Full House

If the registration process isn’t frustrating enough, many students this semester were faced with an additional obstacle: the trusted system of write-ins didn’t hold up.

According to Andre Willis, a religion professor and the instructor for RS 296, Saints and Sinners, many of the students he wrote into his class for next semester were denied in the Registrar’s office.

Robert Barisciano, ’04, is one of these students. Barisciano, who has had Willis for two other classes, said that when he took his note to the Registrar’s office the week after registration, they told him he couldn’t register. They said there was nothing he could do but sign up for another class, even though he had a note.

According to Rev. Thomas Regan, S.J., associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and chair of the Philosophy Department, there is no way to accommodate the number of students Willis admitted.

“Ms. Newall in the registrar’s office approached me earlier on the morning of registration after she had received several signed slips from Professor Willis granting students permission to enroll in his RS 296,” said Regan. “She noted that in a class which had an agreed upon cap of 30, there were now 47 students.” According to Regan, Pat Newall is responsible for assigning rooms and said there were no classrooms large enough to accommodate all the students Willis was admitting during the time code his class was scheduled for, so Regan allowed her to close the class to write-ins.

Melissa Habighorst, a 25-year-old transfer student, was left one class short for next semester because of this. Habighorst was in Willis’ office when two students came in and told him that they couldn’t register with their notes, and that she shouldn’t even bother.

“I have had two classes with him and think he is a great professor,” said Habighorst. “It frustrates me a lot. If they can accommodate the class, they should because there aren’t that many professors that get the kind of response and reaction he does. He has a certain connectedness with his students that I haven’t seen with any other professors.”

This action greatly angered Willis, who feels a strong commitment to students.

“I think that if students ask to take my course, they want to take it. I believe it is my responsibility as a professor to meet the needs of the students and I do not feel like it is appropriate to undermine students’ interest when they show it,” said Willis.

“I have taught at Wellesley, Boston College, Holy Cross, Wesleyan and other places and it strikes me that Fairfield students in particular are a real challenge to get interested in academic material,” said Willis. “Thus, if I am able to touch the students intellectually, spiritually or personally, I believe I am obligated to follow through with them and see that their interests are sustained and fulfilled.”

Willis currently teaches about 36 students in each of his RS 10 classes and about 66 in his RS 236 class, and said he is not aware of any written policy on class size at Fairfield.

“I was orally and casually instructed by my department chair on at least three occasions that I should cap my class at 30, and that I should not sign in too many students because this would mean too much work for me,” he said. “Still, it was always implied to me that the class numbers were ultimately the responsibility of the instructor and every semester I have signed in as many students who wanted to take my class.”

Regan said that faculty members, their department chairs and the dean are all involved in agreeing upon the “cap” number of students for each class before every semester, and this is what the room assignments are based on.

“If Professor Willis foresaw that he wanted to accommodate all the students who had a desire to take his class and to whom he had made commitments, he should have discussed his need for a cap larger than thirty with Professor Davidson, his department chair, in September,” he said. “Believe me, in my experience when professors project classroom needs out of the ordinary, every reasonable effort is made to accommodate all the parties involved.”

In response to the overwhelming amount of students that want to take Willis’ RS 296 next semester, Regan, Ronald Davidson, chair of Religious Studies, and the dean’s office decided to create a new section of RS 296 on the same day at the same time, taught by Harriot Luckman. However, this does not solve the problem for many students.

“It is not necessarily the same class,” said Habighorst. “The whole reason I wanted to take the class is because he’s teaching it.” She said taking the class with a different professor “definitely wouldn’t be worth my time.”

Erin Maier, ’04, agreed. Maier, who has already had Willis for two classes, was written in to RS 296 before a new section was formed, and two weeks after she was registered, she got a note in her mailbox saying that she was put into the new section.

“I am hesitant to take the class with a new teacher because I’ve been so excited about the subject with him,” said Maier. “He’s an interesting teacher and I was interested in the material he described, and I know that I will never have the opportunity to take him again because he is leaving after next semester.”

Willis said that he offered to teach another section of the class himself, but Regan told him that was not an option. To Regan, it seems to be a matter of policy.

“I have no reason to doubt that Professor Willis is a very popular professor,” Regan said. “There are many popular professors at Fairfield and they apparently understand that professors do not operate independently of both their departments and the dean’s office and unilaterally create additional sections of their courses in the middle of the registration process by signing in an additional fifty students when they have agreed upon a cap of 30.”

Willis said his intention was not to disregard policy, but to serve the students.

“I think the commitment to university policy over a commitment to the interests of the students is dangerous and unfair,” he said. “Actually, my criteria for a note were very stringent: you either had to be a former student of mine who had already asked me for permission to take a new class, or you had to agree to get a failing grade if you missed class once during the semester.”

Willis said that even with these harsh requirements, students he had never met before still wanted to take the class.

Why does Willis attract that many students?

“He is my friend, he is my mentor,” said Habighorst. “The enthusiasm he has blows me away. He knows how to have fun with it. He knows how to infuse life into something that can be so boring.”

Barisciano agreed. “He’s the only teacher that connects with us,” said Barisciano, who has still not received any invitation to register for the new section. “He seems like the only teacher that cares that everyone is interested. He wants everyone to be interested.”