G. E. Courses Pathetic

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

I would like to comment on the fourth paragraphh of your article entitled: "March of Time Starts Shooting for University Movie Tomorrow" (Harvard CRIMSON; 11-17-50).

It states: ". . . the film will probably stress the College as 'an adult world, free of coercion' . . ."; and: " . . . the ollege in its true prospective, without any propagandizing." I don't know what the movie is going to show, but the first statement refutes the second and is, in itself, an untruth. It is both propagandizing and untrue to say that the College is: "an adult world, free of coercion."

I feel it is most definitely coercion to force freshmen to take two, and, in the future, three General Education courses. I feel that this action is all the more unfair and coercive since the University's G.E. courses are so poor. I can, of course, only judge the two I am now in the process of being forced to take.

They are both pathetic. I have had both better material and better teachers at Prop school than those connected with these emasculated survey courses . . .

I have no quarrel with the purposes of General Education. One being the awareness of one's role " . . . as a responsible human being and citizen," the other the restoration of the unity of higher education. The first is not accomplished, and it is to be hoped that most intelligent citizens are aware of their role without General Education. The second is both admirable and desirable. It seems almost too bad it is impossible. Oh, certainly the entire student body could be trained in some one field in order that it might have something in common, but we cannot return to the golden age of cosmopolitanism when all educated men had the same things in common. Back then, before the Great War, the classical and the worthy literature of more modern vintage along with at least two or three foreign languages were the heritage and the requisite of educated men. Today, with the economic necessity of specialization there are few who want that sort of education and fewer still who can afford it.

Unless English A is removed from the curriculum, any student entering next year who has not been excused from English and who has not fulfilled his language requirement will be forced to take five courses, since next year three G.E. courses will be required . . . Silence may be golden, but I for one do not intend to be crucified on a cross of gold. (Name withheld by request)