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WE ALL know that the world is in constant motion and that change is a fact of life. These laws apply as much to university departments as they do to the natural world. However successful a department may be today, long-range success will elude it unless it adapts to new conditions and responds to new needs. Thus one of the prime functions of the chair is to ensure that the department's programs continue to evolve. The chair's responsibility in the matter of program planning and development embraces three broad and complex areas: the conception and development of new projects, the application and inclusion of these projects in the department's course of study, and the cultivation of agreement and support within the wider college community.
The chair may initiate a plan, provide resources or advice for its development, or promote it within the department as well as without. He or she may also act as a supporter of, or spokesperson for, a colleague's project. In all these roles, the chair is responsible for maintaining up-to-date knowledge of current profession-wide trends and goals and regularly transmitting this information to colleagues. Frequent attendance at professional meetings and diligent reading of journals will provide numerous ideas and a wealth of data on activities that are proving successful elsewhere and that might work equally well in the department. A report on these findings may be enough to fire the imagination of a colleague and inspire him or her to launch a project. In all likelihood an initiative for change will require the appointment of a committee and the continuous personal involvement of the chair. It is a great asset when the latter has some entrepreneurial spirit. Such a person will anticipate the long-range implications of a project and will try to defuse potential complications before they arise. He or she will also marshall resources in advance to strengthen the proposal.
The chair should not be the only initiator of new projects. In a well-run department, faculty members are encouraged to bring up suggestions for change. It is usually best that they solicit the chair's reaction early. If the chair does not support the proposal, it is unlikely to be realized; if he or she approves, or even responds enthusiastically, the plan is much more likely to succeed. The wise chair will not jump to negative conclusions but will be willing to consider the project impartially.
The new suggestion will most likely be discussed first at a section meeting. Much will depend on the ability of its proponent to justify the need for the project and the practicality of acting on it. The chair—who should attend the meeting to show support for faculty initiative, even if he or she is not a specialist in that section—should see that the group considers all possible ramifications of the project and that the discussion remains open and frank.
If the proposal is endorsed, it is then submitted to the entire department, with a specific plan for its implementation. If approved, it becomes the responsibility of the chair, who must see it through the institution's approval process. This responsibility does not end once he or she has secured that support; the plan must next be put into practice. Unanticipated problems are sure to arise, since new programs almost always conflict with those already in place. Yet the addition of a new element, whatever problems it creates, almost always acts as a stimulus, encouraging the department to look at its subject matter in a different way.
Whether the original idea for a project comes from the chair or another faculty member, the chair's obligation is to support it fully and constantly once it has been endorsed by the department. This means listening respectfully to objections, giving each careful consideration, and, if warranted, refuting them (but if an objection has merit, the chair must be ready to alter direction accordingly). Further, and perhaps more important, the chair must support the plan not only within the department but throughout the college and the university community. Allies in other departments must be found and cultivated, and the dean must be convinced of the value of the project for the department and the college. Department members often undervalue the primary role that the chair's power of persuasion plays in securing outside support. Without an effective spokesperson who is highly regarded by colleagues outside the department, the best-laid plans come to naught.
A fundamental fact all chairs learn quickly when they assume their mandates is that universities change slowly. It takes a lot of time and effort to advance a proposal from one administrative level to another. At every step one must make the same argument to another group, each further removed from the discipline in question and having less understanding of the need for the change. Patience, optimism, and tenacity are absolute requirements. Program development cannot be undertaken lightly. It demands full commitment. Yet without it there is no progress, only decline. Thus the chair who is interested in the welfare of the department and the growth of the discipline is obligated to pursue it.
How does one effect change? What course of action should one take? What pitfalls can be expected and what can one do to avoid them? Where does one find allies? These are only a few of the questions one must ask before proposing a project. Rather than try to respond to them in a vacuum, let us imagine a number of scenarios and see how they might play out at a university.
Let us suppose that a department chair, a woman who happens to be a specialist in Hispanic literature, has become concerned about a decline in enrollment in French. Conversations with French faculty members reinforce her impression that registration in advanced courses is decreasing and that students are showing less interest in literature. The chair has noticed an increasing number of articles on francophone studies in the professional journals she receives. She has glanced at them without paying much attention, but she vaguely remembers that several dealt with the introduction of francophone works into the French curriculum. She goes back to the journals and reads them with care. Since she is active in professional circles, she checks with several French specialists, who support her feeling that the introduction of francophone literature would provide an important and attractive dimension to the French offerings of the department. The chair could, of course, take the matter directly to the department; but as she is not a specialist in French, she decides that it would be wiser to approach the French section and suggest that the French faculty sponsor the proposal. She knows that it will not be easy to convince that group to try something new, especially since it will require a great deal of preliminary work beyond regular coursework preparation. But she knows that unless a project is fully endorsed by the party who will implement it, it has little chance of success. To her pleasure and surprise, the chair finds that half the French section members are quite knowledgeable about francophone literature and are eager to incorporate it into the curriculum. It turns out that they had been talking about it for some time, but had been too busy with other concerns to take the matter in hand. They need the chair to prod them, but once she has done so, they take over the task and convince the remaining doubters of the benefits the change would bring to their section.
The French section members not only put together a proposal that sails through the curriculum committees of the department and the college, but also organize a series of learning activities to help its members acquire expertise in francophone studies. Meanwhile the chair oils the wheels of the institutional hierarchy, informing other chairs and administrators of the proposal before final approval in the faculty council. These contacts allow the chair to present the project in the most favorable light and to refute objections before they are voiced publicly. On final approval, the biggest task—full incorporation of the project into the course of study—still remains, but it can be left in the hands of the French section, whose members were the proposal's acknowledged sponsors.
This example illustrates that, whenever possible, the best policy is to let a group of specialists develop a project: they know the discipline and are aware of which aspects are essential and which can be eliminated or postponed, they can anticipate reactions from the profession at large, and, as part of a disciplinary network, they have access to a wide circle of experts. Lethargy is often the major impediment to program development; no one is willing to volunteer, but once engaged in a project, the group will bring it to fruition most effectively. The task of the chair is to motivate them.
Let us now consider a somewhat different scenario, which begins with the urgent request of a member of the Spanish faculty to alter the traditional balance in the departmental curriculum between peninsular literature and Latin American literature. The faculty member puts forward the claim that Latin American literary works are at the forefront of contemporary international literary production and deserve more attention than they are given in the present course of study. The chair, a man who specializes in Latin American studies, feels that the statement is somewhat bombastic but agrees with the second part of the assertion. The inescapable fact is, however, that there are many more peninsular specialists than Latin Americanists in the Spanish section. He sees no way of increasing course offerings in one area without decreasing them in the other, a measure he knows would be unacceptable. Yet he wants to do justice to the contribution of Latin America. He has often reflected on this problem without finding a solution. He knows that there is no chance of hiring additional faculty members; the budget is tight and enrollments do not justify faculty expansion.
His only recourse is to seek outside funding to offer additional training to the entire Spanish section. He contacts the Division of Educational Programs of the National Endowment for the Humanities and proposes a plan for a summer institute on Latin American literature, to include intensive readings of major texts, a series of lectures by visiting specialists, individual research, and much discussion. The proposal is funded, the summer institute fires up the faculty, and the department is able to shift its focus without additional hiring. Indeed, the results of this venture go beyond the department. During the following year the Spanish section organizes monthly lectures on Latin American works for secondary school teachers of Spanish in nearby communities. Many of these teachers become so interested that they enroll in graduate courses in the department.
Linkages with other departments can also provide resources for program development. Foreign language departments have always said, for example, that it makes sense for a political scientist to be proficient in a foreign language. But political science students would be far more likely to listen if their departments required, or at least recommended, a minor in a foreign tongue. The time and effort expended by foreign language chairs in convincing other departments to link up with their departments are wisely invested. Such pairings bring in students. Offering something in return is usually the best inducement; for example, a course in the contemporary politics of France, Spain, or Latin America could be cross-listed and team-taught by faculty members from each department. The school or department of nursing is another logical partner. To encourage nursing students to continue their study of Spanish, a foreign language department could develop a course focusing on medical terminology and conversation on health-related topics. A similar connection could be established with the school of education. Again, the department could develop a course addressed specifically to the needs of teachers to communicate with Spanish-speaking children and their parents. Indeed, the foreign language department has a particular interest in working closely with the school of education. Language and literature professors should participate actively in the training and supervision of future teachers. No school of education has specialists for every language, and education students would benefit enormously from the guidance of a member of the language faculty. It makes eminent sense to have the methods course taught by a foreign language faculty member, but it will happen only if the department is ready to teach the course and the chair is persuasive.
Developing new programs and fashioning links with other disciplines or the community imply broadening our offerings. Surely literature remains the core of the preparation we give our majors, but why not also include in that major, and thus also make available to a larger constituency, courses in business in the foreign language and in translation? The claim that faculty members do not have the necessary background to teach such courses is no longer acceptable. Special summer courses on contemporary political life, economics, and business terminology and practices have been developed by government agencies in many foreign countries in response to demand from the international business community. Foreign language faculty members spend many summers abroad. A modest financial contribution by the home institution toward the cost of such a course would be a strong inducement to enroll in it, especially if the recipient realizes that this opportunity is due to the will of the department and the institution. The information gathered by these faculty members will lead not only to business courses that attract majors and interested students from other departments but also to civilization courses that present an authentic picture of the country whose language and literature are studied. Courses on civilization have become more attractive as the enormous increase in the availability of authentic material and visual aids has changed radically the way in which the subject is taught. Such courses are as intellectually demanding as our literature offerings and result in sustained language growth.
Translation is another area of study that we should include in our curriculum. Because current pedagogical methods stress interactive communication, we have tended to reject translation as an old-fashioned and discredited teaching tool. But translation can be a valuable method for sophisticated language development. It is most effective with students who have attained an acceptable knowledge of the foreign tongue and want to expand both vocabulary and grammatical correctness. Students enjoy dealing with two languages when they have attained a certain level of competence. Contrasting form and structure can be a stimulating intellectual exercise. Translation can also produce enhanced literary appreciation; it forces the reader to analyze the text closely and to interpret it as precisely as possible. Upper-level translation courses can be discipline-specific, focusing, for example, on art and artists, history, or international politics and drawing students from those disciplines as well as from the language and literature department. Offering such courses also allows interaction with faculty members from other departments for advice on text selection and referrals of interested students and thus can help build personal and professional contacts.
Foreign language and literature departments also do not exploit the medium of film sufficiently. Our students are visually oriented, and film can be a marvelous teaching tool in language as well as in literature courses. The often raised objection that film is too expensive is no longer valid. University film resources have grown exponentially. Of course it takes time to find out where these films are located; each department seems to have its own cache. Much telephoning may be required, but one should not be discouraged by the slim pickings available in the university library. The theater department probably has accumulated a trove of old but major films and has been buying the latest videos. The art history, sociology, anthropology, history, and comparative literature departments may have valuable holdings. The local library may have some treasures, as may student organizations. By borrowing some films here and others there, one can put together an interesting selection. In the event of real penury, one can develop consortial arrangements with sister institutions to share films.
Program planning and development are not limited to broadening or shifting the content of what we do; they also involve examining the way we pursue our task. Are we teaching today as we did twenty years ago or even a decade ago? If we are, then we have bypassed a revolution in teaching methodology. We may legitimately decide that the proficiency movement is not for us, for example, but to reject it out of hand, without prior investigation, is to cheat our students. The successful chair will make sure that every department member keeps abreast of current pedagogical developments. If no one else in the department comes forward with a recommendation to investigate a highly recommended new methodology, the chair should invite an expert to lecture before the department. If that presentation suscitates some interest, the chair must nurture the desire to know more about the subject, perhaps by finding modest financial support to send the interested faculty member to training sessions. As difficult as locating funds can be, a dean can usually come up with a limited sum for an individual training experience that will benefit a department. Again, this means that the chair must be willing to make the extra effort to convince the dean of the value of the expected results.
It is impossible to do everything and to please everyone; we have to choose our priorities. But it is amazing how much can be accomplished with relatively few resources other than the willingness of the group to try something new. To make the right choices and to agree ultimately on those priorities that will be most beneficial to the greatest number of people, the department has to consider the strengths of its members and the needs and desires of its institution and its students. We may believe in the value of our discipline, but if we want it to thrive, we must ask ourselves periodically what else we can do to make sure that others share that belief.
© 1994 by the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages. All Rights Reserved.
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