The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 60, No. 1, Ed. 1 Friday, August 25, 1972 Page: 6 of 8
eight pages : ill. ; page 20 x 14 in.View a full description of this newspaper.
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
Hackerman welcomes, advises new Rice freshmen
by GARY BREWTON
President Norman Hacker-
man, stressed the development
of clear and logical thinking as
an important part of the col-
lege experience as he welcomed
new students with his Matricu-
lation Address Tuesday morn-
ing.
The assembly began as Dean
McEnany of Undergraduate
Studies introduced university
officials and the masters of the
residential colleges.
At the same gathering, fresh-
man and -transfer students were
introduced to the Honor Council
and the Student Association by
Gregg Young and Leighton
Head, respectively.
Dr. Hackerman emphasized
that the university does not
exist to build good character in
students, but rather to provide
the opportunity for each stu-
dent's educational and intel-
1 ectual fulfillment.
Here is the text of Hacker-
man's speech:
"I want to welcome you to the
campus. All of us wish each
of you well in what you set
f lit to do. 1 want you to know
that all of us know that you're
not quite certain what you're
going to do. Some of you will
finish what you started out
to do; many of you will finish
something you hadn't even
thought of when you got here.
That's one of the important
aspects of this place. 1 com-
mend to you a thoughtful con-
sideration of what both Mr.
Read said and Mr. Young said.
They said it very well.
Now before looking any fur-
ther into the aspect of the
constancy of your purpose and
the value of what you'll get off
this campus, 1 want to assure
you that all of us here recog-
nize that your change of site
and its consequent disruption
of ha'nts, that are already
pretty well established in your
.11'-18 years, requires adjust-
ment which is not always easy
i.o make. That's a fairly impor-
tant, although simple state-
ment. It is possible however to
adjust familiar patterns given
a little time and more important
given something of sufficient
interest with which to be occu-
pied. Here, that should be con-
centrated learning: from books;
from laboratories; from people,
faculty and your own peers;
and from your own focus
thought patterns. It must be
made clear to you however that
a university center is by no
means the only one where
learning occurs. It is not even
necessarily the best setting for
learning, for everyone. It is one
however. It's a go'od one and
it lias certain attributes which
should be useful to you, if
your interests and requirements
coincide sufficiently with ours.
Let's consider higher educa-
tion generally, briefly and then.
Rice University more specifi-
cally. As of April 1, 1950
(that's almost 22% years ago)
there were 110 million people
in the United States 25 years or
over. Of these 11% (12 million)
had 4 or more years of college;
52% had completed high school;
25% had done less than 1 year
of high school and 5% had less
than 5 years of schooling. Now
5%; sounds small but I want
you to recognize that's 6 mil-
lion people. However put in
another perspective, in 1950,
those who were 25 years old
or over had a median of 9.3
years of schooling. That means
roughly half the schooling
possible, with the mediaii being
between about t) years and say
20 years for those who take a
long time getting PhDs.
In 1960 that same 25 years
or older (different people flow
but 25 years or older) had a
10.6 median years of schooling,
and in 1970 it was 12.1 median
years of schooling. So you can
see the increase. Now in 1970,
this same date, April first,
of those in the age range
between 18 and 24, 73% had
completed high school. That
contrasts with 52% of the
group in front of them. So the
increase in the level of formal
education is really very clear.
somewhat forceably. Universi-
ties were found unsuitable (in
this area) both structurally
and because they could func-
tion as societal action agencies
only to the detriment of their
primary purpose. They are not
really being considered as ac-
tion agencies anymore except in
education. This has taken place
in the short space of 4 or 5
years. So their function has
changed quantitatively but not
too much qualitatively in the
1000 years they have been in
existence.
Now private universities
which started the whole sys-
tem of higher education have
. <■$<
It's effect would probably have
to be rated favorable, although
that's really not yet proved by
the way. (And I'm-not supposed
to say tliis being a professional
educator.) But the continued
raising of the level of formal
education as a social benefit is
still to be evaluated, as is the
same of an individual benefit
as far as these can be sepa-
rated. 1 would like very much
to leave with you the question
in your mind that you'll debate,
whether and how, education ctfn
be separated into its social and
its individual benefits. It's
really very important.
This brings colleges and uni-
versities into the picture. They
were originally and mainly for
those dedicated to scholarly
pursuits, and are still currently
one of the main sites of scholar-
ship. Universities however soon
expanded beyond scholarship
alone, early adding certain
learned professions and expand-
ing in this area with time as
more such appeared. (In other
words, more things became pro-
fessional and therefore became
eligible.) Universities also came
to recognize the fine and the
performing ai'ts as part of
man's learning. It may amaze
you that people didn't think
this was the case, at one time.
More recently the question of
the university as an operating
societal agency other than in
the field of education has risen,
tended to be less expansive.
Possibly this is so because they
have a less broad constituency
to answer to. This is both good
and bad. It's good if it elimi-
nates the high frequency oscil-
lations which follow broadly de-
bated public issues. That simply
says that there is a lot of emo-
tion charged into the things
we hear constantly on thp
radio, or read in the paper or
see on TV, and the debates
are not as effective as they
might be if they were less emo-
tional. So we're less subject to
that. On balance it is good if
they can act independently
without getting buried in tra-
dition, a difficult thing to ac-
complish. Therefore this says
private universities are likely
to have a narrower band of
objectives with the purpose of
doing these well. One, because
of the limited resources already
alluded to, but also two, be-
cause the more focused purpose
permits the proper set of people
to carry if off better.
At Rice we try to do this by
close faculty-student contact.
These are less than ideal but
sistently. We do it by the inter-
we strive for improvement, con-
action of undergraduate and
graduate education and I cer-
tainly hope you learn that. (I
certainly * hope it's true as a
matter of fact.) We do it by
peer learning, a real benefit of
the residential college system
that's available to most of
you. We do it by making clear
the importance of self-learning,
the book and the laboratory.
A study by Jacobs in 1957
and one by Feldman and New-
comb in 1959 suggests that ad-
justment to campus climate
cause most students to move
to similar views in societal and
intellectual matters, but also
concluded that these were
transient movements. In other
words the molding of character
is .not an effective function of
college.
I have a note here about the
monetary value of your degree.
You know at one time, people
got degrees because it was clear
that their life-time income
would be improved by the ac-
quisition of that degree. I do
not want to belabor the point
that that is a lot less true now
and may not even be the case
anymore and so the importance
of a degree to you is intrinsic.
It is not just what you can do
with it monetarily, but what it
does for you. The acquisition
of the every handsome piece of
parchment which most of you
will come to, simply indicates,
as Mr. Young put it, an ex-
posure of an open mind to open
surroundings with a consequent
gain for you. Some day if we
have more time, I'll talk to you
about the monetary value of
your degree in more detail.
So Rice has a focus purpose.
It can't serve all functions and
needs and must do only a
limited number of things well,
to be of any value. It has
chosen a few scholarly and pro-
fessional areas and will expand
beyond these only with great
care. Our college courses do
provide a means of exploration
and modest program beyond
those things we already have
on campus and can be valuable
as well as interesting.
I hope your needs and inter-
ests coincide with ours or close
enough to permit adjustment.
Rice can of course adapt some,
but not to an extent which may
be detrimental to what it be-
lieves it does best. What it
does best, by the way, is de-
termined by the broad univers-
ity constituency, but not by
each an equal pai't, of course.
You probably can adapt some,
but you should not do so to
an extent detrimental to your
own aims" and best interests.
That's a knotty area because
you may be uncertain as to
what your own aims and best
interests are. The point is that
universities have been casti-
gated for not being up to date,
but it is equally possible that
that should be turned around
and examined for what is meant
by relevant and whether these
are the proper places to leai'n to
live in the world. I think they're
proper places to learn, while
you learn to live in the world,
as do your colleagues who don't
go to college. What I'm saying
to you is that there isn't any
magic formula on this campus
or any other which will fit you
for living in the world. This
is indeed a learning center.
You are a large part self-
selected. Our contribution to
the selection process being
largely a vernier function. You
occupy a relatively narrow band
high in the intellectual spec-
trum. That means only that
you show evidence of a certain
type of capability. It does not
annoint you as being better or
even wiser. Highly intellectul
people are not necessarily wise.
That does not follow; it does
not follow necessarily. These
latter require demonstration on
their own and demonstration
continually and by you. The fact
of the narrow band however is
very important to you. It per-
mits a high level of subtlties
in presentation. This can be
frustrating to all of you if it's
too high, and boring to all of
you if it's too low. And this is
really a problem to the faculty
which is of the utmost impor-
tance. What I'm saying to you
is, that if you have a broad
spectrum group of people to
talk to, you can always interest
someone. If you have a narrow
spectrum group of people to
talk to and they're all of high
intellectual capacity, you have
to hit that narrow band or you
either make them fussy or put
them to sleep.
The problem for you is that
hitherto most of you were more
often on the bored than on the
struggle side. There is going
to be some shock on being sub-
jected more frequently than
you're used to, to concepts not
too quickly grasped. I hope all
of you weather the shock and
I'm sure that most of you will,
perhaps all of you.
That leaves the one last
point, the current tendency to
replace the work ethic by some
less puritanical value. You
know the work is good for you
concept. That's not fully ac-
cepted now, and that may be
(now I'm no historian) an
aspect of the history of human
drive which has been to reduce
the physical work necessary to
survive. The transfer of this
drive to mental effort is now
evident. I believe the machine
can replace man's muscle but
I don't believe that, understand-
ing of man and understanding
of nature will yield to superfi-
cial discussion. It will take
thorough, h a r d concentrated
thought in order to do that.
You should be sure to assess
regularly whether your time
and your effort are well utilized
in extracting value, for you.
My observation, by the way, is
that this is a very hard work-
ing community. I've never, in
a long history of education,
seen a library used as thor-
oughly and as effectively as it
is here, and that's a pretty
good indication.
Of course, working as I've
suggested is wearying. You
should indeed take advantage
of the relaxing jjeriods. All of
us here will help in providing
the means for leveling the
stress if you will let us; but
you'll have to be thoughtful,
with a minimal emotion about
yourself.
I've put into this bit of diffi-
cult to read material a number
of thoughts, which I've fooled
with over the last 25 years as
a matter of fact, and have de-
cided that sometime during the
course of this year I'm going
to develop each of these sepa-
rately. And I thought I'd turn
them loose on you. Maybe that's
not a nice thing to do. After all,
you're just sort of starting out.
Why should you be concerned
about reasonably subtle
thoughts. But you are a group
of people able to do it, and if
it's planable, if it fits with you,
you'll think about it; and if you
don't like it, you'll reject it.
But I have an idea that my
saying this here today will have
a great yield, not for me but
for Rice, and hopefully for you
in the future. Welcomg to the
caimpus."
the rice thresher, august 25, 1972—page 6
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
Jackson, Steve. The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 60, No. 1, Ed. 1 Friday, August 25, 1972, newspaper, August 25, 1972; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth245135/m1/6/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.