Faculty Council passes fall break recommendations

The fall break proposal considered by the Bloomington Faculty Council on Tuesday passed, bringing proposed changes to the academic calendar a step closer to reality.

After discussions at Tuesday’s BFC meeting, the Bloomington Campus Calendar Committee members voted “yes” on four proposed recommendations regarding changes on the University calendar for the 2011-12 academic year.

In November 2009, Provost and Executive Vice President Karen Hanson convened the committee and brought two questions: the possibility of adjusting the calendar so no classes would be held on Labor Day and a fall break.

At the BFC meeting, Calendar Committee Chairman Tom Gieryn said making Labor Day a University holiday is a “must-do” as it is part of the U.S. history to honor American laborers.

On possibility of a fall semester recess, Gieryn said the need for a few days off in the long stretch between August and Thanksgiving is necessary.

“It allows students and faculty to catch their breaths in a long run,” he said.

The Committee recommended that the fall break occur on Monday and Tuesday of the seventh complete week of classes in mid-October; however, implementing the break will require faculty and students to “reaffirm their commitment to treat Monday and Tuesday of Thanksgiving Week as bona fide instructional days,” a response to faculty concerns that students miss class in the days leading up to the holiday.

Since the price that comes with the two-day break is an early start in the semester (on Wednesday of the week prior to the current first day of class), some faculty members on the Calendar Committee opposed the break.

Herb Terry, associate professor in the Department of Telecommunications, said the early start of fall semester makes no sense to start with a broken week since it is “especially difficult for Monday classes.”

Some other members feared that the change in the calendar would cause reduced time in faculty research before the semester starts.

Some said they would not oppose starting the semester a full week earlier instead of several days earlier.

The chemistry department responded to the proposed changes to the calendar in a letter with a warning flag. The department worried the changes would result in “major logistical perturbations for those of us that teach large, multiple-section laboratory courses.”

Randy Arnold, associate scientist in the department and also a BFC member, said re-scheduling the lab programs is a huge concern for meeting the needs of science students.

The proposal suggested that the half-week early start will not reduce the instructional contact time, since it moves the orientation activities previously scheduled on Monday and Tuesday to Wednesday, which reduces opportunities for “undesirable” student activities between residence hall move-ins and the start of classes.

Some also argued that a two-day recess could not be called a break since it is too short. It makes that week “awkward.”

The BFC also recommended a re-schedule of summer sessions, which consists of three four-week modules.

Classes in the first summer module will begin on the current first day of classes for six weeks. With no breaks in between, each module will start immediately as soon as the classes in the previous one ends, which shortens the current 14-week summer sessions to 12 weeks.

The BFC said this change will allow a longer buffer zone between the end of summer sessions and the start of fall orientation, while also providing an extended period for facility maintenance.

Another critique in opposition to the proposal took costs of bureaucracy into consideration.

Some members said it would simply be “too expensive” for the University to make changes in the calendar and accordingly adjust all facilities and forms that have already been set up.

Despite the existing debates on the proposal, IU Student Association executives said they were excited to see the projected break finally get passed.

“I am optimistic about the prospects of the fall break next year,” IUSA former Vice President for Administration Jack McCarthy said after the meeting.

McCarthy said the fall break has been a big issue on the iUnity student government platform during the campaign and he was happy to see the progress because the BFC was not always positive about changing the calendar.

“I can still remember then the administrators told us the fall break was one of the topics that they were very interested in discussing,” IUSA former President and current Vice President for Administration Peter SerVaas said. “It’s really exiting to see how it has progressed from that point until it has been passed now. Now we need to make sure it’s implemented well.”