Crimson opinion writer
Tommy Barone
Latest Content
Dissent: With Pass-Fail Policy, the FAS Would Make Grades Even More Meaningless
Grade inflation and compression, worse with every passing year, pose a serious threat to the health of Harvard. The last thing the FAS should do now is give students another out.
Dissent: Abolish Advanced Placement
Sure, the Advanced Placement program provides a standard. But a bad standard is worse than none at all. We should abolish it.
Dissent: Departmental Restructuring Won’t Save — or Kill — the Humanities
Convinced that the longevity of Harvard humanities must take precedence over the longevity of its present departmental form, we hope the FAS does not allow questions of structure to elide more fundamental questions of substance.
Dissent: Equitable Admissions Are Proportionate
Instead of absolving selective colleges of their obligation to admit comparable numbers of men and women, we wish that the Editorial Board had consistently applied its reparative admissions rationale to men.
Harvard Isn’t Fun Enough. That’s No Laughing Matter.
Fun is no laughing matter. It is an institutional imperative for students to be happy and socially connected. A mental health crisis fueled by record loneliness is what happens when we act like fun is not an essential, soul-nourishing part of the human experience. So why do our fetes falter? I see two things dimming the Friday night lights.
Admissions Can’t Be a Dirty Word
The thing that unsettles me most about today’s affirmative action decision is that admissions remains a dirty word on Harvard’s campus. There exists a politics of politeness that proscribes honest discussion about Harvard College’s admissions practices. This reluctance has long held back reform; now, it could restrain the student response to the fall of affirmative action too.
Need-Blind: Why Harvard Hardly Accepts Low-Income Students
Lost beneath the panic over affirmative action’s coming demise, the hidden tragedy of the ongoing admissions saga has been to make it seem as though class-conscious admissions is an alternative to race-conscious admissions. In reality, we need both. My point is not that there is one inarguable conclusion about how to fairly structure Harvard admissions; it’s that the current system has failed to achieve economic diversity, which is a state of affairs we must reject and improve.
Dissent: We Can Take the Heat
With today’s editorial, the Board seems to have missed the punchline. As a long, important train of our precedents emphasizes, student well-being matters deeply and merits firm institutional support across a host of issues far more serious than a few sweltering evenings. But Harvard neither can nor should be a palace. Manageable, non-life-threatening adversity is an entirely reasonable burden to expect us to bear.
Dissent: David Kane is Harvard’s Institutional Failure
Harvard should use its reputation amongst universities to remove rot as soon as it’s discovered. The longer it fails to do so, the deeper the blight of misconduct will fester and spread. Students, for want of a Google search, will continue to suffer.
Harvard Dreams, Allston Nightmares
Harvard’s dreams and Allston’s nightmares are one and the same. It’s time for both to end.
A More Democratic Student Government Wouldn’t Have Elections
The original sin of this school comes with awkwardly fitting a fractured template for representative government from the outside world onto a community small enough to lead itself cooperatively. To absolve it, we must choose something different, better — a politics of direct democracy, of personality, and of action.
The SAT Doesn’t Matter: A Case for Economic Affirmative Action
If Harvard cares about diversity of perspective, about being a place for ordinary people, and about being plain old fair, it must drastically alter how it accounts for wealth in admissions.
What Criticisms of Grade Inflation Really Tell Us
Criticisms of grade inflation mistakenly take a handful of letters to represent a potent educational spirit that goes much deeper. But in perhaps a greater way, they grasp a truth of Harvard we would all do well to admit.
