This year, Lewis eliminated the dean of students position, replacing it with an associate dean post he considered more appropriate for the responsibilities involved. As for the controversial PBH reorganization, administrators say this move helped make the administration of that organization more efficient.

Lewis says he has streamlined the College administrative structure, making the responsibilities associated with each position clear and holding administrators accountable.

"I've tried to get different parts of Harvard that are dealing with students to talk to each other," Lewis says. "A lot of this is gradual work."

Epps says Lewis' managerial methods have centralized his administrative authority.

"His management style is through the computer, tending to centralize authority more because he is able to communicate with so many people," Epps says.

"He will help complete the modernization of Harvard College," Epps adds.

Lewis himself says he takes particular pride in the appointments he has made, including an unusually large number of House masters and a handful of associate deans.

He also issued a report on advising and counseling which prompted some departments to change their advising systems but provoked no unilateral action.

Most recently, in the wake of the Radcliffe merger, Lewis has held fast to the idea that no programs open to only one gender will be permitted within the College--a move which Fox says is more consistent with being a conserver of the College's traditions than being an innovator.

But if the past three years have seen Lewis act more conservatively, focusing on gradual change and defending existing policies, Dean of the Faculty Jeremy R. Knowles says this role is appropriate and important.

"As to style, I don't think that colleges respond so well to Grand Sweeping Statements (which...are often forgotten or lost after the rhetoric wears thin), but are actually improved by continual incremental changes," Knowles wrote in an e-mail message.

"For much of what we all do, whether it's recruiting new Faculty, renovating classrooms, or shaping the curriculum, improving a little every day can be a better strategy," Knowles added.

A Professor's Priorities

Student leaders say that Lewis' focus on education and academic life at Harvard have had a quiet influence over the success or failure of student-driven proposals.

A lifelong academic who studied his way to a summa cum laude College degree during the tumultuous '60s, Lewis says he evaluates all projects in light of their contribution to the College's educational mission.