The September 11th Coalition for Justice and Peace has shown Washington University’s students the increased effectiveness of organizations that successfully integrate professors and students in a single campus group. Professors, deans, and administrators should follow the Coalition’s lead and both get involved in current student organizations and start their own.
In most high schools, teachers are the bridge between the students and the administration. Messages of school-wide events, lectures, and even college counseling are distributed by the network of teachers. But currently at WU, students, administratiors, and professors are three independent entities, and the burden is on the student to find out about campus events, even if the professors are involved in the programming. But college is new to all students, and many don’t know what they’re looking for, much less where to find it.
Professors should, simply based on their own personal interest or experience in a topic, not wait to be invited by an existing group to join in, but take their own initiative. This is not to say that students do not need to invite more professors to their events, but the September 11th Coalition has shown this community that the simple generational differences between students and professors provide dramatically different perspectives on the nature of war and patriotism. This difference exists on a range of issues, and a welcoming of professors into more student activities is necessary now.
An integration of professors into the student social and intellectual communities need not stop at discussion panels or activist groups. Increasing the involvement of the faculty fellows and the professors in residence on the South 40 will be fun and beneficial to the faculty and students alike.
Little steps like these would create an even greater intellectual community on campus. The knowledge and experience of professors aiding student groups and professors advertising in class for student activities which interest them will boost student attendance at campus events as well.
Of course, the greatest obstacle in the way of forming this intellectual community is simply the time constraints placed on professors. Between research, publishing, teaching, and all the other demands on one trying to reach tenure at a major university, there is little time to get involved with students more than required. But getting involved with students is not another full time job. A few activities a semester will make a world of difference: lunch with a class in Holmes Lounge, an open-door office policy, or a simple discussion after class brings professors to an appropriately accessible level.
This plea, then, is mostly aimed at the deans of the five undergraduate schools to allow professors the time to increase their interaction with students. So many other structures at WU were laid in place for this to be possible-class size, advising programs, even the layout of the dorm-but this is to no avail if students’ mentors are simply stretched too thin. Perhaps the shortest route to increasing both formal and casual interactions between students and professors would be placing greater weight on the amount a professor spends with students in his or her tenure consideration.