THE ADVISEES ADVISE

The announcement made last night to the members of the Class of 1929 at their meeting in the Union to the effect that one of the early theme topics assigned to them in English A would be "My Reactions--Favorable and Unfavorable--to my Reception at Harvard," indicates an interesting innovation in teaching the young idea how to do its shooting at Harvard.

Someone once remarked that when the graduates of Harvard stopped criticising, then and only then would he despair of the future of Harvard.

The same is true to a still greater extent of the undergraduates, as they are far more vitally interested in and effected by present conditions at Harvard than are the elder Harvard men. And, in all truth, Harvard undergraduates have in the past proved neither unwilling her unintelligent critics of the University.

But of necessity, the opportunities for such criticism have generally been limited to the upperclassmen, who have been able to voice their opinions through the Student Council, the college publications, the Debating Union, and other organs for student self-expression not available to first year men. Never before has such an opportunity for a candid voicing of opinion been offered to a Freshman class at Harvard.

The action taken by the faculty of English A should indicate to the Freshmen that in spite of their brief week of residence in Cambridge they are already being considered and consulted as an important portion of the community. The reception which has been prepared for them was one which was calculated best to start them upon their careers as Harvard men. If this reception has failed in any of its details, the Freshmen by describing their reactions to their first few days at Harvard can best point the way to the correction of these defects in the reception of future Freshman classes at Harvard, of which the men of 1929 should now consider themselves accepted members.