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Salient. An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria College, Wellington, N.Z. Vol. 15, No. 1. March 5, 1952

By Sweater to Long Island

By Sweater to Long Island

Before studying in the United States. I had imagined (having seen, no doubt, the wrong films) that American college life was largely two all but contradictory things: a hectic social whirl cheer-leaders and co-eds in sweaters advertising Camels were the symbols and a sideline pursuit of earnest young capitalists; on the first rung of the ladder from smalltown apartment to Long Island mansion, and needing cultural consolidation. Not that these groups don't exist they do, about equally as far as I could see; but they did not set the dominant tone of college life.

Now, it seems to me that a lot of confusion is caused by the wide currency of the phrase "working your way through college". What the American usually means by this is paying your own way or part of it, while following a full-time programme of university studies. The work meant is part time and vacation work, and plenty of help is available at most colleges for students wishing to do this. Some students, no doubt, get their degrees like so many Vic students—through a slow piling up of unit after unit ("credits", they're called), gained in night class study.