CHUL Members Plan Caucus To Discuss Student Issues

Three student members of the Committee on Houses and Undergraduate Life will propose tomorrow a plan for a CHUL student caucus that would deal with all CHUL issues that concern only undergraduates.

The proposal comes in response to a divisiveness between students and faculty over issues "which might in another university be addressed by a student government," the students' report says.

Under the proposal, the student caucus would consist of all undergraduate members of the CHUL.

The students in the caucus would take stands on such issues as the Gallo wine boycott, University workers' strikes, and selections of trustees for the W.E.B. DuBois Institute for Afro-American Research, James G. Lemoyne '75, a coauthor of the report, said yesterday.

Steuart Thomsen '76, another of the report's authors, said yesterday he hopes the plan will make the CHUL function more efficiently and increase what he called waning commitment to the organization.

Thomsen said the proposal has a "pretty good" chance of passing the CHUL because it is "not very controversial."

Printers' Strike

"A perfect example of a type of issue that the caucus would handle is last spring's printers' strike," Thomsen said. "The full committee felt that it did not want to take a stand on the issue but the students drafted a unanimous statement in support of the workers after the meeting."

Regular meetings of the caucus would be open to all members of the University unless a particular issue requires a closed meeting.

The proposal also suggests that the CHUL should discuss the possibility of opening its own meetings to increase the "flow of information" between faculty, undergraduates and the administration. CHUL meetings are now closed to both the public and the press.

Dean Whitlock said yesterday he believes the plan would strengthen the CHUL on a day-to-day basis, but added, "In time of crisis the plan will weaken the committee."

Whitlock said that the caucus would work well on external university issues like the Gallo boycott, but he said he is worried about a division on internal University issues that may hamper the working coalition of students and faculty.

Edward L. Keenan '57, master of North House, said yesterday that the student caucus plan "will strengthen and regularize the activities of the CHUL."

Keenan said the caucus plan will be analogous to the masters' informal group and will not be "anything revolutionary." He predicted that "there will be some speechifying but the proposal will pass."

The proposal also says that "All members of the committee are presently derelict" in their participation and that the present degree of master participation is "minimal."

The report says "the Dean of the College and the Dean of the Faculty must actively encourage master participation.