Undergraduate Council President Matt W. Mahan ’05, who was not at the meeting, said he strongly endorsed the move to place course evaluations online.

“Going online would make the feedback mechanism produce lengthier and more thoughtful responses,” Mahan said. “Professors and TFs spend an entire semester teaching us. They deserve to get solid feedback on their work just as we deserve comments on our papers and exams.”

Later in the meeting, Wolcowitz announced a reduction in the fees charged to students who add and drop a course after study cards are due. While currently students are charged $5 for an add/drop change the first week after study cards are due, $10 the second and $15 the third week, beginning next fall students will not be charged for changes during the first week after study cards are due, while the fee for the third week will be reduced to $10. Fees during the second week will remain at $10.

Gross said the fees are used to cover the cost of processing add/drop changes, but that once the process is moved online—perhaps as early as next year—he expects “that we’ll do away with fees.”

Gross also told CUE members that he had been unsuccessful in convincing senior tutors to change the add/drop process to eliminate a required signature by the senior tutor. The tutors feel that reviewing add/drop requests constitutes an “essential” part of their job, Gross said.

CUE member Teddy E. Chestnut ’06 said the best way to eliminate the College’s add/drop problems is to make shopping period more informative and useful to students than it currently is.

Chestnut said placing syllabi for all classes and videotapes of the first lecture for larger classes on course web pages, as well as ensuring that actual lectures— rather than discussions of logistics—take place during shopping period would be improvements to the process.

—Sara E. Polsky contributed to the reporting of this story.

—Staff writer William C. Marra can be reached at wmarra@fas.harvard.edu.