Before packing their bags to head home for Thanksgiving, some students made a pit stop at Marcuvitz Auditorium in the Sidney Frank Hall for Life Sciences last Monday night to meet with members of the Task Force on Undergraduate Education, where discussion focused on the troubled state of undergraduate advising.
The task force, which is undertaking a broad review of the College and its curriculum, comprises 10 faculty members and four undergraduates and will release a preliminary report of its findings early next semester for campus review. Last week's open meeting was intended for students to give the committee feedback and receive answers to any questions they might have before the preliminary report is written.
In her opening remarks, Dean of the College Katherine Bergeron assured the audience that the task force has never discussed introducing requirements to the open curriculum.
"They have been absolutely open conversations, and anyone had any right to say anything ... which I think is itself a testament of how powerful the education ideal is that we have here at Brown," Bergeron said.
Bergeron, who moderated the discussion, sat in the center of a table at the front of the small auditorium, flanked on either side by President Ruth Simmons and Michael Glassman '09, president of the Undergraduate Council of Students. UCS hosted and organized the event.
The entire task force meets every two weeks, and its subcommittees schedule their own individual meetings. The subcommittees focus on individual issues such as teaching and assessment, general education, concentrations and advising.
Despite the broad purview of the task force's own discussions, the forum on Monday focused mainly on the quality of Brown's undergraduate advising.
Concerns about advising included the state of pre-law advising, which shifted this year as long-time pre-law adviser Perry Ashley, formerly executive associate dean of the College, was replaced by the Associate Dean of the College for Health and Pre-Law Andrew Simmons and Associate Dean of the College for Fellowships and Pre-Law Linda Dunleavy.
Concerns about sophomore and first-year advising, concentration advisers and the Meiklejohn advising program were also raised by students at the meeting.
Other topics of discussion at the meeting were concentration requirements and double concentrations, service learning projects, the Plan for Academic Enrichment and academic honesty, as one student said he has noticed a high incidence of cheating on campus.
