Evans, who is from Britain, compares Harvard’s efforts to the experiences of his friends from home. “In the English uni system they have subsidized student bars so you pay for your alcohol at cost price. If Harvard actually had a student bar I think it would make going out a lot more affordable for people. It would encourage a lot of people to go out—I don’t think Harvard encourages people to have a social life. I think your social education is just as important as your academic education.”

Social Education or Money Drain?

“I’m very surprised by the way money shapes your social life,” Veljic says. “I meet a lot of amazing people who don’t get to be as popular because they don’t have as much money.” But many students say money is just not as important as who your friends are. Jugo Kaptenovic ’07 says he believes that money doesn’t have to dictate student social lives: “I really don’t feel there’s much of a unified social pressure to do anything at all—campus has so many different niches and groups.”

Yet for some students a struggle to keep up with their peers clearly exists. “I do think that a lot of the social life may revolve around ‘going out’” for meals or coffee, says Suzanne Renna, acting director of the Bureau of Study Counsel. “You don’t necessarily want to say why you can’t go, but you might feel excluded from activities you’d really like to be involved in.”

A few years ago, the Bureau started a group, “Harvard on a Shoestring,” to address this issue. The Bureau started the group for those who wanted “to know about other students who feel financially constrained so they can go out and do things together without spending money.” Although students expressed interest, in the end, not enough showed up to keep the group going—they didn’t have time. According to Renna, the combination of working, socializing, and studying can be stressful for students, especially those under financial pressure.

“It often comes out as issues of time management—those trying to hold a job feel that the choices they have are limited due to time,” she says. “Choice making is a big part of what college is all about and for people who are under financial difficulties, they have many more choices, hard choices…what kind of courses they’re in, what to concentrate in…to give priority to what they think will be practical.”

Indebted to Harvard

In theory, the choice to consume is individual. Learning to handle money is arguably one facet of the college experience.

“I think I definitely consumed more freshman year than I am right now…it’s something about being a freshman,” Kaptenovic says. “Once you get here you’re on your own for the first time and you don’t really know how to manage what you’re spending.”

A junior who asked to remain anonymous had his credit card taken away after overspending freshman year. “I felt overwhelmed with the amount of resources I had at my disposal and I just had this urge to spend—on drugs, parties, dinners, clothes…” he says. Things improved as his lifestyle shifted. “I was given a budget readjustment and I also started working in the summer—I still spend a lot but I think about the things that I want to buy.”

The potential to spend money at Harvard comes as a surprise for some international students. “The English university system is such that most parents stop financing their kids when they go,” says Evans. “I had to renegotiate how much money my parents would give me. We both underestimated how much money I thought I would need—they thought my lifestyle would be such that I wouldn’t need as much money.”

Evans honed his money management skills through his recreational activities. “I don’t want to drink Ketel One’s for the first half of the month and Gordon’s for the last half—I’d rather drink Stoli for the whole month.”

But money mistakes made are not always easily undone.

“I definitely raked up a lot of credit card debt going out to try to keep up socially,” says a former student who graduated in 2000. “They sent me ads in the mail and I signed up for all of them. I spent money really wantonly—not because of [credit cards], but they facilitated it. I just kept getting new ones and never paying off the balance…it was a pretty typical consumer experience.”

The student, who comes from a small town in the Midwest, recalls the culture of silence that revolved around money at Harvard. “It was absolutely secret—when I was an undergraduate we were very secretive about our financial dealings. It is a real visceral social pressure—at least it was to me.”