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The social scientists, who for years have gone out from the colleges to study various cultures, have now redirected their studies toward the colleges in order to investigate the social processes occurring on the campuses and to attempt to understand the processes of learning and development that take place there. The present symposium offers studies from various universities; they range from theoretical and philosophical to proved and practical, and concern acceptance as well as nonacceptance of the importance of mental health to education. An interesting innovation is to interpose parts of the discussion in the body of the paper. In general, the papers are of high caliber, recommended for college psychiatrists, faculty, and administrators who deal directly with mental health. The practicing analyst may find it of less interest.
Nevitt Sanford of Vassar emphasizes the need to help the student commit himself to the educational process in its broadest sense so as to increase the outlets available for his impulses, such as can be expressed through poetry, art, and literature, and through creativity in the sciences. Young people must be taught how to deal increasingly with life via symbols rather than primarily by direct action or sensations. He also suggests that development of certain processes of learning can be even more important than the specific content of the learning itself; for example, the experience of pursuing some basic truth in an individual project uses resources that can become firmly integrated within the student's personality and remain active long after the factual details may be dimmed or forgotten. In the freshman year a core curriculum should be offered with emphasis on developing a community of knowledge but in later years independent work must be done to insure good balance. Also the freshman must be won over to the basic concept of the intellectual enterprise at hand; his imagination must be captured and he must develop a sense of what i