Housemasters Vote To Adopt Associate Membership Plan For Out-of-House Men

Acting on Student Council recommendations that capped a year and half of undergraduate agitation, the Housemasters voted on Monday to admit 10 to 12 associate members to each House as an experiment for next year and decided that "the quota of upperclassmen to be admitted be increased for the year 1939-40," Dean Hanford announced yesterday.

A third Council proposal, that out-of-House men be given athletic secretaries and full intramural facilities, has already been put into effect. In addition the Masters voted that associate members be charged a fee of $25 to "meet the additional expense which will be made necessary by the admission of extra members."

The new hybrid members will be granted full House privileges, including use of dining halls, use of libraries where capacity permits, and participation in all House activities. As far as possible they will be admitted to residence as vacancies occur in the Houses with which they are affiliated.

No Junior-Senior Guarantee

Although the Council's proposal for a virtually Iron-clad guarantee of admission to Juniors and Seniors was turned down, the Housemasters approved the general Principe of admitting a large number of upperclassmen.

In commenting on this decision yesterday, Dean Hanford said, "The number of upperclassmen is being increased so as to provide for a larger proportion of the resident Juniors and Seniors in good standing, who have applied regularly for the Houses during the last two years."

The new plan is designed to accomplish two purposes: to reduce the number of men who go through all or most of their college life outside the House system; and to increase the total number of undergraduates receiving the benefits of the Houses.

174 Now on Waiting List

At present there are 174 men on the waiting list, of whom 103 are Sophomores and 47 are Juniors and Seniors. Presumably at this time next year the number of waiting upperclassmen will be out down, and the number of Sophomores increased; the number of Sophomores increased; the number of Sophomores who have no House affiliation, however, will be reduced by the operation of the associate plan.

The problem of dealing with the annual overflow of men who cannot get into Houses is a recent one; in the early years of the Houses it was found impossible to fill all the rooms. But the increasing popularity of the Houses and a growing College enrollment has caused an acute situation in the past few years. It is estimated that an average of 260 men are dented admission to the Houses each year.

Student sympathy for the plight of the out-of-Housers was evidenced by an H.S.U. investigation f the problem early in 1938. Last spring a Freshman committee's recommendations that the associate membership plan be tried was rejected by the Housemasters. It was on the basis of a thorough Council investigation that they reversed their stand this week.