Democracy's College, 1967 version Part 2

at first the college had offered degrees in two fields agriculture and mechanic arts however emphasis was moving from the practical arts to the underlying sciences research flurries but a hybrid seed corn is one of the most fascinating stories of this century the Pioneer agronomist who produced hybrid dent corn played the largest role of all in the American agricultural revolution and I would say that the experiments with the breeding of corner accredited among several genuinely important contributions to genetics in the past half-century this research not only gained nationwide recognition and prestige for the college the new recognition of the importance of research and the scientific approach even while hybrid seed corn was still in the research stages the other divisions were stressing the scientific viewpoint open education and research beginning with World War two the campus environment was to become a home for a major laboratory of the Atomic Energy Commission so I told dr. Compton that they had to have a lot of chemical and metallurgical work done on uranium immediately and we couldn't do it at Chicago until we built a building until we got some staff together we had high priorities we could get people from any university if we asked for them but this takes time and we had all the necessary equipment to start here in Ames the result was the development of a method for the quantity production of uranium metal an outstanding contribution to the success of the atomic bomb project the way the laboratory and research is progressed here I think it's a very great benefit to be on the campus because our laboratory is developed into a basic and pioneering type of laboratory graduate students play a big part in research but the last two years Iowa State has ranked in the top ten universities for total doctor it's given and in the top 15 for the last ten years in total volume of research in the area of agriculture no I fifth Iowa State University six Purdue University seven University of Missouri in total volume of research in the physical sciences mit fourth Iowa State University fifth Illinois Institute of Technology stick and soul Iowa State University ranks well in its areas of research across the nation and its prestige continues to grow this is good for both the university and the student this growth has brought us to the here and now to the students who are now going to class these students what are their impressions usually about four o'clock when students are through for the day they come and gather over coffee and bridge and frostys the Union also provides bowling alleys some different forms of recreation for students a lot of people say that it's a big campus so what it's pretty the architectural pattern or should I say style seems to be well maintained throughout the campus it's a very uniform campus the whole campus is built around one central area this central campus area is highlighted by the campanile which is really a beautiful spot I had a visiting professor who told our class that Iowa State University was one of the few universities in the nation that had continued to grow and at the same time had retained its beauty I think everyone has an idea of what a campus should be in their mind and iowa state certainly fulfills this in my own image the university is being forced to expand there's a lot of building going on this is all being done to handle the greater amount of students that are coming in academically a lot of times I probably have complained is as have other students that you get tired of having a lecture of 200 or 300 students but not all your lectures are that way it may seem that way as a freshman because you you take some general courses but after spending a quarter or two quarters or three quarters here or a year whatever the case may be when you start having a lot greater choices of wind to take what course then you can avoid things like this and you can get into groups of 25 or 30 my last year year I would say the biggest lecture I've had was probably Oh 65 or 70 down to a class of eight students which was tremendous I think probably the first year most students do tend to feel lost this is probably because of the large number of students that are in required courses as soon as you start specializing in your major field I think classes becomes smaller and you know your instructors as well as your fellow students much better I find this very true in my own major because the ratio of teachers to students is so small right away the chances for knowing your instructors personally are much greater the university offers enough courses is it from different departments you can find any number of courses in your field of interest courses that you just wouldn't think of because they're outside your major department and yet apply to what you're interested in I've always felt free to go see my advisor if he's in his office just walk in and start talking tell him what you want maybe what you're having a problem with and you'll do his best to help you out I've never had any problems as far as having to keep an appointment or having to be there a specified time to make sure I find him he's generally around the office enough there's never any problem you