ood Intentions, but lackluster results. Lately, that seems to be the trend haunting the Academic Affairs committee of the Student Assembly, which has worked hard to produce well-researched reports about the academic direction of the College, only to have itself remembered by high profile failures such as almost making us go to class during Greek Key Saturday. And judging from the latest initiative being proposed by the committee, unless significant parts of the Undergraduate Teaching Initiative (UTI) are changed, the SA might be facing a similar embarrassment.

The Initiative

It is important to recognize the need for further discussion on undergraduate teaching at the College, and the assembly must be commended for including the issue on its agenda. For years, students have debated whether Dartmouth is losing its focus on undergraduate teaching as the College moves to emphasize both undergraduate and graduate research. Furthermore, students have always privately known which classes are a “must-take” at the College, partly because of the professors who teach them. Would it not be nice to publicly recognize these professors for their dedication to teaching?

The UTI aims to address both of these issues. It calls for a report that would discuss the need for a teaching center at the College, as well as quarterly awards for professors that students feel should be publicly recognized. These recommendations, although not without flaws of their own, would in general be a positive for the student body, and indeed, most of the UTI would be a welcome change for Dartmouth.

Rankings

The initiative’s first and what some call the most important component $mdash; using ‘measurable’ criteria such as class size and number of majors to rank professors and departments — proves to be the most problematic. First, because it claims to measure qualities that really cannot, or should not, be measured, and second, because it may actually lower the quality of teaching at Dartmouth by making professors more worried about their ranking than their teaching methods.

Rankings in general are always controversial and seldom go beyond providing a superficial review based on arbitrary criteria. For example, the Student Assembly’s initiative suggests that things like student to faculty ratio and class size can be used to measure performance. Would a small class automatically signal a better department because of a low faculty to student ratio, or would it signal a bad professor because students are not lining up to take that class? Beyond the problem of concluding one way or another based on numbers that can be manipulated to show what the SA wants, there is the obvious problem of trying to quantify qualitative data. The committee’s chair, in an interview with The Dartmouth, mentioned that student feedback would be one element in determining the rankings. Of course, there is nothing wrong with student feedback; in fact, it should be encouraged to the greatest extent possible and the students’ suggestions should be taken into account when making key decisions about faculty tenure, etc. But professors are not like new car models that can be ranked from 1 to 5 in Consumer Reports and be objectively compared using criteria such as type of engine, etc. There are some classes that are very tough, and others that are notoriously easy. Professors can be judged relative to student expectations and how much students learned in the class. Judging professors relative to one another, however, can become a dangerous game. Recognizing departments is a good thing; it is nice to say, “you did an excellent job, and we want to thank you for it,” and the past SA leaders have done exactly that. On the other hand, to say to a department, “you are ranked lower than another department,” and suggesting that the department is somehow inferior, will accomplish nothing but to antagonize the faculty and the administration.

Not only could such practices lower the overall quality of teaching at the College, they can also make professors afraid to continue their activities outside the classroom. How comfortable, for example, would an openly anti-Greek professor feel if she knew that she was being ranked at the end of the term? Can we truly call ourselves a liberal arts institution when professors cannot feel free enough to express their opinions because of how an organization claiming to be the students’ government will rank them? The answer is a resounding no. Again, there is nothing wrong with recognizing especially good professors, but the implications of ranking one below another based on criteria that is sketchy at best can have serious negative implications.

There is, of course, the more general issue of whether rankings are really goal and whether they really accomplish their objective. We are all familiar with the infamous U.S. News and World Report’s annual ranking of colleges and universities. We all know how useless they are. Yet we all know that, whether we like them or not, a lot of people pay attention to them. Therein lies the great problem: just like there are some students that choose schools based on how they are ranked, it is possible that a few years from now, incoming first year students will choose professors based on ranking, regardless of whether they are actually good professors.

Until the issue of rankings is attached to the initiative, the assembly leadership can end up antagonizing key areas of the College that currently support it $mdash; a mistake it cannot afford to make.

Teaching Center

Another key component is a report underscoring the need for a teaching center at the College. This is a novel idea, and few undergraduates would oppose the creation of a program that helps professors be more effective inside the classroom. The SA, however, needs to take a more active role than simply writing another report if such a center were ever to become reality. The report would simply restate what students have been telling the administration, and by judging from the effectiveness of reports in general on this campus, it remains to be seen whether it would serve any purpose.

Instead, the Assembly should think creatively about the goals that it hopes to accomplish through the creation of a teaching center. If the goals are to gather professors together on a regular basis to discuss effectiveness in teaching, then the Academic Affairs Committee should take the first steps and create a symposium that would accomplish that goal.

A symposium could also serve as a way for the committee to get constant feedback on what professors are thinking, thus keeping it more in touch with the concerns of the faculty. The Assembly has excelled in writing reports in the past that have been ignored by much of the College’s student body and administration, and it should rethink that strategy if it is serious about truly making a difference in undergraduate teaching.

The Road Ahead

It is clear that the Assembly’s initiative recognizes the need for a discourse about teaching on this campus. It makes some key mistakes, however, such as proposing a controversial ranking system that could backfire in the end and lower the quality of teaching on campus.

On one hand, the SA should be congratulated for wanting to publicly recognize professors who have demonstrated excellence in teaching, but its approach to creating a teaching center needs to be more innovative and daring if the assembly expects it to be at all effective.

elcome to Dartmouth. You’ll hear that phrase repeated many times throughout Orientation week. Your UGAs will welcome you, your professors and class deans will welcome you; even the president will shake your hand and welcome you to our beloved college. As you walk around campus during your first weeks here, take a moment to reflect upon what Dartmouth means to you $mdash; in other words, the Dartmouth that you see yourself being welcomed to.

The perceptions you have of Dartmouth today will change $mdash; in some cases, a lot $mdash; over the next three years. Yes, you have read all the admission guides, about how Dartmouth’s social life revolves around “frats and kegs” (yep, that is what the Princeton Review says), or about how the D-plan will give you instant access to opportunities you have only dreamed of. You have even talked to a few Dartmouth students, most of whom greeted you cheerfully and told you how much they love it here. I mean, being at a bastion of intellectualism and constantly learning from people who are different- where else could you find such an experience.

After you survive your first Dartmouth winter, see the ‘06s take over campus during your sophomore fall, and start looking forward to sophomore summer, keep your initial perceptions of Dartmouth in the back of your mind. For many of you, Dartmouth will be just the place you imagined, for some it will be a place you will come to hate. You’ll learn that Dartmouth is not the Benetton-commercial style utopia where people of different races, gender, and sexual orientations all hang out together, as some admissions brochures may suggest. Nor is it just a party school. Although Dartmouth’s social life and the fraternity system have been deemed synonymous ever since Animal House came out, you will realize that there is more to do on any given Friday night than to just go to frat parties. You will discover that the D-plan will indeed open up some new doors, but will alter the definition of “relationship” beyond what you have ever experienced. You will come in as leaders, as the most intelligent, the most popular, but you’ll soon discover what it means to be just average. You will see things you do not like, and you will realize that talking about change and actually seeing it happen are two very different things. Perhaps most importantly, you will learn that there is no one “Dartmouth experience.” In the end, how you spend your four years at Dartmouth are entirely up to you. Getting drunk, getting laid, working hard, playing hard, research, performance, sports, activism… Your choices are endless, but my only hope is that you prove us cynics wrong and never give up on making Dartmouth what you think it should be. You must be the change you wish to see in this community.

Diversity

The administration has taken many symbolic steps towards improving diversity on this campus. All this talk about diversity $mdash; which seems to be the topic en vogue in academia these days $mdash; might even lead you to accept the illusion that there is not a racial divide on this campus. One ’03 remembers when her opinion on race at Dartmouth was that “only stupid hicks were racist people,” not “smart rich kids.” The same rich kids whose disregard for the Indian head as an symbol of racial prejudice, or whose continued attitude that only they truly “belong” at Dartmouth epitomize the racial problems at this school. In fact, one does not have to look too far back in campus history to find the instances of “ghetto” parties or luaus that have inflamed racial tensions and have made people wonder exactly how successful these acclaimed discussions on diversity have been.

The Frats

I was talking to a friend recently when she exclaimed, “I was scared to come here. I though there would be nothing to do on weekends except for frat parties!” Do frats rule the social scene at Dartmouth? Probably. Are frat parties the only way to have fun on this campus? No. According to one ’03, non-Greek organizations like Panarchy serve as a refreshing reminder that there is life beyond the Greek system. “You actually have an intellectual conversation once in a while,” the junior remarked. If you’re wondering what the Greek system is all about, you will get introduced to it pretty early during the fall. If you are the short-skirt toting type (or something like that), you should have no problems getting into frat parties. The rest of you, unfortunately, will be subject to the policy that first year students are not allowed into frats during the fall. Once you do get in, it will all get old pretty fast. Unless, of course, you came to college to be a world-renowned pong player. What about Collis? If you are white, you will stick out like a sore thumb on a Friday night. But who gives a shit? Challenge yourself and step out of your comfort zone; you will realize there is more than one way to have fun. The frats are good for one thing: the College hates them so much that it makes an extra effort to provide alternative programming. If you think you are too cool for karaoke, or one of those other “school sponsored” activities, you are not $mdash; and going to them is a good way to meet new people, some of whom (gasp!) might even be different than you are.

The D-Plan

The D-plan is like weather at Dartmouth; everyone complains about it, knowing that it is a part of life here. You have probably heard all the positives already from the Admissions Office, and some of them are indeed true. Where else, for example, could you spend a semester in Spain, another term doing community service in Latin America, and another getting to know what investment banking is like. If it were only that simple. Your personal life will suffer the most: relationships will be measured in 10-week intervals (and congratulations if you can make yours last more than 10 weeks), you will make friends that you will not see for a year or more, and you will move in and out of dorms like you check in and out of hotels. Academic life will be just as rushed; midterms will arrive just as soon as you are settled in, and you will be studying for finals just as soon as you are done with midterms. Overall, you will learn to accept the D-plan as a given and love it. Take as much advantage of the opportunities provided to you through it; if you have always wanted to research the aborigines in Australia, do it. Or if you have been fantasizing about taking a winter off to ski, use the D-plan to your advantage. But do not stop complaining about it just yet; it is always a good source of conversation during those awkward moments of silence.

Activism

Many of you will want to get involved in many aspects of the school. You will want to change things, and see change actually happen while you are still at Dartmouth. You might even be under the illusion that students have decision-making power on this campus. Perhaps none of your perceptions will change as much as your views on campus activism. You will discover that students will talk, protest, make petitions, and write resolutions, but the administration’s “this is not a democracy” attitude will bring you back to reality. The issue of whether the student government, the Student Assembly, has any real power is debatable, but what is true is that no matter how many endless committee meetings you sit through, or how many resolutions you write, or how many critical editorials you publish, you will find an institutional barrier to student voice on campus. So should we just accept this as a reality and learn to live with it? Probably not, but just do not be surprised to discover that four years of struggle for change will produce nothing but frustration.

Tomorrow and Beyond

Enjoy the fall to the fullest. It might be the only time during the next four years when your sense of excitement and your optimism will overwhelm your apathy and frustration. The D
artmouth that you are at now may not be the same as the Dartmouth that you imagined, but that does not mean that the Dartmouth that you will leave in four years will be that way. Do not look towards the generations before you as role models; instead, be a role model and show them that diversity is not just a topic of discussion, that there is more to Dartmouth’s social life than frats, and that if students try hard enough, they can bring about change on campus.w

n epidemic rages on in the world beyond Dartmouth. For most students at the College, it is easy to tune out the news reports warning of the increasing rates at which HIV is spreading in the US., especially amongst young adults. After all, the College is not located in a high-risk area, and most students here are from populations ethnically or socially considered to be “low risk.” There are some who even contend that HIV isn’t present amongst members of the Dartmouth community. “There’s a denial that no one will have sexually transmitted diseases on this campus,” Gabrielle Lucke, Director of Health Resources told the Free Press. “But you have to consider how many of our students come from epicenters, and how many travel to epicenters while they are at Dartmouth.”

The cause of the prevailing attitude about HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases at Dartmouth is two-fold: the administration’s wavering commitment to educating students and providing them adequate resources to protect themselves, as well as student apathy towards a disease that seemingly has no visible impact around them.

In the early ’90s, the College promoted safer sex through the distribution of free condoms. In ’93, however, it became the first Ivy League school to suspend the condom distribution program. Since then, the Health Resources department has been working to provide condoms to key public areas and Undergraduate Advisors (UGAs) for distribution. Many people, however, feel intimidated in approaching their UGA for a condom, and it is practically impossible to expect students to go to Dick’s House or another such public space to look for a condom when it is really needed.

Lucke agreed with the conventional wisdom that “what compromises condom use is alcohol use.” Yet neither the College, nor the Greek system $mdash; one of the most prevalent outlets of alcohol on campus $mdash; have taken any steps to provide condoms where alcohol is freely served. To give the administration some credit, certain College dormitories and men’s restrooms do have condom vending machines. There are no such outlets in women’s bathrooms, however. Furthermore, the availability falls short of the steps that schools across the country have implemented, or even what the College itself did more than a decade ago.

While providing an effective and affordable distribution system is important, it is equally as important for Dartmouth to make an institutional commitment to teaching students about HIV and encouraging frequent testing.

HIV cases in college-aged students are staggering: the Center for Disease Control (CDC) estimates that half of all new HIV infections in the US. are among people younger than 25, and the leading cause of new infections in that age group is sexual intercourse. Every hour, two Americans under the age of 20 are infected with HIV, according to the CDC.

There is no question that HIV testing and education should be taken seriously on college campuses, and Dartmouth has a long road ahead of it if the College is committed to changing the attitudes of the student body. As universities around the country proactively seek to reach out to students, the College has been reluctant to take major steps such as publicly promoting HIV testing or providing accessible and affordable outlets for condoms.

Statistics indicate that about a third of those living with HIV do not know that they have it. Furthermore, since it takes years for visible signs of the disease to surface, people who have been recently infected may not know about it for as much as a decade. HIV testing, therefore, should be stressed $mdash; even among “low risk” populations. Other college campuses have taken advantage of events such as the “National HIV Testing Day” to raise awareness and administered free HIV tests.

At Dartmouth, the process of getting tested for HIV involves going to Dick’s House under the pretense of an ailment and asking the practitioner for a blood test. There are few parts of the College beyond the Health Resources Center or the Office of the director of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgendered, Questioning, and Allies (GLBTQA) programs that publicly talk about the need to get tested for HIV.

Students are just as responsible for being apathetic towards HIV testing. UGAs seldom bring up the topic of HIV testing or resources available for those living with HIV. Student groups committed to educating the campus about HIV-related issues, such as Responsible Aids Information at Dartmouth (RAID) which once used to distribute condoms and literature about HIV prevention, have fallen by the wayside over the last few years. The only prominent group on campus that is currently active in raising HIV/AIDS awareness is the AIDS Workcrew, which works primarily with residents of the Upper Valley area.

Dartmouth is no haven and should not be seen as such. “I personally knew two students who had HIV,” Lucke said. “On the outside, they were incredible healthy people.” She added what really brings the issue of HIV and AIDS to the spotlight is “when I look at the Alumni Magazine and see who is starting to die of AIDS.”

The initial steps for Dartmouth are anything but overwhelming; the College must educate students about HIV testing, both through explaining the need to get regularly tested as well as through making the process of testing easier and more accessible. Furthermore, it must move away from the mentality of “if you weren’t prepared, then it’s your fault.” Instead, there must be an active effort to increase the availability of free condoms for students.

In the end, no one can force students to change their attitudes towards HIV and AIDS. The College’s complacency to the epidemic, however, has only helped to propagate the misconceptions that exist within the student body. s

ou all should run for VP one day. I’m serious $mdash; even if you couldn’t give a damn about the assembly, or institutional voice, or the administration, or even change for that matter. You should run just because of all of the interesting people you’ll get to meet and all of the viewpoints that you’ll hear.

Over the last few weeks, I’ve talked to people about everything from gender relations on campus to the over-generalization of the Greek system to the concrete ways in which I will improve the SA, with everything in between (including what I plan to do about 2-ply toilet paper in dorms).

Some of these conversations have resulted in disagreement and debate, and quite a few have helped me refine my own perspective on life at Dartmouth. But there’s one thing that pretty much everyone that I’ve talked to has agreed upon: no more useless committees. We’re all tired of committee after committee being formed and seeing nothing out of it. You would think that people would have learned their lesson by now, but of course I wouldn’t be writing this if they had.

One of my competitors wants to set up a “steering committee” that would (in theory, at least) bring together campus leaders. So, what exactly, if I may humbly ask, is the point of having a general assembly meeting if campus leaders won’t attend it? And if they won’t come to a SA meeting, why in the world would they go sit through these “steering committee” meetings?

I can just see the ads now: “time spent at your regular committee meeting: one hour, the general SA meeting: two hours, the SA executives meeting: one hour, steering committee meetings: two hours; that surprised look on your face when people wonder why SA doesn’t get anything done: priceless.”

My other competitor wants to see “the end of the Student Assembly” $mdash; get this $mdash; by creating yet another committee. That’s right folks, it’ll be called the “Reform Action Committee” and it’ll be appearing at a school near you.

My promise to you is this: no new committees. Of course, if the College wants input on the future of student life or an administrator search, I’ll make sure that student voice is heard. But who are we kidding if we think we can make Dartmouth a better place by just creating more committees?

For Amit’s entire platform, please visit http://www.dartmouth.edu/~amit