Course Review to be online Monday

After three months of absence, the Penn Course Review is expected to make its online return on Monday.

For over 40 years, the Course Review was published in book form, providing honest student feedback on various courses and offering criticism of professors. But soon after going online last year, the Web site folded due to a lack of student interest in running the publication.

Therefore, last month, three branches of student government -- the Undergraduate Assembly, Student Committee on Undergraduate Education and the Student Activities Council -- agreed to help revive this publication.

Members of the UA and SCUE held an information session last night for approximately 30 interested students about contributing to the Review.

"Our first goal was to have the Review up in time for pre-registration," SCUE member and College junior Erica Miao said. "Now, we are looking to bring together writers and editors to help complete this project."

The project, also known as "The Penn Course Review Resurrection," started earlier this year after the Review's Web site went down.

Working on the technical side of things, Engineering seniors Howie Vegter and Stephen MacCrory are remaking the online version of the Review as part of their computer science senior design project.

The online version of the Review, which will be complete starting Monday at coursereview.vpul.upenn.edu, will contain only the numerical statistics from Spring 2003 classes for three undergraduate schools -- the College, Engineering and Nursing. According to Vegter, student comments and "notable quotables" will be added once a staff is compiled.

"There's going to be everything that was in the book, plus a lot more," Vegter said.

Vegter added that at this point, there are no plans to publish a print version of the Review, as printing the publication cost about $30,000 per year as opposed to the under-$500 ethernet port and domain name fees of the online version.

Vegter and MacCrory "have done an excellent job," UA representative and College sophomore Mike Cohen said. "They added search functions so that students will be able to find reviews by professor, class or department."

Users will also be able to view courses according to course rating, instructor and course difficulty, according to Vegter.

"You have a lot more control of what you want to find," he said.

UA Education Committee Chairwoman and Wharton sophomore Cynthia Wong was very happy about the turnout.

"I'm very glad that so many people attended this event and with the progress we've made," Wong said.

College sophomore Sarah Gudis reflected on her own experience as motivation for applying to be a writer for the Review.

"The Review would be very useful in determining my course choices," she said. "Penn has so many classes and departments that it would be really valuable to have other students' opinions accessible."

College freshman Susan McIlvaine agreed with Gudis and expressed her personal frustration with not having the Review.

"As a freshman, it would have been really helpful for me to have had [the Review] earlier," she said. "I ended up switching most of the classes I originally signed up for."

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