January 1998
5 - Alan K. Simpson, former Republican senator from Wyoming, is appointed as head of the Institute of Politics. Simpson's tenure ended this spring; he will be replaced by David Pryor, former Democratic senator from Arkansas.

31 - Former Kirkland House resident Joshua M. Elster, Class of 2000, is charged with rape and indecent assault and battery by an undergraduate woman. The arrest is initially omitted by the Harvard Police Department from its blotter, a violation of Bay State law. Elster later pleads guilty to all six felony counts and is dismissed by the Faculty in an April 1999 vote.

February 1998
5 - Princeton boosts its financial aid program starting a trend among Ivy League schools. Harvard's own sweeping financial aid changes, introduced more than six months later, come only after similar efforts by Yale, MIT, and Stanford

March 1998
15 - David L. Okrent '99 is found dead on Revere Beach. Okrent's death is later determined to be a suicide.

Diana L. Eck, professor of comparative religion and Indian studies, and her partner Dorothy A. Austin are selected as the new masters of Lowell House, filling the posts vacated by long-time masters William H. Bossert '55 and his wife Mary. Eck and Austin are the first same-sex couple to serve as masters of a Harvard house.

The woman's basketball team upsets Stanford, top seed in the West regional, to advance to the second round of the NCAA tournament. It is the first time a number 16 seed has defeated a number 1 seed in the NCAA tournament.

April 1998
Radcliffe College may relinquish its role as an undergraduate college and become an "allied institution," the Boston Globe reports. The following week, students rally in Radcliffe Yard in support of the 120-year-old institution.