SECRETARY OF EDUCATION William J. Bennett was scheduled to speak on the state of American higher education at Sanders Theater Friday. His discourse should have presented an important opportunity for reflection, yet Bennett's scathing anti-Harvard diatribe was neither serious nor substantive. In the midst of his vituperative litany, however, Bennett stumbled upon some serious criticisms.

Most of the Secretary's address was confined to the kind of ethnocentric blather that we have come to expect from this Administration. Bennett called for a return to fundamentals in education and basing classes on the core values of Western civilization. The Secretary also harped on the importance of self-discipline and a drug-free campus. His allegations were poingantly Reaganesque, well formed with appropriate anecdotes, yet totally lacking a systematic or considered basis that might have lent them any credence.

On several points, however, Bennett's criticisms were valid. Harvard does need a way to prevent undergraduates from "falling through the cracks." The advising system that Bennett confronted as a freshman proctor 15 years ago is still totally inadequate. While the University offers motivated students an opportunity to delve deeply into their own specific academic interests, it fails to give other students--less directed and less sure of their ultimate academic goals--much help at all.

Bennett attacked teaching along the same lines, pointing to the low priority undergraduate instruction gets at Harvard. The recent denial of tenure to two of the best teachers on the faculty speaks for itself.

Bennett also offered an attack on the Core Curriculum as a "symbolic nod, a head feint," in the direction of a true central educational core. When Bok confronted him on the issue, Bennett displayed a remarkable ignorance of the specifics of the core program. While he was able to crack that it is a "core lite," he failed to offer any specific commentary. Yet the Core does have its pitfalls, foremost among them the fact that the undergraduates it serves, like their Secretary of Education, don't understand its foundation. The Core's mission to teach students how to think instead of what to think is a is a well-kept secret. That goal can hardly be reached when it is not even known.

Harvard President Derek C. Bok responded to Bennett's absurd accusations with some polemical remarks of his own. On the level of soapbox debate, Bok floored the Secretary with an even more formidable display of histrionics. While it is heartening that the President of Harvard can defend himself and his institution from peevish and petty assaults with great skill, Bok failed deal with the important issues that Bennett did raise despite himself. On these more substantive issues--teaching, advising and, to a lesser extent, the Core Curriculum--Bok issued the sort of conditioned, knee-jerk defense of Harvard that Bennett had predicted he would.

What Bok might better do is to try to act on some of the fine rhetoric that he creates in his work. He has made much of his commitment to teaching and advising in his 15 years as president, yet teaching and advising have advanced little since Secretary Bennet lived in Matthews 15 years ago. It's time for action, not words.