Costly Gen. Ed. Course is Cancelled

Cost overruns in the production of a sourcebook have forced the cancellation of a General Education class slated to be held this semester, the head section leader in the course said yesterday.

The course, General Education 174, "Coping with International Conflict," was to be taught by Professor of Law Roger D. Fisher and Lecturer on Law Bruce M. Patton.

The sourcebook, which was to be several hundred pages in length, was comprised of hundreds of articles from newspapers, magazines and books. Because most of these selections were copyrighted, each author charged a small fee for the use of their material.

The resulting sourcebook would have been an unfair cost to impose on the students in the class, said Wayne Davis, head section leader. Davis said that the expected enrollment of 60 to 100 students might have dropped as a result of the price, which would have been more than a $100.

The decision to cancel the course was made in late January after the fees began to come in.

But Davis said that "this is really a story with no villains. Everybody charged fees that were each relatively small, but the costs just kept on growing since we were using so many articles."

Davis said that in other courses which print costly sourcebooks, the copyright costs are spread out among the large number of students, as in Social Analysis 10.

Organizers may try to offer the course next year if they can publish the sourcebook commercially, a move which would defray costs.