The University Daily, Est. 1873 | Volume cxlv, No. 54 | Cambridge, Massachusetts | wednesday, april 11, 2018
The Harvard Crimson The College should make the student activities fee mandatory.
Men’s hockey reflects on a season full of ups and downs.
editorial PAGE 6
sports PAGE 8
Admit Data Could Be Public
Students Rally for Title IX Mass. Bills
By delano r. franklin and samuel w. zwickel
By paula m. barberi, nina h. pasquini, and jordan virtue
Crimson Staff Writers
Crimson Staff Writers
A small, redacted portion of more than 90,000 pages of Harvard admissions documents—including applicants’ files and internal correspondence between admissions officers—will become public information in coming months after a judge’s ruling in a lawsuit against Harvard Tuesday. At an April 10 hearing at the U.S. District Court in Boston, Judge Allison D. Burroughs ruled that, within the next two months, lawyers for Harvard University and advocacy group Students for Fair Admissions must file two near-identical sets of previously confidential Harvard admissions documents—one unredacted set to be filed under seal and one redacted version of the set to be filed publicly. These filings
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diana c. perez—Crimson Designer
Student Groups Lose Office Space in SOCH By jonah s. berger and simone c. chu Crimson Staff Writers
At least five student groups will lose their office spaces in the Student Organization Center at Hilles as part of a College effort to reduce the number of SOCH office occupants—and reconsider the broader use of at least two floors of the building—by the end of the semester. Members of the Harvard Pops Orchestra, comedy group On Harvard Time, and the Harvard-Radcliffe Asian American Association said administrators recently informed their respective groups they would be relocated to new offices elsewhere in the building. Members of the Harvard Republican Club and the Harvard College Democrats said their organizations have been kicked out of the SOCH entirely. Members of all five groups said they learned of these developments via emails sent by Harvard administrators in the past few weeks. According to an April 9 email sent to one student group by Fellow for Student Organizations and the SOCH Joseph P. Flanagan, “many student organizations” will either lose office space in the SOCH or will be reassigned to a new location in
IOP Predicts High Youth Turnout in Midterms
the facility. “Many organizations have lost space entirely,” Flanagan wrote in the email. “Unfortunately, some difficult decisions needed to be made.” The SOCH, located in the Quad, contains over 50,000 square feet of space designated for meeting rooms, office and storage space, conference facilities, and common spaces, according to the Office of Student Life website. Multiple undergraduate groups use the SOCH either for headquarters or for office space. Flanagan wrote in the April 9 email that the push to relocate or remove student groups from the SOCH stems from a “larger directive by the College to reduce” the number of SOCH office occupants. He added the College plans to evaluate the broad usage of the second and third floors of the SOCH. “The SOCH has been put in a position to reduce the number of student organization offices, and as a result, all student organizations are being moved and consolidated to the third floor,” he wrote. Alexander R. Miller, the Office of Student Life’s associate dean of student engagement, wrote in an emailed
See soch Page 3
The Student Organization Center at Hilles (SOCH) is located in the Radcliffe Quadrangle.
Fund Established to Honor Alex Patel
SEE PAGE 3
By caroline s. engelmayer and michael e. xie
Crimson Staff Writer
Young people in America said they are increasingly dissatisfied with the current Congress and will be “definitely voting” in the upcoming midterm elections, according to the spring 2018 edition of the Institute of Politics’ biannual youth poll released Tuesday. The survey was organized by a team of undergraduates from the Harvard Public Opinion Project, an Institute of Politics program, and included more than 2000 survey results from 18- to 29-year olds nationwide, according to Theodore N. Landis ’20, the head of the project. Some of the survey’s key findings include data about young Americans’ opinions on President Trump, political parties, and various institutions including, for the first time, technology companies like Google and Facebook.
Crimson Staff Writer
See iop Page 5
Harvard Today 2
See rally Page 5
Kathryn s. kuhar—Crimson photographer
By alexandra a. chaidez
Inside this issue
Joining a few hundred demonstrators with signs reading “1 in 5. Is that my future?” and “No means no,” a handful of Harvard students braved the April cold on Tuesday to join the Student Rally Against Sexual Violence at the Massachusetts State House in Boston. The rally—organized by the student-led Every Voice Coalition—was in support of two bills currently in Massachusetts House committees: H.4159 requires colleges and universities to administer sexual misconduct climate surveys and H.632 codifies Title IX protections for victims of sexual assault, enforcing equal access to education. Citing Bureau of Labor Statistics that up to 90 percent of sexual assaults go unreported, proponents argue that the climate survey bill would provide accurate information to evaluate the prevalence of sexual assault in higher education. “The first step to solving any problem is understanding it,” said Rep. Lori A. Ehrlich, the lead sponsor of H.4159. “And the way it is right now, we lack hard data and statistics that are needed to measure the depth and breadth of sexual harassment and violence at colleges and universities.” Ehrlich said she worked closely with Harvard Kennedy School students Catherine M. “Cici” Coquillette and Elyse N. Voegeli to develop the bill. Coquillette and Voegeli wrote a “fact sheet” advising legislators on best practices based on data collected from colleges and universities in Massachusetts that have already implemented such surveys. While Harvard implemented a sexual assault climate survey in 2015, Voegeli said H.4159 would ensure that every school in Massachusetts has to participate in such a survey and would collect comparable data from different schools. The task force to create the climate survey would include state officials, college students, and representatives of rape crisis centers. “You might be getting from one school a sexual violence rate of 0.1 percent, and you might be getting from another school 30 percent,” Voegeli said. “That doesn’t necessarily mean that more incidences are happening at those schools–it’s just that the question was asked differently, in such a way that people responded differently.” Coquillette said the cost of develop-
animal heads
News 3
A box of severed animal heads was found on Church Street, near Harvard Yard. Awnit singh marta—Crimson pho-
Harvard College launched a fund Monday to support a new group of student teaching fellows in the Computer Science department in memory of Alexander H. Patel ’17-’18. As a part of the Alex Patel Peer Teaching Fellows Fund, the Computer Science department plans to form a team of students who will serve as supplementary teaching fellows for various department courses and will provide individual tutoring to students, Alex’s father Hiren Patel wrote in a letter to family and friends Tuesday. “We were looking for something that would be very one-on-one and would be specific to the CS department and would also help foster that kind of personal relationship that Alex really
tographer
Editorial 6
Sports 8
Today’s Forecast
CLOUDY High: 45 Low: 31
Visit thecrimson.com. Follow @TheCrimson on Twitter.
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Facesmash
HARVARD TODAY
FOR LUNCH
FOR DINNER
Japchae Beef Bulgog
Arugula, Goat Cheese & Bacon Multigrain Pizza
Spicy Tofu with Green Beans
WEDNESDAY | APRIL 11, 2018
Waffle Fries
Reds Best Fresh Local Fish w/Capers & Parsley Wild Mushroom Ravioli
AROUND THE IVIES Yale Research Team Discovers New Galaxy with Little Dark Matter A 12-astronomer cohort led by Yale astronomy and physics professor Pieter van Dokkum discovered a new galaxy, according to the Yale Daily News. This discovery is especially important because this newfound galaxy has at least 400 times less dark matter than expected. The researchers first found the galaxy two years ago with a telescope in New Mexico called Dragonfly, which van Dokkum built. The relative absence of dark matter these researchers found challenges Modified Newtonian dynamic theories. They hope to further study similar galaxies to understand them better.
Parents of Penn Student Who Committed Suicide Sue the University for Inattention
FREE CONE DAY The Garage location of Ben & Jerry’s gave out free ice cream cups and cones toay on its annual Free Cone Day. AWNIT SINGH MARTA—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER
Parents of former Wharton junior, Olivia Kong who died by suicide in April 2016, are suing the University for not responding to Kong’s pleas for help in the weeks leading up to her suicide, the Daily Pennsylvanian reported. Kong reported her suicidal intentions at least nine times to Penn professionals; each time, she felt unheard. The Kong family is the third over the past three years to sue Penn for negligence in the case of a student who later died by suicide.
Over 140 Dartmouth Students March in “Take Back the Night”
HAPPY WEDNESDAY!
Today’s Events
Åsne Seierstad at Harvard Book Store The Harvard Book Store is hosting journalist and writer Asne Seierstad as she discusses her latest book. It’s free, and no ticket is needed!
Class at Harvard: A Talk about Socioeconomic Status on Campus Head over to the Harvard College Women’s Center for a talk about class and socioeconomic status at Harvard.
Fit + Fabulous Fitness Series at CambridgeSide CambridgeSide and the Cambridge Athletic Club are hosting a free event that has a blend of Yoga,Tai Chi and
It may be Hump Day, but Yardfest is so close we can taste it.
pilates. Registration required. The Laramie Project at Oberon Come out to the Oberon for this version of The Laramie Project, the story of a man and the town he was killed in for being gay. Tickets can be acquired online. Claire J. Hoffman Crimson Staff Writer
Over 140 Dartmouth students marched last Friday at “Take Back the Night,” an international march with the aim to end sexual, domestic, and relationship violence, the Dartmouth reported. According to a member of the Week of Action planning committee, no more than 20 people showed up for the march in previous years. All fraternities, sororities, gender-inclusive houses and off-campus houses also decided to close their doors for social events independently on Friday night in solidarity with the sexual assault survivors.
IN THE REAL WORLD Zuckerberg Says Facebook in Technological Arms Race with Russia Mark Zuckerberg, creator and CEO of Facebook, attended his hearing in Capitol Hill, and made some controversial statements. “This is an arms race. They’re going to keep getting better,” Zuckerberg said. There are people in Russia whose job it is to try to exploit our systems and other internet systems and other systems as well.” Donald Trump’s Long-time, Personal Lawyer, Michael Cohen, Raided The home, office, and hotel room of Cohen were raided by the FBI. Trump’s response included a tirade in which he used “disgrace” several times, which hints that the president is concerned on top of angry. Sacremento Police Issue New Rules On Police Muting Body Cameras After Muting During Stephon Clark’s Shooting The Sacremento Police Department made changes to rules on muting body cameras after Stephon Clark, an unarmed black man, was murdered by police who muted their body cameras. These new rules only impose how and when police may turn off their cameras, including that they must audibly announce their deactivation or muting on camera. Clark was murdered mid-March by two police who assumed he was pointing a gun at them when he, in fact, was only holding his cell phone.
The Harvard Crimson THE UNIVERSITY DAILY, EST. 1873 Derek G. Xiao, President Hannah Natanson, Managing Editor Nathan Y. Lee, Business Manager Copyright 2018, The Harvard Crimson (USPS 236-560). No articles, editorials, cartoons or any part thereof appearing in The Crimson may be reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the President. The Associated Press holds the right to reprint any materials published in The Crimson. The Crimson is a non-profit, independent corporation, founded in 1873 and incorporated in 1967. Second-class postage paid in Boston, Massachusetts. Published Monday through Friday except holidays and during vacations, three times weekly during reading and exam periods by The Harvard Crimson Inc., 14 Plympton St., Cambridge, Mass. 02138 Weather icons made by Freepik, Yannick, Situ Herrera, OCHA, SimpleIcon, Catalin Fertu from flaticon.com is licensed by CC BY 3.0.
TECH & DEMOCRACY WAITING AT THE DOT Participants at the Tech and Democracy Workshop Series discuss policy issues related to technology. JASIEL D. LAPKIN—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER
QUOTE OF THE DAY
STAFF FOR THIS ISSUE
“It’s the type of thing that you allow for the possibility but you don’t plan for its being an eventuality.”
Night Editor Kenton K. Shimozaki ‘19
Design Editor Diana C. Perez ’19
Assistant Night Editor Jonah S. Berger ’21 Lucas Ward ’20
Editorial Editor Caleb S. Esrig ’20
—Richard T. Porteus Jr. ’78, graduate president of the Fly Club
CORRECTIONS
The April 9 article “Grad Students Dismayed at Lack of MailIn Voting” incorrectly identified Nathan Robinson as a Ph.D. student in Anthropology. In fact, he is a Ph.D. student in Sociology and Social Policy. The Harvard Crimson is committed to accuracy in its reporting. Factual errors are corrected promptly on this page. Readers with information about errors are asked to e-mail the managing editor at managingeditor@thecrimson.com.
Story Editors Graham W. Bishai ’19 Hannah Natanson ’19 Claire E. Parker ‘19 Kenton K. Shimozaki ’19 Alison W. Steinbach ’19 Sarah Wu ’19
Photo Editors Ellis J. Yeo ’20 Margaret F. Ross ‘19 Sports Editors George Hu ’19
THE HARVARD CRIMSON | APRIL 11, 2018 | PAGE 3
HKS Prof. Wins Award By ALEXANDRA A. CHAIDEZ CRIMSON STAFF WRITER
Jane J. Mansbridge, a Harvard Kennedy School professor of political leadership and democratic values, is this year’s recipient of the 2018 Johan Skytte Prize in Political Science, the highest international honor for political scientists. The committee that awards the prize chose to honor Mansbridge for her “field-defining contributions to our understanding of the theory and practice of democracy, political representation and deliberation as well as feminist theory,” according to a statement released by the Skytte Foundation Friday. Past recipients of the prize include Harvard Government professors Theda Skocpol and Robert D. Putnam. The award ceremony is scheduled for Sept. 29. Mansbridge said she was “thrilled” and “excited” to receive the award, adding the honor was significant, not just for herself, but also because it stresses the importance of political awareness. “I took the award not only to be something about me but also something about the importance of the subjects I study, so I was very, very happy,” Mansbridge said. Mansbridge is known for crafting political theories pertaining to groups historically underrepresented in politics. One theory, which she calls “descriptive representation,” enumerates the benefits of having representatives with the same experiences as their constituents, especially African
Americans and women. The press release announcing the award called Mansbridge “a pioneering role model for women in political science.” Mansbridge, who began working on women’s issues in 1968, was quick to say that title was an exaggeration, citing other female leaders in the field.“One of the things you know if you spend anytime in the women’s movement is that this stuff is collective. None of us could do it without the others,” Mansbridge said. At the beginning of her career, as a woman studying political science, Mansbridge said she often had to find creative ways to attract attention in a classroom. “You have to be willing to put your hand up really straight when you want to ask a question and sit in the front row so that they can’t miss you,” Mansbridge said. “You have to know what you’re saying.” Mansbridge, the former president of the American Political Science Association, said she has faith that the field of political science can create solutions for modern problems like climate change. “These problems are going to get more and more interdependent and the only group of people in the entire planet whose job it is to think about this stuff is political science,” Mansbridge said. “More and more people are going to be really trying to help.” —Staff writer Alexandra A. Chaidez can be reached at alexandra.chaidez@thecrimson. com. Follow her on Twitter @a_achaidezCum
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Animal Ritual Remains Found By ISABEL M. KENDALL and PAUL D. TAMBURRO CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS
Several animal heads discovered in a trash can on Church St. on March 31 appear to have been used in a religious ritual and are not being investigated as a crime, according to the Cambridge Police Department. According to the official Cambridge police report, three boxes containing three pig heads, deer heads, and a bird, were found near the trash barrels on the street. The officer on duty at the time notified both animal control and the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. The remains were later removed by the Department of Public Waste.“The pig heads also had what appeared to be in-
felt was important,” Hiren said in an interview Tuesday. Patel—a Harvard undergraduate who died last semester at the age of 22—is remembered by peers and faculty as a brilliant student and an “incredible friend.” On top of his academic coursework, Patel served as a teaching fellow for several Computer Science classes throughout his time at the College. He also wrote for The Crimson, reporting on Harvard Business School and working for the paper’s data analysis team. Patel, a Philosophy and Mathematics concentrator, died by suicide, according to the Massachusetts Medical Examiner’s Office. Patel’s passion and dedication for his work as a teaching fellow served as the inspiration for the creation of the new fund, Hiren said. “This started because we were trying to think of a way to honor Alex, and Alex loved teaching, particularly on a one-on-one basis,” Hiren said. “He wanted to actually help you, not just getting through your [problem set].” Members of the Computer Sci-
ence department, including Margo I. Seltzer ’83—who served as a research mentor for Patel—played a key role in creating the fund, Hiren said. In an interview Tuesday, Seltzer said the teaching fellowship comprises the “perfect” way to remember Patel. “I am extraordinarily happy to see this fund be created,” she said. “I think it’s a positive thing that the family has been able to do in the face of real devastation and tragedy and I think the fund will keep Alex’s memory alive in Harvard Computer Science for a long time .” Seltzer—who said Patel was “super passionate and dedicated to his students” —said students and faculty have been “incredibly supportive” of efforts to begin the fund. “Every time I mention this to undergraduates or graduate students, they get that look in their eyes that says, ‘Oh, this is the perfect way to remember Alex,’” she said. Patel teaching fellows will help provide “additional resources” to “students who are struggling the most,” according to Seltzer. She said the fellows will supplement—not replace—normal course staff. Seltzer said the inaugural class of
By AIDAN B. CAREY and YASMIN LUTHRA CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS
Renovations to Robinson Hall will begin this June in order to make the building more accessible. The changes will include the installation of an elevator that accesses each floor of the building as well as the addition of new restrooms and renovation of existing ones, according to Harvard spokesperson Rachael Dane. After the renovations, the building will be compliant with codes outlined in the Americans with Disabilities Act. In addition to making the building more accessible, the renovations will update student and faculty workspaces in Robinson. “The project will also modernize departmental administration offices, create needed new faculty offices, and improve existing classroom space,” Dane wrote in an email. These major renovations will also
fellows should include people who knew Patel. “What’s important to this program is that the first cohort of fellows be people who knew Alex,” she said. “Moving forward, our goal is that each year the cohort of Patel fellows will help us pick the next cohort so that we can keep the memory of Alex alive.” Hiren said he thinks the preliminary response to the establishment of the fund has been “fantastic.” “It’s a shame, I think, many of us don’t know how many lives we touch until we’re gone,” Hiren Patel said. “I think so many people whose lives have touched by Alex and who knew him well will be supportive.” Contributions to the fund can be made online at https://community. alumni.harvard.edu/give/16040771 or mailed to Harvard University Alumni and Development Services, 124 Mount Auburn Street, Cambridge, MA 02138. Staff writer Caroline S. Engelmayer can be reached at caroline.engelmayer@thecrimson. com. Follow her on Twitter @cengelmayer13. Staff writer Michael E. Xie can be reached at michael.xie@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter@MichaelEXie1.
Student Groups Expelled from SOCH SOCH FROM PAGE 1 statement Tuesday that the College is currently executing a reorganization of the SOCH. “We are currently in the process of implementing a data-based plan which will provide more community spaces and better storage for students,” he wrote. “In the meantime, all groups will be able to continue operating in their current locations through the end of the academic year.” Flanagan wrote in the April email that administrators are using several criteria to determine which groups lose their SOCH office space. He wrote staffers are weighing groups’ applications to use SOCH rooms as well as “the current physical conditions of the office” and “usage data.” Flanagan did not specifically define what this data entailed in his email, but he wrote that one group— the group headed by the student who received his email—had only “entered the space fifteen times this academic year.” Given other groups had used their offices “between fifty and five hundred times in that same time period,” Flanagan wrote, this particular group deserved to be relocated to a new space in the SOCH. Devontae A. Freeland ’19, president of the College Democrats, said administrators told his group mem-
bers would be given until early May to move out of their current office. “It seemed as though we had received, more or less, a form email that was probably sent to other students, informing us that we would be offered some moving supplies to help us move our personal effects out of the SOCH office, and letting us know the deadline,” Freeland said. “But that was essentially it,” he added. Freeland said the College Democrats use their SOCH office space frequently to work on their new podcast series, and that the space had served as a home base for their canvassing efforts during political campaign season. Kiera E. O’Brien ’20, the president of the Harvard Republican Club, said she and other club members are disappointed the group has lost its SOCH space. “It is a huge hardship for our club, since we don’t have any other space to our name,” O’Brien wrote in an emailed statement. On Harvard Time will move to a larger office but will have to share that room with multiple other student groups, according to its executive producer Julius Z. R. Wade ’20. Wade said he was unsure if the move would end up being positive for the group. “The new office that they assigned us is a fairly large office in the corner of the SOCH, which was what I spe-
animals in this way,” Gyatso said. “I have heard that there may indeed be
I am dismayed at the horrible and cruel use of animals in this way. Janet Gyatso
Professor of Buddhist Studies such rituals in Thailand, although I don’t know anything about it.”
Robinson to Undergo Renovation
Teaching Fellow Fund To Honor Patel FUND FROM PAGE 1
cense sticks driven into them with leftover ash on their faces,” officer Joseph Crowley wrote in the official police report. Crowley wrote that the remains likely played a role in some sort of religious ritual. “In Thailand, Buddhists place pig heads on tables with incense sticks in them as food offering shrines,” Crowley wrote. “The incident does not appear to be a crime and the practice of rituals such as the one described above as part of religion is protected by the first amendment,” the report further read. Janet Gyatso, a professor of Buddhist studies at the Divinity School, said she did not know what the animal remains might have been used for. “As an animal ethicist I am dismayed at the horrible and cruel use of
cifically requested in the application, so I’m pleased because of that,” Wade said. “But in the application, I also specified that because of the nature of the work that On Harvard Time does— having lots of expensive equipment and stuff—it would be best to have our own office.” “I’m hoping that it all works out fine,” he added. Harvard Pops Orchestra Co-President Leah U. Rosen ’19 said Pops has had its own office in the SOCH for “as long as I can remember.” Rosen added the group uses its office to store more than two decades’ worth of expensive sheet music, which the organization archives in order to avoid buying new copies of the same songs. Now, Rosen said, Pops has been assigned to share the space with other performing arts groups, “I’m worried that we’ll have less storage space, or that we’ll have to battle with other groups,” Rosen said. “Because the music is so expensive, we are really careful about not losing anything and being really organized with it.” Staff writer Jonah S. Berger can be reached at jonah.berger@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @jonahberger98. Staff writer Simone C. Chu can be reached at simone.chu@thecrimson.com. Follow her on Twitter @simonechu_.
include the installation of an automatic sprinkler system per a statewide resolution passed in 2008 that requires buildings over 7,500 square feet to have an “adequate system of automatic
Almost the entirety of the faculty will have to leave Daniel L. Smail
History Department Chair sprinklers in accordance with the provisions of the state building code. This requirement does not apply retroactively to buildings existing before the law was put in place, but can be triggered in the case of major alter-
ations. The project, expected to be completed by the end of 2018, will have a significant impact on the building’s inhabitants. History Department chair, Daniel L. Smail, whose office is one of many in Robinson, said the renovations will be difficult but “manageable” for staff and faculty. “Almost the entirety of the faculty will have to leave and arrangements are being made for the staff to have various forms of temporary office space in corners of the building while the work is going on,” Smail said. Robinson Hall was constructed in 1904 and originally housed the Department of Architecture. It is currently home to the History department, which includes over 50 faculty members, 200 undergraduate concentrators, and 130 graduate students. Staff writer Yasmin Luthra can be reached at yasmin.luthra@thecrimson.com.
Some Admissions Data May Soon be Public DATA FROM PAGE 1 could total thousands of pages but will only comprise “a small fraction” of the 90,000 total pages of documents designated as “Confidential” or “Highly Confidential” that the University has given over as part of the ongoing lawsuit, according to a filing made by Harvard lawyers last week. Nonetheless, most of the confidential information related to Harvard’s admissions will not be contained in these filings. If the case goes forward, much of that information could become public at a later trial. That trial is now likely going to take place this next fall after hearing participants discussed moving up the tentative date at the hearing Tuesday. Instead of a previously proposed date in early January, the judge, Harvard, and Students for Fair Admissions spoke about holding a trial in mid-October. Judge Burroughs determined that Harvard and Students for Fair Admissions must work together over the coming months to agree on redactions for the public set of documents prior to filing. She instructed both groups they should not redact the files to the point of being “incomprehensible.” Students for Fair Admissions, an anti-affirmative action group, first filed the lawsuit against Harvard in 2014; the suit alleges Harvard discriminates against Asian Americans in its admissions process. Harvard has repeatedly denied this accusation. In Oct. 2016, Harvard provided Students for Fair Admissions with data for hundreds of thousands of students who applied to the College between fall 2009 and spring 2015. This information, evaluated in the discovery phase of the ongoing lawsuit, omitted the names and social security numbers of applicants. Harvard and Students for Fair Admissions previously battled over whether this College admissions data should become public in clashing briefs filed last week. In its brief, Students for Fair Admissions argued that “Harvard already has redacted all personally identifiable information of applicants, alumni, and donors.” Harvard, however, asserted in its filings that even the redacted admissions data could render College affiliates identifiable. Harvard asked for the documents to “be filed provisionally under seal,” citing concerns regarding student privacy. Students for Fair Admissions requested the documents be filed publicly, arguing the public has a “profoundly important” interest in the documents. Representatives for both Harvard and Students for Fair Admissions said their respective institutions are content with the outcome of Tuesday’s hearing.
Harvard spokesperson Rachael Dane wrote in an emailed statement Tuesday that the College is satisfied with Judge Burroughs’s ruling. “Harvard College is pleased the court today affirmed our responsibility to protect the confidential and highly sensitive personal information of our applicants from unwarranted public disclosure,” Dane wrote. “The process the court set forth will allow for the careful consideration of confidentiality before any private information is made publicly available.” Edward Blum, president of Students for Fair Admissions, said his organization is optimistic for the future. “We are encouraged that the American public will soon have access to the full record in this lawsuit and look forward to the scheduled October trial,” Blum said. Andrew D. Bradt ’02, an assistant law professor at University of California, Berkeley, wrote in an email Tuesday that he thinks Judge Burroughs sought a “middle ground” between Harvard’s desire to keep the admissions data entirely under seal and Students for Fair Admissions’ request to make it public. “Judge Burroughs’s ruling does not surprise me,” Bradt wrote. “This seems like a wholly appropriate middle ground solution for this phase of the litigation.” William F. Lee ’72, the senior fellow of the Harvard Corporation, numbered among several lawyers representing Harvard at the hearing—acting only as an attorney, not on behalf of the Corporation. The Department of Justice has taken a strong interest in the lawsuit and in the confidential status of Harvard’s admissions data, filing a brief Friday as part of the lawsuit that argued Harvard should make the data public. Lee sent a letter to Judge Burroughs Monday calling the Department of Justice’s intervention “perplexing” and “entirely unnecessary.” “The United States agrees that applicants to Harvard, their families, and the general public have a presumptively paramount right to access the summary judgment record in this civil rights case,” the Justice Department filing reads. Justice Department spokesperson Devin M. O’Malley declined to comment on Judge Burroughs’s decision Tuesday. The hearing comes a few months before a June 15 deadline—set by Judge Burroughs Tuesday—for the parties to file motions on whether the lawsuit can be resolved without a trial. Staff writer Delano R. Franklin can be reached at delano.franklin@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @delanofranklin_. Staff writer Samuel W. Zwickel can be reached at samuel.zwickel@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @samuel_zwickel.
EDITORIAL THE CRIMSON EDITORIAL BOARD
Supporting Social and Extracurricular Life The activities fee changes are welcome, but the fee should be mandatory
L
ast week, The Crimson reported that the College will increase the student activities fee—an optional sum paid by Harvard undergraduates as part of their enrollment costs—from $75 to $200 next academic year. The Office of Student Life will also form a committee of students and administrators to allocate the funds, which used to go directly to the Undergraduate Council’s budget. These are welcome changes. Though campus social life has transformed in the past decade, and inflation has eaten away at the fee revenue’s purchasing power, this activities fee has held constant since 2006. Furthermore, since 2015, University President Drew G. Faust has helped fund undergraduate social events by providing part of her discretionary fund to the College, which uses it to fund student social life. However, the certainty of this continued funding source is unclear given the presidential turnover. Meanwhile, the Undergraduate Council—which is currently responsible for allocating the student activities fee funding—is struggling with a budget shortfall, and it drew down a third of its emergency fund earlier this semester to continue funding student organizations. Having faced these problems in the past, the UC called for a raise in the fee in 2012, to no avail. We therefore believe that the
current system of relying on Faust’s discretionary funding and still not having sufficient funds for normal UC operations is unsustainable. This raise will also bring the College’s fee closer to many of its peers. At Brown, Cornell, Dartmouth, Yale, and Columbia, for example, the activities fee averages $205 per year. Furthermore, given recent financial mismanagement of the UC, we
Student life at the College has remained an important and changing area of scrutiny. support transitioning control over student activities fee inflows away from the Council and toward a committee of students and administrators. Such a change will also allow for improvements in the distribution of funds between the UC, College Events Board, House Committees, and Intramural Council. We do however remain concerned about the continuing voluntary nature of the student activities fee. The fee is not part of tuition, and students can avoid paying it by mailing a letter to the College at the start of the academic year. This is an unfortunate reality—it permits students to enjoy the products of the fee, such as events paid for by the CEB, like Yardfest, or organizations supported by the UC, without paying. This
creates the potential of a problem akin to a tragedy of the commons, as any student not paying the fee can enjoy the benefits of those who do. Instead, the College should make the fee mandatory, yet, of course, provide appropriate financial aid for those students who require it. It is also concerning that the College did not announce this fee change to students directly, and there is a level of disingenuousness in the College’s allowing students to opt out of the fee only by physical mail, while not making this possibility well-known. Nevertheless, if properly announced and formalized, a mandatory fee would avoid these concerns. Student life at the College has remained an important and changing area of scrutiny. For the many students who attend and rely on events sponsored by College-support organizations, including student groups and the CEB, this increase in the student activities fee will ensure the continuity of their social life. As the College continues to change, supporting strong student social life is essential. This staff editorial solely represents the majority view of The Crimson Editorial Board. It is the product of discussions at regular Editorial Board meetings. In order to ensure the impartiality of our journalism, Crimson editors who choose to opine and vote at these meetings are not involved in the reporting of articles on similar topics.
BE A CRIMSON CARTOONIST Submit a sample cartoon or any questions to Associate Editorial Editor Wonik Son ‘19 (wonik.son@thecrimson.com).
The Precarity of Being an International Graduate Student
D
espite the current political climate, Harvard, in contrast to its peer institutions, saw an increase in international student applicants for 2018-19. Many international students, just like many American students, dream of coming to Harvard to pursue excellence in research. And, just like many American students, we face the ups-and-downs of being graduate students. Unlike our American peers, however, we often work far away from our families and friends with uncertainty around when and how frequently we might be able to go back home. Importantly, our visas—and many of our rights—are tied to our status as students at this institution. As a result, the usual challenges of graduate school—the precariousness of our compensation and healthcare benefits or maintaining healthy and productive relationships with our advisors— are magnified manyfold for us. This severely restricts our ability to advocate for ourselves when faced with difficult situations at work, such as harassment or unreasonable expectations from our supervisors. Many of us choose silence over risking our academic careers, especially because for some of us, based on our country of origin, losing visa status may mean never getting a second chance. In fact, we personally know cases of international graduate students not speaking up with accounts of sexual harassment in their labs, about being denied time off to visit family, or about being ridiculed by our advisors while being passed on for professional development opportunities like conference funding. Faced with these challenges, we feel vulnerable and often without substantive support from the administration. Our mental health care staff routinely lack sensitivity to pressures unique to being an international student, and the high cost of accessing external care, especially given visa restrictions on where and how much we can work, means our concerns often remain unaddressed. There are also few systems of support to help us manage relationships with advisors and supervisors. Troublingly, we do not know what recourse there might be if we were un-
justly forced out of an academic program, even though being forced out often means being forced to leave the country because our visas are tied to active status in academic programs. This lack of systematic support from the administration mirrors what we see at the undergraduate level with students from historically underrepresented backgrounds. Moreover, despite the pro-immigration stance the administration has taken rhetorically, the actual responses from the administration to the increasingly restrictive immigration policies on the federal level have been feeble, to say the least. We cannot help but often feel that this university is not a place made for us. While in recent years the University has stepped up its efforts to recruit students globally, it has not coupled these efforts with adequate resources for those it recruits. How could international students address these issues? How could we push the University administration to do more for international students? Such advocacy requires that we band together to speak up boldly and organize actively; while we may be a few in number in our own departments, we make up nearly one-third of the graduate student population at Harvard. One way to get our voices heard and turn organizing into real leverage is via mobilizing for a union. The right to join and participate in labor unions in the U.S. is legally protected for international student workers in the same manner as it is for domestic workers. Full participation in our union would empower us to shape student workers’ priorities as a whole and bargain with the University administration on an equal footing to improve our conditions. Full access to our union’s grievance procedure would ensure that we have the ability to fight back whenever faced with unjust treatment. Across the country, graduate workers’ unions have won powerful protections for international students. For example, in 2015, graduate employees at the Wayne State University secured a clause in their union contract that an absence due to immigration procedures shall be treated the same way as an absence caused by illness or injury. At the University of Connecticut, graduate students won provisions in their
union contract that prevent the university from imposing visa-related fees on international students. On our own campus, the Harvard International Office established an emergency hotline for international students and scholars who encounter difficulties entering the border in April 2017, after the International Scholars Working Group of the Harvard Graduate Student Union-United Automobile Workers advocated for such a measure for over two months through a petition supported by hundreds of Harvard community members. Mobilizing for our union would not be a panacea for all of the challenges we face, including the rise in xenophobic policies federally. But it does provide one concrete way for us to hold the University accountable and make specific demands. Our power in this process originates from the fact that student workers across the entire campus come together, join forces, and have each other’s back. International student workers, who now make up a substantial portion of the membership of various local unions affiliated with the UAW, have also significantly shaped the priorities and advocacy efforts of the UAW on the level of national politics. In recent years, the UAW has actively advocated to lift limits on employment-based green cards for foreign students graduating from American universities with advanced degrees and to expand the OPT program. Ultimately, our Harvard is better when all members, including our international students, work with the stability of a contract and the security of a community that can organize in times of need. We are voting for this better Harvard by voting “yes” on April 18 and 19, and encourage our fellow international student voters to join us so that present and future scholars have equal access to opportunities regardless of where they were born and what their passports say. Jingyun Dai is a first-year Ph.D. student in sociology at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. Rohan P. Naidu is a first-year Ph.D. student in astronomy and astrophysics at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. The authors are both international students and from China and India, respectively.
THE HARVARD CRIMSON | APRIL 11, 2018 | PAGE 4
M16s and MREs
Real weapons, military rations, college kids, no sleep—what could possibly go wrong?
H
ypothetically, I’m not terriGrace M. ble with numbers. CHAO I’ve taken multivariable calculus (albeit specificalTHE UNDERGROUND ly for social sciences concentrators), econometrics, and have turned in dozens of Stata problem sets over the last year or so. I’m no math concentrator, but I do have reasonable competency with numerical operations. Yet, when I am handed a map, compass, and protractor and am expected to plot and then actually go find five grid coordinates in the woods during an Army land navigation training? My brain starts flashing the blue screen of death that my old Windows XP desktop machine would flash on the daily. (Fun aside: The Department of Defense seems to still largely rely on ancient Windows operating systems. You should definitely be concerned.) You would think that, being a college student, basic geometry like plotting grid coordinates and measuring angles would be a piece of cake. However, the woods do not care at all about how smart or clever you might be or where you go to college. You can perfectly plot your points, plan an ingenious route, shoot perfect compass azimuths, but the woods and terrain will still have the final say. Does the Army have digital GPS systems that lead us exactly to where we need to go most of the time? Yes. Will I actually pull out my compass, protractor, and map to navigate my platoon to an objective when I’m a Lieutenant? I shouldn’t eliminate the possibility, but it’s fairly unlikely. But as is the case with many events in Army ROTC, the ultimate goal of seemingly irrelevant training is not necessarily developing perfect compass skills, but developing the mental skills to stay calm and collected under pressure. Can I keep my wits about me and not panic when the point marker isn’t exactly where I expected it? Can I exercise tactical patience and pace out 50 meters in each cardinal direction to systematically canvas the area where I think the point should be? Will I decide that the woods will not defeat me? These are the questions that land navigation training is actually asking—not just whether I can read an eight-digit grid coordinate. When Army ROTC battalions take cadets out into the woods, equip them with real M16 rifles loaded with blanks, issue them MREs (meals ready-to-eat, which are surprisingly not terrible), and task them into infantry platoons during spring field training (as our battalion did this weekend during a casual April snowstorm), the goal isn’t necessarily to develop supremely competent, super hooah infantrymen. The goal is to develop resilient leaders and effective communicators. Every cadet will need those soft skills, whether they’re leading a real Infantry platoon or commanding a Cyber task force. Yes, there are basic soldier skills that every officer, non-commissioned officer, and junior enlisted have to have. The Army has to be able to speak a common language when we talk for example about operations orders, task organization, and standards. In ROTC-land, this is certainly important, but developing the ability and mental toughness to lead your peers and subordinates through a cold, wet, hungry hell is what will make or break cadets. You can read the Ranger Handbook cover to cover, but there isn’t a page on how to motivate these cold, wet, tired, and hungry cadets to get up and move out quickly. You can bring the most high-speed terrain model kits and cover every single line of an operations order, yet still fail to create a shared understanding of what job each squad in your platoon has during a patrol mission. You can be the most knowledgeable and the most tactically and doctrinally sound platoon leader out there, yet still fail to take care of your soldiers. Being a leader in the field is as much about managing people and personalities as it is understanding doctrine and tactics. Sometimes, it takes a miserable April snowstorm to teach you how to endure, how to take care of your soldiers while holding them to the standards of their profession, and how to hold yourself to those same supposed standards. I’m reminded of one Colonel Kenneth Mintz, former commander of Army Cadet Command’s Second Brigade (in charge of overseeing the New England Army ROTC battalions), and how he once led our Paul Revere Battalion through a combat PT workout that was nothing but low-crawling back and forth across a field with a dummy M16 rifle for an almost an hour. At the end of this session, Colonel Mintz stood in tattered fatigues (he had done this workout several times in one week with almost every Massachusetts unit) and told us simply that we become a team when we do hard things together. What a valuable reminder for any weekend of brutal training conditions—we’re never out there in the frosted forests struggling on our own. Doing the hard things together makes us better. Grace M. Chao ‘19 is an Economics concentrator in Mather House. Her column appears on alternate Wednesdays. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of Harvard’s ROTC program, the Department of the Army, Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.
The Harvard Crimson President Derek G. Xiao ’19 Managing Editor Hannah Natanson ’19 Business Manager Nathan Y. Lee ’19
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY, EST. 1873
Associate Managing Editors Mia C. Karr ’19 Claire E. Parker ’19 Associate Business Managers Dahlia S. Huh ’19 Max W. Sosland ’19 Editorial Chairs Emmanuel R. R. D’Agostino ’19 Cristian D. Pleters ’19 Arts Chairs Mila Gauvini II ’19 Grace Z. Li ’19 Blog Chairs Lydia L. Cawley ’20 Stuti Telidevara ’20 Design Chairs Morgan J. Spaulding ’19 Simon S. Sun ’19
Digital Strategists Caroline S. Engelmayer ’20 Jamie D. Halper ’20 Dianne Lee ’20 FM Chairs Marella A. Gayla ’19 Leah S. Yared ’19 Multimedia Chairs Amy Y. Li ’20 Ellis J. Yeo ’20 Sports Chairs Cade S. Palmer ’20 Jack R. Stockless ’19 Technology Chairs Nenya A. Edjah ’20 Theodore T. Liu ’20
THE HARVARD CRIMSON | APRIL 11, 2018 | PAGE 5
IOP Youth Poll Predicts High Turnout Students Rally for Mass. Sexual Assault Bills IOP FROM PAGE 1
This is the first release of data from the project. Subsequent installments of the project’s results will be announced within the next three weeks, IOP Director Mark D. Gearan ’78 said. John Della Volpe, the IOP polling director in charge of the survey, said one of the most significant findings of the survey was the heightened interest in midterm elections. “This is the most interest we have seen in midterm voting in the history of our poll,” Della Volpe said. More than 37 percent of young Americans said they “definitely will be voting” in the 2018 elections, a marked increase from the 23 percent in 2010. Democrats are leading that charge, according to the survey, with 51 percent of young party members reporting they “definitely will vote” in the elections as compared to the 36 percent of Republicans who say the same. Approval of congressional Democrats and Republicans remained rela-
tively stable from last fall, with backing of Democrats dropping from 42 to 41 percent and Republicans growing from 23 to 24 percent. Landis said a lot of the momentum predicted in this poll will be translated into the 2018 midterm elections. “What we’re seeing is that a lot of young people are really angry,” Landis said. “The seas are really choppy out there, and we are not just seeing blue waves. We’re seeing a lot of youth waves as well.” “We think that is attributable to many young people’s distaste for Trump and his administration,” he added. President Trump’s rating remained stable at 25 percent approval and 72 percent disapproval from last year’s fall semester poll. Landis said student involvement in the poll is an important aspect of the process. “It’s a collaboration between political professionals and undergraduate students,” Landis said. “We, as students, are uniquely able to ask the
questions that are important to other people like us.” Landis said the questions chosen by students “anticipated” many of the events now in the news, including privacy concerns on social media. The New York Times reported last month that Cambridge Analytica obtained the private information of more than 50 million Facebook users. Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified in front of Congress Tuesday to answer questions about this data privacy and security. According to the survey, which was released before news of Cambridge Analytica broke, roughly 25 percent of young people said they “never” trust Uber, Twitter, or Facebook. Only about 15 percent of young Americans said they “never” trust Amazon or Google. In a list of institutions polled, college and university administrators sit firmly at the top of the approval ratings, with 61 percent of young Americans saying they trust them “all” or “most of the time.”
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RALLY FROM PAGE 1 developing a climate survey is often a barrier for implementation. She said the state would provide the new survey to Massachusetts colleges and universities free of charge. “A lot of the bigger private schools are able to do these sorts of surveys and have the resources to do it, where more community colleges or smaller schools just don’t have the resources,” she said. H.632, and its sister bill in the Massachusetts Senate, S.706, would strengthen Obama-era sexual assault reporting and response requirements, mandating annual awareness and prevention training, the publication of policies and resources for sexual violence data online, and equal rights, notices, and representation for both the reporting and responding parties. “When it comes to sexual assault, we want to ensure, to mandate, that there will be training for all students, staff, and faculty, around sexual assault—that everyone will be aware of their rights and what the procedures are,” said Rep. Tricia Farley-Bouvier, the lead sponsor of the bill. “There are rights for the victims, and for the responders. Everybody’s rights need to be protected.” “The person who inspired me to really look at this issue was my daughter, who started to look at colleges, and it got really scary,” she added. “You all chose your schools. You all could figure out, pretty easily, which schools have the best English professors, which schools have the best dining halls… Shouldn’t you know which schools are the safest?” Eight Harvard student groups endorsed the rally, including the Harvard College Democrats, the Harvard Republican Club, and anti-sexual assault advocacy group Our Harvard Can Do Better. The Every Voice Coalition,
co-founded by John B. Gabrieli ’16, was the primary organizer of the rally. The group is comprised of students, victims of sexual assault, and experts advocating a campus climate survey as the first step towards improved campus safety. Gabrieli said he was particularly moved by witnessing survivors and advocates “reclaim the narrative.” “I mean today was incredible because students actually got to sit face to face with legislators,” he said. “There were meetings where survivors were telling a legislator to their face, ‘This is my story. This is why this matters to me. This is why we have to act.’” Representatives from both the Harvard College Democrats and the Harvard Republican Club said the bills are urgently needed on college campuses. “Sexual assault and harassment has become an epidemic on higher education campuses, and not doing something is unacceptable at this point,” said Kiera E. O’Brien ’20, president of the Harvard Republican Club. Isabel A. Giovannetti ’21, communications director of the Harvard College Democrats, said that by working together, the Democrats and Republicans are sending a message that the bills should be non-partisan. “This issue is not a partisan issue in any way. And I think emphasizing that by showing that both the College Democrats and the College Republicans are in support of these bills is really powerful,” Giovannetti said. “There’s no left or right side to preventing sexual violence.” In the fight against sexual violence on college campuses, Rep. Farley-Bouvier said students can play an important role. “It cannot be overstated how important student voices are in this conversation. The more students that are speaking out, the better it is for the passage of this bill,” she said.
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SPORTS
THE HARVARD CRIMSON | APRIL 11, 2018 | PAGE 6
Harvard Men’s Hockey’s Season in Review
The 2017-2018 edition of the men’s hockey squad finished with a record of 15-14-4 and 11-8-3 in conference play. The Crimson was ranked highly in national preseason polls but fell out of the USCHO’s top 20 rankings mid-season. TIMOTHY R. O’MEARA—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER MEN’S HOCKEY By STUTI R. TELIDEVARA CRIMSON STAFF WRITER
With the NCAA men’s hockey tournament finally concluded, Harvard will jump from its brief offseason into spring training. Before looking ahead to 20182019, though, the team must reflect on a season full of ups and downs, perhaps best exemplified in the ECAC semifinal overtime loss to then-No. 10/8 Clarkson that put the Crimson out of business. “It was just a chess match,” said tri-captain forward Jake Horton, thinking back to the mid-March showdown. “[But] as a hockey player, you want to be in those kinds of games that are intense with a lot of good players in it.” After jumping out to a 4-1 lead mere seconds into the third period, the Crimson was staring at the chance to earn a second straight Whitelaw Cup, given to the postseason conference champion. In the earlier semifinal, Princeton—a team that Harvard swept this season— had bested then-No. 2 Cornell. With a streaking yet beatable Tigers squad waiting ahead rather than the Big Red, which shut down the Crimson in both of the teams’ meetings this year, Harvard liked its chances to play its way into the NCAA Tournament. The team, of course, never had that opportunity. Instead, the Golden Knights escaped the jaws of defeat, scoring three unanswered goals to tie the game and then another to steal it in the extra frame. And so it was all season. While the Crimson witnessed spurts of offensive brilliance and a banner year from junior forward Ryan Donato, the group seemed unable to find its groove for sustained periods of play, and uncertainty in net didn’t help either. “The season was basically characterized by learning curves,” Horton said. “It gave a lot of guys...that didn’t necessarily get those experiences over the past few years...the experience that they’re going to need to be great [next] season.”
A FRESH START Short of winning a national championship, Harvard managed to accomplish almost everything a Boston-area hockey program could hope for in the 2016-2017 season—a Beanpot title, an Ivy League crown, ECAC regular season and playoff championships, and the school’s first Frozen Four appearance since 1994. After the historic season finally ended at the hands of tournament runner-up Minnesota-Duluth, the Crimson graduated the highest-scoring senior class in the country and began 2017-2018 with the aim of fulfilling its own high expectations. “Coming off the season that we did... the expectation is that you just kind of want to repeat that,” said tri-captain goaltender Merrick Madsen. “[20172018] was a reminder that what we did that year was not an easy thing to do, and it takes a lot of hard work.” The spring prior, Harvard had chosen three captains for the first time in program history to guide the squad back to the Frozen Four. Madsen, Horton, and fourth-year forward Eddie Ellis would wear letters for the team. “To be elected as a captain...means you have the respect of your teammates and your friends,” Ellis said. “To be elected captain after such a successful season by such an accomplished team even means all the more, for them to be able to trust me and [Horton] and [Madsen] to carry on that torch and that culture, and uphold that expectation. That was, personally, very humbling.” A promising freshman class joined
the Crimson, including two NHL draft picks in forward Jack Badini and defenseman Reilly Walsh. The new team tested the waters on Oct. 21 in an exhibition game against the United States National Team Development Program’s U-18 squad. While the 7-2 Harvard victory meant nothing for the season in terms of points, some aspects of the game foreshadowed the season to come, such as Donato’s hat trick—completed less than five minutes into the second period—and offensive contributions from Walsh. The yearly turnover was also happening behind the scenes, as younger players took on greater leadership roles. “I learned a lot of things, freshman year, from those older guys,” said sophomore defenseman Adam Fox, who led all NCAA blue-liners in scoring in 20162017. “Coming in your second year, you kind of want to take on a bigger role…. I wanted to step up, and that was a focus coming in, trying to more of a leader.” A week later, the Crimson began its season in an unusual Sunday tilt against Ivy opponent Dartmouth and put on a clinic for a 5-0 win. This was Harvard at its best: a perfect save percentage from Madsen, execution on the power play, and a high-octane mentality even after taking the lead. Freshman forward Henry Bowlby broke the ice, snagging his first collegiate goal before the halfway mark of the opening period. The Crimson carried the spark of its auspicious opener into the following weekend, when it played host to rivals Yale and Brown. There, the team hit an unexpected stumbling block and fell, 5-2, to the Bulldogs for the first time in over a year, breaking a long stretch of undefeated play at the Bright-Landry Hockey Center. When the tied contest grew heated, Harvard—normally one to play fast rather than physical—took one too many penalties, and Yale made the squad pay. Such stumbles would frustrate the Crimson throughout the early portion of the season. As head coach Ted Donato ’91 put it in November and again after other tough losses, the team “beat [itself] to a certain extent.” “Early on in the season, we found some ways to not end up with the result we wanted,” said coach Donato, reflecting on the season. A shutout win against the Bears offered some consolation, with the offensive-minded Walsh notching his first two goals and cementing his slot beside Fox on the top power play unit. But with Brown dispatched, Harvard was set to face the most daunting stretch of its season: a program-record nine-game road stint that would keep the team away from home until 2018. THE LONG ROAD November and December would present Harvard with some of its most challenging opponents—as well as its most hostile venues—of the campaign. The fishy jeers of Cornell’s packed Lynah Rink, not to mention the team’s largest crowds of the season at Minnesota’s 3M Arena at Mariucci, made the road gauntlet that much more taxing. Harvard was immediately put to the test against an underestimated Colgate squad. A tight contest ended in a 2-1 loss, chiefly at the hands of Raiders sophomore net-minder Colton Point who would once again punish the Crimson in late-January. The very next night, the visitors suffered a heartbreaker against the Big Red, then ranked No. 14/12. A tense tie game was broken just 2.3 seconds before the final horn by Cornell senior defenseman Alec McCrea, sending Lynah into seventh heaven and handing the
hosts a 3-2 win. Meanwhile, Harvard left frustrated and without a point on the weekend. “[We played] at Minnesota twice, at Cornell, at BC, with a relatively young group,” Horton recalled. “And you’ve got to think that a lot of guys that were in our lineup this year, even though they weren’t freshmen academically, were pretty close to freshmen...in terms of their experience and their role in previous years.” During Harvard-Yale weekend, the Crimson jetted to St. Paul, Minn., for a rare two-game matchup against the No. 6/7 Golden Gophers. The Crimson hoped to put a dent in its all-time winless road record against Minnesota, but as was frustratingly characteristic on this roadie, the squad still fell short, first by a score of 4-2 and then 2-1 in overtime. All the while, the team saw its place in the rankings slip until Harvard dropped out of the USCHO’s top 20 for the first time in 78 weeks. After the Crimson lost four straight games for the first time since Feb. 7, 2015, its record stood well below .500 by the time it faced then-No. 13/14 Boston College. The Eagles had begun their season with a dismal 1-5-1 record in October, playing against only ranked teams, before completely reversing their fortunes and winning seven straight contests in November. The head-to-head resulted in a raucous 4-4 tilt that entertained audiences as much as it must have dismayed both coaching staffs. For Harvard, the battle at Conte Forum closed out a November best left forgotten: the squad was outscored 1520, and tri-captain goaltender Merrick Madsen, thought to be the runaway choice for starter after his stellar 20162017 campaign, was the owner of a disappointing .897 save percentage. Perhaps the only bright spot in the winless month was a career-best eight-game point streak for Donato (4–6—10), who led the team in scoring. BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE THE CRIMSON Harvard opened its December play with an impossible-to-miss difference. When the squad traveled to Quinnipiac and Princeton, the coaching staff chose to swap Madsen for junior backstop Michael Lackey, breaking the fourthyear’s 55-game start streak and giving rise to a goalie contest that would persist through the end of the season. The change energized the squad as much as it gave Madsen a chance to rest and reset. For the first time all year, the Crimson cruised to back-to-back triumphs as it defeated the Bobcats, 6-2, and then prevailed over the Tigers, 5-2. “The two-game sweep right before our break...set the tone for what we could become as a team in the second half [of the season],” coach Donato said. Though the team still owned a sub.500 record, it looked like the Harvard group that most people, including and especially the players in the locker room, expected ahead of the campaign. Donato tallied his second career hat trick against Quinnipiac, and Walsh’s scoring burst seemed to arrive at the perfect time, as the Crimson would be missing the dynamic talents of Fox for the last weekend of December. The sophomore sported the red, white, and blue at the World Junior Championships for the second year in a row, this time donning the “A” as well for the bronze-medal team. Fox or no Fox, Harvard split its Catamount Cup contests against UMass Lowell and UVM. The first matchup resulted in a 5-2 loss, while the latter was a 4-1 victory on the back of yet another Donato hat trick. The junior’s whopping eight tallies in four Decem-
ber bouts earned him national Player of the Month awards and extended his scoring streak to 12 games. More importantly, perhaps, it also helped propel the Crimson to .500 in conference play. “We started to figure it out, find an identity, close to Christmas,” Horton said. “We go home for break, come back with a hiccup in the [Catamount Cup], and then we begin to start slowly building up.” “Building up” is exactly what happened. January marked a welcome return to the friendly ice of BrightLandry, and Harvard played host to Union and RPI. Madsen turned over a new leaf against the Engineers, stymying the visitors for his 10th career shutout, 50th win, and a 3-0 victory. Bowlby played spoiler against the Dutchmen in a 4-3 overtime win, scoring the tying goal as well as the sudden-death winner. The two wins weren’t the only happy news for Crimson fans as they rung in 2018. On New Year’s Day, Donato, in addition to former captain and defender Noah Welch ’05, was named to the Team USA Olympic roster. For Harvard, however, Donato’s February departure would mean the loss of its top point-getter and goal scorer. For the next few weeks the Crimson would have to prepare for the void left by his absence. Harvard completed its sweep of Princeton and tied both RPI and Quinnipiac before heading up to the “North Country.” Between ECAC bottom-dweller St. Lawrence and thenNo. 2 Clarkson, the latter was the obvious competition, but both contests were close. The Golden Knights wreaked havoc in a 6-6 contest which featured an avalanche of goals that all net-minders involved probably would have liked back. The following evening, a three-point night from Zerter-Gossage and an OT winner from rookie Badini vaulted the Crimson past the Saints, 4-3, giving the team three of four points on the weekend. The squad’s dramatic turnaround had yielded a respectable 8-3-3 conference record. But ahead lay a home double-gamer against Colgate and Cornell, teams that had frustrated Harvard back in November. Two formidable foes awaited in net: Point for the Raiders, and Big Red freshman Matthew Galajda, critical pieces in shutting down the Crimson earlier in the season. Unfortunately for Harvard, revenge was not in the cards. Despite outshooting opponents by an incredible 86-49 margin, the Crimson was held entirely off the scoreboard that weekend, falling 3-0 to Cornell and 2-0 to Colgate. A 4-1 win at Dartmouth the next weekend, though it provided some redemption for Madsen in net, did little to dispel the frustration of a season sweep at the hands of both upstate New York teams. Suddenly, the goaltending question seemed all the more urgent, and Donato’s trip to South Korea was looming. There was no time to sit and ponder these concerns, however. It was February, and that means Beanpot season. HOME STRETCH In a rematch of last year’s Beanpot final that handed Harvard its first title in 24 years, the team headed to TD Garden to face Boston University. In some respects, the local hockey classic means as much to coaches and teams as a Frozen Four appearance does, and the Crimson’s desire to repeat as champions clashed with the Terriers’ desire to avenge 2017’s 6-3 defeat. The teams were an even match for most of the contest—and it was certainly a long contest, with the confident net-minders keeping play going into a second overtime frame. Harvard, however, hadn’t scored on 15 straight man-advantage opportunities, and failure to cash in on those chances inevitably led to heartbreak. An seemingly innocuous shot beat an otherwise solid Madsen, and the door shut on the Crimson’s Beanpot defense. Offensive worries compounded when Donato departed and Harvard fell, 3-1, to Union between Beanpot matchups. The early part of the Beanpot consolation game against Boston College seemed just as lackluster, despite sophomore backstop Cam Gornet making a surprise start—his first. But then, the action ramped up. A 1-1 tie became a 4-2 Crimson lead, only to be snuffed out by Eagles rookie forward Logan Hutsko, who completed his hat trick in less than 12 minutes to bring the score to 4-4. Senior forward Seb Lloyd, played the hero for Harvard, scoring early in the extra frame to secure third place in the tournament. “Personally, it turned out to be my last collegiate goal,” said Lloyd, looking back on the memory fondly. “It was a nice way to end my Beanpot career, but also [it was] a big win for the team in overtime. That’s something I’ll remember for a long time.” The Crimson returned to the Bright for its final home games of the regular season, facing St. Lawrence and Clarkson in its Senior Weekend showdowns. Adam Fox hadn’t scored a single goal so far in the 2017-2018 season. But when
it rains, it pours, so Fox notched his first career hat trick against the Saints, the first trio of tallies by a Crimson defenseman since 2011. Lackey was particularly sharp in net, keeping out every St. Lawrence attempt en route to a 5-0 Harvard win. The momentum stayed with the hosts against the then-No. 7 Golden Knights. The power play fired on all cylinders and Madsen redeemed his January performance in a 5-2 Senior Night victory, the team’s most complete game of the season. “[Donato] is obviously an unbelievable part of our team,” Zerter-Gossage said. “[But] when he wasn’t there and everybody stood up and had a good stretch, it was good to see what everybody could bring to the table when they had the opportunity. I thought that was special.” With a conference playoff bye in hand, the Crimson prepared to close the season out at Brown and Yale, adding Olympian Donato to an already surging team. But the Bears stunned a disjointed Crimson squad, 6-4, and a raucous night at the Whale witnessed the Bulldogs complete their sweep of Harvard after a goalie duel ended 2-1 in the Elis’ favor. The Crimson would have to settle for fourth seed in the ECAC after winning the Cleary Cup the year before. NOTHING PLACID ABOUT IT Having trained through the bye week, Harvard opened its Whitelaw Cup defense against familiar Ivy foe, fifth-seeded Dartmouth. After Dartmouth’s decisive 4-1 win in Game one, the Crimson had more than just honor on the line—a Game 2 loss would mean the end of the 2017-2018 season. The squad stepped up to the plate in game two, however, scoring four times in the second frame for a 7-1 drubbing of Dartmouth. The message was clear: coach Donato’s group was far from finished. In game three, a hat trick from none other than Donato and a two-point night from Fox powered the Crimson to the ECAC semifinals for the fourth consecutive year, meaning not a single athlete on the Harvard roster had ever missed the tournament in Lake Placid. Yet, with the NCAA Tournament in sight, the Crimson stumbled at the hands of Clarkson, and just like that, the 2017-2018 season with all its highs and lows was over. “It’s definitely the end of the season regardless of how it ends,” said Horton, when asked about the toughest part of that ECAC semifinal contest. “But when you a blow a lead...with those stakes, I remember sitting at the hotel after the game...just staring blankly and just saying, ‘how?’ That’s all I could keep saying to myself. Just, ‘how?’” WHAT NEXT? Harvard has now said goodbye to one of its winningest senior classes and closed the book on a fairytale Donato season and career. “It didn’t [end up] being exactly what we wanted,” Horton said. “But for me, looking back on it all, it was a lot of success for our class over the four years. We’d have liked to make another run at it in the tournament, but going to Lake Placid four years in a row isn’t shabby either.” In many ways, though, the team’s offseason retooling will be akin to 2017’s. Once again, the Crimson will have to replace its top-line center— perhaps sophomore winger Ty PeltonByce will find himself taking opening faceoffs, as he manned the middle of the ice quite ably during Donato’s Olympic sabbatical. Sophomore John Marino seems poised to take over fourth-year Wiley Sherman’s role as primary shutdown defenseman, but if Harvard wants to replicate Sherman’s formidable 6’7” presence, it will need to look further. The team’s offensive-minded defenders, at least, are locked into place. Walsh and Fox will continue to have significant roles and anchor the top power play unit—Fox confirmed in March that he would not be joining the NHL’s Calgary Flames next year and would continue with the Crimson instead. Madsen’s record-breaking career leaves a vacancy in net, too. Presumably, Lackey will find himself in that position, with Gornet backing him up. If Harvard’s faithful have learned anything this season, however, it’s that coach Donato is unafraid to reward merit between the pipes, even if it means benching his number-one backstop. Come October, the curtain will rise on a new season, and even though the class of 2018 will no longer be suiting up at the Bright, its members will be cheering from afar. “I said this last year, and I still stand by it,” Horton said without hesitation. “Harvard will win a national championship before [the class of 2020] graduates.” Staff writer Stuti R. Telidevara can be reached at stuti.telidevara@thecrimson.com. Men’s Hockey co-beat writer Spencer R. Morris contributed reporting for this story. He can be reached at spencer.morris@thecrimson.com.