Time to Concentrate

What were you thinking about when you graduated from high school? As Pomp and Circumstance reached its final decrescendo what began occupying your thoughts? Summer, perhaps? Spending time with soon to be departing friends? Your concentration choice at Harvard? Right—not so much. In fact, choosing a concentration does not really become a salient reality until far later—after Freshman Week, after the early barrage of extracurricular opportunities, after shopping period, after Winter break, after finals and, for many, after the concentration deadline itself. That many first-years dismissively fill out their plans of study knowing that they will need at least the summer to mull it over is a sign of errant timing. Choosing a concentration is important. But as first-years wrap up only their second set of classes, having been bombarded sans interruption with the demands, challenges and adventures of first-year whirlwind, they are forced to make such a choice, often prematurely. With a lot to swallow, first-years are not given time to digest.

Some argue that the earlier decision enriches the academic experience. Namely, it allows concentrations to incorporate an additional semester of sophomore tutorial. To be sure, the tutorial system at Harvard is the highlight of many students’ four years. Nevertheless, the trade-off offers a considerable and more compelling gain: another semester of uninhibited exploration from the vantage point of a student who has spent a year at college and a summer to reflect on that year.

The vision emphasized more emphatically than any other in last week’s curricular review report is one of a recommitment to a broad liberal arts education and a distancing from “increasing specialization and professionalization.” And the curricular review correctly identified early concentration choice as one of the prime inhibiting factors towards its ultimate end. The curricular review’s recommendation to delay the concentration decision to the end of Fall term of sophomore year—still a semester before the vast majority of our peer institutions—is of critical importance to the whole of its vision. This vision significantly deemphasizes a culture of producing academicians—a goal not all Harvard College students aspire to—in favor of championing the education of whole persons “so that they may lead productive lives in national and global communities.” A Harvard with a concentration decision deadline at the end of sophomore Fall will promote the culture of exploration, the culture of the liberal arts.

Michael B. Broukhim ’07, a Crimson editorial editor, lives in Pennypacker.