Philosophy majors

According to this morning's newspaper account,

The Department of Philosophy must present a viable plan for significantly increasing its number of majors. It must be approved by the interim provost and president by Sept. 30. If it is not, various options for merging the Philosophy Department with the most appropriate and compatible existing academic department at the university will be considered. The major may be phased out over a three- or four-year period.

Also noted in the article,

The dean is quick to point out that the Philosophy Department has an acceptable number of majors based on Tennessee Board of Regents standards. "That is an average of 10 majors over a five-year period," he said.

Thank you, Dean. The majors issue is a red herring, in the original report because the task force that produced it passed false information along to the President... or because someone wants it there for ulterior reasons.

Almost no philosophy department in the country has a surfeit of majors compared to larger, standard-vocation-oriented programs. This is America, after all. Of course we want more majors, and goodness knows the country (and its pool of collegiate administrators!) can use more thoughtful people. But pretty clearly, that's not what our university's present budget-slashing initiative is about.