The table is crowded with issues. Living wage issues, Core reduction issues, study abroad issues, archaic secretive tenure issues. There are dozens to pick from. They fade in and out, never really completely dropping off the radar. And the import of decisions today, decisions made by the bureaucratic cogs that run this venerable institution, will most likely never make anyone’s life easier or more enriching. At least not today. But the crystal ball is half-full, not half-empty. Mixing metaphors obfuscates the point but—to the rescue—the Rev. Peter J. Gomes, Plummer professor of Christian morals, gets right down to it. “Larry Summers is many things but he’s not stupid,” Gomes says—an observation made in the context of rather informed daydreaming about the future of Harvard College. Gomes, with formidable institutional memory and a charming interest in Harvardiana, breezes backward more than 25 years in his memory and proclaims that the future is literally in the hands of students today—editorial writers and protest leaders and student government committee chairs and holders of every position that has ever seemed slightly, well, inconsequential in the bigger picture. Gomes asserts that Summers is blatantly pandering to student interests. If students have enough chutzpah to capitalize on the situation, Gomes says, they can effect far-reaching change just by asking for it. Ultimately, Gomes thinks Harvard 25 years from now will be shaped by the students of the next 24 years.
Gomes, who is minister at Memorial Church, brags that he currently holds the record for the most years in the same administrative position at Harvard. “I’m a footnote” in Harvard history, he says. With his far-reaching institutional memory Gomes confidently makes predictions about Harvard in 25 years and suggests how students can mold the school they want. “I remember vividly 25 years ago,” he says. “I remember very well in those days that it was a very tense community. People were not on talking terms.” After the radical polarization of the 1960s, the Harvard way of life was eroded by distrust. “Things that were premised on intimacy, talking together, the House system, the common freshman year—these were all very shaky,” Gomes recalls. “So it seemed to me that the ideal of Harvard College as a way of collegiate living among the generations was really on very hard times.”
So eating popcorn and watching Must-See TV with a resident tutor these days is progress, and much personal interaction students have with their tutors and professors does not depend on abstract institutional calculations regarding undergraduate emotional health. It depends on how loudly people ask for what they want. “Most of you come to Harvard because you have some idealistic notion of what Harvard should be. It needs to be worth all the sacrifices that you and your parents make,” Gomes says. “You, today’s generation, push the questions about the quality of life. If you didn’t raise questions about Core, etcetera, the rest of us, it’s sad to say, would not care.”
Gomes gropes for the correct word to describe University President Lawrence H. Summers, finally choosing to call Summers the “tribune” of the students. This is a radical claim. Harvard, the large entity over which Summers presides, is not supposed to care about undergraduates. There are bottom lines and worldwide reputations and fundraising demands that traditionally have preceded chatting up undergrads on the president’s list of priorities. But Summers makes the Undergraduate Council meeting rounds, heads to House Masters’ open houses once in a while and talks consistently—to colleagues and national publications alike—about improving the experience of students at the College.
Concretely, this seems to translate into contemplating Core Curriculum reform, making the ranks of tenured Faculty better reflect the composition of the student body and—as Gomes asserts—responding to whimpers from students in a concerned, methodical, “sucking-up” kind of way.
What will the Faculty look like?
In Business Week’s Feb. 18 cover story on Harvard’s future, Summers describes the College’s failure to prepare undergraduates for “the current world landscape” as “Harvard’s Achilles heel.” He uses the magazine as a forum to advocate a number of changes, including stiffer grading standards, more interaction between students and professors and the inclusion of teaching reviews in tenure applications.
Of the proposed changes, Summers’ attack on tenure is possibly the most radical. Historically cloaked in confidentiality, the tenure process has survived centuries of criticism and, most recently, legal action. Harvard’s lawyers have succeeded in keeping the process secret after a close brush with a pesky request for evidence in a lawsuit against the University. And most tenured Faculty would say it’s better that way. Loker Professor of English Robert J. Kiely, a 25-plus year veteran of the English department, gives a quasi-rousing justification of the current process. “In one way, one can defend the tenure process because we are trying to get the best people possible. It has to be painstaking. I don’t know if it will change,” he says.
Summers irked critics recently by denying tenure to more senior candidates, saying that the University’s goal should be to move toward tenuring professors whose best work lies ahead of them. In non-euphemistic terms, the intention is to move toward younger scholars, an initiative that has the potential to make internal tenure more common. Summers also advocates increasing the weight that teaching credentials and evaluations carry in tenure applications. But as for Faculty diversity, the pool of candidates for future tenured professorships ultimately comes from the ranks of current graduate school students—so the Faculty will not accurately reflect the demographics of the undergraduate student body until graduate school demographics change.
These demographics depend, of course, on interest and on the general composition of the applicant pool which, according to Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology Theda Skocpol, is bound to become more diverse. “We’ll have a lot more women, a lot more international Faculty and a lot more people of color,” Skocpol says. Those are the people, she says, who “will be going to graduate school and doing the scholarship of the future.” Those in the know view the future of Harvard’s Faculty through rainbow-colored glasses. “The hope and expectation,” Kiely says, “is that the day will come when the Faculty is as diverse as the student body.” Part wishful thinking and part genuine expectation, the anticipated diversification of the Faculty is somewhat substantiated by recent progress. “There’s been much greater sensitivity in hiring people who have not been represented,” says Professor of Psychology Marc D. Hauser.
However, nothing is as blissfully easy as announcing that all things improve, in time. “I don’t think the incorporation of women into the Harvard faculty is a simple linear process,” says Skocpol. Ethan Y. Yeh ’03, a leader of the movement for an ethnic studies department, sees minority Faculty increasing at a snail’s pace because the administration isn’t faced with any serious incentive to change.
The general consensus is overwhelmingly positive, though the optimism is not anchored to anything other than vague knowledge of sociological trends and a whole lot of good cheer.
What will the course catalogue look like?
Everyone asked to daydream about the future of Harvard policies first offers the caveat that no one knows exactly what the future holds. “I never make predictions, especially about the future,” confides Jay M. Harris, Wolfson professor of Jewish studies. At the same time, people like Harris are in charge of deciding what the future holds. Harris sits on the Committee on Undergraduate Education (CUE), where he sifts through policy proposals aimed to improve the undergraduate academic experience.
“I would love to see a deeper intellectual culture at Harvard among the students,” Harris says. “I think there are places that have a stronger intellectual commitment to the world of learning. In my ideal world, Harvard students would graduate being much more prepared to be citizens of the world.”
This desire for cultivation of better world citizens, a sentiment Summers has also expressed, relates in a practical sense to initiatives to improve study abroad options and to intiatives to reform the Core. Most feel that students’ ability to study abroad is destined to improve. Undergraduate Council President Sujean S. Lee ’03 remarks, “The University has recognized the importance of the cultural immersion that you gain from study abroad.”
A messier aspect of Harvard’s curriculum is the much-debated Core, which was implemented a little under 25 years ago to much praise. However, time and practice has made many students and Faculty think twice about its merits.
“Within the next five years, the Faculty will realize that students are not leaving the gates with the kind of liberal education they should have,” says Rohit Chopra ’04, a member of CUE and chair of the Undergraduate Council’s Student Affairs Committee. Benedict H. Gross, who is Leverett professor of mathematics and chair of the Core’s Quantitative Reasoning subcommittee, wagers that “there will be some mutation of the Core.” One could argue that this has already begun, as the Faculty considers reducing the number of requirements from eight to seven. “General education programs have a half-life, and the Core may be reaching its half-life,” Gross says.
Chopra goes further, predicting the death of the Core and its replacement by something that looks more like a distribution requirement, a change that doesn’t seem monumental but will allow students to choose from a broader and more diverse group of classes.
“Years ago, a person was considered an intellectual if they were educated in literature, if they could, say, quote The Canterbury Tales. That’s no longer the case,” Hauser argues. “To be an intellectual and be ignorant to science is no longer valid,” he says. Summers, who has repeatedly complained that Harvard students think it is “fine to not know the difference between a gene and a chromosome,” certainly agrees. Hauser is optimistic about solving this problem. Between teachers like Stephen Jay Gould, who is Agassiz professor of zoology and is accessible to non-science concentrators and technology that makes teaching more visual and intelligible, Hauser sees future Harvard students as a whole being more educated and interested in the sciences.
But this semantic shuffling of requirements is secondary to shifts that some foresee in interdisciplinary areas. “The real question about the Harvard of the future is not just what kinds of people will be here but what new intellectual fields will develop,” Skocpol says. Many professors and administrators have pointed to the current trend of interaction between different departments and fields as something that will continue—and at a rapid pace. Hauser mentions the already phenomenal growth of the mind sciences and predicts the future partnership of the mind and applied sciences. Programs like Mind, Brain and Behavior are already beginning to forge alliances with unlikely allies such as the religion department.
However, most are quick to add that there is also a strong tendency toward specialization. Kiely remarks that one of the great challenges for students and professors will be to keep Harvard vigorous in terms of general interdisciplinary studies as well as in specific fields. He sees interdisciplinary work as one of the best ways to pursue scholarship. Citing the example of his freshman seminar, which combines the study of literature and that of the Christian religion, Kiely extols the virtues of studying a little bit of everything. “The student who comes here hoping just to do economics or engineering is not making the most out of Harvard,” he says. Hauser seconds that thought emphatically. “We need to guard against narrow education,” he says. He pauses. “Seeing as Harvard is not MIT,” he adds.
Even thousands strong, the Harvard campus protest march has yet to affect major policy change. Things aren’t looking too promising for the 20-odd supporters of the Committee on Ethnic Studies’ certificate program who braved cold weather and total apathy toward their cause in a protest last week. Yeh, who is spearheading the certificate push, is not as glibly optimistic as most Faculty. “I do see Harvard kind of changing along with the curriculum, as other colleges do,” he admits reluctantly. But he adds, “To me, it doesn’t seem like, within 25 years, Harvard is going to make any large advances in ethnic studies.” Having waded through bureaucracy already, Yeh is cynical. “Unless students press for it, there isn’t going to be much change,” he says.
Along with changing focuses in education, the job descriptions of Harvard professors may shift a bit as well. Faculty members, as well as Summers, have expressed the desire for more student-faculty interaction. Hauser realizes that “there’s a great deal of intimidation. Students come in and see [professors] as monsters with three heads.” That needs to change, he says—and it will, because “Harvard is serious about it.”
Already, there have been efforts to increase the size of the Faculty. Chopra says this would bring about only good things: smaller classes, more courses offered, expanded research opportunities and better thesis advising.
Kiely can’t envision an effective advising system that doesn’t utilize resident tutors. “It’s one of the uniquely good things about Harvard,” he says. Chopra concurs and points out that with the current real estate market in Cambridge, grad students have ample incentive to apply for the job. This competition for spots in the Houses results in a group of tutors who are extremely qualified. Most Faculty members and administrators seem to agree that the tutor system will stay essentially the same, with a few small adjustments. In the future, tutors will be better-equipped to deal with a variety of students and they themselves will be more diverse, both in their backgrounds and in their fields of study.
What will student life be like?
The subject of the Houses themselves, on the other hand, sparks no such consensus. There is a wide range of opinions and predictions regarding the role that Houses will play in the future. Chopra feels the loosely-knit House communities are still recovering from randomization. With the implementation of the lottery, facilities have to be equalized to “better reflect each House being a microcosm of the whole College.”
Much of the reasoning behind randomization was that each House should reflect the ethnic and socioeconomic blend of the College. All-white houses were an anachronism in Harvard’s carefully cultivated atmosphere of diversity. The quest to fully integrate the Houses is somewhat impeded by the fact that blocking groups are still decided by students themselves and may or may not continue to reflect racial segregation.
Undergraduate Council Vice President Anne M. Fernandez ’03 hopes that blocking groups become more ethnically varied and is confident that it will happen. “As the College works towards more diverse Faculty and a more diverse student body,” she reasons, “it will reflect itself in all areas of student life.”
Just as they are beginning to recover from randomization, the Houses face another attack on their traditional role at Harvard. Proposals to build a student center of some kind threaten the Houses’ status as the center of student life. There is a difference of opinion on both the need for and probability of a student center getting built. While Associate Dean of the College Thomas A. Dingman ’67 calls the idea “unlikely,” Fernandez sees it as necessary. “It’s important as kind of a crossroads and intersection where students can interact on a day-to-day basis,” she explains. After freshman year, students lose touch with friends and the sense of class pride that is fostered in the Yard diminishes.
Even students comfortably ensconced in revamped residences need to get out of the House sometimes. Over the past few years, Harvard has seen its number of clubs skyrocket. Students coming from varying ends of the spectrum, from proud Texans to juggling enthusiasts to community service devotees, have taken the initiative and formed their own organizations, sometimes with little more than a handful of members. Dingman points out that splintering has occurred among cultural and performing clubs. “We keep getting more and more Balkanized,” he says. There are many more choices for students but the plethora of groups also serves to separate students. “The question is,” he asks, “‘Is this a good thing and is there an end in sight?’” It’s a natural thing, answers Associate Dean of the College David P. Illingworth ’71, and yes, the numbers will plateau. Over the next 25 years, student groups will echo the current interests of students. Illingworth predicts that some of the groups we have now will fade out and will be replaced with more contemporary ones.
Assistant Dean of Freshman James N. Mancall agrees. “Just as ‘Cultural Rhythms’ reflects our diversity now,” he says, “other events will reflect the diversity of Harvard 25 years from now.” It will be more difficult to accurately reflect campus diversity in 25 years with one sold-out dance performance, Mancall thinks, because Harvard will continue to draw international students from currently underrpresented areas.
Diversity, the catchphrase that can, won’t merely wreak havoc on departmental rosters and course offerings. Students have faith that the social scene will open up and loosen up a bit as well. “There is a trend for greater cooperation between student groups and the administration for having really drastic improvements in social life,” Lee says, citing the Concert Commission’s negotiations with University Hall as an example. Lee predicts this is only the beginning. “Students will continue to generate really creative ideas for ways social life can be improved,” she says. Fernandez also forecasts the arrival of many more options for students, including the development of more informal social spaces in the Houses, similar to the Quincy Grille where she flips burgers.
In addition, both Lee and Fernandez see the future of the Harvard social scene filled with estrogen-fueled punch events and vast seas of little black dresses. Increased interest in women’s social clubs is sure to result in the formation of more female final clubs, the two say with certainty.
As vice president of the newest female social club, the Isis, Fernandez extols the positive qualities of such groups. Lee, as a member of the Seneca, another female social club, also contributes an insider perspective. She points to the large rush turnout for sororities as an indication of the rising popularity of female social organizations. Even so, she doesn’t pretend to see the College bending its anti-discrimination policy in order to sanction the women-only clubs officially.
The Rev. Douglas W. Sears ’69 has served as the president of the Inter-Club Council (which oversees Harvard’s final clubs) for the past 10 years and has thought a lot about merry-making at fair Harvard. “Twenty-five years from now, the Harvard social scene will be so vastly superior to what it is now that there will be no need for final clubs to bear the brunt of the social life,” he says.“Harvard will be a much more commodious place to go to. People will be attracted to the fine quality of its social life as well as the rigors of its academics.” Sears is confident of this? “Absolutely,” he says. “Over the next 25 years, the best and brightest minds will figure it out.”
Mancall has some idea in what direction those minds will go. He says that as the clubs are presently constituted there is no way they will be incorporated into the College. He does offer a solution: if a male club were to merge with a female club, the College might have a different attitude.
Some wouldn’t mind seeing the final clubs disappear altogether. Dingman admits he is “very uncomfortable with the current situation.” He explains that the women have nothing comparable to men’s final clubs and—with the sheer cost of physical space—it’s unrealistic to think they could every create something equivalent to the male clubs. Not to mention, Dingman adds, that “final clubs are very expensive [to join] and perpetuate a sense of elitism.” He lightly suggests their future may not be secure. “I think people are asking themselves about the company they want to keep and feeling somewhat uncomfortable finding friendships drawn up around income.”
In his annual report for 2001, Dean of the College Harry R. Lewis ’68 reflects on the issues that affected the school at the turn of the 20th century. “Remarkably,” he writes with an unseen shake of his head, “the major themes sounded by my distant predecessor, L.B.R. Briggs, in his annual report…are strikingly similar to several mentioned [here].” It would seem that Lewis has hit the proverbial nail on the head. Many of the problems students, Faculty members and administrators faced in the past continue to plague the College. In 1901, students were clamoring for more social and extracurricular space, financial aid was falling short of students’ financial need and administrators were debating the merits of Advanced Standing.
If Lewis’ remarks indicate that students’ needs remain constant, they also highlight the slow pace of change. “It is absolutely contrary to the nature of institutions to change,” Gomes says. “It will come because [students] insist upon it.” Gomes jokes that one of his colleagues used to say that “it would be wonderful if students just send in their money and stay at home.” The sentiment behind the humor, he says, is that “students are not an immediately rewarding commodity” and professors prioritize publishing above guiding undergraduates.
Undergraduates with high enough soapboxes can counteract this tendency, Gomes thinks. He says that Summers’ goals of curbing grade inflation and decreasing the average age of Faculty members will only succeed with undergraduate support, which is a bold claim considering that students have little say in Harvard’s decision-making processes. But Gomes is sure that undergraduates are ultimately the most influential entity at the College. “The only way Summers has influence is by sucking up to students. And he’s doing it in such a conspicuous way. He has no authority. He has influence but no authority,” Gomes says. “You will be recreating Harvard by your expectations and insistence, and we will respond.”
