The Star Chamber

JUST when you thought it was safe to consider the Undergraduate Council the sole forum for expressing undergraduate opinion, student leaders last week formed HUSO, the Harvard Union of Student Officers. The group is supporting the formation of a much-needed student center on campus. Unfortunately, HUSO's legitimacy as a voice on campus issues is still questionable.

According to co-founder Van Truong, HUSO has four goals: to be a forum for communication, an officer support group ("leadership is so trying, sob, sob"), an opportunity to act on common issues (name one besides the student center) and a place to exchange news and agendas.

They may plan festive retreats once a year. And they may publish a "leader's handbook" which presumably would help run-of-the-mill Harvard students attain the exalted "student officer" status.

WE don't find fault with student leaders for the frustration they feel dealing with the administration; but an unrepresentative campus wide group saying the same things as the Undergraduate Council won't help the situation. Derek Bok won't say to the Corporation, "The Undergraduate Council has called for a student center Who cares? Wait a minute? Did the student officers, speak? Let's get moving now!"

Whether the student officers like it or not, any HUSO resolution will be seen as representing student opinion. But HUSO members joined the group based upon their proficiency in their extracurricular activities rather than their ability to gauge campus sentiment. And members were not chosen as representatives by their groups, but rather chose to join HUSO on their own. Their insistence that they will defer to the Undergraduate Council on important matters does not help; it only shows that they will be ineffective, as well as unrepresentative.

Any groups which choose to send a representative to HUSO should hold a democratic election to choose that person. Then HUSO members would at least represent their groups, if not the student body as a whole.

If student leaders want to pass out copies of their newsletters to each other and commiserate about their positions of power, let them do it on their own time. Leave the Undergraduate Council to represent students.