Bono’s jumped on the bandwagon. So has University President John J. DeGioia, along with Kofi Annan and Bill Gates. So why has the School of Foreign Service stalled?

Development, the broadly defined field of studies that asks the fundamental question, among others, why are we rich and others poor and what can we do to solve this problem, should be one of the School of Foreign Service’s crowning programs. Development guru and Columbia University Economics-professor-turned-international celebrity Jeff Sachs calls development “cultural economics.”

Georgetown already offers cultural politics and political economics majors. This third hybrid should fit right in.

All of the factors line up perfectly: students interested in international issues and a university committed to social justice, all in one of the world’s power centers. All of the factors except one: a united voice from the student body.

DeGioia has already created a faculty task force to investigate the possibilities of starting a Development Studies Program at Georgetown. The next step is up to students.

And student interest is not lacking. When DeGioia and Carol Lancaster, a government professor who has previously served as Deputy Administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, offered a course this spring entitled “Ethics and Global Development,” the class filled almost immediately.

Each year, scores of Georgetown graduates head to the Peace Corps, the World Bank and non-governmental organizations that work directly with issues facing developing countries. With requirements in economics, political science and ethics, the SFS core curriculum is a de facto crash course in development – alas, a major by any other name would sound as sweet.

Critics can claim that that the School of Foreign Service does not have the resources at this time to create a new major. New tenured professors and courses would be a veritable kiss of death on an already strained university budget. They are right. A new major is probably unfeasible at the time, but this is not the only way to create new opportunities for study.

A new certificate program would be far less onerous. The resources required are minimal. Many classes already offered – from the aforementioned ethics course to Cultural Anthropology to Economic Development to Comparative Politics of Economic Development – could be included in their existing form. Faculty to serve as advisors and perhaps either an introductory course or a capstone course would be the greatest and most difficult demands on the university.

But the university will not respond unless students demonstrate interest.

And the fact remains that in Washington, D.C. it’s easy to ignore the impoverished thousands of miles away.

If Georgetown, and particularly the School of Foreign Service, intends to continue to be at the forefront of academic thinking, it should not be afraid to join the bandwagon that has of late littered the pages of the New York Times and is the topic du jour among the glitterati of global politics.

Before we realize it, that bandwagon will become a movement. Tomorrow’s revolution begins in today’s classroom. And once Bono is too arthritic to walk the dirt roads of Kenya and Kofi Annan is but a footnote of history, who will sing their song of hope and who will preach their vision of a more just future? Hopefully, we will.

Aaron Terrazas is a sophomore in the School of Foreign Service and is Managing Editor of THE HOYA.