PRES. LITTLE FAVORS GIVING HIGH PLACE TO STUDENT ACTIVITIES

President C. C. Little '10 of the University of Maine, in a recent interview with a CRIMSON reporter, gave a high place to student activities in the system of personal contact, judgment, and instruction that the hopes to introduce into the University of Maine within the next few years.

"Working through our student council I hope to establish a universal system of athletics that will embrace every student in the college," he declared. "I do not mean that in the personal character judgment for admission a man will have any influence simply because he is an athlete. We can very quickly tell whether or not such a man is going to be a bad bet intellectually, and if we feel that such is to be the case, the fact that he would be a tower of strength on an athletic team will, not get him through.

"There are, however," continued President Little, "a large class of men with athletic ability, who, while engaged in outside activities, do C T D work, while if they devoted themselves wholly to their academic duties would certainly do A to B work. These are the men that the colleges want and that the student body picks for its leaders. For such men the time devoted to athletic activities is more than justified.

"One of the greatest services rendered by student competition is to produce in the individual a mine of sound ideas. The acquisition of such ideas or conceptions is likely to prove a great deal more useful if they come by way of hard work than if they are merely the offshoots of idle thinking.

"This is true," said President Little is conclusion, "not only on the athletic field but in every branch of activity that demands earnest effort, such as college publication, dramatic activities and debating. This last I think to be an especially good intellectual developer. The process of getting to the bottom of a subject--and you can't do that without a good deal of hard work--is a good steadying influence on the mind and reasoning powers. So long as a student can keep above board in his work I think his other activities should not only be permitted but encourages."