The New Curriculum
To THE EDITOR:
When I first glanced at your article, A NewEducational Program, in the April issue, I was appalled - could Dartmouth really be considering a shift to the quarter (or threeterm) system? Your subsequent explanations softened the blow considerably; and of course if the faculty approved it after two years of debate, I apologize for the "voice in the wilderness" character of this letter. However, I still want to get a couple of comments off my chest. These are based on three years of studying and teaching at the University of Minnesota after leaving Dartmouth, the former being run on a quarter basis.
First of all, the shorter term gives you little time to really become at home with your course material and to get a feeling for the subject. You rush in and you rush out - then it's time for a new one. In the article you say that, in the three-term program, "the student . .. will be able to give sustained attention to independent work." But by closing down courses and, presumably, the grading thereof, before the long vacations, you have effectively eliminated the only chance a student ever had to get away from the constant demands of "homework" and exams, to do a bit of side reading and organize a presentable and thoughtful term paper.
Finally, let me say that anything which reduces electives, as you admit this program will, should be wholeheartedly condemned. There is all too little opportunity as it it to roam the intellectual world as an undergraduate, shackled as the normal course of study is with requirements and prerequisites. But it is comforting to know that students of a certain achievement can - and at no cost, too - take a couple of extra courses. The average lunkhead will, as usual, coast along without giving the matter any further thought.
Well, maybe I'm biased on this subject, as I took an intense dislike to the quarter system (partly, to be sure, because at Minnesota it involved 5 courses, with a correspondingly reduced number of lectures definitely leading to superficiality) - and some of my most satisfying experiences were in electives. I hope that, in 1970, the Alumni Magazine will receive a letter proving me wrong — and if the "Program of Independent Reading" and the plans for "training in the effective use of English" are carried through as planned, I foresee that this may well be the case.
Petropolis, Brazil
"It Works"
To THE EDITOR:
The "new" three-term, three-course system at Dartmouth is the old traditional Scottish three-term, three-course system at Edinburgh - a fine system allowing the student to do justice to three subjects instead of skimping five. After Dartmouth, I spent a year there in 1930-31 studying British history, seventeenth century English literature, and English language—first term, Anglo-Saxon; second term, Middle English; third term,. Middle Scots.
And we know it works: it has been working in the Scottish. universities for several cen- turies.
Washington, D. C.
Fugitive from the June
To THE EDITOR:
Lying athwart the equator on the north side of the mouth of the Amazon is the Brazilian territory of Amapa, and there the Bethlehem Steel Company, in conjunction with Brazilian interests, has just inaugurated an important manganese mine, with over 100 miles of railroad and a covey of gondola cars for the ore. The company has one reconditioned passenger car which was placed at my disposal for a recent visit to the mine. Something about that weather-beaten chariot was immediately so reminiscent that I promptly inquired.
Sure enough, the mining company bought the car on the hoof in North Station from the Boston and Maine and shipped it to the Amazon a few months ago. They face lifted it with elegant aluminum paint to withstand the equatorial sun and substituted round for square wheels. Otherwise, it's in about the same condition you last saw it, possibly disgorging Winter Carnival girls a generation ago.
All of which led me to have the enclosed photograph made for such edification as it may produce on the Hanover Plain. "E. F. AMAPA" stands for "Estrada de Ferro Amapá," that is, Amapá Railway. ICOMI are the initials of the company and stand for "Industria e Comercio de Minerios, S.A."
I recall that the company building the Amapá railroad - Foley Brothers - has a Dartmouth alumnus as president: Carl Swenson '15, and another as vice president: Paul Halloran '19.1 suppose a B & M car was inevitable.
American EmbassyRio de Janeiro, Brazil
Literate Hanover
The following letter to the editor appeared in the March 24 issue of The Observer of London, England. The writer has been a visitor to the College.
INHABITABLE
Sir, - Modern technology has forced a change in English (or American) usage that casts some light on the problem of "inhabitable," raised by Miss Beloff in her article on "Anglomania." At most American airports, the tank cars carrying "gas" bear on their flanks the word "flammable." "Inflammable" is thought to be dangerously ambiguous.
On the other hand, it survives on tank cars delivering gas in literate communities such as Hanover, N. H. (home of Dartmouth College).
Cambridge