Good and bad news about the Houses

Both supporters and critics of the College's House system found something to cheer about last week, when the Office of Instructional Research and Evaluation (OIRE) released the results of its latest survey of student evaluation of the Houses.

On the plus side, the report found that students now feel the Houses make a markedly more valuable contribution to "the Harvard experience" than in 1973, when the office conducted a similar study.

The 1240 students who answered the poll last spring rated the overall House contribution almost a full point higher on the "satisfaction scale" than did the pollees three years ago.

Critics of the Houses system noted, however, that the Houses rated poorly in terms of their contribution to the students' education. While pollees reported more frequent meetings and dinner-time conversations with their tutors--a key aspect of the study's analysis of House atmosphere--most students said they see the tutors more as personal friends than as academic or career advisors.

Some students contacted yesterday about the poll said that Dean Fox's decision this week to withhold the ratings of the individual Houses might obscure negative evaluations of certain Houses while presenting a picture of general satisfaction within the College.

Dean K. Whitla, director of OIRE, said yesterday that while differences between the evaluations exist, he did not perceive any "inherent biases" or "strange anamolies" in the report's findings.

He said he believes most ratings in all Houses "were generally up across the board." He added that the office had not explicitly tried to rank the Houses in terms of student preferences.

Whitla said, however, that it is "realistic to expect" that certain Houses, especially those by the river, would draw a more favorable reaction than others.

The study shows "a very nice movement" towards improvement of the Houses, Whitla said, the lower rating of the educational role serves to highlight a problem the University must still face, he added.

Still, Whitla said, the upturn in students participating in House tutorials is contributing to "the generally more positive feelings towards the Houses."