IRWIN ROSS FLAYS CONANT'S FIRING OF POPULAR TEACHERS

For one Harvard alumnus the boy-hood dream of going back to school and beating up on teacher has come true although this alumnus operated at long range.

He is Irwin Ross '40, former editor of the Progressive. In an article entitled "The Tempest at Harvard" in the current Harper's he castigates President Conant's "administrative foibles" and adds "there appears no way to explain Conant's action other than to underscore the rigidity of his methods and presumably, his mind."

Ross's articles reviews at some length the tenure controversy which began in 1937 with the Walsh-Sweezy cause celebre and which came to a which hot climax last winter in lengthy Faculty debates over problems arising out of the famous "case of the ten assistant professors."

Poor Administration

His conclusion is that the tenure problem, precipitated by the dismissal of a number of popular teachers during the past few years, was not caused solely by a shrinking budget or by misguided publicity seekers, but by administrative incompetency, which he lays alive to what is going on," Ross writes, "and it appears unlikely that mass dismissals can recur. The demoralization among the younger men has not been alleviated, however. Frankly and simon President Conant's doorstep.

"For the nonce the Faculty seems alive to what is going on," Ross writes, "and it appears unlikely that mass dismissals can recur. The demoralization among the younger men has not been alleviated, however. Frankly and simply, they distrust President Conant ... the will of President Conant is frankly suspect."

Whither Progressives?

Although he notes the "steady exodus of progressives from Harvard" during the past few years, Ross nevertheless does not rank political prejudice as the primary cause of personnel troubles in recent years.

In closing, Ross observes, "the problems of adapting a university to the hard facts of restricted income, and at the same time developing a brilliant Faculty, are enormously complicated ones, involving that most delicate human factor--morale and cannot be solved with an axe."