The Detroit News

http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2007709050311

Wednesday, September 05, 2007

Opinion

Cutting program undermines Wayne State's urban mission

Ronald Aronson

What is going wrong at Wayne State University? Why, two years after dismantling its landmark College of Urban, Labor and Metropolitan Affairs, is Detroit's national research university placing its premier urban mission program, the Department of Interdisciplinary Studies, on the chopping block?

Two years ago, President Irvin Reid and members of the Board of Governors intoned their admiration for this nationally recognized program -- which provides open access for 700 working adults, one of the largest majors in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. More than any other part of the university, our students mirror the working city: 70 percent African-American, average age nearly 40 and attending school evenings after work.

The 30-year-old Department of Interdisciplinary Studies, with two sites in Detroit and at Macomb Community College's University Center, was developed to meet WSU's urban teaching mission: "to implement its curricula in ways that serve the needs of a nontraditional student population that is racially and ethnically diverse, commuting, working and raising families."

Well, no more. Or, at least, less and less if interdisciplinary studies is axed.

The stated reason for the move is the university budget crisis, resulting from the state budget crisis. But this is a smokescreen. The university will probably lose money as many potential part-time adult students find their way to other colleges.

There is a rather different truth: Reid and Provost Nancy Barrett, egged on by a small group of self-styled "elite" faculty, are pushing for a makeover of the university.

Interdisciplinary studies caters to working adults, who are admitted under our unique open admissions policy.

The program has a small-college atmosphere, where faculty and advisers get to know our students by first name. They become a close-knit learning community. But our students don't look like other students at Wayne State. And our resulting teaching methods (discussion, not lecture) and curriculum (courses focused on interdisciplinary problem-solving that incorporates students' life experiences) have always made our program look too unconventional to some of our colleagues. Above all, we take in any adult high-school graduates who apply and then let them prove themselves in our courses, which are capped by a significant senior research project.

In the tense, budget-cutting environment, this particular "different" is immediately read by many as "inferior."

Those who envision a more selective Wayne State University have seen their opportunity. The Board of Governors is ready to vote on the matter and probably go along. Yet we actually do better than the rest of the university in one of the most important statistics of concern to the community: Our graduation rate for African-American students is higher than that of the rest of WSU.

At its core, the proposed plan to close Interdisciplinary Studies and discontinue its degrees is an act of extreme disrespect to some of the communities WSU claims to serve. Our typical student, the African-American single mom who works full-time, will not find the same kind of welcome -- or respect -- elsewhere at WSU.

Normally the community lets a major institution like Wayne State operate without interference, just as its Board of Governors likes to let internal decisions be made without "micromanaging." But from time to time, when vital community interests are being violated, it is time to step in and be heard.

Ronald Aronson is a distinguished professor of interdisciplinary studies at Wayne State University in Detroit. E-mail letters to letters@detnews.com