YOU CAN TEACH SOME OF THE PEOPLE...

Fow Harvard undergraduates will dispute the contention that course examinations which require pure memorizing are of little permanent value. Nor will they deny that students can often accomplish more toward attaining a grasp of a given field of study through independent reading than through the fulfillment of an inelastic set of course requirements. The question which arises in connection with Mr. Fairbank's letter, printed else-where in these columns, is how far present conditions at Harvard over-emphasize course work and what benefits could be derived from a further reduction in course requirements--particularly those of Seniors.

While tutorial work may in general conduce to greater progress than attendance at lectures in such fields as history, philosophy, or even literature, the reverse is certainly true of many other departments of study. Lectures in the fine arts, laboratory work in the sciences, discussion groups in mathematics or economic theory can scarcely be supplanted by independent reading on the part of the student.

It should, furthermore, be remembered that the swing from course to tutorial work is not likely to benefit any one but honors candidates. The student who has not sufficient scholastic ambition to try for honors will but rarely find a larger opportunity for unprescribed work of advantage.

And even for the honors man there are bound to be a sufficient number of truly stimulating lectures in any department to make an entire abolition of course attendance undesirable. Whether or not the course reductions at present allowed Seniors who are candidates for honors has struck the proper balance between course and tutorial work in perhaps open to question. But there is certainly little reason to suppose that a general reduction in course requirements at Harvard would be a widespread blessing.