Students, administrators discuss Barnard reaccreditation

Barnard administrators currently in the process of reevaluating their school asked students on Tuesday to give their two cents on the school’s problems.

Students gathered at a Barnard Student Government Association town hall to discuss Barnard’s reaccreditation process with Barnard President Debora Spar, Dean of Barnard College Dorothy Denburg, and Dean for International Programs Hilary Link.

This process, also called “self-study,” is a university reevaluation that the Council for Higher Education Accreditation requires Barnard to complete each decade. Barnard has been working on its self-study since early spring 2009 and intends to finish by 2011.

Dean Link and Biology Professor Paul Hertz are the co-chairs for this reaccreditation process. Link said that there are no specific rules for the self-study, but there are 14 standards of excellence to provide a framework for the findings.

“What we really want to ask ourselves is what do we want to accomplish here at Barnard? What do we want our students to take with them when their time ends?” Hertz said.

Many discussions throughout the room gravitated toward the complex relationship between Barnard and Columbia.

Verna Patti, BC ’10, said, “Columbia has a great pre-law society that Barnard students aren’t allowed to be a part of,” adding that it often has to do with issues of dorm access.

Giselle Leon, BC ’10 and SGA vice president of communications, echoed these concerns, saying, “Barnard athletes can’t get the flu shots the way Columbia athletes can despite playing for the same team.”

But Madeline Welsh, BC ’11, said that differences in health services could be an advantage. “Because our health services caters only to women it is that much better than that of a coed school,” she said.

Others said they did not feel as much of a disconnect between Barnard and Columbia.

“I feel that there is a lot of community here,” Rachael Gashkoff, BC ’10, said. “I see how well all the schools work together, and have made friends on both sides of Broadway,” she added.

Students said they were interested in a range of changes, from universal swipe access to credit for preprofessional classes abroad. Some said they wanted the mission of Barnard’s distribution requirements, the Nine Ways of Knowing, to be clearer, and others said they wished there were more career-oriented options , like the Barnard education program.

A 200-page report with recommendations and evaluations will be completed by the summer.
Spar said that this process of soliciting student feedback is just the beginning. “There will be many more opportunities to have more formal interactions when it comes to hearing out students as the process goes on.”