BIRDS OF A FEATHER

The work of the House Cross Section Committee, directed toward making, each House a cohesive group of congenial men, has signally failed in its purpose. When the House Plan was inaugurated in 1930, it was widely heralded that the autocratic rule of the clubs had come to an end, since each house fulfilled the various functions of a club on a large scale. At the present time, however, an annual exodus to the clubs drains the Houses of many of their most popular and versatile men.

Social incompatibility is the explanation of this unfortunate situation. For its first two years the House Plan functioned perfectly as no attempt was made to regulate the placement of men against their wishes. When some of the Houses became "social deserts", as Time expressed it, however, their masters, in cooperation with the College authorities, arranged for a central cross Section Committee to regulate room assignments. The aims of this committee, as its name implies, have been to make each house representative of the college as a whole, and thereby to establish a standard of social equality among the houses. The obvious result of this hit-or-miss plan has been to place a great many men in a thoroughly uncongenial, and often intolerable atmosphere. Friendships made in the familiar Yard surroundings are rudely interrupted and can rarely be satisfaciorily picked up again, while the field for new friendships, is barren compared to the opportunities of the Freshman year. As a consequence, men who are invited to join clubs tend to pick up their belongings at the end of a year under the House Plan, and move out of it irrevocably.

Oxford and Cambridge have for centuries employed the doctrine regarding this problem, that "birds of a feather flock together", and there is no reason to believe that the expression would not fit Harvard conditions equally will. Specifically, men should be permitted as far as possible to live in the House of their choice. Groups applying together for admission should be permitted several perfectly frank consultations with the House Master or Senior Tutor. Facts and figures should not be withheld from the student, as it is his privilege to know what he is going to pay for.

If circumstances would not permit placing a man in his chosen House, he should be advised of the reasons, and allowed to petition for assignment to another. By this "laisser faire" method most men could acquire rooms which would be comparatively satisfactory to them. Owing to insufficient capacity, about ten percent of the applicants would have to be denied admittance to the Houses, even before failures eliminated others. This discrimination could best be made on a basis of academic standing, but here again the student should have the situation clearly explained to his satisfaction.

The Freshman year is so well arranged that men can determine what sort of friends they prefer. A compatible group of newcomers, therefore, would be assured in each House after the accomodations had been reshuffled and definitely arranged. Instead of seven second-rate boarding houses, the Houses could become real entities, composed of inmates of kindred spirit, and possessing separate characteristics and personalities. Men would no longer leave the Houses to live in quarters which, repugnant in themselves, are employed only because they assure congenial living companions.