The Undergraduate Chair

THE outgoing members of Palaeopitus last month introduced a new procedure on campus when they distributed to the entire College a printed report on the academic year nearing its end. The report dealt mainly with areas where the eleven members of Palaeopitus, serving as the executive committee of the Undergraduate Council, felt that improvement was called for.

"Each year in the spring," stated the report, "there is always a great amount of discussion among seniors as to their feelings about the College. These discussions, however, seldom reach beyond the 'Friday night bull session' phase. It is the purpose of this report, compiled by Palaeopitus, to present the independent thinking of eleven men. This is the campus as we see it."

The report expressed concern over the trend toward the weakening of extracurricular activities, and the potential the new three-term, three-course program will have "for destroying the unique extracurricular activity system present today." It opposed deemphasis of intercollegiate sports, or of Winter Carnival, stating: "No matter what some officials care to believe, Dartmouth is not thought of solely in academic terms - nor, we hope, will it ever be."

Following, in excerpt form, are some other highlights of the Palaeopitus report:

"Although believing that the varied extracurricular factors which have made Dartmouth unique should not be dropped, we do decry the serious anti-intellectual attitude prevalent on the campus. There are many opportunities here ... for intellectual stimulation outside the classroom and yet, these activities are always lightly attended. There is so much more to learning than just being buried in the stacks of Baker or listening to a professor. The student body should take advantage of these offerings and consider them not an imposition but an adjunct of learning."

"Yet the blame is not entirely with the student body. We feel there has been far too strong an emphasis during Freshman Orientation on the quantity of work a student must do - not the quality. Freshmen are consequently afraid to venture away from their textbooks, to go to a non-required lecture, to join an extracurricular activity until they feel established. In many cases, establishment comes too late for any joining to be done."

"Anti-intellectualism has another manifestation: boorishness. It is disappointing to see supposedly mature College students gleefully throwing food in Thayer Hall. . . . The Thayer food-thrower has a cousin in the 'handler' - the man who takes books under an assumed name in order to keep them longer, who borrows a jacket for six months, who orders records and books and then refuses to pay for them. But handling, say these men, is the thing to do; it's being casual. No, handling is stealing."

"Although it should be obvious to say that the College exists for its students - for what would we have here save empty buildings if there were no student body - we feel that this has been neglected by many in the administration who are far too public-relations minded. These officials are hyper-sensitive to public opinion and tend to interpret anything on the campus in terms of the effect it will have in newspapers. This tendency to overemphasize adverse publicity has, in turn, led to a lessening of communication between the student body and the faculty-administration. Although we are very pleased to see that serious efforts have been made this year to overcome this lack of communication, we do feel that only the surface has been touched...

[Dean McDonald, in a Dartmouth interview concerning the report, pointed out that the College is responsible to more constituencies than just the student body, and that while he believes the students come first, they must not expect the College to consider them exclusively.]

"The student body sometimes has been guilty of diffusing questioning through any number of channels - most of which are ineffective - and ignoring the clearest of all. The Undergraduate Council is the central force of student government; it is the logical channel of student opinion...."

"Being the executive committee of the U.G.C., we are naturally interested in student government and it is here that we see a complete lack of interest on the part of the campus. One of the curious paradoxes present at Dartmouth is that a favorite sport here is deriding student government while also showing a total absence of desire to do something about it. The Political Affairs Conference - one of the few opportunities a student has to express himself freely in group discussion - had to scrape to get delegates; U.G.C. meetings, open to all students, seldom if ever draw anyone save the members; the Milton Kramer Fund, which is to be used at the discretion of the student body, went begging for suggestions. This statement of fact is given in the form of a challenge: those who feel that student government is ineffective, it is up to you to do something about it. In more colloquial terms: put up or shut up."

"The discrimination problem ... rests squarely on the individual houses. A show of strength and independence is required here. It is our belief that all houses should stand up to their nationals and inform them they consider themselves free to choose whom they desire.... But this must go much deeper. We have some very serious questions concerning the actual value of national fraternities on the Dartmouth campus.... We look forward to the day when there are only local fraternities here - but local fraternities under the same unique system we now have."

"One of the finest men in the College is, by virtue of his position, often the most criticized by those who have had little contact with him. Dean Joseph L. McDonald deserves the greatest admiration and praise for his very excellent service to Dartmouth in the understanding of individual student problems."

"Although there are very creative men in the majority on our faculty, we are still suffering through professors who are giving the same stale lectures year after year. In many cases, it is these men who strictly enforce attendance regulations. More stimulating and original lectures will eventually lead to the ideal we strongly endorse and which has been recommended by the Academic Committee for several years - a completely free attendance system."

"The basic, primary purpose of Dartmouth is to build, through education, the whole man, the man who will question, who will examine life around him with a discriminating eye. In this past year, under our present system, we have been disturbed to see this basic purpose relegated to a lower rank in the hierarchy of values. Education has become, for so many students, only a desire to learn facts and figures and answers. The art of questioning has slowly disappeared. We look forward to the new educational philosophy embodied in the three-term, three-course system. Dartmouth has long needed an awakening, a critical re-examination of its educational beliefs. The opportunity which will be presented next fall is just such a re-examination."

Joseph B. Blake '58 of Denver, Undergraduate Council president, receives the Barrett Cup from Prof. John V. Neale at Wet Down.