Letters to the Editor

Spanning the Great Divide F. W. J. Hemmings

The Wolienden Debate

Jeremy Hardie, R. B. Browning, George Richards, R. L. Archdale, Geofirey Gorer

Consumer Reports Caspar Brook 'What About the Opium War?' George Edinger.

Godfrey Hodgson

The Church of England and Divorce

Canon F. J. Shirley

Vacuum Flasks L. Leslie-Smith

SPANNING THE GREAT DIVIDE

SIR,—Professor Flew would probably be disappointed if his enthusiastic defence of the Keele experiment failed to evoke some comment, and surprised if some of this comment was less than sympathetic.

In one respect Keele is the object of the envy of most other provincial universities in England. It is permitted to retain its undergraduates for four years. It is thereby doubly privileged: its new graduates /cave its portals maturer by one year than the pro- ducts of Redbrick as a whole; and it can find time for the admirable Foundation Year which (with varia- tions) would be included in the programme Of every modern university if four-year courses became the 'normal practice. It is to be feared, however, that for many years to come Keele will continue to enjoy this privilege alone. To extend it would mean a steep rise in the contributions of the Treasury and local educa- tion authorities to students' maintenance; increased annual grants to the universities to permit the neces- sary expansion of staff; and:even greater congestion in the already overcrowded existing universities.

The first criticism one may offer of Professor Flew's presentation of the Keele system is that he makes it appear more `different' than it really is. It is by no means the only attempt that has been made in recent years to 'span the great divide.' Universities seldom find trumpeters .outside their own walls; it is there- fore bound to devolve on a member of Leicester University to point out that undergraduates here reading for the General degree (an Honours course, may I stress) are obliged to study at least one subject, for at least one year, that they will not normally have studied in the Sixth Form. The combinations English- Philosophy. History-Geography, Chemistry-Eco- momics, which Professor Flew cites, are. I dare say, to be encountered as commonly at Leicester as at Keele. It is only fair to add, however, that the academic

body which framed the Leicester General-Degree regulations were not improbably influenced by the precedent and example of Keck.

My second criticism is. aimed less at Professor Flew's exposition than at the underlying philosophy

that led to the establishment of the university he serves. To the outsider it is bound to appear that Keele offers less freedom, rather than more, to the

school-leaver. Can it, after all, be denied that certain intelligent youngsters, at the age of eighteen or nine- teen, have already developed an overriding interest in one traditional subject, belt Physics or French, and ask for nothing better than to be allowed to de- vote-the three years that lie ahead of them to a more intensive study of the branch of knowledge to which they feel drawn? A truly liberal university will not set out to frustrate this Section of its freshmen, and it is to be hoped that the new university to be estab- lished at Brighton will cater both for the student with 'a special bent and for the student more anxious to roam in foreign fields; always with the essential pro- viso that neither type of student receives preferential treatment: the possibility of earning Honours de- grees in both 'General' and 'Special' courses is one way of guaranteeing this kind of equality.

Professor Flew devotes only one short paragraph to the special feature of Keele that arouses most ad- miration or dismay in the breasts of other dons; de- pending on how crusty they have grown : this is the fact that, living together on a fairly small campus, some miles frOm the nearest large town, staff and students are, during term, perpetually thrown together. This feature can hardly be imitated at Brighton. Is there a case for establishing new universities on the Yorkshire moors or in the New Forest?—Yours faithfully,