With the possible exception of reducing the number of support staffers in less popular departments, academic departments should remain untouched. The thought of making any cuts in academic areas is troubling, particularly in light of the administration's seeming reluctance to significantly reduce funding to or eliminate organizations like the Office of Pluralism and Leadership, whose purpose is peripheral to the academic mission of the College.
--Christian Kiely '09
I am concerned about the College's decision to cut course offerings. In comparison to its peer instituions, Dartmouth's small size already makes it difficult to offer a large number of courses. The College should do its best to maintain the breadth and depth of its curriculum.
--Tina Praprotnik '09
It would be naive to think Dartmouth could escape one of the largest global economic recessions in history without cutting the academic budget. The administration's decision not to target smaller programs, however, seems irrational. Budget cuts to less popular academic departments will naturally affect a smaller proportion of the student body. By cutting from both large and small academic departments, the administration fails to minimize the impact of these budget cuts on the Dartmouth student body.
--Kevin Niparko '12
I agree with The Dartmouth Editorial Board that courses that consistently garner poor ratings should be cut first, if that is not the practice already. At this point, all departments should be on the table for cost-cutting examination, even those that don't need to justify their existence.
--Nathan Bruschi '10
Making more than nominal cuts to academic departments is unacceptable. Dartmouth is an academic institution, first and foremost. Streamlining courses by not having unfamiliar professors teach them makes sense, but the enrollment numbers in a class do not do justice to how valuable it is to the overall Dartmouth experience.
--Tom Mandel '11
The administration would do well to eliminate bureaucratic waste, but that's where the cuts should stop. Cut sports, dining or orientation festivities, but leave our educational foundation intact. I'd rather see our dorms all look like the River cluster than see our academics suffer.
--Spenser Menstel '11
I do think academic cuts are permissible, but only if they affect the right departments. The College can and should eliminate major departments that can be subsumed into other departments, like Native American Studies or Women's and Gender Studies. One can study Native American culture in the history or anthropology departments, just as one can study the literature of feminism in the English department.
--Peter Blair '12
While the College's extracurricular organizations certainly add to the Dartmouth experience, we must keep in mind that our school is first and foremost an academic institution. Budget cuts to the academic departments should be secondary to cuts made to other aspects of student life. This approach is highly democratic and cost-effective, as academics is virtually the only aspect of Dartmouth life that affects every student equally.
--Blair Sullivan '10
Our institution would be in a sorry state if the only courses offered were general, generic classes that hundreds of students were interested in taking, but it doesn't seem plausible that removing two courses out of 80, as, for example, the history department must do, will put Dartmouth in such a position. The cuts provide an opportunity for departments to reevalute which courses are successfully furthering their students' Dartmouth educations and which are not.
-- Emily Johnson '12
