To the Editor of the "Mobrh-Chixn Dany NEWS"
Sm,—Three. points seem to have emerged from the correspondence about British degrees.
The first one seems to have centred 9n London University degrees, which Mr, Bennett, quoting chapter and verse, has shown can be obtained here. His letter will 1 hope, encourage aspirants to carry on; personally, 1 apologize; 1 wrote solely fo prevent local candidates from meeting with disappointment later on. In 1996 1 wrote for the Overseas Regulations, and those I received were dated 1931; naturally, I presumed these were not obsolete; hence my quotations from them—they contain no reference whatever to Shanghai. Any upset 1 so unwittingly (and with the best of intensions) have caused has been amply nullified by Mr. Bennet. But in view of the regulations I have recently been sent, I was naturally interested to know how degrees had been obtained in a manner not mentioned in these regulations.
The second point was, if degrees could be obtained through correspondence courses; this, too, I hope, has now been made clear; no correspondence college can grant a London degree.
The third point reveals a lack of distinction between degrees and professional qualifications; in my opinion, a degree can only be granted be a university (or the Archbishop of Canterbury); 1 may be wrong, but I am under the impression that professional qualifications and diplomas are not identical with, and should not be confused with, degrees, Of course, there is no suggestion about superiority; requirements are quite different, and comparisons are both impossible and undesirable.
1 am sorry CAP AND Gown wrote anonymously such a letter as I read in tO-day's issue; 15 it too much to ask of him that, in order to explain his remarks, he at once gets into touch with 22998 Shanghai, Jan, 16.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.