By position, Donald Johns is a lecturer in English literature and composition at UC Davis. But this spring he's teaching a small class on Elvis Presley's impact on American cultural history.
Steven Sheffrin is the dean of the Division of Social Sciences and a professor of macroeconomics. He is leading a 15-person seminar relating economic principles to health, environmental and fiscal policy.
The faculty members are two of 17 instructors participating in the Freshman Seminar program, developed by the Teaching Re-sources Center in 1988. The eight-week seminars not only offer first-year students a rare, personal class setting, but allow instructors to teach a topic of special interest to them.
"For me this was totally different," said Sheffrin, a taxation expert. "I've never taught a class like this before."
Other faculty members in the program are teaching seminars on medical ethics, regional Mexican literature, California water policy and animal rights.
The campus is willing to host just as many seminars as there are faculty members willing to teach them, said Patricia Turner, vice provost for undergraduate studies. She is in the midst of recruiting instructors to teach seminars for fall, winter and spring quarters next year.
It can be a difficult task, she said.
"A lot of our faculty would like to have those experiences, but the demands of delivering their own majors and doing their own research" can keep them busy enough, Turner said.
She hopes, however, the faculty can see the many benefits of teaching the classes.
In many majors at UC Davis, students don't have small classes until they take upper division courses. Professors typically don't know their students well, nor do the students know their professors.
"The seminars allow freshmen to see the intellectual pursuit up close and personal," Turner said.
In his class, "Economic Policy Debates Today," Sheffrin has enjoyed showing students how they can relate basic economic principles to public affairs. He has his class read his 1993 book on the topic, Markets and Majorities.
Participating in the program has allowed him to return to teaching, while balancing work as a dean, Sheffrin said. The two-unit seminars meet just once a week.
Students in Johns' "Elvis Presley: Roots, Impacts, Legacies" study the musician's influences, a topic that has long fascinated the lecturer. They read Peter Guralnick's acclaimed biography, Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley, watch video clips and even travel to two specialty music shops in the Bay Area.
Sophomore Allison Leonard took Johns' seminar last spring.
"The small class size was a wonderful change," she said. "It enabled me to meet all of my classmates, and it was great to be able to know everyone's name in the class."
Leonard, an avian sciences major, said she loved the class, both for its intimate setting as well as the knowledge she gained about the roots of rock music.
"I think it's very rewarding to have this contact with these students," Turner said. "Freshmen are not as jaded about the university as upperclassmen can be. They are excited to be here, excited to learn."
The deadline for instructors to propose a freshman seminar course has been extended to May 4. Instructors are paid $1,500 per seminar they teach. They may also apply for a grant of up to $100 to offset course expenses.
Faculty members who are interested in the program can call the Teaching Resource Center at 752-6050 or going online at http:// trc.ucdavis.edu/TRC/frosh/FRSdetails. html.