Votume VI. No. 10. NEW HAVEN, CONN., THURSDAY, DECEMBER 3, 1896. Price Tren CENTS. FACULTY COACHING IN DEBATE, Explanation and Discussion bya For- mer Yale Debater. In reference to an editorial which appeared in the Harvard Crimson last week supporting the action of the Ad- visory Committee in limiting ‘Faculty coaching’’ for intercollegiate debaters and making certain statements about the system of coaching by the Fac- ulty at Yale, an officer of the Yale Union makes the following statement, which was published in the Yale News: “This question of ‘Faculty coach- ing’ is not a new matter. It was thor- oughly discussed at the meeting of Harvard-Princeton-Yale delegates held here last Spring. It was found impos- sible to come to any agreement on the subject, Harvard holding a different opinion as to the point at which Fac- ulty assistance becomes unjustifiable, from that of either Yale or Prince- ton. All agree that there are objec- tionable features in any system in which the Faculty should give aid; but the .... . prohibition of Faculty help, proposed by one of the Harvard dele- gates, was considered impracticable; and the scheme now proposed by the Harvard Advisory Board is likewise imperfect, ‘‘No professor can suggests general analysis to a debater, for instance, without indulging in more or less of a criticism of the speech which the de- bater has already prepared. Thus any such measure as this leaves the way open for just such practices as the Board condemns. The misunderstand- ing seems to have arisen from the ex- aggerated newspaper reports of ‘Fac- ulty coaching’ here. Such reports have evidently furnished the basis for the Crimson’s statements as to the con- duct of preparations for debates at Yale, ‘“‘Having taken part in an intercol- legiate debate, my own experience may perhaps throw light on the question. Before becoming a member of the team which debated against Princeton a year ago, I neither asked nor received any assistance whatever from any graduate or member of the Faculty. After the final selections -we speakers met and mapped out our work. We went to members of the Faculty, who criticized this division slightly, without making any material change. They gave us no new facts and suggested but few new arguments. Various members of the Faculty were present at our practice debates. Their assistance was almost wholly confined to criticisms of the method of presen- tation and delivery. Such aid the Ad- visory Board considers justifiable and it was of great assistance to us. Twice when undergraduates who had prom- ised to debate against us, failed to ap- pear, members of the Faculty who were there to criticize us, kindly vol- unteered and spoke extemporaneously against us. It is upon the slender basis of such facts as these that reports were circulated claiming’ that we were ‘mere mouth-pieces of the Faculty.’ We fully explained these exaggerated accounts to the Harvard delegates last Spring, apparently to their satisfac- tion; and we are much surprised at their re-appearance in the Crimson, as well as at the resurrection of the whole question which we Yale dele- gates supposed that convention had settled. “Intercollegiate contests are only pos-_ sible through mutual concession. The Princeton and Yale delegates felt that this matter was not of so much jm- portance as the question of confining . three - eic", delegates to undergraduates working for a degree. On this subject they could not get the Harvard dele- gates to agree with them. Under the present arrangement, any special stu- dent, even a practicing lawyer, taking one hour a week in some. graduate school may enter an intercollegiate d>2- bate. The Yale and Princeton dele- gates, however, did not press this point when Harvard had expressed her