Design School Project Stresses College's Place in Environment

The difficulties of an Urban Renewal Program and the general decline of local conditions have highlighted a long-dormant problem for the University--its relationship to the national and local environment. Usually this problem is seen as a debate over left or right side parking in Cambridge or, on a slightly higher level, Harvard's responsibility for educating American youth.

But this fall the Design School's Department of City Planning and Landscape Architecture began work on a more far-reaching approach: an analysis of the University as a sociological and economic institution. Urban Renewal is only one phase of this project, which aims at analyzing problems ranging form the economic raison d'etre of higher education to housing married students and faculty members in Cambridge.

Under the overall direction of Reginald R. Isaacs, Charles Dyer Norton Professor of Regional Planning, and Mark Fortune, Director of the Cambridge Planning Board, third year students are carrying out the project, which may continue for several years. Despite its unofficial status the implications on long-range University planning could be profound.

The areas of study are immense. The relationship of the University to the national demand for education is an obvious example. What will be the effect of changing population composition? Can accurate predictions of the make-up of the student body be made, in terms of married versus non-married students, or in terms of the demand for different kinds of housing? These considerations must also include the possibility of depression or inflation and the effect of the standard of living on both the scale and demand for higher education.

Such problems have long been recognized, but to date the University has apparently made little effort to answer them in more than highly generalized terms. Yet the need for answers is obvious. If there will be more married students, houses must be found. If, as the Design School's study suggests, the local resources in certain types of housing are exhausted, the University must do something--now. If housing for married couples is to be built, land should be bought now. If three more houses are going to be necessary, part of the expense can be averted if the need is anticipated, rather than recognized after it has arisen.

The relationship of higher education to industry is a field as yet largely unexplored. The possible changes in the composition of the student body as industrial concerns demand more education are clear. The growing dependence on industrial funds is also obvious. But what about industrial demands for more specialized technical training, especially in fields which are now virtually non-existent--automation, nucleonics, and solar energy?

While the major significance of the Design School's study is the fact that it highlights the need for a broader and more thorough approach to University planning, the four students working last fall also researched several of their projects.

Studies of faculty and student housing supported the general awareness of declining local conditions, and the need for University action, with both statistics and predictions.

Research on the economic impact of the University on Cambridge similarly served to support the importance of education as a basic local industry, despite the tax exemption.

Again, the factors have been recognized, but never analyzed or meticulously supported. The work done thus far raises far more questions that it answers. The biggest question of all, however, is whether the University will attempt to develop the student's work, analyzing and predicting the unknowns involved, or pursue the old policy of solving problems ten years after they become acute.