Data Shows Crowding in River Houses

Eliot House and Mather Houses will have the greatest increases in number of residents next year, according to a two-year statistical comparison of housing assignments obtained yesterday by The Crimson.

The statistics indicate that Eliot House will have 22 more residents next year while Mather will have 15 more. The number of rising sophomores assigned to each of the two Houses jumped this year by 49 and 55, respectively.

Leverett and Winthrop were the only two River Houses to lose residents, dropping by 15 and ten people, respectively.

North and South Houses had the greatest decreases in House size, with drops of more than 20 students in each House. The numbers fell despite a 27-per-cent increase in the number of rising sophomores assigned to the two Houses for next year. The entire Quad was assigned 108 more sophomores this year than last.

Bruce Collier, assistant dean of the College, said last night it was necessary to assign additional sophomores to the Quad to replace a "large group of graduating seniors" who are leaving the Quad.

Collier declined comment on relative crowding in River houses because he did not have figures available.

Several representatives of the Committee on Houses and Undergraduate Life (CHUL) expressed dissatisfaction yesterday with the method Collier uses to determine the optimal number of residents in each House.

This method, passed by CHUL last year, requires that Collier determine a "pain factor" for each House based primarily on the average amount of room space available in each House. After setting the relative discomfort caused by crowding in each House, Collier is then to set the quota of students assigned to each House in order to equalize crowding in all Houses.

"The way Collier has worked out the pain formula is unfair to certain Houses," Katherine Fulton '78, CHUL representative from Winthrop House, said yesterday.

Lee Bains '77, CHUL representative from Kirkland House, said yesterday he will introduce a motion at the next CHUL meeting asking Collier "to reconsider the pain factor and devise a system that is more equitable to all the Houses."

'Mountain of Facts'

"I know there's something wrong here regardless of Collier's mountain of facts and statistics," Bains added.

Both Bains and Fulton said Lowell House is comparatively uncrowded and a prime example of the disparity between the Houses.