Education in the Round

This time last year an article appeared here discussing the effectsof coeducation on the College. Now, the second of the two mostimportant changes at Dartmouth in recent years comes understudent scrutiny. As in 1958, when the College changed from asemester to a three-term academic calendar, the authors find thatthe transition to year-round operation has been attended by bothbirthpangs and breakthroughs. Andrew J. Newman III is thecurrent undergraduate editor of this magazine and MelanieFisher '76 is a staff writer for The Dartmouth. Their article takesthe place of the usual "Undergraduate Chair."

THE Dartmouth Plan for year-round operation was adopted for four reasons. First, to allow an increase in enrollment without increasing the number of students on campus during any one term and without building extensive new facilities. Second, and most important in the eyes of many, to admit 1,000 women without decreasing the male enrollment. Third, to provide a new flexibility for students and faculty to order their careers at Dartmouth. Fourth, to utilize the College's facilities more efficiently through more or less continuous 12-month operation.

As a method of evaluating the progress of the Dartmouth Plan, the four ideals outlined in the final report of the Committee on Year-Round Operation, submitted in the fall of 1971, were contrasted with the realities on campus today. Students, faculty, and administrators were questioned about their opinions on adjusting to the new calendar, the increased size of the institution, and the many options now available to them.

The College still has two years before all of its students will be on the Dartmouth Plan. Many of the current juniors and about-to-graduate seniors, when given the choice three years ago, opted for the traditional fall-winter-spring attendance pattern. This evaluation is therefore a preliminary one. That fact, however, should not obscure the plan's very real achievements and problems.

The Summer Term

The key to the Dartmouth Plan's workability is the residence requirement that every student must spend one term off-campus either working or studying and, except in special cases, at least one summer term in Hanover. (Theoretically, the various calendar options permit the addition of 1,000 students without having more than 3,400 on campus at any one time.) The key to the summer term is the idea of "parity," a concept much touted in

1971. Only one summer term has taken place, but some difficulties have been spotted.

The problems last summer were two-fold, said those interviewed.

On one hand, the course offerings were not as extensive as other terms. Secondly, the activities linked with "normal" terms were lacking. One student said, "The summer term is supposec to be equal, but it's not. This is especially true for the sciences." Another commented "The big, required science courses were not offered last summer. Some science departments require courses to be taken in a sequential pattern for the major. Usually these courses have been offered in a fall-winter or winter-spring sequence. Some students are having trouble fulfilling the major. It's not this bad in all the departments, though." For Russian majors like Jan Murphy '76 "it was really a poor deal to be here last summer. There was only one Russian course offered. Some departments have taken it upon themselves to make it worthwhile to stay in the summer. Others have not."

Extracurricular activities were not present in abundance There were no intercollegiate sports, for example, and no Glee Club. A number of the student organizations were not we staffed - or staffed at all. Those groups that did operate ran under considerably reduced power. The Dartmouth published twice a week and emphasized community - not College - news ar: events. Dave Hunt '75, General Manager of WDCR, said. "The summer was our biggest problem. It used to be that the College subsidized ten full-time staffers to keep us on the air. They could take courses and eat and make enough to break even. I program has been dropped as of this year. We project that this summer we'll have 28 people on campus. Not all of them will be willing to work several hours a day; some will show up only for two hours a week. We normally have 110 staffers here.

Summer dormitory life has not been equal to that of other terms. Most dorms are closed during the summer, and students are clustered in the few kept open. The summer has no bearing on room priorities for the fall term. "I felt like I was moving all the time," said Jan Murphy. "I got kicked out of my room at the end of spring term, put a lot of stuff in storage, moved into another room for the summer, and into still another for the fall." Judy Yablong '76, dorm chairman of all-female Woodward Hall. said that last summer the male/female ratio was quite different, almost 50:50. "But so many of the students last year were from other schools, especially the girls. They had no feeling they had to add anything to life in the dorm, or to the College, or to the peopie here."

"Parity means many things," said Gregory Prince, Assistant Dean of'the Faculty and member of the History Department. "To me it means that the quality and diversity of the experience are similar to another term. The summer need not be the twin of another term to be a good experience." The students who spent the summer here last year agree. "I really enjoyed it," said Jan Murphy. "It was a lot quieter, none of the frenzied activity there is in the fall. There was a big barbeque. Thayer Hall had meals on Baker Library lawn. It was really a different atmosphere." Dave Hunt found it a better term than most: "I had a full course load while working at WDCR, but I did enjoy the term's atmosphere and lack of overcrowding. The courses were limited for some, but I got what I wanted . . ."

Carroll Brewster, Dean of the College, agreed: "The academic content was relatively inferior as far as quality and quantity, but on the non-academic side the term was quite successful. There was not that much formal activity, but the students did take advantage of a lot of good informal activity, like the out-of-doors, more than in other terms. Academically, the term was not strenuous, though that may change in a few years."

The 1971 report by the Committee on Year-Round Operation had little to say about how the faculty would deal with the upcoming changes. Much like the students, the faculty viewed year-round operation mostly as the advent of coeducation, not paying much attention to the plan itself, according to Charles Wood, chairman of the committee and Professor of History.

The faculty now faces general criticism from students and administration on two counts. First, for the poor course offerings during the past summer. Second, because students must file their course plans long in advance, they fear discovering a year or two later that a department has eliminated a course, re-scheduled it, or drastically altered it. President Kemeny has commented that "the faculty have not absorbed the fact that there aren't any freshmen around summer term." Some departments like Anthropology have adapted well to the Dartmouth Plan; others have not.

Louis Morton, chairman of the History Department and former Provost, explained some of the faculty's problems in adding. justing."During the summer, the total number of students is not expected ever to be more than 1,500. We know that few freshmen will be here. We need to offer some required courses, a few info troductory courses, and more upper level courses. Last year we offered a required course taught by two professors and had only nine students enroll in it. Should we keep it? In doing all this, we have to take into account the individual plans of our members. Some have school-age children and need to be here in the winter, and would prefer to have summer off. Then research opportunities arise. Who wants to turn them down?"

Mathematics Professor William Slesnick echoed Morton: "The biggest problem - no matter how you slice it - is that the fourth quarter [summer] does not have parity. If only four or five students are going to be around to take a course, there may be no sense in offering it during the summer. Nobody really knows how to do the planning. Also there are a lot of different things faculty might do that would prevent them from teaching in the summer. Some may be part of the Alumni College. Others may be writing books."

Assistant Dean Prince said it's not a lack of concern by the faculty that results in summer term course problems. "The problem is determining what courses ought to be offered. It's hard to get a pattern of offerings and be able to say it is clearly the best one. It's going to take time to see what courses are essential for the summer. Many departments are already working on the problem. Some are using students to review their plans for the summer."

Long-term problems do not seem easily solvable. Said Morton, "When you try to plan offerings for three years in advance, at best they are tentative. Some faculty may have left by then, research grants and sabbaticals may come up, or someone's contract may expire. The student signing up for a course two years in advance is taking a chance."

The Faculty

Although the faculty, which approved the plan for year-round operation, has not been markedly upset by it, some related developments have proved bothersome. A recent 1,500 word essay, "On the Need for a Stronger Faculty at Dartmouth," written by Professor of Biology Thomas Roos and Professor of Romance Languages Stephen Nichols '58, charged that the faculty has in recent years lost its authority to the administration. Blame was implicitly laid to the bureaucratic machinery growing up around Dartmouth Plan and other student-related activities. At a full meeting of the faculty called to deal with this issue, several resolutions were passed attempting to stem administrative growth and increase faculty voice in College decision-making.

Students and faculty have complained that some of the new offices are of little benefit to them, their functions unclear, and, with the budget squeeze, their continuation in question. Dave Hunt said, "I don't have any contact with any of these people. It used to be if a student had a problem he went to the Dean's Office. Now, before you go anywhere, you've got to decide who you want to see. It's really been an impersonal addition to the College in the years I've been here."

Frank Waterous '76, chairman of Hitchcock dormitory, said that in counseling freshmen about their problems he is not sure where to direct them. "I usually tell them to see one of the freshman deans. They are still the best people to see. Their offices must really be deluged by now."

Stephen Gray '75, member of the Inter-Fraternity Council, said, "I'm not sure what the function of the offices of Student Affairs and Student Services are now. Year-round operation was created to save money, but more jobs have been created, too. I'm sure Student Affairs knows what student opinion is. I think they want to know, but they may not like what they hear about this problem and others. It's difficult now to see who are the leading figures on campus. It used to be Brewster and Kemeny. We don't see much of Kemeny now. There's Vice President Kreider [in Student Affairs] and Marilyn Baldwin and Charles Dickerson [his two assistants]. Is an assistant vice president more important than a dean? I would guess so, but it's not clear."

Members of the faculty also appear confused by some of the new organization. Said Morton, "I never saw additional problems arise that required setting up all these offices. I assume some students use them, but I know of none who does." Wood commented that the Committee on Year-Round Operation saw a need to beef up services to students, especially in counseling. "This has taken place under the umbrella of Student Affairs. Yet certainly part of the faculty unease arose because of the proliferation of people who fight each other instead of providing students with services."

The administration acknowledges that communications have been poor in some areas. President Kemeny in fact welcomed some of the faculty resolutions, saying they would improve faculty-administration communications on matters such as this. Some of the offices under criticism also are either experimental or temporary in nature. Marilyn Baldwin, Assistant Vice-President for Student Affairs, said, "I'd call it at best a temporary proliferation of administrative offices. The Dartmouth Plan Office is being phased out two years ahead of schedule and it was the only transition office set up." At a faculty meeting, President Kemeny added that Vice President Ruth Adams' office is only a temporary position, and would not be refilled after her contract expired. Said Baldwin, "Miss Adams' office was set up to make coeducation a little smoother." Vice President kreider said that "a good deal of the concern is temporary - part of the problem is the high visibility of necessary procedures to cope with some of the problems we are encountering."

The Student Adjustment

The student adjustment to year-round operation can be viewed in terms of three issues: housing, the flexibility of the Dartmouth Plan, and the effects of an increasing mobility on the College community.

The planners recommended "the immediate construction of housing units for approximately 200 students." Professor Wood explained that the primary purpose of these spaces would be to accommodate some of the additional 800 students allowed to enroll. This would allow 3,400 students to be on campus in one term, as opposed to the previous peak of 3,200 students Dormitories are expensive to build and maintain, however. As President Kemeny points out, New Hampshire, unlike other states, taxes dorms. The new units were postponed.

More students were enrolled in any case. And many of the plane filed by students included residency in the fall. At the same time, off-campus housing costs were increasing, dormitory living was becoming more popular, and the number of students choosing to reside in fraternities was dropping off. Ultimately, 100 students wanting to enroll in next year's fall term were left without dormitory spaces. The Office of Student Affairs and the students on the Inter-Dormitory Council proposed a lottery to determine which students would be granted dormitory rooms and which students would be put on a waiting list.

The student uproar over this unprecedented move was immediate. The Dartmouth protested that members of the Inter-Dormitory Council had "sold out" their fellows, and castigated the administration for the lottery proposal. President Kemeny finally announced that space for students would be set aside at the Hanover Inn Motor Lodge and that consideration of a new dormitory would be on the Trustees' agenda in June.

The flexibility of the Dartmouth Plan is still widely touted. "A small fraction won't get their first choice [of patterns] but the Dartmouth Plan represents vastly more flexibility," the President has observed. Students reactions are mixed, however. Frank Waterous, calling himself "a child of the Dartmouth Plan," said, "Yes, it's flexible. You could take any 11 terms you wanted if there were no major distributive requirements. But by the end of your freshman year you must have narrowed down your choice of majors so that when you file your pattern preferences, you are here when the courses you want to take are offered." Students are required to file their majors at the end of the sixth term.

According to Betsy Cox '77, if a student did not know what he or she is going to major in after spring term first year, "you're taking a big risk at not being able to fit everything in. But you don't know really what courses are being offered when — it all changes so fast we're hanging by our thumbnails." As for Dartmouth Students having a better chance getting jobs during the normal academic year, she said, "Year-round operation is giving me a job market when I'm off campus and a lot of freedom to choose when I want to be here." Judy Yablong countered, however, that although the College is in year-round session "the rest of the country is not. The student job market still stresses the summer. I ran into the problem myself with internships that are still offered in the summer." Said Marilyn Baldwin, "It's a change and that's disconcerting. People need to get used to the change. The Admissions Office reports that high school seniors are very taken with the plan."

It is also true that the College set up an effective job-placement organization to help students find worthwhile employment during their terms off campus. Through a far-flung alumni network, over 1.000 students have landed jobs as systems analysts, television scriptwriting assistants, town planning interns, teaching aides in schools for the mentally retarded, corporate management interns, and in dozens of other assignments. A potential banker found that the work he performed in a commercial loan department "was relevant to my education . . . and, at the same time, important to the overall operation of the department." A crewman on a Mississippi barge said that his work "taxed the muscles more than the brain, but all of it was new and interesting." A trainee in social work remembered her cases as "involved, interesting, and requiring a lot of work. I was given a reasonable amount of freedom and responsibility." One of the great advantages of the Dartmouth Plan is scheduling flexibility permitting this kind of work-study experience.

But the increasing mobility of the College's students has also become an issue. The planning committee said it could not foretell "what strains on the social fabric of the community might result from a large increase in student mobility." These strains are evident. The spirit of the Class of 1977 for the College is well-documented, but its members are now experiencing their last term on campus as a unified body. Betsy Cox, a member of that class and a singing group called the Distractions, believes, "I won't see my roommate now for a year and a half. . . there are a lot of friendships that will have to be remade." Small student groups like the Dartmouth Aires and the Distractions suffer immediately from all the transience. The movement "really wrecks the continuity of the group."

Some feel that the transience may also break up class unity, traditionally an important factor in alumni strength. Steve Gray said, "I think the College will have trouble with its alumni in the future. This transience destroys any sense of belonging. The education here has always been great. But class fraternalism has also been a real part of the College, and that is not there anymore. A student who is here twice a year can't really develop a deep feeling for Dartmouth. Relationships are created and strained. It's like being in a factory that takes in resources and gives out diplomas." The fraternities play a big role in giving students some sort of home base to which to return, he added.

Judy Yablong said, "Yes, that's true, but it also makes it incumbent on everyone to work harder to develop that unity and those friendships." Freshman Dean Ralph Manuel '58 said he felt that "place loyalty" would become even stronger among students and alumni.

Conclusion

The discrepancies between the ideal and the reality are clear enough. What perhaps again ought to be stressed is the time factor. There are still two more years left before year-round operation becomes a full reality. All agree that the discrepancies are obvious and will probably be resolved within a year or two.

The Dartmouth Plan has allowed an increase in the student body, permitting the addition of women without reducing the male population. The flexibility of planning it has brought is generally approved of by both faculty and students, as are the cost savings. The effect of the transience, however, does not appear to be a problem easily solved. Charles Wood explained, "People are not fully 'year-round operational' in their thinking. September to June will always be the normal academic year. We've just added a summer term to that year. Students and faculty will always want to be here certain terms.

"The people who pushed least for year-round operation liked the Dartmouth they saw when they arrived in Hanover. The plan is intended to create an atmosphere stressing the intellectual, purely classroom aspect of the College. It would have been easier to institute it at a big-city commuter college, not a residential school like Dartmouth. Certain things will obviously be lost ... I didn't vote for year-round operation."

"... the place they (the alumni) knew will be far more changed by year-round operation than by coeducation..." — Psychology Professor Rogers Elliott, 1971