The gamecock. (Columbia, S.C.) 1908-2006, March 20, 1972, Image 1

Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page. It is also available as plain text as well as XML.

*4AW Seals an Stephanie Hammonds (c Carolina Easter Seals Childr4 with Ricky Allen (left) and J Kappa Delta sorority. All si campus will hit the streets to of the Easter Seal drive. Masters in not abund4 By HOLLY GATLING Staff Writer In the past seven years, only one person has received a master's degree from USC's theatre department. Russell Green, theatie director said, "We have 15 active graduate students and seven in the stages of getting their degree." A master's program was in stituted in 1965 when Green became the director and he said, "Many students failed to get their master's because of money or because they had to work and had to put it off." Bob Treacy, who teaches theatre at the regional campus in Salkehatchie attributes his slowness in getting a degree to procrastination. "My thesis was approved and I have taken all the required courses. Mr. Green wanted me to write an introduction to my thesis but I've kept putting it off." He said, however, he will have his degree in June. Another graduate student, who asked not to be identified, said he has been in theatre for a number of years, "and I've never seen anything so screwed up." He said the attitude of the department is "the show's the thing" and that students are "used and bled" without their experience being an academic or teaching one. "I'm sure a lot of students didn't deserve to get degrees," he said, "but the whole program is too much production oriented." He said students rehearsed until 2 or 3 a.m. for one show after another, "and unless a person is extremely self-disciplined he falls behind." He said also that he felt a theatre program should be educational rather than have the students be given certain jobs that had no academic value. The GAMECOCK contacted a former USC theatre professor, Dr. Conrad Bishop in Milwaukee, who now has a New York based touring company. Bishop has his Ph.D in . It d smiles - " enter), one of five South ?n, shows an optimistic smile knnette Eckard, members of )rorities and fraternities on morrow collecting in support theater mt here theatre and said The master's program at USC "was as good as could be offered." He said he and his wife Linda enjoyed working there; "the theatre group was small and offered a cohesive at mosphere. I left because I found a better job." Bishop agrees with Green that money and work tend to hinder a person getting a master's degree in theatre. A member of the theatre department, who also asked not to be identified, said the theatre program is very limited because the size of the faculty is small. One reason the program is not strong is people like the Bishops keep leaving. Another attack on the theatre department is animosity among the faculty. The unidentified graduate student said, "The faculty over there all hate each other and the students are pressured to take sides." Treacy, however dismissed this and similar charges as "petty jealousy." He said, "Things get pretty tense during a show and a lot of people are at each other's throats. These charges sound to me as if someone Is not over his wounds from a show."~ Green said plans are being made to institute a Master of Fine Arts. "We're hoping to propose an M.A.T. and a B.F.A." Green said. The graduate student said, "It's awfully hard to prove anything. I think It's a crying shame that the University is not doing some checking on Its own to find out why so few degrees have been received." See all candidate and polling listings on page 6. GAMECC K VOL. LXII - NO. 70 University of South Carolina, Columbia, S. C. 29208 Monday, March 20, 1972 General Studies Bachelors deg By FRAN ZUPAN Staff Writer Two proposals for a four-year degree program in the College of General Studies will be discussed at the next meeting of the Faculty Senate April 5. A vote on the proposals is slated for the May 3 meeting. Under a proposal made by the Curriculum and New Courses Committee of the Senate, a student seeking a Bachelor of General Studies would have no requit-ed courses but could determine his own 120-hour degree program in consultation with an administrative staff member from the College of General Studies and two faculty members from other colleges or schools. An alternative proposal, made by an ad hoc committee of 11 faculty members, would provide for a larger faculty-student group to decide whether the degree should be unstructured or structured, and if structured to make curriculum recommendations to the Curriculum and New Courses Committee. Spokesmen for both committees say they hope the groups can agree on a measure. Both proposals would allow students to transfer to USC from community colleges and special purposes institutions such as technical colleges ideally without losing any credit. Associate degrees, now offered by the College of General Studies, would be continued under both proposals. The original proposal.made by the Curriculum and New Courses Committee grew out of the proposal for an experimental college, ex-officio committee member and Vice Provost John Guilds said. "This is almost identical with the proposal for an experimental college referred to us by President (Tom) Jones,"he said, "but this is better because the College of General Studies already exists." Guilds said under this proposal students could specialize or generalize without the interference of requirements. He said, however, that refinements in the proposal are still being made. Students would probably not have complete freedom to choose their advisors, he said. The faculty or department would have to designate which faculty members could serve as advisors, he explained: "It would not just be a student picking his favorite prof." What the ad hoc committee's proposal does is to divide the Curriculum and New Courses Com mittee's proposal into two subparts, Dr. Richard A. Kasschau of the Department of Psychology said. He and "six or eight others" formed the committee in mid-January to "look at innovative education and how it might best be accomplished," he said. "We tried to get with them (the Curriculum and New Courses Committee) before the March meeting, but we really didn't have our proposal ready until Student Night functions to as By LARRY EVANS campus unrest ar Staff Writer communication sh In conjunction with .the arise," he said. University Police the 13-man Student Night Patrol covers the Two groups of campus as a function of Student with radios and f Government. dressed in plain cdo Ben Feldman, Director of campus from 7 p.ni Student Government Security, group patrols south said, "Our basic task is not a police and the other pa function per so. Our main concern Green Street. Is to help the student whenever possible. With spring coming up, The patrols look we hope to add an extra patrol to unusual, such as soi the force.". around a womei "Presently the student division something unusual is working on a student feedback immediately call system to lessen the r.hnne af police station, whic ,ree proposed then," he explained. The only major difference in the ad hoc proposal for a general studies's bachelors degree and the Curriculum and New Courses idea is in the im plementation. The ad hoc group would have a faculty member from each college with an undergraduate degree program and four students selected by the Student Faculty Liaison Committee sit on a com mittee chaired by the Dean of the College of General Studies for the purpose of determining curriculum requirements for a bachelor of general studies degree. This would provide for faculty control over curriculum which is at stake, Kasschau said, "That's Dne of the few areas still within faculty control." Guilds, on the other hand, said he sees the two proposals as "really not very different." He said that either proposal would be satisfactory, but that the Curriculum and New Courses proposal is less cumbersome but still provides for "sufficient faculty control." The second division of the ad hoc committee's proposal would establish a Division for Experiments in Education at USC. This division would be an ad ministrative home for an increasing number of trans college programs such as Contemporary University and Opportunity Scholars, Kasschau said. In addition, an Advisory Council of 12 faculty members, three undergraduate students and one graduate student would screen experiments proposed by administrators, faculty, students and staff. The Advisory Council would decide whether a student should get academic credit for his work and whether an experiment's results could and should be applied at USC, Kasschau said. "For example, suppose a French teacher is also interested in art," he said. "This kind of program would allow him to teach an art course in French." Kasschau said a student who wanted to earn a 120 hour unstructured degree could do so under the Division for Experiments. He said the ad hoc com mittee's two recommendations offer as much as the Curriculum and New Courses proposal plus more because the Division for Experiments would allow administrators, faculty and staff as well as students to experiment. If either proposal for the general studies degree passes, it can be administered without further ap proval since the faculty has jurisdiction over curriculum, Kasschau said. However, the establish ment of a Division for Experiments in Education would involve the creation of a new division, and as such would have to be approved by President Jones, the Board of Trustees and the Higher Education Commission, he explained. Patrol list students id to facilitate car to the scene. The students on >uld this ever patrol do not get physically in volved. two, equipped lashlights, and Ben Feldman and Jack Burgess thes, patrol the direct the patrols. The students are to 1 a.m. One chosen through the work-study of Green Sreet program and work five nights trols north of during a two-week period. The patrols began two years ago for anything under Mike Spears' ad neone loitering ministration. The patrol has i's dorm. If helped to build a better wn s spotted, they derstanding between the students the campus and the University police, ac h dispatches a cording to Jack Burgess