Huge B-52's from the Wright Field SAC base in Ohio used to make practice bomb runs over one of the dormitories of near-by Antioch College. Plane after plane came roaring over the target dormitory, opened their empty bomb bays, and disappeared over the trees.

Annoyed Antiochians climbed up on the roof of the dormitory and with strips of linen spelled out in six-foot letters a message for the bombardiers to zero in on: "SCREW SAC."

The message (not to mention the bombing runs) probably accurately portrayed the level of communication that has long existed between Antioch and the local military authorities. Thus it seemed only natural that when the National Collegiate Conference on the Draft met at Antioch two weeks ago, it should assume a defiant stance against the military establishment.

The delegates called for an end to involuntary conscription and denounced the large standing army and huge defense budget as a cause of the Vietnamese war.

It is difficult to attach any clear significance to the myriad of resolutions which the conference adopted. The delegates did not represent a fair cross section of college students, teachers, and administrators. But it would be equally unfair to dismiss the conference as a bunch of leftists suggesting predictable reforms. Many of the students who came were presidents of their college councils, not simply disgruntled SDS types.

At the very least the conference proved that there is a good deal of concern about the morality of the draft. It also dramatized a split between students and faculty over two issues: deferring students and basing deferments on class rank. In the end the students, ignoring cautions from the faculty, called for the total abolition of ranking and -- more surprising -- of the student deferment.

Students and administrators from Antioch had billed the conference as an examination of the influence of Selective Service on colleges today. A list of possible modifications, voted by the delegates, was to be submitted to the Presidential commission now studying Selective Service reform.

Undoubtedly most people who feel the present draft system is pretty good did not bother to make the long trek out to Ohio for a conference based on the premise that it needs reform. Almost everyone, who did come was concerned with the ethics of the draft; they obviously constituted a more radical segment of the intellectual community than those who stayed at home. And while invitations were mailed out to hundreds of universities and military colleges across the country, only about 40 colleges were represented.

When this slightly left-of-center group arrived, there was no concensus as to what should be reformed or where the debate should begin. At first the delegates grappled with the philosophy behind involuntary conscription, but finding the discussion too amorphous, they moved on to an examination of the conscription mechanism--ranking, 2-S, and the deferment of conscientious objectors. Here the delegates were on their own turf, debating policies with direct impact on their personal lives -- the draft and its relation to the education industry.

They agreed that ranking is intended to make the 2-S deferment less inequitable. But ranking's main effect on the colleges, they argued, has been to turn teachers into Selective Service representatives. "We have to do their dirty work," snapped one outraged professor.

The delegates objected to ranking because:

* grading standards vary among teachers, departments, and universities;

* averages often have to be calculated all the way to the third or fourth decimal place;

* ranking intensifies competition for good grades at a time when many colleges are in fact realizing that rigid grading may distort the learning process; and

* students who must hold part-time jobs to keep themselves in school have less time to spend on their studies and thus are automatically at a disadvantage.