a Seventy-Sixth Year EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN UNDER AUTHORITY OF BOARD IN CONTROL.OF STUDENT PUBLICATIONS In Defense of requirements WhereOpWionAr Free. 420 MAYNARD ST.. ANN AFBOR, Micu. NEws PHONE: 764-0552 Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 3, 1965 NIGHT EDITOR: LAURENCE KIRSHBAUM The 'U' Pilot Proj et: Alld-Out Support Needed BIG AND IMPERSONAL as the large university may be, there come those times when course work is exciting and offers stimulation beyond the classroom. Odd as it may sometimes seem, course work is relevant to the real world. Thus when interest in it is limited to only the classroom, a good deal that is worthwhile dies. One day an instructor or a lecturer excels his usual self and gets one of his students excited about something in his course. The student walks out of the dis- cussion section or lecture hall and stays excited all the way back to his dorm, where he settles down to eat, discuss football, and forget about that fleeting moment when the big university made use of what it had to offer. The people in the dorm are not the people in his classes, and if there are a few taking the same courses, the chances are slim that these people will be in the same sections. THE UNIVERSITY'S pilot project, now five years old, is an attempt to solve some of these problems. It has met with both successes and failures, but accord- ing to administrators and faculty mem- bers connected with it, the theory be- hind it has been proved conclusively. When classroom and residence are iso- lated from each other and there is little real impetus given to share what hap- pens in course work with those one is living with, an all-important academic 'dimension is lost. The advantage of a small college is that a community is created in which people who live together also take courses together. Thus they share a common classroom experience, and because they live together they are afforded the op- portunity to enlarge that experience through discussion with each other. A large university, with its random sys- tem of housing people, cannot offer that. A freshman may sometimes talk to one or two of his classmates for an extra 15 or 20 minutes, but they only share one course. Unless the instructor is an extra- The Greeks Had A Word for It ONE\OF THE TWO LECTURES in the Honors freshman Great Books course -the Honors Program's way of introduc- ing its participants to the exciting chal- lenges of intellectual activity-is remark- able for a policy which is a curious con- tradiction of the course's purpose: as- signed seating and recorded attendance. The possibility that such a practice will encourage independence or maturity of judgment in young, impressionable and grade-conscious Honors freshmen is mar- ginal. It seems more likely that the policy is designed to coerce students into at- tending lectures they would otherwise do without. Perhaps, of course, the other Great Books lecturer believes that "by suffer- ing comes wisdom" (Aeschylus, "Agam- emnon") and hence the practice of re- cording attendance, since it "encourages" attendance, is valuable. BUT SINCE "SLEEP, the universal van- quisher" (Sophocles, "Antigone") and homework for other courses, not the lec- turer, are the primary occupations of many Great Books students during lec- ture, and since the other lecture in the course-where attendance is not taken- is always much better attended, one con- cludes that "force without wisdom falls of its own weight" (Horace, "Odes"). The course may someday change its rather anomalous r practice-or perhaps its lecture content. In the interim, the Honors Program's present attitude to- wards fostering intellectual independence and maturity of judgment in its Great Books course seems to be, "I see and ap- prove better things, but follow worse" 'Ovid, "Metamorphoses"). -MARK R. KILLINGSWORTH ordinary one, there are no seminars or discussions centered around the course. Thus when class ends the instructor leaves and the people in it disperse, and that ends things until it is time to repro- duce facts on the next exam. THE IDEA of the pilot project is to do away with the anonymity of this sit- uation-to allow students the chance to retain among their living companions what they have found in class. In addi- tion, trained floor counselors are pres- ent, who can offer the benefits of ad- vanced education to discussions, and who can stimulate further interest. Planned seminars are also held. The hope is to offer the student the excitement of smallness within the re- sources of the huge multiversity. But the project has certainly been far less successful than the theory behind it would indicate. While the intensive cours- es-French and English seminar (the latter is open to all of 10 students)- have met with success, many students either don't even know they are in the pilot project, or have not been excited enough to care. When seminars center around test preparation, and when a student can say "there was a tea but I never sawthe guy who spoke," one gets the idea that perhaps things could be done a bit better. The problem seems to be one of the old- est known to administrators - lack of funds. It seems a lot of time and money may well be being wasted for a lack of more of it. ONE OBVIOUS WAY to improve the program would be to move the boys houses to Markley. If the pilot project is "enmeshed in tradition" in East Quad, as one administrator told me, perhaps it is time that tradition was broken and the houses moved together. As it is now joint pilot project func- tions involve a long walk and are less effective than they could be. Further, the effectiveness of the "living experi- ence" is halved by splitting the project into two groups. But this is really one of the least of the project's problems. Where first semes- ter freshmen share three and four cours- es with their floor-mates, second semes- ter freshmen share fewer courses. The sophomore, program is often nonexistent. In addition, the number of planned dis- cussions and seminars could improve in both quantity and quality. But it is expensive to schedule common sections for a large number of people across a large number of courses, to pro- mote good discussions, worthwhile sem- inars, and speakers who have something to say, to train staff counselors who have something to offer. Each small addi- tion to the program costs another ad- ministrator. If the addition is to be good, the administrator must be good. To ex- pand the project beyond what it is now- in courses, houses, and participants - will cost quite a bit. BUT IT'S COSTING the University quite a bit not having a large and effective pilot project. The diffused garbage of stereotyped survey courses, whose value is further scattered by a living situation totally independent of any academic ex- perience, costs a freshman a year no one should be made to pay to waste. If the pilot project is worth having, then the cost should not be spared. All the indications from pilot project partici- pants and from a committee of faculty and residence hall officials studying it, are that the pilot project is achieving its goal, the goal those who have come to college for a more complete education are still looking for. Some administrators do seem commit- ted to pushing the broadening of the base of the project as far as funds will allow. One official said: "The academic bull session in the dorm, independent of an upcoming paper or exam, is what we seek, and what we will push for as hard as we can." EDITOR'S NOTE: The fol- lowing editorial is in reply to Daily staff writer Shirley Ros- ick's recent editorials on ada- demics. Prof. Sheridan Baker of the English department is chairman of the literary college curriculum committee this year. By PROF. SHERIDAN BAKER CAN WELL understand Miss Shirley Rosick's'disappointment in the revised distribution require- ments, proposed by the literary college's curriculum committee (after deliberations in extreme secrecy) and voted in by faculty and Regents. She hoped for a new philosophy that would arrest the sun but discovered only the old daily round. She wants innovation, en- thusiasm, groups of students studying what interests them, rel- evance, elasticity. She wants a meaningful education, as do we all. Sheiwants an education free and exciting, and not demanding, ex- cept insofar as the student may demand something of himself, within "broad and flexible guide- lines." AS A MEMBER of the Curricu- lum Committee during the period under fire (excepting one semes- ter's leave), and as chairman for the current year, I feel that Miss Rosick's objections, as well as the committee's efforts, deserve some- thing more than silence. I shall speak only as a private academic citizen - the member- ship of the committee changes remarkably, semester by semester -but I suspect that I shall di- vulge something of our secrets, and something of one voter's ideas with which neither Miss Rosick nor some members of the com- mittee will agree. First, I should report, with re- gret, that the committee is most unfortunately not on the point of bringing forth anything at all about foreign languages, as Wed- nesday's Daily .speculates , from our pregnant secrecy. We have talked about them, and disagreed about them, in our few meetings and moments left from trying to adjudicate some of the minor chaoses caused by the new re- quirements, which must be settled into print before the Announce- ment goes to press. We are also looking at a proposal for some adjustable courses in contempor- ary issues, which may, if worked out in time, satisfy some of the current hunger for the new and relevant. BUT MISS ROSICK is right in observing that the Curriculum Committee, as now situated, will not bring about the kinds of in- novation she wants. We haven't the constitution for it. New courses must come from men interested in teaching them. The committee (each man busy to the eyeballstwith his own courses, committees, students, papers, research, writing, in about that order) cannot find the im- petus to go about recruiting, and then persuading departments to take its recruits and its programs. Perhaps the committee should be rewired. But the fact remains: new courses come from the man and the department. Miss Rosick is right in believing that students should beginreform by persuading particular men on the faculty to teach particular courses. Miss Rosick asks for two kinds of reform, not always distinguish- ed or distinguishable: reform of educational philosophy, and re- form of pedagogical methods, or, more simply, of general require- ments and of specific courses. In addition to hoping for a new philosophy, she hoped for relief from laboratory science by sub- stituting a course in the history and theories of science; she hoped for broadly synthesizing courses in social sciences and in the hu- manities. But mostly she hoped for the abolition of requirements in English composition and for- eign languages. THE COMMITTEE did in fact take a long and multidirectional look at the philosophy behind distribution requirements. We talked about a number of things that would have made excellent headlines: abolishing all require- ments except 120 hours for grad- uation, with a limit of 40 in one department; turning curricular matters entirely over to depart- ments, each department to design its own, making the departments small colleges which trade among themselves their several skills as needed-languages, English, chem- istry, psychology, history, and so forth. We talked about the new resi- dential college, and looked with hope toward workable experiments there, which will afford models for limbering up the curriculum in the literary college in general. We tested various suggestions among the faculty at large; and, in the end, we discovered that the philosophy of the liberal arts college-Literature, Science, and the Arts-was not easily abandon- ed, in our heart of hearts. Our academic society as a whole is not yet ready to give up, under pressure from specialization, on the one hand, and independence, on the other, the idea and the ideal of the well-educated person. THE IDEAL sounds quaint, stated baldly, and perhaps I over- state. Nevertheless, it assumes an educated person as one who knows the literature and the history of his culture, its music and its arts, who can write with distinction, that is, with some resonance from that cultural depth, who knows at least one language other than his own, which is simply a part of that cultural heritage, who knows something of mathematics, of science, and social science. This is the "General Education" on which the liberal arts college builds, including ours, with our slightly diluted distribution re- quirements. From this foundation, we go on up to specialization, not primarily as a breadwinner but as a mindwinner and integrator, or so our loftier dreams would have it, before the necessity to stay alive takes over from the parental bankroll. To something like this ideal, the faculty of the literary college gave their affirmative vote, ex- pressing fears that we were not demanding enough toward assur- ing an education for those we certify educated. THIS IS INDEED a different philosophy of education from Miss Rosick's. which emphasises "how to think," and wants some foot- work in dealing with change and currency, and thinks very little about knowledge, particularly knowledge associated with the past, which may go even as far back as Hemingway. The longer I immerse myself in the process of learning and thinking, the more I am con- mendously important to thought. vinced that knowledge is tre- No one can read Kenneth Bould- ing's The Meaning of the Twen- tieth Century without being im- pressed, and indeed excited, by the knowledge that has produced this grand sweep of thought-and I mean such seemingly inert facts as that the waterwheel was in- vented in the sixth century and the stirrup in the eighth. No disinterested observer could very long listen to a discussion of Viet Nam, proceeding toward in- finity on perfectly untouching parallels, without concluding that there was nothing wrong with the "how to think" but something very wrong with the very different "knowledges" from which each started. Our educational system demands very little knowledge of us. The College Boards give us some sub- stance, but our own final exams ask only that we retain what we know for two hours, and then never asks again-and some find even this system too exacting. THIS IS the real trouble with foreign language requirement: it asks that we memorize and ac- cumulate-and this is work-and then it refuses to let us wipe the slate clean at the trimester's end. I myself, who am a wretched, cook-book product of a training in languages far worse than that our students currently do not enjoy, believe that no mental training equals that in a foreign language, as it strains your mind into an awareness of grammar and syntax and words, by which thought becomes articulate. I am perfectly convinced that nothing has widened my aware., ness of language in general, of English in particular, and of the mysterious connections between thought and the words that clothe it than the intense commitment I made to Latin about a decade ago in an effort to translate Catullus into idiomatic and metri- cal English. The products were mediocre but the learning was tremendous. And it all started about fifteen years before that, in the last semester of my senior year, when I suddenly discovered that I was about to graduate and didn't know anything. Somehow a course in freshman Latin seemed toube the answer. I would at least know something of what every educated man from Shake'peare up through T. S. Eliot had known, and I wanted the feel of it. I FIND dropping the foreign language requirement unthink- able, lopping off still more of our cultural knowledge, making us second raters behind the best uni- versities in this country and a few more notches below the tops of Europe. losing one of the best trainers we have of that linguistic facility which is almost the very sinew of thought. As for freshman English, I would not only teach it harder and better but also add another se- mester in the senior year as the last chance of straightening out the only way we can think straight at all, even in numbers: working our thoughts into clarity and grace on paper, since the squirm- ing facts exceed the squamous mind, if one may say so. But these are the dreams of a poet doomed to awake a commit- teeman. I meant only to suggest that the distribution requirements perhaps have some thought be- hind them, that perhaps an edu- cation is something more than asking a student what he wants and then trying to impart it as benignly as possible. IT IS NO COINCIDENCE that many of the best minds in this university were trained in Europe in systems that demanded some- thing of them, including two or three languages. S A 0 Also-p: Strategy of the Vietnamese War By JOSEPH ALSOP WASHINGTON-In Saigon, Gen. Westmoreland has now re- vealed the invasion of South Viet Nam by seven regiments of North Vietnamese regular troops, and he has said two more regiments may also have entered the country. That adds up to three divisions in the invasion force. The general has also said he thinks the enemy has the capability of raising the ante a bit further, increasing the invasion force to four divisions in all. Here, beyond doubt, he is basing his estimate on the enemy's acute supply limitations, which must certainly be taken into ac- count. Some U.S. policymakers, and those not the most easily alarmed, are none the less inclined to think that the Westmoreland estimate may be on the low side. The prin- cipal factors in the enemy's sup- ply problem are briefly as follows: FIRST OF ALL, the coastal -supply route, on which the Viet Cong formerly depended very heavily, has almost certainly been blocked by intensive American and Vietenamese coastal patrolling. Immense numbers of searches are made every week without once revealing a coastal vessel carrying illicit supplies. It must be as- sumed, therefore, that almost nothing is being smuggled across the beaches of South Viet Nam, whereas a year ago the picture was very different indeed. Secondly, however, the North Vietnamese have made a gigantic effort to improve the Ho Chi Minh Trail through Laos. It is now truckable down to Attopeus and can probable deliver 40 tons of supplies per day. The problem, here, is the need to carry supplies forward by por- ter from the Vietnamese border. An army of 40,000 porters would have to be deployed-and fed about 30 tons of rice each day as well-in order to distribute a daily input of 40 tons of supplies. Some of the work can be and is done by elephants, but this is quite limited. THIRD, and increasingly im- portant, Canbodia's loudly pro- tested neutrality is obviously as phoney as most of Prince Siha- nouk's protestations. Arms de- liveries to Sihanoukville for the Viet Cong are strongly suspected, and it is about as certain as any- thing can be that the very large numbers of North Vietnamese troops in the Chupong Massif have been getting at least their food from Cambodia, just a couple of miles away. Fourth, invading forces can also reduce their supply requirement for a long time by consuming the accumulated food caches of the Viet Cong main force units. These caches are impossible to estimate, but they are certainly very large. If you work these factors, and if you also remember that the normal supply requirements of a North Vietnamese outfit are far smaller than ours, it can be seen why some people in this town think that the total invasion force may eventually be increased to five divisions or even to six. The intention to send in as large a force as possible can hardly be doubted. On this point, work on the Ho Chi Minh Trail is decisive evidence. THE QUESTION really is not what the Hanoi government in- tends to do, but why they want to do it and whether they will go on wanting to do it. The heroic battle in the Ia Drang Valley, where American troops took on immensely larger numbers of the enemy, paid a price that must make every American sad, but ended by destroying the equivalent of an entire enemy division, may perhaps make Hanoi change its plans. But until this week Hanoi's pur- pose has plainly been to try to break the American will to win by courting battle with the American outfits in Viet Nam-and this al- though the exchange to date, in these hard fights, has been so favorable to the Americans that it seems far more likely to end by breaking the will of Hanoi's own troops. There is no doubt that the Hanoi 'policymakers are still con- vinced that Americans are soft and irresolute and can, therefore, be worn down until they grow tired of the war-and call it quits. Foolish people in this country have helped to produce this fool- ish belief-although probably they have not helped as much as is charged by the other foolish people who come perilously close to wanting to deny the right of 0 free speech, BUT THAT LEAVES a central puzzle of a rather hopeful char- acter. For the best way to tire out the Americans was not what Hanoi is now doing. The best way was to dig in for a very long war, fought in true guerrilla style, in penny packets, with the Ameri- can outfits in' Viet Nam hardly ever seeing the face of the enemy. This was much feared by every American military leader and pol- icymaker until the precise op- posite began to happen. The puzzle is hopeful in char- acter because it has only two possible solutions. Either the lead- eers of the Hanoi government are supremely stupid or there is some- thing on their side that forbids them to opt for the alternative that would be the worst for our side. And that something can only be a new fragility, a novel and progressive loss of morale and authority, throughout the whole Viet Cong structure and organiza- tion, which has made it too risky to try to dig in for a very long var. (c),1965, The Washington Post Co. 9 Letters: On GI Joe, The Daily's Motives, and theDraft To the Editor: CONGRATULATIONS to The Daily on the great national service rendered by pointing out the evils of the G.I. Joe doll. It's tragic that toy manufacturers, government controlled, no doubt, in the face of the recent national crisis, should use such diabolical means to stiffle budding draft card burnism. Who dares to tam- per with the sacred institution of a boy and his doll? I can only compare it to a com- parable plot against the American girl. Gone are the days when dolls were baby dolls-when you could feed them water from a little bottle and then have them wet your lap in a realistic fashion, teaching the incomparable joys of motherhood and instilling in every single little girl the overwhelming desire for a large family and four glasses of milk a day. No longer will one all-purpose doll do. In a broad-based plan to stimulate the economy, baby dolls are out, and IN is Barbie, an over- sexed clotheshorse with her own beauty parlor, a doll designed to make every eight-year-old's heart beat faster for clothes, more clothes and the cute teen-age boy, next door. Nor is Barbie enough. Spend, spend, spend. Besides Barbie's against the conspiracy that leads my two-year-old nephew to shoot me dead with endless relish thirty times a day and that makes my ten-year-old cousin feel a moral need to start dating. Maybe we could have G.I. Joe captured by the Viet Cong, only to be released to repudiate U.S. involvement in the war. All red- blooded American boys would turn in horror to pelt store owners with rotten tomatoes, tear down displays, and burn the stockpile of Beachhead Kits. Or better, let himamarry Barbie and have to take a desk job to keep her in clothes. Barbie could then have three kids, get fat and sloppy, and all our old ideals would be restored. -Mary Ellen Gottemoeller, '69 Intimidation' To the Editor: UNFORTUNATELY, I was out of the country when the story broke concerning Regent Eugene Power's various conflicts of in- terest on the Ann Arbor scene. As a result, I have no idea of what new facts may have come to light since November 1, when a thoughtful friend sent me a bundle of clippings, via American R . t n the,. it might an extended "expose." There will be many in the state who will, now, always remember Eugene Power as the man who was steal- ing from the University. After a few moments of thought, I began to wonder if there was any connection between the Power Probe, and the disagree- ment, earlier this year, between Eugene Power and the Daily Sen- ior Editors concerning the relative merits of the new University theatre. A few years ago, a former Daily editor proposed that the Daily start a "file" on every Regent and administrator, full of potent in- formation which would be used if any of these people disregarded the advice of the Senior Editors. I had thought that this idea had been forgotten, but the nature and characteristics of the recent collection of accusations of conflict of interest on the part of Regent Power have raised some doubts in my mind. Perhaps a few of the Senior Editors should look closely to see if they have any conflicts of interest regarding the use of the Michigan Daily as an instru- ment of intimidation. --David Kessel Boston, Mass. EDITOR'S NOTE: There was no "connection," intended or express- ed, "between the Power Probe, and the disagreement, earlier this year, between Eugene Power and the Daily Senior Editors concerning the relative merits of the new Univer- sity theatre." The Daily doesn't intimidate, it just prints what's happening. -R.J. Reclassifications To the Editor: VIEW with horror the use of draft boards in Ann Arbor to inhibit disagreement of students with national policy. It has become grossly apparent to any casual observer that the U.S. is the most reactionary force in the world politic, but even the dema- gogues defended this type of be- havior under the guise that free- dom was being preserved "at home." Even this is no longer "true." When the "pursuit of happiness" is ablated as well, then we can cut our glorious constitution into "paper tigers" in support of the "great consensus." -Lee Waldenberg, '63 0 Schlze 's Corner: Part Two THIS, the second in a marvelous three-part series on the new left, is a discussion of "the un- implementation of the unobjec- tives of new left unpolitics," or "looking mother squarely in the eye." Yesterday's lesson recounted the process by which the new left had decided to adopt a platform like writing to our congressmen or something dull like that." Pre- cautions were proposed. THE LEADERSHIP absolutely forebade the rank and file to carry on political activities of any nature. "Both political parties are morally and fiscally bankrupt," the leadership explained. "They're vailing, members were encourages to organize marches, trots, races, and stampedes. But the leadership solemnly re- minded its following that All was not fun and antiwar games. "Re- sponsibilities abound. When moth- er asks you what you do all day, look mother squarely in the eye, place your hand on her shoulder, Ol Ilis Airfligatt 1 tilil jT COSTS a huge amount just to pro- duce what quality the pilot project has now. Many administrators connected with the nrogram have promised that money. I