Herbert Hawkes

Herbert Hawkes
Frederick P. Keppel
Succeeded by	Harry Carman
Personal details
Born	1872 (1872)
Died	1943(1943-00-00) (aged 70–71)
PhD )

Herbert Edwin Hawkes (1872 – 1943) was an American mathematician and an experienced educator and had first-hand knowledge of the various problems, boys face during their college life.

, the longest of any Columbia College dean, earned him the title "the dean of American college deans".

Hawkes studied mathematics at the

in 1917, Hawkes became acting dean, ascending to the full deanship a year later.

As dean, Hawkes was known as a supporter of general education. He promoted a full undergraduate education and opposed the "Columbia plan" to fast-track students to graduate school in under four years. In 1919, he and a small group of other faculty members helped assemble a sequence of war-issues classes known as "Contemporary Civilization;" this would become a more general year-long philosophy course and the cornerstone of the college's famous Core Curriculum. In the 1930s he pushed through a similar year-long humanities sequence, to become the Core Curriculum's "Literature Humanities" course, over some faculty objections. His advocacy of general education classes in the natural sciences, however, did not meet with the same success.

Hawkes served as dean of the college until his death in 1943.

References

External links

• Profile of Hawkes at Columbia College
• Herbert Hawkes at the Mathematics Genealogy Project

Academic offices
Preceded by Frederick P. Keppel	Dean of Columbia College 1918 – 1943	Succeeded by Harry Carman