No creative solutions

As plans take shape for the Center for Creative and Performing Arts and the "arts neighborhood" that will serve as its physical centerpiece, the University must address two principal student concerns. The first relates to the admission process for arts courses and the second to the potential for close relations with Center faculty. Both are especially focused on the Program in Creative Writing.

The Center should, above all, expand its introductory course offerings, especially in the creative writing program, which as of now cannot accommodate all of the students who would like to participate. Classes in screenwriting and autobiography are all well and good, but students are not clamoring for them, only for the opportunity to enter an introductory class without having to undergo the judgment of a gatekeeper. With $101 million in the bank, there is no conceivable reason why the supply of classes should not match student demand. The Center will not serve its purpose well if it does not take this task to heart.

The University's public relations material emphasizes the prominent writers who teach in the Program in Creative Writing. This statement is true but for a few exceptions. Therefore, as the program expands its faculty, the Center should make sure that premier faculty, and not just visiting professors or temporary fellows, continue to teach introductory classes. It is far more important that they teach introductory classes than faddish or specialized courses that only a small number of students may want or be able to take.

An increase in full-time faculty and the creation of a society of fellows will certainly include many who will commute from New York City. The Center will thus have to make a concerted effort to encourage the new faculty to contribute to campus life, instead of merely coming off the Dinky, walking the short distance to the Center, teaching and then immediately hightailing it back to the Dinky. By providing adequate accommodation for visiting professors and other incentives such as the ability to take on larger atelier enterprises like last year's Boris Godunov, the University can help integrate permanent and visiting faculty into life at Princeton.

If done right, the Center for the Creative and Performing Arts will be a boon to the arts at Princeton, especially to the creative writing program, which is in serious need of expansion. The onus now falls on the University to assure broad student participation and continued close student-faculty relationships. And this even before assessing what the geographic distance of the arts center from the E-Quad will mean for course scheduling!