"They were granting museum passes to workers instead of a living wage," Elfenbein says. "It doesn't really address the issue of poverty."

Members say that while it was discouraging, last spring's report did not weaken the campaign--it merely changed the focus.

"This is not a frightening obstacle," says PSLM member Amy C. Offner '01. "We're not worried at all by their resistance. We faced even greater resistance at first. It's not a big deal, we just have to continue with what we're doing."

So in addition to staging a variety of light-hearted actions and a mock Christmas pageant, living wage campaign members have spent the past semester meeting with students and campus workers to garner support for their cause.

"Not all work is adequately done by public actions," Offner says. "We've had to spend a fair amount of time doing research and laying the structure for the future."

Targeting The Top

Campaign members have resolved, then, to change the focus of their actions--targeting the Harvard Corporation as the University's ultimate decision-making body.

"We basically just discovered the existence of the Corporation as our major obstacle this semester," Elfenbein says. "It was sort of an overwhelming discovery."