New advising structure good for Oberlin

The Goldsmith era has begun. The new dean of student life's honeymoon concluded Tuesday when he brought before the General Faculty his preliminary proposal to revamp the student advising process.

Goldsmith was just looking for input from the collected General Faculty on Tuesday, so nothing is quite concrete at this stage. Senate, which should be applauded for showing up in full force, raised its share of concerns. A few senators pointed out that this proposal just rehashes the responsibilities of administrative elements that are already in place. The faculty also expressed concerns about how the ³advising deans² would play into their role as academic advisors.

But what is at the heart of this? The problem that faces many students, at the point of a ³meltdown,² as Associate Professor of Theatre Jane Armitage titled it, is that their problems fall into the jurisdiction of multiple domains that have no unified background.

The academic side of a student's life rests in the hands of the Conservatory and the college of arts and sciences, while their social life lies in the hands of Student Life. The two administrative structures have no formal ties. If you look in the back of your Fussers, you'll see the two separate branches of this bureaucratic family tree.

Judging from Goldsmith's letter, he has the best interest of the student in mind by suggesting that the College put in place these deans. These deans would branch the divide between administrators, providing support when support is needed. The system would also hopefully provide guidance for wayward sophomores looking for a major. These advising deans don't just have to benefit those of us entrenched in academic problems.

Of course, that ugly word ³retention² reared its ugly head at the GF meeting. Although he did not dwell on it, Goldsmith did mention the fact that retention played a part in this proposal. As everyone knows, Oberlin has been scaring away its students in the past few years. This looks like another welcomed appeal to solve that foible.

Goldsmith, as well as President Nancy Dye, included student's parents in this model. The parents do after all pay the bills, and they need an official body to talk to if their little prodigy is sniffing too much glue. Maybe parents could be introduced to their child's dean during orientation, so that they have an idea of who to call when there are problems. The administration often neglects the parents perspective when forming new ideologies, so this is a breath of fresh air to see mommy and daddy put into the equation.

The proposal is quite young at this point. Someone, no doubt Goldsmith, will have to draw up a formal proposal and ram it through the GF. Hopefully, the Oberlin community will embrace this student orientated design.

Goodbye conflicts

Come spring registration, if our next session with BANNER does not kill us, we may owe Associate Professor of Mathematics Robert Bosch our deepest, most heartfelt gratitude. Thanks to the work of he and his students in his class, ³Practicum in Operations Research,² for the first time students may not have to choose between similar classes because of time conflicts. By developing a complex system ranking time slots, Bosch's work could eliminate many of the intra-departmental class conflicts, which arise because of classes catering to students' overlapping interests that now plague the current system. Every student on this campus has experienced the frustration at having to choose between two classes, both appealing in subject matter, both fulfilling major requirements, both making for a more well-rounded education, only to have to choose one over the other because of a time conflict.

The onus is on academic departments to alter their scheduling procedures based upon the Practicum's findings. With these changes, departments could increase class accessibility for students. Once departments work together to devise a system accounting for intra-departmental interests, those students double-majoring or doing cross-departmental majors will experience a greatly improved registration experience.

What makes these results even more commendable is that such work was done here on campus, by our very own students and professor. It was not a product of some high-priced consultant or group, nor of outside researchers. All too often colleges or universities look outside their homegrown talent in order to solve problems solved just as effectively, more efficiently, and certainly more cost-effectively in-house. Bosch and his students should be applauded for their research into solving this prevalent scheduling problem.