English Dept. Will Offer New Sophomore Tutorial Program

A new non-credit group tutorial program will be available to sophomore English concentrators on an optional basis this spring and will become mandatory for Sophomores beginning with the Class '78, spokesmen for the English Department said yesterday.

David D. Perkins, professor of English and American Literature and head of the committee that designed the new program, will present the details of the plan to a meeting of the English Department faculty tomorrow.

Perkins said yesterday that graduate students will teach the groups of approximately six sophomores, which will meet for at least one hour each week.

He said that the tutorial groups will study one or two authors each semester in "a many-sided way." Assistant professor Lawrence L. Besserman, head tutor of the English Department, said the intensive study of a few authors will balance the "broad exposure to English literature" provided by English 10, "The Tradition of English Literature."

English 10 discussion sections, which are required of all sophomore concentrators, now serve as sophomore tutorial.

Besserman said that the new tutorial program will benefit non-honors as well as honors concentrators. He said that only honors concentrators formerly got "real tutorial."

Junior and senior tutorials in English are only available to candidates for honors.