Mrs. Bunting Flies Back to Face Sit-In, Announces New Plan for Black Admissions

A sit-in by 25 black Cliffies at Fay House yesterday prompted Mrs. Mary I. Bunting to fly back to Cambridge from a conference in North Carolina and announce major changes in Radcliffe's black admissions policy.

As a beginning, Mrs. Bunting said, Radcliffe has allotted $5000 to its Admissions Office for the recruitment of black students.

If Radcliffe's minimum goal of 30 qualified black students for the class of 1973 is not reached by the Jan. 1 application deadline, she added, the College will continue accepting applications until it is. "We will continue the search into the summer months if necessary," she said in a statement to the group.

"Hopeful Sign"

The black students greeted the announcement with enthusiasm. "We have gotten what we came for today. It's a hopeful sign," Diorita C. Fletcher '71, spokesman for the black students, said.

Besides allotting $5000 for recruiting and pushing back the application deadline, Mrs. Bunting said in her statement:

* Radcliffe will hire a black admissions officer as soon as possible. Mrs. Bunting and members of the Admissions Office are already considering three candidates.

* Staff members will visit ghetto schools in Boston and New York within the next two weeks. A member of the staff and a black student visited ghetto schools in Philadelphia last week.

* The College is setting up an ad hoc committee to study pre-admission and college preparatory programs.

* The staff has written to 250 black high schools in the South and to all semi-finalists in the National Achievement Scholarship Prigram, a program for black students.

* Letters have gone out to all Radcliffe Clubs and to people recommended to Mrs. Bunting as influential community members to ask for help in recruiting black students.

Mrs. Bunting also suggested setting up a regular procedure for communication between her and the black students, "in order to avoid further misunderstanding."

March

The black students had marched from Barnard Hall to Fay House at 9:30 a.m. yesterday and sat down in the main lobby. They originally planned to stay until noon, "to dramatize the fact that we are still serious about and concerned with the black admissions problem," Miss Fletcher said.

Upon seeing the students, Mrs. Kathleen O. Elliott, dean of the College, telephoned Mrs. Bunting at a conference she was attending in North Carolina on the relevance of higher education. The President said she would return and speak to the group. When the students heard Mrs. Bunting was coming, they decided to stay.

At 1 p.m., about 30 black Harvard students started picketing outside Fay House in support of the girls inside. Shifts of a few girls at a time joined them throughout the afternoon.

The black students had presented eight demands on recruiting and admissions of black students to a Nov. 26 meeting of the Radcliffe Policy Committee on Admissions and Financial Aid (RPC). Mrs. Bunting reportedly agreed to make a public statement by Dec. 5. On that date, she sent a statement to members of the RPC, but not to any black students.

About 60 black Harvard and Radcliffe students confronted Mrs. Bunting last Saturday and gave her a statement repeating the demands. She agreed to meet with them this Thursday when she returned from North Carolina.

When she arrived at Fay House at 4:45 p.m. yesterday, she read to the students and a large group of reporters a statement she had worked on in North Carolina and telephoned to her staff yesterday morning.

After Mrs. Bunting read her statement, Miss Fletcher thanked her and agreed to meet with her tomorrow. The black students went back to Radcliffe for dinner and a party. "We've been sitting all day, and I'm sure there are many of us who would be happy to stand," Miss Fletcher said