Seventy-Fifth Year'
ExroAND MANAGEDSY STENSOF HE UNIVERSTOY 0 MICHIGAN
UNDER AUTHORY OF BOARD IN CONTROL OF STUDENT PUBLICATIONS
THE RECORD IS GOOD ...
The Faculty's Role in Policy Making
lnions Are ' 420 MAYNARD ST., ANN ARBoR., Mrc.
IWinl Prevail
NEws PHoNE: 764-0552
ditorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers
or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints.
WY, 26 JANUARY 1965 NIGHT EDITOR: LEONARD PRATT
Scrap the Literary College:
It Wouldn't Be Missed
LITERARY COLLEGE at the Uni-
versity is an anachronism and an ob-
struction and ought to be abolished-right
down to its last vestige of departmental
fatuity and organizational antiquarian-
ism.
The problems are numerous, obvious
and generally interrelated. The college is
first of all too big. Its faculty is well
aware of this and has been vocal in de-
scribing the resultant problems. This
same faculty, however, has yet to pro-
pose any other solution than to retreat
by reducing numbers or, at the very least,
to stand pat. (The residential college is
too far in the future to offer immediate
hope, and there is considerable question
as to Whether it offers any hope at all.)
The idea that the problems of growth
can be met squarely-now-rather than
cried about seems never to have occurred
to anyone in a position to do anything
positive.
It is a paradox that a collection of great
minds such as this University's faculty
is unwilling to think about, let alone ac-
tually approve, any change in its insti-
tutional environment.
HERE ARE ADDITIONAL problems
that are traceable to the college's ri-
diculous organization..Physicists working
at the Phoenix Project or the cyclotrons
on North Campus have more in common
with many parts of the engineering col-
lege than they do with humanities or
social sciences departments of the liter-
ary college.
Throwing such myriad departments un-
der one head tends to engender consid-
erable isolationism. When traditional de-,
partmental autonomy is added, the iso-
lationism becon es virulent-much to the
detriment of the free and spontaneous
academic inquiry that supposedly is the
heart and soul of the University.'
Trying to impose coherence on this
great variety of departments is the final
knot that strangles the system. The col-
lege deteriorates into a series of half-alive
organisms that cannot be useful to each
other and must rely for their sustenance
on the plethora of very active centers
and institutes that dominate whatever
academic ferment that is taking place on
this campus.
Occasionally a department does get big
enough that it can become a world unto
itself, large and exciting enough to ig-
nore the deadening structure of the lit-
erary college organization. The psychol-
ogy and mathematics departments are
examples. This, of course, is no help to
the other, less imposing departments, or
to those without center and institute ties.
RYING TO LEND coordination and di-
rection to such an aglomeration is
an impossibility that has resulted in de-
fault to the status quo. Growth, for in-
stance, means very different things to the
chemistry department and the history de-
partment. Different ways of approaching
growth would probably be used by these
departments in order to meet the prob-
lems most effectively. Yet they are put
together with several dozen departments
of equally diverse interests and problems
and expected to collectively approach
growth in a coherent, structured manner.
They can't. And don't. To the extent
growth is being forced onto them from
above, the whole system is nearing the
brink of collapse. It is simply a problem
that can't be dealt with, prepared for
and met head on, given the present struc-
ture.
H. NEIL BERKSON, Editor
KENNETH WINTER EDWARD HERSTEIN
Managing Editor Editorial Director
ANN GWIRTZMAN..Personnel Director
BILL BULLARD..................Sports Editor
MICHAEL SATTINGER .... Associate Managing Editor
JOHN KENNY...........Assistant Managing Editor
DEBORAH BEATTIE... Associate Editorial Director
LOUISE LIND......Assistant Editorial Director in
Charge of the Magazine
TOM ROWLAND .........Associate Sports Editor
GARY WYNER ..........Associate Sports Editor
STEVEN HALER..............Contributing Editor
MARY LOU BUTCHER .......... Contributing Editor
JAMES KESON................Chief Photographer
NIGHT EDITORS: Lauren Bahr, David Block, John
Bryant, Robert Johnston, Michael Juliar, Laurence
Kirshbaum, Leonard Pratt.
ASSISTANT NIGHT EDITORS: William Benoit, Bruce
Bigelow, Gail Blumberg, Michael Dean, John Mere-
dith, Barbara Seyfried, Judith Warn re.
Business Staff
FURTHER, departmental isolationism
breeds departmental stagnation which
in turn results in a static, unyielding
curriculum that spells varying degrees of
disaster to the education process. Even
the faculty become locked into a tedious
rut from which there is no easy escape
that they can detect within immediate
reach. In a sense a given department
enshrines itself on an assigned floor of
Haven Hall and leaves itself with no
channels for intellectual communication
and stimulation either in or out.
And who is the first to suffer? The
undergraduate, of course. He is hand-
ed a tasteless, deadening curriculum on
a grubby platter. His education is in the
form of great, indigestible hunks of raw
meat. With luck he survives, and with
greater luck he discovers how hecan get
involved in the intellectual ferment con-
nected with research centers and insti-
tutes.
It's not easy. The undergraduate world
is effectively isolated from the worlds of
research, graduate training and general
academic excitement. No one cares about
the undergraduate position.
REPLACING the literary college is al-
most too easy compared with the prob-
lems being dealt with now. The Califor-
nia State College at Palos Verdes, open-
ing this year, is organizing its liberal arts
and sciences into three schools. They are
natural science and math, humanities
an fine arts, and social and behavior
sciences.
At this university the humanities and
fine arts departments could plan to va-
cate Central Campus in favor of a plush,
wooded location near the music school
on North Campus. Or this classification
might be further divided into two schools,
with the fine arts people keeping the
music school company and the humanities
groupKstaying close to their campus li-
braries.
The natural sciences and math, with
some exceptions, are pretty well estab-
lished on Central Campus. Giving them a
coherent organization within which they
can work together profitably mright pro-
duce outstanding results.
Finally there are the social and be-
havior sciences. Putting these in close
proximity and providing them with ra-
tional organization able to devote itself
to their needs and problems could pro-
duce truly spectacular results, rather akin
to atomic fission.
THE PROBLEM yet remaining is the
lost undergraduate. Again, the solution
is at hand. The graduate school approach
would seem applicable. Why not an un-
dergraduate school? Given a strong ad-
ministrative organization devoted to get-
ting undergraduates educated, maybe
they would-for a change.
This of course presupposes considerably
more interest in undergraduate education
than now exists. However, it is an ex-
citing possibility - an undergraduate
school devoted to shepherding the stu-
dent through the new array of colleges
presented to him, devoted to fostering and
encouraging great, new experiments in
college and inter-college curriculum. It
might even engender enough excitement
in enough people that it could really be
put across and made to work well.
THE REST of the University is passing
the literary college by. Growth is about
to destroy what is left. The excitement,
the fervor, the interest, the possibilities
inherent in a complete academic revolu-
tion would be well worth the risks and
the intervening chaos. Why wait?
-ROBERT JOHNSTON
The Protest
LAST WEEKEND'S colossal movie sit-
ins ended on a predictable note of wet
indifference. The SGC proposal-or per-
haps request-inspired few and impressed
none, and the rabid participation of
habitual campus malcontents such as
Voice kept others away.
SOC wants to negotiate with the But-
terfieli management. But without the
By WILBERT J. McKEACHIE
rFE OPERATION of an insti-
tuition of the size and com-
plexity of the University requires
the skilled services of many in-
dividuals devoting their full en-
ergy and talents to administration.
Although major University ad-
ministrators are largely drawn
from faculty ranks, a move west
across State Street is often view-
ed by the faculty with the sort
of attitude appropriate for a con-
vent whose Mother Superior had
moved across the street to a house
of ill fame.n
Our suspicion of administration
extends to faculty committees. On
the one hand we complain of
lack of involvement of faculty in
decision making and at the, same
time we complain about the
amount of time committee meet-
ings steal from our research and
teaching. The Senate Advisory
Committee on University Affairs'
position is similary doubted. Is it
a company union which the ad-
ministration uses to win faculty
acceptance of the "administra-
tion's" policies, or is the chair-
man of the committee to play the
role of Walter Reuther in mobil-
izing the power of the faculty as
a counterpoise to the power of
the administration?
I have purposely spoken in ex-
aggerated terms because I do not
believe that these polarities are
appropriate in an academic com-
munity. Administrative officials
and faculty members share the
goals of extending knowledge and
enriching beauty through scholar-
ship and creative activities and
of transmitting to new generations
our hard-won cultural heritage.
We faculty members are likely to
be particularly conscious of the
needs of our own departments and
our own disciplines. In our dis-
ciplinary provincialism we are
likely to be to little aware of the
importance of a healthful uni-
versity climate for the vigor of our
field. We can blithely discuss the
establishment of new research or-
ganizations outside the University,
but how many such organizations
are really as productive as their
University counterpart? We can
dream about renting a house and
establishing our own community
of teachers and students' but how
well would we teach without li-
braries, laboratories, or even our
much maligned plant department?
* * *
THE UNIVERSITY has a long
tradition of faculty participation
in decision making. Faculty exec-
utive committees function more
or less effectively at the level of
the departments and colleges. The
Senate Advisory Committee for
University Affairs has been evolv-
ing a pattern of increasing ef-
fectiveness during the past several
years. It appears that faculty com-
mittees have often failed to func-
tion effectively for lack of pos-
sible alternatives. Increasingly our
colleagues in administrative posi-
tions are providing staff support
for faculty committees so that
these committees can use their
time to suggest directions for in-
vestigation, evaluate the informa-
tion given and suggest and react
to proposals for action.
This means that the subcom-
mittees of SACUA have come to
have increasingly close relation-
ships to administrative offices.
Thus the Committee on Educa-
tional Policies has become the ad-
visory committee for Vice-Presi-
dent for Academic Affairs, Roger
W. Heyns; the Committee on Re-
search Policy works with Vice-
President for Research A. Geof-
frey Norman; the Committees on
Campus Planning and Economic
Status of the Faculty work closely
with the staff of Vice-President
for Business and Finance Wilbur
K. Pierpont; the Committee on
Student Relations is part of the
advisory committee for Vice-
President for Student Affairs
Richard L. Cutler; the committee
on Public Information works with
Vice-President for University Re-
lations Michael Radock.
These arrangements vary in ef-
fectiveness. Where they have been
ineffective it is often not so much
from a lack of willingness to have
faculty participation as from the
lack of willingness on the part of
the administrator to spend time
discussing a problem whose solu-
tion is already clear to him and
..AND CAN BE BETTER
r1. .r r I e F .
his staff. And the administrator's
ennui in this relationship is us-
ually attributable to faculty will-
ingness to sit back and listen to
the latest developments on the
west side of State Street but lack
of willingness to do the work
necessary to make any useful con-
tributions.
* * *
STUDENTS and faculty mem-
bers sometimes speak about the
mittee is highly respected and ef-
fective. The faculty meetings
themselves give every faculty
member an opportunity to express
himself when he is concerned
about issues. But these mechan-
isms are likely to become over-
loaded as the college becomes
larger. More and more of the
executive committee's time is like-
ly to be devoted to new appoint-
ments and promotions with less
PROF. WILBERT J. McKEACHIE, chair-
man of the psychology department, is a
former chairman of the Senate Advisory
Committee on University Affairs. In his
present post, to quote a colleague, he has
"maintained the unity of a group whose
counterparts elsewhere have often frag-
mented"--the world's largest psychology
department.
d
r .
.y ,, ''
lack of power of the faculty. Theye
see University policies as emerg-c
ing from the pushing and shovingt
of various power blocs interestedI
in the University.r
This description seems to me tos
be grossly inadequate. In my ex-
perience, policy making here isx
usually a rational, problem solving
activity in which creativity, weigh-t
ing of pros and cons, amassing ofI
relevant evidenceand clarity ofc
reason are much more important
than power.<
Student and faculty committeesz
often fail to have influence, notI
because they lack power or be-i
cause the administration refusesi
to listen, but because the com--
mittee has failed to do its home-I
work. Many senate committees
meet once a month and do littleI
between meetings. Is it any won-
der that decisions sometimes haveI
to be made before the faculty
committee has made up its mind?
Nevertheless the record of fac-
ulty participation is bright. Even
though the fruits of faculty par-
ticipation are not always visible,I
we can point to several significant
recent achievements. One of these
is the establishment of the Center
on Research in Learning and
Teaching. The creation of the
center was suggested by the Sen-
ate Committee on Improvement of
Instruction and that recommen-
dation was endorsed and extended
by an, ad hoc faculty ,committee
under the chairmanship of Pro-
fessor Walker.
* * *
THE REORGANIZATION of the
Office of Student Affairs is at-
tributed to the work of the Senate
Committee dn Student Relations
and an ad hoc committee under
the chairmanship of Professor
John Reed, formerly of the law
school.
The regulations governing invi-
tations to outside speakers rep-
resent a significant advance in
our commitment to the principle
of free inquiry. We take pride in
the fact that the work of Prof
Samuel Estep and his committee
became the policy not only of the
University but of all state col-
leges and universities.
Those who are familiar with
University organization will recog-
nize that I am pointing to the
achievements of faculty participa-
tionboth withinand outdof the
structure of SACUA. I do this
deliberately, because I believe that
one of the strengths of faculty
participation here is that we are
not bound by rigid organizational
protocol or hidebound procedures.
We tackle problems in whatever
manner seems most likely to be
productive.
150 senate members are now.
working on one or another ofthe
committees related to SACUA. It
is tempting to think that one can
leave the University's problems in
their hands with confidence that
the faculty will be well represent-
ed. It will. Nevertheless, on many
major policy issues, too great a
number of faculty members feel
uninformed and resentful about
not having been consulted. Some
faculty members and students be-
lieve that it is less effective to
work through established mechan-
isms than to talk directly to a
regent.
This practice contributes to the
regents' sense of knowing the fac-
ulty viewpoint (and we appreciate
their willingness to listen), but it
tends to complicate and disrupt
established mechanisms of policy
making. (Nor, I suspect, is it ap-
preciated by the responsible ad-
ministrators.) The problem of ap-
propriate communication channels
and sense of participation in de-
cision making is, I believe, a prob-
lem the faculty must solve for
itself. Certainly the possibility of
direct communication to regents
is one we should not abandon
lightly, but it should be used only
when normal channels have failed,
not as a routine way to circum-
vent the checks and balances of.
our system of organization.
* * *
IN THE UNIVERSITY of the
future I expect the faculty to con-
tinue to play a strong role in
planning at the departmental and
college levels. The increasing size
and less time remaining for dis-
cussion of broad policy issues.
Similarly, as the faculty becomes
larger, the individual faculty
member is likely to feel that his
voice and vote are less important
and faculty meetings will come
more and more to represent only
those who like to hear themselves
argue. (Judging from extent
participation in debate,I'n, ione
of this group.)
One of the major arguments for
creating new small colleges ad-
ministratively independent of the
literary college is that such a move
would enable us to preserve the
virtues of our present system of
faculty participation in decision
making. Adding more students and
staff to our present college will
almost inevitably mean the ad-
dition of cumbersome layers of ad-
ministration.
* * *
AT THE University level the
effects of large size have already
become apparent in the woeful
lack of attendance and participa-
tion in senate meetings. SACUA
and its sub-committees are, de-
spite the inadequacies to which
I have alluded, reasonably good
representatives of the faculty.
Moreover, I believe that the SA-
CUA system is becoming increas-
ingly effective.
As for the senate meetings
themselvesrIam ambivalet.
like the ritualistic nd symbolic
aspects of the calling together of
the University faculties for ,uph
occasions as the State of the Udi -
versity address and the annual
reports of SACUA committees. I
like the availabilityo f the enate
as a pbtntfal mn'haiam' for
bringing the whole weight of the
faculty behind some issue about
which there is vital concern. And
when an issue is vital, the faculty
will turn out. Lack of attendanc
may be a sign of confidence rather
than of failure. I would hope
that communication between fac-
ulty committees and admiistra-
tors would be such that senate
meetings could continue to be
rather dull and uneventful. But
I should be reluctant to give up
the potentially great power of a
resolution passed by the assembled
faculties.
Despite the problems to which
I've alluded, I am optimistic about
the role of the faculty in decsion,
making. Wehave a good tradition
and healthy contemporary rela-
tionships. These are exciting times
for higher education. They are
especially exciting for one in an
institution like the University.We
have tremendous resources of hu-
man talent both in the faculty
and in the student body we are
educating.
In his address to the Illinois
Citizen's Committee some time
ago, President Hatcher spoke of
the fruitful partnership between
conscientious teachers and ded-
cated laymen. If faculty, students
and administration join in this
partnership, I am confident that
together we can help the Univer-
sity lead our civilization into a
new and greater era.
NEXT WEEK: Michel Benamou
LETTERS:
Cheating
To the Editor:
IN HIS Jan. 23 editorial M. Sat-
tinger critizes the Air Force
Academy for being "hypocritical"
and "overreactive" in its attitude
toward the recent resignations on
the part of several cadets who ad-
mitted to breaking the honor code.
He then calls for the academies
to abandon the "showcase of mor-
ality."
Mr. Sattinger apparently does
not realize that the academies
have a purpose beyond the grant-
ing of bachelor's degrees. They
ar intended to develop military
officers who must be, and for the
most part are, example of gentle-
mendand all that we should be
proud of in Americans. The acad-
emies are perhaps the only insti-
tutions left where the honor code
SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL:
What May Be Forgotten
. . .
By DICK WINGFIELD
SIR WINSTON sat in a respect-
able pub in London. In his
jolly British manner he had grown
quite mellow on his favorite bev-
erage, brandy. As the evening
wore on, Si. Winston and his
friends grew more fraternal, and
fell under the critical eye of a
Mrs. Braddock, a large, rotund,
unattractive Member, of Parlia-
ment representing the Labor Party
from the district of Liverpool.
"Bessy," as Sir Winston affection-
ately called her, had also become
more glib, and had built up the
courage to quip the Conservative
gentleman.
"Winston, my dear sir," she
said, "you're drunk; you're very,
very drunk."
"Bessy, my dear," Sir Winston
is to have replied, "you're ugly;
you're very, very ugly. But to-
morrow morning I'll be sober, and
you'll still be ugly." They both
laughed.
TODAY, as the world morns
Winston Churchill, much of what
was Churchill will not be remem-
bered. It will not be forgotten
that he wrote "A History of the
English Speaking Peoples." But
those who read the volumes will
not regard them as a history, but
-- - -,.. . -n v.roi.ti
painting and of affection for his
pet cat. Behind his sagacity and
precocity, there was also the stub-
born boyishness which persisted in
keeping him above ground during
part of the German blitz. More-
over, he smoked only the finest
cigars-and plenty of them, and
was a connoisseur of brandy and
cognac.
BRITONS will take pride for
centuries to come in their stand
against the Germans in the Sec-
ond World War, in what the world
has come to know as "Her finest
hour." The father image of
Churchill is foremost in the minds
of many, the leader who guided
and inspired his nation.
However, Prof. James K. Pollock
of the political science department
recently pointed out that while
Churchill was more sagacious than
Roosevelt and other contempor-
aries, he was not always heeded.
According to Pollock, Churchill
was one of the first and most
accurate in "identifying and de-
fining the Communist challenge."
He warned the world, much as
he had warned Britain to arm
against the Germans, that Com-
munism was spreading, and that
Germany should not be divided,
leaving one half open to the East
and Russia. He warned, at an
-- A + +hn +h <rsv--nmi.ina
will profit from his wisdom; per-
haps through his example, fewer
mistakes will be made regarding
totalitarianism and Communism.
Perhaps not.
Sir Winston would consider it a
grave injustice, however, to en-
velop his memory in a sterile, pa-
tronly cloud of half-truth. Very
likely, if he were called upon to
write an epilogue to his life, he
wouldn't dwell upon his books or
his education, his political status
or his prophetic success.
He would probably repeat the
story he told so many times about
one of his aids with whom he was
traveling by train: Since the trip
was long, the fellow was diverting
himself by comparing the capacity
of the railroad car with the-
amount of brandy Churchill had
consumed in his life. After lengthy
calculation, the aid approached
Sir Winston and reported:
"Sir, according to my estima-
tion, if we could collect all the
brandy you have previously con-
sumed we could fill two thirds of
this car."
Sir Winston is said to have
looked rather stunned, and then
to have replied: "Ah yes, we have
so much to do, and so little time
to do it."
* * *
IT WOULD be to the great
rip,.impn+. of+the liing to alter