The Class of 1963 surpassed all previous classes in academic performance for the freshman year, according to statistics recently released by the Registrar's office.

Of the 1128 students in the class, 489, or 43.4 per cent, achieved Dean's List standing. This figure represents a slight increase over the previous record of 42.6 per cent that was attained by the Class of 1960. The statistics for the Classes of 1961 and 1962 were 35.3 per cent and 42.1 per cent respectively.

Group Standings

Twenty-three students fulfilled the requirements for Group I, 163 attained Group II, and 303 achieved Group III standing. Also, 295 were in Group IV, 225 in Group V, and 17 in Group VI. The class median was somewhere in high Group IV.

In June, 102 men had unsatisfactory records and, of these, 26 received severance of connection. Although students from private schools comprise only 43 per cent of the class, the number of "preppies" severed was three times that of public school graduates.

Public School Grads Excel

Maintaining the tradition, students from public schools also excelled their private school counterparts in every other category. Much speculation has arisen concerning this perennial phenomenon. Some members of the Administration have cited the Sophomore Standing program as the most important factor. Many of the ablest preppies skip the freshman year and thus do not appear in the statistics.

Another alleged factor is the so-called "bourgeois grade orientation" of public school graduates as opposed to the blase attitudes of many students from private schools. In addition, defenders of private schools graduates claim that preppies tend to engage in more extracurricular activities than students of public school background.