Phase two of the project will make non-public syllabus information available and will continue to refine the guidelines for the information that students look for when selecting classes, according to Sue Hosack, director of the Office of Student Records, who serves on the working group along with members of the Information Services and Technology department and four students.

The next step is “to define what [students] are looking for at the point of registration…which may be a very different thing from what a faculty member would perceive as being syllabus information,” Hosack said.

Within the next three to four weeks, students will receive a survey asking what kind of information they want course syllabi to contain, for registration purposes.

“[With online syllabi] you know what to expect and can pick classes off of how you’re being evaluated,” said junior Michelle Brown, who noted that some students prefer papers or exams to presentations. “A lot of times the class description on WebSTAC aren’t enough to know what the class is really about.”

eSyllabi follows Syllabi Central, an effort by Student Union Senator Joseph Marcus and former Senator Jake Novick, which was shut down last semester. Syllabi Central was run entirely by Marcus and Novick, which, according to Marcus, made the site unsustainable.

“We wanted the University to take it over and make it something that’s part of the campus,” Marcus said.

There were also questions regarding protection of University information and intellectual property on Syllabi Central, according to Hosack.

Marcus noted that the original site was not the subject of any legal action, nor did the intellectual property concerns escalate to the level of talking to lawyers.

The prior site, however, according to Hosack, represented a positive step forward

“[The original site] underscored the importance that students saw in being able to see detailed syllabus information at the point of registration,” Hosack said.

Students responded favorably to the idea of implementing this program.

“Accessing syllabi prior to registration is a really good idea,” freshman Carol Stoll said. “Current course listings are OK, but you really don’t get a good feel for the class until you’re in it for while.”

Phase three of the project will provide a central repository for all syllabi or portions of syllabi, in which professors would be able to upload PDFs or Word documents to a database. The project would also establish levels of access for the syllabi, such as public, available upon login with a WUSTLKey, or available to students registered for the course.

“In an ideal world [eSyllabi] would be up by spring 2011, but nothing is set in stone,” Marcus said of phase three.

Hosack said the working group is making good progress, but could not predict when the project would be completed.

The idea for the project originated with Marcus and Novick, and initially started in SU Senate. Hosack described eSyllabi as “primarily a student-driven initiative,” and Marcus noted that there are “lot of resources in the administration that make this possible.”

Students frustrated with one-paragraph course descriptions for academic course listings now have a new online resource to help them pick out classes.

Student Union Senators Joseph Marcus and Jake Novick have invented ​SyllabiCentral, a Web site that gathers syllabi from different University courses in one central location in order to give students a better sense of what classes offer.

“Being a bio major, if I wanted to take a psych course or political science course, I would have absolutely no idea what a class would cover because I wouldn’t have a major advisor to go to,” Marcus said. “So this would be especially useful for introductory-level classes that really don’t change much year to year.”

The senators hope that the program will have all course syllabi up by next semester. So far, SyllabiCentral has about 400 syllabi uploaded to its database, which is accessible to students online.

Since course listings for spring 2010 were posted a couple of weeks ago, Marcus said he has seen an increase in the number of visitors to SyllabiCentral.

Chethan Rao is a junior who has been using SyllabiCentral since its initial stages.

“Sometimes the synopses on course listings aren’t enough to know if you’re interested in the class,” Rao said. “It helps to know what kind of books you’ll be reading and details like that.”

While SyllabiCentral is intended primarily for students, faculty can also find the information useful.

“It’s good for faculty because you get a better look at who wants to take your class and hopefully it decreases the volatility in the shopping period in the first couple weeks of class, where a lot of people just go to class to grab a syllabus to see if they want to take it and decide. Why not speed that up a little bit and help people plan out their courses?” Novick said.

Allan Larson, professor of biology, agreed. While the biology department currently has many course syllabi already listed on its Web site, SyllabiCentral would be able to link these syllabi with a central database.

“I hope that all departments and instructors will work with SyllabiCentral to create a comprehensive source of course syllabi,” Larson said.

SyllabiCentral mirrors many other programs at Washington University’s peer institutions.  Universities such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Georgetown and the University of Southern California all have password-protected course syllabi, and Duke has open syllabi online.

While SyllabiCentral is still a work in progress and syllabi are being added as they come in, there has been no set schedule for implementation.  Currently, Marcus and Novick have been trying to meet with as many departments and programs as possible in order to get support behind the project before releasing it to the entire University. So far, response has been overwhelmingly positive.

“Just as the project itself is about gathering everything into one place, it’s all about gathering the support in one place as well,” Novick said.  “Right now, we’re just trying to lay as much groundwork as possible.  If we can get all the intro classes, all the classes that have been taught consistently over time, the rest will come later and eventually fill out.”

The Student Technology Advisory Committee has been providing initial guidance.

“When we want this type of software, this type of database—this is not my expertise,” Novick said. “This is where they come in and this is where they support us.”

Interested students willing to provide feedback about the project are encouraged to contact syllabicentral@gmail.com.

Correction: The Student Technology Advisory Committee has provided initial support and will be helping with later implementation of this project. They are not, at this stage, managing the technical implementation.

We believe that the ideas behind this initiative should be cause for faculty support. Currently, many Wash. U. students treat the first two weeks of the semester as a course-shopping period, sampling several classes before they decide on the ones they most prefer. While the University has rightfully chosen to allow students to drop classes during that time without penalty, there are other negative consequences to the prevalence of course shopping.

Over-registration, encouraged by uncertainty about course content, causes long waitlists that discourage truly interested students with later registration times from signing up for a particular course. Moreover, the need to return books from courses dropped during the shopping period can prevent students from seeking cheaper alternatives, such as the Lock and Chain book sale and online providers.

Perhaps most importantly, students who sign up for multiple courses during the same time slot disturb the academic lives of both themselves and their classmates. They often start the semester behind because of the classes they inevitably miss. Professors often waste valuable class time redistributing syllabi, adjusting the class roster and even delaying the instruction of important material until class attendance stabilizes.

Finally, these hurdles prevent many students from course shopping in the first place and, as a result, many students feel forced to take classes that do not meet their expectations. Posting past course syllabi online would be a much-needed alternative.

Students who wish to experience a class or professor in person before deciding on their final course schedule should still have the option of doing so, but those who wish to avoid unnecessary course shopping should have access to as much information as possible in order to make better decisions.

While we know that syllabi change from year to year, past syllabi still give a helpful—if incomplete—picture of what students can expect. Course descriptions are often too short and too unfocused to provide much insight into the content of the course. Syllabi contain course outlines, reading lists, and information about expectations that can prove much more helpful in making a decision. Making this information available earlier would make it easier for students to take classes that truly interest them. Reading lists in particular could help students avoid classes that repeat material they have already learned.

Access to past course requirements would also better help students manage their course loads and strike the right individual balance between tests, papers and other projects. Although we do not believe students should choose classes based solely on the workload, more realistic expectations about coursework would allow students to concentrate their time in the areas they care about most. We believe that the quality of student work would improve as a result.

Course descriptions are too short; course evaluations, while helpful, do not fully describe course content or requirements; and sources like ratemyprofessor.com and student gossip are notoriously subjective and unreliable. Professors should support granting students more information to better enable students to take the classes that interest them most.