College advising sys. undergoes overhaul
Oceanside High School '98
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Oceanside High School '98
Oceanside High School '98
Fourteen professorships are still being negotiated. Those talks are expected to yield about seven profs. The School of Arts and Sciences recruited 22 new faculty members this year, with 14 more appointments currently in negotiations, school officials said yesterday. Of the 22 hirings, 19 are junior professorships, while three are senior appointments in Economics, Romance Languages and Physics, SAS Dean Samuel Preston said. Earlier this year, SAS authorized 40 recruitment searches in departments across the school. The 14 ongoing recruitments will likely yield about seven more hirings for next year, Preston said, while the remaining four will be deferred until next year. Eight of the 14 continuing searches are for senior appointments, but Preston said, "It's obviously increasingly unlikely" that they will result in hirings by the start of the fall semester. He noted that SAS will see only four senior faculty departures this year -- compared with 13 last year -- and nine senior faculty retirements, allowing the school to grow in size. "I'm very pleased with where we are right now," he said. Among the junior recruitments are 11 positions in the six departments targeted by the SAS Strategic Plan for additional faculty positions and increased funding. The Economics Department, which had planned to hire as many as five new faculty members, currently has two junior and one senior appointment confirmed. The department hired Antonio Merlo, a political economist at New York University, for a senior professorship next year. Preston said Merlo is one of the leading experts in the United States on political economy, "a field that we've been trying to build up" at Penn. Acting Economics Department Chairman Kenneth Wolpin said he was very excited about Merlo's decision to come to Penn. The two junior professors -- one of whom will start at Penn this fall and one in fall 2001 -- are both recent doctoral graduates. Wolpin added that the department still has two offers out to fill the remaining senior positions, but noted that all of the candidates also have offers from other universities, making it "a pretty complicated situation." Another of the three senior appointments next year will be in the Spanish division of the Romance Languages Department, which will also get one new junior professor in Spanish and one in French. After the departures of four Spanish professors last year, the department recently struggled to meet student demand for Spanish courses. "We are very fortunate this year," Romance Languages Department Chairman Ignacio Lopez said, adding that the new appointments in Spanish will "help correct the situation that we unfortunately had in the past year." The Political Science Department, which this year lost one junior and one senior faculty member, will get one new junior professor and one temporary fellow. The department, which had hoped to hire as many as four senior professors, still has searches underway, Preston noted, including "someone who says he is leaning toward coming to Penn" but is currently on leave from his own university. "I'm disappointed that the Political Science searches were not more successful," Preston said. "I don't blame the department for that." Political Science will likely receive additional authorizations for junior professorships next year, he said, a decision that outgoing Political Science Department Chairman Ian Lustick said would help the department grow. The department will also have a visiting professor from the University of California at Berkeley next year who specializes in Far Eastern politics, Lustick noted. Among the other departments targeted in the SAS Strategic Plan, the English Department hired two junior professors, Psychology hired three junior professors, History hired two junior professors and Biology hired one junior professor.
High school seniors enrolled in the College of Arts and Sciences this fall will have an extra decision to make this summer while they are busily selecting housing arrangements and dining plans. They will also need to decide whether or not they want to participate in the College's new pilot curriculum program, which includes a modified version of the General Requirement. College Dean Richard Beeman said the school will soon send out letters and brochures to incoming freshmen explaining the differences between the pilot program and the traditional curriculum, allowing students to indicate a preference for one or the other. From the group of students indicating an interest in the pilot curriculum, 200 will be randomly selected for the new program, Beeman said, but he added that the participant group may be somewhat adjusted to create a balanced mix of students. "We want this to be, as near as possible, a cross-section of the freshman class," Beeman said, noting that "we will pay attention to obvious categories" to ensure a balanced distribution of males and females, as well as students who indicated different interests on their applications to Penn. The most publicized part of the pilot curriculum, approved last fall by the College faculty, is the modified General Requirement, which will consist of four special interdisciplinary courses rather than the traditional 10-course requirement. One course will be offered each semester, on average, in each of the four areas: "Structure and Value in Human Societies," "Science, Culture and Society," "Earth, Space and Life" and "Imagination, Representation and Reality." The pilot program will also include a required research component for every participating student, as well as increased emphasis on the development of oral and communication skills and the use of free electives. Math Professor Frank Warner, the chairman of the Committee on Undergraduate Education, which oversaw the development of the pilot curriculum, said the new curriculum "could make a really significant difference to undergraduate education here at Penn." Classes offered this fall will include titles like, "Globalization and its Historical Significance," "The Self-Portrait" and "Life in the Universe." Students are expected to take one pilot course per semester for their first four semesters. "My hope is that we get a good number of students to select it, but that the number of students is not overwhelming," Warner said of the pilot program. Beeman said the College used focus groups of current students in developing its mailings on the new curriculum, and the participants were evenly divided about which program they would have preferred if given a choice. "I think we have crafted our [brochures] in a way that we expect a good many people will opt for the traditional curriculum," Beeman said, since the mailings will point out both the advantages and disadvantages of each program. Though the pilot curriculum's General Requirement includes only four courses, Beeman said he did not think that incoming students would choose it to avoid taking classes in subjects they do not like. He added, however, that "the pilot curriculum really does not ensure that students will be exposed to? as many subject areas." Warner noted that the experimental General Requirement would not necessarily be a reduction of six course requirements for most students, since many now fulfill parts of the General Requirement with courses in their majors or Advanced Placement credits. He said the pilot curriculum's special interdisciplinary courses -- most of which will be taught by a team of professors -- might actually get students to become interested in subjects that they might otherwise have avoided with the traditional General Requirement. In the fall of 2001, 400 freshmen will participate in the pilot curriculum, which will be overseen by a committee associated with CUE. The program will be evaluated in five years by the SAS faculty, which would have to vote to expand the initiative to all College students.
The Wharton School yesterday announced the beginning of a partnership with IBM to develop new online continuing education programs for its executive education division. The technology initiative will be administered as part of a new education group within Wharton that will also include Wharton Direct, the school's current distance-learning program. Wharton Dean Patrick Harker said yesterday that continuing education on Penn's campus has been an important part of Wharton's mission for the past 15 years. "We now need to deliver it to the world," he said. Through the five courses already taught through Wharton Direct, Harker said, Wharton officials learned that "we need a strong technology partner to bring with us." "IBM is a great technology partner," he added. In a written statement, IBM Vice President of Distributed Learning Laura Sanders said the company is "looking forward to working with Wharton as the school expands its resources and faculty expertise." She noted that Wharton "has done extensive analysis of the impact of technology on both the learning process and organizational efficiency." The new program will offer courses designed to help companies with challenges that come from incorporating new technology into existing businesses. Managers at participating corporations will be able to get specific information they need when questions arise, and will have the opportunity to participate in other learning opportunities, including live online classes with Wharton faculty members. "Adults don't learn things [by taking] a 12-week course," Harker said. "People learn when they need to learn." Harker said the new agreement with IBM will also help ensure that Wharton's name is not used improperly by other online technology companies hoping to make money off of the school's prestige. "We're going to make sure we control the brand name of Wharton and Penn," he said. Harker explained that the new technology program will not just be limited to executive education. Wharton will use the new program to study the most efficient ways to get people to learn, he said, and then apply those techniques to Wharton's undergraduate and graduate degree programs. "The overarching reason for doing it is to start to bring strong learning technology into the school," he said. When appointed permanent dean of Wharton in February after a stint as interim dean, Harker said one of his main goals was to find ways to enhance Wharton's educational programs through better use of technology. Harker said he hopes to have the first new distance-learning programs in operation this summer, with existing Wharton clients receiving the first opportunity to use them. The education group running the new programs will be headed by Robert Mittelstaedt, who is currently Wharton's vice dean for executive education.
The committee finished its work by asking Rodin not to join either group. In its final recommendation to University President Judith Rodin, Penn's sweatshop task force recommended that the University not join either of two sweatshop-monitoring organizations at this time. In a letter to Rodin last week, Howard Kunreuther, the chairman of the Ad Hoc Committee on Sweatshop Labor, said the committee felt that neither the Fair Labor Association nor the Worker Rights Consortium has yet done enough to address Penn's concerns about balanced representation for colleges and universities on their governing boards. "While both groups have acknowledged our concerns, neither group has fully satisfied them, and we are not comfortable joining either organization at this time," Kunreuther wrote in the letter. He said the committee sought "to ensure reasonable balance between financial support and governance" in both organizations. The committee reached the consensus that it would not be appropriate to join either group until one, or both, adequately addressed the concerns over university representation. Kunreuther said the task force felt that the Committee on Manufacturer Responsibility, which will be responsible for enforcing the code of conduct approved earlier this year for licensees that produce University-logo apparel, could do a better job at deciding which organization to join. That committee will be composed of students, faculty and staff and will likely be charged by Rodin in the next week. "It came to the point where we should wait and get more information," said Nursing sophomore Kimberly Colopinto, the Undergraduate Assembly's representative to the sweatshop task force. She noted that many things are still unknown about both groups, particularly how successful the WRC will be in acquiring adequate financial support and whether either organization will listen to students' concerns. Three committee members made a presentation at an FLA board meeting earlier this month, outlining Penn's concerns. But Wharton sophomore Brian Kelly, a member of Penn Students Against Sweatshops who serves on the committee and helped make the presentation to the FLA, said the FLA did not take any action to satisfy Penn's demands for more balanced representation. "[The FLA] gave us the opportunity to present our concerns but didn't address them," he said. Penn had been a member of the FLA until earlier this year, when Rodin withdrew from the organization after a nine-day sit-in in College Hall staged by Penn Students Against Sweatshops. The group wanted Penn to withdraw from the FLA and join the WRC. In a written response to Kunreuther's letter released yesterday, Rodin said she accepted the committee's recommendation to remain outside of both the FLA and WRC until the organizations meet Penn's conditions for membership. "I regret that neither the FLA nor the WRC has fully satisfied the committee's concerns," she wrote. Noting that the WRC is undertaking a review of its governing structure and the FLA plans to examine the composition of its own governing board at a meeting in June, Rodin said, "It seems premature for us to join either organization until they are in a position to act formally on the committee's requests." Rodin said she plans to appoint the members of the Committee on Manufacturer Responsibility soon and asked that the ad hoc sweatshop committee hold a transition meeting to transfer its work to the new group. PSAS organizer Miriam Joffe-Block, a College senior, said her group is happy that Penn will not be joining the FLA, but still wants the University to join the WRC, which PSAS believes is less influenced by corporate concerns. "The whole group [is] united on the position -- we still want to join the WRC," Joffe-Block said, adding that the FLA is "set up to accommodate industry, not workers' rights." While the University most likely will not make a final decision on joining either of the organizations until the fall semester, Joffe-Block said PSAS members are sure that the University will see things their way in the end. "We're confident that [Penn] will eventually join the WRC," she said. "The WRC is a really positive thing and has gained a lot of support." Membership in the WRC has ballooned over the past few months, going from four schools when PSAS staged their sit-in to the dozens that now belong to it.
The body backed a call to limit administators' access to student e-mail. University Council approved an updated proposal yesterday for a school-wide policy governing the privacy of e-mail and other electronic information, addressing some of the concerns raised by students and faculty since an initial version of the policy was released in January. The latest version includes several changes demanded by the Undergraduate Assembly. Physiology Professor Martin Pring, who chairs Council's Committee on Communications, agreed to include the UA's proposed changes in the version of the policy placed before Council yesterday. The changes make it more difficult for administrators to read students' e-mail without their permission. University President Judith Rodin must approve Council's recommendations before the proposal takes effect. Also at yesterday's meeting, Provost Robert Barchi announced that the University has decided to accept recommendations made by the UA that students receiving financial aid be permitted to receive a waiver from their summer earnings requirement if they participate in a low- or non-paying public service or research internships. The policy, which goes into effect immediately, allows students to apply for a waiver for one summer during their undergraduate years at Penn. Current freshmen, sophomores and juniors must apply by May 15 to receive a waiver for upcoming summer plans. The newest version of the e-mail policy authorizes specified University officials to access a person's files or e-mail under certain conditions: "when there is a reasonable basis to believe" that doing so is necessary to comply with the law; will provide necessary information for an investigation of a violation of the law or University policy; is necessary to ensure the integrity of University computing systems; or may yield information needed to deal with an emergency. The previous version had required only a "good faith belief" before a search could be conducted, which the UA objected to, saying that the policy should use accepted legal terms in defining its protections. Another change applied only to the section of the policy governing students' privacy. The Office of Student Conduct was removed from the list of official University bodies authorized to approve searches, with the Vice Provost for University Life taking its place. The OSC is the main student judiciary body, and is responsible for hearing disciplinary cases. Many expressed concerns that the quasi-prosecutorial organization would have the right to decide when to read e-mail. The other changes require that the Office of the General Counsel keep a record of all authorized searches and shorten the length of time before the policy undergoes a review from two years to one. "We were just really ecstatic that the administration was so receptive to our concerns," said Undergraduate Assembly Chairman Michael Bassik, a College junior. "I think it's a real victory for the student body." With a quorum present for the first time this semester, the policy proposal was approved by a vote of 46 to zero, with no abstentions. About half of Council's 92 members attended yesterday's meeting in McClelland Hall, though not all of those in attendance participated in every vote. At least 37 members must be in attendance for official votes to take place. In its other major business of the meeting, Council approved five changes to its by-laws. The changes included revisions of rules that govern representation on Council's Steering Committee and the timing of Council's annual transition meeting.
Lorraine Sterritt, an associate dean at Harvard, will help coordinate a new advising system for freshmen. The College of Arts and Sciences announced yesterday that a Harvard University administrator has been appointed as the College's first dean of freshmen, a position created as part of the College's ongoing overhaul of its advising system. Lorraine Sterritt, Harvard's associate dean of freshmen for academic affairs, will take the position on July 1. Sterritt will be responsible for overseeing freshman advising, coordinating academic support services for freshmen and planning a newly expanded New Student Orientation in the College. The College has actively been planning changes to its advising system this semester, the results of which will be seen in a new, more comprehensive advising program for freshmen this fall. College Dean Richard Beeman explained that the dean of freshmen position was designed to have someone organize and implement the new system of advising. "By creating a high-level position? we're going to get advising in the College off to a good, strong start," Beeman said. Sterritt said she is looking forward to the opportunities her new position will provide. "I love freshmen," she said. "I really see the freshman year as a time when it's really important to get good advice." Sterritt, who has been at Harvard for four years and previously worked with freshmen and sophomores at Princeton University, said her new job will offer her the chance to further develop her work on freshman advising. "It builds on what I've already been doing at Harvard," she said. "I think it's going to be a great opportunity." Sterritt noted that she was pleased to find that a large number of faculty members in the College were interested in advising students, saying that she hopes "to be able to build on what already exists." Freshmen need "a real human being that they can sit down and talk with about academic matters," said Sterritt. She also emphasized the importance of supporting advisors and showing them how they can best help students with academic concerns. College Advising Director Diane Frey said Sterritt will serve as "a point person" for freshmen, getting in touch with students who might not otherwise be able to get the undivided attention of an administrator. "I think she'll have more time to do outreach to freshmen," Frey said, adding that "since there's no one person dealing with freshmen [now], we might not have heard all their concerns." Frey noted that while Sterritt will work primarily with freshmen in the College, she will also be involved with the other undergraduate schools. "It will be something of a work in progress," Frey said. "I'm sure good things will come out of it." Sterritt will report directly to Beeman and Deputy Provost Peter Conn. In addition to her administrative work with freshmen, Sterritt, who has a doctorate in French literature from Princeton, said she will teach one course a year in the Romance Languages Department, most likely on Renaissance French literature, which is her specialty.
The University's sweatshop task force met yesterday in preparation for its final recommendations on which of two rival organizations Penn should join to monitor the production of its logo apparel. Ad Hoc Committee on Sweatshop Labor Chairman Howard Kunreuther said the task force -- charged with advising University President Judith Rodin on sweatshop-related issues -- would likely release a statement by early next week. "We have been in touch with both groups," said Kunreuther, chairman of the Operations and Information Management Department. "We are now putting together a letter for President Rodin." In February, the committee recommended that Penn withhold its membership from both the Fair Labor Association and the Worker Rights Consortium until both groups responded to concerns about the representation afforded to colleges and universities on their governing boards. After being dissatisfied with the responses provided by both groups last month, the committee suggested that Penn continue to remain outside both the FLA and the WRC, and asked Rodin to contact the organizations again with Penn's concerns. Penn withdrew from the FLA in February following a nine-day sit-in by members of Penn Students Against Sweatshops, who favor the WRC, saying it is less influenced by corporate concerns. Representatives from the committee made a presentation to the FLA's board of directors last Thursday in which they outlined Penn's position, which called for more balanced representation for colleges and universities on the FLA board. FLA Executive Director Sam Brown called the meeting "useful and productive," saying that other FLA member schools had raised similar concerns about representation. The FLA currently allocates only one of the 13 seats on its board for a representative of its 134 member schools, with the other 12 seats divided among apparel companies and human rights groups. The WRC, which held its founding conference on April 7, allocates three of the 12 seats on its board to its 45 member schools, with three additional seats going to students from United Students Against Sweatshops and six seats to members of the WRC Advisory Council, which includes human rights and labor experts, politicians and university professors. WRC Coordinator Maria Roeper said yesterday that the WRC had not made a specific response to Rodin's most recent letter to the group, noting that the WRC denied Penn's request to send observers to the founding conference because only member schools' representatives were allowed to attend. At the conference, administrators from several schools expressed concerns about the composition of the WRC board, and a working group was created to look at possible changes.
A policy requiring notification if officials read e-mail was informally approved by University Council. After months of debate in University Council among faculty, staff, students and administrators, Penn may soon have an official policy governing the privacy of e-mail and other electronic information. A proposed electronic privacy policy was approved informally last month at a Council meeting that lacked a quorum. The proposal -- the third version brought before Council in as many months -- has been put out for public comment by Provost Robert Barchi through June 1. The new policy states that notification will always be made if someone's electronic privacy is violated and it outlines four conditions that must be met before any person's e-mail or computer files can be read by administrators. The four conditions apply to students, faculty and staff members, who had been given differing levels of protection in previous drafts of the policy. If the proposal is accepted, specified University officials will only be able to access a person's files or e-mail without consent if there is a "good faith belief" that doing so is required to comply with the law; if doing so may provide information needed for an investigation of a violation of law or school policy; if doing so is necessary to ensure the integrity of University computing systems; or if doing so may provide information needed to deal with an emergency. In the case of staff members only, a search of electronic data without consent may also take place if it will "yield information that is needed for the ordinary business of the University to proceed." The policy also would require that the person be notified "as soon as practicable" of the involuntary disclosure of information. Previous proposals had stated that students would "ordinarily" be notified when their e-mail was read, but did not guarantee notification. "Except as may otherwise be dictated by legal requirements, individuals will be notified of access to, or disclosure of, the contents of their e-mail, voice mail or their computer accounts as soon as practicable," the newest proposed policy states. Physiology Professor Martin Pring, who headed the effort to create a University-wide policy governing electronic privacy as chairman of Council's Committee on Communications, said that comments made at previous Council meetings this year helped the committee gain concessions from the general counsel's office for stronger policy protections. University attorneys had previously been hesitant to accept some of the stronger proposed protections because of the constraints they would place on the University's ability to act in many situations. "When University Council started asking the same questions [as the committee], it helped our argument considerably," Pring said, calling the latest version of the policy "substantially strengthened" from earlier drafts. Pring said he expects the policy to be approved and take effect this summer unless Barchi receives substantial negative comment before June 1. Because there was no quorum at the meeting, the majority of Council members present gave an informal approval to thepolicy, though several Council members still voiced some objections. On the recommendation of Council, a review of the privacy policy and its effectiveness will be made two years after it takes effect.
The labor monitoring organization now has 44 members schools. The Worker Rights Consortium held its official founding conference on Friday in New York, formally bringing into existence an organization that has been the subject of tremendous controversy at colleges and universities across the country. The meeting at Judson Memorial Church, near New York University's campus, brought together students and administrators from most of the WRC's 44 member colleges. Nearly all of those schools have joined in the past six weeks, which has seen a wave of protests urging colleges and universities to join the WRC. Penn has not joined the WRC, but withdrew its membership from a rival anti-sweatshop organization -- the Fair Labor Association -- in February after a nine-day sit-in by Penn Students Against Sweatshops, which opposes the FLA. Penn was the first school in the country to leave the FLA. Penn's Ad Hoc Committee on Sweatshop Labor, which is advising University President Judith Rodin on which of the two groups Penn should join, recommended two weeks ago that Rodin continue to withhold membership from both until they meet demands for increased representation for colleges and universities on their governing boards. At this point, nine of the 12 seats on the WRC's board -- including three student seats and six WRC Advisory Council seats -- have been filled. The three remaining seats will be held by representatives of member schools' administrations and will be decided on at a meeting of administrators in Chicago later this month. The FLA currently allocates only one of the 13 seats on its board to universities, with six seats going to apparel companies and six to human rights groups. According to WRC Coordinator Maria Roeper, Friday's four-hour meeting -- which was closed to the public and the media -- saw students, administrators and human rights experts involved with the WRC "airing concerns and having discussions and making sure that we're all at the same place." "People were nervous coming into this meeting," Roeper noted, saying that administrators and students from some schools came to the meeting with adversarial feelings after student-led protests on many campuses forced schools to join the WRC. At the conference, the WRC Advisory Council suggested the creation of four working groups of students and administrators to look at such issues as how factory information will be made public and how the WRC will work with human rights groups in developing countries to evaluate factory conditions. When several administrators at the meeting expressed concerns about the representation of universities on the WRC governing board, Roeper said, a decision was made to add a fifth working group to look at possible restructuring plans. The student members of the governing board -- elected nationally by USAS chapters at both WRC-member and non-member schools -- are Brown University student David Moore, University of Michigan student Peter Friedman and Purdue University graduate student Marikah Mancini. Brown and Michigan are WRC members, but Purdue is not. "The sense I got at the founding conference was one of collaboration" between students and administrators, Moore, a Brown junior, said yesterday, calling the decision to add the fifth working group on governing-board representation "phenomenally responsive." The six Advisory Board representatives include a Columbia University Law School professor, an officer of the AFL-CIO, a University of California labor policy specialist and a member of Congress. The FLA currently has more than 130 member schools, while the WRC has increased its membership in recent weeks to 44 schools, including the University of California system, which joined last week. Some schools have switched their membership from the FLA to the WRC, but others have retained membership in both groups. The WRC governing board is expected to hold its first regular meeting in June, when it may hear reports from several of the working groups.
Penn was disappointed by the FLA's and WRC's responses to its requests. After receiving responses deemed unsatisfactory from two rival sweatshop monitoring organizations, the University has decided to continue withholding its membership from both the Fair Labor Association and the Workers Rights Consortium. The Ad Hoc Committee on Sweatshop Labor recommended holding off on joining either organization after reading the FLA and WRC responses to a letter from University President Judith Rodin requesting greater representation of colleges and universities on each organization's governing board. In its initial report, released on February 28, the sweatshop committee had recommended that Penn withhold its membership from both organizations until each adequately addressed the committee's concerns about who sits on each organization's board. In a letter sent to Rodin last Thursday outlining the committee's latest recommendations, Chairman Howard Kunreuther, a professor of Operations and Information Management, said the committee was disappointed by the responses provided by the FLA and WRC. The letter stated that the FLA's promise to "take into consideration" greater university involvement with its governance "falls far short of our expectations." And Kunreuther called the WRC's response "promising," but said that it "fails to make a sufficiently firm commitment to address the composition of the governing board." As of yesterday, 35 colleges and universities had joined the WRC, while more than 130 had joined the FLA, with several joining both. The WRC will hold its official founding conference on Friday in New York, where several of its 12 board members will be elected. The organization promised that at least half of the board -- three students and three university representatives -- will involve colleges in some way. The other six members will come from the WRC Advisory Council, which includes academics, politicians and worker-rights experts from around the world. The FLA's board currently has six apparel industry representatives, six representatives from human rights groups and one representative from member colleges and universities. Penn had been a member of the FLA until February, when Rodin agreed to withdraw from it after a 10-day sit-in in her office by members of Penn Students Against Sweatshops. In a letter sent to Kunreuther last Friday, Rodin said she agreed with the committee's assessment of the FLA and WRC responses and had sent letters to both groups explaining Penn's disappointment with their answers to her original requests. Rodin said she would ask for the committee's help again after receiving the next set of responses from the FLA and WRC. In her letters to the groups, Rodin asked the WRC to permit Penn to send two observers to the founding conference on Friday and requested that the FLA allow a Penn representative to speak at its governing board's April meeting. But WRC Coordinator Maria Roeper said yesterday that non-member schools will not be permitted to send any representatives to the WRC's conference on Friday. "We've been saying all along that we can't accommodate observers," Roeper said. "We've told Penn that before and it's not going to change." PSAS member Miriam Joffe-Block, a College senior, said two Penn students will attend the conference as representatives of United Students Against Sweatshops, but will not represent the Penn administration. FLA Executive Director Sam Brown would not comment on whether a Penn representative could attend his group's next board meeting, but said he was disappointed that Penn declined to rejoin the FLA at this time. "I think it's a mistake," he said, noting that college-logo apparel accounts for less than 1 percent of all clothing production. "It seems to me that universities should have an interest in that broader world."
New software enables profs to create highly interactive class Web sites for students. Penn professors are starting to throw away their chalk and erasers in favor of a new kind of blackboard. Using a commercial software product called "Blackboard" that the University is pushing faculty to use, professors can create sites that allow students to access class information and assignments, hold group discussions, take electronic exams and monitor their grades online. Blackboard was first unveiled last semester, when a small number of courses made use of it, primarily in the School of Arts and Sciences and the Engineering School. Classical Studies Professor Joseph Farrell, the faculty director of distributed learning for SAS, has spent the past two semesters working to get SAS faculty members interested in using Blackboard for teaching their courses. The program is designed to be user-friendly so that even professors unfamiliar with programming can design Web sites, he noted. Every SAS department has held a faculty-training meeting to make information about Blackboard more widely available, and Farrell said he hopes every department will have at least one or two courses utilizing the resource next semester. Blackboard Web sites are pre-formatted, allowing professors to add relevant course materials and use as many or as few features as they choose, as well as make a limited number of design changes, like changing color schemes. Students in courses using Blackboard must log in using a password to the course's Web site to use most of its features, allowing online class discussions and other private areas of the site to be protected from public view. In a Penn survey of students who used Blackboard in their courses last semester, 83 percent of respondents said the use of the program had enhanced their class in some way. Almost all of the nearly 400 students surveyed said they found the program to be user-friendly, while about two-thirds of those surveyed said they would like more of their professors to make use of the software. Farrell said the positive student reaction to Blackboard "was much more enthusiastic than we had even hoped for." At a training session for the Anthropology Department earlier this month, several professors in attendance said they planned to use Blackboard for their courses in the future. One of the features that most interested those in attendance was the software's ability to place course materials like readings and photos online, eliminating the need for course bulkpacks. These types of readings can be placed in the restricted areas of the Web sites accessible only by enrolled students, Farrell noted, avoiding problems like copyright violations. "Its a little less personal in some ways," said Engineering junior Ben Williams, who uses Blackboard to chat with classmates from a poetry class taught by English Professor Al Filreis. But he also noted that discussions via the Web site were "not as intimidating" as speaking in class. Farrell said he has found the program to be very useful in teaching one of his own poetry courses, "Horace," this semester. Students did not have to purchase any books or bulkpacks for the class because all of their assigned readings were on the Web, Farrell said. Students in his class take online quizzes based on the readings, he said, and can then keep track of their grades automatically using a personal information feature provided by Blackboard. "I can't imagine ever wanting to teach a course without [Blackboard] ever again," Farrell said.
In the six weeks since members of Penn Students Against Sweatshops ended their 10-day sit-in at University President Judith Rodin's office, Penn has continued -- in quieter fashion -- to consider which of two major factory-monitoring organizations best meets the University's needs. Penn withdrew from the Fair Labor Association last month in response to PSAS's sit-in demands and is currently a member of neither the FLA nor the rival Worker Rights Consortium, the group favored by PSAS. At the sit-in's close, Rodin promised to re-evaluate the merits of both organizations. She also said she would withhold a final decision about membership pending recommendations from the Ad Hoc Committee on Sweatshop Labor. In a report released on February 29, the sweatshop committee recommended to Rodin that the University not sign on to either of the groups until they both responded to requests for greater representation for colleges and universities on their governing boards. Rodin has received responses from the FLA and WRC to letters she sent earlier this month asking that both organizations provide greater representation. The committee met yesterday to discuss the responses. It plans to issue recommendations later this week on how the University should proceed. Wharton sophomore Brian Kelly, a PSAS member who serves on the sweatshop labor committee, said both the FLA and WRC offered "very political responses." "The organizations, especially the FLA, are proving what we have been complaining about," Kelly said, adding that the responses were indicative of the groups' bureaucratic natures. In an effort to keep their cause in the public eye, PSAS members have been distributing information on Locust Walk since last Thursday. PSAS members have passed out fliers headlined, "It's not over yet!" that say that the sweatshop task force agreed with several of the group's criticisms of the FLA. The flier accuses Penn's administration of "trying to rejoin the FLA before these problems are resolved" and urges students to e-mail Rodin and demand that the University join only the WRC. Kelly said many PSAS members received inquiries from students after last month's sit-in ended asking whether the group had stopped its work, so PSAS decided to set up a table on the Walk. The group will also be holding a "sew-out," featuring a mock sweatshop, on College Green Thursday night to protest in solidarity with demonstrators at other universities. Kelly also said that the WRC -- which had four member schools when PSAS began its sit-in at Rodin's office on February 7 -- now has more than 20 members.
It has been nearly eight months since a new policy designed to change the social culture at Penn and prevent alcohol-related tragedies went into effect. And those behind the ambitious plan say that while they believe the University is on the right track, the policy remains a work in progress. The policy was created after the death of 1994 College graduate Michael Tobin following a night of drinking at an annual Phi Gamma Delta reunion. Tobin fell to his death down a flight of stairs behind the FIJI house a year ago this week. After five weeks of discussions, a provost-led task force submitted a 10-page report to University President Judith Rodin, who approved the recommendations in full last summer. Now, administrators and students are looking at ways to better achieve their stated goals, even if it means altering parts of the policy. "We are not wedded to any of these specifics -- we are wedded to the overall goal," said Provost Robert Barchi, emphasizing that the policy still cannot be fully evaluated after just one year. The current policy outlines stricter rules for monitoring parties and the distribution of alcohol at registered undergraduate events. It also proposes a wide range of non-alcoholic social and educational programming. After more than a semester under the new rules, there is a general consensus among administrators and student leaders that the policy has provided more social options and better enforcement of alcohol rules. But there are definitely a few kinks to work out. The BYOB rules outlined in the policy have proved largely ineffective. And certain social options, such as bringing a bowling alley to campus, have not yet come to pass. Administrators stress that the policy is still a work in progress and changes will be made as needed. Barchi -- who last year headed and continues to lead the Working Group on Alcohol Abuse -- said changes to the policy are appropriate because it was designed to be a working, evolving set of regulations and guidelines. "The idea here was to try to change the culture at Penn towards drinking," Barchi said. "The goal was never to create a policy that was going to last forever. We said from the very beginning that this is going to be an incremental process." Over the next year, several components of the policy may be modified, as administrators review some of the alcohol restrictions and work to fulfill more of the social programming goals. First on the list of changes is the current rule that requires alcohol to be brought to registered events on a BYOB basis, which has proven to be ineffective at limiting alcohol at parties. "The BYOB policy is one area that is a good example of an element that was put in place for a good reason but turns out to be relatively impractical to implement," Barchi said. Barchi said the BYOB policy will likely be reviewed in coming months, as well as the practice of using tickets to redeem drinks from bartenders at parties. Alcohol Policy Coordinator Stephanie Ives said the policy's implementation has gone very well in general, with students demonstrating a willingness to comply with the new University regulations. "I think the rest of the policy looks pretty solid," she said. "The increased social options have been very successful." The BYOB situation will most likely be discussed this summer, she said, with a decision in place before the start of the fall semester. A related provision in the alcohol policy requiring that registered parties have trained bartenders may also be revisited in the near future, according to Undergraduate Assembly Chairman Michael Silver, a member of the Alcohol Rapid Response Team, a committee of student leaders which meets periodically to discuss alcohol issues with the provost. Many fraternities have been reluctant to use the bartenders trained by the University because of their high costs, he said, preferring to use other licensed bartenders instead. Incentives are being considered that could be used to encourage increased use of University-trained bartenders, Silver said, noting that these bartenders "were trained according to the rules of the alcohol policy." InterFraternity Council Executive Vice President John Buchanan, a College junior and ARRT member, agreed that it is "easier on the fraternities" to have bartenders familiar with University rules at their parties, but noted that the $25 per hour charged for each University-trained bartender is "a fairly significant expense" when fraternities can have licensed students tend their bars for less money. "Another compromise can be reached where we have trained bartenders behind the bar instead of students," Buchanan said. "I respect the University wanting to have trained people behind the bar." Regulating alcohol consumption at parties, however, wasn't the only recommendation to combat alcohol abuse made by the WGAA in its report last spring. The group recommended that the University arrange for increased non-alcoholic social options for students late at night. Programs organized by college houses and student groups have been a part of the implementation of these recommendations, but the University has also been working to bring businesses to University City that will allow students to have a wider range of late-night entertainment. "When we start talking about entertainment options? we're working on that right now," said Vice President for Business Services Leroy Nunery. The opening of the Perelman Quadrangle this summer will be "a huge plus" in providing more options for students, Nunery said. Surveys have shown that students are interested in having an expansion of the types of entertainment available to them, he added. "People particularly were interested in places where they could play pool [and] bowl," Nunery said. Though he said the University is working on bringing new business to campus, Nunery noted that projects like building a bowling alley require a considerable amount of space, among other expenses. "We had some early discussions about [bowling]," he said, including talks with a leading national producer of bowling alleys. "I think it would be a very attractive option." However, Nunery stressed that Penn must "utilize the assets we already have" by focusing on efforts like those of the Vice Provost for University Life to create more non-alcoholic student programs. "You can't just throw money at it" with new businesses, he said. "You have to make sure that, on a broad scale, [change] happens."
The position, as advertised, would involve coordinating advising and programs for first-year students. The College of Arts and Sciences will soon hire a new staff member to serve as the "dean of freshmen," a position created as part of the College's ongoing advising overhaul. The post will involve coordinating advising efforts, the expanded New Student Orientation and many other programs for the benefit of first-year students, School of Arts and Sciences Dean Samuel Preston said yesterday. The dean of freshmen will "serve as an advocate for freshmen in the College office," Preston said and will organize freshmen advising and academic-development programs. The position was created as a result of a reorganization of the current College advising staff, he said, which is part of the College's efforts to integrate the many parts of its now-fragmented advising system. Preston noted that all freshmen will remain within the College's regular advising system, though their activities will be coordinated by the new dean. "There will not be a separate staff of advisors for freshmen," he said. The dean of freshmen will also be responsible for organizing NSO in the College and for overseeing the creation of handbooks for incoming freshmen and their parents. The Council of Undergraduate Deans voted earlier this semester to expand NSO from four days to seven, allowing an expanded academic advising component to be added. The dean of freshmen will only be responsible for coordinating academic and advising programs for first-year students, Preston said, after which responsibility for the students will fall under the regular advising coordinators. Preston said the deanship is similar to ones that exist at undergraduate colleges in several other universities. The new dean of freshmen will report to College Dean Richard Beeman and Deputy Provost Peter Conn, according to an advertisement placed in The Chronicle of Higher Education announcing the position. Preston said that although a national search is being conducted to fill the position, both internal and external candidates are being considered. He expects the position to be filled within the next month, allowing the new dean to have time to prepare plans for the fall semester. Applications for the job will be accepted until April 15. According to the advertisement for the position, candidates must have at least a master's degree in a field that is taught in the College and a minimum of five years of "significant and progressively responsible experience in an undergraduate college program."
School officials said offers have already been made to 18 prospective faculty members. Departments in the School of Arts and Sciences are planning to hire as many as 40 new faculty members by the end of the semester, school officials said last week. SAS Dean Samuel Preston said the hirings will be focused mainly in the departments targeted in the SAS Strategic Plan released last spring -- Biology, Economics, English, History, Political Science and Psychology -- with each acquiring as many as four new faculty members, including junior and senior professors. The strategic plan specified these six departments as ones deserving increased faculty appointments and funding. Offers have already been made to 18 prospective faculty members, Preston said, with more expected in the next few weeks. Each candidate must be approved by a series of committees and administrators, with final approval granted by the Provost's Staff Conference, which generally makes decisions through the middle of May. Preston said it is unlikely that all 40 authorized positions will be filled, adding that he would be "very happy" if 32 new professors were hired. The Political Science Department, which has struggled in recent years to recruit senior faculty members, is working to recruit as many as four senior professors and one junior professor this year, according to Chairman Ian Lustick. "We're recruiting in many areas, but primarily in American politics and political theory this year," he said. "In every one of our sub-fields, we want to add strength." He said the department is making an offer to an "outstanding" junior professor in political theory. And Preston added that the department is "pursuing vigorously three senior faculty members," still noting that ultimately they may hire "as many as four and as few as zero." The small size of Penn's Political Science faculty -- with fewer than two dozen professors -- makes it difficult to recruit senior professors who are looking to join faculties with many colleagues in their own area of specialization, Lustick said. "We have been very successful in recruiting people at the junior level," he noted. He said he hoped to get more junior-level authorizations in the future to build on this strength. The Political Science Department hired three new faculty members last year, including two senior professors. Last week, JosZ Antonio Cheibub, a junior professor, announced he would leave for Yale University this fall. Cheibub said the department was not recruiting enough new faculty in his specialty -- comparative politics -- while Yale has brought in several new professors over the past few years. The Chemistry Department, which until last year had faced difficulties in recruiting senior professors, is recruiting one senior faculty member and no junior professors this year. Chemistry Chairman Hai-Lung Dai said the department, which has 32 faculty members, currently has one candidate under serious consideration, adding, "We are not at the stage of offers yet." The department hired two senior and two junior professors last year and has not lost any of its faculty members to other universities in the past three years, Dai said. The Economics Department is looking to recruit as many as five faculty members this year, though Acting Economics Department Chairman Kenneth Wolpin noted that tough competition for senior professors with other schools may mean that fewer than five will be hired. "We currently have three senior offers out," he said. "All of the senior people we have offers out to have offers from other institutions." Two offers have been made for junior professorships, and one has been accepted by a recent doctoral graduate from the University of Wisconsin specializing in international trade. The Economics Department will not see any faculty departures this year, though it almost lost Professor Frank Diebold, a senior faculty member, to New York University's Stern School of Business earlier this year. After initially accepting an offer from NYU, Diebold decided to stay at Penn. And History Department Chairwoman Lynn Hollen Lees said her department is planning to recruit as many as two junior and two senior professors this year, some in conjunction with other SAS departments. The department has already made a long-term arrangement for Roger Chartier, a professor at the Ecole des Hautes Etude en Sciences Sociales in Paris, to be the Annenberg Visiting Professor of History starting next year. Chartier, an expert in early-modern French cultural history, will divide his time between Paris and Philadelphia for the first few years of his appointment.
Penn will hold off on joining a monitoring group until certain conditions are met. University President Judith Rodin agreed yesterday to accept in full the recommendations that the Ad Hoc Committee on Sweatshop Labor released this week. The committee recommended that Penn join one or both of the factory-monitoring organizations for school-logo apparel -- the Fair Labor Association and the Worker Rights Consortium -- if the groups agree to give greater representation on their boards of directors to academic institutions. Penn is currently a member of neither organization after withdrawing from the FLA two weeks ago. Members of Penn Students Against Sweatshops demanded in a nine-day sit-in last month that the University leave the FLA in favor of the WRC, which they believe is less beholden to corporate interests. The WRC currently has about 12 schools on board, including five that joined this week. The FLA has more than 130 colleges and universities among its members. Rodin said yesterday that she is sending letters to both groups requesting greater representation for colleges and universities and "would be very surprised if they didn't seek our response readily." "Certainly one representative on the FLA is not sufficient, and so we would like to see their response," she said. "And the same from the WRC, that indeed has more college and university representation, but not in the committee's opinion -- and not in mine -- a sufficient amount." The fledgling WRC currently plans to allocate about one fourth of its board seats to academic institutions. In the recommendations, the committee noted that it hopes for a speedy response from the WRC and the FLA, especially because the WRC founding conference will be on April 7. "I agree, as you suggest, that it would be in [workers'] best interests if we could work with both the Fair Labor Association and the Worker Rights Consortium if they respectively agree to balanced representation of colleges and universities on their governing boards," Rodin wrote in a letter to Howard Kunreuther, the committee's chairman. In the letter, Rodin said she will ask the committee for further advice on how to proceed after receiving responses from the FLA and WRC. Rodin's decision comes after several weeks marked by anti-sweatshop protests at schools across the country. More than 300 students at Yale University rallied on Tuesday, asking their administration to leave the FLA and join the WRC. PSAS member Susan Casey, a College of General Studies student and member of the Penn task force, said she was not surprised by Rodin's decision to accept all of the committee's recommendations. However, Casey emphasized that the committee's work was just the first step in a long-term process. She said she would prefer that the University join the WRC and withhold its membership from the FLA until the FLA agrees to more than just changes in the way it is controlled. "There are so many issues that are more important," she said. "I don't know that I'm necessarily happy about the fact that she is taking up these recommendations." Casey added committee members' decisions to vote for the group's final report "doesn't necessarily mean that everybody's real happy with it," but that she thought the code of conduct for apparel manufacturers included in the committee's report was very strong. Religious Studies Department Chairman Stephen Dunning, another committee member, said he was pleased by Rodin's decision, noting that the committee worked very hard to create its recommendations. Dunning said the long-term recommendations of the committee, especially its plan to set up a committee of students, faculty and staff members to "monitor the monitors," were more important than its short-term suggestions. "Both organizations look like they are subject to being controlled by interests" other than the factory workers, he said -- the FLA by corporations and the WRC by the unions that helped start it. "The groups present very different advantages," Dunning noted, adding that committee members all agreed on the basic ideas behind ending sweatshop abuses but had specific concerns about each monitoring group's effectiveness. The code of conduct included as a part of the committee's final report will undergo a period of public review for comment through March 22 and will be formally presented to University Council by Rodin on March 24.
JosZ Antonio Cheibub will leave at the end of the semester for Yale U. The already embattled Political Science Department, which has been struggling in recent years to recruit new professors, will face the loss of another of its junior faculty members next year. Professor JosZ Antonio Cheibub, who specializes in comparative politics and Latin American politics, will leave Penn's faculty at the end of the semester to join the Political Science Department at Yale University. Cheibub said yesterday that Yale "made a good offer for me to work there," calling the move "a good professional opportunity." He noted that Penn's recruitment problems in recent years have left its Political Science Department behind that of many peer institutions. "It's just a better department," he said of Yale's Political Science Department, adding that it has hired several comparative politics specialists during the past few years. Despite the ongoing difficulties the department has faced, Ian Lustick, the chairman of Penn's Political Science Department, said Cheibub's loss is "not going to be a major problem." The department currently plans to hire one junior faculty member this year, he said, and the loss of Cheibub means that one more assistant professor in comparative politics will need to be hired next year. "We are going to be recruiting in comparative politics next year, which we didn't think we were going to do," Lustick said. Lustick added that the department's biggest difficulties have been in its recruitment of senior faculty members -- not junior ones, who he said have typically been easier to bring to Penn. The Political Science Department may use the new opportunity to recruit someone with expertise in European politics, which some department members feel is a weak area right now, Lustick noted. However, Cheibub, who is currently in his fifth year at Penn, said he felt the department had been ignoring hirings for junior faculty positions in recent years, especially in the area of comparative politics. "They haven't recruited in this area for some time," Cheibub said. "Penn isn't hiring enough assistant professors," he added. "They are trying to recruit senior faculty." Cheibub will continue as a junior faculty member at Yale. The Political Science Department has been hit by several resignations, retirements and failed tenure bids over the past three years and has struggled to find replacements to fill its depleted faculty. Last year, the department received an added boost when it landed three new faculty members -- one full professor, one tenured associate professor and one assistant professor. In a strategic plan unveiled last spring, the School of Arts and Sciences named the Political Science Department as deserving of increased faculty appointments, calling for the department to be provided with more funding in the next several years.
Every student government group, except for SCUE, will receive increased funding. The Undergraduate Assembly last night passed a $1.1 million student government budget for the 2000-2001 academic year, a 3.9 percent increase over last year's UA funding, and also approved two funding requests for upcoming student events. Items in the budget include funding for Spring Fling, increased finances for the Social Planning and Events Committee To Represent Undergraduate Minorities and a subsidy to give student groups dolphin server accounts free of charge. The budget -- which includes all money given to the UA, the Nominations and Elections Committee, the Student Committee on Undergraduate Education, the Social Planning and Events Committee, the Student Activities Council and the four class boards -- is generally increased each year in proportion to the increase in University tuition. But the UA plans to request more funding from the University to give additional funding to SAC for advertising and other expenses. The 27 voting UA members in attendance at last night's meeting voted unanimously to approve the budget of $1,105,906. Five members of the body were absent. Every student government group will receive increased funding next year except for SCUE, which requested less money this year than last year. Additionally, the Senior Class Board will not receive a $15,000 grant to subsidize the senior formal that it had in previous years and the UA itself will cut its operating costs. UA leaders said they decided to remove the $15,000 subsidy for the senior formal because the event lasts only three hours and is open only to seniors. UA Treasurer Michael Bassik said the resulting $9 increase in ticket price "shouldn't hurt the event that much, in terms of sales" and noted that the UA will provide $500 for a trip to Manayunk, offer a larger loan to pay for senior formal expenses and reduce by $1,000 the senior class's own contribution to its budget to make up for the lost $15,000 in funding. Some of the money saved from the removal of the subsidy will go to SPEC-TRUM, which will receive new funding with $6,250 to fund a comedy show -- it sponsored a Def Comedy Jam show last December with help from the UA -- $2,250 for a Kwanzaa celebration and $1,000 for a CASA Carribean party, as well as additional funding for its annual Penn Relays concert. Included in the UA's operations budget for next year is $6,500 to subsidize student group accounts on the University's dolphin server, which will for the first time cost each group $17 per year to maintain. The $6,500 includes enough funding to pay for the continuation of all current dolphin e-mail accounts and the creation of about 20 new accounts next year. Bassik said SAC had been concerned that student groups would join SAC just to have their dolphin fees paid next year, so the UA "decided we would pre-empt it" by paying for the dolphin accounts itself. UA leaders said last night that they are lobbying University administrators to provide more than the minimum 3.9 percent budget increase this year in order to give additional funding to SAC. Bassik noted after the meeting that costs for student government groups have risen during the past year due to increased facilities-use costs, the increased costs of Daily Pennsylvanian advertisements and SAC's recent decision to provide funding to a cappella groups. Also at last night's meeting, the members present voted unanimously to provide $2,000 in funding for an April 5 concert featuring an Israeli rock star and $256 to the United Minorities Council for an affirmative action rally later this semester. At the end of its meeting, the UA debated a proposed change to its attendance policy which would require that UA members be automatically removed from their seats after missing more than 25 percent of UA meetings in any given semester, regardless of their reason for being absent. Though the body initially appeared to pass the change to its bylaws, which would not take effect until after this year's UA elections, a voting discrepancy discovered after the meeting ended led UA leaders to nullify the vote. The body will vote on the measure again next week.