FISHERY BULLETIN: VOL. 70, NO. 3 



COMPARISON OF OPINIONS FROM PFB 

 AND FISH CULTURISTS 



Few members of PFB were concerned with 

 any kind of aquaculture; therefore a similar 

 questionnaire was submitted to people in the 

 western United States who were on a mailing 

 list (December 1968) for the Northwest Fish 

 Culturists Conference. The number of respon- 

 dents was much smaller, perhaps because a con- 

 siderable proportion of the fish hatchery super- 

 intendents lacked college degrees, but usable 

 answers were obtained from 16 fish cultural su- 

 pervisors and 19 fish cultural researchers. The 

 first group included 7 without a baccalaureate 

 degree, 9 with, and none with a higher degree. 

 Of the second group all had baccalaureate de- 

 grees, 5 had master, and 7 doctorate degrees; 15 

 were employed by government laboratories. 



A larger proportion of the fish cultural super- 

 visors than of the PFB members rated physi- 

 ology, oceanography-limnology, aquacultural sci- 

 ences, and hydraulic engineering as the most 

 useful courses. They found basic mathematics 

 very useful but not higher mathematics or biosta- 

 tistics-population dynamics, but many wanted to 

 add courses in the latter. They listed English 

 composition and public speaking as the most val- 

 uable course about as often as the PFB members 

 did. Above all they wished they could have add- 

 ed more courses in the aquacultural sciences. 



The fish cultural researchers valued subjects 

 much differently from either the total PFB mem- 

 bers or the PFB researchers. A larger propor- 

 tion of them listed physiology, advanced biology, 

 chemistry, advanced chemistry, physics, and the 

 aquacultural sciences as their most valuable sub- 

 ject, and botany, sociology, and economics as 

 their least valuable. Fewer of them than of the 

 other two groups rated biostatistics-population 

 dynamics as their most valuable subject but many 

 wished they had taken more. Above all they 

 wished they had taken more physiology, ad- 

 vanced chemistry, and aquacultural sciences. 



COMPARISON OF OPINIONS FROM PFB 

 AND STUDENTS 



The questionnaire circulated to the PFB was 



also given to undergraduate and graduate sem- 

 inar groups in the College of Fisheries of the 

 University of Washington. Replies were re- 

 ceived from 20 undergraduate and 28 graduate 

 students. 



There was a notable diversity of opinion 

 among the undergraduates. A relatively large 

 proportion listed the following subjects as the 

 most valuable course and a similarly large pro- 

 portion rated them as their least valuable: re- 

 search methods, advanced chemistry, physics, 

 fisheries-fishery biology, fishery management, 

 and biostatistics-population dynamics. Because 

 of this diversity, no critical comparison of their 

 opinions with those of PFB members is possible ; 

 but they seemed to value zoology and communi- 

 cation courses much less than PFB members and 

 aquacultural sciences more than PFB members. 



The graduate students were much closer to 

 PFB members in opinions and differed largely 

 from them in only a few subject areas. A larger 

 proportion of them rated physiology, biostatist- 

 ics-population dynamics, and aquacultural sci- 

 ences as the most valuable course, whereas fewer 

 of them included chemistry and com.munications 

 as the most valuable course. They differed espe- 

 cially with regard to communications; they had 

 no understanding of its importance. 



SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS 



1. No single curriculum is ideal for training 

 in fishery science. The field has become much 

 too broad and includes too many specialties that 

 each require a high level of training. The spe- 

 cialization is expected at graduate level, of 

 course, but is desirable even at undergraduate 

 level if students can anticipate either the grad- 

 uate work or the type of job they will enter. 



A corollary of the above conclusion is that a 

 person with a terminal baccalaureate degree 

 should not be a dropout from a research-oriented, 

 two-degree or three-degree program. A major- 

 ity of the jobs in fishery science has been held 

 and probably will continue to be held by people 

 with only a baccalaureate degree. Some of these 

 jobs will be major administrative, decision-mak- 

 ing jobs with rewards equal to those that will 

 be open to holders of a doctorate degree. 



690 



