Coed Living In Houses To Continue Into 1971; Ratio Still Not Certain

The Faculty yesterday approved coed housing for the next academic year-whether or not the merger goes through-but declined to limit it to the two-to-one male-female ratio recommended by the Committee on Coresidential Living.

Jerome Kagan, professor of Developmental Psychology and chairman of the committee, proposed the ratio as one of four recommendations representing the group's final report. Karl A. Strauch, professor of Physics, added an amendment that the Dunster House Committee asked him to propose, striking out the sentence on ratio in Kagan's motion.

The final decision on ratio will now rest with the committed established under Kagan's resolution to choose which Houses will be coed. It is now possible-al-through very unlikely-for all of the Houses to be coed.

The Yard will remain the domain of Harvard freshmen only, and Radcliffe freshmen will have the choice of living in coed or all-girl dormitories at Radcliffe.

Strauch said in proposing his amendment-which passed by a vote of 68-61- "I am not at all an expert on this subject, but as an experimental physicist, I'd like to see some experimentation." He suggested that some Houses have a two-to-one ratio and others have different ones. He pointed out that the present ratio in Adams, Winthrop, and Lowell Houses is about seven-to-one.

Under Kagan's two-to-one proposal only three or four Houses could be coed. Kagan said that "informal reports" from Yale and Princeton where the ratios are over five-to-one, indicate that the girls "feel like curiosities."

Extra Incentive

He also said that limiting the number of coed Houses will provide an extra incentive for men in other Houses to move to Radcliffe-almost all of which will be coed. Kagan had suggested that 440 to 450 men move to Radcliffe and an equal number of women enter the Houses.

Kagan also announced the results of apoll on coed housing taken by his committee last December. Fifty-two per cent of the student body (2960) answered the poll. Ninety-eight per cent of the women were in favor of coed housing, and 90 per cent of the men.

Kagan pointed out that if the other half of the student body feels the same way, approximately 600 men are opposed to it.

Kagan pointed out that long-term co-residential living at the University will become a financial problem because "the Quad will have to be architecturally brought up to snuff." He cited the lack of suites and common rooms in the Radeliffe dorms and said, "It's just not fair to send Harvard men up there."