Soc Rel 148 Staffers Try for Federal Grant

Soc Rel 148 staffers are applying for a Federal grant for more than $11,000 to help pay the costs of Teaching Fellow salaries, guest lecture fees, and other course expenses.

The course's staff said they hope to receive the subsidy from "Coalition for Youth," a Labor Department subdivision which has funded radical experimental programs at colleges throughout the nation.

The list of the course expenses was submitted too late last spring to get full funding from an already tight Faculty of Arts Sciences budget, Thomas J. Cottle '59 the course's sponsor, said. The course was approved as a full-credit University course only after impassioned debate about its controversial format, which includes using undergraduates as sectionmen, for example.

Cottle denied reports that the course had already received the grant, which were circulated in yesterday's Boston Globe. He said he didn't even know that the course staff had started working on the application.

Cottle added that he was upset about the apparent contradiction in asking the national government for funds for the radical-oriented course.

Cottle emphasized that "the course is highly critical of the present political system, and radicals in the past have been opposed to the government's involvement in the University." He added that he would "look everywhere and do anything before going to Washington for money to subsidize Soc Rel 148."

David S. Finkelhor '68-4, an undergraduate sectionmen and one of those investigating the grant, said he didn't believe any contradiction existed. He said the move was "merely opportunistic."

"We certainly wouldn't dream of accepting the money if we felt that this would compromise the course's purpose in any way," he added.

Finkelhor said that the Labor Department has described as "favorable" the course's chances for getting the grant. The University regulation which severely restricts using grants to pay Teaching Fellows may, however, be a stumbling block to the course's accepting the money.

Soc Rec 148 has so far pooled the four Teaching Fellow's salaries, which the Faculty allotted, to pay for all the course expenses, Finkelhor said.