“The [Social Studies] sophomore tutorial is a very highly prepared course” because of the interaction between the instructor and his staff, says Maier. “Ideally the instructors [of Harvard College Courses] would be doing the same with their teaching staff.”

However, the March report did not detail how this interaction between the Harvard College Course’s professor and teaching staff would occur.

A POOR RECEPTION

On March 9, the committee presented its Draft Final Report to the Faculty Council, the 18-member governing body of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. The report—which some thought would be the committee’s final product—was supposed to be released to the full Faculty shortly thereafter.

However, as news of the contents of the report spread, faculty and students began to express strong concern over the perceived lack of a guiding vision in the report and its failure to adequately define key aspects of its recommendations.

“We were premature in issuing a report,” says Menand.

Within three weeks, Kirby had received sufficient feedback to convince him to drop his earlier plans to release the report to the full Faculty, and he chose instead to reconvene the committee.

Kirby says colleagues sent him “comments and suggestions as to how the report might be further redefined.”

Committee members say Kirby’s decision to hold off on the report was also influenced by the hostility toward the administration in the wake of open criticism of Summers’ leadership of the University, which culminated in a vote of no confidence at a March Faculty meeting.

Some on the committee acknowledge that the report lacks sufficient justification and rationale for its conclusions and neglected to discuss the possible trade-offs inherent in increased student choice.

“In my opinion, the committee didn’t sufficiently identify the specific benefits and potential downsides related to an open distribution requirement,” says Mahan.

Kirby now says that members of the committee will work to “flesh out the rationale, which isn’t there now,” adding that they will finally address questions such as, “What are the weaknesses in the current structure that we aim to address? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the Core Curriculum?”

THE CHOSEN FEW

After the report’s poor reception in March, Kirby held several meetings of the Committee on General Education to discuss problems in the report. He has since convened a group of six committee members that will work on the report over the summer.

The members of the summer subcommittee are Kirby, Menand, Maier, Professor of Philosophy Alison Simmons, Fisher Professor of Natural History and Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences Andrew Knoll, and Bass Professor of Government Michael J. Sandel.