This brings to a conclusion my ideas, begun in Wednesday's issue of The Dartmouth ("11 Ideas for a Better Dartmouth," May 11).
6) Make an Off-campus Program obligatory: According to Provost Barry Scherr, each year only 600-700 undergraduates participate in off-campus academic programs. Given that some students pursue more than one program, barely half of all undergraduates take advantage of the College's off-campus opportunities during their four years here. Dartmouth should make one LSA or FSP term mandatory for all undergraduates. This requirement, certainly justifiable pedagogically, would reduce the number of students in Hanover and go a long way toward solving the dorm housing shortage. In light of this benefit, the College should provide supplementary financial aid to assist students for whom these off-campus programs are prohibitively expensive. Additionally, the faculty would need to work to improve the quality of many off-campus programs. Too often, they are not viewed by students as "real" Dartmouth terms. Annual Cost: $500,000.
7) Increase summer enrollment: Only 1100-1200 students attend summer term, whereas an average of 3,800 students are on-campus in the fall and spring. Correcting this imbalance somewhat would also reduce dorm overcrowding in Hanover.
Departments would need to expand their course offerings significantly to make the summer term more attractive, and the College could provide tuition incentives to encourage attendance for a second summer term. Former Trustee Peter Fahey and the Student Life Initiative both have suggested this commonsense idea. Annual Cost: $500,000.
8) Ensure dorm continuity: When College President James Wright speaks publicly about the "disconnect" between students and the College that has developed over the last 20 years, he need look no further for an explanation than the lack of dorm housing continuity ("An Old Tradition Failed," Sept. 27, 2004). Familiarity breeds friendship in my experience. The College should make it the highest of all priorities that students, if they choose, be able to live in the same dorm for all four of their years at the College instead of bouncing from dorm to dorm when they come and go from Hanover. The construction of new dorms and my previous proposals for reducing campus overcrowding make this a feasible goal.
Tightly knit dorm communities composed of all classes would smooth the arrival of incoming freshmen and lessen the need for administrative hand-holding. In fact, if dorm continuity were reinstated, the costly and much-ridiculed community directors would no longer be needed; supportive dorm communities grow naturally when students live in the same dorm for many years. Annual Cost: significant savings and freed-up dorm space.
9) Grow and shape the Greek system: The Administration should at long last admit that its endless war on the fraternity/sorority system has failed. Despite the 1977 Epperson Resolution, the Wright Report of 1987, and the SLI in 2000, the Greek system is stronger than ever. The students have spoken. The Administration should shift gears and accept once and for all that fraternities and sororities are an integral part of Dartmouth College life. Let's encourage the ones that we have and allow more of them.
The College already gives $10,000 in awards for positive behavior by Greek organizations. This program is a good start; the next step should be to truly embrace the fraternity/sorority system and guide it with a series of even more substantial rewards. As history professor Jere Daniell can describe in detail, the fraternities were central to the College's cultural life in the 1920's and the 1950's. They can be again, if guided and encouraged by creative deans and the right incentives. Annual Cost: $100,000.
10) Have Student Assembly play a meaningful role in shaping academic life: Each year, Assembly should prepare a State of the College report that details student concerns about the quality of Dartmouth's undergraduate academic program -- not just student social life.
Drafts of the report should be made public throughout the year so that students may comment on it, and the report should be supported by the results of broad surveys. Anecdotal student complaints about waitlists and overcrowding in columns in The Dartmouth should not substitute for clearly expressed suggestions for reform. The Student Assembly, as the elected representative of the undergraduate student body, should speak publicly to the Administration about academic issues. Annual Cost: negligible.
11) Reduce administrative costs: The Administration should provide a detailed description of the changes over time in the number of deans and the size of the administrative arm of the College: how many deans and administrators did Dartmouth need 10 and 20 years ago to administer the lives of 4,200 undergraduates? How many are there today? And what do they cost?
We should be able to debate in an informed way whether we need all of the Administration's new deans and administrators. When the growth in the number of bureaucrats has been laid bare, along with a clear description of their costs, the necessary actions will be evident ("The Administrative Life Initiative," April 2, 2004). Annual Savings: $3,000,000, if the Administration budget is cut 10 percent -- far more than enough to fund all of the changes that I have proposed.
Conclusion: Change is necessary to reverse the decline in the quality of undergraduate life that has occurred over the last two decades and for Dartmouth to begin to move forward again. However, in all likelihood, a series of administrators will reply that these ideas are financially unfeasible.
Of course, we can't test the latter point because we are not privy to the budget, but I believe that the Wright Administration can more than afford these substantive steps if it imposes honest budget rigor on itself.
Additionally, these changes will immeasurably assist the 160 employees of the Development Office in their discussions with alumni, especially the large number of disaffected alums who have abandoned their college over the last 20 years.
Rather than continually being obliged to play damage control ("Dear Old Dartmouth," Feb. 28), Dartmouth fundraisers will find their work immeasurably easier when they are able to show alumni actual progress in the measures that should represent Dartmouth's true goals: excellent residential life, the smallest average class size in the Ivy League, the most courses per student, no waiting lists for classes, the best academic support and the closest cooperation between students and faculty.
I have no doubt that the alumni will respond to an effort to return the College to its undergraduate roots. Come to think of it, when the trustee election results are announced on May 13, you will see that they already have.
