"Take a Harvard House, put the 200 most eccentric people in Cambridge in it, and you have an approximate picture of Bard College," has said one critic of the little college overlooking the Hudson. That most Bard students would not consider this an insult is perhaps the best proof of its truth.

While situated in a dull little hamlet in New York's upper Dutchess County, there is nothing about the place to make the itinerant Bohemian feel himself in Philistia. For Bard, in its unique approach to the liberal and creative arts stresses education of the individual to such a degree that intellectual and social individualism have run wild on the campus.

Jean-clad members of both sexes move from dormitory to seminar to lunch; yet, each person within the group maintaing perhaps too deliberately something of his own personality. In spare moments on an occasional dull weekend, Bardians are not unaccustomed to gather in the grassy quadrangle between the men's and women's dormitories, to beat drums and play records, and improvise original dances to their tunes--all to pass the afternoon.

But it is a mistake to consider Bard an aggregation of pseudo-left-bank dillettantes. The college has academic standards virtually as high as those of any school in the country, and keeps its students as busy with schoolwork as any more traditional institution. With the seminar method of instruction used in almost all courses, it is not easy for the student to "goof off" for any length of time. The majority of Bardians, moreover, do not concentrate in the creative arts--dance, drama, art, or music--but rather in the social sciences.

But all is not so sound at Annandale-on-Hudson as its academic standards. Finance--or lack of it--is an important factor in restricting the scope of all the college's undertakings. Many buildings are in a state of disrepair. New dormitories, erected shortly after World War II, are either "barracks" or "dwelling units." The extent of student activities and the facilities available in teaching courses are also adversely affected.

Idealist or Fanatic

Besides these difficulties, Bard suffers from an unduly large faculty turnover, especially since many of its professors devote a goodly proportion of their time to professional work outside the field of teaching. Because of the effort required to teach a curriculum composed entirely of seminars, teachers find themselves hard-pressed. "To teach at Bard, one must be either a terrific idealist or a fanatic," mused Ruth Gillard, acting Dean and professor of Sociology. Yet, in spite of the difficulties in maintaining an adequate faculty, Bard offers a rather effective type of education.

The student who chooses Bard obviously is not looking for the traditional, ordinary educational experience. For those who have chosen the more traditional type of college, it is sometimes difficult to understand the particular appeal of the very small educational institution--especially Bard. At first glance the disadvantages of such an education seem to outweigh the advantages. The library is small; the student body is not varied; the professors are not ordinarily the top in their field; and the course possibilities are not wide.

But in talking about Bard it would be unfair to take Harvard's standards and Harvard's aims, measure up Bard against these, and decide that it was quite deficient. Bard has quite particular goals and a unique but deliberate method of education. Ultimately, while one should keep in mind general educational aims, Bard must be judged by its own standards.

There are great advantages in the small college--advantages which the large college can not hope to have, try as it may to achieve them in part. Most appealing of these ordinarily is the intimate relationship and friendship of the scholar with his teacher.

The man with hat and briefcase in hand who walks onto the raised lecture platform two or three times a week, talks for an hour, and then, picking up his hat and stuffing his papers back in the briefcase, disappears again until the next meeting of the class is uncommonly different from the man in shirt tails who walks to and from class with his students, studies with them, eats with them, and fences with them occasionally on the front lawn.

Harvard and Yale have attempted something of the same general nature in the House system, but this has not generally succeeded. The possibilities for personal contact and individual attention which the small college offers, as well as the secluded location--so conducive to serious thought and meditation--argue well for its existence.

Bard has such features. With its seven to one student--faculty ratio and idyllic seclusion it is in a sense a remarkably good place for intellectual development. Within this atmosphere the college aims--on paper at least--to develop creativity, individuality, and community spirit in its students. Detailed research is not part of the plan.

In creativity, perhaps, it has succeeded very well. But in aiming at individuality and community Bard has shot to the extremes and the extreme of each have confounded each other. Its individuality has tended to develop into extreme idiosyncrasies and its community spirit, into indifference.

Creative Approach