Professor Mile's Advice.

"I have much pleasure in welcoming to Victoria University College the new students of 1937. Your first aim. without doubt, is to equip yourselves for your chosen profession. As most of you come directly from school, a few words about the differences between School and University may be of use. At school you probably studied five or six subject and had your work set and supervised at very frequent intervals. At the university you will be studying two or three subjects much more intensely than at school; and although there may be a weekly exercise and three or four short tests in the course of the session you will have very much greater freedom in organising your work. I would advise you very strongly to keep up to the work covered in lectures. It is a disheartening experience to go through the session only half understanding the lectures. It is very difficult for a university teacher to be in anything like such close contact with first year students as a school teacher is with his pupils, but I do assure you most sincerely that the members of the staff are glad when their students have recourse to them in their difficulties. In particular, as Chairman of the Professorial Board, I want every student to feel free to approach me for advice.

"A university worthy of the name is something more than a professional school. Whether you are a student of Arts, Science, Law, or Commerce, I hope you will take some part in the wider social life of the College.

"In these days of rapid change it behoves us all to have opinions about the great problems of human nature and of society; let us by reading and by discussion see that such opinions are reasoned ones. We are fortunate in having at Victoria College an admirable library; to make the best use of a library requires training, do not therefore hesitate to seek the guidance of the librarian and his staff. There is a place for browsing and desultory reading, but I take it that you will generally read with a definite purpose. I have myself found it a sound principle, when I really wanted to gain knowledge, to read the big books on a subject. Having done this, by all means read short brilliant sketches of aspects of the subject. To confine one's reading to the latter is rather like making a dinner of savouries. When you have settled down here and understand the New Zealand University System, you might find it interesting to read Newman's "Idea of a University" and Flexner's "Universities: American, English, and German."

"In conclusion, I cannot wish you a better fate than that, when you have finished your three or four years at Victoria College, you may be able to look back at them with the same pleasure as I do at my four years at Knox College and Otago University."

President Wild Speaks.

"The authorities behind our education system require the passing of examinations as the sine qua non of our future careers. They therefore provide us in this College with a building to work in, degrees to work for, professors to lecture to us, and fees to pay. It is left to the individual to do the work. Whether he gets academic distinction or academic annihilation is a matter for him. If we don't work no one will make us— the professors are paid notwithstanding. The student must be his own taskmaster.

"In the same breath the same authorities tell us that man cannot live by examinations alone. A balance of interests, we are told, is essential. This we know to be true, and this, we also know, we must provide ourselves. The Student's Association represents our attempt to provide that balance of interests in this College. Its job is hard because many of us are at Training College or in offices, and only the few are students pure and simple. In these circumstances the tendency is for the College to become a degree factory or a night school and it is this tendency that the live student body is forever organising itself to fight.

"What interests does the Students' Association provide? In all there are 29 clubs and societies, each of which urges the fresher to join its ranks. Every ordinary sport is provided for. If yours is not an ordinary sport it is a simple matter to form a new club. It is unpardonable for the university student to join an outside club. Intellectual pursuits are represented by 15 societies ranging through interests scientific, historical, policical and religious. Some of these clubs will be found lethargic or dying but whether or not the present officers are slacking there is always room for action and enthusiasm.

"This is a democratic place. Because he is a newcomer the fresher should not imagine that he must keep out of things. Quite the contrary. Seniority counts for little here and ten years difference in age leaves us on the same level as students. The fresher's only disadvantage is that he cannot re-present in this year's Tournament and his vote is worthless (though his voice is not) until after the Annual Meeting.

"Action is the only demand the Association makes of its members. New students who are active will find here opportunities and enjoyment to be grasped with both hands."