Pusey Says University Won't Remodel Houses

President Pusey yesterday ruled out the possibility that the University will do any large scale remodeling of the old upperclass Houses before proceeding with the construction of a tenth House.

He said that remodeling, though desirable, is "well down on our list of priorities." "The money just isn't there for major architectural changes in the old Houses," he declared.

Pusey's statement seemed to out the ground out from under any proposal to help equalize freshman House applications by reducing the disparities in House physical plants. Such a proposal might have emerged from an ad hoc Faculty committee now considering the application system, and the influence of physical plants and other factors on applications.

What disturbs the Masters, who pressed for creation of the committee last spring, is the memory of the surge in applications to Quincy and Leverett which followed construction of the new Quincy building in 1959 and Leverett Towers soon after. The same thing is expected to happen when the tenth House finally goes up.

One Man, One Bedroom

Pusey reaffirmed yesterday that the College's eventual aim is to provide each student with his own study bedroom--an objective that was first voiced by a Visiting Overseers' Committee before the construction of Quincy House. "Every change we make is in this direction," he said.

But Pusey said he did not know if the tenth House would provide enough space to make this goal a reality. Though some deconversion in the older Houses will take place when the new one is built, the tenth House will also have to accommodate the 60 or more students who live off campus each year because of overcrowding in the College.

The University is still seeking a site for the tenth House, which it had hoped to locate on the Bennett St. MTA yards. This became impossible when the MTA abandoned indefinitely its plans to shift its switching and storing facilities from the yards to Codman Sq., in Dorchester.