"It is no secret that there has been a significant and unfortunate gap between the courses in American politics that our concentrators would like to take and the courses available from our regular faculty," the department's head tutor, Associate Professor Louise M. Richardson, wrote in an e-mail message.

Still, government concentrators are sure to benefit from another future addition to the department, funded through the fruits of the campaign. In August 2003, the Knafel Center for International Studies is slated to open on Cambridge Street.

For the first time, government professors and the department's undergraduate office will be housed in the same building.

"The undergraduate program will be able to deal on a one-to-one basis with faculty members," MacFarquhar says.

The Knafel Center still has to clear several city committees before Harvard gets the go-ahead to build. In the meantime, MacFarquhar says students should be patient: The department's needs are the same as their own.

"What students want is obviously very important, but it should not be thought that we ourselves are not aware of the deficiencies," he says.

When students have requests, the department listens, even though it might not be able to act, according to MacFarquhar.

"Undergraduates make their feelings known to the [head] tutor," he says, "and it gets to the chair very quickly."