Draft May Cut College Enrollments Next Year

Unless the present draft law is changes by next summer, 10 to 15 percent of the College may be called into the armed services before September. Under the present law, students are automatically exempt until this June, but a recent survey taken of colleges and universities throughout the country by the Wall Street Journal showed an expected drop in enrollment from 234,451 to 351,676 men.

This, added to the decrease already suffered this year, will place several institutions in serious financial difficulty. Many schools are even now operating in the red, including Harvard, which has been dipping into its reserves in order to be able to maintain standards.

Yale forecasts a loss of 600 men, while Stanford sees a 50 percent cut and Princeton 30 percent. The latter is planning to undertake more government research projects on a cost plus basis, and Yale will try to admit an unusually large freshman class and accept more transfer students.

Co-ed Schools See Solution

Co-ed schools, like Stanford, may take is a greater number of women. North-western University, in Chicago, asked the government directly to defer 1100 draftable non-veterans. President George F. Senberger said they had received no reply yet.

Henry M. Wriston, president of Brown and the Association of American Universities, predicts a "financial hurricane" if the draft age is lowered to 18, that would clean out most colleges."

Many schools fear a tuition boost will be necessary, but an official at Dartmouth observed that "too big a boost will price colleges out of the market, with state institutions charging much lower fees."

For the first time since the war, colleges this year experienced a 7.4 percent drop in total enrollment, with big name schools suffering a 15 percent loss. Only $50,160 freshmen entered college last September, compared with the 601,872 figure for 1949. There are 2,344,500 students now in colleges throughout the country. Eighty percent of the schools said they could have taken more, but also claimed insufficient funds to support their existing student bodies. Before Korea, 75 percent of them had plans for much needed now buildings, a record program, which have now been shelved.

Upward Trend Seen

General consensus feels that the '49-'50 upward trend will resume. Many institutions expected to reach their peak year by 1954 under normal trends, but are now worrying about how to keep their heads above water. Some 500 small colleges are in serious danger unless they got financial aid soon. They fear that to survive under present conditions would involve lowering their standards far below the one on which they are willing to operate.

Donations to the nation's colleges have been slow since the end of the war. Even Harvard's reserves have "diminished sharply" in the last few years, according to a University official. Inflation has forced prices upward to the point where materials have become unavailable to a large number of smaller schools.

Unimpaired Freedom

The American Council on Education and the National Education Association have pledged their resources to the fight her education. In a recent joint statement, the two organizations emphasized the need of universities and colleges in the ideological war. "Most important," it included, "academic freedom must not the limited in any way during the present crisis."