The Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning kicked off its two-day fall teaching orientation yesterday with record attendance, James D. Wilkinson, the center's director, told participants.

Hundreds of graduate students and a handful of undergraduates attended the program, which included workshops and panel discussions for teaching fellows.

In one workshop yesterday afternoon, Assistant Professor of English and American Literature and Language and of Afro-American Studies Philip B. Harper discussed gay issues in teaching. Harper said he feels comfortable acknowledging his gay identity, in part because his fields contain a "critical mass" of gay professors and scholars sympathetic to gay issues.

"I'm also trying to move students who are uncomfortable with...queerness...to another step," Harper said.

In another discussion, McKay Professor of Computer Science Barbara J. Grosz urged section leaders to make special efforts to encourage female undergraduates, since women are vastly outnumbered in science concentrations.

Other workshop leaders yesterday included Professor of Romance and Comparative Literatures Susan R. Suleiman, Professor of Government Michael Sandel and Rotch Professor of Atmospheric Science Michael B. McElroy.

Generational Bridges

At an orientation lunch outside Memorial Hall yesterday, President Neil L. Rudenstine stressed the importance of TFs as bridges in the generational gap between faculty members and undergraduates.

"You provide for the students something that's very hard for them to get any other way," said Rudenstine, a former teaching fellow in the English department and an Adams House tutor in the 1960s. "They will come to you and they will depend on you."

In an interview with The Crimson under the lunch tent, Rudenstine outlined hisgoals for the Graduate School of Arts andSciences, including reducing the number of yearsstudents spend completing their dissertations.

"While continuing to use graduate students inappropriate ways, we're also hoping to getgraduate students able to finish their work more[quickly,]" Rudenstine said.

Such a change will leave less time for graduatestudents to teach, and will require facultymembers to "take up some of the slack," he said.

Program participants some of whom are teachingfor the first time this year, said the workshopswere beneficial, if not quite what they expected.

"So far it's been pretty helpful," saidJonathan E. Tannenhauser '94, who will teach maththis year. "A lot of what's been presented here ismaterial that you hear over and over again, butit's nice to hear it."

Anthropology research assistant DebbieLotstein, who will teach a Science B-42 sectionthis year, noted that the workshops providedoverarching advice rather than specific tips foractual teaching scenarios.

"People are saying things and then in my mindI'm imagining practical situations," Lotsteinsaid.

Today's highlights include an undergraduatepanel on "What Students Want," A workshop onsexual harassment and a panel on innovativeteaching methods