Fewer Courses Offered Next Semester

Registration for a new semester is always an anxious and exciting time for students here at Yeshiva, but this year, after all the dust had settled, several students were left disappointed with the number of courses offered by several departments.  In fact, almost every department in Yeshiva College is featuring fewer classes than it did one year ago.  In part, the limited class schedule stems from the fact that a significant number of adjuncts are leaving at the end of this semester.

Yeshiva College Dean David Srolovitz stressed the university’s efforts, in the midst of addressing the decreasing budget, to focus on “maintaining the university’s academic integrity” as well as “continuing to grow.”  Dean Srolovitz ensured that the budget cuts that have been made are predominantly in areas that do not affect class offerings.

He did admit, however, that certain classes that used to be offered every semester will now only be given once a year and that others will be offered in fewer sections than in past semesters.  This process lowers the overall number of course offerings and allows full-time professors to teach the classes that adjuncts were once covering.  “This is in an attempt to consolidate, but not compromise, academic offerings,” Dean Srolovitz explained.

In a similar vein, Sy Syms School of Business Dean Michael Ginzberg stressed that SSSB will have to engage in “smarter scheduling” in order to maintain the quality of education that the business school strives for.  He admitted that “there’s no way we can be as entirely accommodating as we have been in the past,” but guaranteed that “it won’t affect the quality.”  Like Dean Srolovitz, Dean Ginzberg admitted that they are consolidating classes into fewer sections and will be offering certain classes on a yearly, basis rather than every semester. 
Some non-tenure stream professors are leaving as a result of YU’s policy in which full-time professors come under review when their one to three year teaching contract in the university expires.  Tenure-stream assistant professors are also reviewed at the end of their initial three year contract.  At that point, if the administration wishes to sign another three-year contract, he/she is granted a semester’s leave and offered a second three year contract.  If, however, the professor does not pass the review, then the administration chooses not to renew the professor’s contract.  Three years later, the professor is carefully reviewed for tenure – a year long process. 

Three years ago, YU hired numerous tenure-stream and non-tenure-stream professors, and those professors are now either going on their semester’s leave, or are not returning at all next year.  Professors who will not be here next semester, either due to this third-year policy, the course consolidations, or because they found permanent employment elsewhere, include Professor Lenny Tevlin in the physics department, Professor Michael Kaplan in the history department, and Professor David Friedman in the economics department.
SSSB, meanwhile, is slated to lose three professors at the end of this semester. Two of them, Professors Leon Schwartz and David Brock, were visiting professors who will be returning to their original universities for the beginning of the Fall ’09 semester. Henry Jorisch also will not return (see article “Jorisch” for discussion).

One way that the faculty may address the decrease in class offerings is by making certain courses into larger lecture-hall courses.  In fact, Dean Srolovitz noted that Psychology, which is rapidly becoming the most popular major in YC, may soon boast several formal lecture-style class offerings – a system already in use for certain science classes.  He added that the Glueck Center will contain several of the larger-style classrooms that are needed for such a format, which will further enable such configurations.

Professor Ruth Bevan, the Senior Member of the Political Science department, supported such a plan, explaining that “introductory courses profit from large enrollments and should have no specific prerequisites to hamper such registration.”
Jacob Goldberg (SSSB ’10), on the other hand, was apprehensive about such an arrangement: “I think that part of the reason why YU can justify charging such high tuition is because of the small class sizes that they feature – a luxury that one can’t find in larger universities.  If they forfeit this, then they will be compromising their students’ education.”  Dean Srolovitz agreed, saying “that overall we are committed to small classes for our students; however, it simply makes sense to offer two large lecture classes in place of eight small classes when possible.”  He further added that “very few courses in Yeshiva College fall within that category.”

There are certain departments that remain opposed to larger class sizes.  Dean Srolovitz acknowledged that the Bible faculty feel that since Bible classes address important and sensitive hashkafic (ideological) issues, it is important to keep classes at a smaller, intimate number. Rabbi Carmy, Chair of the Bible Department, commented that for Bible he is “against a huge impersonal lecture hall.  Class should be small enough to allow for real interaction.”  He did add, however, that “it need not become so small that it's a schmoozing (chatting) group.”

Rabbi Carmy explained that he has capped Intro to Bible classes at a lower number than past years, but has increased the number of sections being offered in order to compensate.  He explained that “over the past several years many students have put off taking Introduction to Bible, even though educationally it should be taken early,” and that, by offering extra sections, he hopes that many of the upper classmen who have yet to take the course will enroll for the following semester.

Because of the extra sections of Introduction to Bible and the fact that Drs. Shalom Holtz and Yaakov Elman are on leave next semester, only three higher-level Bible classes are available for students in the traditional “bible slots.”  Several students were disappointed by such scanty offerings, including AJ Berkovitz (YC’ 12), a Jewish Studies major concentrating in Bible, who called next semester’s offerings “quite dissatisfying.”

In response to such concerns, Rabbi Carmy has recently created a new section in a relatively uncommon timeslot for a Bible course – Mondays and Wednesdays at five PM.  The course, on Five Megillot, will be taught by Dr. Joseph Angel and can be counted as a “text-Bible” which is worth two credits.

Another department that students have been particularly upset about is Political Science.  The department, which last fall offered nine classes, is now only offering five.  Dr. Bevan explained that the fewer classes are mostly the result of one professor, Dr. Evan Resnick, being on leave for the fall, and guaranteed that offerings would be back to normal in the spring.  She did stress, however, that in the interim many students are supplementing the number of offerings by engaging in independent and directed studies with individual professors.

This answer did not, however, satisfy all Political Science majors.  One student explained that "when a professor goes on leave is exactly when the school should hire an adjunct to fill that slot.  Even this past year there was a paltry amount of class offerings, and next semester it's even worse."
On the other hand, Phillip Reich (YC’ 11), another Political Science major, while admitting that he was disappointed by the offerings, said that he “understands the situation that the university is in.  They have, thankfully, placed a freeze on tuition increases for the forthcoming year, and if the consequences of such a move means slightly fewer classes, well, that’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.”