Brown University - Liber Brunensis Yearbook (Providence, RI)

Page 33 text:

RESEARCH is the primary interest of Dr. George H. Borts, professor of economics. From his undergraduate con- cern for the causes of the Great Depression, Professor Borts' attention has shifted over a variety of subjects, arriving at his present specialty of economic growth models. A grad- uate of Columbia University with a master's and doctorate from the University of Chicago, Dr. Borts taught at the Illinois Institute of Technology and was a research assis- tant at the University of Chicago prior to his arrival at Brown in 1950. His progress in research was complemented by his pedagogic elevations to associate professor in 1955 and full professor in 1960, On leave from Brown in 1955 as an associate with the National Bureau of Economic Re- search, he established for the first time the relationship be- tween cyclical variations and the regional growth character- istics. A large Ford Foundation grant enabled him to join other members of the economics department in a three year study of economic maturity as it applies to regional eco- nomic development in the United States. In 1960 Professor Borts also received a Ford Faculty Research Grant to investi- gate depressed areas in Great Britain. Recently he acted as a consultant to the governments of Alberta and Manitoba concerning railway cost functions, while in Rhode Island, he has advised various business groups as a member of the College Community Research Program. Through his in- termediate courses and his graduate course on economic theory, the wealth of Professor Borts' research and exper- ience is available to students, exemplifying what he consi- ders a great advantage at Brown - the availability of origin- al knowledge, attributable to the fact that the many excel- lent faculty members teach as well as engage themselves in research. Dr. Borts considers present economic theory a much more sophisticated and intellectually demanding dis- cipline than that of twenty years ago and maintains that the contemporary Brown student is a great improvement over recent graduates, having more intellectual interest and a greater willingness to experiment in careers. As a result, Professor Borts is interested in organizing a five year mast- er's program. IN ARNOLD LABORATORY, Mr. Seymour Lederberg, Associate Professor of Biology, studies various aspects of the structure and function of bac- teria. Bacteria illustrate in miniature general prob- lems which occur throughout the animal kingdom, he explains; and in his bacteriology courses he teaches students the value of bacteria as experimental tools for research. In both courses he emphasizes the importance of laboratory work, for he knows from personal ex- perience that this field becomes more exciting as the student acquires practical knowledge. Associate Professor Lederberg decided to become a bacteriologist as a result of a parttime job in the laboratory of a bacterial geneticist. Until he became involved in bacteriology, his many interests seemed equally alluring and even now he studies chemistry, archeology, and languages in his leisure time. Mr. Lederberg received his B.S. degree with honors in chemistry from Cornell University and completed his Ph.D. in bacteriology with a minor in physical chem- istry at the University of Illinois. As a post-doctoral fellow and an Assistant Professor of Biology at the University of California, Berkeley, he conducted re- search in the regulation of protein synthesis in protoza. At present, he is studying this process in bacteria which have been infected by viruses, and has publish- ed several papers on his results. When he describes his work, he communicates his enthusiasm for research, which he defines as asking a meaningful experimental question and then following your question with a lot of drudgery. Somehow, as Mr. Lederberg tells about it, drudgerv sounds exciting, and as one student was heard to remark, He could even make an English major want to be a bacteriologist.

Page 32 text:

u ' a. e L L - u ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR of Psychology Frances Louise Clayton first came in contact with Brown in 1950 as a candidate for the M.A. degree. A native of Elizabethtown, Illinois, she received her A.B. degree from Indiana University in 1949. Continuing her edu- cation at the University of Minnesota, Miss Clayton was granted her Ph.D. in 1954. She taught there for one year before becoming a member of Brown's faculty. Originally attracted to college teaching because col- lege could provide her with the necessary facilities for psvchological research, Miss Clayton soon found that the student-teacher contact was helpful to her research as well as personally rewarding. Miss Clayton's particular interest is animal behavior, especially the study of learned rewards. On her sabbatical leave next year she will conduct research in child psychology to discover whether the idea of learned rewards applies to children. In particular, she feels that the tactile as well as the basic rewards of food and water may be factors affecting a child's learning. A further interest of Miss Clavton's lies in writing programmed instruction books, a vital part of machine teaching. This relatively new method of teaching re- quires the student to fill blank spaces in a series of statements. The advantage is that the machine gives the student the correct answer after he has answered it. Faulty ideas are thereby prevented from forming and the student's knowledge is increased with each suc- cessive statement.

Page 34 text:

AFTER ORGANIZING the Mellotones Orchestra at the request of a Greenwich Connecticut radio station, Mr. Erich Kunzel, in his junior year of high school, began leading them on the radio as well as conducting the Greenwich High School Orchestra. In the summers of 1952 and 1953 he directed the Summer Youth Music Festival of Old Greenwich, conducting operettas and opera. Mr. Kunzel is an alumnus of Dartmouth College, graduating in 1957 with Distinction in Music. While at college, he was President and Student Director of the Fresh- man Glee Club and member and piano soloist of the Dartmouth Glee Club, as well as the Assistant Director of the Dartmouth Marching and Symphonic Bands. During the summers of 1956, 1958, and 1959, he studied at the Domaine School of Conduct- ing under Pierre Monteaux and as part of his study conducted Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and Mozart's Jupiter Symphony with the Hancock Symphony Orchestra. In 1957 he conducted the Santa Fe Opera Company in its premiere season. That fall and in 1958, he did graduate work at Harvard University and in June of 1960 he received his Master's degree from Brown. Since he began post-graduate work at Brown in 1958, Mr. Kunzel has been a member of the faculty of the Department of Music and Director of the Glee Club. He has directed the Club on all of its extended cross-country tours and has often added to its successes by joining in some of the novelty numbers him- self, as well as by tossing-in occasional ad libs and unexpected gestures. One critic was so overwhelmed by one of the selections that he wrote: Dry Bones' . . . was so amazing . . . I wish I had had a cow bell in order to join in the fun. In addition to his classes and to his directing to Brown Glee Club, Mr. Kun- zel also directs the Pembroke College Glee Club and the Car- mina Club of Pembroke. He has published an arrangement of Prelude to Western Star and several editions of pieces of Nineteenth Century male chorus which heretofore have not been available and has plans for completing one such work each year. 30