Father Malloy, among others, has been concerned for years about
the dwindling number of Friday classes, which has turned Thursday
night into the unofficial starting point for weekend partying.
Last spring the Academic Council approved a proposal aimed at
restoring Friday as a major class day.
The change would abolish 75-minute Monday-Wednesday classes
and replace them with Wednesday-Friday pairs of the same length.
Classes that previously met only on Friday would move to Monday,
as would any discussion groups or tutorials that met only on Friday.
Under the arrangement Monday would become a lighter day for
classes instead of Friday. The change is partly to ease scheduling
conflicts. But there's also the hope that students will party
less on Sunday night, when many attend dorm Masses, than on Thursday
night.
The changes were scheduled to take effect in spring semester
2003, but after objections were raised by faculty - mainly from
the Arts and Letters college, which would be most affected --
the provost postponed the revision until the fall of 2003.
