Class of '74: Just About Tops As Far as Entering Groups Go

Roughly 1529 of you are now preparing to enter Harvard and Radcliffe later this month as the Class of 1974.

That shouldn't come off as big news to any of you as individuals. But you will be interested to know that you are collectively one of the most intelligent entering classes in Harvard's history.

Some 225 of you are National Merit winners, a figure staggeringly higher than that of any entering class before you. Your median SAT's hover within ten points of 700, which compares respectably with the scores of all other freshman groups.

Each of you won your place here by competing in a field of 10,598 applicants. If you are one of 319 entering Cliffies, you succeeded where each of five other women failed. For every one of the 1210 new Harvard men who will turn in his registration card September 21, four and a half applicants were rejected last April.

Good Work, Kids

Now if you've accurately juggled these figures, which you're certainly bright enough to do, you already know that there is a group of men and women who actually declined Harvard's and Radcliffe's offers of admission.

About 240 men turned down Har-vard's acceptance. Many of these, according to Dr. Chase N. Peterson '52, dean of Admissions and Financial Aid in Harvard College, were scholars from the Eastern states who may have feared that Harvard's campus turmoil would inhibit their academic lives.

At Radcliffe, 108 women have chosen not to enter. Most of them will attend Yale, Princeton, Dartmouth, or some other newly coed school. Nineteen of them, however, have only deferred registering for the time being, and will take a year off, perhaps to read or travel. Radcliffe President Mary I. Bunting encouraged the entire class to consider this option, and is guaranteeing places in subsequent classes for those who did.

As usual, the public/private school ratio of the entering class hovers at around three to two.

A Tough Term

The first semester of this year will be the toughest here for most of you. After mid-term exams, one in ten of you will receive an "unsatisfactory" grade report.

Your career plans will shift considerably in subsequent months. Right now, about a third of you intend to concentrate in Natural Sciences. By June, one of every three potential Natural Scientists will switch to Humanities or Social Sciences.

Academic recovery will be quick. In June, half of you will make Dean's List (B-or better). Only ten freshmen will have to leave Harvard for academic reasons at year's end. Of course, there's no particular reason why you won't be one of them.