English

The English Club

For all thsoe who haven't heard the news, the English Club has been transformed into a staff/student committee.

Representatives were called from each tutorial of all the English Literature courses being held at the moment, and three reasonably successful meetings were held.

At each meeting it was decided that the representatives would be back to their tuts and ask for criticism, comments and proposals for change in courses. After all, students reaction is the only test of success of a course.

We discussed the problems of an unrealistic workload, and the examing of 1st ½ year courses. Unfortunatley there are no simple answers, but that doesn't mean the problem should be ignored. And we should be especially careful that 'solutions' don't simply camoflague the problem. For example we could have more tuts to cope with the reading list, but just adds to the problem as the workload is further increased and even less time is allocated to reading.

Positive changes discussed were the possibility of a questionnaire assessing lecturers and different forms of exams such as open-book (if open-book exams were adopted some training should be given in how to use them) and take-home exams. I think take-home exams particularly deserve a lot of consideration.

With students enthusiasm the English Club is seen as a continuing body that will provide a focus for such discussion of practical alternatives to problems faced by lecturers and students. An equally important function will be a social centre for the English Department.

It was felt much more stress should be laid on the creative work that many people are doing, and the club could be a centre for this.