A TEMPORARY MEASURE

Mr. Bingham's attempt to revive the minor sports deserves a vote of thanks from the undergraduate body. There are several stipulations attached to their resurrection, however, which should be investigated carefully. The sports will only be supported next year provided that substantial savings in cost, as compared with expenditures of previous seasons, are definitely assured. To accomplish this they will be conducted on a reduced intercollegiate basis, so that expensive trips and officials' fee can be kept at a minimum. Further the H.A.A. is not committed to this policy for more than one year, and a definite saving will have to be a proven reality before this plan is definitely adopted.

As a compromise the undergraduate body is temporarily satisfied with this settlement of the problem, but as a final solution the proposition is fundamentally inadequate. By cutting down on the intercollegiate schedules and limiting outside games, the value and enjoyment of the minor sports are materially reduced. Substantial cost reductions will be very difficult to achieve, unless the hitherto high standard of coaching is done away with and men of Jessor ability employed. For these reasons the new step is a stop-gap-measure, which, if allowed to become permanent, will result in the impaired utility of the newly-supported sports, since it is very difficult to see how "substantial savings" can be made, unless the minor sports are revived on a lessened-efficiency basis.

Because this measure is one that can only be temporary, definite steps must be taken to find yet another way of bringing these sports back to their old 1933 standard. If the proposed ten dollar athletic levy on all undergraduates were adopted, it would be unnecessary to put the sports on a reduced intercollegiate basis, and thus climinate the present danger of their unstable existence. The problem of these sports is not one that can be solved by any half-way measure, and unless other means of financing them are found, they are doomed to lose part of their value and usefulness.