Incoming Class Includes Fewer Minority Students

Fewer minority students will be enrolled in next year's freshman class than in any class since 1968. David L. Evans, associate director of admissions said yesterday.

Out of the 100 minority students Harvard admitted. 71 accepted enrollment--compared to 101 in 1971, 89 in 1972, and 78 in 1973.

Radcliffe admitted 80 minority students, and 56 of them accepted--one more than last year--Mary Anne Schwalbe, director of admissions at Radcliffe, said yesterday.

Evans said that the 100 students who were admitted to Harvard were selected from a pool of 292. Although the number of minority applicants to Harvard declined by about 25 per cent this year from last. Evans said he thought this pool of applicants was of a much higher quality than last year's.

Although students who do not accept places at Harvard do not give their reasons, many of them will go to schools that offer them larger amounts of financial aid, he said.

Evans said the Ivy League schools' financial aid directors meet after admissions decisions are made and before acceptance letters are sent out to decide how much aid they will offer each student, so that no school offers more than $200 more than any other school.

Radcliffe and Harvard both lost five minority students to Stanford, which does not participate in the Ivy League agreement.

Schwalbe said that she could not account for the rise in minority acceptances at Radcliffe, except that "students that come to visit here speak to happy students."

"We're talking about suc' small numbers that it's hard to really talk about how--to change the recruitment procedures." Evans said. "The number of qualified applicants is so small that all the colleges are clawing after the same people."

Evans said that Harvard is trying to get black alumni to become more active in recruitment efforts, but that since most of Harvard's black alumni graduated between '69 and '74--which he called "a turbulent period"--many of them "have bitter feelings toward Harvard."