Monro Advocates That Council Quit Giving Aid Grants

The Student Council's possible withdrawal from the scholarship business yesterday received enthusiastic approval from John U. Monro '34, Director of the College's financial aid center.

The Council's current Grants-in-aid program is "an anachronism," Monro said, because "it was designed when the College's financial aid facilities were not as strong or as well integrated as they are now."

Monro said that students receiving small financial grants under the Council program are usually deserving of them, but that "inevitably the committee gets fooled sometime." On each list of Grants-in-Aid beneficiaries, Monro added, he's noticed some students who are not needy but merely "can smell a buck a mile away."

Under the Grants-in-Aid system, a Council Committee has been distributing $800 a semester in 10- or 20-dollar amounts to students who appeal for aid. Committee chairman Irving K. Zola '56 was appointed Tuesday, however, to investigate the program and perhaps turn the distributing function over to the University.

Monro yesterday strongly advocated this move, asserting that "for the Student Council to make the awards is not the best way to use the money. No student committee can distribute such funds wisely," he continued, because its experience is necessarily limited, and also because it has no confidential information, as does the Financial Aid Center, on the applicant's real needs.