THE UNDERGRADUATE CHAIR

FEBRUARY 1, 1962 is a date that may long be remembered on the Dartmouth campus. On that day 70.4% of 2,492 voting students elected to approve the controversial Academic Honor Code - controversial because so few of the people involved, even those who favored it, could readily and honestly admit little more than that they sincerely hoped the code would be successful. If the Honor Code does indeed prove to be workable at Dartmouth, the merits and advantages it offers this institution and its students are obvious. If it fails, the consequences could be tragic.

The following is the text of Dartmouth's new Honor Code as presented by the Undergraduate Council:

"The Undergraduate Council proposes and recommends to the student body an Academic Honor Code whereby all academic activities will be based upon student honor. Integrity and honesty are the central presuppositions of the code, and the sole means of regulating academic endeavor. Under the code, the presence of examination proctors is unnecessary, however, if administrative procedures necessitate, proctoring may be used at the discretion of the instructor. It is assumed that students recognize the pact of honor the code requires.

"If necessary, students can invoke social sanctions to preserve this pact. Specific social sanctions are not listed here, because the student body is believed capable of generating these in a realistic, intelligent, and sophisticated manner.

"This code includes no mandatory reporting clause. For the protection of the student, however, the code provides the opportunity to gain justice in any rare cases in which social sanctions prove ineffective. Signed student reports of academic dishonesty will be considered by the two senior at-large members of Palaeopitus. These men, subject to the advice of the Undergraduate Council, will determine the point at which men reported for dishonesty will be brought before the UGC Judiciary Committee.

"To perpetuate the code, incoming freshmen will be required to affirm these principles of honor when they formally indicate intention to matriculate.

"The Academic Honor Code will become effective upon the affirmation of 67 percent of the voting undergraduate body."

This code is now in effect, but the question is whether or not it will work.

Those who look on with a certain amount of pessimism have suggested that the code and those who actively promoted it have made some naive and invalid assumptions. They point out that it assumes that the student body either is ready to accept the added responsibilities of academic honesty and integrity or, at least, is at a point where these qualities can easily be cultivated. In addition the code assumes that the student body is capable of generating social sanctions "in a realistic, intelligent, and sophisticated manner," and that, for the most part, these sanctions will be adequate. And finally, it assumes that the occasions of severe dishonesty will be rare.

While these assumptions are flattering to Dartmouth, and while they may be substantiated to an extent, the fact remains that they may be somewhat premature and unrealistic. If this is true, the honor system will fail, and the stigma attached to Dartmouth thereby would be anything but flattering.

On the other hand, there are a number of factors to be presented in favor of the code's future. In the first place, 1,754 of 2,492 students, and almost the entire faculty and administration, have voiced their approval of Dartmouth's putting the code on trial. And this in spite of the assumptions that had to be made, the outraged protests that had to be encountered, and the procedural difficulties that were inevitable.

In the second place, there is the obvious fact that even prior to the code's adoption, difficulties have been encountered and criticisms offered. And it is not too indiscreet to suppose that all the students are aware of and have seriously considered both the difficulties and the criticisms. This very awareness may be the most powerful factor of all leading to a successful system.

It seems safe to say that the students realize the system is not and cannot be perfect. They realize that its potential advantages to themselves and Dartmouth are of great worth. And they further realize that they themselves - and no one else - can make the system work.

Because this is true, there is reason to be optimistic about the code's success. And because it is true that a successful honor system will be of benefit to Dartmouth, those members of the student body, the UGC, the faculty and administration who worked and persevered to establish the system are owed a debt of thanks.

THE fifty-second Winter Carnival is now just a memory for the students, and for almost all an enjoyable memory. The standard recipe for a successful weekend was again applied in the Hanover kitchen. Namely, take over a thousand attractive young ladies from all over the country, add several thousand somewhat undernourished Dartmouth students, sprinkle in some cold weather and warm spirits, stir with parties, plays, concerts, skiing and athletic events, and touch off with Igluk and his fellow statues across campus. The result: one merry Winter Carnival.

For some, of course, the weekend had some discouraging moments. There were those who were disappointed by the absence of the Outdoor Evening, by having to wait in line for hours for tickets to Carnival events, by . having to walk or ride back to campus after the ski jump was cancelled on Saturday afternoon in favor of Sunday morning (a clever device of Mother Nature designed to make sure she entered the Carnival fun). And, naturally, there were those few blind dates that didn't work out.

But guided by the new Winter Carnival Council, DOC, COSO, and so many other campus organizations, the weekend rolled on - rapidly as always — to its normal, confusing and melancholy chaos at the White River Junction railroad station.

Whether Carnival this year was better or worse than those of years ago is a moot issue. But the general consensus expressed during the Sunday night TGTG (Thank God They're Gone) parties was that the weekend was indeed a good one. Besides, the Dartmouth ski team returned

to its winning ways by capturing the Carnival Cup with a final team standing six points ahead of second-place Middlebury.

MILESTONES

1963 Directorate, The Dartmouth: President, Kevin Lowther '63; Weston, Conn.; VicePresident, Roger Parkinson '63, Chevy Chase, Md.; Business Manager, William Russell '63, Rumson, N. J.; Managing Editor, Joel Jutkowitz '63, Yonkers, N. Y.; Executive Editor, Peter Slavin '63, Shaker Heights, O.; Advertising Manager, Bruce Phillips '63, Arlington, Va.

1963 Directorate, WDCR: General Manager, Sturges Dorrance '63, New York, N. Y.; Administrative Director, Peter Stern '63, Philadelphia, Pa.; Business Manager, Stuart Mahlin '63, Lincoln, Neb.; Program Director, William Woolley, Long Branch, N. J.; Technical Director, Robert Gitt '63, Hanover, Pa.

Judy Miller, Queen of the Snows, receives a congratulatory kiss from her date, KentStockton '64 of Prairie Village, Kan. Judy is from Los Altos, California.

Igluk, Eskimo god of fun, cast his benevolent look on 1962 Carnival visitors.

James Wallace, a Dartmouth medical student who spent his undergraduate years atHarvard, frequently snowshoes to classes from his home two miles north of Hanover.Twenty years old and married, he sometimes wears kilts on warm days.