30 - William H. Gates III, Class of 1977, and Steven A. Ballmer '77, who is a Crimson editor, announce that they will give $25 million to Harvard's computer science and electrical engineering programs. The Maxwell Dworkin building funded by this donation opens two years later.

31 - Twelve members of the Queer Action Group are removed from the ARCO Forum during a speech by Ralph Reed, director of the Christian Coalition. The group protested the Coalition's anti-gay stances by engaging in lengthy homosexual kisses during Reed's speech.

November 1996
6 - Voters elect the Man from Hope, William Jefferson Clinton, to another term as president of the United States, making him the first Democrat since Franklin D. Roosevelt '04 to be re-elected. Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) earns a third term by defeating his popular Republican opponent, Governor William F. Weld '66.

December 1996
11 - Lamelle D. Rawlins '99 is elected president of the Undergraduate Council by an overwhelming majority. Rawlins becomes the first woman to lead the council and the council's second popular elected president.

1997

January 1997
Nearly two years after a statewide referendum abolished rent control in Massachusetts cities, the government's temporary protective provisions come to an end. Roughly 1,500 of the city's low-income households are affected.

February 1997
7 - Course offerings in the Core reach a seven-year low with 86 classes total compared to the 105 offered in the 1995-1996 school year. Not since the 1989-1990 academic year, when the offerings in the Core curriculum dropped to 83 courses, had the total been lower.

21 - Four first-year students are brought before the Administrative Board and required to withdraw from the College because of their involvement in a Feb. 7 fire in Thayer Hall.