Honors in General Studies

The current requirements for a degree with Honors in General Studies differ importantly from those that were in force until February of 1961. Dean Monro will discuss the General Studies degree at a meeting of the Faculty this afternoon, and his comments ought to provide the first indication of whether or not the new system is working out as it should.

Before 1961, a student could not ask for the General Studies Honors degree without the formal approval of his department. Now, this endorsement is unnecessary, and in deciding whether to award the cum laude in General Studies, the University places no particular emphasis on the student's performance in his field of concentration. The C.L.G.S. is conferred solely on the basis of how many honors grades a student has received.

People favored this change for several different reasons, not the least of which was a feeling that if an honors-calibre student did not wish to commit himself to a single discipline to the extent of writing a thesis in it, there was an inconsistency in allowing the representatives of that discipline to pass judgment on the student's candidacy for an Honors degree. The cum in General Studies was thought to lie outside the province of the departments, and therefore it seemed only natural that the degree applications should be processed solely in the offices of the College.

On a more practical level, the Faculty decided that since the departments were not to have anything to do with the C.L.G.S., there should be no discrepancy between the C.L.G.S. requirements imposed upon students concentrating in different fields. A large discrepancy existed at the time of the 1961 revision: some departments would recommend students for the cum in General Studies quite readily; others would give the needed formal approval only with great reluctance.

For example, under the old system almost as many English concentrators received Honors degrees in General Studies as received the standard cum laude in English Literature. Departmental approval was automatic for any senior receiving a mark of 80 or higher on the non-Honors general examination. In Government, on the other hand, it was almost impossible for a student to get his department's endorsement; the only regular exceptions were made for seniors who had been unable to write a thesis because of illness.

Besides dissociating the C.L.G.S. from the departments and standardizing its requirements, the Faculty members who favored changing it also wished to insure that the C.L.G.S. provision would fit into a larger, more far-ranging scheme designed to reshape Harvard's tutorial and Honors programs. At the same time as the Faculty approved the General Studies revision, it also passed a motion which attempted to convert the distinction between Honors and non-Honors Programs into a distinction between programs with, and without, tutorial instruction. The important point was that either the tutorial, or the non-tutorial program could lead to an Honors degree--the tutorial program by way of departmental recognition given for a competent senior thesis, and the non-tutorial program, by way of the cum laude in General Studies.

If this motion, more familiarly known as the Gill plan, has had any effect other than an extensive rewording of Harvard's tutorial legislation, more students should be receiving General Studies degrees in fields which (like Government) had previously seen the senior thesis as the only way to an Honors degree. But is this really happening? This is the sort of question which Dean Monro's comments this afternoon can help answer.