When she arrived at Harvard, Lagemann created several committees to examine the school’s administrative and curricular structures, aiming to bring together the faculty’s three distinct divisions—Administration, Planning and Social Policy; Human Development and Psychology; and Teaching and Learning.

One of the committees—charged with investigating the workload of faculty and the appointment process—has recommended dissolving or modifying these groupings.

As a result, five new committees will be formed, which will work “in tandem” with GSE’s three central groupings to “give more emphasis to school-wide structures,” according to an e-mail Lagemann wrote to the GSE community in May.

“We are moving towards a nimble school-wide structure that promotes excellence within fields and vibrant collaboration across all fields,” Singer, who is now academic dean, writes in an e-mail.

Associate Professor of Education Wendy Luttrell says these changes will facilitate new opportunities at GSE.

“An ed school is the place for that sort of interdisciplinary scholarship to take place and yet our current structure doesn’t oil the wheels as well as it could in terms of the way administratively the school has been set up,” she says.

And the changes may help to eliminate “gaps” in doctoral training, Luttrell says, because students with similar interests earning the same degree become isolated in separate programs.

Many students with similar interests “would never in fact encounter each other over the course of their doctoral training,” she says.

The concept of consolidating GSE applies to the school’s masters degree students as well.

Currently, GSE boasts 14 masters programs.

But under Lagemann’s leadership, one committee has questioned the necessity of such a large number of programs, proposing changes Pagett calls “quite radical.”

Reducing the number of available programs and creating required core classes for all students are among their suggestions, Pagett says.

“Stepping back a step, does it make sense for a school this small to be offering a program of that much breadth?” Pagett asks.

Any change in the curriculum would follow a major reform this year that requires students to enroll in a particular masters program rather than building an eight course program on their own.

“We just didn’t think coming in and taking any eight courses adds up,” Lagemann says.