The Boston University Student Government announced that its Academic Affairs Department is creating the Syllabus Archive, a campus-wide database of syllabi from BU courses designed to assist students during class registration.
StuGov’s Academic Affairs Director Matt Feliciano wrote in an email statement that the goal of the Syllabus Archive is to make the registration process more resourceful and transparent for students.
“The purpose of this initiative is to provide students with additional resources during registration. The idea is that before registering for a class, you should have access to the syllabi to make more informed decisions regarding the material of the course,” he wrote.
By providing students with detailed information about BU courses, such as grading breakdowns and expected workload, Feliciano hopes to prevent misunderstandings about course content.
“[The Syllabus Archive] helps to prevent those times when you register for a class expecting to study one thing, but the course is completely different,” he wrote.
Currently, StuGov’s Academic Affairs Department is using a Google Form to collect syllabi and student-written reviews about courses.
The collected syllabi and reviews will then be compiled onto a master drive managed by the department.
In a Nov. 21 email titled “Post-Election Support and Other Initiatives,” StuGov President Akwasi Antiwi said that the archive “will allow [students] to preview materials, gauge workload and make registration easier.”
Sophomore Nina Lazarovici said that the idea of the archive seems useful during registration and feasible to manage.
“I’m surprised that [the Syllabus Archive] doesn’t already exist,” she said. “It seems like it would be a pretty easy task for professors to partake in as well. It would definitely be helpful, because I feel like the descriptions on the class registration [portal] aren’t super in-depth.”
To encourage syllabi submissions, students can receive an entry into semesterly raffles for prizes such as gift cards or a TV for every syllabus submitted through the Google Form.
Sophomore Altea Peyser said having access to a variety of syllabi “sounds like my dream.”
“I love reading through syllabus and course descriptions, and I feel like there’s always a lack of depth to it or they’re not always accurate,” she said. “Being able to look back and have a historical archive of classes would be super interesting.”
The Academic Affairs Department hopes to have a trial version of the archive ready by the end of next semester, with the syllabi of 25-30% of BU courses compiled.
The department is still deciding on how students will access the archive, according to Feliciano. Proposed ideas include adding the archive to StuGov’s website and social media pages.
Senior Logan Lechuga said the Syllabus Archive would help students better prepare for their courses.
“Having a syllabus to look at would be nice, just in case, you know, I want to get ahead on topics [or] if I want to see if there’s any books available that I can start reading on,” he said.
Lechuga also noted that the archive could help students manage their time more efficiently.
“It would help students figure out ‘Is this course right for me? Is it worth my time? Do the topics being covered relate to what I want to do in everyday life?’”
