Yesterday, the CRIMSON published the the views on expansion of Seymour E. Harris '20, Chairman of the Department of Economics. The following is the second statement from a faculty member on the subject, that of Wilbur J. Bender '27, Dean of Admissions. Because of space limitations, about one-third of Dean Bender's text has been deleted, as indicated.

We can agree, I think, that there is nothing sacred about the present size of the College and that there is no one perfect or right number for Harvard. There is, no doubt, an optimum size, within reasonably narrow limits, for any college, the size being the number of students which, given an institution's particular resources, circumstances and function, it can educate with maximum effectiveness. I believe that, in these terms, our present enrollment is about five hundred too large, but I realize that this is subjective, unscientific judgment and I accept the fact that under pressure we are bound to depart somewhat from the ideal. And of course the optimum size will change as resources and circumstances change.

No Provincial Spirit

We can agree, also, that we must not approach the difficult national problem of greatly increased numbers wanting higher education in the next generation in any narrow, provincial or selfish spirit. We have a profound concern as citizens and as members of a university community with the kind of education the coming generation will have, and we have an obligation to the nation and to Harvard to do our full duty. But what is our duty? Here Harvard men will disagree, as usual.

On the face of it the answer is simple. With a big increase in the number of college candidates, and presumably a corresponding increase in the number of qualified candidates wanting to attend Harvard, we should expand, although no one yet argues that we should double in size, which we would have to do in order to keep pace with the increase, and obviously any conceivable increase in our enrollment would take care of only an infinitesimal part of the estimated two and one half million more students who will, it is predicted, be in college in 1970. The report of the Visiting Committee of the Board of Overseers is silent on how much bigger it wants Harvard to be, but it does mention a Freshman class "of say 1,500" which would mean an increase of 25-30 percent, or 1,000--1,400 over-all.

There can be only sentimental objections to increasing the size of the College in face of the great national need provided we can come reasonably close to doing Harvard's particular job effectively with increased numbers. The problem really boils down, then, to these questions: what is Harvard's special function in the national educational picture? what specifically would be required in the way of resources and arrangements to perform this function with reasonable adequacy if we have x number of additional students? and can the necessary additional resources be obtained? There is a further general policy question: will our national educational needs be best met by enlarging the already large institutions or by a decentralized development?

More Candidates for Miss Radcliffe?

In considering these questions it must not be forgotten that the College faculty teaches five groups of students: Harvard undergraduates, Radcliffe undergraduates, Radcliffe and Harvard graduate students and Graduate School of Public Administration students. (It also has some peripheral responsibilities for students in the graduate schools of Education, Divinity and Design.) Are all these categories going to expand and if so how much and what will that mean in terms of increased burdens on faculty and resources? If not all expand, which ones should grow at the expense of which others? Can we think of the College problem without considering the competing needs of the other groups? In view of the shortage of college teachers, which will be the critical bottleneck in the national expansion of higher education, and in view of the importance of the Harvard Graduate School in training college teachers, a stronge case can be made for expanding the Graduate School instead of the College. [Ed.--See Professor Harris' Friday statement]. Yet it has been said that it requires about three times as much in university facilities and in faculty time and energy to educate a graduate student as it does to educate an undergraduate. . . And what about Radcliffe, a small college where the pressure for admission is already, apparently, greater than it is at Harvard?

It may be helpful to take a little closer look at the numbers. We have all been somewhat bemused by the staggering figures about future college enrollments which are tossed around so freely and we tend to apply these statistics ever-simply to the consideration of Harvard's problems. National and local developments will not necessarily be identical in scope, however.

It seems clear that nationally in the next fifteen years there will be a large increase in the number of college students. Just how big the increase will be is, however, uncertain. College enrollments will be effected by a number of more or less unpredictable factors: business conditions, draft and man power policies, social and economic pressures, the cost of higher education, scholarship opportunities, the difficulty of securing admission to college, etc. . . The increase may be much more than is generally predicted, or it may be much less, depending. But even if the common estimates of a doubling of the number of college students nationally by 1970 are accepted, it does not follow that all colleges will be affected equally by the increase in the number of candidates, or in particular that Harvard will.

A considerable part of the estimated increase is the result not just of the rise in the birth rate and therefore of the total size of the college age group but of a projected increase in the proportion of the age group going to college. We have been moving pretty steadily from about four percent of the age group in college in 1900 to about 25-30 percent now. Quite possibly the proportion will go up to 40-50 per cent eventually. This will mean a lowering of the average level of academic ability of the college population.

The level of academic ability of the Harvard population, however, has been going up. The median Scholastic Aptitude Test verbal score of the entering class has gone up in the last four years from 582 to 632 and it will probably go up still further, but not much, I hope. The median Scholastic Aptitude Test mathematical score this year is 638.

The Cream of the Tidal Wave

It is not generally understood even at Harvard, and I mention it with some trepidation, that the average Harvard student is in the top 3-4 percent, academic-ability-wise, of his age group. Yet it is a fact of central importance for Harvard's problem that almost the entire Harvard student body is in the top 10 percent in terms of academic ability, of the national college-age population, and the great majority of Harvard students is in the top 5 per cent.

In other words, 90-95 percent of the "tidal wave" of college candidates is not part of the potential Harvard clientele. What happens to them is important, but they are not our particular problem. . .