Grad Students and PALC Set Up Shop

Campus activism began simmering on several fronts this week although the prospect that it will reach a full boil this year is as yet uncertain.

The first meeting of the Graduate Student and Teaching Fellow Union on Thursday attracted a somewhat disappointing turnout, but if the Union's assessment of the financial situation of teaching fellows presented at the meeting is correct, the organization will have a successful organizing drive.

Nancy Glaser, a member of the Union's financial research committee, told the 60 Union members present that the University's new tuition abatement program appears to mean that "teaching fellows as a group are receiving approximately $250,000 less than they did last year."

The substitution of the new program for Staff Tuition Scholarships (STS) last Spring led to the formation of the Union. Union spokesmen have continually maintained that less assistance for teaching fellows will be forthcoming under the new program and their success this year hinges to a great extent on the validity of this claim.

Another activist campaign that achieved remarkable success last Spring will be renewed this Fall. Kevin Mercadel '74, president of Harvard-Radcliffe Afro, said Tuesday that his group and the Pan African Liberation Committee (PALC) plan to continue their compaign to force Harvard to divest its 683,000 shares of Gulf Oil stock.

Appearing on a Third World Liberation panel with Socialist Workers Party vice presidential candidate Andrew Pulley. Mercadel said that PALC and Afro plan "a massive re-education process" during the coming months.

Antiwar activists were also in the week's news. The Committee on Rights and Responsibilities (CRR) announced it will reconsider the cases of five students accused by the Administration of participating in an antiwar sit-in at Littauer Center May 10.