New House's Possible Size Seen at 440

The Master of the College's largest House said yesterday that expansion by one more House would not overload the College, and he placed the upper membership limit for the new House somewhat highe, than the figure of 400 students discussed tentatively at the Faculty meeting earlier this week.

John J. Conway, Master of Leverett House, said he shared with Elliott Perkins '23, Master of Lowell, a feeling that there exits a definite point beyond which the membership of a House should not he increased. Perkins put this point at 400, but Conway felt it could be as high as 440, a figure he selected three years ago during the planning sessions for the Leverett Towers. Leverett has 450 students at present.

Conway felt that overflow from Leverett and the other existing Houses could fill up approximately 100 beds in the new House, leaving about 340 for expansion.

If there were ten Houses instead of nine into which to feed sophomores, it would also be possible to enlarge the freshman class by about 100.

Dean Monro, who has placed the College's expansion potential a shade higher, at about 500 students over the next ten years, said yesterday that the reason for building the size of the College was to fulfill Harvard's "obligation to do what it can" in response to "a very great national need."

Monro felt that there was no necessary contradiction between quantity of students and quality of education, pointing to the improvement the College had shown in the past 20 years, during which it has grown by 1500 students.

He also pointed out that while the number of students under the Faculty of Arts and Sciences has risen by ten per cent since 1952, the tenured members of this Faculty have increased by 20 per cent.