THIS week, as the U.S. inaugurates a new President, TIME adds a special 20-page section to its regular issue. The section attempts to assess the quality of U.S. life at this point in the nation's history, to examine the problems that face the new Administration and to suggest some of the promising paths for the future.

It was prepared by a team of writers, correspondents and researchers, headed by Senior Editor Robert Shnayerson, a veteran of many TIME departments. Shnayerson was long-time Education editor before he helped to start TIME'S present Law section, and is now responsible for editing TIME'S Essay. His writing staff included Associate Editors Timothy Foote and Gary Clarke, and Contributing Editors Lance Morrow, Christopher Cory and Philip Herrera, along with TIME'S former London Bureau Chief Robert T. Elson, the author of TIME INC. The Intimate History of a Publishing Enterprise.

The job of finding the most useful books, articles, statistics, pictures and even song lyrics among the mountains of background material was performed by Researchers Nancy Chase, Mary Kelley, Leila Little, Marion Pikul, Helen Prince, Mary McConachie, Michele Stephenson and Jane Van Tassel. To garner the most provocative ideas for their files, TIME correspondents around the world questioned historians, philosophers, ecologists, clergymen, politicians and businessmen. The reporting group was made up of 20 correspondents and 20 stringers. Major files came from a special Washington team directed by TIME Senior Correspondent John Steele and including Donn Downing, Richard Saltonstall, John Stacks, Arthur White and Marvin Zim.

THE COVER is a photomontage by Robert Crandall. The composite picture, containing photos by Steve Schapiro, Jim Wells, Laurence Fink and John Stewart Olson, symbolizes the major problems that face the incoming Administration of President Richard Nixon. The four segments illustrate student protest, the Viet Nam war, the problems of the cities and law and order.

The Nixon inaugural medal shown at the bottom of the cover is the official medallion approved by the new President. The sculptor was Ralph J. Menconi, and the medal itself was struck by the Medallic Art Co. of New York. The three-quarter view of Nixon's face is a departure from the traditional presidential profile. The reverse side of the medal is also something of a novelty: instead of being the standard reproduction of the Great Seal of the United States, it is a sculptured rendering of the crewelwork seal that Julie Nixon gave her father as an election-night surprise.

While pointing out the problems that the country faces, TIME'S editors are happy to be able to offer a generous helping of what many think of as at least a partial remedy for the ills of the world: poetry. This week the entire Books section is devoted to a thorough survey of contemporary U.S. poetry--a look at the modern school and what has been developing over the past decade. All the reviews were written by Contributing Editor George Dickerson, himself a poet, whose work has been published in a variety of magazines, including Mademoiselle and The New Yorker.

Once he started an examination of what he considers "the revitalization of American poetry," Dickerson was surprised to discover how many important poets have recently put out new books. He turned out 26 reviews before reluctantly paring down his list to the twelve that appear. His personal reward, he says, was "the sharpening of one's own language that comes from studying other people's poetry."

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