Among other things, the poll will ask students to comment on four options.

The first option, called a "total random" system, is modeled after Yale College's housing lottery. It would assign individual students to a House by random when they register as freshmen.

A second option, known as the "modified random" proposal, would randomly assign student-chosen rooming groups to the Houses during the spring of their freshman year.

A third alternative would allow individual House masters to select their House populations in accordance with a series of distribution quotas. This system was eliminated under fire from students in 1973.

The fourth option--the current system--assigns rooming groups and blocks to upper-class Houses during the spring of their freshman year. The system attempts to maximize students' first-choices, granting their preference on a space available basis when their number comes up.

The 12-question poll will also ask upperclassmen to rate their general satisfaction with their House experience and also to comment on suggested modifications of the current system, such as releasing lottery numbers before House assignment are announced.

Fox, who has historically opposed the current lottery, says he still has "difficulties" and "discomfort" with a system based on student choice.

"The present system doesn't achieve the ideal microcosm [of the College on the whole], but I'm not leading a crusade to change it," Fox explains. Yet, if the study shows respondents' doubting the current system. Fox says, the administration will "look at the the situation seriously."

Fox declines to offer a specific alternative to the choice system.

And informal Crimson survey of House Masters, however, suggested that the issue of diversity is a divisive one outside the offices of University Hall.

Of the 12 Masters reached, three said they prefer a more random system, five favor the current system, and four declined to state an opinion.

North House Co-Masters Hanna and J. Woodland Hastings both approve of the random assignment system. "We have 100 percent diversity, and we've come to believe that a random system would benefit the community," Hanna Hastings says.

Because the Quad Houses and Mather typically are not chosen by many freshman lottery entrants, they wind up with a random group whose only common trait is their lack of success in the lottery process.

The North House couple say they originally supported the present system and now regret it.

"People like the absence of a stereotype," she adds. And, Professor Hastings explains, "When people choose a House they find it uncomfortable to be strapped to a stereotype."