On the other hand, it the corresponding College course is a half-course, more lecture and reading time is available in the Extension program and the work can be more thorough.

The greatest difference from regular College procedure is the comparative lack of individual attention. Shortage of funds precludes sections (although few classes are almost as small as sections) and any phase of the tutorial program.

A.A. candidates must meet distribution requirements, but there is no concentration. Lectures and papers are the only instruction methods used. For these reasons, Harvard does not give credit toward the A.B. for Extension work, although many other colleges do and teachers frequently receive credit from their school boards for such work.

Square Round-up

Perhaps the Extension's most important difference from the regular college is in the much greater variety of students attracted by its low costs and high standards. "Go out and round up a hundred people in the Square some night and you'll have a fair approximation of my class," one lecturer said.

Professional men, wives of graduate students and faculty members, university secretaries, and high school teachers are the largest groups, but together they form little more than a majority. The rest of the students refuse to fall into categories. Very few undergraduates take the courses.

All have different motives and back-bounds. Because of the low cost, few worry about losing money if they don't achieve good grades or credit. Likewise, few want to work for many years towards a degree, and except for teachers, most can not get credit in their occupation for liberal arts study. Yet students, whether they are passive auditors, seeking cultural pleasures, or pathetically eager, seldom lack a genuine interest in learning for learning's sake," one lecturer put it.

Another instructor pointed out a woman studying psychology in the hope of understanding her teen-age daughter. Sitting next to her was a dowager who audited all courses on general principles. Graduate students learning French for a reading requirement study with secretaries saving for a trip to Paris.

The white-collar worker who's never ben further away than New York reads American literature he missed in business school next to an Indian student who has studied all over the world and now wants to enhance his knowledge of Americana.

Attendance Variable

Such variety complicates teaching considerably. "How can I keep that student back there with a Ph.D. interested while I try to get across to the secretary here who's only gone through high school," a History professor asked.

There is the added difficulty of antecedence and homework: "It's impossible to assume that most will attend and do the reading with any regularity, as you can about a college class," one instructor said. "Some come from as far as Providence on the coldest of nights and have read everything I suggested. Others don't even buy the books and attend perhaps half the lectures. At five dollars per half course, each lectures costs only fifteen cents, which few mind wasting."

Each class has problems it shares with no others. The instructor in English for foreign students almost invariably has highly intelligent students, many Full-bright scholars, but each has a different problem depending on his language. In English composition, the intelligence levels vary considerably, though the language is common.

Balance and Cover

Accordingly, each lecturer must find his own solution. All must remember, however, that their courses have to maintain the high standards set by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences to qualify those students who want credit. "I lecture for credit students and those willing to work as hard as credit students and let the rest takes what they can," one faculty member said.