Romance Languages and Lit Endorses Section Cap

Faculty, students, and teaching fellows from the Romance Languages and Literatures Department endorsed on Tuesday the Harvard Teaching Campaign, a movement urging administrators to cap sections and lab groups at 12 students.

The endorsement statement, signed by 30 instructors and students from the department, expressed support for the movement, citing individualized attention for undergraduates and professional development for graduate students as benefits of smaller sections.

“A 12-student section ensures a productive teaching and learning community in both language and literature courses, facilitating discussion, creativity and a fluid exchange of ideas,” the statement read.

Members from across the department expressed support for the campaign, according to Jonathan Solarte, a campaign organizer and a teaching fellow from the Romance Languages and Literatures Department.

“This endorsement, unlike previous ones, shows a level of solidarity between faculty, graduate students, undergraduates, and teaching fellows, that so far hasn’t really been seen,” he said.

Romance Languages and Literatures is the seventh department or committee to extend its support for the Harvard Teaching Campaign. Previously, endorsements have come from the humanities and social sciences. According to student organizers, campaign members are actively reaching out to departments in the sciences.

Amanda Gokee ’15, a Romance Languages and Literatures concentrator and a member of the campaign’s undergraduate committee, said that the department’s endorsement is timely as undergraduates are voting on a referendum question concerning section sizes on the Undergraduate Council ballot.

“Hopefully this endorsement will help the issue of section sizes gain visibility,” she said.

In addition to the endorsements it has received, the campaign has circulated an online petition calling for the University to cap sections and lab group sizes at 12. As of press time, it had been signed by 1,604 members of the Harvard community, according to the campaign’s website.

—Staff Writer Zara Zhang can be reached at zara.zhang@thecrimson.com.