Freshman Fiasco

The plight of the 450 Freshmen now living in the Yard is the crisis in the absorption of the Freshman Year by the House system. Instructors in the major survey courses report that the class is apparently doing poorer work than its predecessors; the Yardlings themselves admit that after two months of College they still feel like outsiders in the Houses with which they are affiliated. Part of their uneasiness is due to inevitable uncertainty about the future; for this, the University can offer only advice and an aspirin. But it is not too late to correct the College's failure to make the Houses an active medium for the stability formerly provided by the unit of the Freshman Class.

The Dean's Office made the initial mistakes. Too confident that the September Freshmen could make up for the isolation of four months in the Yard by succeeding terms in the Houses, it created a hodgepodge of members of the various Houses, scattered indiscriminately throughout the dormitories. Occasionally it even assigned roommates to different dining halls. University Hall, its hands already busy with immediate problems, has postponed until February any attempts to correct the situation, meanwhile filling vacancies in the Houses with commuters, if at all Collectively, the Faculty is too busy now to sponsor Freshman activities, individually, their efforts have of necessity been confined to teas and dinners. And these are not enough.

Responsibility for the success of the program must lie principally with the undergraduates. Yet only one House has seen fit to give the Yardlings representation on its Committee. Greater efforts must be made to organize teams, record dances and tournaments within the House; notices of such events must be posted in the Freshman dormitories. Upperclassmen and June Freshmen alike must abandon their traditional reserve to attempt to help Freshmen get acquainted in their House. This is no longer a case where the Freshmen themselves are apathetic, as in last summer's experiments with class unity. The Yardlings have shown, by giving the Student Fund more support than any other group in the College, and by the attitude with which they do it, that they are as eager as any other Freshman Class to become a part of Harvard. They are aware that the next three months may be their only chance. And unless the Houses take the lead soon, that chance will be too little, and will come too late.