A Letter

Dear Sir, It is with great pleasure that I pen this letter and ask you to print my hearty congratulations to both the executive of the Student's Association and those members of the staff who showed that they are alive to the necessity of maintaining good staff-student relations. I have been at this college now for longer than I wish to recall, and over the years the staff have not always been aware of their duties in this matter. Overcrowding, under-staffing, research have been but three of the scores of excuses that I have heard members of the staff give in an [unclear: attempt] to justify their apparent disinterestedness over the years. There are many good reasons why this peculiar relationship has of times exists.

Now the Students' Association have taken a positive action in providing what was missing: a time and place ordained for first-year students to meet their helpers. The staff response this year is on the whole very gratifying. It bodes well for this year's freshers: first impressions are after all most important. A correct attitude towards the staff, and encouragement by members of the staff, ensures that freshmen place university education in its proper perspective at the start of their studies, and also that they are not afraid to approach staff members for help with problems.

Kudos, then, to the executive and also to those members of the staff who showed that they appreciated the fact that the university, as Professor Slater remarked at the Science Faculty evening, is a community of students and staff.