Change, Write Now

On the surface, Harvard seems to place a lot of importance on its Expository Writing program. It's the only class that's required of all first-year students, the only formal preparation undergraduates receive for the writing they'll do in the coming four years and beyond. A liberal arts setting requires intensive writing; Expos is the University's sole compulsory class with the expressed purpose of teaching that skill.

Study the third floor of the Harvard Union and you get a different picture of the University's commitment to Expos. The Crimson's six-week investigation into Expos shows that preceptors are virtually ignored by the faculty; that morale is low; that students' concerns are secondary to administrative vengeance and backstabbing against the teaching staff. For a program of such importance, Expos seems to be spinning wildly out of control and it's hard to see how the turmoil could benefit students.

Harvard has stood by and allowed the administrative problems in the Expos programs to fester. Harvard's failure to address the serious problems at Expos reflects a shallow commitment to its undergraduates, and to undergraduate education.

Central to the problem is Richard C. Marius, the director of Expos, who has molded the program significantly during his 15-year tenure. Marius is by all accounts a skillful teacher, an accomplished writer and, as Alumni Association Director John P. Reardon '60 points out, an effective fundraiser.

But as an administrator, Marius is seriously flawed. Many agree that he has hurt the program, alienated Expos preceptors and mistreated students. Marius refuses to implement changes most Expos teachers agree would strengthen the program, including something as simple as as assigning three papers instead of four.

He makes no serious effort to recruit teachers of color; there are no minority preceptors in a current Expos staff of about 40. In the past six years, in fact, there have been only three minority teachers on the Expos staff; all found the program on their own.

More importantly, Marius' behavior, both public and private, is egregious and entirely unprofessional. He has verbally abused preceptors in the presence of colleagues and students and fired two preceptors publicly while standing in a hallway. He has publicly referred to students by name and called their writing `drivel.' He has threatened colleagues, in one instance stationing an armed undercover police officer outside a preceptor's classroom to prevent him from teaching.

Expos boasts some talented writers and some excellent teachers. But the program's atmosphere and structure make it increasingly difficult to attract quality preceptors--and impossible to retain them. Expos teachers are poorly paid significantly less than their colleagues at several other Ivy League universities.

The Expos program's hopelessly misguided four-year rule, which Marius introduced in 1989 without a grandfather clause, resulted from his desire to quash dissent on the faculty. Other teaching positions at Harvard, including junior faculty appointments, carry term limits, but few are so rigid. Most preceptor positions in foreign language and math programs last eight years; stellar teachers have the opportunity to remain at Harvard much longer, with periodic reviews.

No Harvard administrator has been able to justify the four-year Expos rule; some agree that it's destructive to the department. Many teachers say that as soon as they enter the program, they must prepare to leave. Teachers agree that it takes years to adjust to the format and demands of the Expos class; just as teachers grow comfortable with the program, they're kicked out the door. There are no provisions for excellent teachers to stay.

The administration has structures in place to oversee Expository Writing; its paralysis, then, is inexcusable. The standing faculty committee on Expos meets only once a year for about 90 minutes to hear--and rarely dispute or investigate--a presentation from Marius and Associate Director Nancy Sommers. Deans of Undergraduate Education Lawrence Buell and David Pilbeam, Marius's direct superiors, have deferred to his judgment for even his most dubious decisions. Both deans, as well as Assistant Dean for Undergraduate Education Jeffrey Wolcowitz, have given only tepid responses to student concerns.

Harvard knows about the problems with Expos; it needs, for once, to address them. For starters, Richard Marius--who has hinted that his days at Expos are numbered--should leave the department for good. The four-year rule should disappear swiftly with him.

Addressing the next challenge is harder, but equally necessary: It is to assure students and faculty members that Expos is not an afterthought, but an integral part of undergraduate education at Harvard. As the Faculty prepares for its billion-dollar fundraising effort, it should include Expos more completely than it currently intends. When it considers curricular changes, it should encourage greater collaboration among Expos preceptors and department faculty.

The Expos program's emphasis on one-on-one conferences and extensive revisions offers the kind of intensive, personal educational experience most students crave. Unlike most of the University's programs, it exists wholly for undergraduates, and wholly for the purpose of teaching. Such a valuable program should not be allowed to suffer because of poor administration.

The turmoil in Expos does neither teachers nor students any good. But ultimately, as the best teachers continue to leave the program, it's the students who suffer the most. Until the University demonstrates its commitment to reforming Expos, it will be hard to convince us that undergraduate education is one of its priorities.