Junior Year Abroad

Last Tuesday's Faculty decision to allow qualified Juniors to study abroad is a welcome one. Although limited to men in the field of Romance and Germanic Languages and Literatures and to Comparative Philology concentrators specializing in Romance or Germanic languages, it represents the first post-war step toward solving the complex question of allowing credit toward a Harvard degree for work done outside of the College.

The new plan, which was proposed by Francis M. Rogers, associate professor of Romance Languages, will operate for a trial period of three years. Only students in Group III or better are qualified, and they must study under the auspices of a regularly organized study group like the one now in France under the Sweet Briar plan.

This proposal is fine as far as it goes. But the Faculty should not wait the full three years before it considers broadening the plan. There is no reason why concentrators in the other Humanities and the Social Sciences should be excluded from foreign study if they have some particular interest in going to Europe and if suitable courses are available abroad.

Before the plan can be expanded, however, the individual departments will have to be convinced that it is needed. And the best way to convince them is through forceful student demand.