THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Wednesday, February 5, 1997           TAG: 9702050456
SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B5   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: BY PHILIP WALZER, STAFF WRITER 
DATELINE: NORFOLK                           LENGTH:   39 lines

ODU FACULTY, LARGELY OPPOSED, DELAYS VOTE ON SCHEDULE CHANGE A PROPOSAL WOULD STRETCH MONDAY AND WEDNESDAY CLASSES, BUT CUT OUT FRIDAYS.

Old Dominion University's Faculty Senate decided Tuesday to delay voting on a controversial plan to overhaul the university's course schedule.

The group referred the matter to a subcommittee for further research and campus hearings. Senate chairman William A. Drewry, who advocated the delay, said he didn't expect the full senate to take it up again until next semester.

Currently, ODU offers primarily a two-track schedule: Students may take 50-minute-long classes on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays or 75-minute-long classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

The Senate proposal would have eliminated most of the Monday-Wednesday-Friday courses. Instead, it would create a Monday and Wednesday schedule with 75-minute classes, similar to the Tuesday-Thursday plan.

Advocates said that would make it easier for students with jobs to schedule working hours and would improve instruction by limiting interruptions. But at the senate's meeting, most professors spoke out against it.

With some professors not teaching on Fridays, senate members said, the change could whip up criticism from the public and Richmond.

``It would not change our workload, but it would give the appearance of changing our workload,'' said Charles E. Hyde-Wright, an associate professor of physics. Politicians could even propose cutting budgets 20 percent, he said, if they thought professors weren't working Fridays.

The university's president, James V. Koch, expressed similar concerns about the political impact during a meeting with Faculty Senate leaders Tuesday morning, said Robert Wojtowicz, an associate professor of art.

Christine Drake, a political science professor, said the professors she polled didn't think 50-minute sessions lowered the quality of teaching.

No students spoke at the meeting. But Ronald E. Johnson, an associate professor of oceanography, said he quizzed about 300 students in his class, and they opposed the change by a 3-to-1 margin.