A HAPPY MEDIUM

Using the entire academic world as his province, President Conant has announced his intention of attracting men to the University who are authorities in their field, men who have demonstrated their ability to carry on research. Yet praiseworthy as such a policy may be, if carried to its logical extreme; it might very likely result in an unbalanced faculty, one made up too largely of research men. This would be a dangerous tendency for teaching ability would no longer be its own reward, and would receive but minor consideration.

The neglect of such as important qualification might lead in time to the gradual decline of the University preeminently as an educational institution. There is definitely a place for both the research man and the teacher in any institution of higher learning. Students attend a university for the purpose of preparing themselves either culturally or specifically for a career they intend to pursue afterwards. They want and need men who can lecture to them interestingly and impart their subject matter with skill and clarity. A certain amount of research is necessary in order to keep the subject living and progressive, and there should of course, be men to take care of this important task of imparting this material as it is gathered. if men are expected to do worthwhile research and at the same time develop interesting courses, one phase of their work is going to suffer for want of time to do both. Some men come Harvard for the sole purpose of doing research while others want direct contact with the authorities in different fields regardless of how interesting the lectures, may be. For these men some opportunity of taking courses with men doing research must be provided, but the courses should be limited in number and confined to the special field of the instructor.

If the University is to maintain its standing as one of the foremost educational institutions of the country. It must adopt a policy of faculty replacement which provides for competent instruction of its students as well as opportunities for research men. The men who are assigned to teaching for the most part much not be expected to do research work in order to secure promotion but must merit advancement according to their ability to understand their subject, keep up with its developments, and impart it intelligibly to students. Research and enlightenment much aid and abet each other. No educational institution can maintain a prominent position in the educational world which neglects either or allows one to assume a too great preponderance over the other.

In the general process of relaw for the finals acts and vital prince town will be command as same with a fine disregard of their ultimate destiny in the process or cresting the educated man. In mathematical courses particularly, such as Physics C. Math A, and Engineering Sciences, the student is plagued by the necessity of fixing in mind pages of formulas and their derivations which he will be expected to reproduce on demand when the examination papers are passed out.

As in the past, these moldy ghosts of antiquated pedagogy long since defunct but not yet laid decently to rest rise from their uneasy slumber to haunt the most conscientious and industrious of students as well as those of easier academic virtue. There is not point in compelling the student to spend hours committing to memory dozens of formulas which frequently differ from each other by only a sign which nevertheless makes all the difference in the world. Too of ten the result is that the able student with a short memory is outshone by lessor lights of seeming greater brilliancy.

A genuine advance in the teaching of these subjects would result were the student allowed to take text books or at least formula cards into the exam room. Mathematical subjects are not mastered overnight at the Widow's and these aids would prove a mental convenience rather than an intellectual crutch; and furthermore their use would enable the harassed student to spend the fleeting hours before finals in a more profitable pursuit of knowledge.