Norwich bulletin., 1913-03-21

l afternoon at 1.30 o'clock the various l departments of the. university closed l for the Easter recess and the college 1 opens again on the morning of Thurs l day, March 27 In the interim, the l Yale baseball team will make it's pre- season southern trip to Norfolk. Va, Washington and Baltimore and mem l bers of the Yale champion swimming ! team will visit some of the big univer- sities of the middle west, including North Western, the University of H. | linois, the Chicago Athletic club and the University of Cincinnati. In New Haven many of the crew and track men will remain in order not to break training and several learned societies will meet, in the Yale buildings.
 The problem of the secret societies and fraternities has been giving grad
 uates, faculty and undergraduates ser ious thought and it is largely due to
 the influence of the former that in
 the sophomore class of the college
 petition has been circulated that will
 have an important effect in determin-
 ing the status of the three senior so-
 cieties after the next Tap day. The
 tNozthirds of the class, and by all of
 the class leaders with but few ex-
 captions, is to the effect that if the
 members of the senior societies do not
 show discretion in picking out their
 A men from the present junior class.
 that the members of the sophomore
 class in their turn. will refuse to be-
 come candidates for the senior SOcfe-
 ties. The movement, behind which
 are said to be number of influential
 graduates as well the sentiment of the undergraduate body, Is to make election to the senior societies a re-
 ward for work done and ability shown
 in the activities of the first three years
 at school, and to keep out the work
 ing of social pull, fraternity pol
 tiles" and similar factors that result
 in excluding men who have actually
 done more for Yale than many who are chosen. There is also strong
 sentiment in removing other of the un-
 desirable features of the senior socie
 ties than their method of choosing, such as the abolition of much of the
 secrecy of the groups. which has been
 held up to bitter attack of late.
 With the junior fraternities at Yale
 as well, there has been call for re- form, or at least for some change in the system. For with the increasing size of the classes there is a growing fraternity members and others. who remain non fraternity because they de- sire one particular fraternity and no other. For example, practically third of the present senior class IS non fraternity and in the two lower classes the proportion of independent men is still greater. owing to the fact that elections are not completed until the beginning of senior year. Each of the five fraternities eventually elects 40 men and thus a large part of the class is left out of fraternity life At one time this year there appeared to be ternities when two fraternities were able to get their required quota of men only with much difficulty and if a repetition of this should occur. and if some means of providing for the growing number of non-fra ternity men is not made, there is apparently the danger that the fraternity system will be called upon for important revision
 What Vale means to men who have spent four years in her atmosphere and what they take from her lecture halls and athletic fields and all the other activities into the world outside, Is shown by answers that have been Iating classes and published this week Tn the Yale News. The questions that l were asked of the classes of 1910 and l again of s1913 were these: What has l meant most to you at Yale ? and What l s the most valuable thing that you | nave gained from your college career? l These answers of several hundred men l ,how extreme difference In viewpoint | put at the same time they are a most | yaluable commentary on what the diff | erent types of men may expect and | -eally get from four years in Yale.
 Mental development is the thing sn1- | by a large group; start | oward independent thinking, concen- 1 ration, command of thoughts ana abil- ty to express them on words or on | paper. One man wrote The ability o plan my work and then to work | ny plan. The broadening influences if college life and education, a ca ,acity for seeing things from many | tides, is a second thing that a large 1 number of men find one Of the big
 h inc n hn nh fair in an11a friendships made in college days rank ligh in the estimates of a third large yroup of men, 34 mem bers of 1916 and