Patri J. Pugliese, head teaching fellow inScience B-17, says that in sections of more that15 people, "it becomes very easy for students tohide."

"It is hard for me to tell if they are sittingback or are lost," Pugliese says.

Professors as well as TFs are nearly unanimousin their call for a section size of "below 15" intheir classes.

"It is no longer a section at 20 or 25students," says Higginson Professor of EnglishLiterature Larry D. Benson, who teaches Literatureand Arts A-13. "It is a lecture."

But Buell says core sections will likelystay large. Shrinking them is not necessarily thetop priority in the Faculty budget, he says.

"I would have to be persuaded that core sectionclaims are more important than department sectionclaims," he says.

The budget constraints are not the only reasonbehind huge core sections.

Many teaching fellows fault the core office forfailing to allot enough section leaders forclasses which grow dramatically during shoppingperiod.

A few section leaders point to grossunderestimations. For example, Moral Reasoning 40initially hired enough TFs for 200 students, butended up drawing nearly 500, says head TFChristopher Chandler.

And some say core office underestimates are notjust mistakes, but systematic efforts to savemoney.

"The core office underestimates every coursebecause once the staff members are hired, theycannot be fired," says Robert D. Gale, headteaching fellow for Foreign Cultures 56.

Lewis defends the core office's estimatesystem, which is based on the enrollment of thecourse the last time it was offered.

"Our track record is better than thedepartments," Lewis says. And she adds that theshopping period--not the core office--isresponsible for staffing problems in course.

But some section leaders say that even after acore course finds itself dramaticallyunderstaffed, it cannot always get the TFs itneeds.

Blank says he teaches an extra section for freebecause the core office denied his appeal foranother teaching fellow.