Grinnell College - Cyclone Yearbook (Grinnell, IA)

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Eleanore Spiegel Dr. Howard Burkle, philosophy and religion

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Prologue- Consult the proper polls of academic prominence and you find Grinnell College among the nation's top ten or twenty small co-educational liberal arts schools. Talk about Grinnell with your neighbor in Cleveland and you're likely to hear, Oh, that's the school in Ithaca, isn't it? Somehow, Grinnell doesn't register with most people as a Brain School. Still, Grinnell has a con- siderable academic reputation with Higher Educators. The conclusion must be that Grinnell is academic- ally able, but is neither pedantic nor desirous of a Harvard reputation. Professors at Grinnell teach without fear of perishing, while Grinnell students who maintain a respectable grade point average can expect to get into the Big Name graduate schools along with Harvard grads. Helping to produce this capable, if largely un- recognized, academic community is everything from the school's isolation to its cosmopolitan student body, from a favorable 1:12 faculty-student ratio to an equally favorable $16.6 million endowment. Despite occasional debates about matters such as the school's educational philosophy, Grinnell usually gets its academic iob done. Nearly two-thirds of her recent graduates have continued their educations. The academic atmosphere at Grinnell continued to evolve, albeit unspectacularly, in the year 1965- 66. A minor umutation of possible future signifi- cance gained a foothold early in the second semes- ter when approval was given to a limited credit-fail grading system. The Grinnell speciolty- a book-oriented educa- tion - was fortunately not the limit of concern for everyone in the college community. To supplement their academic endeavors, a significant minority of Grinnell students went about obtaining some knowledge of the practical. This real world aspect of the liberal arts concept extended beyond Dr. Burkle and Art Arnold the college's small campus and reached the town of Grinnell with programs to help the town's under- privileged children, spread to Iowa's capital with the Des Moines poverty proiect, and even got as far as Washington, DC, with a Grinnell contingent for the November peace march protesting the Viet- nam war. On campus, concern with practical matters showed up in the Vietnam teach-ins, the notorious picketing of a CIA recruiter, and a successful stu- dent battle with the administration to prevent a new parking lot from destroying the natural grandeur between the library and the women's dorms. Strangely, the concerned students did not be- come involved with the perennial issue of college social regulations. Due largely to a student govern- ment leadership dedicated to a year of status quo, social rules created little furor. Or perhaps there was no need to change rules that could be so easily ignored. Culture - Grinnell style - had a good year, with play after play, art exhibit after art exhibit, rock and roll dance after rock and roll dance. The only cultural failures were the varsity teams, which sported a mediocre year. Concentrated culture-including concerts, sym- posia, a formal dance, and a photography exhibit - cluttered the inaugural weekend in April as Glenn Leggett got a formal okay to continue his haIf-year reign as Grinnell's eighth president. The academic year of 1965-66 was, in most respects, iust another academic year at Grinnell College. There was little academic innovation and little concern for the outside world. The develop- ment of an individual social consciousness was not viewed as a very serious matter by a faculty and administration who generally had little social con- sciousness of their own.

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Grinnell College is isolated by many square miles of highly productive farmland. The countryside isn't all flat and monotonous - there are gentle hills, even occasional stands of trees along small but persisfent streams. Even the farm buildings and corn fields have an unreal, appealing qualify. Venture along the railroad tracks and farm roads into the isolation surrounding Grinnell and you can appreciate Iowa's peculiar grandeur. Grinnell is surrounded by feed grain and cattle farms.