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Jennifer Gundersen
Staff Reporter
In a semester full of battles over its standing with the University of Maine, the theater department experienced a major victory this week. The department is currently suspended and under review by the University Board of Trustees and could be shut down.
The freeze on new theater majors set forth in the preliminary proceedings of the suspension, announced in September, was revised. Current students at the University of Maine can now choose to declare theater as their major.
“This was one of the big issues from student’s point of view,” Nathan Dore, a major in the theater department, said “We felt that since the university had to continue classes for matriculated freshman in the department why couldn’t other freshman or juniors declare now?”
Rebecca Eilers, dean of Liberal Arts and Sciences and Laurie Hicks, interim chair of the theater and dance department, made the decision to allow new majors from within the university.
“We made the decision because we felt a number of students had begun the sequence, but had not yet declared,” Eilers said.
“We are encouraging anyone who has an interest in theater to declare now because they might no be able to for much longer,” Dore said.
The possible suspension proceedings will continue at the end of the month when Hicks returns from a conference in New York.
Hicks, an associate professor of art, was named the interim chair of the theater department in early October.
“She is there to give some outside leadership to the group,” Eilers said. “As a professor of art, she is familiar with arts in general. She is an experienced chair who can offer guidance and counsel the theater department through this process.”
The first step of the process is an impact study that will observe the department and meet with members of the faculty and staff, as well as students to see where improvements are needed.
“We are really concerned that the study is perceptive to student and faculty concerns,” Dore said. “We want there to be a format where students can air concerns and be taken seriously.”
The study is expected to continue through the semester.
“The administration has told us they hope this will not result in the suspension of the department,” Dore said. “It should be an ironing out of the communication problems in the department.”
