A moratorium on student admissions to the Department of Population Planning and International Health (PPIH) has been altered to allow for admission of up to 10 new students.
The change was announced in a March 1 memorandum to PPIH students and faculty and School of Public Health department chairs from Dean June E. Osborn and the School’s Executive Committee.
PPIH Chair Yuzuru J. Takeshita said normally the department enrolls 25 to 35 new students each year and that the number has been increasing in recent years.
He says the decision to allow up to 10 students to enroll is not a fair solution to the problems resulting from Osborn’s and the Executive Committee’s December decision to place a moratorium on student admissions and faculty recruiting.
“If we are admitting them, we have to see them through for two years. We have to provide courses for their degrees. Why not a full contingent of students?” Take-shita asked.
Noting that the department will still have a full complement of faculty, Take-shita said the solution does not effectively utilize resources.
Osborn and the Executive Committee wrote in the memo: “Although we continue to believe that the moratorium on new admissions to the program was a prudent decision, we are acting to alter the terms of the moratorium so that the review of the department can proceed without the process being charged as prejudicial to the outcome by virtue of the moratorium on admissions. It was and remains our considered judgment that the moratorium as previously envisioned was not prejudicial. We do intend to continue the moratorium on the hiring of tenure-track faculty in the department.”
Only students who can demonstrate that they can complete the program within a two-year period will be offered admission. Admitted students also will be notified that the department is under review and that they will be able to complete the program by May 1995. They will need to be prepared to transfer to another department if it takes them longer and if the review concludes that the department should be discontinued, according to the memo.
Takeshita said some students plan to personally contact the Regents with their concerns about the way the dean and Executive Committee have handled the department’s review.
A peer review committee, to be chaired by John H. Romani, professor of public health administration who is on retirement furlough, is in the process of being constituted.
