Brown and White Vol. 67 No. 52

              lehigh university brown and white vol 67—no 52 summer thursday june 28 1956 lu bethlehem pa students must pledge selves to adhere to own hp rules houseparty continuation rests on two conditions whether or not future houseparty weekends will be held at lehigh will depend upon the ability of the student body to come forward with an acceptable set of rules and regulations for the event and upon the effectiveness of their unequivocal pledge to adhere to their own rules that is the meaning of the evaluation and recommendation of the special student-faculty houseparty committee which has been inves tigating the problems surrounding the gala social event since febru ary 14 released today the committee's action sets up two fundamental condi tions upon which the holding of future houseparties including that of fall 1956 is contingent these prerequisites agreed to by the dean's office are 1 that the students through their regularly constituted representatives present to the dean of students for his approval a set of rules and regu i lations particularly with respect to the housing of lady guests and 2 that the students through their representatives pledge themselves unequivocally to ad here to such rules and regula tions because these conditions must be met to the satisfaction of dean wray h congdon before there could be a fall houseparty this edition of the brown and white is being mailed tq each student to enable interested parties to begin planning now for the fall houseparty was originally scheduled for oct 26-28 the complete evaluation and rec ommendation of the houseparty committee follows many of our students claimed that they needed only to be giv en an opportunity to demon strate their capacity and will ingness to accept responsibility for their behavior in university approved organized social af fairs they were given this op portunity in a larger measure than ever before at the recent spring houseparty rules were relaxed and new regulations were set up only in so far as these could be instrumental in assisting students in carrying out their responsibilities we were ready to accept at face value all signs of good faith on the part of all individual students and of all living groups we expected that they would behave responsibly whereas this expectation was jus tified by the behavior of some in dividuals and groups we were seri ously disappointed by the behavior of others there were signs of de i fiance of basic regulations and we have evidence of irregular behavior in a significant number of cases lehigh university cannot know ingly approve or condone social ac tivities which either by the irre-t sponsible behavior of students or by the physical conditions under which the activities are planned are con ducive to the violation of publically expected standards and to the em barrassment of the university we the members of the special committee therefore respectfully submit the follow ing recommendation to the dean of students that the holding of future house parties be contingent upon the fol lowing conditions 1 that the students through their regularly constituted repre sentatives present to the dean of students for his approval a set of rules and regulations particularly with respect to the housing of lady guests and 2 that the students need for math teachers cited by principals by pauline seyer need for school systems to place more emphasis upon the teaching of mathematics commonly thought of as the most hated subject prompt ed its discussion by lehigh valley principals at a conference on sec ondary education problems last thursday and friday in drown hall from a recent report of the educational testing service the educators learned of the state of today's mathematics teaching programs the report revealed that a large number of teachers are barely more advanced than their students and consequent ly it is today the poorest taught subject in elementary and secondary schools under the chairmanship of robert e brong of the mathematics de partment at allentown high school the group concerned itself with in creasing the flexibility of teaching programs so that more courses could be taught to more students more effectively in a recent survey of courses re quired for high school graduation english ranked first and mathe matics was at the bottom since mathematics is taught to develop critical thinking gives information facts and principles of space and an appreciation of mechanical and in dustrial life today it is an import ant part of our democratic life the group asserted in the final report of the conference the final report termed mathematics the greatest of all sciences because it is practical cultural and offers disciplinary action in addition to giving facts and skills the study of mathematics of fers critica judgment ability to in trepret and present data draw con elusions and understand statistics the student learns to analyze rela tions of quantity and space apply critical thinking to abstract and life major participants in principal's conference held here last friday from left to right dr harold p thomas director of summer session james e nancarrow speaker dr trever williams president of conference a f hunsberger past president photo by whitaker to be or not to be a scene from last fall's houseparty which may not be repeated this fall the special report from the committee on houseparty indicated that plans for any future houseparties would be contingent upon two special condi tions which must be met by the students between now and this fall university average increases to 2.106 following the trend of academic improvement in the spring semester the all-university average rose from last fall's all-time low of 2.004 to a more respectable 2.106 for the eighth straight semes ter leonard hall led the way with a 2.979 an improvement of 144 over the fall tau delta phi hit a 2.335 to re place delta chi as the fraternity leader the delta chi's dropped to second place in the fraternity race with a 2.323 compared to fall's 2.443 fraternities copped six of the top ten places in the academic rating as all ten student class and residence group classifications improved their averages over their fall showing for the second straight spring the fall semester's 2.004 was the lowest average recorded at the university since the war with only the previous fall me dian of 2.020 approaching last fall's poor showing six sections of dravo house the all freshman dormitory remained on scholastic probation falling short o a 1.8 however dravo d-iv and b-ii pulled themselves off the pro list only to be replaced by c-111 of the same dorm no fraternities fell below the 1.8 mark this spring as psi upsilon and alpha chi rho made percentage advances from 1.732 to 2.137 and 1.764 to 2.188 respectively sigmq phi jumped over the pro fence by 075 of a point in spite of the improvement of the average of the entire uni versity over this fall's showing the percentages are continuing a downward trend which began in 1953 in that year the spring average was 2.201 in the fall of 1954 the mark fell to 2.0612 then rose in the spring to 2.168 the fall of 55 found what was for that period a start ingly low 2.020 average for the uni versity last spring's 2.109 was almost an entire point off the spring 53 mark and this fall's record-breaker of 2.004 continued the downward trend the senior class average of 2.403 although lower than last year's class average was good enough to put them third of all groups on the list they were headed only by the perennial leaders leonard hall and tem po n the freshman class showed an im provement of 077 of a point to pull them above the probationary bor derline and to remove them from what was technically a pro status this fall with a 1.790 mark then the spring averages students must originate own hp regulations students upon their own initia tive are to formulate a set of accept-t able regulations governing the con-j duct of houseparty dean wray h congdon said today in a statement supplementing the recommendation of the student-faculty houseparty committee see story col 5 this page pointing out the committee's concern over the housing of lady guests dean congdon stated that the whole question of housing lady guests in the same houses with students will need to be reconsidered the crux of the matter he noted was the committee's second condi tion that the students pledge themselves . . . unequivocally to ad here to such rules and regulations although the dean did not rule out the possibility of students meet ing the two basic conditions in time for holding a fall houseparty he remarked upon the extent of the problems involved adding when the extent of the prob lems raised by these recom mendations is fully appreciated it is difficult to imagine how the conditions for granting permis sion for a fall houseparty can possibly be met early enough to permit negotiations and ar rangements to be started in time to have a houseparty for the fall of 1956 dean congdon's comments follow the report of the student-fac ulty committee on houseparty was received in this office after the last regular issue of the brown and white for the spring semester had forward b&w parents asked because of the importance of the news concerning the future of houseparty this edition of the summer brown and white not ordinarily circulated off campus is being mailed to each student via his parents the editor respectfully asks that the paper be forwarded to the lehigh student whose par ents are addressed the brown and white has no other way of reaching students during vaca tion periods see hp report page 4 see math need page 2 see two conditions page 4 see leonard page 2