HPC Decides Classics Is Not Difficult En ough

The Harvard-Radcliffe Policy Committee has called for extensive changes to toughen the Classics Department.

In its audit, presented last week to the department, the HPC's subcommittee on the Classics proposed making the elementary courses harder and requiring all concentrators to take honors general examinations.

The committee aimed its strongest criticism at the whole group of middle level courses, which it says "fluctuates wildly" in difficulty from the "ridiculously low" level of most of the courses to Greek and Latin 112, which "resemble no other course so much in their intent and result as Chemistry 20."

The committee wants to see a basic and systematic sequence of courses established to eliminate the "guessing game" students must now play to figure out what courses will be offered. But chances of establishing such a sequence are slight, for Wendell V. Clausen, professor of Greek and Latin and chairman of the department, said yesterday that the department can't influence professors to teach any particular course or to set an arbitrary level of difficulty. "We don't want a rigid system," he said.

Another of the committee's proposals is aimed at lessening the gap between students who major in Classics and those who major in either Latin or Greek. At present Classics majors have to take general examinations in both Latin and Greek while the single-language majors lave to take generals in only one. The HPC wants to make translation passages in both languages mandatory for all.

Double Major

But here again the committee may run into faculty opposition. Marsh H. Mc.Call Jr. '60, Instructor in Classics and head tutor, said he is "mildly against" the proposal because in effect it makes all students in the department have a double major. "And some students taking just one language either are not as good as those in Classics or want to pursue other interests," he said.