THE WITCHING HOUR

December hour examinations are still customary in certain courses, although the College has announced that its policy is to abandon such measures, which serve as petty disciplinary ties and have little real value.

Coming shortly before Mid-years, these tests must cover in one hour an amount of material almost as great as that which later requires three, with the result that they neglect important portions of the semester's work or force too many questions into a short sixty minutes. In either case the resulting grades may be meaningless, and in either an injustice is done. This is a month when many men are preparing course theses, and to distract and divide their attention is to defeat the purpose of the new educational trend.

Perhaps these exams spur a few lazy scholars out of the pre-vacation slump, but in subjecting everyone to such an ordeal in order to stimulate a sluggish minority is patently unfair. The contention of others that they benefit by a review of their studies is true to a certain extent, but a quizzing of trivial details contributes little to one's education, while those broader essay subjects which evoke individual thought require more time. If some mid-semester's grade is necessary, then to submit term papers would be far more profitable than hour exams. Irksome and worthless, those relics of juvenile schooling ought long ago to have been relegated to the limbo of the birch rod.