Ann Spence. assistant director of OGCP, cites state-preference laws in state-run universities as a major cause. "It's definitely getting tougher," she said last week. "What were finding is that it's more, and more important where you're from, not how you do. If you went to certain high schools you could have up to 70 times as good a chance of getting in to certain state medical schools."

Spence said that the rise in medical school applicants from Harvard in the past two years hat not been as substantial as the rise in the number of applications the students have sent in to medical school. However, she added that the jump in enrollment of the pre-medical school required courses may show up in the applicants in the next two years.

Frederick J. Fox '68 pre-medical advisor in Adams House, agree with Spence. "In fact the number of students applying to medical school is about the same." Fox said. It's the kind of people who apply that have changed--more women, graduate students, older people deciding late, and special students."

Whether the number of actual applicants from Harvard and Radcliffe has increased or not, the medical schools are over-applied, and admission is increasingly difficult. Samuel Z. Goldhaber '72, a first-year medical student, in the July 26 issue of Science magazine wrote on the problems of getting into medical school in an article "Medical School Admission--A Raw Deal for Applicants." The article points out that while the number of medical school seats has increased by one-third since 1968 a greater rise in the quality and quantity of applicants makes this increase inadequate.

In addition, students applying to medical school face astronomical costs, fierce classroom competition, the tension of waiting out present "rolling admission" policies of medical schools, and heavy grade reliance.

How, then, can a student interested in medical school improve his chances while a Harvard undergraduate?

"Most students take their pre-med courses in the wrong order," Fox said. He strongly suggests interested students first acquire a fundamental grounding in Mathematics and Chemistry as opposed to Biology. He also urges students to take required courses as early as possible and in taking them to realize that even at this point grades are crucial.

Fox further feels that pre-medical freshmen should investigate the advisors from different Houses carefully before choosing a House. He calls the advisory program at Harvard "non-existent."

The stringent screening of applicants by school still leaves Harvard with 85 per cent of Rs applicants accepted into as medical school--a commendable percentage. However, the tremendous increase in undergraduate class enrollment has led Harvard to promote its screening. This year for the first time, students other than Freshmen receiving a grade below B in Mutural Sciences 3, "Introduction to Chemistry," cannot enroll in Chem 20 unless they receive a score of 700 or better in the Chemistry placement examination.

"There's a movement afoot in the Chemistry Department to limit enrollment," Fox said Thursday. "But it's being hotly contested." He added that such limits underline the tremendous grade pressure on "premed students, equally stremed by grade screening procedures of the medical schools themselves.

Westheimer sees these constraints primarily as a result of an inefficient medical school system. He for sees no reversal in the trend of competitiveness. "Harvard has very highly qualified students, and consequently a certain amount of arrogance, he said. "Although a higher percentage of students from Harvard will get into medical school than from other colleges they're not all going to get in. The percentage is almost certain to fall and there will be many bright bitterly disappointed--and bitter--students.