NEWS IN BRIEF: Faculty Council Votes To Hold More Faculty Meetings

The full Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) may meet 14 times next year instead of the standard nine times to allow more time for discussion of the curricular review.

“We want to do this to make more progress. We’re having a great deal of trouble fitting all of our business in” during the one and a half hours allotted for each monthly Faculty meeting, said Weary Professor of German and Comparative Literature Judith L. Ryan, a member of the Council.

With curricular review committee reports scheduled to come up for discussion next year, more Faculty meetings would allow professors to spend a full meeting discussing each report in depth.

“It’s really important that we start digging into these topics instead of skimming over the top of them,” Ryan said.

The Faculty Council—FAS’s 18-member governing body—voted unanimously at its meeting on Wednesday to increase the number of Faculty meetings for the next year. Before the change can go into effect, the motion must be voted on by the full Faculty at its meeting on Tuesday in University Hall, said Ryan.

If the full Faculty approves the increase in meetings, the change will go into effect for only one year.

The Council also heard a presentation from David MacGregor of Cooper Robertson Partners about Allston planning, particularly about the physical layout of buildings in Allston, Ryan said.

The Council also approved the FAS Courses of Instruction for next year.