Allow Co-Ed Summer Housing in DeWolfe

Harvard just can't seem tokeep its hands out of issues they don't belong in. The University Housing Office is again refusing to allow co-ed rooming groups to apply for housing in the DeWolfe Street apartments this summer.

The main justification the administration uses in defense of this policy is that, should someone drop out of a rooming group, it is easier to just put another man with three men or a woman with three women. According to Catherine M. Millett of the Undergraduate Housing Office, "If a student for some reason cancels, we have to fill the slot." The administration thus frames its opposition in economic terms.

Yet DeWolfe Street was filled to capacity last summer when rooming was restricted to single-sex groups. It is unlikely it would not be filled if co-ed rooms were allowed.

University officials probably know this; their reasoning seems like just another excuse for enforcing outdated puritanical rules.

The University would not have to suffer financially in order to let co-ed rooming groups into DeWolfe. Nevertheless, housing officials seem satisfied with the current approach and are unwilling to change.

Tradition and stubbornness are again getting in the way of good policy Forward should move into the 20th century and allow coed rooming summer.