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QUESTION FOR THE 1960's GENERATION.................

Mack_Daddy

Well-Known Member
Oct 7, 2001
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Which year was more tumultuous for the United States: 1967 or 1968?

I always heard '68 b/c of Bobby and King being assassinated.
 
1968 Riots after the King assassination and Tet offensive. I lost several friends and classmates that year in Vietnam.
 
1968. In addition to the previously listed events, there was the NFL's "Heidi Game," which outraged millions of viewers. Also, Pitt failed to win the national football championship, breaking a string of 55 consecutive titles.
 
1968 without a doubt.

MLK followed by RFK - everybody was upset.
LBJ decides not to run for president. Big protests/riots at Democratic Convention in Chicago.
Vietnam conflict more screwed up than ever.
Dibbs surviving tumultuous freshman year with a 3.71 spring term, raising overall average to 2.42 and advisor finally cracks a smile.
 
1968 without a doubt.

MLK followed by RFK - everybody was upset.
LBJ decides not to run for president. Big protests/riots at Democratic Convention in Chicago.
Vietnam conflict more screwed up than ever.
Dibbs surviving tumultuous freshman year with a 3.71 spring term, raising overall average to 2.42 and advisor finally cracks a smile.
looks like a 1.13 first semester. Fat dumb and stupid is not the way to go through life!! or so they say!! So far so good for me!
 
looks like a 1.13 first semester. Fat dumb and stupid is not the way to go through life!! or so they say!! So far so good for me!

This was in the era of three - ten week terms comprised an academic year. Since I started in summer of 1967, spring of '68 was the end of my fourth term.

For some reason things clicked for me that term.
 
Ahhh yes 3 term academic years. I do recall them.

I liked the trimester system. The fall trimester ended by Thanksgiving. There was a month of winter trimester before Christmas. Spring break at the end of winter trimester. Spring trimester ended by Memorial Day. Then a 10 week trimester over summer if you wanted to take classes over the summer.
 
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The month off before winter trimester was great for getting part-time jobs. Employers wanted temporary help for the holidays, and PSU students were available for more than a month. Students at schools on the semester system only had a week or two off.
 
I liked them as well. I liked the fact that you took fewer courses even if the learning/work may have been a bit more compressed into 10 weeks. Felt like it was easier to focus. Started at PSU in trimesters but finished under the current 15 week semester system. Give me the trimesters any day (although it was a bit of a PIA for people who tried to transfer mid year).
 
I liked the trimester system. The fall trimester ended by Thanksgiving. There was a month of winter trimester before Christmas. Spring break at the end of winter trimester. Spring trimester ended by Memorial Day. Then a 10 week trimester over summer if you wanted to take classes over the summer.
In my day (late 1970s), you had to go for 2-3 weeks of winter term before Christmas. That led to profs assigning papers over the holiday--which were difficult as most folks were far from Pattee Library for research.

tOSU, when I went to grad school, was on the quarter system (similar, but classes were shorter, so transferring credits to a semester school was almost impossible) at that time too. But they did not start until late September and there were classes until the first week of December--then you got a month off for Christmas.

I liked the timing better at tOSU, though not being at school over Thanksgiving (the dining halls were closed--and I think undergrads had to go home). But I preferred PSU's practice where a trimester credit = a semester credit. Not that I had to transfer anything...
 
Late 60s,early 70s academic calendar ... Fall term started mid September and ran until early December. Winter/Christmas break went until very early January.
Winter term started early January and ran for 10 weeks. Had a week off and Spring term ran ten more weeks until first week of June.

I'm not an academician, but I think that a credit hour is the same regardless of the semester/trimester/term "schedule" that it is earned in. Under the ten week "term" system, a 3 credit hour course met 3 times per week for an hour and fifteen minutes - do the math and you have 37.5 hours of classroom time. Since I never went on a semester schedule, I imagine that the classes are shorter, maybe only meet twice/week (?) for an 18 week semester.
 
Late 60s,early 70s academic calendar ... Fall term started mid September and ran until early December. Winter/Christmas break went until very early January.
Winter term started early January and ran for 10 weeks. Had a week off and Spring term ran ten more weeks until first week of June.

I'm not an academician, but I think that a credit hour is the same regardless of the semester/trimester/term "schedule" that it is earned in. Under the ten week "term" system, a 3 credit hour course met 3 times per week for an hour and fifteen minutes - do the math and you have 37.5 hours of classroom time. Since I never went on a semester schedule, I imagine that the classes are shorter, maybe only meet twice/week (?) for an 18 week semester.
Not always. The standard time for a semester class was/is 48 min (plus or minus a couple)--basically an "hour" class with time to get to the next one. As I recall, at PSU the "term" classes were about 75 min (it's been 40 years). So you are correct that, at Penn State, one trimester credit equaled a semester credit elsewhere. Schools on the quarter system (such as tOSU) did it differently. There, the class length was the same as a semester class length. So a quarter system credit was about 2/3rds of a semester credit. Semesters traditionally were 15 weeks of instruction.
 
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