THE NEXT READING PERIOD

The news that Economics A will not adopt the Reading Period this year, while it applies to but one course in a large field, is good evidence of the fact that at least one danger threatening the success of the experiment has been avoided. A year ago the college was awaiting with considerable trepidation the coming of a first Reading Period that was known to it only by official statements and formidable reading lists. The results in those courses adopting it, however, were so gratifying that converts to the plan flocked in as one non-scientific department after another took up the standard.

The peril was that courses in which personal contacts and discussion groups could not be sacrificed without loss would be stampeded into a blind acceptance of the idea, and the decision of the Department of Economics in regard to its introductory course is reassuring on that score. Other courses that tried the experiment last year have decided to hold optional meetings during the next Reading Period and there is no longer any reason to fear that it will be adopted or retained where it would be actually detrimental.

Such cases deal with only a small fraction of the courses in the college, and those few outside the intended scope of the innovation. There are more fundamental problems that will have to be met and at least a beginning made towards overcoming during this second year. The professor must cover his field and still allow the student time for some independent work, according to one of the avowed objects of the plan. A balance will have to be found between the necessity of testing the work done in the examinations following and the granting of liberty to each man to make his own choice of reading. These and other difficulties could not be attacked until the mechanics of the system were corrected, but with the machine in good working order it will be the part of the next Reading Period, now just over the hill of the coming vacation, to start it along the road to its distant goal.