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Catalog, Handbooks, Q Guide Go to On-Line Only Versions
Conservation, Ease of Use, Cost Savings Cited
Cambridge, Mass. - April 1, 2009 - In a plan designed to eliminate waste, provide more options for faculty, students and staff, and to reduce costs, the Courses of Instruction, Harvard College Handbook for Students, The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Handbook for Students, Q Guide and Information for Faculty Offering Instruction in Arts and Sciences will be available on-line only, beginning with the Fall 2009 term.
In announcing the elimination of the Courses of Instruction and handbooks, Registrar Barry Kane says, "There are many compelling reasons to have on-line only versions of these publications. A majority of our students and many members of the faculty and staff conduct most of their business on-line, and are very effective at using the array of on-line tools available to them. In addition, the president has asked all segments of the University community to make good judgments about activities that may contribute to the creation of green house gases. The amount of paper used for these publications is, by definition, not a good use of resources."
Kane also says that eliminating the printed versions of these publications will save tens of thousands of dollars. Further, he says, the printed Courses of Instruction "is significantly out-of-date before the first copy rolls off the press." Many faculty members find it increasingly difficult to finalize course data in time for the May print deadline, and students relying only on the printed version to shop, have complained that their ideal schedule sometimes has to be dismantled because of changes to the courses selected, especially when creating spring study cards by which time the catalog is nine months old.
Some of the advantages to the on-line catalog: the on-line shopping tool offers advanced course search capability, allowing students to search for courses to populate their on-line shopping carts and to ultimately print their study cards; it allows for easy printing of courses offered by a particular department; and faculty have access to a sophisticated stand-alone electronic application that provides them with the results of their course evaluations.
"When you look at the volumes of paper, printing costs, and the fact that most people use the on-line versions of these publications, it made very little sense to continue to print paper versions," says Jay Harris, Harry Austryn Wolfson Professor of Jewish Studies; Dean of Undergraduate Education; Master of Cabot House. "Further, the on-line versions of these documents give the user a greater ability to access information, and much more flexibility in viewing multiple sources of information synoptically."
On-Line course evaluation information will be fully integrated into the shopping tool, allowing students to find it very easily. Students will be able to compare courses using a number of evaluation parameters. Courses in the students' shopping cart will have a summary of their Q scores, so students can look at them side-by-side. Students will have access to the full text of comments on the evaluations for one key question, asking whether students would recommend the course to their peers, rather than edited versions in the printed guide. Finally, students will see displays and analyses of evaluation data, including various benchmarks, not currently available in the printed guide.
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