Report of Fainsod Group Suggests Faculty Council

The Fainsod Committee released today its long-awaited report on University decision-making and the role students should play in it.

The Committee-chaired by Merle Fainsod, Carl H. Pforzheimer University Professor-began meeting last February after the Faculty set it up in the wake of last December's anti-ROTC sit-in at Paine Hall. The Faculty will consider its report at a special meeting on October 28.

Recommendations of the Committee included a 20-man Faculty Council, which would replace the present Committee on Educational Policy and act "as a combined dean's cabinet and steering committee of the Faculty," and three joint student-Faculty committees, on which students would have full voting power.

"Our recommendations contemplate a larger administrative role for the Faculty than it has hitherto exercised," the report stated.

The Committee reserved for the Faculty "the final responsibility for appointments, curriculum, and degree requirements." It stated that "an uncritical application of egalitarian theory in the universities is likely to damage the interests of students as well as the university of which they are a part."

But, "in the area of social rules, student organization, and extracurricular activities," the report added, "the student voice should be strengthened: students should enjoy as much autonomy as possible in regulating their affairs outside the classrooms."

The Faculty Council proposed by the report, "in addition to overseeing educational policy,... would make recommendations to the Faculty on legislation to be considered by it, would exercise a general oversight over the committee structure of the Faculty, would serve as an advisory body on decanal and committee appointments, and would also advise the Dean and the Faculty on allocations of space, building programs, and plans and priori-ties for Faculty growth and development."

Committee Chairman

The dean of the Faculty should serve as chairman of the committee and the dean of Engineering and Applied Sciences as vice-chairman, the report added. The areas of the Natural Sciences, the Social Sciences, and the Humanities each would be represented by four tenured members of the Faculty and two non-tenured members.

Under the proposal, the dean would nominate candidates for all the Council positions. Additional nominations, however, could be made by petitions signed by at least ten Faculty members, in which case a special Faculty election by mail ballot would determine the Council members.

A Compromise

This selection procedure, the report said, represents "a compromise" between an elected and an appointed committee. Liberal Faculty members generally favor the former method of choosing committee representatives, conservatives the latter.

Six of the original Council members would be chosen by lot to serve for one year, six for two years, and six for three. New elections for replacing six members annually would follow the same procedure as the first election.

New Committees

The new student-Faculty committees which the report recommended would deal, respectively, with undergraduate education, graduate education, and "students and community relations." The last of these would replace the present Student-Faculty Advisory Committee (SFAC).

In addition, the report suggested that 11 students with full voting powers be added to the present Committee on Houses, which should be broadened to deal with other "issues of undergraduate concern." The now Committee on Houses and Undergraduate Life, as it would be called, would deal "with such issues as a review of the Regulations for Students in Harvard College and the procedures and machinery for dealing with infractions of these regulations, rules governing undergraduate organizations, the operations of various offices which supply services to undergraduates, and related matters of particular concern to undergraduates."

The new Committees on Undergraduate Education and on Graduate Education would each consist of five Faculty members and five students. The Committee on Students and Community Relations would include nine Faculty members and 11 students. The 11 students on the Committee on Houses and Undergraduate Life would join the 13 administrators now serving on the Committee on Houses. The Dean of the Faculty would chair all four committees.

Channels of Communication

The Committee on Undergraduate Education would "consider and initiate studies and proposals to improve the quality of education in Harvard College." It would also "undertake to improve departmental channels of communication between undergraduates and Faculty" and advise the dean of the College and the dean of Freshmen.

The Committee on Graduate Education would primarily concern itself with such aspects of graduate education as are general to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and do not fall under the specific jurisdictions of the departments" and "with the improvement of departmental student-Faculty communication at the graduate level."

The Committee on Students and Community Relations would consider "subjects of student concern involving the relations of the Faculty to the community and government." Specifically, the Committee would "serve as a forum to discuss admissions and scholarship policies in the College" and would meet regularly with the Faculty Committee on Admissions and Scholarships.

"Proposals originating in and approved by the joint committees would first be presented to the Faculty Council for its recommendations before being submitted for Faculty consideration." the report said.

Participation

Student committee members could participate in the Council meetings considering their proposals.

Student committee members also could attend Faculty meetings and join in discussing matters relevant to their committee. "A few" members of the Fainsod Committee, the report said, "are willing to entertain the possibility that within the Faculty... these student participants might vote on issues of proper concern to them."

The Fainsod report also recommended inclusion of students on such committees as the Library, Athletics, Dramatics, Graduate and Career Plans. Student Activities, and Study Counsel. But, it added. "we do not believe it to be wise or appropriate to include students as members of research or degree committees which deal with purely Faculty matters or which are engaged in making professional judgments about the qualifications of students for degrees."

Time-Saver

The establishment of a Docket Committee, the report said, could "save considerable time in Faculty discussion." This committee, which would consist of three Faculty Council members, would set a tentative docket for all Faculty meetings-a function now exercised by the Dean of the Faculty, who would chair the committee.

The Docket Committee would "receive proposals for Faculty action from all sources... convert each proposal into a docket item,... specify the procedure by which it should be considered,... propose the appropriate form of voting,... and... call the attention of the Faculty to the kind of timetable that should be followed."

The committee could in special cases "call for a decision by a mail ballot of the entire Faculty, instead of by a vote of those present at the meeting," and it could also recommend to the President "the calling of additional meetings or meetings of exceptional length."

The Fainsod Committee recommended "that at each Faculty meeting, following the reports from the President, the dean, and the Docket Committee, approximately ten minutes (or longer, if so voted by a majority of the Faculty) be reserved for members of the Faculty to request information from the President, the dean, or the chairmen of Faculty committees."

For the University

Recommendations made by the report for the University as a whole included representation of its Faculties on a Committee on Honorary Degrees and on a committee to select Harvard's next President, and revival of the "long dormant" University Council to "concern itself with inter-faculty and University-wide problems."

In the past, the Corporation has awarded honorary degrees-"often without consulting the Faculty," according to James C. Thomson, Jr., assistant professor of History and a member of the Fainsod Committee. Thomson called the Committee's recommendation of Faculty participation in the matter "a mini-revolutionary proposal."

The University Council, as established by the Statutes of the University, includes "the President. professors. associate Professors, and assistant professors of the University and such other University officials as [the Governing Boards] many appoint." This large body has never been called together.

Choosing Deans

The report recommended that the Faculty Council be consulted in the choice of future deans. "Many" of the Fainsod Committee members, it added, "believe that in due course all senior deanships might ideally be filled by members of the teaching Faculty." Not all present deans teach.

Turning to the question of Faculty membership. the Fainsod Committee suggested "that future additions to the Faculty be limited ordinarily to those holding teaching and research appointments, and exceptions to this rule be recommended by the dean of the Faculty only after consultation with the Faculty Council."

Fifty-four of the 657 present members of the Faculty do not hold academic appointments. The report did "not recommend any retroactive action which would deprive [them] of Faculty membership."

The Fainsod Committee endorsed the Committee of Fifteen's working paper on discipline and recommended its adoption by the Faculty. It also recommended the continuation of the present Faculty policy allowing student media to cover Faculty meetings and permitting the dean of the Faculty to invite student representatives "to participate in discussions of matters on which their views are deemed relevant."

A final recommendation of the report was that the Faculty Council establish "a subcommittee on Plans and Resources, composed of five of its members, with the explicit mandate of addressing itself to problems. choices, and priorities in Faculty development."

Fainsod Was Draftsman

Fainsod himself wrote the first draft of the report and mailed it over the summer to members of his Committee, who sent suggestions back to him. Fainsod wrote a second draft before the Committee's first meeting this school year and revised the report since then.

Besides Fainsod and Thomson, other members of the committee were Konrad E. Bloch, Higgins Professor of Biochemistry: Giles Constable '50, Henry Charles Lea Professor of Medieval History; Andrew M. Gleason, professor of Mathematics; Harry T. Lavin, Irving Babbitt Professor of Comparative Literature: Don K. Price, professor of Government: Howard C. Berg, assistant professor of Biology; and Kenneth M. Deitch '60, assistant professor of Economics.

Five students served as consultants to the committee. They were Kenneth M. Glazier '69, ex-chairman of SFAC; Stephen H. Kaplan '69, ex-president of the Harvard Undergraduate Council: Kenneth M. Kanfman. ex-chairman of the Harvard-Radcliffe Policy Committee: Ellen Messer '69, ex-president of the Radcliffe Union of Students: and Paul G. Munyon, teaching fellow in Economics, president of the GSA.

Each committee member probably will present a part of the report at the October 28 meeting, and each major section will be considered separately. The Faculty must approve the parts of the report dealing only with Arts and Sciences, while Corporation approval is necessary for the other sections.