ROSE-COLORED GLASSES

One of the more sound statements made by Harvard Club presidents in answer to the query of the Boston Transcript as to whether graduates favor the House Plan or not emphasizes the point that "possibly the older alumni are more in sympathy with the plan than recent graduates." The significance of this remark cannot be overlooked in a consideration of the graduate attitude toward the forthcoming experiment.

It is evident that most of the Harvard Club presidents have been convinced that the "terrible individualism" of Harvard students and the great size of the University has produced a rift in undergraduate social solidarity which can only be remedied by such an attractive panacea as the House Plan theoretically provides. Most of the favorable statements are made by men who have been out of College over twenty years. These prominent alumni admit that they and their friends are not in touch with undergraduate social life. Still, if such alarming conditions as the House Plan promises to ameliorate really exist today, they claim the step is by all means desirable. Any plan which promises the intimate contacts of the smaller Harvard with which they were familiar cannot but appear attractive.

On the other hand, the younger graduate is more inclined to appreciate the prerogatives possessed by the contemporary Harvard man. He probably feels that the evils of present day Harvard undergraduate life are less obnoxious than they are painted by the warmest supporters of the Housing system. For undergraduate life at Harvard is not so unnatural and artificial that the House Plan can eliminate immediately the small social groups, as one Harvard Club officer predicts. The more enthusiastic older alumni are too optimistic. When it is admitted that the same small social groups will be just as conspicuous a part of the House Plan as they are of the present dormitory system, many erroneous impressions as to the Utopian democracy of the House Plan will be swept away. The older graduates seem to be of the opinion that instead of a mature and natural social hierarchy Harvard College possesses a caste system. If some of the most ardent standard bearers of the reform ever have to live in the Houses, they will probably be disappointed to discover that proximity only exaggerates the branch between perfectly natural Harvard undergraduate social groups.

Whether the Harvard undergraduate desires to be harnessed with silken leading strings or allowed the free reins of natural social intercourse, it is evident that the older generation of graduates sentimentally think of him in terms of the pre-war Harvard of their youth. The younger graduate would be the better authority on the problem of how sadly the modern Harvard man needs the House Plan.