A Sympathetic SGA

Once upon a time there was a student government, which lived in a shaded enclave near Garden Street. It was a fragmented and confused student government: legislative bodies and their subsidiary committees largely duplicated each other's activities. Its members talked, they knit, they collected dues, and even on occasion passed a law. All this they did subject to the approval of a benevolent Administration with which they managed to communicate only after its duress became fact.

Now Radcliffe has changed the SGA constitution, so that Board of Hall Presidents and the Student Council merge, and three members of the Administration join the new Association as voting members. On the whole it is a sensible change. The fact that the Administration controls only three votes out of 40 preserves the useful illusion of student autonomy. At the same time, the Constitution ensures that students will at least have the chance to know what their Deans are thinking about.

The Radcliffe Administration will no doubt always act without paying much attention to public opinion as expressed through the SGA. The importance, if any, of the constitutional change lies in the fact that a massive transformation of the college (such as President Bunting's house system is likely to prove) may, if it moves too quickly, and is not quite understood, engender a mild form of anomie in the student community. At the moment, an essentially conservative bunch of students could use the benefits of direct confrontation with a strong Administration before the bureaucratic wheels begin to roll.

There will probably be no substantial alteration in the politics of student-dean relations at Radcliffe, but perhaps more of Garden Street will come to know about, if not to approve of, Mrs. Bunting's efforts.