With less than a week remaining before the teeming ranks of the class of 2002 descend on Cambridge for pre-frosh weekend, a crisis over the involvement of ethnic student organizations in the extracurricular activities fair was averted yesterday with the decision to open the extracurricular fair to more student organizations.

This decision came after several ethnic organizations criticized the policy of the Undergraduate Admissions Council (UAC), the organizers of the fair, which limited the numbers of groups invited to table at fair this Saturday.

Caroline T. Nguyen '00, the co-president of the Asian American Association (AAA), led the protest against the policy, which UAC leaders said was based on space considerations in Eliot Dining Hall, where the fair is being held.

In an e-mail sent yesterday to student leaders, UAC co-chair Adam R. Kovacevich '99, said that the council felt the fairest policy was "to select a cross-sampling of groups that tend to represent extracurricular 'niches' on campus." Many ethnic organizations also host their own receptions and are already represented in a panel discussion of minority groups, Kovacevich added.

However, Nguyen argued that the selection process undermined the fair's claim to represent campus extracurricular life.

"To make a blanket statement like 'no ethnic organizations in the fair' makes no sense, and I think there is enough evidence to claim discrimination," she wrote in an e-mail message to the Undergraduate Council.

Nguyen rallied other student groups to her cause and drafted a letter to the Undergraduate Admissions Office protesting the exclusion of ethnic organizations.

The UAC resolved the issue yesterday morning, announcing that it would allow all organizations who can provide at least four student hosts to table at the fair.

"As soon as the UAC heard the concerns [of the ethnic organizations] they said, `Well, we can change it,'" said Macy H. Lenox, director of the visiting students program. "This is the first time we've heard anything [about this issue]."

The decision was made after a consensus was reached between the UAC, Lenox and Director of Admissions Marlyn McGrath Lewis, Kovacevich said.

Student leaders were pleased with the speedwith which the issue was resolved.

"I was overwhelmed; it's such good news," saidRAZA president Sergio J. Campos '00 who offered toco-sign the letter to the admissions office thatAAA had prepared. "I wasn't expecting anyresponse," he said.

AAA scrapped its letter to the admissionsoffice after the announcement.

As a result of the UAC's decision, Kovacevichsays student groups and pre-frosh can expect atight squeeze on Saturday, and he pledged that theformat of the event will be reevaluated next year.

Kovacevich emphasized that there was no"malicious intent" to exclude specifically ethnicgroups in the original policy.

"In a similar fashion, a cappella groups arenot invited to the fair because they have anopportunity to attract pre-frosh by virtue of theweekend's A Cappella Jam," he said.