Freshmen Decry College QRR Sabotage Verdict

The Administrative Board's decision yesterday to force seven freshmen to withdraw for a year for sabotaging the College's computer system has prompted Weld North's roughly 90 residents to write a letter of protest to a top College administrator.

The letter, addressed to Dean of the College L. Fred Jewett '57, who chairs the Ad Board, will express the residents' dissatisfaction with the verdict and ask the dean to act as the students' advocate when they appeal the ruling, said Weld North resident Mihail S. Lari '89. The details of the letter were not available late last night.

The implicated students--six from Weld Hall and one from Straus Hall--will be required to leave for one year for crashing Harvard's computer system three times during the Quantitative Reasoning Requirement (QRR) testing. One Weld Hall freshman will be put on probation for one year for helping crash the system one time, said Thomas T. Sugiura '89, roommate of two of the freshmen.

The students asked not to be identified pending the appeal.

After two of the students involved failed their QRR computer test, they decided to play a "prank," Sugiura said. Using a modem on an Apple IIC computer, the eight hooked into the computer system, he said.

They then repeatedly printed out, "This computer test sucks," about the requirement, which more than 600 freshmen still had not passed, Sugiura said. The messages "got worse," he said.

Seven of the eight students crashed the systemanother time that night and once another night.The students were caught when QRR administrators,trying to find the cause of the test-delayingsystem crashes, found one of their names had beenlogged into the system.

All eight declined to comment on their case.Jewett also refused comment.

"I think it's the most ridiculous miscarriageof justice I've ever seen," said Weld Northresident Paul Z. Goldstein '89.

Said Lari: "What they did was wrong, but thepunishment they received was totally out ofproportion." He said their actions were not nearlyas severe as physical violence.

Yuriko Kuwabara, precept for the QRR testing,said, "I didn't realize they were being AdBoarded." She refused any further comment.

Although the eight students' action did causetrouble, Lari said, "It did not actually harmanybody." Lari added, "They have realized whatthey did was wrong."

Lari defended the freshmen's characters, sayingthat one of the students was "the driving forcefor intramurals" in Weld Hall. "Most of them havenever done anything wrong in their lives," hesaid