FACULTY PLAN FOR IRAQ WAR WITH ONE-DAY MORATORIUM ON CLASSES

[NORTON, Mass.] - If and when the U.S. launches its long-anticipated strike on Iraq, Wheaton professors are prepared to act.

The Wheaton faculty voted on Friday to call a one-day moratorium on "classes as usual," in the event of war. The faculty plan to devote an entire day to a campus-wide discussion of the implications and ramifications of the war, examining the issues from political, cultural, psychological, artistic, environmental, and health-related perspectives.

''War will affect our students' lives in a number of ways, ways that they cannot know,'' said political science professor Darlene Boroviak, who proposed the motion on behalf of a campus group of faculty and students. ''We may be able to help them begin their process of questioning and exploration about the war and its effects on their lives by providing various community forums as venues for learning and exploration.''

The moratorium would be held two days after the start of the war, allowing sufficient time to distribute a program of events for the day.

The moratorium is not meant to espouse a particular point of view about the war. ''We don't see this as an antiwar day or a support-the-war day,'' Boroviak said, speaking on behalf of the Wheaton College Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, which proposed the moratorium. Several faculty members spoke out about the need to make individuals who support the war feel comfortable in expressing their viewpoints. The faculty later approved a resolution opposing war in Iraq without UN support.

The faculty's plan for a one-day moratorium on ''classes as usual'' calls for compiling a list of courses from all disciplines that will be open to the campus at large, offering a daylong viewing of war-related films and documentaries, and planning a campus-wide meeting at which students, faculty and staff of the college will be encouraged to express their viewpoints.

''If students are not paying attention to current events, then this moratorium would be a perfect teaching moment,'' said sociology professor Hyun Kim. Students at the meeting said residence hall discussions are dominated by talk of the impending war, and activism on the Wheaton campus has been on the increase. The moratorium builds upon a series of protests, teach-ins, panel discussions and lectures that have been staged on campus since the start of the school year.

''Whatever our views, those of us who have experienced other war situations, even the modern version with smart bombs and surgical strikes, know that war is a catastrophic event,'' Boroviak said. ''It takes lives and leads people to kill; it maims people, alters and disrupts societies and cultures, increases suffering, harms the environment, erodes morals.''