Later this week, standing faculty in the School of Arts and Sciences will vote on the first major reform of the College’s undergraduate curriculum in decades. By now, many of us are familiar with key proposed changes from the current Foundations requirement to “Kite and Key,” “First-Year Seminars” and the new “12+5+3” distribution system.
A great deal of work has gone into these proposed changes — years of meetings, countless proposal drafts and listening sessions, rounds of data gathering. Curricular reform is needed, and the proposed changes address significant concerns shared by students and faculty, including reasserting the value of a liberal arts education. Yet underneath these genuinely valuable goals lies a fundamental failure of shared governance: A significant majority of the people who actually deliver Penn’s education have been sidelined.
As concerned faculty members, we urge our colleagues to vote “no” on these reforms — not based on pedagogical merits (and to be clear, we see many), but because the proposal is a violation of the norms of shared governance. We cannot reform a curriculum while excluding the voices of those who teach roughly 65% of our courses.
The last significant change to the College curriculum was in 1985. Back then, the employment landscape of higher education looked significantly different — non-tenure track faculty made up a much smaller percentage of instructors. Faculty could vote on proposed changes with confidence that even if enrollment shifted in their departments and programs, it wouldn’t risk their employment. But that’s simply not true in 2026. For example, language instruction at Penn, like most universities, relies heavily on NTT faculty, and it is their jobs on the line if enrollment drops. Yet while NTT faculty undoubtedly have the most to lose in these curricular reforms, they are excluded from the vote.
The administration is upfront about the impact of this proposal in terms of pedagogical labor. They note that for this new curriculum to succeed, a “shift in teaching will be needed.” They also invite “all long-term faculty,” including senior lecturers, multi-year lecturers, and long-term staff, to join the effort to roll out a new set of courses and requirements.
But there is a glaring omission in this “inclusive” vision: the right to vote. NTT faculty have been largely excluded from the formal feedback and decision-making processes, their participation reduced to a “Curriculum Conversation” held last month and to informal initiatives taken by individual department chairs at their own discretion. The FAQ notes that “Standing faculty ownership over these courses... is critical.” This phrasing suggests that while the labor of teaching is shared, decision-making power is not.
When the administration says that faculty teaching loads will not increase, they are speaking to standing faculty. For instructors who lack tenure protections, a “shift in teaching” often translates to increased precarity. By proceeding with a vote that excludes these colleagues, the University is treating its most productive teaching cohort as a silent and exploitable workforce rather than a core constituency of our campus community.
Voting yes for this curriculum means endorsing an understanding of shared governance that is shared in name only. We are telling our NTT colleagues that their labor is essential but their perspective is not. Tenure track faculty at SAS who rarely or never teach undergrads will get a say, while NTT faculty are not just excluded, but treated as expendable.
It’s also worth pointing out that TT faculty at the Annenberg School for Communication and the Stuart Weitzman School of Design are excluded from voting on the proposed changes. These are faculty who consistently teach courses in majors and minors offered through the College, but do not get to vote because their appointments are outside SAS. This is true even when faculty are deeply involved in undergraduate teaching and programming in the College. Yet this violation of shared governance pales in comparison with the exclusion of NTT faculty.
The American Association of University Professors’ guidelines on inclusive shared governance (which have been recognized and incorporated into the Penn Faculty Handbook) strongly recommend that faculty that hold contingent appointments be involved in matters of governance, including in key votes. We are asking Penn to show its commitment to these norms of shared governance by reinstituting a process where our NTT colleagues have substantive input into this curriculum revision.
We cannot support a “more consistent and coherent curriculum” that is built upon an inconsistent and incoherent democratic process. A “no” vote is not a rejection of the importance of curricular reform itself; it is a demand for a process that respects the dignity and perspectives of all who teach. We must revise the SAS handbook so that NTT faculty can vote on changes that have a deep and lasting impact on their classrooms, and indeed their livelihoods. Any curricular change must ensure that every person who bears the “large commitment” of this curriculum has a seat at the table and a vote in the reform.
JESSA LINGEL is an Annenberg School for Communication professor and the director of the Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies Program. Her email is jessa.lingel@asc.upenn.edu.
MARCIA CHATELAIN is Presidential Penn Compact Professor of Africana Studies and undergraduate chair of Africana Studies. Her email is marciach@sas.upenn.edu.
GWENDOLYN BEETHAM is associate director of the Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies Program. Her email is gbeetham@sas.upenn.edu.
