UC Proposes Changes In Academic Calendar

The Undergraduate Council unveiled its plan for a revamped academic calendar yesterday, calling for a reconfiguration of the school year and proposing a new calendar for implementation in 2008-2009.

The 10,000-word position paper, which UC members said went through 13 drafts prior to its release last night, was guided by the results of a survey administered by the UC last month to about 750 students. Nearly 90 percent of the survey’s respondents said they wanted to complete the fall term before winter break.

If yesterday’s UC-endorsed plans were to be adopted, students would attend the first day of fall classes on Sept. 2. Reading period would begin on Dec. 4, and the end of fall exams would fall three days before Christmas.

In the absence of the current late-January reading period, students would remain on an inter-semester break through Jan. 19. The spring semester would then end a week-and-a-half earlier than at present.

Yesterday’s plan passed by a margin of 18-4-1. Much of the dissent focused on whether the UC’s survey was statistically legitimate.

“I don’t know if you’ve taken any base statistics,” said UC representative Justin M. Orlosky ’09 during the floor debate. “[The survey] did sort of lead the reader towards the answers that we wanted to see.... There are good surveys and bad surveys, and I think that was on the bad end.”

Fellow UC representative Joseph W. Stanley ’09 called for a new survey to be conducted.

But Student Affairs Committee Chair Michael R. Ragalie ’09 said he was not worried about the survey’s methodology.

“The numbers are so skewed towards [having] finals before winter break,” he said. “When we have those kinds of margins, I think it largely cancels out any bias there was in the survey.”

Student dissatisfaction was only one of the arguments in favor of changing the calendar. The paper also raised claims—corroborated by University Health Services (UHS) officials—that the current structure of the academic year has a deleterious effect on the mental and physical health of students.

According to the UC report, the College’s aberrant scheduling of January exams and abbreviated breaks make winter athletic scheduling difficult, prevent students from seeing many of their hometown friends on break, and reduce their opportunities for cross-registration.

Speaking for international students at yesterday’s meeting, Rebecca R. Gong ’08, a Beijing native and president of the Woodbridge Society endorsed yesterday’s paper.

Gong said that calendar reform would allow international students to enjoy more extensive breaks despite long travel times, and it would become easier to apply on time for H1-B work visas.

Petersen said after the meeting that he was not concerned whether administration officials would read the whole of yesterday’s lengthy report.

“The information [in the report] comes from authorities within the Harvard community,” he said. “They don’t need to read the report. They can call [UHS Director David S.] Rosenthal and talk to him about the impact of the calendar on student health.”

Last night’s meeting ended after 10 p.m., too late to reach College administrators for comment.

—Staff writer Christian B. Flow can be reached at cflow@fas.harvard.edu.