The $600 Question

Provost Buck's announcement last night should come as no real surprise to anybody who has kept himself informed of the University's financial theories and present status. The Corporation has followed a rare policy in insisting that all faculties balance their own budgets without help from other sections of the University, and on the two occasions in the past when a deficit existed in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, drastic steps were taken: a ten percent expenses cut in 1940 and a tuition raise last year.

The immediate necessity for the rise is obvious in the Provost's figures. This year, with a two term average of 7100 students in the College and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the total revenue from tuition and fees will be about $3,700,000. Next year, with an estimated enrollment in these schools of 6250, a drop of about $200,000 at present rates would occur; and in 1950-51, when the College is down to 4300, a further cutback would be in prospect. In addition, nationwide inflation and continuing commitments for permanent Faculty salaries and other educational projects have increased the financial pressure.

As for other reasons for this latest, and, according to the Provost, last hike, there is no way that anyone not intimately familiar with the educational policy and the financial problems of the Provost can really analyze it. Students, alumni, and Faculty alike must take his word for it. The important thing now is what the Faculty and Arts and Sciences should do with the freedom which this extra money will give them.

Buck has stated that with a tuition rise, he will be able to channel all further gifts and endowments into new projects. At present, there are committees on scholarships and on advising working towards reports which should propose important changes in Harvard procedure. There is the matter of rents--with the additional money next year, there seems little reason for any rise in overall room rates. More money now should also be enough of a booster to prevent deterioration in instruction which has made a diploma from many colleges farcical since the war.

The job of balancing a budget determined by established educational policy is an immense one. Provost Buck has certainly done well to stay ahead of his competitors in the past three years, to keep his books balanced, to make what economies he could within the Faculty; he is correct in raising tuition now if failing to do so would hurt instruction. But he has assumed a very definite responsibility to make good on advising, on expanded scholarships, on reviving tutorial, and on drastically revising such College institutions as have fallen out of date in the last decade. He and the Faculty members involved in this work must produce the goods, now that there is a little more cash in the till.