The decreasing significance of the Redbook is not, in itself, a disaster for General Education. But when the aims of the old program ceased to be of importance, nothing took their place. Today General Education finds itself in a position similar to History and Literature--the only way anybody can explain the program is to appeal to old standards which no one believes to be true.

One of the critical problems is the program's relation to the departments. During the early years when there was a great deal of enthusiam for General Education, and the Committee was the central force in guiding undergraduate education, the problem of courses like Social Sciences 1 caused a good deal of discussion, for there was much resentment at the incorporation of a departmental course (Social Sciences 1 was the old History 1) into the program. In the last few years, however, the problem has acquired new aspects.

Most conspicuous, Humanities 6, a course which Professor Brower admits is not General Education in the traditional sense, has taken on a singularly ambivalent character as both an English department course and General Education. It is the only sectioned introductory course, and the enrollment problem has become so difficult that English concentrators were given preference among sophomore applicants last year and this.

In addition to these two specific difficulties, there is growing resentment of the special status enjoyed by History. As long as the Redbook remained the guiding principle of the program, the dominance of one field could be explained. But with the Redbook virtually a dead letter, this preferred status is an additional irritant. The initial ranks of those who did not support the Redbook have been swelled by those who think that the Redbook is simply being used as an excuse for perpetuating the dominance of the History department.

This situation is aggravated by the fact that Social Science 1 has become more and more oriented towards history in the last few years. Professor Myron P. Gilmore, chairman of the History department comments, "I hardly see that Social Sciences 1 has anything of the Social Sciences in it. It's history."

But it is impossible to duplicate Hum 6 and Soc Sci 1 as departmental courses, both for economic reasons and because the staff is not available. The cost of reducing the involvement of the departments would be removal of the courses from the program.

Seminars a Challenge

Pressure to institute departmental courses in the lower level program has increased in the last few years, in part because many departments felt that they had to offer potential concentrators a way of using the General Education program, as the History department does. Proposals to make elementary Government and Economics courses into part of the Gen Ed requirement have been rejected, but the sentiment is still strong.

But in addition to departmental pressures, the entire College is changing its attitude toward the fundamental ideas of Gen Ed. The most recent manifestation is the Freshman Seminar program. Called by one member of the General Education Committee "advanced work for specialists," the seminars are directed toward far more specialized work than is normally done during the Freshman year, and are in direct opposition to the General Education program. "I feel that the fate of the General Education program depends a great deal on the fate of these other experiments," says Howe; "you can't have both."

In place of the long-standing assumption that a student who has just arrived from school is not prepared to choose his field of concentration, the Seminar program seems to support the hypothesis that a student is fully capable of doing upper level work and entering a field, not merely during the Freshman year, but before it begins. (The members of Seminar groups were generally selected during the summer.) Many Seminar members are taking three courses in one field, and the science seminars are so specialized that the Committee classifies them as "not normally open to Freshmen."

The seminar program also suggests how much the influence of the General Education Committee has diminished during the last decade. Ten years ago the Committee would surely have been extensively consulted during the planning of such a program; this year it was presented with the accomplished fact, and told, in effect, that if it did not permit Gen Ed credit the entire Freshman year experiment would probably collapse.

A few years ago such action would have been strongly resented, as was President Pusey's appointing Rev. George A. Buttrick to teach an upper level Gen Ed course without consulting the Committee. The most conspicuous sentiment this fall was one of slight confusion.

Accompanying the growing emphasis on specialization is a personnel problem which the Natural Science program has felt for some years. But even now, as it seems possible that distinguished scientists will take greater interest in teaching Gen Ed courses, the difficulties are becoming more acute in other fields.

The Nat Sci program is one of the virtually insoluble problems of General Education. The most important difficulty--that there is not the remotest agreement on what, correctly speaking, ought to be taught, is one which is coming into other areas, as the personnel problem has. While the rest of General Education has been received with general approval over the last decade, Nat Sci has not. One of its founders admitted last spring that the program as it stood was a failure.

Attempt to Revitalize Nat Sci