Columns
Since When Does Trump Care About Grades?
If the Trump administration swaps maximalist hostage-taking for more subtle and fundamentally reasonable asks, it may be appropriate to reconsider Harvard’s stance. If the Oval Office has changed course and opted for a project of durable institutional reform, that would be a nice change of pace. For now, though, those are pretty big ifs.
Harvard, Have Some Dignity.
So when you are inevitably cut from a club, don’t allow that to crush you. Don’t allow yourself to spiral into feeling inadequate or othered by a random group of students. You can have more dignity than that.
Speak on Principle, Not for What It Gets You
There is no venue for speech nor any set of policies that can make words come out of our mouths.
Harvard Is a Liberal Arts School. Our Courses Don’t Reflect That.
In order to fulfill its stated mission as a liberal arts school, Harvard must reform course requirements so students engage meaningfully with disciplines outside their concentration.
All Harvard Students Should Study Abroad
In focusing on what they might lose by not being in Cambridge, students discount what they will gain by living in a foreign country. Why learn about Italian Renaissance art on this side of the pond when you can see it yourself?
Make Everything as Efficient as the Flu Shot
The flu shot didn’t just help protect us from illness, it reminded us what this institution is capable of when it wants to be effective. I hope Harvard can learn to make simplicity the rule, not the exception.
The Unexpected Gift of Being Quadded
Quadded or not, don’t wait for proximity to define your relationships. Reach out to the people who make you feel good and watch as your days become more fulfilling. Make the effort and take the time to be truly intentional about how you spend your precious moments at this school.
Decline in Protest Spells Trouble for Harvard
The University has committed itself to “Intellectual Vitality” to promote challenging conversations on campus. But to be vital means to be lively and active — Harvard cannot fully dedicate itself to such an ideal while stifling the voices of students most active for the causes they care about.
Harvard’s Commitment to Free Speech is Half-Baked
We must commit ourselves to hearing different viewpoints, no matter how detestable we find them to be.
ChatGPT Has Been My Tutor for the Last Year. I Still Have Concerns.
This transition will be messy, and no policy will be perfect. But if we don’t agree on how to talk about AI, when to use it, and when to avoid it, we risk creating fragmented and inequitable experiences instead of preparing students for an AI-driven future.
Applicants: Improving Harvard’s Speech Culture is Worth the Hassle
So, to any prospective applicants: don’t hesitate to apply because you think your voice will be silenced. Rather, apply knowing your voice is the key to sustaining Harvard’s free speech culture. Come prepared.
Harvard Can’t Afford to Neglect the Humanities
Harvard exists to promote the highest intellectual pursuit in every discipline — it can’t leave the humanities behind.
Harvard Has Lost Its Moral Compass
Harvard could have remained steadfast in the fight for a brighter future, but instead chose to prove its own intellectual fragility. It caved to the current political moment, rapidly reorienting its beliefs to best serve its own financial interests.
Dean Deming’s Instagram Is Fun — But the Moment Demands More
Obviously, Dean Deming’s Instagram won’t solve all our problems. But in this time of unprecedented peril for higher education, every effort helps.
Can’t Concentrate? Lose the Double.
Today, many Harvard students know two things well — and nothing else.
