150 Students Enroll in House Seminars; Current Events Most Popular Topic

(This is the first of two articles on seminar programs in the Houses.)

Eight of the nine Houses are now running non-credit seminars, supposedly for whichever of their members feel discouraged at the lecture system and its "one-way" education.

About 150 students attend their seminar meetings regularly, according to senior tutors and leaders of the individual seminars. Regular attendance implies conscientious preparation, which in many cases means a reading load nearing that of a standard half course.

Some of the seminars, however, are doing better than others on the matter of attendance. While no group has been completely disbanded for lack of student interest, membership in more than one has dwindled to a lone undergraduate and the person in charge of the group. Since the structure of the various seminars is for the most part similar--meetings once a week, often around the dinner table--topics, speakers, and, oddly enough, the House it is given in have emerged as the determining factors with respect to attendance.

African Problems Popular

Current events in general, and African problems in particular, have met with the best reception. Indeed, Quincy's combination of this topic with the added attraction of speakers borrowed from the U.N. has brought as many as 180 undergraduates to the "open" meetings, and at least 15 students are doing the 100-page reading assignments required for the bi-weekly "closed" sessions. Lowell House is also offering a seminars on Africa, under the leadership of a former African Journalist. A more usual number of students (about eight) attend regularly.

The seminars that survive and don't deal with events politically affecting students usually concern things students can do themselves or can apply directly to themselves. Drama workshops and visual arts studies are universally popular. Poetry and tutoring in composition also have substantial student interest.

The topics themselves are remarkably varied. Winthrop House has one group under a Boston lawyer considering the hypothetical case of one "George Peters," an imaginary student run down while crossing Massachusetts Avenue. Two phases of the case have received consideration so far--first, medical facts, the decision to go to court, and the pre-court haggling by insurance companies; and second, the preparation given by each side to its case and the parrying for an out-of court settlement.

"Galety and Excellence"

A different approach is typified by Quincy's investigation of "Gaiety and Elegance." Co-leader Arthur R. Gold, teaching fellow in General Education, who defines elegance as "mental efficiency," points out that "most students need to work to think. The difficulty here is that there's no work to do." The three students in the seminar may well find themselves assigned to write a line of poetry on either of the topic concepts as an eventual piece of preparation. The group so far has confined its investigations to poetry and other art forms.

Quincy, evidently, has a strong program of seminars, as do Kirkland and Dudley. In fact, over one quarter of the students involved in the program are in Dudley. Adams, with a similar offering including five groups, has only 17 undergraduates attending meetings regularly. (Because of the problem of opening the new buildings, Leverett will not start its program full force until the Spring Term.)

Besides the obvious talking point that those who want intellectual activity are getting it, the seminars have a second and, perhaps unexpected, beneficial effect: they are bringing undergraduates into contact with teachers and authorities outside the University.

Each House has received $3,000 to finance its program, but no full-time member of the Faculty can receive outside pay for employment such as running a seminar. Thus the most easily obtainable pepole are men from Brandein, B.U., M.I.T., or recent alumni.