Bundy, Bender, Ferry Discuss College Tasks

Dean Bundy, Dean Bender, and Ronald M. Ferry, retiring Master of Winthrop House, presented some of the major problems confronting the College to a large group of Class of '32 reuners yesterday in Paine Hall.

Bender considered the problem of selecting from the large number of applicants for the relatively few places at the 50 leading colleges and, particularly, Harvard. He explained the applications pressure by both "an almost obscene desire on the part of the American public to procreate" and a sharp rise in the percent of college-age youths actually applying to colleges.

A relatively short time ago only five percent of the college-age group were applying, but this figure has risen to 30 percent at the present time.

After stating some of the possible criteria for judging applications and suggesting that intellectual prowess might not be the best measure available, Bender closed by saying, with regards to the size of the entering Harvard class, "I cast a vote for no bigger--I want to cut it down."

Later in the morning, Bundy countered this opinion by saying that Harvard should expand slowly but steadily over the coming years.

Bundy also pointed out briefly several more problems which the College must face. The tendency of most people to cling to traditional forms of education, the shortage of teachers, largely because of their low pay scale, the need for evaluation and possibly reevaluation of the relative importance of various fields of learning in the University, and the role of Harvard as the educational leader of the United States all pose major problems for the University in the coming years.

Ferry outlined briefly some of the aims and accomplishments of the House system which had just come into being during the Class of '32's college career.

He mentioned that seminars, tutorial meetings, and, recently, course sections have been held in Houses, "increasing the academic efficiency of the Houses" and making life in the House "even more worthwhile."