Invitation to Living

"We are not interested in producing well-rounded men, but men with sharp, abrasive edges--rebels with clear minds and uncowed consciences, critics of society, not adjusters to it." The words would have a stirring ring coming from any educator, but they take on added meaning coming from the dean of faculty of a new public college spun off by big (20,000 students) Michigan State University, long known as an "ag and tech" institution. Last week, at the opening of the new college at Oakland, 60 miles east of M.S.U.'s main East Lansing campus, crewcut Dean Robert Hoopes, 39, onetime Marine Corps aviator, laid out his goal: to teach the art of living as well as pure knowledge. Said he to M.S.U.Oakland's first 500 students (all freshmen): "What is success? What is good? What do I want? Where am I going? You are in college to seek answers to those questions, and the first thing to discover is that there are no pat answers."

Nucleus of a Dream. Michigan State hopes to get to the goal by developing a top-drawer liberal arts college to match its excellent technical schools. Oakland has the plant and the men for a good start. Most of the sweeping 2,000-acre campus was given to M.S.U. two years ago by the widow of Auto Tycoon John Dodge and her husband, Lumberman Alfred G. Wilson. Value of the land and the 125-room Wilson mansion: about $15 million. When the Wilsons added another $2,000,000 to the gift, astute M.S.U. President John Hannah appointed Vice President Durward B. Varner, 42, as chancellor and gave him the job of turning Oakland into a dream college. Varner recruited 25 of the nation's best young teachers (average age: 33) as the nucleus of his faculty; almost all are Ph.D.s v. an average of 30% in other colleges. He managed to pry $670,-ooo out of the money-strapped Michigan legislature to pay the first year's salaries and maintenance, and with help from some of the country's top scholars laid out a challenging curriculum.

The college will shun short-term specialization, emphasize principles that endure through technological changes. Oakland will offer degrees in only four fields: liberal arts, engineering, business, teaching. Every student will devote half his time to humanities, spend a full year studying the Far East, Middle East, Africa and Latin America. Engineers must master one foreign language, preferably Russian, and all seniors will take a "great issues" course together.

Oakland's first students (60% in the top quarter of their high school classes) may find the experience a bit prickly. All must live off campus; no dormitories have yet been built. The school will have no fraternities, sororities, ROTC or remedial courses. The only athletics will be voluntary and for fun.

Independent Study. Mental effort is another matter. Says Dean Hoopes, sometime English teacher at Harvard, Yale and Stanford: "To a degree probably unmatched anywhere in this country, the students will find themselves responsible for their own education through independent study. Our aim is to render the professor dispensable at the earliest possible moment. Our university is a place of the mind, and the mind is an activity, not a repository. In this spirit we invite students to come and learn with us."

Oakland is sure to have plenty of takers. M.S.U. is growing so fast that enrollment will double to 44,000 students by 1970, and the new college expects to have at least 10,000 of them.

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