Ultimately, CCL members voted on the issue via e-mail, as the committee met so infrequently. This did not sit well with everyone.

This year, though, Kidd says she has scheduled five meetings for the CCL—three more than last year.

“I think it’s a huge improvement,” says Jennifer S. Axsom ’04, who served on CCL with Kidd, and had said last year that the Christian fellowship matter should have been resolved more quickly.

“We will review student groups more regularly so that they don’t get into that limbo,” Kidd says, although she adds that she does not wish to second-guess Illingworth’s decisions.

“I think we evolved…with a somewhat similar ethos as to how we interact with students,” Kidd says of Illingworth. “Perhaps David is a bit more conversational.”

Kidd has also invited officials from some other offices to work with CCL, and says she plans to work “very closely” with the Undergraduate Council.

Additionally, Kidd wants to be a catalyst for communication between the multitude of offices that even tangentially affect student affairs.

She has already put into place a committee of six administrators who will meet regularly to discuss student services and activities. The group, which Kidd will chair, draws together the directors of the Harvard Foundation, the Office for the Arts, the Bureau of Study Council and other organizations.

But the mandate of the group is ambiguous, even to its members.

“I assume the initial effort will be a smooth transition to the new administrative structure of the College,” says Charles P. Ducey, Director of the Bureau of Study Council. “Dean Gross felt that College administration should be divided into different spheres, and this grouping of offices seems a natural and coherent one, as all its members focus on student services and activities.”

New Kidd on the Block

Gross says that the curricular review is his number-one priority, which has led some to worry that he will let student affairs fall to the wayside. Gross will not have as much time to devote to student affairs as his predecessor, former Dean of the College Harry R. Lewis ’68, and that is where Kidd is meant to pick up the slack.

She is, by title, the successor to Illingworth, who oversaw student groups and departed at the end of last year. But in addition to most of Illingworth’s responsibilities, Kidd will take reports from the heads of several offices that used to report to Lewis.

While Kidd may be a highly effective manager, students and administrators say she has two tools that will help ease her administrative burden: committees and delegation.

There are a number of committees and offices within the College bureaucracy that will serve as liaisons between Kidd and undergraduates to keep her informed of the nitty-gritty details of student life.