It's one of the best read books on campus, but it's not by Shakespeare, Tocqueville, or Lipsey and Steiner.

Students write it. Faculty egos rise and fall with it. Junior professors' and graduate students' careers may hinge on it.

Established in 1974 as an aid for undergraduates and a source of feedback for instructors, the CUE Guide has become more than just another registration handout. Following a string of policy changes and a new wave of Faculty criticism aimed at the book, Harvard's official course critique is at the center of a debate that goes beyond the ritual of shopping for courses.

In recent weeks, members of the Faculty have been reexamining the Guide's influence, questioning the stock students and professors place in the annual course evaluation book. The scrutiny follows concerns raised earlier this year, when a series of letters from professors challenging the Guide's reliability prompted the student-faculty Committee on Undergraduate Education (CUE) to begin a formal review of its namesake.

At the outset, the review focused on complaints that the book had become overly subjective. Critics charged that the book often failed to faithfully reflect student opinion and had come to resemble The Crimson's tongue-in-check Confi-Guide. Several science professors voiced additional objections, complaining that the CUE's general questionnaire did not allow for an accurate assessment of science courses because it focused on reading assignments instead of problem sets and labs.

After months of discussions with Faculty officials and committee members, the publication's editors two weeks ago detailed a series of changes adopted to satisfy the critics. But even as the editors announced their reforms, members of the committee raised new concerns, questioning whether the Faculty misuses the only formal assessment of its academic offerings in two particular ways.

First, several committee members expressed concern that the CUE Guide evaluations are accorded too much weight in several departments which use them when deciding whether to promote junior faculty.

Some committee members also objected to the University's use of CUE evaluations to assess the performance of teaching fellows. Among other consequences, graduate students are known to have been removed from teaching positions on the basis of low CUE ratings, committee members reported.

Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education Steven E. Ozment, who chairs the committee and oversees the guide, indefinitely suspended that practice last month, and it is currently under review.

But beyond that particular element of the CUE controversy, discussion continues about the quality and value of the CUE Guide and its role at Harvard.

Behind the Guide

While course review book, were already fixtures at other schools 11 years ago, Harvard students still had to rely on word of mouth. Then, someone in Massachusetts Hall had a brigh, idea.

"President Bok has said the CUE Guide is one of the best ideas is had," says Ozment.

This year's Guide is 641 pages long and was budgeted at $65,000. Funded by the Faculty, the book is run by a salaried staff of three student editors and ten writers who labor through the summer in the Guide's Vanserg office.

The CUE attempts to evaluate all courses with enrollments of more than 14 students, excluding Expository Writing, tutorials, and seminars. However, not every course that meets the enrollment cutoff appears in the book. According to Faculty policy, the Guide cannot evaluate a course without the instructor's written permission. Each year, between 15 and 20 percent of all eligible professors withhold their approval, says CUE Editor Barbara S. Okun '86.