That Good Advice

Students had no seeming objection to absorbing some pood advice last Tuesday evening, and were assured that it would be of more practical use than the University welcome of the previous evening.

Professor Somerset gave lucid and entertaining advice on "Methods of Study": it was obviously, as he said, the result of his own experience.

With the analogy that an actor must understand the part he is acting, Professor stressed that the student should realise the role he must fulfil as a student and first of all, despite many "threats" to the contrary, that he was not left entirely to his own fate when he arrived: many people were prepared to be interested in him. The difference was between the school and university community.

The university had no hierarchy but was a community entirely concerned in the search for truth, and therefore offering a considerable intellectual community—and the Student Union will eventually provide the social community.

The student therefore has a responsibility to discuss his problems and ideas with his teachers, but Professor did not mention the difficulties concomitant with the staff shortage and very large classes. Three aims were set down for the student: to keep an open mind; to set and maintain standards of accuracy and precision (a 50% pass mark is not sufficient for 100% accuracy in knowledge); to gain full appreciation of a subject. The teacher-pupil relationship in school was gradually supplanted by a pupil-subject relationship, and the subject becomes the discipline.