instructions for use i - hofmann megaplan

in this issue we offer commentary on the Institute’s report regardingAaron Swartz (see Editorial below and From The Faculty Chair, p. 5); two reflectionson teaching online courses (below and p. 15); and M.I.T. Numbers concerning ourincoming freshman class (p. 23).

MITFacultyNewsletter

Vol. XXVI No. 1September/October 2013

http://web.mit.edu/fnl

MassachusettsInstitute ofTechnology

continued on page 12

The MIT PhysicsDepartment’sExperience with edX

Report to thePresident, MIT andthe Prosecution ofAaron Swartz

continued on page 20

John Belcher

I N H I S T R A N S M I T TA L L E T T E R ,

President Reif urges everyone in the MITcommunity to read Professor Abelson’scommittee’s Report to the President, MITand the Prosecution of Aaron Swartz, in itsentirety (swartz-report.mit.edu/docs/report-to-the-president.pdf).

We agree, and we applaud PresidentReif ’s open stance and his decision tocommission the report. The committee’sresearch is thorough; the treatment, bal-anced; and the questions, important. Thecommittee’s chair understands MIT, he ishimself a pioneer in open publishing, heis highly objective, and he and his teamput astonishing effort into the work. Itwas the right thing to do, and it was doneby the right people.

And because we are who we are, every-one in our community should look care-fully at the factual data in the Abelson

EditorialNot Blameless, But Not to Blame

continued on page 3

Reprinted below is the Introduction to thereport submitted by Prof. Hal Abelson andhis committee at the request of MITPresident Rafael Reif.

ON JAN UARY 6, 2011, Aaron Swartzwas arrested by the MIT Police and anagent of the U.S. Secret Service, accused ofbreaking and entering for events that

I G IVE A B R I E F S U M MARY of theDepartment’s planning for and experi-ence with 8.02x, an online physics courseoffered last spring through edX. [Thisarticle is based on an article of the samename to appear in the fall 2013 issue [email protected], the annual journal formembers and friends of the MIT physicscommunity.]

The MIT Physics Department has along history of innovation in physics edu-cation, beginning with the formation in1956 of the Physical Science StudyCommittee led by Jerrold Zacharias andFrancis Friedman. More recent highlightsinclude the enormous, world-wideimpact of the Web physics lectures ofProfessor Walter Lewin beginning in the1990s and continuing to the present, andthe implementation in the early 2000s ofthe widely emulated interactive physics

The Rogers Building c1901 (First building on the MIT campus)

An editorial in the May/June 2013 issueof the Faculty Newsletter made referenceto a new motto for MIT – Mens, Manus etCor – that was proposed by Prof. JamesH. Williams, Jr. in the pages of theNewsletter nine years ago. A more specificreference there would have been appropri-ate, and we regret the omission. The pro-posal appeared in Vol. XVI No. 4,February/March 2004, in “A FormalRecommendation to the MIT Corporation”by Prof. James H. Williams, Jr.

2

Vol. XXVI No. 1 September/October 2013

Robert BerwickElectrical Engineering & Computer Science

*Nazli ChoucriPolitical Science

Ernst G. FrankelMechanical Engineering

Jean E. JacksonAnthropology

Gordon KaufmanManagement Science/Statistics

*Jonathan King (Chair) Biology

Helen Elaine LeeWriting and Humanistic Studies

Stephen J. Lippard (Treasurer)Chemistry

Seth LloydMechanical Engineering

Fred MoavenzadehCivil & Environmental Engineering/Engineering Systems

*Ruth Perry (Vice Chair)Literature Section

George Verghese (Secretary)Electrical Engineering & Computer Science

*Patrick Henry WinstonElectrical Engineering & Computer Science

David LewisManaging Editor

*Editorial Subcommittee for this issue

AddressMIT Faculty NewsletterBldg. 11-268Cambridge, MA 02139

Websitehttp://web.mit.edu/fnl

Telephone 617-253-7303Fax 617-253-0458E-mail [email protected]

Subscriptions$15/year on campus$25/year off campus

01 The MIT Physics Department’s Experience with edXJohn Belcher

01 Report to the President, MIT and the Prosecution of Aaron Swartz

Editorial 01 Not Blameless, But Not to Blame

From The 05 Initial Thoughts Faculty Chair Steven R. Hall

07 Teaching this fall? You should know . . .

In Memoriam 08 Pauline Maier Harriet Ritvo

Beyond the 09 Students and Institute GovernanceClassroom Robert Redwine

10 Creating a Culture of Caring:MIT’s First Institute Community and Equity OfficerEdmund Bertschinger

11 Resolution for Presentation to the MIT Faculty: “Establish a Campus Planning Committee”

15 My Experience Teaching 3.091x Michael Cima

18 The HASS Exploration (HEX) ProgramDiana Henderson, Christine Walley

19 Request for Preliminary Proposals forInnovative Curricular Projects

19 Nominate a Colleague for the MacVicar Faculty Fellows Program

Letters 22 Disturbed By Abelson ReportKenneth R. Manning, Patrick H. Winston

Letters 22 Praising America’s Public LibrariesAnn J. Wolpert

M.I.T. Numbers 23 Class of 2017 Enrolled Students: Admissions Statistics

M.I.T. Numbers 24 U.S. News & World Report:Graduate School Rankings 2004 – 2013

contentsThe MIT FacultyNewsletterEditorial Board

Photo credit: Page 1: Wikimedia Commons, Page 8: courtesy of Andrea Maier

MIT Faculty NewsletterSeptember/October 2013

3

report before becoming prejudiced by theopinions abundantly offered in the media,on the Web, and in this editorial.

But once we have read, we mustdiscuss, because no institution, includingMIT, can be what it aspires to be unless ituses the past to improve the quality of itsfuture. In that spirit, we have read thereport and offer our contribution to theengagement and exploration thatPresident Reif has encouraged. Like theAbelson committee, our purpose is not toassign blame. Instead, we focus on whatwe believe are among the lessons to belearned.

Lesson 1: Reasonable today may notbe so reasonable tomorrow Anyone can construct scenarios in whichit would be right to let a criminal case runits course. Just after Swartz’s arrest, whennot much, if anything, was known, otherthan that Swartz was not and never hadbeen an MIT student, neutrality lay in the(reasonable) part of the space of possiblepositions.

Over time, however, more came to beknown about ties to MIT: Swartz’s father,Robert, was a consultant at the MediaLaboratory; Swartz’s two younger broth-ers had been interns in the MediaLaboratory; and Swartz himself hungaround MIT’s Student InformationProcessing Board and participated inactivities of MIT’s World Wide WebConsortium. So it appears that Swartzcould have been considered a member ofwhat might be called the greater MITcommunity. Moreover, some have sug-gested that there is a still greater commu-nity to consider: that of technicallyeducated people who share some of MIT’svalues, such as open access to scientificpublications, codified in the MIT FacultyOpen Access Policy.

Presumably, such connections cameout in meetings between Swartz’s fatherand our administration, in letters directedat MIT’s administration, and in meetingsbetween Swartz’s counsel and MIT’s

counsel – but once it was decided to beneutral, the administration stuckdoggedly to that neutral position throughmultiple reviews. Maybe if emerging miti-gators were more carefully considered inthose reviews, we would have shifted ourposition toward engagement.

Lesson 2: Confirmation bias may leadto strange conclusions Evidently, the administration was influ-enced by notes prepared by MIT’s externalcounsel following a conversation betweenhim and the lead prosecutor:

The prosecutor said that the straw thatbroke the camel’s back was that when heindicted the case, and allowed Swartz tocome to the courthouse as opposed to beingarrested, Swartz used the time to post a“wild Internet campaign” in an effort todrum up support. This was a “foolish” movethat moved the case “from a human one-on-one level to an institutional level.” Thelead prosecutor said that on the institu-tional level cases are harder to manage bothinternally and externally.

The administration concluded thatany public statement made by MIT mightsimilarly have a negative effect by similarlyirritating the lead prosecutor, but theanalogy seems strained and hard tosupport in the face of obvious questions.Surely a carefully thought-through state-ment from MIT is very different from anInternet petition. And is it not possiblethat the prosecutor’s remark was a clever

gambit intended to dissuade MIT frommaking a statement that would makeprosecution untenable? And shouldn’tMIT do the right thing whether or not asensitive prosecutor is irritated? Was theadministration just looking for confirma-tion of a decision already made?

Ask why five times is one of the maximsrecommended by W. Edwards Deming,the statistician largely responsible for thehigh quality in Japanese manufacturingafter World War II. Maybe if the adminis-tration had followed Deming’s maximand asked why five times we wouldn’thave seen such strong support for neutral-ity in the prosecutor’s reported remark.

Lesson 3: Lack of public interest isnot a good reason for inaction The Abelson report notes that few in theMIT community expressed interest in theevolving Swartz situation. Why? Perhapsbecause Swartz knew that what he wasdoing was illegal and did it deliberatelyand repeatedly. Perhaps because there wasa sense that, unlike in other cases that haveattracted serious community attention,Swartz was not perceived as one of ourown. Perhaps because the prosecutor’shard line on a plea bargain was not gener-ally known.

Whatever the reasons, the Abelsonreport indicates that the lack of commu-nity interest was a factor in MIT’s decisionto remain neutral.

Not Blameless, But Not to Blamecontinued from page 1

continued on next page

The administration concluded that any public statementmade by MIT might similarly have a negative effect bysimilarly irritating the lead prosecutor, but the analogyseems strained and hard to support in the face ofobvious questions. Surely a carefully thought-throughstatement from MIT is very different from an Internetpetition. And is it not possible that the prosecutor’sremark was a clever gambit intended to dissuade MITfrom making a statement that would make prosecutionuntenable?

MIT Faculty NewsletterVol. XXVI No. 1

4

But mitigating factors seem to havebeen known to the administration; like-wise the administration knew that thosefactors were not widely known. So lack ofcommunity interest should not have beena decisive factor in shaping MIT’s position.

Lesson 4: We need to get better atcommunity engagement In his letter to the community, PresidentReif articulated the need for reflection onbig issues: “I have therefore asked ProvostChris Kaiser to work with Faculty ChairSteven Hall to design a process of com-munity engagement that will allow stu-dents, alumni, faculty, staff, and MITCorporation members to explore thesesubjects together this fall and shape thebest course for MIT.”

That we need to design a process ofcommunity engagement is itself worthy ofnote because it suggests we do not haveone ready at hand. In the past, recent anddistant, we have opened up Websites, wehave witnessed vigorous faculty-meetingdebates, we have conducted communityforums at various temperatures, and backduring the Vietnam War, we took to thestreets. But none of these were designedprocesses of sincere and effective commu-nity engagement. Accordingly, we hopethat the process designed by the Provostand the Faculty Chair will be innovativeand serve as a useful positive precedent.

Lesson 5: Civil disobedience requireseyes wide open We honor those – Thoreau, Gandhi,Mandela, and King come to mind – whosedistaste for existing laws leads them tobreak those laws deliberately, and weshould honor Swartz for breaking a law he

considered highly distasteful, whether weagree with the law or not. To this day thereis disagreement about what Swartz wasdoing. Some contend that he was down-loading the material simply for the pur-poses of comparison and analysis. Othersthink that because Swartz was an activistfor open access to Internet resources, hewas downloading the journal articles ofJSTOR in the first place because hethought the knowledge there should beavailable freely to everyone – not just thosewith university connections. Because theprofits of JSTOR did not go to the aca-demics who wrote the articles in questionanyway, but to the company that put themon the Web, his was a Robin Hood act.

Unfortunately, Swartz did not expectto get caught, he did not comprehendwhat could be thrown at him by anaggressive prosecutor, he did not antici-pate the threat of a felony conviction andjail time, and he was said to have a historyof depression, which, if so, indicatedheightened vulnerability to suicide.

That Swartz did commit suicideinstantly turned a little-noted policy ques-tion into a widely discussed controversy.No one can doubt that wide discussion isgood. What’s tragically bad is that the dis-cussion comes at a high price, with natureand events combining in such a way as todeprive the world of decades of advocacyby someone who had important things tosay.

. . . . . . . . . .

Editorial BoardElections

FOLLOWI NG PROCE D U R E S outlinedin the Policies and Procedures of the MITFaculty Newsletter, an Institute-wide elec-

tion for new members of the FNLEditorial Board will be held in the comingweeks. All regular faculty members andprofessors emeriti will be eligible to vote.

Nominees for the Editorial Board willbe selected by the Newsletter NominationsCommittee from submissions by theInstitute faculty. Please submit all nomi-nations to: [email protected], or via interde-partmental mail to FNL, 11-268. Deadlinefor all nominations is October 15.

Elections will be electronically based,with each eligible voter receiving an e-mail with a link to the voting site. Facultyand faculty emeriti will need to have MITWeb certificates installed on their com-puter, to allow for voter authentication.No record of individual voting prefer-ences will be kept.

According to the FNL Policies andProcedures:

“The Nominations Committee will have theresponsibility of recruiting and evaluatingcandidates for the Editorial Board, takinginto account the need for representationfrom different Schools and sectors of theInstitute, junior, senior, and retired faculty,male and female, underrepresented groupsor faculty constituencies.”

“Candidates for the Editorial Board shouldgive evidence of commitment to theintegrity and independence of the faculty,and to the role of the Faculty Newsletter asan important voice of the faculty.”

We encourage the participation ofeveryone eligible to vote.

Editorial Subcommittee

Not Blameless, But Not to Blamecontinued from preceding page


5

Steven R. HallFrom The Faculty ChairInitial Thoughts

TH I S I S MY FI R ST Faculty Newslettercolumn as Chair of the Faculty. Like mypredecessors, I hope to use the column asa way to communicate with faculty aboutongoing issues of concern to you as well asthe broader MIT community, and toinvite feedback to the faculty officers andcommittees of the faculty.

I’m fortunate to be working with twoother faculty officers, elected in May of thisyear. Prof. John Belcher is the newAssociate Chair of the Faculty. John is theClass of ’22 Professor of Physics and aformer MacVicar Fellow, with researchinterests in astrophysics. He has led severalinnovations in the teaching of physics atMIT, including the development of theTechnology Enabled Active Learning(TEAL) format for teaching 8.02. Hisexpertise in the technology of learning isespecially valuable at this time, as theMITx and edX initiatives continue to growin size and influence. Prof. Susan Silbey isthe new Secretary of the Faculty. She isLeon and Anne Goldberg Professor ofHumanities, Sociology and Anthropology;Professor of Behavioral and PolicySciences (Sloan School of Management);and head of Anthropology. With researchinterests in governance, regulatory, andaudit processes in complex organizations,she brings an interesting perspective toMIT governance that I’ve found enlighten-ing and useful.

All of the faculty officers are availablefor discussions with faculty. We welcomee-mail, phone calls, or face-to-face meet-ings. The officers can be reached collec-tively at [email protected].

Faculty Role in Shared GovernanceMIT’s shared governance structure givesfaculty a variety of opportunities to affectthe future of the Institute. There are two

key ways to make your voice heard. Thefirst is participation in faculty meetings.Traditionally chaired by the InstitutePresident, faculty meetings are a monthlyopportunity to catch up with the adminis-

tration, members of faculty committees,and faculty members from other MITSchools – plus to enjoy an informal post-meeting reception. This year, I anticipate anumber of important issues will comebefore the faculty, from new degrees toexam policies to the use of the H-levelsubject designation.

Given the many demands on facultytime, it’s no secret that attendance atfaculty meetings fluctuates, and we occa-sionally struggle to achieve a quorum –sometimes forcing the delay of agendaitems. Other than the procedural problemof needing a quorum to do business, isattendance at faculty meetings a problem?I think it is. A typical pattern is that whena vote is scheduled for an issue that espe-cially affects a single department or unit(say, the approval of a new degreeprogram), proponents show up in rela-tively large numbers to support the pro-posal. While special interests areinevitable, the result is that the attendanceat any given faculty meeting is likely to behighly non-representative of the faculty.

While it’s traditional for a new Chair ofthe Faculty to exhort colleagues to attendfaculty meetings (and you should!), I thinkit’s also important to look for opportuni-

ties to strengthen our governance struc-ture to make participation in faculty gov-ernance in general and faculty meetings inparticular more meaningful. For example,a common complaint I hear is that faculty

meetings spend too much time on infor-mational reports that require no action onthe part of the faculty, and not enoughtime to consider and debate issues thatrequire faculty attention. Yet many ofthose reports are mandated by the faculty,and can’t simply be eliminated withoutfurther action by the faculty.

Increasing Faculty Participation Given the importance of informed debate,is there another way to make informationavailable? Some schools have experi-mented with online voting, with votingopen for a short time (say, a day or two)following meetings. While online votingwouldn’t be a substitute for faculty meet-ings, does it have the potential to make thefaculty decision-making process morerepresentative and inclusive? For thosewho’ve spent time at other institutions, wewould be interested to hear comparativeperspectives.

There is a second important way toparticipate in governance: membership onthe standing committees of the faculty.Most of the work of the faculty governancesystem is accomplished by the 11 standing

Given the many demands on faculty time, it’s no secretthat attendance at faculty meetings fluctuates, and weoccasionally struggle to achieve a quorum – sometimesforcing the delay of agenda items. Other than theprocedural problem of needing a quorum to do business,is attendance at faculty meetings a problem?



6

committees of the faculty. These commit-tees oversee matters of broad faculty inter-est, such as the curriculum, the librarysystem, and graduate programs. Nomineesfor standing committees are selected bythe Committee on Nominations, whichpresents a slate of candidates for opencommittee and faculty officer positions tothe faculty at the March faculty meeting.(Members of the Committee onNominations are appointed by thePresident.) In addition to the 11 standingcommittees, there are two awards commit-tees (the Harold E. Edgerton FacultyAchievement Award and the James R.Killian Jr. Faculty Achievement AwardSelection Committees), whose membersare nominated by the Committee onNominations and elected by the faculty,and two standing subcommittees (on theCommunication Requirement and theHASS Requirement), whose members areappointed through the Committee on theUndergraduate Program.

In all, more than 90 faculty membersserve on standing committees, and closeto 40 must be elected or appointed eachyear to replace committee members withexpiring terms. Generally, facultymembers nominated or appointed tostanding committees are selected fromamong those who volunteer on theInstitute Committee PreferenceQuestionnaire, which is sent to facultyearly in the fall term.

While serving on faculty committeeshas few extrinsic rewards, there are intrin-sic rewards. I’ve found my time onInstitute committees to be interesting,challenging, and worthwhile. When youreceive the survey this fall, please reviewthe committee list and submit your pre-ferred assignments. Most importantly, ifasked by the Committee on Nominationsto serve on a committee, please say yes.

Engagement Around the AaronSwartz ReviewIn January of this year, our communitywas shocked and saddened by the suicideof Aaron Swartz. Aaron was a brilliant

young programmer and activist whohelped develop, while still a teenager,Internet infrastructure that many of usnow take for granted, such as RSS. Aaron’sdeath came two years after his arrest andsubsequent prosecution on chargesrelated to his use of the MIT computernetwork to download thousands of aca-demic articles from the JSTOR digitaldepository. Aaron’s friends and support-ers believe that Aaron’s prosecution wasunjust. As the case continued, MITreceived substantial scrutiny for its role inthe matter.

On January 22, President Reif chargedProf. Hal Abelson of EECS to reviewMIT’s involvement in the Swartz matter.Specifically, the review was to (1) describeMIT’s actions and decisions during theperiod beginning when MIT first becameaware of unusual JSTOR-related activityon its network by a then-unidentifiedperson, until the death of Aaron Swartzon January 11, 2013, (2) review thecontext of these decisions and the optionsthat MIT considered, and (3) identify theissues that warrant further analysis inorder to learn from these events. Thereview panel consisted of Prof. Abelson,Institute Professor Emeritus PeterDiamond, and Andrew Grosso, an attor-ney and former Assistant U.S. Attorney.Their report was released on July 30. Iwould like to offer my thanks and appre-ciation on behalf of the faculty to Profs.Abelson and Diamond and Mr. Grossofor the thorough and thoughtful reportthat they produced.

Concurrent with the release of thereport, President Reif sent a letter to thecommunity, thanking the review commit-tee, and beginning a process throughwhich the MIT community will try toaddress the questions raised by the report,specifically the eight questions posed inPart V of the report. Among other actions,President Reif charged Provost ChrisKaiser and me “to design a process ofcommunity engagement that will allowstudents, alumni, faculty, staff and MITCorporation members to explore thesesubjects together this fall and shape thebest course for MIT.” As of the writing ofthis column in mid-August, the Provost

and I are still working on the form of thatengagement. However, as a first step, wehave launched a forum, Swartz-review.mit.edu, to gather input from theMIT community. (The URL for the site isthe same as the one that was used by thereview committee. Issues raised by thecommunity provided important directionfor the panel during the first part of thereview.) The site can be viewed by anyone,but commenting is restricted to membersof the MIT community. Current membersof the community can log in with a validKerberos username and password or MITnetwork certificate. Alumni can log inusing their Infinite Connection usernameand password. The site is organizedaround the eight questions posed in PartV of the report.

Prior to the release of the review com-mittee findings, MIT, as an institution,understandably made few statementsabout the facts surrounding the Swartzcase. My sense is that both the lack ofinformation and the desire to see theresults of the review before forming opin-ions may have muted discussion of thematter during that time. Now that thereview is available, I urge you to read itand provide feedback on the Website aspart of our community discussion onissues surrounding open access, intellec-tual property, responsibility, leadership,policy, and ethics.

President Reif noted in his letter thathe has heard from many in our commu-nity who believe that MIT’s actions wereproper and justified; he also noted thatothers believe that MIT should havebeen more active in the case. I also haveheard a range of thoughtful perspectives,both on the actions that were taken andhow our ethical commitments might betested in the future. I look forward tohearing more from the faculty and thebroader community on these importantquestions. On this or any other topic, welook forward to your comments [email protected].

Initial ThoughtsHall, from preceding page

Steven R. Hall is a Professor in theDepartment of Aeronautics and Astronauticsand Faculty Chair ([email protected]).


7

Teaching this fall? You should know . . .the faculty regulates examinations and assignments for all subjects.

View the complete regulations at: web.mit.edu/faculty/teaching/termregs.html. Select requirements are provided below for reference.

Contact Faculty Chair Steven Hall at x3-0869 or [email protected] for questions or exceptions.

No required classes, examinations, oral presentations, exercises, or assignments of any kind may be scheduled afterthe last regularly scheduled class in a subject, except for final examinations scheduled through the Schedules Office.

Undergraduate SubjectsBy the end of the first week of classes, you must provide:

• a clear and complete description of the required work, including the number and kinds of assignments• the approximate schedule of tests and due dates for major projects• an indication of whether or not there will be a final examination, and• the grading criteria and procedures to be used

By the end of the third week, you must provide a precise schedule of tests and major assignments.

Tests, required reviews, and other academic exercises outside scheduled class times shall not be held on Mondayevenings. In addition, when held outside scheduled class times, tests must:

• not exceed two hours in length• begin no earlier than 7:30 PM when held in the evening, and• be scheduled through the Schedules Office

In all undergraduate subjects, there shall be no tests after Friday, December 6, 2013. Unit tests may be scheduled during the final examination period.

Graduate SubjectsBy the end of the third week, you must provide:

• a clear and complete description of the required work, including the number and kinds of assignments• the schedule of tests and due dates for major projects• an indication of whether or not there will be a final examination, and• the grading criteria and procedures to be used

For each graduate subject with a final examination, no other test may be given and no assignment may fall due afterFriday, December 6, 2013. For each subject without a final examination, at most, either one in-class test may begiven, or one assignment, term paper, or oral presentation may fall due between December 6 and the end of the lastregularly scheduled class in the subject.

Collaboration Policy and Expectations for Academic ConductDue to varying faculty attitudes towards collaboration and diverse cultural values and priorities regarding academichonesty, students are often confused about expectations regarding permissible academic conduct. It is important toclarify, in writing, expectations regarding collaboration and academic conduct at the beginning of each semester. This could include a reference to the MIT Academic Integrity Handbook at: integrity.mit.edu.


8

Harriet RitvoIn MemoriamPauline Maier

T H E H I S TO RY FAC U LT Y W I L L feelvery different this fall without PaulineMaier. It will seem more subdued withouther exuberant laugh, and poorer in lessimmediately apparent ways without herwealth of experience and her generousengagement. To a great extent our depart-ment is her creation – the product of herhigh professional standards. We were allhired on her long and vigilant watch. Shewas department head for many years, andthose of us who followed her always bore

in mind her expectations with regard tocommitment, integrity, and scholarship(and if we occasionally forgot, she wouldremind us).

Pauline’s presence was genial as well asbracing. She liked her colleagues andenjoyed spending time with us; she toldme that that was the main reason that sheattended search dinners. She understoodthat life included more than work,important as work was to her, and sym-pathized with the challenges of balancingprofessional obligations with those offamily, whether in the form of young chil-dren or of aged parents. (But balance wasimportant; she felt that dedicating a firstbook to parents predicted continued pro-fessional activity, since that requiredwriting a second one to dedicate to apartner.) Her interests and enthusiasmswere broad and varied, and she happilyshared them. She was an energetic gar-dener and planted on an awe-inspiringscale at her Rhode Island farm; her col-leagues often enjoyed its fruit and veg-etable bounty. She was an aficionado ofcheese, and a talented cook. She wasdevoted to her dogs, as well as to thehuman members of her family.

The many published notices thatappeared after her death appropriately

emphasized the importance and distinc-tion of her scholarly work on earlyAmerican history. The generosity thatcharacterized her relationships with col-leagues and students at MIT was alsoevident in her writing, which, no matterhow arcane and weighty the subject,addressed the general reader as well as thescholarly specialist (with striking success –for example, American Scripture, her bookabout the Declaration of Independence,was featured at Costco). It was alsoexpressed in ways less visible from theInstitute. Pauline’s expansive sense of theaudience for history led her to engagewith groups of high school teachers. Andwe were not the only colleagues who ben-efitted from her learning, her intelligence,and her wisdom.

Along with the formal obituariesappeared a flood of very moving posts onblogs and listservs by younger scholarsfrom around the country, who had appre-ciated her high standards and valuableadvice, whether they first encountered heras a formal reader of a submitted manu-script, or at a lecture or conference. So ourloss is very widely shared, but our corridorwill be especially quiet.

Harriet Ritvo is a Professor in the HistoryFaculty ([email protected]).

Pauline Maier


9

Robert RedwineBeyond the ClassroomStudents and Institute Governance

HAVI N G B E E N ON TH E MIT facultysince 1979, I have noted that a topic thatcomes up frequently in faculty-studentinteractions outside the classroom is theissue of Institute governance. This can bea contentious topic to say the least. Thetypical situation involves student unhap-piness that they were not included morein discussions leading to decisions thataffect them. The typical faculty reaction ispuzzlement that the students think theyshould be included to the extent they do;after all, we have been in their positionand our stake in the Institute involves a40-50 year timeframe, not four years. Wesometimes forget that when we were intheir position we probably felt the sameway they do.

I certainly do not have a magic solutionto this situation, and we are likely to con-tinue to see disagreements of this natureappear from time to time. However, Ithought it might be of interest to describesome very positive involvements of stu-dents in matters of Institute governancethat I have been fortunate to experience. Iserved as Dean for UndergraduateEducation from 2000 to 2006 and as Chairof the Committee on Discipline (COD)from 2010 to 2012. In both of those roles Ihad many interactions with students, espe-cially those who chose to be involved withInstitute governance.

Not surprisingly, the Dean forUndergraduate Education interacts on aregular basis with representatives of theUndergraduate Association. I have alwaysfound these students to be remarkably ded-icated and thoughtful. They are very proudof MIT and the education they are receiv-ing, but they also want to do whatever they

can to make it even better. They often spenda lot of their (precious) time working withfaculty and staff to improve MIT education.An important example was the work of theTask Force on the Undergraduate

Educational Commons, an effort startedwhile I was Dean. We included students onthe Task Force and the perspectives theybrought to the discussions were invaluable.All of the faculty members on the TaskForce gained important insights from thestudent representatives.

The Committee on Discipline at MITconsiders serious cases of alleged miscon-duct by students; some cases involve aca-demic misconduct and other casesinvolve personal misconduct of a non-academic nature. These cases can be verycomplicated and often are quite painful.MIT is distinguished from many of ourpeers by the fact that we have longincluded students (both undergraduateand graduate) on the Committee onDiscipline, along with faculty and staff. Inmy experience the inclusion of studentson COD panels provides an extremelyimportant perspective that almost alwaysleads to a better decision. It is also the casethat the student members obviously taketheir responsibilities on COD very seri-ously and try as hard as anyone to under-

stand these complicated situations. I havegained enormous respect for thethoughtful contributions of students toCOD decisions and for the individualswho provided them.

Apparently a major reason why some ofour peers do not include students on disci-pline bodies is worry about confidentiality.I was actually stunned a few years ago tohear this from a colleague at a peer institu-tion, because in my experience we havehad no reason for concern in this regard.As I indicated above, our students taketheir responsibilities very seriously andthey greatly improve the COD process.

Institute governance involves variouscomponents, and I am happy to say thatour students make important contribu-tions to many of them. I have been fortu-nate to have my professional life enhancedby many of these interactions with stu-dents. Having the opportunity to teachand interact with such amazing studentsis one of the chief attractions that bringfaculty to MIT. I believe that we as facultymembers should be very proud of the stu-dents who contribute so much to Institutegovernance.

Robert Redwine is a Professor in theDepartment of Physics and Director of theBates Linear Accelerator ([email protected]).

MIT is distinguished from many of our peers by the factthat we have long included students (bothundergraduate and graduate) on the Committee onDiscipline, along with faculty and staff. In my experiencethe inclusion of students on COD panels provides anextremely important perspective that almost alwaysleads to a better decision.


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Edmund BertschingerCreating a Culture of Caring: MIT’s FirstInstitute Community and Equity Officer

“TODAY, I CAN TE LL YOU for certainthat the world will respect you for whatyou know. And for what you know how todo. But I also want the family of MIT to befamous for how we treat people: Famousfor sympathy, humility, decency, respectand kindness.” President Rafael Reif gavethis problem set to the MIT communityin his Charge to the Graduates duringCommencement in June 2013. Theassignment followed his letter to the MITcommunity in April 2013, which stated“One of my goals as president is to culti-vate a caring community focused onMIT’s shared values of excellence, meri-tocracy, openness, integrity and mutualrespect. I also want to help the entire MITcommunity to draw strength and energyfrom our extraordinary diversity of expe-riences and backgrounds.”

I have the privilege and the dauntingtask, as MIT’s first Institute Communityand Equity Officer (ICEO), to help usreach this goal. The role expands theresponsibilities held previously byAssociate Provosts for Faculty EquityWesley Harris and Barbara Liskov, whoseefforts drove important progress onfaculty recruiting, retention, and mentor-ship. In addition to supporting the successof women and minority faculty at MIT,my office will facilitate and support effortsto enhance the life of everyone at MIT –faculty, students, postdocs, and staff –with the aim of making MIT the bestplace to work and study for everyone.

At MIT we love to innovate and welove challenges. We will have to innovateto create a new office that has few prece-dents at other universities. And while thechallenge is awesome, so is the thrill ofworking to make a difference.

I bring to this position nearly six years’experience as Physics Department head,where my own charge came from womengraduate students who urged me to createa culture of caring. They gave me theencouragement and confidence to under-take this challenge by building on theexisting culture of educational innovationand collegiality. I quickly linked up withothers working to strengthen diversityand inclusion at MIT and elsewhere,which led to collaboration on such effortsas the MIT150 Symposium “Leaders inScience and Engineering: The Women ofMIT” and the annual Institute DiversitySummits. I believe strongly that suchefforts – at the department level as well asMIT-wide – make a real difference and arean important part of institutional self-improvement.

In no way does creating a culture ofcaring mean lowering the standards;during my 27 years on the faculty, thePhysics Department has never been moresuccessful in recruiting and retaining topfaculty and students than it is today. Onthe contrary, people do better when theyfeel valued and supported. We can be thebest university only by helping everyoneto do their best. When we do, diversity andexcellence go hand in hand.

MIT has made good progress in build-ing community and equity over the years.We’re famous for our critical self-evalua-tions of the status of women (1999, 2002)and underrepresented minority faculty(2010). In 2004, MIT faculty committed“to taking a leadership position amongour peer institutions in the recruiting andsuccess of underrepresented minorityfaculty and graduate students.” Colleagueselsewhere are amazed when I tell them

that there is no majority ethnicity in ourundergraduate student body. Last spring,faculty responded enthusiastically to thecall for increased advising and mentoringof freshmen, and this fall the number offaculty freshman advisors has doubledfrom recent years. This is a perfect time toreinforce our efforts by providing facilita-tion and communication of best practicesthrough the new office of the ICEO.

Since beginning in this position in July,I’ve been on a listening tour to learn asmuch as I can about the MIT community.One of my initial impressions is that MIThas not yet resolved the paradox of indi-vidualism and community.

On one hand, MIT prides itself as ameritocracy, a place where advancementis based on individual achievement. Thisideal underlies our tenure system and it isessential for ensuring the highest qualityfaculty. Individual achievement in itself isa good thing but, taken to extreme, indi-vidualism can promote isolation and asense of being overwhelmed. For example,as a new faculty member, I felt the sameshock and self-doubt that afflicts manynew students, namely the ImpostorSyndrome. The Impostor Syndrome is thefeeling that, despite evidence of compe-tence, one is not as capable as othersthink, and will be revealed to be a fraud. Itis rampant at MIT and even afflicts facultymembers. The resulting stress can lead toa self-fulfilling prophecy and to a self-induced erosion of meritocracy.

On the other hand, MIT prides itself asa caring community. After an undergrad-uate student described her struggles withdepression in 2012 and many MIT stu-dents shared their struggles with stress, anMIT faculty member shared his own


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struggles with depression, showing thatone can overcome mental health prob-lems to thrive. His caring story swept asidea stigma that, like the ImpostorSyndrome, prevents us from doing ourbest. Our community similarly showed itsstrength following the tragic shooting ofOfficer Sean Collier last spring, when theworld saw an unprecedented outpouringof empathy, respect, and gratitude at MIT.

We resolve the paradox of individual-ism and community by strengthening ourculture of caring, empathy, and respect –by valuing and supporting individualaccomplishments while helping everyoneto do their best. We do this by expandingthe circle of caring to include not only theself-selected devotees of community, butto include everyone: Every staff member,including those who work the midnightshift. Every student, including those whochallenge authority. Every postdoc,including those who struggle with child-care. Every faculty member, includingthose who are denied tenure. We resolve

the paradox with sympathy, humility,decency, respect, and kindness.

My role is to be a facilitator, a resourcefor the many people already providingsupport to community and equity acrossMIT, a focal point for organizing MIT’srelated activities and conversations, apractitioner and champion for best prac-tices in equity, inclusion, and diversity.

Working under Provost Chris Kaiser,this fall I will lead a strategic planningprocess in consultation with, and reflect-ing the needs of, the entire MIT commu-nity. The deliverable outcome will be anICEO mission statement reflecting twoobjectives: deepening the sense of inclu-sion based on MIT’s shared values, andhelping all members of the MIT commu-nity to appreciate and leverage its diversityof experiences and backgrounds. Thisstrategic planning process will also articu-late a set of achievable goals and the meansfor assessing progress toward these goals.

I need your help. Please contact mewith your ideas, concerns, and dreams.

The strategic planning process can onlysucceed if we leverage our diversity togather the best ideas. I’m on a listeningtour and seek to meet with interestedindividuals and groups. Some of the ques-tions I seek your thoughts about are:

• How do you define community and equityat MIT? What do they mean to you?

• What should be the top priorities forstrengthening community, equity, andinclusion, and why?

• What are the potential roadblocks toreaching the goal of a stronger MITcommunity?

• What advice do you have for me?

Please send your thoughts and requestsfor appointments to [email protected]. I lookforward to hearing from you.

Edmund Bertschinger is Institute Communityand Equity Officer ([email protected]).

Resolution for Presentation to the MITFaculty: “Establish a Campus PlanningCommittee”

S E PTE M B E R 4, 2013

Whereas:MIT’s Charles River campus with its

buildings, open spaces, and landscape isan essential component of the Institute’seducational and research environment.

And Whereas:The faculty, students, and staff are

essential stakeholders in the Institute’seducational and research functions.

And Whereas:The rapid economic development in

the Kendall area, increased scarcity of

available land, and increase in real estatecosts, calls for very careful long-termcampus planning to ensure the availabilityof space to support future academic needsof MIT.

And Whereas: Critical decisions affecting the future of

the campus should be made with the fullyconsidered input of the above stakeholders.

Therefore:A Campus Planning Committee com-

posed of a majority of faculty memberselected by the faculty, together withstudent, staff, and administration repre-

sentatives, shall be established as aStanding Committee of the Institute,prior to the end of the fall 2013 semester.

Respectfully submitted,

Nazli Choucri (Political Science) Jean E. Jackson (Anthropology)Jonathan A. King (Biology) Helen Elaine Lee (Writing) Ruth Perry (Humanities) Nasser Rabbat (Architecture) Frederick P. Salvucci (Civ. & Env. Eng)Frank Solomon (Biology)Roger Summons (EAPS) Seth Teller (EECS)


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classroom instruction model for residen-tial education, TEAL [TechnologyEnhanced Active Learning, see:icampus.mit.edu/projects/project/?pname=TEAL]. Given the Department’s currentprominence in the GIR educational expe-rience, and its long history in physics edu-cation, Professor Edmund Bertschinger,the then Physics Department Head, posi-tioned the Department to becomeinvolved in edX at an early stage in the lastacademic year, both to gain experience inusing the online platform and also toinfluence the capabilities of that platformby being an “early adopter.”

To that end, Bertschinger appointed anad hoc committee, the PhysicsX PlanningGroup (PxPG),to create, monitor, andreview the development and offerings ofthe first few departmental subjects onedX, and to advise him on the schedulingof subjects to go online. The online course8.02x was approved in April 2012, beforePxPG was formally convened. That coursebegan online on February 18, 2013, andended on June 17, 2013. The decision tobegin with 8.02x was made because theDepartment has available a wealth ofdigital resources for electromagnetism,most notably Lewin’s lectures from hisresidential course given in spring 2002.There was also an electromagnetism text-book and a number of electromagnetismsimulations and visualizations created inthe process of the curriculum develop-ment for 8.02 TEAL (this work wasfunded by the d’Arbeloff Fund forExcellence in Education and iCampus).

The next course to go online, 8.01x,was approved by PxPG in December of2012.This course is scheduled to go onlineon September 9, 2013, with an end date ofJanuary 13, 2014.One additional courseduring the summer, Professor DavidPritchard’s Mechanics ReView,[web.mit.edu/physics/news/spotlight/20130501_mechreview.html] was approvedin March of 2013, and began on June 1,2013. Although not based on 8.01, thiscourse is part of the Physics Department’s

effort to learn how to use the edX platformfor improving teaching and learning.

The Format of 8.02xThe recorded lectures of Professor WalterLewin’s courses, including 8.01 (ClassicalMechanics), 8.02 (Electricity andMagnetism), and 8.03 (Vibrations andWaves), have been visited more than 8million times on MIT OpenCourseWare(OCW), and more than 11.4 milliontimes on YouTube. The first lecture for8.01, recorded in fall 1999, has beenviewed more than 1.2 million times onYouTube. Translations of ProfessorLewin’s courses into Chinese, Spanish,Portuguese, Korean, Turkish, and Thaihave been accessed by hundreds of thou-sands of learners.

Given Lewin’s immense reputationonline, the Department decided to buildthe online offering of 8.02x around the 36recordings of Lewin’s spring 2002 lectures,complete and in sequence. Because theOCW videos of these lectures were putonline in 2003, at fairly low resolution, thedecision was made to go back to the orig-inal tapes of Lewin’s lectures and redigi-tize them, thus producing much higherresolution videos for 8.02x compared toversions previously online. The onlychanges in his original lectures were editsby Professor Lewin to include three toapproximately 10 “gaps” for short ques-tions during a given lecture. Studentsviewing these lectures online in 8.02x hadto answer these gap questions before theycould proceed with the next lecturesegment. This was done to provide moreengagement and a better learning experi-ence for the online students. This featuredid not exist in the edX platform beforethe Department requested it, and it is anexample of how interacting with the edXsystem early on helped the Department tomold its capabilities. In addition to the2002 lectures, 8.02x used the many “helpsessions” that Professor Lewin hasrecorded over the years for the weeklyproblems sets assigned in the residentialversion of 8.02. Also, many of the TEALelectromagnetic simulations were portedover to the edX platform for use in 8.02x,

where they run in javascript on anyHTML5 compliant browser, making thesimulations widely accessible. The coursealso featured an online discussion boardwhere the students could ask questions ofthe course staff, including ProfessorLewin.

The structure of the online course wasdesigned much like the residential course.There was a problem set due every threelectures, with three exams over the courseof the term and a final exam. To discour-age dishonesty, the problem set andexams had problem parameters that wererandomized between students – that is,different students received a different setof input parameters with a correspond-ingly different set of correct answers. Toaccommodate the various schedules ofthe online students and because of thelimitations of the online format, the stu-dents had three days to complete theexams. Thus, even though the exams wererepresentative of an MIT level two-hourexam, the mean score on these examswere very high by MIT standards, withtypically a third of the students getting aperfect score on the exams. Not only didthe 8.02x students have three days tocomplete the exams, they also had accessto any reference or textbook material theycould find, including those on theInternet. This explains the high numberof perfect scores in 8.02x compared toMIT students taking a limited-time two-hour exam of similar difficulty. We givethe distribution of scores on the first8.02x exam in Figure 1.

The Demographics for 8.02xA total of 43,758 people registered for8.02x through the end of the course. Theacademic background (the highest level ofeducation attained) of registered studentswho chose to reveal that information isgiven in Table 1. The distribution variessomewhat if we look only at the studentstaking the exams, but not qualitatively.Not surprisingly, using data not shown inTable 1, the more extensive the academicbackground attained by a given student,the higher the grade that student scoredon the exams, on average.

Physics Department’s Experience with edXBelcher, from page 1


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Of this large registered number, only5,241 attempted the first problem set. Thefirst one-hour exam was taken by 3,490students, and the second exam by 2,459students. A total of 1,715 students com-pleted the course and received a certificatesigned by Professor Lewin attesting totheir having passed the course.

The distribution of ages of the enrolledand active students in 8.02x is shown inFigure 2 (next page).These students camefrom all over the world, with the largestpercentage from the United States(19.0%), followed by India (17.2%), Spain(7.8%), the United Kingdom (4.5%), theRussian Federation (4.0%), and Greece(3.1%).

Reception of 8.02xOverall, it is clear that 8.02x was wellreceived by most of the students taking it.For example, in an effort to achieve per-sonal rapport with the students, ProfessorLewin broadcast a short weekly video toencourage the students, interwoven withpractical advice about how to do well (orbetter) in the course. The reaction to thesevideos was very positive, as witness thefollowing quote from an 8.02x student:

Believe it or not, I so eagerly wait for Prof.Walter Lewin’s video message each week.And once it is uploaded I watch it at least 4-5 times. He is such an awesome gentle-man... Hats off to you Sir!!

The satisfaction of students with thecourse is also evident from the generaltenor of the discussion board comments.For example:

Thank you for making this amazing classavailable for free. I took 2 classes on linebefore….Not only [is] Professor Lewinamazing, of course, but the structure of theclass on line is outstanding [including the]mixture of videos, quizzes, simulations HW,textbook. The electronics class I took was notonly expensive but of very poor quality. Thisclass takes advantage of the best of inter-net/java/... I hope it stays free. I hope formore classes like Physics 8.03 and 8.01.Bravo and thank you again.

These anecdotal opinions were verifiedby an online questionnaire at the end of thecourse. The question “How likely are you torecommend 8.02x to a friend?” scored a9.43 on a scale from 0-10, with 10 beingextremely likely. When students were askedhow much they agree that the TEAL visual-izations helped to achieve coursegoals/learn, the results were 4.5 on a scale of0-5, with 5 being “strongly agree,” 1“strongly disagree,” and 0 being “not used.”

Lessons LearnedOverall this experience has been a successin that the Department has succeeded in

offering the course online with few tech-nical problems. In doing this, we gave1,715 students around the world anopportunity to take Professor WalterLewin’s spring 2002 8.02 course in depth,and to receive a certificate from MITx.Moreover, we have facilitated the interac-tion of these students with ProfessorLewin, with the course staff, and with eachother. In doing this, the Department hasgained invaluable experience with the edXplatform and, by being an early adopter,helped shape the capabilities of that plat-form. The Department now has experi-ence with an edX course, including how tocode problem sets and exam problems,the quality control needed before suchproblems go “live”, how to moderate dis-cussion boards effectively, how to moti-vate students, and many other aspects ofrunning a large online course. TheDepartment also now has the knowledgenecessary to use features of the edX onlinecourses to improve our residential offer-ings in physics at MIT, which is a majorgoal of the MIT Office of DigitalLearning, and of our Department.

What is less clear is how successful thiscourse was in terms of learning outcomes.The distribution of grades on the firstexam, as given in Figure 1, was unex-


Elementary 69

Junior High 575

High School 5006

Bachelors 4484

Masters 2570

PhD in Science and Engineering 533

PhD in Other 99

Table 1. Academic background of selectregistered students.

0

250

500

750

1000

1250

0 20 40 60 80 100

Coun

t

Score

Figure 1. Distribution of scores on the first 8.02x exam.


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pected, but obvious with hindsight. Wehad many very serious students taking thecourse, for no formal credit other than acertificate of completion, and they hadthree days in which to complete the test. Itis not surprising that one-third of thesededicated students put in the additionalhours necessary to get a perfect score onthe exam, and that many did very well.But this leaves us with little information ofhow to rank the students in terms ofability, other than in a very coarse manner.In a residential course, we get a muchmore detailed impression of the relativeabilities of the students. If we continue toobtain distributions such as given inFigure 1, varying the pedagogy of theonline course will not tell us much aboutthe most effective pedagogy, because wewill generally end up with this kind of dis-tribution, which tells us very little.

In the future, the edX platform may beable to require students to take the exam fora set length of time in a continuous fashion,sometime within a three-day window, but itdoes not have that capability now. Even ifsuch a feature is instituted in the future,there are many obvious ways to defeat thesystem (by registering twice under differentnames, for example). The most straightfor-ward way to get back to a grade distributioncomparable to residential courses is to havea proctored limited time exam, and edX isexploring that option.

Another lesson we learned from thisexperience is that putting this kind ofcourse online is no easy task. The peoplewho worked on this effort are acknowl-edged at the end of this article. This is agroup of talented people who dedicatedmany hours of their time to 8.02x. We arenow past many of the start-up costs ofmounting this kind of effort but, even so,refreshing 8.02x and offering it again,complete with an adequately staffed dis-cussion board, is an expensive proposi-tion. For example, putting a newhomework problem online requires the

problem statement, the coding to put thatstatement online, extensive testing of thatcode before it appears online, and asystem to correct the mistakes that stillleak through after it has gone online.Although we could perhaps simply repeatthe problem sets from one online offeringto the next, we would most certainly haveto make new exams for each offering.Otherwise these exams and many samplesolutions will be available online fromprevious offerings of the course, and thescores on those repeat exams in the nextiteration of the course would be meaning-less. For these reasons, offering edXcourses on a regular basis would require asubstantial augmentation of the teachingpersonnel of the Department.

In conclusion, we have learned muchin this process, but this is just the first ofmany steps in a long journey. The nextissue that the Department plans toaddress is how to bring the capabilities ofthe edX platform back into our residentialprogram, particularly in the freshmensubjects. A “flipped” class is one wherelecture is presented online outside of classand hands-on-work (discussion, home-work, experiments) is done in class. Ourpresent way of teaching the majority ofMIT freshmen, TEAL, is half-flippedalready, in that 50% of the class time isdevoted to group discussion, group prob-lems, and hands-on experiments. We plan

to experiment with completely flipping8.02 TEAL for two to three weeks in thecoming academic year, using the capabili-ties of the edX platform to deliver theonline content. In doing this, we planextensive assessment to compare the half-flipped and completely flipped parts of8.02 residential, including gathering bothstudent and faculty opinion and evaluat-ing student learning gains. Since we havemuch more interaction with and knowl-edge of the student population oncampus, this use of the edX platform inresidential may also offer us usefulinsights as to what to incorporate into the“x” courses in future incarnations.

There is much that remains to be done.

Acknowledgments Participants in putting the course on linewere Professor Lewin, Dr. RiccardoAbbate, Dr. Saif Rayyan, Dr. GeorgeStephans, Professor Isaac Chuang, Dr.Peter Dourmashkin, graduate teachingassistants Peter Montag, Anthony Zhu,Agata Wisniowska, and UROP studentsMaita Esteban, Mario Martenez, Zixi(Zeo) Liu, Marie Rice, Thomas Villalon,Troy Welton, and Justin White. ProfessorJohn Belcher was the faculty projectmanager. Dr. Teppo Jouttenus was the edXproject manager.

Physics Department’s Experience with edXBelcher, from preceding page

John Belcher is a Professor of Physics([email protected]).

Figure 2. Distribution of ages of enrolled and active students in 8.02x.“Active” means active just after the second 8.02x exam.


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Michael CimaMy Experience Teaching 3.091x

D EVE LOPI N G 3.0 91X, “Introductionto Solid-State Chemistry,” was a terrificbut exhausting experience. I was lucky tobe building upon more than 40 years ofmaterial for a very special course. Briefly,3.091 seeks to help students learn chemi-cal principles through the solid-state. Theunderlying theme for the course is thatthe chemical bond determines properties.The emphasis in the course is on linkingbasic concepts to applications; thus, it ismeant to be an engineering course.Indeed, it may be the first engineeringcourse many students take at MIT, as itsatisfies the chemistry GIR.

I was asked to consider creating aversion of 3.091 for the edX platform inJune of 2012, with the objective to enrollstudents in the fall of 2012. I knewnothing about edX, and my first questionwas, “Is someone going to help me?”Chancellor Eric Grimson said “yes,” and Idid some homework. What I found wasthat research consistently shows equiva-lent learning outcomes for residence-based courses and online learning, acrossa wide variety of types of courses. Moreinteresting is a growing opinion that supe-rior outcomes are achieved by a combina-tion of residence-based learning andonline content. Thus it seemed that the3.091x vehicle might yield the onlinecontent that could improve outcomes for3.091 – a test I hope to examine this fall.So the only constraint I imposed was that3.091x need have the same intellectualcontent as 3.091, a necessity if I was to usethe online material for the campus course.

edX is like nothing I have previouslyexperienced. There are no 50-minutelecture videos such as with

OpenCourseWare (OCW). Instead thereare 10-minute lecture videos on one topic,followed by a short screencast on a newtopic, followed by a self-assessmentproblem. All of this was arranged in whatI call a “learning sequence.” The coursewas composed of a collection of theselearning sequences. edX also operates as a

real course. Everyone begins at the sametime and ends at the same time. Studentsthroughout the world are learning at thesame pace. There are problem sets,midterms, and a final. You may have heardof the “forum.” This is a chat room wherestudents post questions on a particularvideo and other students, TAs, forummoderators, and faculty can post com-ments or answers. I learned that partici-pating in the forum is very helpful for thefaculty in charge. First, it allows me tounderstand what questions students have.Second, students really appreciate and areencouraged by the involvement of theprofessor. My habit was to spend 20-30minutes in the forum every day. It wassomething I really grew to enjoy.

What It TakesMost of the questions I get from col-leagues concern how much effort edXtakes. My answer is, more than I thought it

was going to be. It is important to notethat much help was provided by edX per-sonnel, and I understand that the supportmodel for these courses going forwardwill be different. Nonetheless, here is whatit took to create 3.091x.

Beginning in June 2012, I had a full-time TA and a full-time edX person for the

summer to work on course development.Additionally, we had a full-time videoeditor and about 1.5 FTE of software engi-neering support. Additional staff wasadded as the course came on line. Theseincluded part-time administrative support,five paid forum moderators, and four“community TAs” (volunteers fromvarious places around the globe). Finally,we had two-to-five “beta checkers” atvarious points during the course. Theirresponsibility was to help find bugs inproblems.

I was fortunate that we had access tohigh quality video from my fall 2011 lec-tures on campus. Only a handful oflecture segments were derived from fall2012. Thus, we were able to create 330lecture segments (50 of which we did notend up using) from my past lectures’video library. Despite this large videoresource, I ended up creating 65 screen-

What I found was that research consistently showsequivalent learning outcomes for residence-basedcourses and online learning, across a wide variety oftypes of courses. More interesting is a growing opinionthat superior outcomes are achieved by a combination ofresidence-based learning and online content.



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casts. These screencasts were originallyintended to replace sections of normallectures, but I found them also very usefulfor doing example problems. Finally, in2011 I had professionally produced sixmini documentaries for 3.091 with fundsfrom the Dreyfus Foundation. These werealso included in 3.091x.

Screencasts were a surprise to me. Ihave been on the faculty since 1986. Giveme a piece of chalk and stand me in frontof a blackboard and I am in “lecturemode.” A video segment of a lecture cap-tures that perfectly. A screencast capturessomething different. I am in my office,writing on a tablet, and speaking to theimaginary student over my shoulder. Thewords I use and my tone is completely dif-ferent. There is no “projecting” my voiceso that a student in the back of 10-250 canhear me. I am having a conversation.Mixing these screencasts with lecture seg-ments makes for a much more enjoyableexperience for the listener. Frankly, if Iwere starting a course from scratch, Iwould do it all as screencasts. Also, as apractical matter, screencasts are infinitelyeasier to edit than lecture segments. Fiveto 10 minutes of screencast took meapproximately 60-90 minutes to prepareonce I got used to the video editing soft-ware. So I spent much of August 2012 aswell as the fall term making screencasts.

3.091x was launched October 15, 2012,and ended January 11, 2013. The late startdate was planned so that the fall residence3.091 course would not be contaminatedwith the online version of the class. Theintention was to compare outcomes betweenthe two student populations. It was not goingto be a particularly rigorous study. Rather, itwas going to be a “pilot trial”; gather enoughdata to make some hypotheses.

The initial registration was impressive,as shown in Figure 1. Over 28,000 individ-uals registered. As is common forMOOCs, however, only 10% ended uptaking the exams. This was a bit disap-pointing to me, until I saw the chart indi-cating the last time a 3.091x registrant

interacted with the system (Figure 2). Itshows that approximately 15,000 regis-trants are using the online material, butnot taking exams.

What are these 15,000 registrantsdoing? Our exit survey with over 1800people responding gave me a clue. Itturns out that over 52% of those regis-tered were students enrolled in otherschools. 13% were graduate students,29% were university students, 1% werecommunity college students, and 10%were high school students. We concludedthat many registrants are using theonline content as a resource for a classthey are currently taking elsewhere. Why

would they take my exam if they weregoing to take one for the class they arealready in?

A particularly fulfilling finding was theparticipation rate of teachers. 9% of thosetaking the final in 3.091x were teachers. 4%were university professors and 3% were K-12 teachers. Thus over 60 high schoolteachers took the final. If that same ratioholds true for the entire population usingthe system, it would total 540 teachers. Icorresponded with several high schoolchemistry teachers throughout the countryand the world. They were using the mate-rial to enrich their high school class.

Figure 1. Initial Registration in 3.091x

Figure 2. Last Interaction by 3.091x Registrant

My Experience Teaching 3.091xCima, from preceding page


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OutcomesHow well does all this work? That is a verydifficult question to answer, but I willshare some data. I tried to design the finalsfor both classes (3.091 and 3.091x) so thatI could compare learning outcomes.There are several problems with thisapproach. First, I give partial credit forproblems on the 3.091 final. edX prob-lems do not have partial credit. Instead wegive students a number of attempts to getthe correct answer. For example, if theyslip a decimal point in a calculation, theyget a chance to fix it. We assume that thetwo types of measurement converge tomeasuring the same thing. Second, 3.091is closed book except for a single sheet ofnotes. 3.091x is open book and open Web.The only way to control for this is to usequestions that don’t depend on whetheryou have access to a book or not.Problems that ask the student to calculatesomething are what I took as an approxi-mate “open book independent” problem.Finally, 3.091 has a three-hour final.Students are given an entire weekend totake the final in 3.091x. I could not thinkof a way to control for time, so that needsto be a factor in interpreting the out-comes.

Figure 3 compares outcomes between3.091 and 3.091x students. These out-comes measures try to control for partialcredit grading of 3.091, by only countingstudents that reported the numericallycorrect answer for that problem on theirfinal. The 3.091x scores only report thenumber of students that answer correctlyon the first try. Only three outcomes aremeaningfully different between 3.091 and3.091x; weak acid titration, acidity ofsolids, and surface energy. The 3.091 stu-dents scored particularly low on theseoutcomes. A second look at the writtenexams shows that these problems had ahigh proportion of students having pro-vided no response, not a wrong one. Iassume that the 3.091 students followedthe standard advice; “Look over the entireexam and do the problems that youunderstand first.” Could the problem bethat it is not that they did not know this

material, but rather that I did not givethem enough time to actually measurewhat they know?

3.091x students rated the course highlyduring the exit survey. 27% rated it “Bestcourse I have taken.” 60% rated it “Greatcourse” and 11% rated it “About what Iexpected.”

My plans on how to use the onlinecontent in the residence-based course willbe tested this semester. Briefly, I will beusing the online content of 3.091x as thetext for 3.091. 3.091 has not had a formaltext for many years. We normally used acombination of a standard universitychemistry text, course notes written forthe class, and a reader of individual chap-ters from many other texts. None of thesesources covers the detail that we actuallycover in the class.

The second part of the experiment is tochange student assessment. Instead ofwritten exams, we will be using onlineassessments in a proctored environment.Students will use drop-in hours to evalu-ate their mastery of 27 skills that we havedefined for the course. Each assessment isa single problem selected at random froma problem database on that topic. If astudent does not pass a given assessment,they are given the opportunity to try againthe next day. There is no time pressure on

these assessments. The idea is to overcomethe deficiencies of our classical examina-tion model.

I have spoken with numerous otherfaculty from other universities involved inonline courses. Nearly everyone hasenjoyed the experience, although we areall still unsure where to best deploy thesetypes of courses. My sense is that the largeearly courses offered at many universities,like 3.091, are a natural place to start.These courses offer the broadest appeal tostudents throughout the world. It is alsonot unrealistic to me that by using an edXtype medium an MIT undergraduateexperience may someday be one year offcampus and three years on campus. I feelonline content in our residence-basedinstruction will probably emerge first inother ways. The screencast medium forinstruction is particularly important inmy mind. It can free up valuable contacttime with students. Rather than takinglecture time to get into the mechanicaldetails of a topic, I can reserve that for ascreencast. Instead, I can use the time fordiscussion on the ideas behind the topicand its implications.

Michael Cima is a Koch Professor andDirector of the Lemelson-MIT Program([email protected]).

Figure 3. Comparative Exam Outcomes Between 3.091 and 3.091x Students


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Diana HendersonChristine Walley

The HASS Exploration (HEX) Program

Call for HASS Exploration ProgramExpansionT H E H A S S E X P LO R AT I O N ( H E X )

Program (formerly known as the First YearFocus Program) is looking to expand itsroster of subjects. The Office of the Deanfor Undergraduate Education (DUE) iscollaborating with the Committee on theUndergraduate Program’s Subcommitteeon the HASS Requirement (SHR) in solic-iting interested faculty to design and teachnew subjects that meet the HEX Programcriteria. To support that effort, the DUE hasincluded such subject initiatives as part ofthe Alex and Brit d’Arbeloff Fund forExcellence in Education’s call for proposals.

A Brief History of the HEX ProgramIn 2006, the Task Force on theUndergraduate Educational Commonsproposed the creation of HASS subjectsgeared toward first-year students, to gen-erate a common discussion among under-graduates and familiarize them withfundamental concepts and different disci-plinary perspectives within theHumanities, Arts and Social Sciences.Funding from the SHASS Dean’s Officeand the d’Arbeloff Funds for Excellence inEducation enabled the design and contin-uation of these pedagogically innovative,often team-taught experimental subjects.Following upon the Task Force’s work, theEducational Commons Subcommitteerecommended the creation of SHR as partof the revision to the HASS Requirementapproved by the faculty in 2009 (the samerevision that replaced the HASS-D systemwith a simpler Humanities, Arts, andSocial Sciences Distribution require-ment). SHR has been charged with thetask of recommending to the Committee

on the Undergraduate Program (CUP)whether the First Year Focus Programshould be made a permanent part of theHASS Requirement by academic year2014. Consequently, it began evaluatingthe program in 2009. Since that time, SHRhas determined that these subjects shouldbe available to undergraduates of all yearsin order to better serve its core con-stituency; has revised the parameters forHEX subjects accordingly; and has rec-ommended HEX subjects to students asan appropriate introduction to scholar-ship in the humanities, arts, and social sci-ences at the collegiate level.

The HEX Program DefinedTo join the Program, a subject must meetmost of the Program’s subject criteria.HEX subjects should be appropriate forall undergraduates (no prerequisites),approach topics from multiple discipli-nary and/or interdisciplinary viewpoints(often, but not necessarily, in team-taughtformats), and emphasize close interactionwith faculty (an absolute maximum of 25students per faculty member/senior lec-turer). Students in a HEX subject will:

• Explore a topic using contextualand/or qualitative modes of inquiry.

• Think critically and analytically abouta complex issue, theme, or conceptfrom multiple viewpoints – eitherwithin or across disciplines in thehumanities, arts, and social sciences.

• Practice foundational skills forunderstanding and addressing thecomplexity of the world in which welive.

• Gain focused substantive knowledgeand wide-ranging familiarity withalternative scholarly methods,insights, and analytic resources.

Join the HEX Program CommunityAdvantages for faculty in being part of theHEX Program include the opportunity toexplore topics through multiple lenses,team teaching (if applicable), becomingfamiliar with the pedagogical strategies ofcolleagues, and sharing or developing newresearch and curricular ideas. Instructorsin the SHR-recommended Program haveoccasion to build relationships with fellowfaculty in other departments and teachpreviously unreached students about theirarea of expertise. Events such as theannual HEX Instructors Luncheon overIAP provide opportunities to share expe-riences, perspectives, challenges, and ped-agogical innovations.

How to ParticipateTo find out whether your subject mightfit into the HASS Exploration Programand how you might receive help indesigning and teaching a thematicallyinnovative subject to be considered forthe Program, contact your DepartmentHead, Christine Walley (SHR Chair), orDiana Henderson. To view this year’sroster of HEX subjects, visit:web.mit.edu/hassreq/exploration.html.

Diana Henderson is Dean for Curriculum andFaculty Support ([email protected]);Christine Walley is Chair of the CUP’sSubcommittee on the HASS Requirement(SHR) ([email protected]).


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Request for Preliminary Proposals forInnovative Curricular Projects

The Alex and Brit d’Arbeloff Fund for Excellence in Education

TH E OFFICE OF FACU LTY SU PPORT

seeks preliminary proposals for faculty-led projects to enhance the educationalexperience of MIT undergraduates.Projects that involve faculty-studentdirect interaction, that cross disciplinaryboundaries, or that aspire to providedynamic, effective teaching, particularlythrough the introduction of online learn-ing, are all appropriate.

Projects can be focused at any level ofour undergraduate education. Specialattention will be accorded to enhance-ments of subjects offered in the first yearand as General Institute Requirements(GIRs). The d’Arbeloff Fund ReviewCommittee is interested in proposalsaimed at fostering faculty participation in

the educational experiences of under-graduates, especially freshmen, beyondthe classroom. The Committee also wel-comes proposals for projects that willexplore the ways in which online learningexperiments can be applied to MIT sub-jects. Collaborative projects with thepotential to affect large numbers of stu-dents over time, transcend specificdepartmental curricula, or span multiplesubjects are particularly valuable.

Examples of possible proposal areasinclude: establishing and enhancingHASS Exploration (HEX) (web.mit.edu/hassreq/exploration.html) subjects; creat-ing online modules to be used within asubject or across subjects; providingopportunities aligned with the faculty res-

olution (web.mit.edu/fnl/volume/254/grove et al.html) that envisions every MITfreshman having a faculty mentor; andenhancing freshman participation inappropriately focused group UROPs,project teams, or other forms of super-vised research with faculty.

For all projects, the d’Arbeloff FundReview Committee encourages assessmentof the value of our educational innova-tions and the dissemination of results.

For guidelines and more information,visit web.mit.edu/darbeloff or contact theOffice of Faculty Support at x3-6776 [email protected].

Preliminary proposals, with an esti-mated budget, are due by Friday,September 27.

Nominate a Colleague for the MacVicarFaculty Fellows Program

TH E MACVICAR FACU LTY FE LLOWS

Program recognizes MIT faculty who havemade exemplary and sustained contribu-tions to the teaching and education ofundergraduates at the Institute. Togetherthe Fellows form a small academy of schol-ars committed to exceptional instruction

and innovation in education.MacVicar Faculty Fellows are selected

through a competitive nominationprocess, appointed for 10-year terms, andreceive $10,000 per year of discretionaryfunds for educational activities, research,travel, and other scholarly expenses.

For more information and the nomi-nation process, visit web.mit.edu/macvicar or contact the Office of FacultySupport at x3-6776 or [email protected].

Nominations are due on Thursday,November 21.


20

occurred on the MIT campus. In July2011 he was charged in a federal indict-ment with multiple felony offenses,specifically violations of the Wire FraudAct and the Computer Fraud and AbuseAct. On January 11, 2013, Aaron Swartz’spartner found him dead in their New Yorkapartment, a victim of suicide.

At the time of his death, Aaron Swartz wasa 26-year-old computer programmer andan Internet celebrity – a former childprodigy who as a young teenager hadworked alongside the leaders of the WorldWide Web to create some of its basic tech-nology for sharing information; an entre-preneur whose startup company became akey piece in a major news and entertain-ment service; an activist who co-foundedan advocacy organization with more thana million members that organized peti-tion drives for civil liberties and againstcensorship; and a Fellow at HarvardUniversity’s Safra Research Lab onInstitutional Corruption.

Only Swartz knows why he committedsuicide. However, for the final 24 monthsof his life, he was the subject of a vigorousinvestigation and prosecution by the U.S.Department of Justice, with an indictmentand then a superseding indictment thatcould have resulted in years in prison. Thecharges stemmed from his actions, startingin fall 2010, when he surreptitiouslydownloaded massive quantities of schol-arly journal articles from the JSTOR digitallibrary through MIT’s computer network.

Two days after the suicide, MIT PresidentRafael Reif asked Computer ScienceProfessor Hal Abelson to lead the presentreview of MIT’s involvement in the events,beginning with those in September 2010,when MIT first became aware of unusualdownload activity on its network, andcontinuing until Swartz’s death in January2013. The purpose of this review is todescribe MIT’s actions and consider whatcan be learned from them.

In conducting the review, Abelson hasbeen joined by MIT Economics Professorand Institute Professor Emeritus PeterDiamond; and Andrew Grosso, aWashington, D.C. attorney and formerAssistant U.S. Attorney, with specialexpertise in computer law. When thisreport refers below to “we,” “the review-ers,” or the “Review Panel,” it is referring tothe three of us. MIT Assistant Provost forAdministration Douglas Pfeiffer providedstaff assistance. The process we used togather information for this report isdetailed in Appendix 4.1*.

Other than the announcement of thereview on January 13, MIT has issued nostatements before this report, in the inter-est of providing an account that is full,accurate, and fair. Since that time, we havereceived no further instruction from theMIT administration other than severalpublic indicators that we should take asmuch time as we needed.

News of Aaron Swartz’s death ignited afirestorm on the Internet. In the sixmonths since our review began, therehave been memorial services honoringAaron Swartz in several cities, includingone on Capitol Hill. The AmericanLibrary Association posthumouslyawarded him its 2013 James MadisonAward, and the Internet Society posthu-mously inducted him into the InternetHall of Fame. A bill was introduced inCongress (“Aaron’s Law”) to revise theComputer Fraud and Abuse Act underwhich he was indicted. There has been aCongressional investigation and a petitionto the White House demanding the firingof the prosecutors involved. There havealso been several anonymous cyber-attacks – three of them against MIT – inprotest of Swartz’s prosecution, hate maildirected towards MIT employees andfederal prosecutors involved in his case,and a hoax report of a shooter on campusthat shut down MIT for a morning.

There have also been thousands of newsarticles and commentaries, many of themroundly critical of MIT. Reactions range

from puzzlement, to headshaking disap-pointment, to anger, to dark hints of con-spiracies. We hope this report, by layingout a full history of MIT’s involvement,will put people in a better position tojudge for themselves the plausibility of thevarious comments and positions taken,and to evaluate MIT’s conduct.Both the writing and the readinginevitably involve hindsight: how doesone maintain a perspective uncolored bythe shock and tragedy of Aaron Swartz’ssuicide, or – knowing of him and hisaccomplishments – by the realization thathe was the person who did the download-ing and who was then arrested? Just as wehave tried to limit the effects of hindsightin the writing, we hope readers will do thesame when interpreting our report.

In brief, among our more significant find-ings are the following:

1. Until the arrest in January 2011, MIT wasunaware that the person who engaged in thedownloading of JSTOR’s data beginning inSeptember 2010 was Aaron Swartz. Untilthe arrest, MIT’s concern was to stop the useof its network, by an unknown person, todownload massive numbers of articles fromthe JSTOR database, which was in violationof MIT’s licensing agreement with JSTORand whose scale threatened the operation ofthe JSTOR network to the extent thatJSTOR blocked MIT’s access to JSTOR forthree days. When, on the morning ofJanuary 4, 2011, MIT’s network personnellocated a laptop – covered by a cardboardbox and plugged into a router in a basementdata closet in a campus building – they werenot sure with whom or with what kind ofsituation they were dealing, and they con-tacted the MIT Police. For the same reasons,the MIT Police sought forensic assistancefrom a detective in the Cambridge PoliceDepartment who had expertise in computercrime and with whom they had workedrepeatedly in the past. The Cambridgedetective, who was a member of the NewEngland Electronic Crimes Task Force,responded to the call, accompanied by anagent of the U.S. Secret Service. While theinclusion of the Secret Service agent was not

Report to the Presidentcontinued from page 1


21

the intention of MIT, it was a recognizedpossibility. It was not until a few days later,when Aaron Swartz was arrested, that MITlearned the identity of the person involved inthe JSTOR downloading. Thus, we find thatMIT did not focus on Aaron Swartz at anytime during its own investigation of theevents that led to his arrest, and that MITdid not intentionally “call in the feds” to takeover the investigation.

2. MIT never requested that a criminalprosecution be brought against AaronSwartz. Early in the prosecution by the U.S.Attorney’s Office in Boston (the “USAO”),MIT adopted a position of remainingneutral, with limited involvement. MIThired outside counsel who had experience incriminal law and in the functioning of theBoston U.S. Attorney’s Office; and MITrequested and received subpoenas for theproduction of documents. Some documentswere turned over to the USAO prior toreceiving a subpoena, but, for the reasonsdiscussed in this report, this production didnot violate federal laws.

3. In keeping with its stance of neutrality,MIT never issued a public statement aboutSwartz’s prosecution or advocated publiclyon his behalf, even though doing this wasurged by Aaron Swartz’s family and legalteam and by two members of the faculty.One of the reasons for MIT’s silence was thegood-faith belief, based on private conversa-tions with the lead prosecutor, that theInstitute’s opinion would have no effect onthe prosecution, and that public statementsmight make circumstances worse for AaronSwartz. MIT did inform the prosecutionthat it was not seeking punishment forSwartz, and it did inform the defense that itwas not seeking any civil remedy from him.

4. Before Aaron Swartz’s suicide, the MITcommunity paid scant attention to thematter, other than during the period imme-diately following his arrest. Few students,faculty, or alumni expressed concerns to theadministration. In preserving MIT’s stanceof neutrality and limited involvement, MITdecision-makers did not inquire into the

details of the charges until a year after theindictment, and did not form an opinionabout their merits. MIT took the positionthat U.S. v. Swartz was simply a lawsuit towhich it was not a party, although it didinform the U.S. Attorney’s Office that theprosecution should not be under the impres-sion that MIT wanted jail time for AaronSwartz. (MIT did not say it was actuallyopposed to jail time.) Among the factors notconsidered were that the defendant was anaccomplished and well-known contributorto Internet technology; that the ComputerFraud and Abuse Act is a poorly drafted andquestionable criminal law as applied tomodern computing, one that affects theInternet community as a whole and iswidely criticized; and that the United Statesgovernment was pursuing an overtlyaggressive prosecution. MIT’s position mayhave been prudent, but it did not duly takeinto account the wider background of infor-mation policy against which the prosecutionplayed out and in which MIT people havetraditionally been passionate leaders.

Part I of this review recounts the actionsMIT took from the first discovery of thedownloading up to the time of AaronSwartz’s arrest. Part II reviews actionsafter the arrest by those involved otherthan MIT, in order to set the context forPart III, which describes MIT’s own deci-sions and conduct between the arrest andthe death of Aaron Swartz. Part IV high-lights some of the options that MIT facedthroughout this history. Part V providessome questions for the MIT communitythat the review panel believes should bestarting points for discussion within MIT.

It was not part of our charge in this reviewto draw conclusions, but rather to deter-mine facts and to consider what can belearned from this tragedy. Part V accord-ingly poses questions, not answers. Thesequestions are for everyone at MIT, not justthe Institute’s leadership. They concernthe kind of community that MIT is andthe kind of community it could become.The questions reflect not only the particu-lar events of the Aaron Swartz case, but

also the overall Institute circumstancesand climate in which the events occurred.The most difficult questions challenge usto become better at negotiating thetension between prudence and passion, asgreat institutions must.

*The Review Panel realizes that there hasbeen significant controversy surroundingthe events described in this report. Weappreciate that many of the peopleinvolved have legitimate concerns abouttheir privacy and their security, and weknow that some have even been person-ally threatened. Consequently, our reportgenerally does not identify individuals byname. Many of these individuals havealready been identified in court filings andother public documents, and we are fullyaware that their names are readily discov-erable on the Internet. Even so, we see noneed to further erode their personalprivacy. So as a rule, people in this reportare identified by their role or positionrather than by name. There are a fewexceptions. In cases where including theirnames makes the narrative more under-standable, we’ve named public officials –such as prosecutors, detectives, federalagents, judges, or police officers whoserole in the events has already beendescribed in public court filings. For somepeople actively involved in the eventsdescribed, such as defense counsels forAaron Swartz, we have used their nameswith their permission to do so. We havealso named some people whose connec-tions are only tangential to the eventsdescribed in the report without havingsought permission.

Cambridge, MA July 26, 2013

Harold Abelson Peter A. Diamond Andrew Grosso Douglas W. Pfeiffer

[Editor’s Note: The entire report can beviewed at: swartz-report.mit.edu/docs/report-to-the-president.pdf.]


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To The Faculty Newsletter:

W E W E R E M U C H D I S T U R B E D toread, on page 69 of the Abelson Report[Report to the President, MIT and theProsecution of Aaron Swartz], about ameeting between Robert Swartz and theChancellor and General Counsel:

“Second, Robert Swartz connected the matterof his son to that of Star Simpson, arguingthat the Star Simpson matter was a precedentthat would allow MIT to make a statement.The Chancellor and the General Counsel tooka different view, explaining that after MIThad made those statements its administrationhad been (justly) reprimanded.”

We have to wonder how theChancellor and General Counsel con-strued the Simpson case as a precedentarguing against coming to the aid ofsomeone in need of help. Surely anythoughtful person who attended thedebate preceding the vote on theManning-Winston resolution understoodthat our proposed resolution – some stillcall it a vote of no confidence – was inopposition to characterizing an innocentstudent as “reckless.” Both the Chancellorand General Counsel were there, bothknow that the vote failed and that thefaculty narrowly sustained a policy that

permitted, indeed encouraged, theadministration to act thoughtfully –either by public comment or by behind-the-scenes negotiation – on consequentialmatters involving MIT. The Simpson caseraised concern that the administration didnot act thoughtfully, while the Swartz caseis about a failure to act.

Kenneth R. ManningThomas Meloy Professor of Rhetoric andHistory of Science

Patrick H. WinstonFord Professor of Computer Science

lettersDisturbed By Abelson Report

Praising America’s Public Libraries

To The Faculty Newsletter:

I N H I S A R T I C L E E N T I T L E D “HowOnline Education Might Impact theFuture of Mathematics Departments,”published in the May/June 2013 issue ofthe MIT Faculty Newsletter, ProfessorDaniel Stroock offers his perceptions ofAmerica’s public libraries:

“Ever since Andrew Carnegie provided everylarge city in America with a library, vastreservoirs of information have been availableto the general public. However, only a smallfraction of the population even attempts totap those reservoirs, and only a small fractionof those profit from their efforts.”

I write not to comment on the meritsof Professor Strook’s position regardingthe future of mathematics departments,but to offer an alternative perspective onthe use and value of America’s publiclibraries.

In fiscal year 2012 , the Boston PublicLibrary hosted more than 10,000 publicprograms, lent out more than 3.8 millionbooks and audiovisual materials, andreceived more than 7.8 million visits to itsWebsite. In the same year, the BostonPublic Library helped more than 37,000Boston residents sign up for library cards,hosted more than 800,000 free computersessions, and had more than 3.4 millionpeople pass through its doors. Over adecade ago, the Boston Public Librarybegan digitizing its out-of-copyrightbooks, and in 2011 became host for theLibrary for the Commonwealth, astatewide digital library. The BPL is a keyplayer in the development of the DigitalPublic Library of America (www.bpl.org).

Nationwide, in 2010 58% ofAmericans 16 years and older had librarycards and 80% said borrowing books wasa very important service libraries provide.Americans go to school, public, and aca-

demic libraries more than three timesmore often than they go to the movies.Public libraries circulated 2.46 billionmaterials in 2010, an average of more thaneight books a year for every American.Public libraries made 18.5 million eBooksavailable for circulation, and eBookreaders were available for checkout at 39%of public libraries. Almost 89% of publiclibrary outlets now offer wireless Internetaccess, and more than 60% of librariesreport offering the only free Internetaccess in their communities(www.ala.org).

America’s public libraries continue tooffer highly valued and heavily used services– in person and online – to the populationof the United States. As my public librarycolleagues like to say, “check one out.”

Ann J. WolpertDirector of Libraries


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M.I.T. NumbersClass of 2017 Enrolled Students: Admissions Statistics

2013 2012 2011 2010 2009Freshman Applications 18,989 18,109 17,909 16,632 15,663Freshman Admits 1,548 1,620 1,742 1,676 1,676Admission Rate 8.2% 8.9% 9.7% 10.1% 10.7%Freshman Enrolls 1,125 1,135 1,126 1,069 1,072Yield 72.7% 70.1% 64.6% 63.8% 63.9%

Male 616 55% 609 54% 620 55% 588 55% 594 55%Female 509 45% 526 46% 506 45% 481 45% 478 45%

African American 79 7% 93 8% 97 9% 93 9% 93 9%Asian American 327 29% 313 28% 310 28% 280 26% 272 25%Caucasian 437 39% 420 37% 424 38% 422 39% 386 36%Hispanic 167 15% 174 15% 165 15% 141 13% 154 14%

Mexican American 76 7% 67 6% 77 7% 69 6% 83 8%Puerto Rican 19 2% 28 2% 30 3% 27 3% 22 2%Other Hispanic 72 6% 79 7% 58 5% 45 4% 49 5%

Native American 6 1% 7 1% 7 1% 10 1% 10 1%International 90 8% 114 10% 109 10% 93 9% 88 8%Other/No Response 19 2% 14 1% 14 1% 30 3% 68 6%

Underrepresented Minorities 252 22% 274 24% 269 24% 244 23% 257 24%First Generation to College 185 16% 147 13% 159 14% 169 16% 200 19%

Valedictorians* 194 41% 203 44% 225 43% 238 44% 232 40%Top 5% in Class* 435 92% 431 92% 473 90% 499 93% 524 89%High Academic Distinction 296 26% 297 26% 330 29% 287 27% 227 21%Identified Athletes, Artists, or Musicians 236 21% 281 25% 249 22% 214 20% 210 20%

SAT-I Math (Mean) 769 765 762 763 754SAT-I Math (Median) 780 780 770 770 770SAT-I Verbal (Mean) 723 716 710 710 699SAT-I Verbal (Median) 730 730 720 730 710

Geographic RepresentationU.S. States 48 46 46 48 48Foreign Countries (citizenship) 52 52 59 54 51

Number of Students by School TypePublic 750 67% 728 65% 748 66% 696 65% 745 69%Private 172 15% 181 16% 185 16% 180 17% 157 15%Religious 90 8% 94 8% 93 8% 86 8% 80 7%Foreign 85 8% 102 9% 78 7% 80 7% 68 6%Home Schooled 8 1% 9 1% 5 0% 8 1% 13 1%Other/Unknown 20 2% 21 2% 17 2% 22 2% 9 1%

*Percentage shown is a proportion of enrolled students from schools that report class rank.Enrolled figures as of June 3, 2013.

Source: MIT Admissions Office

M.I.T. NumbersU.S. News & World Report: Graduate School Rankings 2004 – 2013


Source: Office of the Provost/Institutional Research

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Ranking the Top 10 Engineering Schools

Ranking the Top 10 Business Schools

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