General Exam Squeeze

More than 150 seniors will have to write the most important exams they meet in College the day after Chirstmas vacation winds up. These are the General Examinations, qualifying seniors, graduating at mid-years, for their degrees. The College's assignment of the tests to the first week following a long holiday is going to cut things very fine for February graduates.

The big division of History Government, and Economics was mainly responsible for the selection of January 3 aa the day starting Generals. Since this division gives the largest number of the exams, it wants as much time as possible for grading. It has, therefore, traditionally been given first call on a date. As one Economics official stated: "We always have our Generals on the first two days of reading period, and we don't see any reason why we should change."

The important factor in setting the General Examination schedule has been the necessity for getting grades worked out in time for the mid-January meetings of the Faculty, Board of Overseers, and the Corporation, which note degrees and honors to the graduating students. These meetings were orginally slated for around January 15, which some-what cramped the time allotted for correcting the Generals; History, Government, and Economics were undoubtedly justified in picking an early date under these conditions. But now the three all-important meetings have been pushed up towards the end of the month.

The result is that there is now no legitimate reason for crowding Generals right on top of vacation. The whole string of exams for all departments could be moved ahead four or five days, and still leave plenty of time for the subsequent paper work. The fact that examination schedules have already been posted will hardly bother hard-pressed seniors. Exams which are at the printers can have their date-lines changed. The only possible argument against switching the schedule is the standard one that students should keep up with their studies and avoid cramming before a test. In this case things just don't work out that way; even a simple review for Generals will require far more than one day. And with the present set-up a lot of seniors are going to ring in the early hours of New Year's morning with nothing more than a book.