(The Crimson invites all men in the University to submit signed communications of timely interest. It assumes no responsibility, However, for sentiments expressed under this head and reserves the right to exclude any whose publication would be palpably Inappropriate.)

To the Editor of the CRIMSON:

Since the matter of hours for afternoon classes has come before us it seems an opportune time to call up a reconsideration of the reasons for the allotment of time in the University schedule.

The ruthless sacrifice of the morning and early afternoon hours to lectures and classes appears to be nothing more than an "inheritance from the past" which, like most traditions and customs to which people become habituated, goes on seemingly unquestioned. In past centuries when the only means of lighting was by candles or lamps there may have been some necessity for bringing the students together at lectures during daylight. Now that modern systems, of lighting have come into use, however, such a necessity has been removed and there seems to be no reason for forfeiting the precious hours of the morning to lectures and classes. The student is required to spend his fresh, vigorous hours trudging on daily pilgrimages from shrine to shrine, bowing for fifty-three minute intervals before this diety or that and scribbling hieroglyphs which are to be deciphered and interpreted at some future date. Then he is encouraged to consume a large part of the afternoon in the strenuous activity of athletics. After that, in the evening, he is expected to do his real studying, thinking, writing and other creative work. A program such as this is a violation of the commonest physiological principles and could hardly be more irrational. Setting all the equipment of the University before the student and then requiring him to spend his morning plodding from classroom to classroom is like taking him to the ocean for a swim and allowing him only to wade in the water.

Nor does this allotment of the morning hours to lecturing benefit the professors any more than it does the students. Nothing is more annoying to many of them than to begin the day by giving an oftrepeated lecture which commonly leaves them so exhausted as to greatly handicap them in their work of creative scholarship. Surely note-taking and athletics on the part of the students and repetition of lectures on the part of the professors are not the scale of mental activity that should occupy the freshest and most vigorous periods of the day.

Would it not be much better if, instead of a lecture schedule in his mind, the student rose each morning with the thought of the day before him for uninterrupted study, writing and thinking? He would then have an opportunity to do his mental work when his mind was in its most active and alert condition. During the middle of the afternoon he might go out for his athletics (or sports) and have his social relaxation at tea and dinner. Then at seven-thirty or eight he might attend his lectures and classes, which with his laboratory, might last until eleven or eleven-thirty. His mind, when the flighty activity of the morning had worn off, would be more tranquil and receptive and possibly in an even better state for receiving lectures than in the morning. Under such a system the big lecture courses might well come during the first period of the evening. It would perhaps be advisable to have the advanced courses meet once a week for two or three hours when discussion with the professor would be possible rather than for hour periods as under the present arrangement. Since evening is the loquacious period of the day and the effect of the discussion would be stimulating the previous mental work of the day would be hardly noticed. Four or five of the student's evenings each week and three of the professor's would suffice for such a program and it should be much more effective than the stupid system which now throttles the advancement of learning. Surely such a schedule might be a means by which some of the vital forces of young Americans could be diverted from their present expression in class-room excursioning, note-taking and athletics to study, thought and in the end training of intellect and acquisition of knowledge, the presupposed but thwarted aims of college education. JOHN A. HAESKLER. '23 April 3, 1923.