The Hispanic studies department is seeking students’ assistance in evaluating potential professors this week after students complained during Spring Quarter about their lack of input into faculty hiring practices.
Students were invited to attend lectures and meetings this week that featured potential professors Esther Gabara and Jorge Coronado. Gabara, a former lecturer at Stanford University, spoke Tuesday about Mexican photography and met with students Wednesday. Coronado, a lecturer at Columbia University, lectured about Mexican modernism Thursday and meets with students today at noon in Kresge Hall 144.
Weinberg senior Briana Wilson said obtaining students’ input will improve a department that has been criticized for ignoring student opinions on faculty and curriculum.
“The department is making a huge effort and really cares what the students think,” she said. “They’ve bombarded us with e-mails letting us know about these opportunities. Compared to last year, it’s a fantastic improvement.”
Students criticized the department’s hiring process Spring Quarter when it declined to offer a tenure-track position to popular visiting literature Asst. Prof. Christopher Larkosh. Many students took part in a campaign to keep Larkosh at Northwestern and demanded more professors who specialize in Latin American culture and arts.
The department sent out an e-mail on its listserv Jan. 17 notifying students about the visiting professors and asking for their input. The message told students they could express their opinions about the professors to the department or its student advisory board representatives by Monday.
Speech senior Megan Sullivan, a representative on the student advisory board to the Hispanic studies department, said students will benefit from meeting alone with the professors.
“It’s good for students to see how these professors might be and how they interact with students,” Sullivan said.
But McCormick junior Kirsten Hiera said she doubted her voice will matter in the final decision.
“I don’t think our input will make a difference,” Hiera said. “I don’t know why they’re having us do it. They want us to know what’s going on, but we’re not going to have much impact.”
Aside from seeking student input, the Hispanic studies department is keeping a lid on the faculty search. A Daily photographer was barred from taking pictures of Coronado while he spoke, and department chairwoman Lucille Kerr repeatedly has refused to comment on the proceedings.
But students also said they were pleased that both scholars specialize in Latin American culture. Gabara has researched the relationship between avant-garde literature and photography in Latin America, while Coronado has focused on 19th- and 20th-century Latin American literature.
Hiera said she was glad the department was considering hiring professors whose focus was not on Spain.
“I don’t think it makes sense to have half the department teaching about one country (Spain) and the other half teaching (about many countries in) Latin America,” she said.
Weinberg senior Andrew Luckham said he was excited that the department was looking at younger professors.
“It’s exciting that they’re hiring someone who has a greater familiarity with more recent goings-on,” he said. “The fact they’ve just finished their studies means they’re going to have a familiarity with 10 or 20 years of academic literature that older professors don’t have.”
And Wilson said the younger professors would be able to connect better with students.
“I asked Gabara if she would be interested in forming more non-academic relationships, and she said that she definitely was,” she said.