Members of the class graduating today are familiar with the situation.

They’ve had to forgo that alluring elective—“Psychology and the Law,” “The History of Harvard and Its Presidents” or “Riemannian and Lorentzian Geometry”—to fulfill that pesky Foreign Cultures or Science B Core requirement.

Their kids probably won’t have to.

A curricular review that plans to do away with the Core curriculum released results this April to divided reactions from faculty. Among a total of 57 recommendations, it suggests axing first-year blocking groups, pushing concentration choice back a semester and creating a centralized advising system.

In conjunction with the review, a committee to coordinate calendars across Harvard recommended this spring that the College convert to a schedule that moves exams before Christmas and includes a possible January term.

In keeping with the goal of increased flexibility that administrators have touted since the review was officially launched in fall 2002, the curricular review report recommends that the College replace the 25-year-old Core with a distribution requirement of two classes in each of five areas. Provisionally, these areas will be the humanities, the social sciences, the natural sciences, the physical sciences and engineering and international perspectives.

A body of “integrative, foundational courses” known as the Harvard College Courses will replace the Core, but these will be optional—students will also be able to fulfill their general education requirements with regular departmental classes.

In an effort to de-professionalize concentrations, the report recommends capping requirements at 12 courses and abolishing the distinction between honors and non-honors concentrations. These measures would have an especially heavy impact on the sciences, whose concentrations tend to be requirement-heavy—meaning it might be harder for students to catch up should they decide to focus in science midway through their second year of college.

As part of the curricular review’s emphasis on “internationalization,” all students will be expected to pursue a “significant international experience” that will be marked on their transcript and to study a foreign language, eliminating the exception for those who are already proficient in a language.

Students will be able to complete their international experience during a possible January term proposed in the calendar report. Pforzheimer University Professor Sidney Verba ’53 chaired the committee that recommended the adoption of a 4-1-4 calendar, leaving an examless January open for a month-long academic term.

The curricular review report, which recommended the adoption of this calendar, suggested that the mini-term could be dedicated to classes or other curricular and extracurricular pursuits.

But the calendar proposal has already seen heated debate—professors rallied both for and against the possibility when it was first introduced to the full Faculty at its April meeting.

Gutman Professor of Latin American Affairs John H. Coatsworth said the new calendar, by ending the academic year earlier, would permit students to “take advantage of summer study and internship opportunities with early start dates and to combine international experiences with other summer activities.”

But others oppose the switch, saying it would cost fall instructional time and would inconvenience students and professors by beginning classes just after or even before Labor Day.

OUT OF THE BLUE?