Report Shows Dissatisfaction With Gen Ed Program, Prof Says

An interim report on the current program in General Education, released internally to Faculty members at the beginning of March, shows that some administrators, professors, and students are dissatisfied with aspects of the program, according to Gen Ed review committee chair Sean D. Kelly.

Members of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences will discuss the report at their next monthly meeting on May 5. It was compiled by a committee tasked with reviewing the Gen Ed program, although Kelly has declined to share the report and its findings with The Crimson.

Kelly, who is also chair of the Philosophy department, wrote in an email last week that the committee received feedback from many faculty members, who had suggestions to ameliorate the current program.

“[The interim report] reported on a number of dissatisfactions with the program from its various constituencies: the students, the teaching fellows, the faculty, and the administrators,” Kelly wrote. “The report [canvassed] a range of possible ways to respond to these dissatisfactions.”

Over the last few weeks, the Gen Ed review committee met with more than a dozen Faculty and administrative groups—including individual academic departments and a committee tasked with studying the diversity of the curriculum—to discuss the program, according to Kelly.

Kelly wrote that the faculty “responded generously and enthusiastically” with feedback about the report and the Gen Ed program more broadly.

At the Faculty meeting on May 5, the Gen Ed review committee will share the results from these conversations. Kelly wrote that the committee plans to have a final report on the program ready sometime in the fall.

—Staff writer Melissa C. Rodman can be reached at melissa.rodman@thecrimson.com. Follow her on Twitter @melissa_rodman.