NEW PLANS FOR OLD

A group of statistics released yesterday by the committee on admissions seem to be straws pointing toward a definite tendency among candidates for admission toward seeking entrance through the Old Plan of examination. Those undergraduates who remember the gruelling horror of yearly examinations in preparatory school may be at a loss to explain this phenomenon; but the suspicion will arise that this preference for the Old Plan originates in a conviction that, all chances calculated, the Old Plan is the safest bet for admission. By the nature of its mechanics, the Old Plan is undoubtedly better adapted to intensive tutoring methods and in addition, it gives the candidate another finishing his school course.

The New Plan candidate must, on the other hand, risk all on a single cast after graduating from preparatory school; yet the chances are that the College will receive a more accurate estimate of his scholastic abilities. With this in view, the college board originally offered the New Plan with the purpose of displacing the Old Plan entirely: but if, as the experience of the College indicates, the process is rapidly being reversed, it is imperative to increase the difficulties of the Old Plan until they at-least equal those of the new. Such a change would benefit both the college Loard in reducing the complexity of their business, and, the College in providing it with a more accurate sifter of scholastic abilities. If candidates still referred the plodding preparation con the Old Plan, it would be incumbent on the College to use its influence in making the Old Plan more difficult than the New for any device which would turn candidates toward a reasonably difficult Now Plan would aid the scholastic standards of the College.