By contrast, Temple has 120 graduate students, with 25 students currently writing dissertations, according to Asante.

"On the one hand, you want a big enough cohort to create a community for themselves. But you also want to be able to give people sufficient individual attention," Appiah says.

But it will still be a long time before any graduate students actually begin to take classes in the new program.

"[A report] might end up before the faculty by the end of the year," Appiah says.

According to Dean of the Faculty Jeremy R. Knowles, once the formal proposal for the new graduate program is written, it must first be considered by the academic deans, including the dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS), who will examine the proposed program's curricular desirability and need, resource commitment and "fit" with existing programs.

After discussion with the department and possible modifications, the proposal must then pass the Committee on Graduate Education (CGE) and the Faculty Council before finally reaching the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS).

"How long [the approval process] takes depends simply on whether everyone likes [the proposal] or whether there are questions, about it," Knowles says.

Appiah suggests that students will not begin study in the graduate program until the fall of 1999 at the earliest. "I expect to go through many formulations and reformulations," Appiah says.

"It's not just bureaucracy," he says. "The process will help us refine the program."

Ali understands that the program will take time to develop.

"It's an evolution," Ali says. "Six or seven years ago, Harvard couldn't claim much of anything in the way of Afro-American studies."

Ali says he will probably begin graduate school, hopefully at Harvard, before the University's Afro-American studies graduate program becomes a reality.

"I'm somewhat anxious to go back to school before whatever passion I have cools down," Ali said.

Nevertheless, Ali says he wants to see the graduate program finally take fruition.

"I'm anxious to see it happen, whether I'm a part of it or not," he says.