Sert Brings New Spirit, Staff to Design

Since Jose L. Sert replaced Joseph F. Hudnut as Dean of the Graduate School of Design last September, a new regime of faculty and policy has come about in Robinson Hall, home of design at the University. New, sincere enthusiasm has taken the place of the "loss of heart" attributed to the School last year.

With Sert's arrival, a fundamental stumbling block, the $10,000 deficit then confronting the School, has been erased by increasing tuition from $600 to $800 per year, and by Corporation grants. Financially solvent, the School has been able to plan important policy changes under the new dean.

Faculty Turnover

Dean Sert has gathered a long list of new professorial talent, including several visiting critics from America and Europe.

His new faculty is now divided into the departments of Architecture, headed by Dean Sert, and City Planning and Architecture, headed by newly-appointed Roginald R. Isaacs, M. Arch, '39. Formerly, the latter department consisted of the two separate groups of City Planning and of Landscape Architecture. A third affiliated group, the Architectural Sciences department in the College, remains under the chairmanship of Norman T. Newton, associate professor of Landscape Architecture.

In all departments, faculty spirit has skyrocketed. "If enrollment doesn't increase 500 percent in the next three years that I'll be here, I am going to hand in my resignation!" Professor Isaacs exclaimed when describing the change in atmosphere which has come to Design since Sert's arrival.

To shorten the four years required for a Master's degree, the School will now admit qualified students in exceptional cases, either at the end of three years of college training or with advanced standing.

Greater Freedom

Dean Sert declared that the emphasis in the Department of Architecture has been shifted to stress an even greater movement toward novel expression and freedom of individual creation in the designing of buildings. To achieve this end, courses have been planned in ecstatic and architectural composition.

Isaacs states that the Department of City Planning and Landscape Architecture is now training men for two specific sorts of professional careers: the "well rounded landscape architect for regulation city planning," and "men more broadly trained in conservation of resources and government finance who can work with government and other groups." Pointing to the fact that over one-half f the leaders of the planning professions are Harvard-trained, Issacs explained that he was anxious to maintain this leadership.