, Peabody Professor of American Archeology and Ethnology, is divided into three sub-committees, each analyzing one aspect of college life in the Houses. The sub committees will discuss formal education, such as House courses and sections, informal education, such as student-faculty interaction, and facilities and extra-curricular activities in the Houses.
The subcommittees are still in the collection stage, members say, sifting "through all the statistics you might ever want to read." Although the committees appear to be moving toward a defined goal now, the emphasis of the group has shifted. Perhaps because so much time was spent on housing options throughout the fall, the task force will not be able to study in depth the position of the arts and athletics at Harvard beyond how they relate specifically to the Houses.