TUTORS FOR FRESHMEN

Freshmen will always have difficulty in choosing a tutor until they know what it means to work individually. They have no idea until then what qualities to look for in the man who guides them. The majority of every incoming class have been taught as members of a group, not as individuals, and the Adviser system does little to change the Freshman attitude towards education. Until the University works out some better plan, the tutorial system can not be effective until the Junior or Senior year.

It is safe to say that less than ten per cent of the Freshmen are benefited by their infrequent meetings with their advisers. The lack of opportunity for individual work accounts for the fact that the first year is considered of little value intellectually. To make it of value, Harvard must extend the tutorial policy to the last half of the Freshman year.

The advisers now merely helping men to choose courses, after Mid Year should arrange for frequent meetings and assign work in the field that the Freshman thinks will be his selection for concentration. Thus the choice made by Freshmen at the end of the year would be more permanent and the upsetting shifting at the end of Sophomore year largely eliminated.

The Tutorial System on the whole has proved its worth. But men cannot be too soon aided in determining their favorite bent or too soon initiated into the work of thinking as individuals.