IDS to suspend admissions
By Jessica Roy
April 20, 2009 9:55 p.m.
Starting in June, the international development studies program will no longer be admitting new students to the major.
The Undergraduate Council of the UCLA Academic Senate voted to suspend admissions to the program for 12 months while the faculty reforms the curriculum for the major.
There are no plans to close the major permanently, and this decision should not affect students who are already in the international development studies program.
Michael Goldstein, the Academic Senate chair, said they are not shutting down the major, but rather giving its current faculty a chance to implement changes.
“It’s up to them to address the reforms,” Goldstein said.
Goldstein said the main change that needed to be made was the level of involvement from the faculty. Because international development studies is an interdisciplinary major, there are no professors who are solely dedicated to that department.
According to the program’s Web site, professors who teach international development studies courses come from a number of other departments, including English, sociology, anthropology and political science. Goldstein said the program needs more people to be involved in admissions and advising, not just teaching.
“On paper, there’s a lot of faculty involvement,” Goldstein said. “It’s question of whether that paper involvement can be turned into real involvement.”
Michael Lofchie, chair of the international development studies program, said many faculty members have expressed interest in the program, but have not necessarily followed up with action. Lofchie said despite that, he thinks the council’s decision was not in the best interests of the program.
“(The Undergraduate Council) is going about it the wrong way,” Lofchie said. “Their actions are too extreme.”
But Mark Moldwin, a professor of space physics and member of the Undergraduate Council, said they made the right decision.
“It needs to have faculty participation and oversight, and the departments that have been involved with it have not committed the resources,” Moldwin said.
The Undergraduate Council regularly reviews each major at UCLA. The Undergraduate Council committee is made up of more than 20 professors from different departments, the vice provost for undergraduate education, four undergraduate representatives and two graduate representatives.
The faculty on the council were unanimous in their decision to suspend admission to the major, said Jason Tengco, one of the undergraduate representatives on the committee.
Boris Lipkin, another undergraduate representative on the council, said problems with the international development studies program have arisen during review several times over the past few years. This recurrence is part of what prompted the Undergraduate Council to take a measure as extreme as barring admittance to the major.
Tengco said he voted against the suspension.
“I was concerned with what message the suspension would send to students,” Tengco said.
Amy Turman, a third-year international development studies student, said she is surprised by the decision.
“I think it’s a little bit ridiculous,” she said. “I know so many people who love this major.”
Lofchie, who took over as chair of the program last summer, submitted a plan to the Academic Senate in December 2008 that included changes to the major, such as implementing an application process for entering students to decrease the major’s size. It has increased dramatically over the past few years to about 500 students, Lofchie said.
In the proposal, Lofchie asked that the department be given time to make its own reforms, but the request was denied, he said.
The committee said the international development studies program has a shortage of faculty to teach core classes, which Tengco said needed to be remedied. He also said that the Undergraduate Council said it thinks that by cutting off admittance to the major, it could convince more faculty to be involved in the interdepartmental major.
But Lofchie disagreed. He said he thinks the council’s actions will have the opposite effect.
“This decision will create doubt in faculty’s minds and will make them less inclined to join the faculty,” he said.
Another problem the council cited was that many international development studies students were taking upper divisions courses before completing the major’s prerequisites.
Turman said she has taken six upper division courses in the major even though she has only completed four of the six required prerequisites, but that it didn’t seem like a problem to her.
“I don’t think I’m at a disadvantage in my upper division classes because I haven’t finished all the (prerequisites),” Turman said.
She said her primary criticism of the major is that it is difficult to enroll in certain classes.
“It’s hard to get into some of the (prerequisites) and some of the upper division geography and political science classes,” Turman said. “Enforcing the (prerequisites) before taking upper (division classes) will only make it more difficult for students to graduate.”
Lofchie said he is open to any changes that will allow the program to survive, but said he is let down by the Undergraduate Council’s decision because it will dishearten students in the major.
“The students attracted to this major are very idealistic. I’m disappointed that the Academic Senate is giving students such a negative message,” Lofchie said.
Leslie Shin, a third-year international development studies student, said she still believes the program is great and that she wished that more students were consulted before admission was cut off.
But Tengco said that the faculty on the committee made its decision with the students in mind.
“They want what’s best for students,” Tengco said. “Suspending admission was a last resort to maintain the integrity of the major.”
Moldwin said that it would be “unfair to all the undergraduate students” in the program to leave the major the way it was. Lofchie said that while some change is necessary for the program, shutting down admissions wasn’t the right choice.
“There are challenges that need to be addressed in the major,” Lofchie said. “But I want to address them in partnership with the Academic Senate, instead of them hitting us and our students over the head with a sledgehammer.”
With reports from Anthony Pesce, Will Weiss and Rotem Ben-Shachar, Bruin senior staff.
