College Must Expand Dormitories To Relieve Crowding, Pusey States

President Pusey returned to a theme of his first Report to the Overseers for his second annual message last week. Once again the University's twenty-fourth president criticized the overcrowding of College facilities. Expanding upon remarks made to the Overseers a year ago, he termed crowded dormitory space "perhaps the College's most serious problem." Although he offered no immediate solution, he hoped that "by next year we shall have at least begun to plan a way out."

The body of the Report--required annually by the statutes of the University--dealt with the position of the humanities in the College. The President noted and deplored enrollment drop in this area.

He emphasized the seriousness of the drop by noting that it had occurred during the twenty-five years in which the overall College enrollment had steadily increased. But there are other indications, he noted in concluding, that show the humanities still continue to occupy a significant place in the curriculum.

Personal Regret

Faced with learning his own job during the early part of 1953-54, President Pusey limited his first report of a year ago to touching upon University problems in the light of comparing the present University with that he left in 1929. In his second report this year he singles out Advanced Standing, a special Bachelor of Science degree, and curriculum revisions at the School of Design for special commendation. Excerpts from his report are compiled below.

"Twenty-five years ago the number of undergraduates concentrating in the three large divisions of the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences were very roughly the same, with the largest number in the humanities. Today more undergraduates are concentrating in the social sciences than the other two combined. . . . A visiting committee from outside . . . submitted an independent evaluation of the state of the behavioral sciences at Harvard. . . . They said: . . . 'We have found that, without exception, each of the departments and professional schools studied rank at or close to the top among the universities of the country.'"

The President then examined the status of the Humanities in the College.

"The evidence (The Report on Behavioral Sciences) made available last year concerning the relative healthy condition of the social sciences is reassuring. But at the same time I confess personal regret that reasons for optimism and satisfaction concerning the position of the humanities are not equally convincing. . . .

"In 1930, for example, 1,200 undergraduates concentrated in this field. By last year, although the number of students in the College had risen by more than a thousand, their numbers had fallen below 900. It is difficult to say what determines undergraduate concentrations . . . but the apparent lack of appreciation from which the humanities seem to suffer in the eyes of today's undergraduates is disturbing.

"The humanities hold a central position in liberal education. In a sense, all subjects deserve a place in liberal curriculum only as they partake in at least some degrees of the goal of humane scholarship. But a college in which the studies traditionally called the humanities are weak runs the risk of being less liberal than it should; for our full humanity is best quickened and developed through imaginative grasp of the subtler experiences of individuals as revealed through arts and letters. . . .

"The chief aim of undergraduate education is to discover what it means to be a man. This has always to be done in personal individual terms. A college will be strong, therefore, only where those studies flourish whose principal value is to arouse such awareness and where they are taught with charm and vigar and win respect. . .

"There are some indications of improvement in the situation of humanities at Harvard. Happily our friends at Radcliffe are helping this cause.

"There are other indications of more immediate relevance. . . The number of course elections in the humanities is virtually as large as in the social sciences . . . Thus we can say they continue to occupy a significant place in the curriculum although a large part of the task of teachers in these fields seems now to be to contribute to the liberal education of students whose major preoccupation is with one or the other of the natural sciences or social sciences. . .

No Housing Solution

"I turn now to a subject to which I have already called attention in various talks within the University. It is the size of Harvard College. . . . The growth in the College without corresponding (or rather without any) growth in dormitory space has created what seems to me to be the most serious problem confronting the College at the moment. With new pressures just around the corner, the present overcrowded condition will soon become completely intolerable. I have no immediate solution to the difficulty, but I hope by next year we shall by taking thought together have at least begun to plan a way out. . . ."

The President gave especial attention to three achievements, by the University during the year 1953-54.

Of the Advanced Standing Program for exceptionally qualified secondary school applicants, he said; "It is not an attempt to introduce a new--certainly not a three-year--program for all students, but only the added flexibility needed to provide well for the best prepared ones."

"Emotional Intensity" Spent

He called the decision to permit qualified students to earn a Bachelor of Science degree, after completing the degree in Arts, by taking additional work in the Division of Applied Sciences, "a second noteworthy action." And he lauded the Design School's "increased emphasis in a new curriculum on history, aesthetics, the theory of architecture, composition and freehand drawing."

Speaking of the new Report on the Bevavioral Sciences, compiled last year by a committee of faculty members, the President said:

"On the whole the University comes off quite well in this report, for with very few exceptions the members of the faculty interviewed state frankly that they would rather be here than at any other university. They like Harvard's devotion to excellence and feel pride in her recognized standing among universities. They enjoy the twofold responsibility for both teaching and research, though this report says less about teaching than one might wish. . . On the other side of the ledger is the fact that almost all members of the faculty interviewed deplore demands upon them to perform administrative duties. . . The younger faculty are subject to very special worries. These arise chiefly from the almost universal desire to attain permanency at Harvard. . ."

President Pusey concluded his message with a discussion of the attention Harvard attracted in the press in 1953-54:

"Now that the emotional intensity has spent itself, it is clear that Harvard did not suffer, but grew in popular respect because of her refusal to make concessions in order to placate an irascible, if limited, public opinion . . . . Because the faculty, administration, and governing boards worked and stood together in this difficult situation prolonged during two years, a very precious internal health and sense of community within the University have been incalculably strengthened."