OVERSEERS ENDORSE POLICY OF "ATHLETICS FOR ALL"

The report of the standing committee of the Board of Overseers on health and athletic sports, recently accepted by the Board, was made public yesterday.

Reviewing the organization and record of Harvard athletics, the committee strongly commends the policy of "athletics for all" and endorses the Athletic Committee's proposals for further squash courts and a large modern swimming pool.

In a significant section the committee declares that the chief problem in athletics "is one of relative values; and it must be met, in our opinion, by following the principle that athletics is an element in the education of the individual to be given its due place but no more than that." The committee also comments favorably on the various agreements eliminating "everything that tends in the direction of professionalism," and praises the high standard of sportsmanship in modern athletics at Harvard.

The committee also indicates the relation between the Board of Overseers, the Athletic Committee, the H. A. A., and the various team managements. It commends the establishment of a budget for the H. A. A. and suggests that the surplus funds of the H. A. A. should be turned over to and invested by the Treasurer of Harvard University. This suggestion was approved by the Board of Overseers and was the basis of an article which appeared yesterday in one of the metropolitan newspapers, declaring that Harvard was approaching faculty control of athletics. Officers of the University said yesterday that the decision marked no radical change of policy but merely the logical development of the relation which has existed for years between the H. A. A. and the University.

The report is signed by Colonel Arthur Woods '92, of New York, former police commissioner of New York City and chairman of the committee; and by John W. Hallowell '01, William F. Garcelon '95, Dr. J. Bapst Blake '87, Alfred Winsor Jr. '02, Barrett Wendell '01, Dr. Channing Frothingham '02, Ernest A. Stillman '07, and John F. Perkins '99.

The report follows:--

Your committee has studied the present organization and work of the various agencies at Harvard University which are engaged in the management of athletics and the safeguarding of health, and is impressed by the advance that has been made. A generation ago only a comparatively few men engaged in athletics, and the responsibility of the University for the health of its students was largely confined to taking care of illness. Today Harvard is actively concerned in bringing athletics within the reach of all, and in the positive promotion of the health of the student body as a whole.

The matter will perhaps be made clearer by an explanation of the functions of the agencies concerned with health and athletics. The department of hygiene, under Dr. Roger I. Lee, has general charge of the health of students. In this department are the medical adviser, Dr. Bailey, who takes care of students who are ill, and has immediate charge of the Stillman Infirmary; and the director of physical education, Mr. William H. Geer, who directs the compulsory exercise plan for freshmen and is in general charge of unorganized athletics.

The direction of organized athletics and of the facilities for outdoor sports in general is in the hands of the Athletic Committee, composed of three members of the faculty, three graduates, and three undergraduates. The three faculty members appointed by the Corporation, with the consent of the Overseers, are Dean Briggs, chairman, Dr. Lee, professor of hygiene, and Professor Greenough, dean of Harvard College. The three graduate members, similarly appointed, are Henry Pennypacker '88, chairman of the Committee on Admission; B. I. Young '07, Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives; and H. H. Faxon, who was first marshal of the class of 1921.

The undergraduate members, nominated by the presidents of the college classes and by representatives of the teams, are George Owen Jr. '23, Charles C. Buell '23, and J. G. Flint '23. Under the general direction of the Athletic Committee is the athletic department, which goes by the name of the Harvard Athletic Association. It maintains the outdoor athletic fields such as Soldiers Field and the Stadium, and has charge of other phases of athletic management, including the large business of ticket assignment and distribution, and the supervision of the work of the managers of the various teams.

H. A. A. to Take Over Indoor Sports

The Corporation has recently voted, on the recommendation of the Athletic Committee, that the committee should take over and operate, through the agency of the Athletic Association, the general facilities for indoor as well as outdoor sport. This decision is commendable. It means that all organized sports and athletics, and buildings used for them, will be under the jurisdiction of the Athletic Committee and maintained by it. This should effect a saving of something like $20,000 a year to the University, which has hitherto maintained out of other funds such buildings as the Hemenway Gymnasium and the University Squash Courts; and the increased income which the Athletic Association has received in the past two or three years from the sale of tickets will make this very reasonable policy feasible.

The primary object of all these agencies, of course, is and should be the health and physical development of the entire student body. The progress made in the past few years in this respect is great.

Physical Examinations Valuable

In the first place, the establishment of a compulsory physical examination and of prescribed exercise for freshmen has proved its value. The requirements have been sensibly devised so as to encourage participation in organized athletics, and to make men take part in games which are enjoyable and can be played in after life. This is a wise policy; the college performs a useful service if it develops in men a liking for games they can play as they grow older, and for outdoor activity generally. Except for the comparatively small number of men who need some special sort of physical building up, none of the wearisome gymnasium exercise with chest weights and other apparatus which naturally come to mind with the phrase "compulsory exercise" are required.

The physical examinations are of value in giving the professor of hygiene a basis for useful advice to undergraduates on health, and also have had the rather unexpected result of giving new confidence to many men who were afraid there was something serious the matter with them when there was not. These examinations are also significant as showing that the men who enter college nowadays, with rare exceptions, come to college with clean and wholesome bodies. There are compulsory physical examinations also for candidates for teams, and other students may have such examinations if they wish. The professor of hygiene has the power to prevent any man from playing on a team if his physical condition makes it unwise; and he has a control over the health of the students that no university official had prior to the past decade. He has brought about the regular sanitary inspection of the University dining halls, the small swimming pools which are now available, the playing fields, etc.; and all physicians and trainers of the athletic teams must be approved by him, and are responsible to him. These steps seem to us so wise and necessary that it is strange to think that they have been taken only in recent years.

Health of Student Body Satisfactory

Statistics compiled by the Department of Hygiene show that the general health of the student body is satisfactory. The incidence of illness is somewhat lower than in the general community; and the University, although it has its epidemics, has had them in recent years less severely on the whole than the general community.

Meanwhile, the opportunities for sport have been not only much increased, but much more widely used. During the past ten years more than fifteen acres on Soldiers Field have been made available; a new track has been built, a large amount of new equipment has been furnished for oarsmen, the University has purchased the former Randolph Athletic Building and the Big Tree Swimming Pool, and is now operating these buildings for the use of the entire student body; a temporary Freshman Athletic Building has been constructed, and there have been many other minor additions to athletic equipment. Many of these developments, of course, have been made possible by the increased revenue of the Athletic Association from the sale of football tickets.

The figures for locker rentals show that undergraduates have been taking an increasing amount of athletic exercise during the winter months of the past few years, and this seems to indicate that the requirement of exercise for freshmen develops a habit which tends to stay with the men during the rest of their college course. A good sign has been the increased popularity of squash racquets which, from being a game known only to few, has grown until last winter an average of about 500 played it every day. The reservation sheet is posted each morning at 8.45; before that time there is frequently a line of twenty-five to fifty men waiting to reserve courts, and only those who report within a few minutes of 8.45 can hope to secure one of the late afternoon periods.

Number of Crew Men Great

It is harder to tell how great the increase in outdoor sports has been, but there has been a general increase, and in rowing it has been particularly conspicuous. Most graduates remember the time when only a few men rowed at Harvard. Since then the number of the men on the river has enormously increased; in fact it has doubled since 1920. "Rowing for the many" is not merely a phrase at Harvard, but a fact. In the spring of 1922, 632 men rowed; last autumn (1922) 552 men rowed, and there were 37 eights on the river, in addition to fours, doubles, and single sculls. Rowing has been particularly popular among the Freshmen; last autumn 189 Freshmen rowed in 21 eights, and 65 Freshmen rowed in singles. It is believed that the rowing squad at Harvard is the largest athletic unit in an American college.

This development is most satisfactory and your committee is desirous to see it continue. The suggestion has been heard that the prescription of exercise be continued after the Freshman year; but it seems to us better to make the most of the present situation by providing every possible facility for optional exercise for upperclassmen. There is a real danger that the University, if it is not able to increase athletic facilities, will be in the position of saying to Fresh-