THE DOCTOR PACKS HIS BAG

The tendered resignation of Professor Burbank from the chairmanship of the Department of Economics will cause regret not only among his large body of personal friends, but among the members of the University as a whole. The retirement of such an able administrator from the helm of the largest department in college leaves the department adrift at an especially crucial moment. Yet one cannot help but admire his sparkling career in such a responsible position and feel that his relief from duty is well deserved.

Perhaps Professor Burbank's outstanding contribution to the University was the work that he did under President Lowell in helping to create the tutorial system. This bold step toward personalizing education, so deeply needed here at Harvard, has given American colleges a standard, an example of which the University may well be proud. With large lecture courses broadening the breach between teacher and student, the tutorial system has done must to restore a better relationship between them. Throughout its infancy, riddled with children's diseases of any new system, the tutorial system has always found Professor Burbank an able pediatrician. The result is that the Department of Economics has one of the best tutorial staffs in the College.

Professor Burbank's resignation may imply merely that he has tired of the stress of administration and wishes to retire to more scholastic activities. Yet, following so closely on the heels of the recent purge of "middle group" men, those who bear the brunt of tutorial activities, the resignation has rather disquieting implications. Now, more than at any time i nits career, the tutorial system needs strong friends, able doctors who can pull the system out of its recent attack of budgetosis. Yet Professor Burbank has packed up his bag and closed his connection with the case. Does this move herald some gloomy days for the tutorial system ahead?