Astronomy Revises Course Offerings; Physics Will Give Seminar to Seniors

Members of the Physics Department will offer an informal seminar next spring which may later be expanded into a tutorial for credit.

Gerald Holton, professor of Physics, is organizing the seminar at the request of several Winthrop and Dunster House undergraduates in the department. Enrollment will initially be limited to seniors in those two Houses, or at Radcliffe. Other students, however, will be admitted if there are openings.

The new course Holton said, grew out of a suggestion by James T. Dakin '67. The Department now offers individual instruction in Physics 90, Dakin said yesterday, but there is still a need for discussion meetings to promote an exchange of ideas between professors and students.

When he proposed such meetings a month ago, Dakin added, faculty members "jumped at the idea." Yesterday, eight undergraduates and four professors met to plan the seminar.

The specific topics to be discussed have not yet been determined. Dakin said, but the group is considering a careful examination of five or six important scientific papers. Holton yesterday mentioned a study on nuclear physics by Enrico Fermi and a paper on relativity by Albert Einstein as possible topics.

If the seminar proves successful, Holton said, he may recommend that it be offered for credit in later years. The seminar would be given as a group tutorial, but it has not yet been decided whether it would be for juniors, seniors, or both.

Faculty Are Responsive

The demands of existing courses could make it difficult for faculty members to add such an offering to their schedules, but so far they have shown a "strong responsiveness" to the idea, he said. He anticipates no other serious problems.

As it is now planned, the seminar will be open to ten seniors concentrating in Physics or Chemistry and Physics. They must already have taken Physics 243. "Introduction to Quantum Theory," which is normally open to juniors and seniors in the department.

Although the schedule for the seminar is not complete. Holton envisions meetings over dinner every other week.