The Spring Catalogue

It won't be long before the Faculty Committee on Educational Policy gets to work on the Catalogue of Courses for 1949-50. This Committee is, among other things, an editorial panel for the Catalogue, so it is a large extent responsible for figuring out just what sort of information the Catalogue will contain.

This year, for the first time, the space in the Catalogue was allotted sensibly more, for instance to the Government and History courses that most students use for distribution, and less to advanced Biology courses which nobody would take unless he were in the field and knew about the content before he ever saw the Catalogue. The new arrangement of space has made this year's Catalogue a lot more helpful to the student, and leaves only one matter for the Committee to clear up in next year's edition.

That is a matter of information. The Catalogue should give as much information as possible that will help a student to plan at least part of his program in long-range terms. It has already gone halfway by listing, for example, the courses omitted in 1948-49, but will not be given in 1949-50. What remains to be done is simply to note whatever course are being given in 1948-49 but will not be given in would be note if they were not to be given in 1950-51. This information is such a simple and logical thing to offer that it is hard to see why it hasn't been included in past Catalogues. And it's impossible to see why it shouldn't be included in the new one.