College officials estimate that 400 undergraduates performed atleast part-time public service work for to outlying communities as part of Harvard's two-year-old Public Service Program, a President Bok initiative. Phillips Brooks House, the 68-year-old community service institution, has approximately 800 volunteers in 23 programs and is also witnessing continued growth, says Macleod.

Even after taking into account overlap between the two organizations, the figures suggest that one of every six undergraduates worked this fall to establish ties between Harvard and the disadvantaged. Says Ann Wacker coordinator of Harvard's Public Service Program: "The ongoing, week-to-week commitment of students [to the outside community] both during the day and in the afternoons has certainly strengthened and grown."

The opening of two shelters for the homeless by student groups and the acceptance of a plan to distribute extra Harvard dining hall food to Cambridge's homeless highlighted a lengthy list of innovative new projects and increasingly popular old ones.

Nine out of 13 Houses sponsored activities for assigned neighboring communities this fall, says Wacker, pointing to still more elaborate second-semester plans, including a new program involving Harvard athletes and troubled Cambridge schoolchildren. For the first time in recent years, PBH had contested elections for all its executive posts, reflecting the surge in interest in volunteerism, says Macleod.

Bok continues to make Harvard's involvement with the communities a top priority after initiating the Public Service Program, saying, "I don't think frankly that I had done as much as I could on this, until recently." "There's no question that the trend is up. I'm delighted by that," he adds.

Although its elections attracted fewer candidates, the Undergraduate Council also involved significantly more undergraduates than ever before. More than 30 undergraduate organizations divided nearly $19,000 in council grants for oncampuses, projects and more than 1000 students participated in campus-wide social events sponsored by the student government.

But what is most distinctive about the council this year is how its College policy-making efforts mirror the serious, often unrecognized community service work, officials say.

In its second year, the council had distanced itself from the checkered pasts of previous attempts at student government with a with a serious of modest achievements and a brand of leadership characterized by a willingness to research and cooperate.

Following last year's preservation of on-campus storage privileges with a study which showed how the College could simultaneously store student belongings and renovate five dorms, the council has participated in similar College debates on the intellectual life of the Houses, student-faculty contact, the Core Curriculum, and expanded food service.

"You have to look to the middle to late '60s to find an agency as effective as the current one," says Dean of the College John B. Fox Jr. '59.

The key difference seems to be an approach to College reform which emphasizes study and negotiation and contrasts the agitators' role previous student leaders have played.

"The semester saw a lot of real hard work," says one council member. "We're doing some pretty nose-to-the-grindstone type stuff."

College officials have previously noted that Harvard's legions of class presidents and community service workers often inexplicably derail their involvement in these endeavors when they arrive in Cambridge.

But the emergence of a serious-minded, hard-working council and new ties between Harvard and the community apparently indicate that students are now continuing involvement in activities in which they distinguished themselves in high school.

"Applicants to Harvard College always had a strong record of public service," says Fox. "We were worried that there was something about this place that discouraged it."

The trend toward unassuming extracurricular involvement toward improving the quality of life on and off campuses is also attracting new converts Kay Latch's Cruz is one.

From a small, low-income neighborhood in Trenton, N.J., Cruz says he first came to Harvard thinking. "I'd get my degree and get out of here."

"Working with these kids made the realize that was not for me," he explains. "I can see myself in them."