Richard,

I am not sure about the unveling (although it sounds like the author who used the phrase "taking sides" could have been reading into the remarks), but I was hoping you might share your opinions on the Crimson story on the faculty rejecting the proposal for student evaluations. You have written about governance before and I would love your take. (see below).

CUE Proposal Irks Some Faculty

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences failed to reach a quorum at its meeting yesterday and postponed a vote on a measure that would have required most courses to be student-evaluated.

Several professors blasted the proposal, saying it would infringe upon “professorial autonomy.”

The motion, put forward by Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71, would mandate that all courses of five or more students be evaluated for the annual guide published by the Committee on Undergraduate Education (CUE).

The Faculty Council and a curricular review committee have both supported mandating course evaluations, noting that they serve as crucial report cards for both professors and teaching fellows. According to Gross, about 60 professors opted out of the CUE Guide process last semester, leaving more than 230 TFs without evaluations.

But at the beginning of full Faculty discussion on the issue, Professor of German Peter J. Burgard called for the motion to be tabled, saying it would “undermine a strong tradition of faculty self-governance in the area of teaching.”

Kenan Professor of Government Harvey C. Mansfield’s ’53 rose a few minutes later, and armed with a torn-in-half piece of notebook paper, launched a blunt attack on the current system of student evaluations.

“Course evaluations introduce the rule of the less wise over the more wise, of students over professors,” Mansfield said.

Mansfield said that “the opinions of the best students get buried” in the CUE Guide, which, he said, does not distinguish the top students’ feedback from that of “the mediocre ones, the A-minus students.”

Another professor took issue with online evaluations, which were fully implemented last fall, saying the new system discouraged students from putting much thought into their evaluations.

“I had large numbers of students who simply checked off some numbers and then went away,” said Philip J. Fisher, the Reid professor of English and American literature. “I learned nothing from the evaluations that I got this fall.”

“The process that you are implementing is not deeply considered,” Fisher concluded, to applause.

In the end, after a roundabout debate over parliamentary procedure, the Faculty voted 59-53 to postpone a vote on the measure for a future meeting.

Even if a vote had been taken yesterday, however, it would not have been binding. Near the meeting’s outset University President Lawrence H. Summers asked whether a quorum—one-sixth of the Faculty’s 703 voting members—was present. Secretary of the Faculty David B. Fithian replied that attendance was seven short.

Wrapping up discussion of evaluations, Gross said that the matter could wait until next fall because the current round of CUE evaluations is already underway and no changes could take effect until late next semester.
 

To be honest, I was hoping to hear from you all on this. I just don't know enough about the evaluation process to have an informed opinion. (Like whether it's changed since my TF-ing days, for example.)

Perhaps the professors, rather than simply rejecting evaluation, could counter-propose?
 

In line with the previous poster, did you [Richard] think that it was funny that one of the prof.'s said that the proposed student evaluations would "undermine a strong tradition of faculty self-governance in the area of teaching."?

I found this comment espicially interesting in light of the fact that there wasn't even a quorum present to vote on the issue. They talk about strong self-governance, but then they don't even bother to show up for the meeting.
 

On the unveiling. It WAS remarkable. I didnt hear any gasps but otherwise the report above fit what I heard. At the reception there was a lot of talk about it (though I was mostly talking to people who were not fans of Summers).
 

A reader said: “Rudenstein gave a passionate defense of the faculty as an agent of creative change, and was uncharacteristically direct in his criticism of "authoritarian" leadership by presidents”.

The faculty as an agent of creative change… absolutely. The faculty as the agent running the FAS on a day to day basis, absolutely not! The comments of the faculty over the last several months show that this is what they really want to do. This university and the FAS are exceedingly complex entities and are becoming more so all the time. These entities can not be run as they were 20 years ago. The corporate world, used to running complex institutions, has much of value to teach universities, and it is a shame that many faculty in the FAS do not recognize that. If the faculty believes the FAS and the University should not be run as a “corporate entity”, there will be few short term dislocations. There will, however, be many severe ramifications in the long run. Unfortunately, many, if not most of the FAS faculty wish to see a “mom and pop” operation i.e. not corporate, particularly not corporate from Mass Hall. They want a situation where one goes to The Dean and says I need $100,000 for project “x”. The faculty member gets upset when, in the larger scheme of things, the Dean turns him/her down. Some turn to the president. Some presidents give the money.
The faculty of the FAS has very little idea of what the real world is; its members have been cloistered for most of their lives. They are greedy when it comes to money, particularly money that benefits them and only them. Many have a perspective no longer than how quickly they can get whatever they need for themselves. Of course, they will never admit this; they will be horrified that someone would even suggest it. The truth of the matter is that many of the FAS faculty look out only for themselves. President Rudenstine was a president who wanted to keep the peace so he handed out money to pacify certain faculty… in fact, a lot of faculty with a lot of money. These people praised him for being a president who listened, but what they really meant was that he took care of them. It will turn out that one of the great long term mistakes The Corporation made while Neil Rudenstine was president was the huge increase in endowment payout in fiscal 2000 and fiscal 2002 (both increases were in excess of 20% and both were made under Rudenstine’s watch). The increase in payouts set a very high bar and the ramifications of the payout will work to the detriment of future generations of Harvard faculty and students (those who have recently decried the current FAS projected deficits might be wise to remember what really caused them). There was not even a murmur of questioning about this ill conceived idea. Everyone was fat, dumb and happy.
Too many believe that Harvard has an ungodly amount of money; this is a false assumption. It does not have as much as will be needed in the next 25 or 50 years, if the money it has today is spent unwisely. Unwisely encompasses not only money spent foolishly on fads or fashions (or on buying faculty peace), but on payouts from the endowment in excess of what is prudent. Those long periods of time, which are crucial for a great university in terms of ongoing scholarly endeavors, seem to be lost on those who think only in terms of “me” and “today.” There are many on the FAS faculty who think in precisely that way. Harvard will survive very well of course, but at what price? Every dollar that is spent, unnecessarily, to “placate certain faculty members”, “to keep the peace”, “to have them behind you at the Faculty Meeting”, is a dollar that could be spent on increased financial aid, for instance, or on reinvestment in the endowment, something that will benefit those who will need it in the future.
Agent for creative change, yes! It has to be realized, however, that someone who has an all encompassing view of the university and who thinks not only of today but of the long term (again, something most faculty are loath to do) has to be in charge. That person has to have authority and to the extent that means he or she has to be authoritarian, so be it. Let us hope that the next president of Harvard has the strength to fully exercise his or her authority.
 

On the fiscal comparison, which interestingly does not favor the former Secy of the Treasury over the Renaissance scholar. Bottom line is that Rudenstine left the university in better financial shape than it has ever been, and Summers left the worst deficit ever in the university's biggest faculty. Even though he micro managed his handpicked dean, and had a financial VP who came from FAS and should have known better. This is the disaster that the new dean and president face.
 

Placating the faculty? or less politely buying off the faculty.
The truth is just the opposite of what the earlier poster suggested. Take the most prominent public example--Skip Gates. Summers ended up giving him lots more than Rudentine ever did. Ask Skip: who was easier to hit up for more funds? This is a case where tough talk put the president in a weaker negotiating position. That was true across the board.
 

Not to interupt this debate about money, but what happened to the original question: why did the Crimson miss this dramatic story? Whatever you think about the leading characters, this was a moment worth reporting. Did the original poster get the story right? If so, why is it not being reported? If not, why are so many faculty still talking about it?
 

The original poster got it exactly right, though I didn't hear any gasp. Anton Troianovski, one of the Crimson reporters who did the story, was in fact taking photos throughout the speeches, so may have been distracted.
 

As the poster (from 6:55) knows better than most, the Renaissance scholar president left the university woefully behind and underinvested in science, and the university has had to play catch-up during the last five years.

And surely the same poster knows the difference between operating expenditures and capital expenditures and knows enough not to conflate the two when speaking of "deficits." One would hope that the poster doesn't make these types of mistakes in any future writings,and also that the poster not forget the imprudent disbursements from the endowment when the Renaissance president held power.
Speaking of that gentleman... if the reports are correct, what was going through Neil Rudenstine's mind when he spoke about authoritarian presidents, at a gathering to unveil his portrait (and knowing that President Summers was in the room).
Very poor form on the part of the ex-president. One would expect him to have better manners .
 

I havent seen any data that shows that Harvard underinvested in science under Rudenstine/Knowles, but I have seen data that shows that under Summers/Kirby the growht of the faculty (one of the most important measures) was overwhelmingly in the humanities and favored social sciences (economics and history). Dept chairs recently showed this data to some colleagues. If there was a problem before, there certainly has been no "catch up"
 

Presidents come and go, but the quality of science at Harvard is more constant and higher than some of the public relations rhetoric suggests. In the cutting edge life sciences (biological, biochemistry and biophysics), Harvard consistently ranks among the top three. (It is true that the best department may be in Longwood, but after all that is still Harvard.) The same is true in almost all of the other sciences (except perhaps computer science and engineering--but even here both improved under a dynamic engineering dean). Yes, science should be a high priority but to keep moving foward, not because we have to catch up.
 

You said: "I havent seen any data that shows that Harvard underinvested in science under Rudenstine/Knowles, but I have seen data that shows that under Summers/Kirby the growht of the faculty (one of the most important measures) was overwhelmingly in the humanities and favored social sciences (economics and history)." (sic)

I think, Professor, you are looking in the wrong places for your data and I believe your understanding is incorrect with regard to what data you have looked at. This is what Dean Kirby had to say to the faculty in 2005:
"Looking back, we can see that growth over the last decade and a half has differed from division to division. Since 1988, we have seen the least faculty growth in the natural sciences (7.7 percent), compared to the humanities (11.2 percent) and the social sciences (18 percent). Thus in 2004, faculty in the life and physical sciences, taken separately and together, constituted lower percentages of the total FAS faculty than was the case more than a decade earlier. A vigorous program of faculty growth will help us to build strength in the sciences, even as we add faculty in the arts and humanities and, in the division with half of all undergraduate concentrators, the social sciences."

Perhaps you don't agree, but it would seem from Dean Kirby's memo that there has been a problem in the growth of the life and physical sciences during the last 15 years. The growth in the number of the faculty has been, from a numerical standpoint,in the humanities and social sciences. However, even with that growth,during the last few years, the amount of money, by a very large factor, has been spent in the area of life and physical science projects. From what I read, this will continue to be the case during the next 10-15 years. Very recently, these areas have included, among other initiatives, the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and the Broad. The initiatives have encompassed buildings for science, as well as scientific equipment.
As an outgrowth of the physical plant, even the number of faculty (a very small percentage of overall expenditures in the last few years)will change. As Dean Kirby has said "A vigorous program of faculty growth will help us to build strength in the sciences." Therefore, the increase in faculty will be a natural outgrowth of these initiatives in the growth of the physical plant. If all of the money spent during the last few years on the physical aspects of the sciences, and if the "vigorous program of faculty growth" in the future,is not a consequence of ..."the least faculty growth [was] in the natural sciences", then I am afraid that we do not agree on the term "underinvestment."
In fact, under the current administration (President Summers and Provost Hyman) there has indeed been an attempt to catch-up, because under the Renaissance president, the sciences were given short shrift and there was significant underinvestment.
It is a bit difficult to understand how it was possible that an FAS faculty member could have missed all of the recent communications within (and outside of)the FAS, which emphasized the past problems, as well as the need for growth in the science area and what was being done about it.
Perhaps, however, we do not read missives in the same way. There are bytes and bits and then there are bytes and bits.
Sincerely,
X
 

I see now what an earlier poster meant by “public relations rhetoric.” I’ll bet this last post by "X" comes from Mass Hall or somebody with family connections there. Science is one of the great failures of this administration. Yes, there have been some big investments, but directed to a few individuals, those who could make headlines for Summers. The fact remains that there is no net increase in science faculty in FAS under this administration, and on some standard ways of counting an actual decrease. Science planning for Allston has been a notorious failure. The search for the science deans was an embarrassment. It is no accident that some of the most intense opposition in FAS that forced Summers out at the end came from the scientists.