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To the Editor of the Crimson:

In several of your recent editorials devoted to the Sociology Department, reference has been made to the "Embree appraisal" of academic departments in leading American universities. You have correctly reported that the Sociology Department is one of two at Harvard which were adjudged as not especially eminent. However, you have neglected to indicate the basis upon which these judgements were made, as described in the report of the Committee on Graduate Instruction of the American Council on Education. This Committee met in 1933 and the report was published in "The Educational Record", April 1934.

The various graduate departments were evaluated on two bases: "the number of doctorates conferred in the last five years" (i.e., prior to 1933) and "a list of the graduate faculty in each field." But since the Harvard Department of Sociology was not established until 1931, and since a doctorate ordinarily presupposes at least three years of graduate study, it is manifest that there was no possibility of many doctorates being conferred by this Department during the period 1929-33. Moreover, arrangements for graduate study in sociology were not completed until one year prior to the Committee investigation.

If these considerations are taken into account, would it not appear that the "Embree report" cannot be held to represent fairly the status of the Sociology Department? Robert K. Merton