TUTORIAL LIMITED

Any survey of tutorial work will reveal its unsatisfactory position in the college curriculum. For years it has stood in a No Man's Land of its own, beyond the pale of the regular course system, and the most conflicting opinions have been held regarding its exact position there, and the relation it ought to bear to the regular course work. The first essential for the invigoration of the tutorial system is to give it a definite standing, and to resolve the present chaos of opinions regarding it into more exact concepts. There must, in fine, be a clearer understanding of the purposes and the relative importance of tutorial work.

These purposes may be classified under three general heads: 1. To develop a technique of thought and study; 2. To throw the student into intimate contact with the personality and learning of a mature mind; 3. To give the student supplementary information in his field. Brief reflection will show that the first two purposes are vastly more important than the third. A student can carry away from college no more valuable acquisition than a method of thought and study. Indeed, it would not be too strong to say that an educational system has succeeded or failed according as it has or has not taught the student this one thing. The methods used in the classroom will probably never be employed in a student's later life; but the freer, more independent methods of tutorial work are the very essence of the way in which study must be continued after college days are over. It is intimate contact with a searching and mature mind which develops these right habits of thought and study. In any case, with primary emphasis being placed upon these aspects of tutorial work, supplementary information is bound to be gained incidentally.

Once the duties of a tutor are defined in this manner, it becomes obvious that only men of the highest calibre can possibly qualify as tutors. When the major benefit of tutorial work consists in individual contact with a mature, well-educated man, then it is in extreme opposition to this purpose to draft men of lesser ability and experience for such exacting work. The CRIMSON believes that it is in the best interests of the tutorial system to eliminate such men from tutorial work; to permit only the outstanding men of departments to tutor; and to make a corresponding cut in the number of students who carry tutorial work. In other words, tutorial work should be limited to a certain select group.

The first step, then, must be for the departments to persuade their leading men to become tutors. It is a type of work worthy of the finest minds, and is emphatically not beneath the dignity of full professors, or brilliant research men. The future success of tutorial work depends to a large extent upon these men consenting to take over a few tutees. In this connection, the University ought to pursue a definite policy of lending prestige to the position of tutor. In some degree, this will naturally result from a system of limiting the number of tutors, but at the same time, the impression must be created that the position of tutor is not a mere stepping stone in a career, but a goal in itself. Such work must be recognized to be, as in reality it is, of supreme importance and dignity.

As for limiting tutorial work to a select group, it is clear that many now carrying such work do not get benefits from it commensurate with its cost. Some are intellectually unable to profit by the work. Others have not the will to enter into its spirit and purposes. All these men consistently neglect the tutorial work, which is being furnished at such expense. One department estimates that it costs $450 to carry a man through three years of tutorial; yet it is perfectly certain that in many of these instances the student would have derived more benefit from three full courses than from three years of tutorial. Here, then, is an opportunity to cut down costs of administration at the expense of students who will themselves admit that they are not profiting from tutorial work.

All men, however, ought to have a chance to work with a tutor. The decision as to whether a particular student should continue could be made to depend both upon reports by the tutor, and upon the honest confession of the student himself. By the beginning of the Junior year, the select group of tutees ought to be chosen. These men would at once be allowed a reduction of one course per year, and their work would be recognized by the dean's office as at least the equivalent to that required by one course. The only record, however, which the dean's office would receive should be in the form of careful reports of the tutees drawn up by the tutors, reports which should receive as much consideration in the awarding of scholarships and degrees as any courses of non-tutees.

These reports are in no sense of the word grades. The CRIMSON believes that any system of grading and examining is entirely alien to the spirit and purpose of tutorial work. The tutorial system was set up in the belief that coercion and tangible reward were unnecessary, and that there was such a thing as study for the sake of knowledge alone. Any retreat to systems of grades and examinations is a tacit admission of defeat in this high purpose. Before that admission is made, a more restricted system of tutorial work ought to be tried.

The system of limited tutees has the advantage of giving tutorial work a definite standing in the curriculum by substituting it for course work. This opens the way, moreover, for an eventual shifting of regular course work to the field of tutorial, in accordance with the abilities of the individual student. The flowering of the tutorial method will come when lecture courses, and especially the less instructive ones, are crowded out of the curriculum, and their place taken by tutorial. The suggested method of tutorial work makes way for this trend. In addition, this privileged system preserves the finest fruits of the tutorial method, while at the same time removing the reasons which heretofore have been urged in favor of some coercive instruments being attached to tutorial. Those only are tutors who can inspire a real desire to work, and before whom a student will be ashamed to come unprepared. Those only are tutees who have the will and the ability to do tutorial work. The prestige of such work has been raised by making it a privilege. And finally, it has been given definite recognition by the University through the medium of reports which carry all the weight of grades.