Expos Policies Fail Teachers, Students

Elizabeth Bayley '96 says most of her friends had bad Expository Writing teachers. And she is still surprised she wound up with a good one.

But she's upset that future Harvard students won't be able to learn from her Expos teacher, George Packer.

"He was instrumental in the class," says Bayley. "He asked the right questions and gave the right advice."

Packer is by all accounts a spectacular teacher. He scored 4.93 out of 5 on the CUE guide's student evaluations last spring, his final semester in the program, according to figures provided by the Bok Center for Teaching and Learning.

Packer would have liked to stay on, but he can't. A rule introduced three years ago by Expository Writing Director Richard C. Marius and University Hall limits the stay of Expos teachers to four years.

Last spring, Bayley and five classmates who also had Packer for Expos approached the administration individually. Bayley wrote a letter to Dean for Undergraduate Education Lawrence A. Buell, Marius' boss.

"My impression is that the professors and section leaders at Harvard are here for one purpose: to give and provide for the students," Bayley wrote in her letter to Buell. "I question the logic of letting go those contributors to our education who are willing to continue to give their energy to each class."

Buell's response to letters and personal inquiries was disappointing, students say.

"Buell said he didn't think he could do much about it," says Bayley. "I was glad that he wrote me back, but I was disappointed with his response."

Bayley, like more than 60 students interviewed in dining halls during the past month, believes that the quality of Expos sections depends almost entirely on the individual teachers.

And the vast majority of the 71 current and former Expos teachers interviewed for this series say department policies, including the four-year limit imposed on Packer and others, negatively impact the quality of teaching.

A six-week Crimson investigation into Expos found an Expository Writing Program with policies that create trenchant personnel problems, resist oversight and hurt the quality of teaching. A rigid hierarchy allows little input from teachers and slows the program's responses to concerns raised by students and teachers.

"There is a lack of an enabling hierarchy," says Pat C. Hoy II, a former senior preceptor in the program who left last spring in frustration. "It's hard for people at Harvard to express frustration without worrying about their existence in a place."

Many of the teachers interviewed for this article agreed to speak only on the condition of anonymity because they said they feared retaliation from Marius and Nancy Sommers, the associate director of Expos. Sommers, in fact, has called numerous current and former teachers in recent weeks and questioned them about any conversations they may have had with The Crimson.

It is this atmosphere that informs the Expos program, where dissent is not encouraged or tolerated, teachers say.

"For all Harvard says about being devoted to the quality of undergraduate education, I don't think there's a single change they have made in the program in the last three years that's improved the quality of teaching," charges one veteran Expos teacher who recently left the program. "Not a one."

Positive on Two Policies

In interviews, students and teachers were generally positive about two Expos policies: the requirement that students revise all work they submit, and the mandated one-on-one conferences between

Taking Expository writing class at Harvard changed the quality of my writing by: Making it much better  9% Making it much better  52 No effect  34 Making my writing worse  5

Expository Writing should be a required course for all Harvard students: Agree  55% Disagree  45

My expos course was: Well taught  41% Poorly taught  18 Average  41

Source: Crimson polling unit. 443 students surveyed; margin of error =±4% teachers and students to discuss writing.

And teachers widely praise the hiring systemfor its thoroughness. Candidates for jobs in Exposare required to undergo a rigorous process duringwhich they must critique students' papers, submittheir own writing and agree to be interviewed.

In recent weeks, Sommers and new seniorpreceptor Gordon C. Harvey have said they areworking on plans to encourage initiative in thedepartment. And Harvey and Sommers have saidrecently they may form a student advisorycommittee to counsel Expos.

But all this is unlikely to change what nearlyall of the teachers interviewed say is theprogram's largest administrative problem: thefour-year limit on teaching jobs.

Introduced by Marius and Sommers in the wake ofinternal turmoil in the department four years ago,this rule limits all teachers, who work underone-year contracts, to four years of teaching inthe program. After that a teacher must leave, nomatter how good the teacher is or how much he orshe likes the job.

"If I were a teacher, I would complain," says asource in the Faculty administration familiar withthe department. "It's not a very good system."

Worse than its effect on teachers' lives may bethe rule's impact on student learning.Teachers--including Harvey, the seniorpreceptor--argue that because the skill ofteaching writing is difficult to learn, manyinstructors have to leave just as they are hittingtheir stride in the classroom.

"It takes at least two years to figure out howto teach," says Norman M. Katz, an Expos teacherfrom 1985 to 1992 and now a writing instructor atCornell University's school of hoteladministration. "When I was teaching in my fifth,sixth and seventh years, I really knew what I wasdoing. In my first two years, I didn't know what Iwas doing at all."

"I don't think students are served by afour-year rule," says William C. Rice, asecond-year teacher in "Social and EthicalIssues," Expos 16. "I think students are served bypeople who are vital and deeply engaged in theirwork. If there's a four-year rule, people willwind up going out on the job market before theirtime is up."

While departments have limits on juniorfaculty, Expos teachers, who have the rank ofpreceptors, are much more limited than theircounterparts around the University.

In mathematics, preceptors must pass five-yearreviews but may stay indefinitely. In East Asianlanguages and Slavic languages, preceptors maystay eight years and also have the chance to bepromoted and remain indefinitely if they can passfive-year reviews.

The end result of the four-year rule isturnover perhaps more massive than anywhere elsein the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.Administrators spend much of their time readingdossiers, placing ads and recruiting around thenation for new teachers. In a given year, nearlyone-third of the teachers are new.

"There are some people who don't have a clueafter the first year," says James D. Wilkinson'65, director of the Bok Center for Teaching andLearning. "Good teachers ought to be retained.There aren't so many good teachers in the worldthat we can go throwing them out after fouryears."

But the administration publicly backs the Expospolicy. Buell says he likes the rule for manyreasons, including the fact that it "maximizes ourutility to replenish" the teaching pool.

"The obvious cases where good teachers are letgo early are more than compensated for [by thefact that] so-so teaching was allowed tocontinue," Buell said. "[In a more lenientsystem,] are you going to chop the head off ofrespectable mediocrity? The odds are that you'regoing to reserve the axe for blatant cases."

But teachers say Buell's response is deceptive.They point out that they work on one-yearcontracts, which do not have to be renewed. Onlylazy administrators incapable of making toughdecisions need a four-year rule to get rid ofmediocre teachers, teachers say. If anything,keeping a stopwatch on teacher's tenure encouragesaverage performance.

"Most of the time what the rule leads to ismassive mediocrity," says one Expos veteran."People walk in the door looking for another job."

"Human psychology being what it is, it'sdifficult to feel any investment in a departmentwhere you learn the ropes the first year, sailthrough the second year and by the end of thethird year, you're thinking about your next job,"says Philip A. Gambone '70, who has taught Exposfor two years and is now on leave. "It seems to meit would be worth the department's while to try tocreate an experienced, competent, collegialfaculty."

The administration does not present a unitedfront on the four-year rule.

One source in the Faculty administration calledthe decision to impose the limit a "mistake."

Asked if he could name one way students wereserved by the four-year limit, Robinson Professorof Celtic Languages and Literatures Patrick K.Ford '66, a member of the standing facultycommittee on Expos, thought for a moment.

"No," he said.

The four-year rule is not the onlychange in Expos hiring policy in recent years thathas met with criticism from teachers.

Sommers and Marius say it has become theirexplicit goal in the last few years to hire asmany teachers with Ph.Ds as possible. In the past,Marius sought to hire practicing writers. Theshift, he says, is part of an effort to"professionalize" the department and make Exposmore academically credible.

According to documents obtained by The Crimson,in the spring of 1989 only seven of the 42 peopleteaching Expos classes had Ph.Ds. Last spring, 24of 40 held Ph.Ds.

But Marius himself has repeatedly said thatpracticing writers make the best teachers.

"It is assumed that every preceptor in theExpository Writing Program be seriously engaged inwriting prose," Marius wrote in a January 29, 1990memo to teachers. "The fundamental policy of thisprogram is that the best teachers of writing arethose who write themselves."

And some teachers say the change represents anobstacle to creativity in the classroom. They,too, say the best teachers of writing areprofessional writers.

Statistics to show the value of hiring Ph.Dsare scarce, but the available numbers show thatmany of the best teachers in Expos are thosewithout PhDs. Of the 41 awards given to Exposteachers over the past five semesters for CUEguide ratings of 4.5 or higher, only 11 werepresented to Ph.Ds, according to documentsobtained by The Crimson.

Other teachers and administrators argue thatteachers with Ph.Ds are more likely to stick tothe academic writing that will serve students bestin their other classes.

"The advantage of having Ph.Ds is that they'reused to doing analytical writing," says formerExpos teacher Laura Otis, herself a Ph.D incomparative literature. "I wonder about someonewho's a novelist teaching writing to people. Isthat going to help them on a history of philosophyessay?"

A smaller group of teachers say the debate issilly. The basis for hiring Expos teachers shouldbe teaching ability, not educational background,they say. But there is general concern that Ph.Dsmay be too worried about making themselvesattractive to future tenure-track employers.

One second-year teacher says he is hoping toleave after this year.

"I hope this will be my last year at Expos,"says the teacher. "That's not anythingduplicitous. Nancy Sommers and Richard Mariusactually thought of this more like apost-doctorate fellowship than as a faculty job."

Whatever its impact on the quality of teaching,the shift toward Ph.Ds has had the unintendedconsequence of making it nearly impossible forExpos to hire instructors of color: The pool ofminorities with Ph.Ds is small, and qualifiedminority candidates can find tenure-track jobselsewhere.

"The criteria for general hiring has gotten sorigid," says a current teacher. "They used to hirewriters. There are plenty of working Blackwriters. Now they hire newly minted Ph.Ds."

The lack of cultural diversity, teachers say,limits the perspectives students may encounter inExpos. Cross cultural, feminist and otherapproaches to writing that might interest somestudents have been neglected, some teachers say.

Sommers disputes that charge, saying thatsearches for minorities have been intense. Some ofthe program's basic structures--including a lowstarting salary of $25,500 a year--have cost themminority candidates.

"It's a serious problem," says Sommers. "We tryvery hard. One of the reasons I read everyapplication so carefully and closely is because Iwant to make sure that we have every minoritycandidate we can."

But the minority candidates Expos does hiredon't necessarily stay very long. Evelyn White,now a reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle,says she left Expos after one semester in thespring of 1991 because she was disappointed withthe program and its efforts to forge a diversefaculty.

"The proof is in the pudding: It's an all-whitefaculty," says White. "It's an insult in 1993 tosay there aren't enough qualified people of color.They need to get a grip."

Sarah King, an associate of the Committee onDegrees in Women's Studies, criticizes minorityrecruiting in Expos. Both she and White found theprogram, not the other way around.

"I don't think a bit of affirmative action ispracticed there," says King. "There's ananti-affirmative action. No one is sought out, noone is brought in."

Students and teachers upset with Expospolicies have few places to turn to get a hearingfor their complaints.

Members of the standing faculty committee,which has direct authority over Expos, aregenerally uninformed about specific matters,administrators acknowledge, and the committeemeets once a year for about 90 minutes. Also,several members of the committee, Sommers andadministrators acknowledge, are recruited by thedirector and the associate director.

"The Expos committee does its best toscrutinize," Buell says. "But it listens veryclosely to what the director and the associatedirector have to say."

Offering one example of his and the committee'swillingness to question Expos policy, Buell sayshe brought up the issue of changing the four-yearrule at last spring's meeting. There, thecommittee carefully considered "evidence" anddecided to keep the rule.

What was the evidence?

"A combination of things, including but notrestricted to the judgment of the program directorand the associate director."

Buell says anyone with a complaint is free toapproach his office. But teachers say the deangives little more than a sympathetic ear. Three ofthe department's highly rated teachers haveapproached the administration to complain aboutthe four-year rule, with little response, theysaid.

In addition, three students of Adam D. Schwartzvisited Assistant Dean for Undergraduate EducationJeffrey Wolcowitz in the spring of 1992 to protestthe departure of their teacher. Two of the threestudents said the dean was "not receptive tocriticism." The third student could not be reachedfor comment.

Wolcowitz says he does not recall the specificvisit.

Teachers say the cumulative effect ofthe program's policies and hierarchy has been torestrict the influence of teachers and to limitthe quality and diversity of ideas about writing.

"You don't see a vehicle for getting your ideasput into any kind of action," says Nan Stalnaker,who is in her third year. "You feel like otherpeople are running it. You aren't running it. Ithink I would like to feel much more thatdecisions are arrived at in a way that we areinvolved."

For example, many Expos teachers say the classrequirements need to be re-evaluated, and thatfour essays, with revisions, is too much for onesemester.

In an interview, Marius acknowledged thedifficulty of fitting four essays in a semester,suggesting that the requirements may be reviewed.But the status quo persists, as it has for years.

Teachers also see a need for debate and changein two other department practices: staff meetingsand evaluations.

The meetings, once productive workshops spenton discussions of pedagogy, are now structured sothat outside speakers dominate the time and thediscussion. Sommers says there are three workshopsplanned for this year.

"Once you enter the environment, you realizethe faculty meetings are not to challenge theorthodoxies, not to challenge ideas," says King,the associate in Harvard's women's studies programwho taught in Expos for three semesters in 1991and 1992.

Many teachers complain that the evaluationsystem does not allow for sufficient nurturingduring their early days in the program. The Exposadministrators who visit classes and give adviceare those who wield the axe.

"It's important to separate the mentoringprocess from the evaluation process," saysVirginia L. Brereton, who taught in the programfrom 1989 to 1992. "You shouldn't mix those two.It's unhealthy."

In the short term, teachers say administratorsmust change policies to make Expos a morenurturing place to work. Simple reforms, likeadding more working phones (the department's threedozen teachers currently have access to just onephone for calls outside of Harvard), would be agood place to start.

"They give them no hope of staying here, theygive them a course that students aren't keen on,they give them only two 50-minute periods a week,and the University gives them little respect,"says Harvey, the senior preceptor. "So things liketelephones...are important."

The longterm solution, teachers say, is lesshierarchy inside the department. There is a slighthope that Sommers and Harvey can achieve a moreinclusive system of decision-making.

"You cannot run a writing program that big withtwo people [Marius and Sommers]," says Hoy, theformer senior preceptor. "It cannot be done well."

Ultimately, flattening out Expos' hierarchy mayrequire more than just a few changes inadministrative policy. If the program is to bestserve students, Expos needs sensitive leadershipwhich will encourage initiative, eliminate thefour-year limit and permit more open debate,teachers say.

"If you want to encourage debate, encouragechange, you want people to feel like the onlyconsequence is more debate," says AskoldMelnyczuk, a teacher at Expos from 1990 to 1992."Hire the best people. Make them feel wanted. Thenstudents will feel wanted."

Elie G. Kaunfer and Andrew L. Wrightcontributed to the reporting of this story.

Expository Writing: Series at a Glance

Today: Expos policies create trenchantpersonnel problems, resist oversight and hurt thequality of teaching in the program.

Tomorrow: Personalities and personaldifferences in the program directly affectpolicies on employment and pedagogy.

Wednesday: The University's academic cultureisolates Expos and undervalues the mission ofteaching the craft of writing.CrimsonEdward H. WuELIZABETH BAYLEY '96 is one of severalstudents who have complained to the administrationabout the decision to let their Expos teachersgo.

And teachers widely praise the hiring systemfor its thoroughness. Candidates for jobs in Exposare required to undergo a rigorous process duringwhich they must critique students' papers, submittheir own writing and agree to be interviewed.

In recent weeks, Sommers and new seniorpreceptor Gordon C. Harvey have said they areworking on plans to encourage initiative in thedepartment. And Harvey and Sommers have saidrecently they may form a student advisorycommittee to counsel Expos.

But all this is unlikely to change what nearlyall of the teachers interviewed say is theprogram's largest administrative problem: thefour-year limit on teaching jobs.

Introduced by Marius and Sommers in the wake ofinternal turmoil in the department four years ago,this rule limits all teachers, who work underone-year contracts, to four years of teaching inthe program. After that a teacher must leave, nomatter how good the teacher is or how much he orshe likes the job.

"If I were a teacher, I would complain," says asource in the Faculty administration familiar withthe department. "It's not a very good system."

Worse than its effect on teachers' lives may bethe rule's impact on student learning.Teachers--including Harvey, the seniorpreceptor--argue that because the skill ofteaching writing is difficult to learn, manyinstructors have to leave just as they are hittingtheir stride in the classroom.

"It takes at least two years to figure out howto teach," says Norman M. Katz, an Expos teacherfrom 1985 to 1992 and now a writing instructor atCornell University's school of hoteladministration. "When I was teaching in my fifth,sixth and seventh years, I really knew what I wasdoing. In my first two years, I didn't know what Iwas doing at all."

"I don't think students are served by afour-year rule," says William C. Rice, asecond-year teacher in "Social and EthicalIssues," Expos 16. "I think students are served bypeople who are vital and deeply engaged in theirwork. If there's a four-year rule, people willwind up going out on the job market before theirtime is up."

While departments have limits on juniorfaculty, Expos teachers, who have the rank ofpreceptors, are much more limited than theircounterparts around the University.

In mathematics, preceptors must pass five-yearreviews but may stay indefinitely. In East Asianlanguages and Slavic languages, preceptors maystay eight years and also have the chance to bepromoted and remain indefinitely if they can passfive-year reviews.

The end result of the four-year rule isturnover perhaps more massive than anywhere elsein the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.Administrators spend much of their time readingdossiers, placing ads and recruiting around thenation for new teachers. In a given year, nearlyone-third of the teachers are new.

"There are some people who don't have a clueafter the first year," says James D. Wilkinson'65, director of the Bok Center for Teaching andLearning. "Good teachers ought to be retained.There aren't so many good teachers in the worldthat we can go throwing them out after fouryears."

But the administration publicly backs the Expospolicy. Buell says he likes the rule for manyreasons, including the fact that it "maximizes ourutility to replenish" the teaching pool.

"The obvious cases where good teachers are letgo early are more than compensated for [by thefact that] so-so teaching was allowed tocontinue," Buell said. "[In a more lenientsystem,] are you going to chop the head off ofrespectable mediocrity? The odds are that you'regoing to reserve the axe for blatant cases."

But teachers say Buell's response is deceptive.They point out that they work on one-yearcontracts, which do not have to be renewed. Onlylazy administrators incapable of making toughdecisions need a four-year rule to get rid ofmediocre teachers, teachers say. If anything,keeping a stopwatch on teacher's tenure encouragesaverage performance.

"Most of the time what the rule leads to ismassive mediocrity," says one Expos veteran."People walk in the door looking for another job."

"Human psychology being what it is, it'sdifficult to feel any investment in a departmentwhere you learn the ropes the first year, sailthrough the second year and by the end of thethird year, you're thinking about your next job,"says Philip A. Gambone '70, who has taught Exposfor two years and is now on leave. "It seems to meit would be worth the department's while to try tocreate an experienced, competent, collegialfaculty."

The administration does not present a unitedfront on the four-year rule.

One source in the Faculty administration calledthe decision to impose the limit a "mistake."

Asked if he could name one way students wereserved by the four-year limit, Robinson Professorof Celtic Languages and Literatures Patrick K.Ford '66, a member of the standing facultycommittee on Expos, thought for a moment.

"No," he said.

The four-year rule is not the onlychange in Expos hiring policy in recent years thathas met with criticism from teachers.

Sommers and Marius say it has become theirexplicit goal in the last few years to hire asmany teachers with Ph.Ds as possible. In the past,Marius sought to hire practicing writers. Theshift, he says, is part of an effort to"professionalize" the department and make Exposmore academically credible.

According to documents obtained by The Crimson,in the spring of 1989 only seven of the 42 peopleteaching Expos classes had Ph.Ds. Last spring, 24of 40 held Ph.Ds.

But Marius himself has repeatedly said thatpracticing writers make the best teachers.

"It is assumed that every preceptor in theExpository Writing Program be seriously engaged inwriting prose," Marius wrote in a January 29, 1990memo to teachers. "The fundamental policy of thisprogram is that the best teachers of writing arethose who write themselves."

And some teachers say the change represents anobstacle to creativity in the classroom. They,too, say the best teachers of writing areprofessional writers.

Statistics to show the value of hiring Ph.Dsare scarce, but the available numbers show thatmany of the best teachers in Expos are thosewithout PhDs. Of the 41 awards given to Exposteachers over the past five semesters for CUEguide ratings of 4.5 or higher, only 11 werepresented to Ph.Ds, according to documentsobtained by The Crimson.

Other teachers and administrators argue thatteachers with Ph.Ds are more likely to stick tothe academic writing that will serve students bestin their other classes.

"The advantage of having Ph.Ds is that they'reused to doing analytical writing," says formerExpos teacher Laura Otis, herself a Ph.D incomparative literature. "I wonder about someonewho's a novelist teaching writing to people. Isthat going to help them on a history of philosophyessay?"

A smaller group of teachers say the debate issilly. The basis for hiring Expos teachers shouldbe teaching ability, not educational background,they say. But there is general concern that Ph.Dsmay be too worried about making themselvesattractive to future tenure-track employers.

One second-year teacher says he is hoping toleave after this year.

"I hope this will be my last year at Expos,"says the teacher. "That's not anythingduplicitous. Nancy Sommers and Richard Mariusactually thought of this more like apost-doctorate fellowship than as a faculty job."

Whatever its impact on the quality of teaching,the shift toward Ph.Ds has had the unintendedconsequence of making it nearly impossible forExpos to hire instructors of color: The pool ofminorities with Ph.Ds is small, and qualifiedminority candidates can find tenure-track jobselsewhere.

"The criteria for general hiring has gotten sorigid," says a current teacher. "They used to hirewriters. There are plenty of working Blackwriters. Now they hire newly minted Ph.Ds."

The lack of cultural diversity, teachers say,limits the perspectives students may encounter inExpos. Cross cultural, feminist and otherapproaches to writing that might interest somestudents have been neglected, some teachers say.

Sommers disputes that charge, saying thatsearches for minorities have been intense. Some ofthe program's basic structures--including a lowstarting salary of $25,500 a year--have cost themminority candidates.

"It's a serious problem," says Sommers. "We tryvery hard. One of the reasons I read everyapplication so carefully and closely is because Iwant to make sure that we have every minoritycandidate we can."

But the minority candidates Expos does hiredon't necessarily stay very long. Evelyn White,now a reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle,says she left Expos after one semester in thespring of 1991 because she was disappointed withthe program and its efforts to forge a diversefaculty.

"The proof is in the pudding: It's an all-whitefaculty," says White. "It's an insult in 1993 tosay there aren't enough qualified people of color.They need to get a grip."

Sarah King, an associate of the Committee onDegrees in Women's Studies, criticizes minorityrecruiting in Expos. Both she and White found theprogram, not the other way around.

"I don't think a bit of affirmative action ispracticed there," says King. "There's ananti-affirmative action. No one is sought out, noone is brought in."

Students and teachers upset with Expospolicies have few places to turn to get a hearingfor their complaints.

Members of the standing faculty committee,which has direct authority over Expos, aregenerally uninformed about specific matters,administrators acknowledge, and the committeemeets once a year for about 90 minutes. Also,several members of the committee, Sommers andadministrators acknowledge, are recruited by thedirector and the associate director.

"The Expos committee does its best toscrutinize," Buell says. "But it listens veryclosely to what the director and the associatedirector have to say."

Offering one example of his and the committee'swillingness to question Expos policy, Buell sayshe brought up the issue of changing the four-yearrule at last spring's meeting. There, thecommittee carefully considered "evidence" anddecided to keep the rule.

What was the evidence?

"A combination of things, including but notrestricted to the judgment of the program directorand the associate director."

Buell says anyone with a complaint is free toapproach his office. But teachers say the deangives little more than a sympathetic ear. Three ofthe department's highly rated teachers haveapproached the administration to complain aboutthe four-year rule, with little response, theysaid.

In addition, three students of Adam D. Schwartzvisited Assistant Dean for Undergraduate EducationJeffrey Wolcowitz in the spring of 1992 to protestthe departure of their teacher. Two of the threestudents said the dean was "not receptive tocriticism." The third student could not be reachedfor comment.

Wolcowitz says he does not recall the specificvisit.

Teachers say the cumulative effect ofthe program's policies and hierarchy has been torestrict the influence of teachers and to limitthe quality and diversity of ideas about writing.

"You don't see a vehicle for getting your ideasput into any kind of action," says Nan Stalnaker,who is in her third year. "You feel like otherpeople are running it. You aren't running it. Ithink I would like to feel much more thatdecisions are arrived at in a way that we areinvolved."

For example, many Expos teachers say the classrequirements need to be re-evaluated, and thatfour essays, with revisions, is too much for onesemester.

In an interview, Marius acknowledged thedifficulty of fitting four essays in a semester,suggesting that the requirements may be reviewed.But the status quo persists, as it has for years.

Teachers also see a need for debate and changein two other department practices: staff meetingsand evaluations.

The meetings, once productive workshops spenton discussions of pedagogy, are now structured sothat outside speakers dominate the time and thediscussion. Sommers says there are three workshopsplanned for this year.

"Once you enter the environment, you realizethe faculty meetings are not to challenge theorthodoxies, not to challenge ideas," says King,the associate in Harvard's women's studies programwho taught in Expos for three semesters in 1991and 1992.

Many teachers complain that the evaluationsystem does not allow for sufficient nurturingduring their early days in the program. The Exposadministrators who visit classes and give adviceare those who wield the axe.

"It's important to separate the mentoringprocess from the evaluation process," saysVirginia L. Brereton, who taught in the programfrom 1989 to 1992. "You shouldn't mix those two.It's unhealthy."

In the short term, teachers say administratorsmust change policies to make Expos a morenurturing place to work. Simple reforms, likeadding more working phones (the department's threedozen teachers currently have access to just onephone for calls outside of Harvard), would be agood place to start.

"They give them no hope of staying here, theygive them a course that students aren't keen on,they give them only two 50-minute periods a week,and the University gives them little respect,"says Harvey, the senior preceptor. "So things liketelephones...are important."

The longterm solution, teachers say, is lesshierarchy inside the department. There is a slighthope that Sommers and Harvey can achieve a moreinclusive system of decision-making.

"You cannot run a writing program that big withtwo people [Marius and Sommers]," says Hoy, theformer senior preceptor. "It cannot be done well."

Ultimately, flattening out Expos' hierarchy mayrequire more than just a few changes inadministrative policy. If the program is to bestserve students, Expos needs sensitive leadershipwhich will encourage initiative, eliminate thefour-year limit and permit more open debate,teachers say.

"If you want to encourage debate, encouragechange, you want people to feel like the onlyconsequence is more debate," says AskoldMelnyczuk, a teacher at Expos from 1990 to 1992."Hire the best people. Make them feel wanted. Thenstudents will feel wanted."

Elie G. Kaunfer and Andrew L. Wrightcontributed to the reporting of this story.

Expository Writing: Series at a Glance

Today: Expos policies create trenchantpersonnel problems, resist oversight and hurt thequality of teaching in the program.

Tomorrow: Personalities and personaldifferences in the program directly affectpolicies on employment and pedagogy.

Wednesday: The University's academic cultureisolates Expos and undervalues the mission ofteaching the craft of writing.CrimsonEdward H. WuELIZABETH BAYLEY '96 is one of severalstudents who have complained to the administrationabout the decision to let their Expos teachersgo.