These resolutions were discussed at length and adopted by the Faculty on January 3, 1908.

ADMINISTRATIVE BOARD FOR FRESHMEN AND SOPHOMORES

At the meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences held on February 7, 1908, a communication was received from the Secretary of the Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees announcing the following action of the Committee taken February 3, 1908:

"Whereas, The Association of American Universities, which is composed of the eighteen foremost universities of the United States, at its last annual meeting held in Ann Arbor, January 9th-10th, 1908, defined an American University as an institution which (1) possessed a strong graduate department and (2) based its professional work on a college course of liberal education, which should ordinarily be at least two years, and made this definition the criterion of admission to the Association, and consequently the condition of recognition by certain governments; and

"Whereas, among the best of our colleges and universities the great break in the course of a collegiate or liberal education comes at the end of the second year, both as regards the curriculum and the methods of instruction; and

"Whereas, not only is the foregoing tendency well marked in the College of Arts and Sciences in Cornell University, but the action recently taken by the professional faculties gives the work of the first two years in the College of Arts and Sciences a new importance for the professional schools; and

"Whereas, this differentiation of the work, methods of instruction, and educational aims of the first two years of the course in the College of Arts and Sciences in contrast with those of later years of that course calls for a corresponding differentiation in the staff of instruction, which could not fail to insure greater thoroughness of instruction, greater simplicity and effectiveness of administration, and closer personal and social intercourse between teachers and students; be it, therefore,

"Resolved, that a Special Committee, of which the Chairman shall be a member, be appointed to confer with a similar Committee from the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, with a view to formulating a scheme of reorganization and elaborating such details as may seem expedient.

"The Chair appointed as such Committee, Trustees Schurman, Van Cleef, Treman, C. E., and Newman."

After full discussion the Faculty decided to elect a committee of five to confer with the committee of the Board of Trustees, the results of their deliberations to be reported back to the Faculty before any action should be taken by the Board of Trustees. The following members of the Faculty were elected members of the joint committee: Professors Crane, Hill, Hull, Nichols and Willcox.

Several conferences of the joint committee of Board and Faculty were held, and the Registrar prepared for the committee a full and careful statistical statement of the registration of freshmen and sophomores in the courses offered in this College. It was discovered that the total number of registrations amounted to 2,002 in 143 courses, but that 1,785 of these registrations, or about nine tenths of the whole number, were found in 55 courses, each registering from 8 to 141 freshmen and sophomores, and that almost three fourths, namely 1,444 of 2,002, were found in 28 courses whose minimum registration was 20 students of the first two years. These facts convinced the members of the joint committee of the possibility of legislation regarding the work of students in the first two years that would apply to the great majority of such students, without involving any change in the work of juniors and seniors.

With a view to having a special group of teachers made responsible for the work of freshmen and sophomores in the College of Arts and Sciences and to bringing these students into close relation with a definite group of teachers regarded as especially their own, the committee recommended:

"That Freshmen and Sophomores be put in charge of an administrative board which shall consist of a group of teachers designated by the President; and that this administrative board in charge of Freshmen and Sophomores shall have full power to supervise their work and to provide means for making it effective; and while for the accomplishment of this object this administrative board is empowered to make such rules, regulations, and arrangements as they may deem expedient, their action in these matters may at any time be disallowed by the Faculty. And the Faculty reserves to itself the function of legislation on all important subjects, and especially on the subjects of entrance requirements, courses of study, and standards of admission to the College and for advancement from class to class."

The committee further recommended:

"That the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences be ex-officio Chairman of the aforesaid administrative board in charge of Freshmen and Sophomores. But in order that the Dean, whose functions are already very numerous and onerous, may not be over-burdened, it is recommended that another member of the administrative board be appointed secretary of the board at a salary to be fixed by the Trustees, the duties of said secretary to be fixed by the Dean, whose assistant he is to be and to whom he shall be responsible."

This report was adopted by the Faculty at a special meeting on April 17, 1908, and the President named as members of the

administrative board for freshmen and sophomores the following teachers in the College of Arts and Sciences: Messrs. Adams, Bristol, Browne, Catterall, Creighton, Durham, Faust, Gordon, Ibershoff Olmstead, Prescott, Reed, Sampson, Shearer, Tanner, Tarr.

Subsequently on the recommendation of the Dean-Elect, Professor Hull, the Trustees appointed Assistant Professor Durham of the Latin Department as secretary of said board.

It is hoped that this movement will tend to foster closer personal relations between freshmen and sophomores and their teachers and will render more efficient the instruction in elementary courses. The experiment will be watched with interest by the Faculty and friends of the College.

VOCATIONAL COURSES

At the special meeting of the Faculty on April 17, 1908, a matter that had occupied the attention of the Committee on Educational Policy for several months was brought before the Faculty for definite consideration and action. At the December meeting the President had called attention to the recommendations made in his Annual Report to the Trustees for 1906-1907 in regard to the formulation of vocational courses in the College of Arts and Sciences, and after some general discussion the recommendations had been referred to the Committee on Educational Policy for consideration and report. The Committee studied carefully the practices of other universities and discussed at length the questions of policy involved for this College. It was thought that the essential purpose of the College should be to furnish opportunity for those who wish to pursue the arts and sciences without reference to their utility; and yet it was the general belief of members of the Committee that the great majority of students actually do have vocational aims in taking a college course, and that there would be decided advantages if courses were organized in groups so that students with vocational aims might plan their work with greater ease and definiteness, with less waste of time, and with better results in training. On the other hand there was some fear lest the announcement of groups of vocational courses might seem to invite students to the pursuit of vocational aims in their study at a sacrifice of the spirit of liberal culture to which the College is primarily dedicated, thus making the College of Arts and Sciences essentially a professional school, similar in spirit to the other professional schools of "the University but with less unity of purpose. But the dangers involved being regarded as

problematical, and the advantage of giving motivation to the work of some students where none seems now to exist, being obvious the Committee finally decided to recommend to the Faculty the adoption of the folowing resolutions:

"1. Resolved, that the Faculty of Arts and Sciences favors the arrangement of groups of courses for Juniors and Seniors in this College designed to guide students in preparing for the vocations of teaching, organized philanthropy, the civil service, and business management.

"2. Resolved, that the Faculty hereby requests the President to appoint committees, each comprising one or more members, to arrange such groups of courses subject to the approval of the Faculty. "3. Resolved, that the Faculty recommends that the courses to be included in such groups be mainly those of a fundamental character rather than such as are highly specialized or applied."

The resolutions were adopted by the Faculty and there was added a fourth resolution recommending that in the arrangement of groups the committees be requested to allow considerable free time for the pursuit of studies not intended to bear directly upon the student's future vocation.

The committees recommended were appointed by the President, and groups of courses were arranged for prospective teachers, business managers, and workers in organized philanthropy. These groups were reported to the Faculty and, after some amendments, were adopted, but as they will be announced in detail elsewhere it does not seem necessary to give here even a general outline of their content. The committee appointed to arrange a group of studies for students looking forward to the civil service did not report before the close of the academic year.

REGISTRATION AND CREDIT

A matter that claimed the attention of the Committee on Academic Records for a good part of the year was the method of registration and of securing changes in registration. The fact that students registered not only with the Dean but with the departments as well, made it possible for the registration with the Dean especially to be counted largely formal, and made too easy unnecessary changes in registration before the end of each term. It was especially noticeable that many of these changes in registration were made after the middle of the term, showing that students in some cases virtually disregarded their registration at the central office, and did much as they pleased in the matter of registration in courses, only

taking care in the majority of instances that the formal changes were made in time to have them recorded before the grades were sent in to the Registrar. Accordingly the following recommendation was submitted to the Faculty and after full discussion adopted, on May 6, 1908, that

"No department recognize any student as a regular member of any of its classes until registration in accordance with the following rules has been reported by the Dean to the department.

"I. Students registering in the College of Arts and Sciences for the first time shall hand in their study cards with list of courses for the term at the Dean's office on or before the third day of instruction. "2. Two weeks before the end of each term students shall hand in their study cards with list of courses for the next term at the Dean's office.

"3. Changes may be made in the list of courses selected during the first ten days of instruction only, and then only with the approval of the Dean.

"4. After the first ten days of the term no student shall have the right to withdraw from any course in which he is registered, unless he shall previously obtain the consent of the Dean to withdraw from the course on the ground of ill-health or other reason beyond the student's control.

"5. A student whose marks average 85 or more in any term may register and receive credit for a maximum of 20 hours for the following term; a student whose marks average between 65 and 85 in any term may register and receive credit for a maximum of 18 hours for the following term; and one whose marks average 65 or less in any term may register and receive credit for a maximum of 16 hours for the following term.

"6.

Students may not register for courses for which they are not permitted to receive credit."

The enforcement of these rules will correct some evils that grew up with the free elective system, and will tend to prevent carelessness on the part of some students who need to be protected against their own loose methods of study. The slight change made regarding the maximum credit per term should also tend to greater fairness in the administration of rules regulating credit hours and terms of residence.

BLOCK WEEK AND TERM EXAMINATIONS

A recommendation that " Block Week" be abolished and that final examinations be held on the last day of instruction, during the regular class period, was submitted to the University Faculty by the Committee on University Policy soon after the beginning of the second term last year. The recommendation was referred to the