Change Undergrad Education, but Leave the Core

The staff accurately points out many of the University's failings that Neil L. Rudenstine will have to address as president. Certainly, Harvard's tenure record is disgraceful, falling far short of the systems at its peer insitutions in minority and women faculty hiring. And as the University prepares to launch a massive fundraising campaign, it would do well to guard against the excessive influence of its donors. It would do even better to open its books to public scrutiny.

(For the record, it should be noted that the Texas couple and Prince Turki Bin Abdul Aziz Al-Saud, while unsavory characters, did not attempt to exert any improper influence over Harvard's curriculum or threaten its academic integrity.)

The real problem with this editorial is its depiction of the Core Curriculum as "Public Enemy Number One." This is exaggerated at best, out-and-out wrong at worst. The "improvements" the staff proposes are far worse than the existing system.

Allowing students to select which subjects to explore within a given discipline is far better than requiring standard introductory courses for all first-year students. Not only would a battle over the content of a "Harvard canon" be vicious, but the outcome would be undesirable. It would force students to take classes they do not want to take and read texts many of them have already read. For professors, teaching such classes would be a chore rather than a chance to teach classes in their own areas of expertise, and their teaching would be less inspired.

A system of distribution requirements, on the other hand, might just stigmatize selected courses in each department as "courses for outsiders," easily shunted aside in the departmental hierarchy. And if non-concentrators don't pool in certain classes, they would be at a distinct disadvantage taking classes with more knowledgeable concentrators.

Finally, the Core is an effective way of accomodating the varying interests of a diverse student body. Black students may want to explore their heritage, not not just American history in general. Pianists may want to study piano concertos, not just music. In an academic institution that demands early specialization, the Core provides an invaluable venue for pursuing interests outside one's concentration.