The Undergraduate Chair

THE new school year in Hanover begins with frost on the pumpkins, cider lady on the Green, and slap of the pigskin in burning foliage, as well as Autumn Activists.

Hailed by some as the hope for man's future, these students evince a social responsibility lacking in past generations of college students. Maligned on the other hand for their disdain for tradition, these same students have often rejected the past simply for the sake of its age. In either case always well-publicized, Dartmouth undergraduates have rallied their legions and raised their standards each fall.

Between the Holy Cross game and Harvard game, students tend to relax as final exams hide remotely in the future. Without the pressure of academics people- occupy themselves with other things, and eventually football games and beer blasts lose their novelty. The Dartmouth campus, as probably all others do, sits in restless anticipation of a worthy cause.

Then comes the storm.

Usually it begins with a small group of sincere students who have grievances or wish to change something in the College. Petitions begin circulating; card table lobbies appear in Hopkins Center; support funds grow on nickels and dimes; orators speak on the steps of Thayer dining hall. The ranks of supporters swell with students who wish to do something more constructive than a line-by-line translation of ParadiseLost.

After three years of such activity, this senior class can look back on a pattern which reveals the constraints on Autumn Activists and perhaps leaves their sincerity open to question.

In the fall of 1969, Dartmouth hosted a convention of the National Academy of Sciences which included a speech by Stanford University physicist William Shockley, who proposed that blacks are genetically inferior to whites. Shockley never got to speak. When he approached the rostrum, about 40 black students stood and clapped to prevent him from being heard.

The College Committee on Standing and Conduct brought charges against the blacks for violating the College Guidelines on Freedom of Expression and Dissent. In response, various petitions circulated among the student body which generally supported the black minority. Meanwhile, local and Boston newspapers carried the story as the campus tensed itself for the hearings and final decision in the case.

The Harvard game took place in late October, and we should all remember the victory because Dartmouth lost only to Princeton that year. Patiently the campus waited for a decision. It might have snowed in the next couple weeks for it usually turns pretty cold. A few of the neglected term papers now clamored to be finished, but we still held interest in the case being heard. When Thanksgiving arrived, almost everyone headed for the hills and a preexam vacation. The students returned to campus under the ominous cloud of finals only one week away. We studied very hard to keep GNP straight from NNP, to see the difference between extinction and counter-conditioning, to learn the principles of BASIC. As the precious days slipped by, we ate irregularly, slept little, and saw far too much of the library. Few people bothered with constructive issues; we let the accused shift for themselves. Then in a final rush, exams were finished; we were on the road, headed home for Christmas.

On the last day of finals, three days after The Dartmouth had ceased publication for the term, with most of the students gone for vacation, the CCSC found the black students guilty without imposing punishment due to extenuating circumstances. Almost everyone had forgotten the issue by the time we returned for the winter term.

In the fall of 1970, the six tenured professors of the Economics Department voted not to renew the contract of James Knowles, a popular leftist economics professor. Knowles had allowed students to grade themselves in some courses and had taught a course on his own time, after the department chairman asked that the course not be offered for the term. Moreover, Knowles differed in his ideas of economic theory from most of his colleagues, a view which he claimed had earned him the whispered title of "vulgar Marxist" around the department.

Many students and non-tenured faculty in other departments rallied to support Knowles. Mass meetings convened and more than one-third of the student body signed a petition supporting Knowles' appeal to the President's review committee. Meanwhile local and Boston papers carried the story as the campus tensed itself for the final decision in the case.

The Harvard game took place in late October, and we should all remember the victory because Dartmouth did not lose a game that year. Patiently the campus waited for a decision. It might have snowed in the next couple weeks for it usually turns pretty cold. A few of the neglected term papers now clamored to be finished, but we still held interest in the case being heard. When Thanksgiving arrived, almost everyone headed for the hills and a preexam vacation. The students returned to campus under the ominous cloud of finals only one week away. We studied very hard to keep Hrothgar straight from Heorot, to see why space and time are equal, and to learn the intricacies of the high-energy phosphate bond in ATP. As the precious days slipped by, we ate irregularly, slept little, and saw far too much of the library. Few people bothered with constructive issues; we let the accused shift for themselves. Then in a final rush, exams were finished; we were on the road, headed home for Christmas.

On the day after finals ended, five days after The Dartmouth ceased publication for the term, with most of the students gone for vacation, the review committee voted to uphold the Economics Department and not renew Knowles' contract. Almost everyone had forgotten the issue by the time we returned for the winter term.

Last fall the coeducation debate followed much the same timetable although the final decision came in late November. But the obvious questions still remain through the chronology.

Did the administration plan the timing of the decisions? As a newspaper correspondent, I watched the events unfold and do not doubt the honest intentions of the deans and review boards involved. Much careful study went into every question with a final flurry to reach a decision before the vacation period.

Are the student supporters insincere because they run to their studies when the going gets rough? From a pragmatic viewpoint, I do not think so, for, after all, students have come to Hanover to get a formal education which entails term papers, exams, credits, and degree under the present system. In terms of individual priorities, there is no choice.

All of which proves very little, I suppose, except that this sure makes it easy to become an Autumn Activist.

Judging by the number of coeds whosigned up for the DOC Freshman Trips,women at Dartmouth are going to taketo outdoor life just as much as the men.