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The Harvard Graduate Council eliminated half the positions on its executive board last spring, a shift that proponents of the change said helped lead to a more than twofold increase in the number of resolutions passed last semester.
The architects of the restructuring, including HGC President Brett Monson, said fewer executive board members has allowed the council to be more efficient and focus on approving more advocacy resolutions for graduate students.
Initially, the council consisted of an executive board and a set of student representatives from each school who voted on resolutions and served as ambassadors for each of their respective schools.
Monson said that the change is “really just reallocating responsibilities to the reps.”
“We did do exit interviews at the end of the spring for all the outgoing exec board members,” he said. “They just didn’t really feel like there was a lot of substance to their roles.”
In addition to reducing the number of executive board positions from 14 to seven, the restructuring mandated that all student representatives serve on committees in addition to attending the general council meetings, which are held every other Monday.
Monson said the HGC hoped that by reallocating responsibilities to council representatives, the council would become more efficient at passing resolutions. The HGC passed eight resolutions over the course of the 2022-23 school year. Last semester, the council approved 17 resolutions.
The HGC also created policies to streamline its process for passing resolutions.
“We tried to really put some structure to what resolutions were,” said Monson. “We cleared up a structure as well for how they’re numbered and coded, just to keep track of them.”
Following the restructuring, resolutions are now developed in the committees, in particular the advocacy committee.
During Harvard One socials — events intended to bring together students from Harvard’s various graduate schools — “quasi mini town halls” were held where students could raise issues or concerns they have, according to Monson.
Any comments or concerns that arise from the town halls are forwarded to Curneisha Williams, the HGC’s advocacy chair. Resolutions are written during biweekly committee meetings before being reviewed and voted on by the full council.
“The students bring the issues and write the resolutions, but it is Curneisha that is working behind the scenes meeting with the different offices and escalating the issues to make these wins happen,” wrote Monson.
Current advocacy efforts include lobbying for communal prayer spaces for graduate students, setting aside graduate study spaces on campus, and allowing graduate students’ HUIDs to be used as CharlieCards.
“We are just very much structured differently this year with the implementation of the committees and putting a heavy emphasis on developing a system from taking in student concerns, writing them up, and escalating,” Monson said.
Monson noted that the size and disparate nature of Harvard’s graduate student body pose a challenge to the council’s goals. The HGC is currently tasked with serving more than 21,000 students at 12 graduate schools.
“I think we’ve done a fairly good job of building things up with what we have, but I think you’re always gonna have the challenge at Harvard of being a fairly decentralized system,” Monson said.
“Getting all these different students from all these different graduate communities to be able to come together a lot more is always a challenge,” he added.
Monson did acknowledge that the graduate council continues to evolve to serve Harvard’s student body, despite facing some barriers.
“HGC is always a constant work in progress, and its best days are always ahead of us,” he added.
—Staff writer Adina R. Lippman can be reached at adina.lippman@thecrimson.com.
—Staff writer Angelina J. Parker can be reached at angelina.parker@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @angelinajparker.
