Word: j-term
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...whether some Houses will be closed over January. Asking students and tutors who remain on campus to relocate for a month involves a slew of complicated adjustments. Will students in the Houses to remain open be required to pack up and store their belongings before winter break to enable J-term students to move in? Will tutors —the vast majority of whom live at Harvard year-round, with school and work commitments that require them to remain at Harvard during January—also be required to relocate...
...even call it J-term anymore? When the College administration announced its revolutionary calendar reform last year, it included in its statement vague plans for a three-week term to begin in January. Possible conceptions of a “January Experience” included opportunities for students to pursue research, travel, internships, or academic study, as is the case at many peer universities. On Monday, however, Deans Michael A. Smith and Evelynn M. Hammonds issued a campus-wide e-mail confirming what many had feared—that the College had opted against providing any structured programming for undergraduates...
...major arguments in support of calendar reform was the possibility of an extended recess with new opportunities that would present themselves during that time. Many imagined J-term as a chance to explore new topics and non-academic interests on campus without the stresses associated with term-time commitments. By aborting plans for structured programming and forcing a majority of students off campus, the administration will effectively remove a large array of opportunities for students, including those who would have used the time to pursue independent projects on campus...
...Hammonds explained that discontinuing plans for a January term would allow the university to focus on developing other programs, including the transition to General Education, improving freshman seminars, and supporting the Arts Task Force. We hope that this rhetoric was not a set of hollow excuses for dropping J-term activities but instead a sincere commitment to focus additional resources on these other pressing issues...
...Finally, we hope the administration continues to plan for J-terms of subsequent years. Although today’s economic circumstances present challenges and the university’s resources are spread thinly across other important initiatives, allowing J-term to go undeveloped entirely for the foreseeable future would be an even greater disappointment than the one we now face...