Jewish Leaders Blast Faculty Council Vote On Final Exam Policy

The Faculty Council voted Wednesday to allow students with religious conflicts to take make-up exams on the same basis as students with illnesses.

The action came in response to requests from Jewish students to change the Saturday exam schedule system.

But Jewish leaders have rejected the council decision as inadequate. "It's been a disgrace to the institution that they've been so petty and unjust," Jay R. Rothstein '71, president of Harvard-Radcliffe Hillel, said yesterday. "Harvard University expects its Jewish students to desecrate their sabbath," Rabbi BenZion Gold, University Jewish chaplain, charged last night.

Under orthodox Jewish beliefs, students are not permitted to take exams on Saturday. Harvard Jews observing the prohibition may come to the regularly scheduled exam period and wait under the supervision of a proctor until sundown to begin the exam. The students are required to pay a proctor at the rate of $2.50 an hour during the waiting period and the examination.

The Harvard-Radeliffe Hillel last Spring proposed a five-day exam week to eliminate the Saturday conflict for Jewish students. Hillel also proposed and honor system in which students could take an exam the day before or after any Saturday exam conflicts.

Robert Shenton, registrar of the College, said yesterday that the Faculty Council did not change the exam period schedule because "we would have had to spread the period thin or shorten it." According to Shenton, the changes proposed to accommodate Jewish students "would be a hardship for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences."

The Faculty Council decision allows students with religious conflicts in the January schedule to take the exam in mid-April while make-up exams for the final exam period are held the following October. Jewish leaders contend that the three to four month waiting period is unfair to Jewish students.

"Religion is a kind of disease," Rabbi Gold charged. "In these days when so few people take their religion seriously, it is most regrettable that the educator has no greater sensitively for students' religious faith."