Evening star., 1943-05-23
Basic Changes Urged
In Postwar Methods
Of College Training
Special Tests Are Urged
For Soldiers on Return
To CIussrooms
By the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press.
NEW YORK, May 22.-The Com
mission on Liberal Education of the
Association of American Colleges
made public today committee re-
port which recommended sweeping
changes in methods of college in
struction after the war, including
the suggestion that the usual en-
trance requirements be discarded
or revised for returning members
of the armed forces.
The report proposed that "the
educational status of each return
ing student be determined primar-
lily by the employment of aptitude
and achievement tests"
James P. Baxter Sd, president of
Williams College and the commits
sion chairman, announced the pro-
gram which is designed, the COM
mission said, to meet the needs of
the demobilization period and of
"the modern. reconstructed world
Membership in the association totals
$50 colleges and universities in the
Nation.
In defining the needs of returning
members of the armed forces. the
report said that because they will be
older and more mature than normal
undergraduates and will have had
a more varied experience most of
them will be eager to prepare for a
peacetime career and many will
want to get married as soon as
possible"
Practices Condemned.
The commission recommended
abandonment Of what it termed the
following "outmoded" educational
practices which it said will not
seem reasonable to returning mill
tary veterans"
l. abuse" of the lecture method
OF instruction under which students
are told and whereby they have
little opportunity to contribute the
results of their own experience and
reflection"
2. Traditional examination pro-
cedure which requires students
merely to reproduce information
the Instructor had talked into their
notebooks"
3. "Unwise use" of textbooks to
the exclusion of reading primary
source materials.
4. Determination of students pro-
grams "by mechanical application
OF rules and regulations without
regard, or with inadequate regard.
to the needs of the individual"
5. Prescription of courses "solelv
Tor their so-called disciplinary
value"
6. Emphasis placed in manyt in
stltutions upon faculty research at
the expense of teaching RESPONSE
bilities.
Recommendations Offered.
Inc commission recommended
the adoption or further development
OF the following practices:
l. 1ndlvidualized truction
methods and wider reading of orig
mal source material
2. General use of achievement
and comprehensive examinations.
3. Effective counsellling, properly
co-ordinated with instruction, to
the end of assisting returning mem
bers OF the armed forces in making
transitions from liberal education
to specialized training and then to
a Job, to family life and to the re-
sponsibilities of citizenship"
Members of the subcommittee
submitting the report besides Presi-
dent Baxter were President Harry
D. Gideonse of Brooklyn College,
committee chairman; President w,
H: Cowley of Hamilton College;
Allan P. Farrell. S. j., assistant
executive director, Jesuit Educa-
tlonal Association; Prof. Theodore
M. Greene of Princeton University.
and Prof. Charles w. Hendel of
Yale University.