University of Virginia Library

Toward A Merry Christmas

Calendar reform finally seems to be
making some progress. At its meeting of last
Thursday, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences
made several long-awaited recommendations
to President Shannon regarding a modified
"early finish" calendar. Judging by the years
that have elapsed in the formulation of some
plan preferable to the present one, the
modification of an academic calendar must be
roughly equivalent in difficulty to the
Gregorian reformation of 1582. Hopefully it
will not take as long to be adopted.

What is presently needed is a groundswell
of support or opposition to the faculty's
recommendations so that the final product
will truly represent what the entire University
community really wants. While no specific
calendar form was endorsed by the faculty, it
did recommend several general changes which
we applaud.

Students have long disdained the
post-Christmas "lame-duck" classes followed
by mid-January exams and the almost useless
semester break. The idea of a September
through December semester, with exams
preceding a long Christmas break, is more
than welcome to most students, especially
those for whom a trip home means a large
expenditure of time or money. A Christmas
break free from papers or the hassle of
"catching up" before exams is appealing for
obvious reasons, and few would complain, we
suspect, about a small reduction in the length
of the semester.

Under the faculty guidelines, the second
semester would end earlier, allowing time for
an extended summer session. While Spring
Break would no longer necessarily coincide
with Easter, the plan would allow students to
enter the summer job market sooner, an
advantage enjoyed by a large proportion of
students nationally already.

In straw votes the faculty favored the
reduction of holidays and semester days, if
necessary, to achieve the "early finish"
calendar. While the votes were intended only
as an indicator of faculty preference for the
benefit of President Shannon, we agree and
endorse those decisions.

However, we note with concern the
faculty's propensity to eliminate or drastically
reduce Reading Days. If the shortened
semester is achieved only at the expense of
Reading Days, we would anticipate much
complaining. It is no secret that,
educationally, Reading Days are for some
students the only productive days of the
semester. And even for those interested in
education for its own sake studying on a
fairly regular basis, Reading Days have
always been a valuable time to "get it
together" and wrap up their courses into
some kind of meaningful unity.

We urge the swift adoption of the "early
finish" calendar, and we strongly recommend
the retention of Reading Days.