OUR DIRECTOR

There exist few doubters to whom it is necessary to demonstrate anew the value of a well-organized program of intramural athletics. To the aspiring athlete of sub-varsity talents, it gives the opportunity to take part in those sports which he enjoys playing. To the collegiate rank and file, it offers stimulus to widespread athletic participation, to pleasurable exercise directed toward the development of sound bodies for sane minds. To rapidly spreading spectator sports and grandstand gymnastics, hailed by our fashionable pessimists as the sign of twilight in a decadent generation, it deals an effective body blow.

At Harvard, the intramural program has an added value. More than any number of House Dinners and High Tables it lends to the development of the cohesiveness and community spirit that President Lowell so hopefully envisioned in the Houses.

Hence, the trends indicated in the report released yesterday by Mr. Samborski, Director of Intramural Athletics, cannot be but completely gratifying. The fact that a predominance of the undergraduate body placed athletics first among extra-curricular activities in the Crimson poll of last spring amply demonstrated the importance of House sports. The present report further points toward increasing importance. A tripling in the participation rate since class athletics gave way to House sports, a doubling of the available sports, an increase to 57 percent participation all are irrefutable indications.

Credit for last year's particularly encouraging upturn belongs jointly to a revamping of the system based on Student Council recommendations and to the active and efficient direction of Mr. Samborski. These two factors have collaborated to reduce the number of defaults, increase participation as well as the varieties of available sports. Their collaboration in the future can be confidently expected to produce a still greater vigor and mounting value to Harvard's House athletics.