Dean's Column: Looking Back & Looking Forward

The Commentator editors have asked me to write about how Yeshiva College has changed in the three years since I arrived in Washington Heights and what we can expect in the future.  The perspective that I present below is my personal view of the changes, ideas that have become reality, things that did not work out as planned, my hopes for the near future, and my dreams for what the College will become.

When I arrived on campus in June 2006 as Dean of YC, I saw tremendous potential and nowhere to go but up. Those students here in Fall 2006 saw a Dean’s Office on the first floor of Furst Hall that was reminiscent of a 1950’s high school principal’s office.  The offices were furnished in what appeared to be discount store furniture.  Two to four professors occupied each faculty office and the offices were furnished with what appeared to be war surplus hand-me-downs.  By the middle of the Fall 2006 term, the YC Dean’s Office and much of the YC faculty moved into the newly renovated fifth floor in Belfer Hall.  The remaining offices in Furst Hall were refurbished for individual members of the faculty. This change signified that the University was ready to view the faculty as a group of professionals. 

In turn, this professionalization signaled to the College’s faculty and administration that our interactions with students must also be different. In the Dean’s Office, we strive to schedule appointments for students rather than have students wait around the office to see a dean, we try to advise students of deadlines well before their arrival, and we work hard to avoid sending students from office to office to resolve issues. Your YC professors no longer recycle old exams, and if they do use questions from the past, they ensure access to the older material to all students. These are but a few examples of the changes. While we are not yet perfect, I am proud of the progress we have made.

Since the most important interactions between students and the College are through contact with faculty, we have been working hard to develop the type of faculty our students deserve: faculty who are scholars in their field, serious about teaching, and who care about their students.  While the composition of the faculty changes slowly as a result of the tenure system that is traditional in the American academy, our faculty has been evolving both by growth and by careful review of its non-tenure-stream members. Over the past few years, we have witnessed significant growth in the Departments of Jewish History, Psychology, Sociology, Mathematics, Philosophy, Biology, Chemistry, Bible, English, and in the foreign languages.  Our newest department, Languages, Literatures and Cultures, emphasizes our commitment to the importance of modern and classical languages, including French, Spanish, Latin, Greek, Yiddish, Arabic and other Semitic languages.  These departments are now among our strongest, where just a few years ago, several of these were among the weakest.  We were fortunate to do extensive faculty hiring during my first year on campus, and my hope had been that this would continue at the same pace for at least five years.  Alas, we live in a world in which our financial resources have not allowed this to continue as planned and our faculty hiring decreased rapidly over the next two years. This is one of my personal disappointments.  Nonetheless, YC continues to put the hiring of tenure-stream faculty as one of its major goals: even in the present challenging financial climate, we have hired two new tenure-stream professors. 

I have been working with the Provost to encourage the faculty to evolve in another way:  that is, to prioritize scholarship.  While there were already a number of outstanding, active scholars on the faculty three years ago, all of the new tenure-stream faculty members were appointed with a mandate to be strong scholars in their respective fields.  Under my administration, we redesigned the faculty award system to encourage active scholarship.  Examination of the leading colleges and universities around the country shows that schools with scholar-teacher faculties are consistently ranked as the best in the country.  Why is this so?  To active scholars, their subject is not something they have simply studied in depth long ago, but it is a living, breathing part of their lives now.  Active scholars also play an important role in bringing students into their scholarly work – both in and out of the classroom.  This is another form of teaching.  No member of the faculty will receive tenure without a strong scholarly portfolio and recognition within his or her field -- yet at the same time, no member of the faculty will receive tenure if his or her teaching is inadequate.  Strong teaching alone does not justify tenure; poor teaching will preclude it.  To better measure teaching performance, we have redesigned (and automated) our teaching evaluation system.  Every evaluation that you write is read by your professor, by his or her department chair, and by a dean -- we are especially sensitive to comments that we hear multiple times.

During the past few years, we have been experimenting with new approaches to how we teach.  A pet project of mine was the introduction of tutorials, in which a very small group of students is guided in its study of a subject rather than being taught in a classroom setting. While I still believe that this is an excellent approach, this experiment was not the unqualified success that I had hoped it would be.  The difficulty was simply that this required more faculty resources than we currently have.  I am glad we did the experiment and look forward to reviving it when the faculty is able to grow again.  (My philosophy is that if you never fail, you are not reaching far enough!)  Other experiments have exceeded our expectations.  For example, two years ago, we introduced an alternative approach to English composition, where an English composition class was combined with a topic in some other discipline.  This six credit class combined composition with art,science, sociology, history, or music.  These successful classes have led us to reshape the entire future of writing instruction in the new curriculum that will be unveiled next academic year.  Another experiment that we began last year was to make sure that IBC classes that count towards YC requirements are at the same level as those taught in the afternoon.  This was accomplished by having YCfaculty teach these classes.  Although it is still early, this experiment appears to be a success, as indicated by the fact that it is in its second year and is supported by IBC’s new leaders.  Other advances in instruction include the installation of computers and audiovisual equipment in all Furst Hall classrooms.  While many faculty members immediately embraced the technology, others are slowly becoming converts.  Both to make educational material more widely available, and to be greener in our instruction, we are increasingly moving toward putting all documents on Angel instead of distributing them on paper in class. 

Anyone who has heard me speak or read my columns in this August periodical know that there are two themes to which I always return:  four years on campus and academic integrity. More than half of our students currently spend three and a half to four years on campus.  With President Joel’s recent announcement that students who spend one year learning in Israel are eligible to receive a 50% discount on their fourth year tuition at Yeshiva, four years on campus is now within reach for all students.  I am thrilled that a four-year undergraduate education on campus here in New York is rapidly becoming a reality.

Academic integrity is not only necessary for the success of the entire academic enterprise, but also for the future of each student and the reputation of this institution.  While I am pleased that the extant data suggests we are doing better here than at other institutions, better is not enough.  We must be an example for the rest of society.  To this end, the College tries to operate by the principle of lifnei iver lo sitten michshol (not placing a stumbling block before the blind).  More concretely, we make sure that what constitutes plagiarism is clearly presented to each student during his first term and that cheating is discussed during orientation; additionally, we have dramatically increased the level of proctoring in finals.  The faculty has also discussed at great length that exams should not be repeated from class-to-class or year-to-year, and if anything is repeated, the old exams should be made available to all students.  In the few instances that we have failed to live up to these goals, we have taken measures necessary to level the playing field for all students. President Joel has recently announced that anyone who is caught cheating on an exam will be expelled from the University.  This is a clear signal as to how serious we are about this issue.

The College has been engaged in a very serious review of the curriculum for the past two and a half years. The review began with visits by our deans to the American Association of Colleges and Universities in Washington DC.  A faculty team from Yeshiva College was selected to participate in a several-day workshop on re-imagining the curriculum -- joining faculty from many other universities in different stages of the type of review we are doing.  The curriculum review has brought to campus curriculum experts representing different areas to talk with the faculty.  While I am disappointed that we have not yet completed the new curriculum, it cannot be rushed since changes of the magnitude we are discussing involve every aspect of what we do as a faculty and as a College.  The faculty has already agreed that the new curriculum will strengthen the majors (and design the majors for four years on campus), restructure the entire first-year on-campus experience, and change how the general education requirements will be satisfied.  Our goal is both more flexibility for students, and majors with much more depth.  Along with this process, we have done an external review of how Hebrew language is taught and are now in the process of redesigning our approach to this important topic.
Another area about which I often speak is student partnership with faculty in research and scholarship. While, for many students, participation in research is essential for going on to first-rate graduate programs, it is also important for all serious students.  We have been working to provide more opportunities for students in this area.  Many members of the faculty involve undergraduate students in their laboratory research during the summer as well as during the academic year.  The Henry Kressel Research Scholarship Program provides competitive scholarships for students to do research under the tutelage of faculty members over at least one summer and an academic year.  This program has funded students to do research in many areas, including chemistry, Jewish studies, physics, and history. In addition, faculty members involve students in research on a volunteer basis, through externally-funded research, and through special funds provided by the Provost.  While we have made real progress in this area, it is my hope that it will grow to the point where at least half of our students experience real research during some part of their undergraduate education.  Book learning is important, but research exposes students to the beating heart of a discipline.

Academic advising is also being revamped for next year, in response both to some students questioning the value of advising, and our own assessment that we could make advising more meaningful – especially for upperclassmen.  Starting this Fall term, academic advising for students who have declared a major will take place with professors in the home department of the major.  This approach – used by schools across the country – is designed to help students get the input of professionals within their chosen field and discipline-specific advice that is relevant to their future.  Advice on fulfilling requirements, getting into closed sections, etc. will remain the purview of the Academic Advisement Office.  Students who have yet to declare a major will also continue to be served directly by Academic Advisement.  In addition to these changes that will go into effect next term, I also want to call attention to the fact that over the last two years, the College has hired full-time, dedicated advisors for students planning to pursue careers in medicine and its allied disciplines, and law: Whitney Bennett and Rani Lustiger.  Their jobs are to continue and enhance our already enviable record in getting Yeshiva College students into professional schools of their choice.  Another significant change on campus since my arrival is the reinvigoration of career services in the form of the Career Development Center, under the able leadership of Marc Goldman. Don’t forget that the CDC is now one of the most powerful arrows in your quiver as you think through and plan for the next stage of your life!  If you have not visited them in the past year, you are doing yourself a real disservice.

The Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein Honors Program is one of the most important arms of the College.  It brings the highest caliber students to campus.  This does not simply make us more elite, but raises the level of discourse across the University.  This year represented the best year ever for the Honors Program, in part because of exciting initiatives set in motion during the last two years by James Otteson, Joanne Jacobson, and Gabriel Cwilich.  You have, no doubt, seen the announcement that Dr. Cwilich will take the helm of the Honors Program in the coming academic year.  His appointment represents both continuity of last year’s successes as well as our optimism for the future, based upon his own special brand of energy and creativity.  The Honors Program is both a laboratory for new curriculum ideas, and provides Honors students with the extra challenge that matches their strengths.  My hope is that this program continues to flourish and that all Honors students complete Honors theses – the capstone to a unique education.
I end with a list of unfinished business.  First, and most importantly, the future of this institution depends on the integration of the undergraduate experience and the myriad programs of this University.  Our institution cannot thrive without the integration of the faculty -- we simply cannot afford to have two Chemistry departments, two English departments, two Art departments, etc.. Discrepancies between policies make it difficult for the University to present a unified image to our constituency -- we have now delayed the implementation of the College’s grade inflation plan pending approval by our partner schools within the University.  If we are to achieve our goal of growth in scholarship, in the quality of the education we provide, and in the number of students we serve, there is no choice but to integrate.  Second, we still have important curricular issues to be settled.  While the faculty is rounding the bend on the major pieces of the curriculum, we still have not adequately dealt with the College’s relationship with the Israel program, with the proper balance between required academic Jewish studies and the rest of the curriculum, with devising new approaches to increase student flexibility, and with relieving some of the pressure that our students who are serious about Jewish and secular learning often feel.  These were challenges that I foresaw before I joined Yeshiva University and are challenges that remain today.  I have high hopes that we will be able to meet these challenges, based upon discussions that are going on right now on campus.  I am optimistic about our future, yet we have work to do. 

Dr. David Srolovitz is Dean of Yeshiva College