The Harvard Crimson - Volume CXLV, No. 36

THE UNIVERSITY DAILY, EST. 1873 | VOLUME CXLV, NO. 36 | CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS | FRIDAY, MARCH 9, 2018

The Harvard Crimson HCFA’s ‘probation’ does not appear to constitute a real punishment.

Men’s basketball to play Cornell in Ivy tournament opener.

EDITORIAL PAGE 8

SPORTS PAGE 9

Discussions Follow Dominguez Scandal Faust Says Admin Unaware of Alleged Harassment

Students Propose Next Steps After Gov. Prof. Scandal

By JAMIE D. HALPER

By SHERA S. AVI-YONAH

CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

University President Drew G. Faust “did not know” about the decades of sexual harassment allegedly perpetrated by Government Professor Jorge I. Dominguez after he was punished for sexual misconduct in the 1980s, she said in an interview Monday.

“As far as I was aware, as far as the rest of I think the administrative staff of Harvard, the leadership was aware, that was over,” Faust said.

Dominguez announced his ­

Students Campaign for HCFA Penalties

SEE PAGE 6

By CAROLINE S. ENGELMAYER and MICHAEL E. XIE CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Graduate and undergraduate students sent two open letters to Harvard administrators Wednesday outlining a vision for how the University should move forward in its efforts to combat sexual harassment after Government Professor Jorge I. Dominguez leaves Harvard this summer.

Dominguez announced Tuesday he will retire at the end of the semester after at least 18 women accused him of sexual harassment over ­

SEE FAUST PAGE 3

Some College students are organizing an email campaign to urge the Office of Student Life to more harshly punish Harvard College Faith and Action after the OSL placed the religious group on “administrative probation” late last month.

In a message circulated over various House and club lists the past few days, campaign organizers asked students to write to administrators—including Dean of the College Rakesh Khurana and OSL Dean Katherine G. O’Dair—requesting they impose ­

RAKESH ON HOUSING DAY

SEE LETTERS PAGE 3

Dean of the College Rakesh Khurana is held up by two students during early-morning Housing Day festivities. CALEB D. SCHWARTZ—

SEE HCFA PAGE 4

CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Higher Ed Act Concerns Faust

Faust Condemns Social Orgs.

Legislation

By KRISTINE E. GUILLAUME

By KRISTINE E. GUILLAUME

CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

University President Drew G. Faust traveled to the nation’s capital last week to meet with Democratic lawmakers about the “deep concerns” she has about reauthorization of the Higher Education Act now making its way through Congress.

The Higher Education Act, originally passed in 1965, authorizes the federal student financial aid program and includes provisions that fund and structure programs like Pell Grants, the Federal Work-Study Program, and loan repayment plans for undergraduate, graduate, and professional students.

Republican House lawmaker’s proposed overhaul, called the PROSPER Act, would restructure loan repayment plans and eliminate Federal WorkStudy and public service loan forgiveness for graduate and professional students, among other changes. The ­

University President Drew G. Faust condemned possible Congressional interference in Harvard’s policy on single-gender social organizations in an interview Thursday, calling it “not the business of the United States Congress.”

Her remarks referred to a suggested amendment to the Higher Education Act, a 1965 piece of legislation that is up for reauthorization. The law principally deals with programs related to financial aid and higher education affordability, but a group of Republican lawmakers are trying to tack on an provision that would legislate universities’ ability to regulate student social life.

In Dec. 2017, The Crimson reported Representative Elise Stefanik ’06 was pushing an amendment to the reauthorization that seeks to forbid universities that have “a policy allowing for the official recognition of single-sex ­

SNOWY SCENE IN CAMBRIDGE

SEE WASHINGTON PAGE 3

A powerful storm hit the northeast on Wednesday, blanketing Cambridge in snow. CASEY M. ALLEN— CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

SEE LOBBY PAGE 4

After Nor’easter, Harvard Sailing Center Sinking into Charles River

By MADELEINE R. NAKADA CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

In the wake of a powerful Nor’easter, the Harvard Sailing Center sat aslant as it began sinking, with the entire barge and parts of the building submerged in the Charles by 11:30 a.m Thursday morning, the Boston Globe reported.

The Cambridge Fire Department and Mass. State Police responded to the scene alongside the Harvard University Police Department and Harvard Facilities Management Group, according to a press release from Harvard Athletics Director Robert L. Scalise.

By mid-afternoon the scene appeared to be under control. A Cambridge fire truck arrived on scene at 4:30 in the afternoon. After briefly talking to Harvard employees, the fire truck left and a state police officer took down the police tape that had previously blocked off the sidewalk in front of the Sailing Center.

In the press release, Scalise wrote the sinking appeared to be caused by issues in the barge underneath the structure.

“The Harvard Sailing Center, located on the Cambridge side of the Charles River near the Longfellow Bridge, has been significantly compromised due to what currently appears to be a failure of the building’s floatation device,” Scalise wrote. ­

INSIDE THIS ISSUE

Harvard Today 2

Two Harvard employees and a member of the Cambridge Fire Department at the boathouse declined to comment for this story.

The Varsity sailing team sails out of the Center during the school year.

Over the summer, the Sailing Center is home to the Crimson Sailing Academy.

Varsity sailing captains Nicholas Karnovsky ’19 and Jessica R. Williams ’20, wrote in a statement that at 5 p.m. their coaches were given access to the boathouse to “salvage whatever gear was not in lockers.”

Both captains said while they have been in touch with their coaches over the course of the day, there are no definite plans for what they will do if they are unable to use the Sailing Center.

“We have discussed a few options with our coaches but there are no set plans or details,” the captains wrote.

“This will certainly present challenges as we approach the heart of our season. We are fortunate to share the river with the MIT Sailing Team, which has graciously offered to moor our docks and boats while a more-permanent solution is arranged.”

While the boathouse has had no reported structural issues in the past, Karnovsky and Williams would not immediately comment when asked if the boathouse has had similar issues in the past. In 1995 a helicopter crashed into the roof of the Harvard Sailing Center, then the Harvard Yacht Club, killing all four passengers.

News 3

Editorial 8

The Harvard Sailing Center sinks into the Charles River on Thursday afternoon. ELLIS J. YEO—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Sports 9

TODAY’S FORECAST

SUNNY High: 40 Low: 29

VISIT THECRIMSON.COM. FOLLOW @THECRIMSON ON TWITTER.

Slow Sink

HARVARD TODAY

FOR LUNCH

FOR DINNER

Basil Chicken Pizza

Grilled 1/4 Pounder with Apple Bacon and Cheddar Cheese

Grilled Chickpea Cakes with Pineapple Salsa

FRIDAY | MARCH 9, 2018

English Style Battered Red’s Best Fresh Local Fish

5 Cheese Tortellini with Spinach & Mushroom

AROUND THE IVIES Former Yale Student Found Not Guilty of Rape After Two-Year Arrest Saifullah Khan, a former Yale student accused of multiple sexual assault charges in 2015, was found not guilty by a six-person jury two years after he was arrested. The long-awaited Khan case is one of few campus sexual assault cases to reach criminal court. According to the Yale Daily News, Khan could potentially be re-admitted into the college as a full-time student after being suspended from school his senior year.

Six Dartmouth Faculty Members Receive Inaugural Grant

HIPPIE SABOTAGE Hippie Sabotage performs at the House of Blues in Boston last Friday night.

CASEY M. ALLEN—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

HAPPY FRIDAY, HARVARD! We hope you enjoyed Housing Day yesterday, and we wish you a restful and enjoyable break.

In the Atmosphere…

If you were not a fan of yesterday’s snow, worry not: it’ll be drier and slightly warmer today, with a high of 41 degrees.

EVENTS Harvard Men’s Hockey ECAC Playoffs vs. Dartmouth Head to the Bright-Landry Hockey Center across the river to watch the Crimson take on the Big Green in Harvard’s first playoff game this season. If you don’t make it tonight, you can try tomorrow—the playoff round is a best of three series.

Six Arts and Humanities faculty at Dartmouth recently received the first New Directions in Humanities Scholarship and Arts Practice grants from the Office of the President at Dartmouth.

According to The Dartmouth, recipients include religion professor Zahra Ayubi, Spanish professor Antonio Gómez López-Quiñones, studio art professor Enrico Riley, film and media studies professor Jeffrey Ruoff, English professor Nirvana Tanoukhi and music professor Spencer Topel.

Princeton Cancelled Classes Due to Snowstorm

Free Film Fridays at the Museum of Science The Museum of Science is screening free movies all day at the Mugar Omni Theater. All you have to do is pick up tickets at the box office on the day of the show, but there’s limited seating so be sure to get there early. You can watch two films on the same day.

As weather worsened due to severe Nor’easter snowstorm, Princeton cancelled evening classes yesterday and closed all libraries at 6 p.m., according to The Daily Princetonian. Multiple eyewitnesses reported seeing trees uprooted in the yard. The university confirmed with students about safety measures via both email and social media. Governor of New Jersey Phil Murphy issued a state of emergency in response to the storm, the first in his governorship.

Brandon J. Dixon & Kyle E. O’Hara STAFF WRITERS

IN THE REAL WORLD Donald Trump + Kim Jong-Un = Nuclear Talks?!

Trump is scheduling a talk with the North Korean leader to negotiate regarding the country’s nuclear program. Since both are known for their fiery personalities and rhetoric, this will probably get weird.

Every Day is International Women’s Day For those of you looking for some spring break/post-International Women’s Day reading, consider this conversation about the role of “women’s writing” in the 21st century.

No matter your genre preferences, these talented female authors have created something you can enjoy.

Samsung Galaxy S9 In case you’re too hip to own an iPhone, here are some things to know about the new Samsung Galaxy. It can scan your face to make AR emojis and they’re lowkey terrifying. On the plus side, the camera is, as per usual, incredible. Maybe that’s why the animations they make of your face are so spooky?

DAY BREAKER BREAKDANCER WAITING AT THE DOT

A breakdancer dances while a photographer snaps his picture at a 90s-themed Daybreaker, an early morning dance party in Boston.

CALEB D. SCHWARTZ—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

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.

QUOTE OF THE DAY “Domestic local affairs of universities and how we manage student life seem to be appropriately the business of Harvard College and those in and around Harvard College, not the business of the United States Congress.”

Drew G. Faust, University President

CORRECTIONS The March 8 article “Prison Panel at Harvard” incorrectly indicated that Yale and Columbia offer degree-granting programs to prisoners. In fact, Yale does not offer such a program; and Columbia offers a program that gives prisoners credit they can use toward obtaining a degree at other “peer institutions.”

STAFF FOR THIS ISSUE Night Editor Alison W. Steinbach ’19

Story Editors Claire E. Parker ’19 Hannah Natanson ’19 Assistant Night Editors Sarah Wu ’19 Katherine E. Wang ’20 Kenton K. Shimozaki ’19 Jingyao Zhao ’21 Phelan Yu ’19 Joshua J. Florence ’19 Mia C. Karr ’19 Design Editors Katherine E. Wang ’20

Editorial Editor Wonik Son ’19 Photo Editors Caleb D. Schwartz ‘19 Casey M. Allen ‘20 Sports Editor Jack R. Stockless ’19

THE HARVARD CRIMSON | MARCH 9, 2018 | PAGE 3

Open Letters Call for Change LETTERS FROM PAGE 1 a 30-year period in articles published by the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Though administrators disciplined Dominguez for his behavior in 1983, he remained at Harvard and later rose through the ranks to assume leadership roles within the Government department and University. The Faculty of Arts and Sciences placed Dominguez on “administrative probation” Sunday.

The allegations of sexual harassment have drawn outrage from some graduate and undergraduate students, who wrote in the letters that the issues surrounding Dominguez signal a larger problem with gender discrimination and sexual harassment on campus.

The letter undergraduates sent to Government Department faculty asks department administrators to implement a series of new policies.

Specifically, the letter asks the Department to “denounce and sanction” Dominguez, rather than letting him retire at the end of the semester, and to issue an apology for its “dereliction of duty” in handling the case.

The authors of the letter also request that faculty and administrators solicit feedback from students about how best to reform the department’s culture. The letter also demands the department start mandating its members undergo annual sexual harassment “prevention and response training.”

“The Dominguez case has brought to light what many members of the Government Department have long known all too well: the Department and the University are complicit in perpetuating these issues,” the letter reads.

Since the undergraduate letter was made available online Wednesday morning, it has garnered over 230 signatures. Sarah S. Fellman ’18-’19, who helped write the letter, said around 60 Government concentrators signed the letter.

The undergraduates’ demands grew out of a series of meetings held by Government concentrators, Fellman said. After a meeting with Government Department Chair Jennifer L. Hoch-

schild on Friday, a group of students decided to hold a forum open to all undergraduates to solicit proposals for further action.

Fellman added that the letter’s main goal is to allow Harvard affiliates to move beyond Dominguez and to more broadly combat sexual harassment and gender-based discrimination at the University.

“I think that our number one goal is to make sure that this never happens again, that no other student in the future has to choose between their safety and their education and their career,” she said.

Government Department administrators announced a number of steps they are taking to address recent reports about Dominguez in an email Tuesday.

These steps include the formation of a standing committee that will seek to gain “a deeper understanding of the conditions” that led to the Dominguez “situation,” a step Fellman said undergraduates cautiously welcome.

“The Department has decided to form a standing committee, which we’re very excited about,” she said.

“But we want to see those groups of people have power on that committee and be compensated for their time, so that we don’t continue the problem of marginalized people volunteering their time that they could be used to work on their studies to make the Department tolerable.”

In addition to requesting that the committee include students and staff, the letter asserts the Department should work towards gender parity in its faculty.

“Women and non-binary students feel uncomfortable speaking up in class and feel a sense of imposter syndrome in the Government Department,” the letter reads.

“And with so few female professors to turn to, when we do experience situations of sexual or gender-based harassment and violence, we are less likely to trust a professor, let alone a senior member of the faculty, with that knowledge.”

Hochschild did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the undergraduate letter.

Over 800 graduate students and at least one professor also signed an open letter addressed to University President Drew G. Faust, Hochschild, and other administrators on Wednesday laying out a proposed path for the University’s response to sexual harassment.

“When students arrive at Harvard, they are told the University ‘is committed to maintaining a safe and healthy educational work environment.’ Over the past three decades, Harvard has failed to live up to this commitment,” that letter reads.

“The Chronicle has reported that at least three women informed human resources of misconduct by Jorge Dominguez. In these cases, as in others, Harvard has not kept its promise to protect those most at risk.”

Government Ph.D. student Shanna Weitz wrote in an email that the broad goals of the graduate letter to administrators were similar to those of the undergraduate letter.

“Having both letters communicated the necessary changes at both the Departmental and University levels so that something like this never happens again,” she wrote.

Graduate students also sent a letter to Government Department faculty Tuesday with a more specific set of policy proposals, some of which the Department addressed in its response later that day.

In response to the open letter from graduate students, Faust wrote that she is committed to making Harvard’s response to sexual harassment an administrative priority going forward.

“As I wrote in December, sexual harassment and sexual assault degrade human dignity, and they have no place at Harvard,” Faust wrote.

“A central commitment of my presidency has been to ensure that everyone here fully belongs, and I share the sense of hurt, disappointment, and upset that has been expressed so poignantly by students, faculty, and other members of the Harvard community.”

“At yesterday’s FAS meeting, I noted that I will be engaging the senior leadership of the University in the coming days to help address this serious and enduring problem,” she added.

Faust Discusses Higher Ed Act WASHINGTON FROM PAGE 1 legislation passed a House committee 23-17 in December but has yet to move to the full House or Senate for a vote.

In an interview Thursday, Faust said she met with Senate Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senator Michael F. Bennet, and Representative Rosa DeLauro to flag potential negative ramifications of the PROSPER Act for the affordability of higher education.

Faust said she and lawmakers discussed “some of our deep concerns about the impact that could have on student aid, so I believe we had a good effect there in alerting them to our concerns.”

Faust also penned a letter on Feb. 28 to Democratic Representative Katherine M. Clark, who represents Cambridge, listing the elimination of subsidized loans for undergraduates, changes to Federal Work-Study for graduate students, and the loss of public service loan forgiveness programs in the PROSPER Act as items of “especially serious concern.”

“A reinvestment in student aid must be a critical element to any new legislation,” Faust wrote. “Student access and affordability have been a priority for many institutions over the past decade, and Harvard is no exception.”

This is not the first time Faust has spoken out about the PROSPER Act. In her remarks at a faculty meeting last

month, Faust said many of the aforementioned provisions may be challenged in the Senate as its committee formulates its version of the bill.

During her trip to D.C. last week, Faust also discussed immigration reform as it pertains to Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals—an Obama-

A reinvestment in student aid must be a critical element to any new legislation.

Drew G. Faust

University President era program that allows undocumented youth to live and work legally in the United States.

“I asked Leader Pelosi and Senator Bennett in particular for their advice on how we should best support them in their commitment to DACA and if they had advice about what the best moves would be for us going forward,” Faust said.

Apart from DACA, Faust raised concerns about the Trump adminis-

tration’s terminations of Temporary Protected Status—a legal designation given to individuals from certain countries who have fled armed conflict or natural disasters—for individuals from Haiti, Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Sudan. She said Pelosi, Bennet, and DeLauro were “very helpful” in those discussions.

Faust penned a letter to House and Senate leadership last month emphasizing the contributions of Harvard employees protected under TPS. Faust sent the letter a day after 50 TPS-holding workers and their allies rallied outside Massachusetts Hall to deliver a petition calling on Faust to write to lawmakers on their behalf.

The terminations could have ramifications for dozens of University employees.

“Today, more than 400,000 TPS recipients live, work, and invest in the United States. As noted above, several dozen of these individuals work across multiple departments at Harvard and are highly valued and productive colleagues,” Faust wrote.

Faust has been an outspoken advocate for undocumented students and immigrants at Harvard and in higher education more broadly. She has recently signed letters, appeared on national television, and met with lawmakers on both sides of the aisle to voice her support for immigration reform.

GSAS Dean Meng to Step Down

By SHERA S. AVI-YONAH and MOLLY C. MCCAFFERTY CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Xiao-Li Meng will step down at the end of June and current interim Dean Emma Dench will take over the position July 1, Faculty of Arts and Sciences Dean Michael D. Smith announced Thursday.

Over the past year, Meng—a statistician by training—has been on sabbatical to pursue research on “foundational issues” in new data science fields, with Dench assuming his duties as interim dean.

Meng has held the GSAS deanship since 2012. During his five years in the position, he helped create the Harvard Horizons, a program which offers eight Ph.D. students the chance to receive mentorship from professionals and present their research at an annual symposium.

He also helped found the GSAS Center for Writing and Communicating Ideas, which provides graduate students discipline-specific support for academic papers, dissertations, and presentations. ­

Meng’s tenure saw the formation of the Harvard Data Science Initiative, a University-wide program launched last fall that aims to elevate Harvard to the forefront of the field.

After his resignation, Meng plans to take on a new leadership role in the Data Science Initiative, Smith wrote.

He will also serve as editor-in-chief of a new data science journal debuting next academic year and will assume the presidency of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, an international society of statisticians.

“I am grateful to Dean Meng for his willingness to lend his leadership and internationally recognized expertise to this important academic priority,” Smith wrote.

Dench, who has concurrent appointments with the History and Classics departments, previously worked as the graduate studies director for the Classics department before becoming interim dean.

“Dean Dench has demonstrated a deep and nuanced understanding of the needs of graduate students and a sincere commitment to supporting them in their academic journey,” Smith wrote. “She has won the respect of her

faculty colleagues for her thoughtful outreach and of GSAS staff for her steady guidance and her ability to forge creative and practical solutions to meet the needs of students.”

Dench’s transition comes at a critical time for GSAS and its students. On April 18 and 19, eligible graduate and undergraduate students will vote on whether to form a union, thus earning the right to collectively bargain with the University.

Like many other schools, GSAS is also grappling with the University’s subpar endowment returns and an uncertain political climate for international students.

Smith wrote that he asked Meng to partner with Dench to “build philanthropic support for graduate education” going forward.

“Our students and programs are fortunate to have two such able advocates for their important work,” Smith wrote.

Staff writer Shera S. Avi-Yonah can be reached at shera.avi-yonah@thecrimson.com.

Staff writer Molly C. McCafferty can be reached at molly.mccafferty@thecrimson.com.

Admins Unaware of Alleged Harassment FAUST FROM PAGE 1 resignation Monday, one day after the Faculty of Arts and Sciences placed him on “administrative leave” as they investigate an outpouring of accusations against the Latin American studies professor. Dominguez allegedly harassed at least 18 women since the 1980s, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education, which first reported the accusations.

I think there was certain institutional knowledge about it, but it wasn’t something that was systematically communicated.

Drew G. Faust

University President The FAS disciplined Dominguez in 1983 for harassing Terry Karl, who was then an associate professor in the Government Department. Faust said administrators knew about that case, which The Crimson covered at the time, but there was no formal process for informing University leadership about past disciplinary action against faculty.

“I think there was certain institutional knowledge about it, but it wasn’t something that was systematically communicated,” she said.

The FAS investigation of Dominguez is just beginning, and Faust said she doesn’t want to “prejudge” the outcome and the University’s response.

Depending on the investigation’s findings, however, Faust said administrators could invoke “third statute proceedings.”

The statute outlines the process by which the Harvard Corporation—the University’s highest governing body— can decide to revoke a professor’s tenure in the case of “grave misconduct or neglect of duty,” according to the University Provost’s website.

Faust said she has spoken to several Corporation members about the issue, but that she has not discussed revoking Dominguez’s tenure with anyone on the Corporation.

“The Corporation at the present time is not directly involved in the adjudication of this matter, but I certainly am talking to them and will continue talking to them about the larger issues that it raises about the nature of the culture here at Harvard, about how our procedures are working,” Faust said.

The University’s policies for dealing with cases of sexual or gender-based harassment have changed since the 1980s, when Dominguez first faced consequences for harassment. In recent years, Harvard has overhauled its Title IX policy and procedures and restructured its Title IX administrative offices.

Faust said she plans to consult the Corporation next time the body meets about how to address the Dominguez situation as well as broader climate challenges at the University that the case has raised.

“I think that the next time we speak as a group, I will seek the advice of the people on the Corporation who’ve run Princeton or run a business or run a law office and get a sense of how their wisdom might be applied to the challenges that have been evident through the experience of the past week,” she said.

Mass Hall Renovations to Keep History In Mind

By YASMIN LUTHRA CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

The Harvard Planning Office is working with the Cambridge Historical Commission on plans to renovate Massachusetts Hall—the University’s oldest building—this summer while still maintaining its historical integrity.

Built in 1720, Mass. Hall has played many roles in both the history of the University and the nation. The building accommodated hundreds of American soldiers during the Revolutionary War, and as a dormitory housed historical figures like John Adams and John Hancock.

The Harvard Planning Office submitted an application for a certificate of appropriateness to the Cambridge Historical Commission on Nov. 14.

The Commission granted approval on Jan. 18 with the condition that “masonry and construction details be reviewed with and approved by CHC staff.”

The application laid out plans to restore the building’s Georgian exterior, including refurbishing the masonry, roofing, gutters, and the clock face on the west facade. It also proposed an installation of a new central HVAC system as well as “significant code and life safety upgrades.”

Swathi R. Srinivasan ‘21, a current resident of Mass. Hall, said these renovations are much needed. ­

“One of the screws on one of the locks got messed up and I was locked into my room and I had to miss part of my class because I couldn’t get out,” she said. “They slipped me a crowbar underneath and I had to pry myself out.”

The University plans to proceed with pre-construction steps to prepare for the project, which will begin in the summer.

According to Yard Operations’s email sent to Mass Hall residents, the clock will be removed for off-site restoration work and some exterior brick work will be done from March 10-16.

Originally a dormitory, Mass. Hall was reconfigured for use as a lecture hall in 1870 and was used as such until it was converted back to a dormitory in 1924.

In 1939 it was renovated significantly to house administrative offices, including the University President’s office, with the top floor set aside for student housing.

Due to the building’s storied history and its location in Harvard Yard, any alterations to Mass. Hall fall under the purview of the Cambridge Historical Commission. The Commission, an unelected body of residents appointed by the City Council, must approve all changes to historic buildings in the city.

Staff writer Yasmin Luthra can be reached at yasmin.luthra@thecrimson.com.

The latest on student life.

The Crimson @crimsonflyby

PAGE 4 | MARCH 9, 2018 | THE HARVARD CRIMSON

Cheers, Tears on Housing Day Students Campaign for HCFA Penalties

By KATHERINE E. WANG CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

A s colorful House f lags and banners were raised in front of University Hall Thursday morning and various chants echoed across the Yard freshmen anxiously waited in their dorm rooms on the annual tradition of Housing Day. Cheers of joy—and palpable silences—soon followed, as members of Harvard’s Class of 2021 discovered which of the 12 residential houses they would live in for the next three years.

To prepare for the festivities, upperclassmen started their days around 6 a.m., with some Houses coming even earlier to the Yard to claim the highly-coveted perch atop the John Harvard statue.

Kirkland House reached the statue first this year, according to current House Committee Co-Chair Anne K. Mills ’19.

“Kirkland always gets here super early and sings and dances on the statue,” Mills said. “I’m not going to give times because we don’t want other Houses to steal our stuff.”

At 8:30 a.m., House Committee chairs rushed out of University Hall waving envelopes containing Housing assignments, ready to storm dorm rooms and welcome rising sophomores into their respective Houses.

Mills and former HoCo Co-Chair Handong Park ’18 both said that freshmen were generally glad to be assigned to Kirkland House, with one student particularly excited.

“She didn’t stop jumping until we left,” Mills said. “Frantically jumping,” Park added. “It was wild.” ­

Cabot dorm stormer Brian Y. Zhao ’19 said that the rising sophomores’ responses to their Cabot House placements were “better this year.”

When asked about his own Housing Day experience, he said, “I wasn’t exactly sure how I felt in the moment, but I’m really happy that I am in Cabot now.”

I don’t think they had ever seen a group more excited to be in Mather.

Gomez, Couto, Jimenez ’21

Blockmates in Mather Blockmates Silvana Gomez ’21, Lucia M. Couto ’21, and Carolina Jimenez ’21 said they were “so excited” about their placement into Mather House.

“We just started screaming,” they said in unison. “I don’t think they had ever seen a group more excited to be in Mather.”

“The Latinx community is really big there, and it’s also just like—singles,” Gomez added.

Future Quincy residents Ryan R. Bayer ’21, Richard M. Sweeney ’21, William J. Matheson ’21, Benjamin L. Owens ’21 said the storming upperclassmen shouted different House names as they approached the freshmen’s room.

“When they were coming up the

stairs, they were yelling Mather, then they switched to Cabot, and then we were really confused,” Owens said.

“It was exciting to open the door and have it be Quincy,” Sweeney added.

Although many students were excited about their House assignments, others were not as thrilled.

Blockmates Lydia Pan ’21, Peter J. Morrissey ’21, Alexandra S. Norris ’21, Natea E. Beshada ’21, Crimson editor Elizabeth H. Yang ’21, and Jacob A. Licht ’21 were placed into the Radcliffe Quadrangle’s Cabot House, with some members saying they were “actually really excited” about the placement, while others had mixed feelings.

“I think Cabot is certifiably best housing, nicest House, number one House, I can’t wait honestly,” Licht said .

Morrissey said the rest of the group’s first choice was Lowell House, but that they remain “optimistic.”

Leul S. Dadi ’21, who was placed into Pforzheimer House, also in the Quad, said his day had been “a mix of feelings” as well.

“I wasn’t expecting to get quadded,” Dadi said. “When Pfoho came into my room, I assumed they were joking. It’s alright though, I’m trying to make do.”

Dadi said he did a lot of “metric manipulations” in an attempt to not get quadded by “looking at the stats” and trends.

“It didn’t work,” he added with a laugh.

Staff writer Katherine E. Wang can be reached at katie.wang@thecrimson.com.

HSPH Alum Bids for Congress

By SIMONE C. CHU and LUKE W. VROTSOS CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

E ric L. Ding, an alumni of the School of Public Health, has announced his bid for the U.S. House of Representatives to represent Pennsylvania’s 10th congressional district.

Ding, who holds a doctorate in the fields of nutrition and epidemiology from the School of Public Health, is running as a Democrat to represent a district that includes central and northwestern regions of the state.

Ding said he will advocate for affordable health care and bring evidence-based policy back to Washington.

When he was in high school, Ding was diagnosed with a tumor the size of a tennis ball in his chest. Though doctors predicted the tumor would be fatal, Ding survived. Ding said the experience left him with a desire to give back to the world, as well as a passion for public health.

“Affordable healthcare for all is not only the right thing to do—as a public [health] scientist, I know it is cheaper and saves more lives,” Ding wrote in an email.

“Workers should not have to worry about how they are going to afford healthcare if they are laid-off, seniors should not choose between food on the table and seeing the doc­

tor, and a family should not go bankrupt because their child has cancer.”

Vasanti Malik, a nutrition research scientist at the School of Public Health who was in the same doctoral program as Ding, wrote in an email that Ding attracted attention during his time as a graduate student at Harvard for his dedication to public health research.

“As a doctoral student, he was always extremely passionate about all things public health,” Malik wrote.

“He used to pull many all-nighters, not just working on class assignments, but also personal projects like uncovering controversies about the safety of Vioxx (a drug used for pain management).”

Malik added that he did all this “while at the same time helping friends with assignments and serving as a TA for various classes.”

Ding said he loved conducting public health research, but he also wanted to apply his knowledge of science to “offer unique solutions” and insights that other policymakers might not be able to.

“Life is about what you do for the world, not the number of letters behind your name,” he said.

Ding said this inspired him to create Campaign for Cancer Prevention, a web platform that raised $400,000 for cancer research and was profiled in the New York Times.

He also created the online database Toxin Alert to aggregate water-testing data in response to the water crisis in Flint, Mich.

“Science from within academia can only do so much to inf luence policy,” Ding said. “We have to cross over if we want to see the change we believe in. And for that, you need a scientist to run for office and become a lawmaker.”

Ding faces four other candidates in the Democratic primary to date, the York Daily Herald reported.

Pennsylvania’s new electoral map supplanted Republican-drawn districts that the state’s supreme court struck down in January because they “clearly, plainly and palpably” violated the state constitution.

If elected, Ding would join several other Harvard alumni in the halls of Congress. More than 40 members of the 115th Congress have degrees from one of Harvard’s schools, including top-ranking Senate Democrat Charles “Chuck” E. Schumer ’71.

The primary election will take place on May 15, and the general election on Nov. 6.

Staff writer Simone C. Chu can be reached at simone.chu@thecrimson.com.

Staff writer Luke W. Vrotsos can be reached at luke.vrotsos@thecrimson.com.

Florida Students to Speak at IOP Panel

By ALEXANDRA A. CHAIDEZ CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla.—the site of a shooting last month that killed 17 people—will discuss gun reform and student activism at an Institute of Politics panel on Mar. 20.

The panel, entitled “#NEVERAGAIN: How Parkland Students are Changing the Conversation on Guns,” will feature many of the survivors of the shooting who have gained national attention for their efforts to enact gun reform across the country.

Emma González, the 18-year-old high school senior who has quickly become the face of this movement, will attend, along with fellow student activists Matthew Deitsch, Ryan Deitsch, David Hogg, Cameron Kasky, and Alex Wind.

Dustin Chiang ’19, president of the IOP Student Advisory Committee, wrote in an email that the IOP was eager to host the students.

“These students have rapidly organized a nationwide movement and are currently at the center of our country’s political discourse,” Chiang wrote.

“We are eager to hear their insight on how young people can make a difference on issues they believe in.”

Meighan Stone, a senior fellow at the Kennedy School’s Women and Foreign Policy program, will moderate the event.

“From Malala’s starting her activism in Pakistan at age 11 to Rep. John Lewis sneaking out from chores to hear Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. speak when he was 14, young people have ­

long led powerful movements,” Stone wrote in an email.

“The Parkland students have refused to be silent victims, instead realizing they need no one’s permission to be a prophetic voice for change and an end to gun violence in America.”

Titles of power and money mean absolutely nothing to me when we’re talking about innocent lives.

Matthew Deitsch Oldest ‘Never Again’ movement member

Matthew Deitsch, the oldest member of the Never Again Movement at 20 years old, said the students will talk about more than just gun control at the event.

A 2016 graduate of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and the older brother of students who survived the shooting, Deitsch said by coming to Harvard he hopes to make the pressing nature of this issue clear.

“By going to Harvard, we’re going to be speaking directly to the future leaders of America, and we’re going to

tell everyone what we’ve been telling everyone. We don’t care if it says Senator ‘insert senator’s name here’ or Representative or President whoever,” Deitsch said.

“Titles of power and money mean absolutely nothing to me when we’re talking about innocent lives.”

Deitsch also stressed the importance of “better” and more informed leaders to find solutions to the gun issue in America.

“We don’t need leaders who are lifelong politicians and have been a part of this system,” Deitsch said.

“We need leaders who are actually going to make the right choices and actually do the things that we need as a society to be more safe and to stop this senseless violence that we have in this country.”

Deitsch said the Parkland shooting was an traumatic experience for everyone in his community, detailing how his brother and sister had to hide in closets for hours during the shooting in fear of the gunman.

He said, however, they are still united in their desire to fix a “failed system.” “[If] we can be this broken up about everyone and be so personally affected and still have the wit to combat the hatred and just the lies that come from the other side in order to justify their stances continuing this bloodshed, then anyone can.”

The event, which will be ticketed, will take place at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum.

Staff writer Alexandra A. Chaidez can be reached at alexandra.chaidez@thecrimson.

HCFA FROM PAGE 1 harsher penalties on HCFA. Organizers sent students an email template that they suggested students use in their communications with administrators.

“I urge the OSL to act rather than set vague expectations of disaffiliation that are unlikely to be met,” the template reads.

The OSL announced in February it

We also continue to welcome everyone into our fellowship as we always have.

Scott Ely ‘18 and Molly L. Richmond ‘18 HCFA Co-presidents

had put HCFA on a year-long “probation” after finding the group had acted in a manner “grossly inconsistent” with the OSL’s guidelines for recognized student organizations—including Harvard’s non-discrimination policy. The Crimson reported Feb. 22 that the decision to punish HCFA was almost certainly linked to the group’s Sept. 2017 move to ask a woman in a same-sex relationship to resign from her leadership position.

To date, it appears the OSL’s probation will have little immediate, practical effect. HCFA will not lose the ability to book rooms, recruit students, or receive Undergraduate Council funding as part of its year-long probation, The Crimson reported earlier this week.

Associate Dean of Student Engagement Alexander R. Miller wrote in an emailed statement Thursday that the OSL “will not discuss specific details

regarding discipline of students or organizations.”

“We are working closely with the leadership of HCFA to ensure that they are in compliance with all of Harvard’s policies with respect to recognized student organizations,” Miller wrote.

“We are committed to creating an environment of mutual respect in a diverse community. By listening to each other with the same passion that we want to be heard we strengthen our community.”

Khurana, O’Dair, and Associate Dean for Diversity and Inclusion Roland S. Davis did not respond to requests for comment Thursday.

In the email template, campaign organizers also decried HCFA’s decision to ask a woman in a same-sex relationship to step down from a leadership position.

“Harvard can and should to better for its minority students, particularly when the discrimination taking place is at the hands of an outside organization,” the email template reads.

Asked Thursday whether they plan to respond to the email campaign, HCFA co-presidents Scott Ely ’18 and Molly L. Richmond ’18 did not directly answer.

“We cherish the diversity of religious organizations across Harvard and desire to continue living out our faith in Christ and our religious convictions on Harvard’s campus,” HCFA co-presidents Scott Ely ’18 and Molly L. Richmond ’18 wrote in an emailed statement.

“We also continue to welcome everyone into our fellowship as we always have.”

HCFA is the first-ever student group to be put on administrative probation by the College, according to Ely and Richmond.

Staff writer Caroline S. Engelmayer can be reached at caroline.engelmayer@thecrimson. com.

Staff writer Michael E. Xie can be reached at michael.xie@thecrimson.com.

Faust Condemns GOP Congress Involvement LOBBY FROM PAGE 1 student organizations” from penalizing members of the groups.

That legislation—known as the PROSPER Act—passed a House committee 23-17 in December, but has yet to move to the full House or Senate for a vote.

As it stands now, the amendment would likely not affect Harvard’s highly contested sanctions against single-gender social organizations, which Faust debuted in May 2016. The College does not have a policy officially recognizing final clubs and Greek organizations, meaning the legislation in its current form does not apply.

But final club members and alumni have been lobbying Congress to rework the language of the amendment so that it would prevent Harvard from implementing the sanctions, the Wall Street Journal reported last month.

The final club graduates’ efforts come as the implementation of the sanctions are already well underway.

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences voted to include the penalties in the Harvard College Student Handbook at their meeting Tuesday.

Faust said Thursday she is “distressed” by Republican lawmakers’ attempts to interfere in what she consid-

ers to be internal University affairs.

“I don’t think this is an appropriate role for Congress,” Faust said. “Domestic local affairs of universities and

I don’t think this is an appropriate role for Congress.

Drew G. Faust

University President how we manage student life seem to be appropriately the business of Harvard College and those in and around Harvard College, not the business of the United States Congress.”

Faust said she spoke to lawmakers about the social group policy last fall.

She traveled to Washington last week, but said she has not yet broached the amendment with members of Congress.

Faust said she has previously been active in “expressing the foundations for why we have this policy, why it’s important, and why it ought to be our responsibility to direct student affairs articulating those purposes and goals.”

Mt. Auburn Hair Cuttery to Close as Rent Increases

By FRANKLIN R. CIVANTOS and HENRY W. BURNES CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Hair Cuttery will be snipped from its Harvard Square location on March 17, according to its manager.

Hair Cuttery is a national franchise of unisex hair salons founded in Virginia in 1974. The store has been at its location at the intersection of Mt. Auburn and Eliot St. since 2006, when it replaced a Supercuts.

Karen A. Doyon, the store’s recently hired manager, said that the closing was due to a rent increase from the shop’s landlords.

“They doubled on the rent,” Doyon said.

A sign in the window of Hair Cuttery already advertises the retail space for a lease. According to Doyon, the store has been handing out $5 coupons to customers that detail other Hair Cuttery locations nearby, and has contacted customers about the closing through email.

The decision to close the store came from Hair Cuttery management, and ­

was prompted by the rent increase, Doyon said. Intercontinental Real Estate, led by Peter Palandjian ’87, owns the 104 Mt. Auburn building that also houses a Cambridge Savings Bank and the Harvard University Employees Credit Union.

Rents in the Square have skyrocketed in recent years, forcing some local businesses to shutter their doors and leading to persistent vacancies in prime locations. Large real estate companies like Intercontinental Real Estate and Harvard donor Gerald L. Chan’s Morningside have also increased their Square property holdings in the past few years.

A spokesperson for Hair Cuttery could not be reached for comment.

Denise A. Jillson, executive director of the Harvard Square Business Association, said the decision to close was unexpected.

“It comes as a surprise,” Jillson said.

“They are long members of the Business Association.”

Jillson added that she has not heard of any potential businesses eyeing a move in to the storefront.

THE HARVARD CRIMSON | MARCH 9, 2018 | PAGE 5

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PAGE 6 | MARCH 9, 2018 | THE HARVARD CRIMSON

HOUSING DAY 2018 Early Thursday morning, sophomores, juniors, and seniors—as well as Faculty Deans, tutors, kids, and dogs—gathered in front of University Hall in celebration of Housing Day, the day when freshmen are sorted into the Houses where they will live for the remainder of their time at the College. Students arrived dressed in clothing showing off their house pride; some sported tank tops and others wore boxer shorts despite cold temperatures and still-falling snow. After much cheering, dancing, and interhouse taunting, housing assignments were delivered in envelopes, at which point students eagerly rushed into dorms to inform freshmen of their placements.

MARIAH ELLEN D. DIMALALUAN—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

CALEB D. SCHWARZ—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

AMANDA M. DIMARTINI—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

CALEB D. SCHWARZ—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

JACQUELINE S. CHEA—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

CALEB D. SCHWARZ—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

CALEB D. SCHWARZ—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

MARIAH ELLEN D. DIMALALUAN—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

THE HARVARD CRIMSON | MARCH 9, 2018 | PAGE 7

ARTS new media

Obama Portraits Ask: Where Are You Coming From?

COURTESY OF KEHINDE WILEY

COURTESY OF AMY SHERALD

And Where Do You Want to Go?

GRACE Z. LI CRIMSON STAFF WRITER In many words, the Obama portraits are: colorful; biting; intensely glowing with jewel-tones or popping with pale hues; history in the making; the kind of art that screams iconic; the kind of art that I want to see reproduced en masse, on mugs and laptop stickers and posters hanging in every common room on campus; the kind of art that visitors to the National Gallery are going to flock to, while other “traditional” presidential portraits quietly take their place on the sidelines.

In one word, the Obama portraits are: cool, as Vox aptly pointed out in their own analysis of the pieces. They’re representative of a changing landscape, reflective of the kind of 21st century connection the first black presidential couple has struck with newer generations, through memes and tweets and screenshots dispersed across the world-wide web by the newest generations.

In Kehinde Wiley’s portrait of Barack Obama, flowers dot the foliage Barack Obama nestles in. One quick Google search about the painting’s botany reveals the African blue lily is for his father’s birthplace (Kenya), the chrysanthemum for Barack Obama’s political beginnings (Chicago), and the jasmine for his own birthplace (Hawaii). It’s the kind of symbolism that purposefully stands out. Wiley’s portrait calls attention to Barack Obama’s roots, melding them into the foreground, petals shining proudly under bright light.

It’s difficult to articulate exactly why this is so affirming to people of color, and I don’t want to force my experiences upon anyone else’s. But in short, whiteness has always been America’s cultural standard. You see it dominate TV screens and advertising campaigns. You see the first black president’s legitimacy being questioned—supposedly over a birth certificate. We’re supposed to find whiteness beautiful and powerful—something

to which we should aspire. As a result, this landscape expects people of color to feel shame for being anything else.

And even when mainstream media does acknowledge that people of color exist, it’s often done in a way that’s reductive, condescending, and “other”-ing, as if a non-white American existence is impossible, as if multiplicity can’t exist in a person’s origins, as if we’re supposed to disregard some part of our identity in order to validate our “Americanness.” But Wiley’s flowers mean feeling pride and respect for heritage without stereotyping or exoticism.

Wiley’s portrait subverts that mainstream expectation. His work is already known for having ornate backgrounds, and this painting is no exception. Everything is lush and bold and teeming with life. The shrubbery crawls around the legs of Barack Obama’s chair and feet in a way that doesn’t feel threatening, but empowering—like the leaves and roots and the flowers representative of Obama’s multiple beginnings are trying to protect and uplift his seat in some way. It’s almost as if they’re saying: “These are the places you’re made of. Now, what are you going to do?”

“Look to the future” might be one of the many potential answers. This comes into view with Amy Sherald’s portrait of Michelle Obama. While the portraits were painted separately by two different artists in two wildly different styles, they converse with each other seamlessly. Wiley’s portrait asks us to answer this question with pride: “Where are you coming from?”

Sherald’s portrait asks us to answer this question with action: “Where are you going to go?”

Sherald’s painting feels undeniably contemporary, with clean lines and cool tones. Michelle Obama’s dress flows, encapsulating nearly half of the canvas in its own regality. The designer of

the gown—Michelle Smith of the label Milly—told Vogue that the dress exists “without a reference to anything past or nostalgic.” It uses a “clean, minimal, geometric print” to give the outfit a “very forward-thinking sensibility.” She added she thinks this is something “very Michelle Obama.”

This diverges slightly from Sherald’s own interpretation (at the unveiling, Sherald mentioned that the gown reminds her of the quilting skills of Gee’s Bend, an Alabama-based black community), but not entirely. Sherald also alluded to Piet Mondrian when thinking about the dress’s geometric pattern. Mondrian was a 20th-century Dutch painter who innovated the field of abstract art, relying on large blocks of bolded colors for his style.

His work has come to symbolize Modernism, an artistic genre that’s bent on breaking outdated traditions. Does that sound familiar?

I hope so, because the Obama portraits are like the Obamas’ political legacy: something of a whirlwind of political and social reckonings, something that wants us to be proud of our own “roots,” something that tells us we can go anywhere—despite what we might be told otherwise. The portraits aren’t demanding us to claim some sort of identity from heritage, and they aren’t demanding we do some kind of work from that either. All of that is up to you. But they ask us to acknowledge who we are and what we can do—even if it’s just for a brief moment, a cursory glance in a museum.

Staff writer Grace Z. Li can be reached at grace.li@thecrimson. com. Follow her on Twitter @gracezhali.

TV

‘Final Space’: Light-speed to Nowhere Created by Olan Rogers JAMES T. BLANCHFIELD CONTRIBUTING WRITER The title sequence of “Final Space” features gore, indicating that some mature content is ahead.

But the show also goes for comedy when a cookie strikes the protagonist Gary in the face, causing him to misfire his lazer gun. It sets up the expectation that the show will combine adult themes and childish shenanigans, all within one animated show. But TBS’s new show fails to execute on both accounts, suffering from weak characterization and a limited arsenal of punchlines.

In the opening minutes of the show, we see Gary (Olan Rogers), an exiled space criminal, floating through space on his last minutes of oxygen. Gary, in a state of near-death makes the show come off as much more serious than it actually is.

However, the more screen time Gary gets, the less seriously we take him. Gary is fast-talking and aggressively friendly, traits that could make a quality protagonist if not for the poor writing. Gary’s dialogue is meant to be the comedic core of the show, but consists mostly of yelling and repeating things (“Cookies? Cookies!”). The style of Rogers’ delivery makes it difficult to ever take Gary seriously, even in moments that are supposed to be dire. As he is informed by HUE (Tom Kenny), the ship’s A.I. system, that he is losing oxygen and will perish in less than 10 minutes, Gary remarks, “They went with green for red alert. I would’ve gone with red. Or perrywinkle. Or eggnog. I don’t even know if that’s a color but now I just want eggnog.” While this line could have worked if the entire sequence was meant to be comedic, it was set seconds prior to seeing Gary and multiple dead bodies that have been eviscerated by the harshness of outer space float by, creating a strange blend within one scene.

It is revealed in the first episode that Gary was sentenced to five years in interstellar solitary confinement as a result of a failed attempt at impressing a girl, Quinn (Tika Sumpter). Gary has only met Quinn one time, but he continues to send her video messages throughout his served

time. While this is meant to open up a romantic storyline and show Gary’s persistence, it functions as forced exposition or a means for repeating the events of the episode with a slightly comedic spin. Additionally, as Quinn begins to forge her own storyline, we are constantly reminded of Gary’s obsession with her, which takes away from Quinn’s exploits in the sense that no matter what she gets up to, she will inevitably cross paths with Gary again.

The show relies heavily on overused character arcs. There is Avocato (Coty Galloway), a bounty-hunter-turned-friend, whose only interest is saving his son from the evil overlord. The evil overlord in this case is the Lord Commander (David Tennant), a super-powered villain who is made fun of for his short stature. Then there is KVN (Fred Armisen), an annoying robot sidekick with a love of cookies. Due to the lack of character originality, the jokes and action sequences are far too predictable. It comes as no surprise when Avocato goes to rescue his son and is led into a trap, or when the Lord Commander kills one of his henchmen who made a joke at his expense. Additionally, the majority of KVN’s scenes consist of KVN doing something, and Gary proceeding to COURTESY OF TBS PRODUCTIONS complain about how much he despises KVN. The lack of original peripheral characters does further damage to “Final Space,” as Gary cannot carry the show alone.

Despite a strong cast and an intriguing premise, “Final Space” feels like it is going nowhere.

While there are still some mysterious elements to the show, the arcs of the characters are not compelling enough for viewers to be interested in uncovering them. Not all television needs to be groundbreaking, but quality TV begins and ends with consistent, strong, or likeable characters, and “Final Space” features no such individuals.

EDITORIAL

THE HARVARD CRIMSON | MARCH 9, 2018 | PAGE 8

When Harvard Breaks You

THE CRIMSON EDITORIAL BOARD

A Slap On The Wrist HCFA’s “probation” does not appear to constitute a real punishment

T

he Office of Student Life made the unprecedented decision to place religious group Harvard College Faith in Action on probation on Feb. 22, after it was discovered that the group had asked a woman leader to step down from her position because of her relationship with another woman.

For student groups who have failed to complete the mandatory annual renewal of their College recognition, the OSL defines probation as removing a wide array of privileges, including the ability to host events on campus and receive Harvard funding.

Previously, administrators have repeatedly declined to specify whether these same penalties would apply to HCFA. Since then, Christian Union—HCFA’s parent organization— has stated the group will lose neither of those privileges. HCFA’s weekly worship service, Doxa, has been held in Yenching Auditorium on campus even after the announcement of the probation.

It is important to acknowledge that the reports of this leniency have only come from Christian Union, which has a vested interest in HCFA’s wellbeing. The administration and OSL have not issued a statement on what HCFA’s probation entails, leaving concerned

students in the dark. Given the nature of the allegations against HCFA, which indicate that this organization discriminates against BGLTQ members of our community, the OSL ought to clearly and transparently identify how exactly the probation will affect HCFA.

As it apparently stands, this punishment fails to revoke any of the privileges of a recognized student organization from HCFA. It is at best a slap on the wrist.

Yet if Christian Union is to be believed, the probation will not be have any immediate practical effect. Any effort to claim that the loss of other, minor privileges constitutes a serious punishment strains credulity. We call on the OSL to reconsider this punishment. Alternatively, if the punishment is in fact harsher than the Christian Union claims, the OSL should offer clarification as to what exactly this decision entails.

Ruben E. REYES

As it apparently stands, this punishment fails to revoke any of the privileges of a recognized student organization from HCFA. It is at best a slap on the wrist. The argument could even be made that the OSL would have been better off not issuing any punishment in the first place. As the first such probation of its type, this action had the opportunity to set a standard of conduct for organizations that do not adhere to values of inclusivity and respect. By letting HCFA off the hook, the OSL has damaged its credibility as an enforcer of those values, and sets a dangerous precedent for other groups that may seek to ignore these policies.

If OSL is in fact unwilling to further penalize HCFA, we call on the UC to unilaterally cut off this organization from Council funding. It should not delay in taking on the moral leadership that OSL has failed to exhibit itself.

BENDING THE ARC

I

idea that the liberal arts themselves are just a buzzword.

The General Education Review Committee’s final report on the new implementation continuously cites the expression “Ars Vivendi in Mundo” as its goal—Latin for “the art of living wisely in the world.” But many Gen Ed courses don’t engage with this ideal. I fail to see how Gen Ed classes, many known for their esoteric nature or status as easy-A “gems,” lead students to walk away knowing how to live wisely.

Additionally, hyper-specific courses belie the fact that some students at the College come from schools that didn’t offer the requisite background for them, or hail from other countries with vastly different curricular systems. Students shouldn’t have to give up certain Gen Ed courses because they lack background knowledge. The History Department can offer courses on Germany from 1848 to 1948, but additionally ought to offer courses on the history of modern Europe, or the modern world.

The new Gen Ed system should thus incorporate more survey courses that (while perhaps necessarily capped to preserve educational benefits) should be accessible to all students, regardless of concentration or academic trajectory. Not every course has to be like Hum 10 (but certainly not like Ec 10).

But Hum 10 is a testament to the power that a well-taught survey course can do for students and for Gen Ed. Courses like it should be available for those of us who want these options to make Harvard’s liberal education stronger.

Then, I might not feel so conflicted quoting Lowell to tourists.

sit in the dining hall. Or it may be my bedroom, a classroom, The Crimson. I am either crying or I am not. That is not the important part of this story.

I have just spoken to a mental health counselor for the first time. I have not submitted assignments. I have missed deadlines. I do not have summer plans. I am a third-year student.

Harvard has broken me.

When I talk about my brokenness, I speak to a feeling that is not completely tangible and that eludes words. It’s the feeling we get at rock bottom—a blend of despair, a sense of ineptitude. It is a frequent questioning of what we are doing with our time here and why we are not doing it better. It feels like defeat. It might bring us shame. Brokenness is that feeling we are deadly afraid to share because of how vulnerable it makes us feel.

Though words My brokeness also threaten to fail me, others have writmakes my time ten about things at Harvard often that remind me of my brokenness. Sixfeel like a game of teen years after she survival, to simply graduated, an alum wrote that “by the make it to the next spring of my sophbreak or trip home. omore year, as the PTSD took over my life, my goal became to simply survive Harvard with my soul intact.” Another said that “Harvard knocked the wind out of me” and that “It is easy to slip into a crack here—a dark mahogany crack—and stay there, and not come out.”

My brokeness also makes my time at Harvard often feel like a game of survival, to simply make it to the next break or trip home. I know that dark place well, and I know how difficult it is to grip its edges to pull myself out.

It is difficult to tell this story.

Sometimes, our friends might hear about how broken we feel, about the tears we’ve shed, and the way we’ve considered taking time off. More often, though, we use our brokenness for a greater purpose. We flip it on its head, sometimes to write op-eds with a positive tilt, writing about “Why We Love to Hate Harvard” or “The Upside to Hating Harvard.”

Sometimes, we make a glimmer of our brokenness public to convince an administrator why certain aspects of this institution need to I myself have change or why people like us need more packaged my pain, support. We might writing about how showcase our pain reassure youngexhausting it can be to to er students who be brown at Harvard, come from similar that, about failed promises, backgrounds though it might be about all my hurt. difficult, they too can survive this place. We use our brokenness to build sympathy.

Sympathy a powerful tool. I myself have packaged my pain, writing about how exhausting it can be to be brown at Harvard, about failed promises, about all my hurt. But presenting brokenness as small, nicely-wrapped gifts hides the way it invades so much of our life at Harvard.

It hides the way that Harvard constantly strips us down, especially if we’re brown, queer, female, or find ourselves living on the margins. It hides the fact that so much of our pain and our darkest moments here cannot be boiled down to an assignment-heavy week or a disappointing rejection.

We feel broken for days, weeks, months, or years even. For much longer than we like to admit, brokenness is our Harvard experience.

And, paradoxically, trying to pinpoint brokenness as moment rather than a continual process prevents us from healing. There is nothing that says that the pieces of ourselves cannot be welded back together. Harvard has broken me and it has broken too But I can’t help many of my friends.

But our fractures myself: I write this are not indefinite— story because my not if we give our the atbrokenness threatens brokenness tention it deserves. to swallow me whole And maybe I am culpable, in this coltonight. umn, of doing exactly what I railed against earlier. Maybe I’ve presented a shard of my brokeness with the hope that that it will coax people into speaking up about how Harvard has broken them. But I can’t help myself: I write this story because my brokenness threatens to swallow me whole tonight.

Though I generally prefer to deal in concrete solutions, all I hold in my hand now are intangibles. Maybe this is a shout into the void. Maybe I write this story about my brokenness with the hope that putting it in print will make it real, something I can hold in my hands, something you will help me cement back together.

This is or is not a column about depression. This is either a column about loneliness, or it is not. This is or is not a column about my pain.

This is a column about my brokenness. That is the important part of this story.

Robert Miranda ’20, a Crimson Associate Editorial Editor, is an English concentrator living in Pforzheimer House.

Ruben E. Reyes Jr. ’19, a former Crimson Editorial Chair, is a History & Literature concentrator in Leverett House. His column appears on alternate Fridays.

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).

Putting the General in Gen Ed

By ROBERT MIRANDA

“E

very student should know a little of everything and something well.”

Every time I give a tour to guests visiting Harvard, I repeat that quote, first said by former University President Abbott Lawrence Lowell, Class of 1887. It’s used to highlight the College’s General Education system, with its purported intellectual diversity and freedom.

After all, everyone comes to Harvard wanting something different from their education. Some people steadfastly stick to their concentration for four years. Others pack their schedules full of low-work, easy-A “gems.” And still others pursue a plan of study like the one envisioned by Lowell.

I’m in that last group. Freshman year, I craved a liberal arts experience characterized by the Great Books, by canons, by studying the essential knowledge of various fields—especially in the humanities. I envisioned syllabi filled with books I’d never read before, which would transform me into a better-informed student and citizen, fill in gaps from high school, and make me more well-read. (I’ve learned one thing for certain: You can never be well-read—there are always more books out there.)

The General Education system, with its broad fields of study, seemed to promise I’d learn much in my time here.

But I quickly realized that wouldn’t be the case. In my experience, there are very few courses at Harvard that are comprehensive surveys of their field.

That’s not to say they don’t exist, but they are often hard to find.

Take, for example, the celebrated Humanities 10: “A Humanities Colloquium,” team-taught by six professors, all veritable rock stars in their respective fields. It’s a breathtaking survey of world literature, and counts for two Gen Ed requirements, as well as the Expository Writing requirement. It’s an amazing course—for the 90 freshmen lucky enough to take it. For the rest of us who want a similar education but couldn’t get in, we must find courses like it elsewhere—and that isn’t always easy.

Hum 10’s selectivity isn’t all bad: Its smaller size is preferable to the likes of monstrous Economics 10: “Principles of Economics,” a course more indicative of survey and Gen Ed courses at the College, characterized by massive class sizes, distant teaching staff, and perpetually packed office hours.

But my biggest issue with Gen Ed courses is that most simply aren’t wide-ranging in their scope. Though the fields of study the current and new Gen Ed systems present to us are broad, the courses within them are often incredibly specific. History, for example, does have a survey course on American history: United States in the World 42: “The Democracy Project.” But the department also offers Gen Ed courses on Germany from 1848 to 1948, the history of the book, and racial capitalism and imperialism in the U.S. between the Revolution and the Civil War. I don’t mean to criticize these courses, or the History department. But if the Gen Ed system makes it possible for anyone to take such specific courses for credit and have it be their only exposure to history at Harvard, does it really reflect Harvard’s commitment to the liberal arts?

The General Education system, with its broad fields of study, seemed to promise I’d learn much in my time here.

But I quickly realized that wouldn’t be the case.

As Ross G. Douthat ’02 wrote in The Atlantic in 2005, it’s easy to leave Harvard Yard after four years without learning much of anything at all.

He then spoke of Harvard’s nearly 30-year-old Core Curriculum, replaced in 2009 with the current General Education system—which now stands to be significantly overhauled itself, less than 15 years after Douthat’s portent.

His words are as relevant today as they were then: “A Harvard graduate may have read no Shakespeare or Proust; he may be unable to distinguish Justinian the Great from Julian the Apostate, or to tell you the first ten elements in the periodic table (God knows I can’t).”

We can and should debate at length whether Gen Ed ought to teach Harvard students about Shakespeare and Justinian, or the merits of a canon. But one thing is certain: Many classes don’t directly reflect these debates. I won’t mince words: Harvard’s General Education system lacks general education.

The focus on the specific goes against the “Gen” in Gen Ed, reinforcing the

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THE HARVARD CRIMSON | MARCH 9, 2018 | PAGE 9

Harvard to Clash with Cornell in Tournament Opener MEN’S BASKETBALL

By HENRY ZHU CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

The stakes have been set.

Four Ivy League men’s basketball teams—Harvard, Yale, Cornell, and host Penn—will descend on The Palestra in Philadelphia, Pa., this weekend.

By Sunday afternoon, only one program will remain as the Ancient Eight’s sole representative in the NCAA Tournament.

Both semi-finals and the championship game will be broadcast on national television, a platform the Crimson (17-12, 12-2 Ivy) has experienced five times this season. A full viewing guide recap is listed below: ­

Saturday, March 10, 2018 No.1 Harvard vs. No.4 Cornell, 12:30 PM, ESPNU No.2 Penn vs. No.3 Yale, 3 PM, ESPN2 Sunday, March 11, 2018 No.1 Harvard/No.4 Cornell vs. No.2 Penn/No.3 Yale, 12 PM, ESPN2 Last year’s inaugural postseason tournament benefited from rivalry storylines, with Princeton playing its nemesis, Penn, and Harvard challenging Yale. The matchups this time around may not stir up the same rancor, but will nevertheless showcase thrilling individual performances and much-anticipated rematches from a highly competitive regular season.

For top-seeded Harvard, the sole focus heading into Saturday will be on the Big Red (12-15, 6-8)—a team that the Crimson needed two overtimes to defeat on March 2 and edged by just three on Feb. 3. Junior guard Matt

Morgan totaled 50 points in those two contests, most recently burying six triples in Cornell’s double overtime loss.

As Harvard coach Tommy Amaker admitted, Morgan has simply been indomitable on offense.

“We have tried everything so far [defensively] and it hasn’t worked,” Amaker said. “He is a tremendous scorer. I think as we see, he can shoot and score it from all different levels. Threepoint line, mid-range, at the rim. He is a lights-out foul shooter. He has just been a thorn on our side.”

Morgan commands the highest Ivy-only points per game average, at 20.5. Towns is tied in second at this category, with 18.6 PPG. On Tuesday, the Ivy League announced that the Player of the Year honor would go to the latter rather than the former, an indication that overall team performance was prioritized.

“I think it was very deserving for how [Seth] has played, how he has put us on his back in a variety of situations this year, and for being our best player,” Amaker said. “He has played exceptionally well, been incredibly efficient, and for our best player to be on the best team; a lot of times you would like to see that happen, unless someone has an extraordinary year...that’s understandable. But I do think Seth Towns was a great choice.”

The Columbus, Ohio, native has received a tremendous amount of output from supporters here in Cambridge and back home since finding out about his award on social media Tuesday.

“I was walking out of class, and my phone was blowing up,” Towns said. “ I looked, and I was like, ‘Why is everyone saying congratulations?’ We won the championship on Saturday so I don’t understand. Then I looked on

Twitter and was like ‘Oh, that’s cool.’

People were proud.”

Alongside Towns, sophomore forwards Chris Lewis and Justin Bassey also earned all-Ivy recognition. Lewis was named onto the All-Ivy first team together with Towns, while Bassey earned an honorable mention award.

This marks the first time since the 2014-2015 season in which three different Harvard players received all-Ivy distinctions. That season was also the last time that the Crimson appeared in the NCAA Tournament.

As for Cornell, Amaker cautioned on centering too much attention on Morgan. The other key offensive component is junior forward Stone Gettings, who finished fourth in conference scoring with 18 points per game.

Unlike Lewis, who employs a traditional post-up game, Gettings has the ability to stretch the floor with a season three-point accuracy of 36.8 percent.

Cornell capitalized on this disparity in both of its games against Harvard, bringing Gettings to the perimeter and forcing the Crimson’s lead blocker outside of the paint.

This theme of spacing applies even more to Morgan, whose NBA-distance three-point accuracy forces defenders like sophomore forward Justin Bassey to challenge him outside of the circle.

After the last contest against Cornell, Bassey also attributed Morgan’s dangerous play to his off-the-ball movement and ability to separate from tight defenders.

This level of defensive intensity on Morgan and Gettings might entail easier opportunities for the Big Red’s supporting cast. Although three other players—juniors Steve Julian and Jack Gordon plus sophomore Josh Warren— scored in double-figures during the

TOWN AND COUNTRY Sophomore forward Seth Towns was named the Ivy League Player of the Year last week. TIMOTHY R. O’MEARA—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Big Red’s regular season finale against Dartmouth, only Morgan and Gettings scored more than 10 points in each of Cornell’s contests against Harvard.

As to the matchup on the other side of the bracket, both Penn and Yale enter the tournament playing its best basketball. After starting the season 2-4, the Bulldogs have completely turned around its season, winning five of its last six. The Quakers have also achieved this end-of-the-year mark, thanks in part to a three-point victory against the Crimson on Feb. 24. Currently, the No.2 Quakers are the bookkeeper’s tournament favorites.

To Harvard team leaders like Towns, however, these ruminations about the championship game are meaningless. Saturday’s semi-finals will be undoubtedly a challenge, one that an increasingly mature team knows it cannot overlook.

“We know it is not going to be a cupcake or cakewalk,” sophomore forward Seth Towns said, “It is going to be a tough tournament. There are four great teams in it, and we are all hungry to get to the NCAA Tournament.”

Staff writer Henry Zhu can be reached at henry. zhu@thecrimson.com.

Crimson Marches on to the Palestra for Ivy Tourney AROUND THE IVIES

By TROY BOCCELLI and STEPHEN J. GLEASON CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

If there’s anything we’ve learned from head coach Tommy Amaker while covering the Harvard men’s basketball team over the last few years, it’s to not dwell on things outside of your control.

Amaker rarely discusses injuries to his players, instead focusing on those who are practicing and suiting up for games.

Just last weekend, the former Duke standout claimed that he did not know that Yale had defeated Penn—a result that gave his Crimson an inside track to an Ivy League regular season championship—until he arrived in the locker room following his team’s double-overtime win over Cornell. While we have the utmost respect for Amaker and the program that he runs here, we are going to completely ignore his example for the sake of this column.

With the second annual Ivy League Tournament upon us, it’s time that the conference received some respect from the national media. When the idea of a conference tournament was announced two years ago, the benefits were obvious—extra revenue for the league through sponsorships and ticket sales, excitement around a new idea in a very old league, the opportunity for fan bases to converge on Philadelphia to support their schools, the increased meaning of regular season games for a greater number of teams, and, perhaps most importantly, added exposure for the conference, which would see its champion crowned in one of college’s basketball most iconic arenas on Selection Sunday in a game televised on ESPN2. We’ll find out just how much that increased exposure will pay off.

For some background, Harvard and Penn enter this weekend as the top two seeds in the Ivy League Tournament after both ball clubs went 12-2 in conference play and split their two regular season matchups. Standing in the way of a rubber match between Amaker and freshly minted Ivy League Coach of the Year Steve Donahue are third-seeded Yale and fourth-seeded Cornell.

The Crimson will take on the Big Red, a team that it has defeated twice this season—by three points in Ithaca and in double-overtime last weekend in Cambridge—in Saturday’s earlier game while the Quakers will square off with the Bulldogs—a team with which it split the season series and to which it fell on a buzzer-beater a mere six days ago.

Not for nothing, each game of the Ivy League Tournament will be played at the Palestra, Penn’s historic home arena and the Cathedral of College Basketball. While the Palestra is arguably the only venue in the conference that could host such an event, it provides an obvious advantage for the Quakers, which will be wearing their road uniforms in front of a home crowd if they face Harvard on Sunday. Penn went 11-3 at home this season, including a 7-0 mark in league play.

While the site of the Ivy League Tournament poses an advantage for the ­

Quakers, we’re not going to argue with the Ivy League’s decision to use the Palestra. As someone who grew up watching dozens of high school and college games at the third-oldest college basketball arena in the country, I could not think of a better place to host this tournament. Plus, if you can’t win a conference game on the road in a hostile environment, you probably shouldn’t be playing in the NCAA Tournament anyway. And let’s be honest, if the conference championship were being played at Lavietes Pavilion, there would probably be more Penn fans than Harvard ones anyway.

What we are going to argue with is the lack of respect that the Ivy League is getting in the national conversation.

Thursday’s Bracketology, which is usually extremely accurate, has the Crim-

Penn have also been buoyed by stud sophomores this season. Princeton is bringing in one of the top point guards in the class of 2018 (Jaelin Llewellyn) next season while Cornell has one of the top pure scorers that the conference has seen in recent memory (junior guard Matt Morgan).

The Ivy League has a history of being extremely top heavy—the Quakers and Tigers won all but two of the conference’s titles from 1963-2007. That string was broken up by three straight crowns for the Big Red and a four-year stretch of dominance from the Crimson. But the Ivy League is no longer a one or two-team conference.

Sure, Harvard and Penn are the only two teams that the league would be excited to see play in the NCAA Tournament, but their matchup on Sunday

sance of sorts to University City in his third season at the helm. Winning 12 games in a conference in which truly anything can happen on a given Friday or Saturday night is a feat in and of itself.

To say that the Crimson or Quakers would be one of the six worst teams in the NCAA Tournament’s field of 68 is laughable. The Ivy League is currently ranked 24th out of 32 Division I conferences when it comes to RPI and the league’s eight teams went a combined 42-64 in a challenging nonconference schedule. However, Harvard is currently seeded below Lipscomb (No. 165 in the latest Pomeroy College Basketball Ratings), 13-loss Iona, and Horizon League champion Wright State.

Back in early February, The Daily Pennsylvanian ran a column entitled

BOXED OUT Sophomore forward Chris Lewis scored 29 points, grabbed seven rebounds, and blocked three shots in Harvard’s last game against Cornell. HENRY ZHU—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

son as the conference’s representative in the NCAA Tournament, seeded as a 16-seed playing No. 1-seeded Xavier in Detroit.

It’s not that the NCAA is naive of the level of play in the Ivy League— last year, Princeton entered the NCAA Tournament as a 12-seed and narrowly lost to Notre Dame in the first round.

No one is going to argue that this year’s Harvard or Penn teams are as good as the Tigers squad that went 14-0 in conference play and did not lose a game for nearly three months, and most people would agree that the Ivy League is having a down year in 2017-2018.

As two people who watch more Ivy League basketball than 99 percent of college basketball fans, however, we can say pretty confidently that the Crimson and Quakers are better than their respective records would indicate. Some might argue that Ivy League teams made each other look good over the past two months, but there’s much more to this story than parity.

Ivy League Player of the Year Seth Towns spurned offers from Michigan and Ohio State to play for Harvard.

Amaker reeled in a top ten recruiting class last season while both Yale and

in the conference championship is far from a sure thing. Morgan gave the Crimson fits last weekend while classmate Stone Gettings did the same in the teams’ first meeting in February.

After battling injuries and mediocrity for much of the season, Yale rides a four-game winning streak into Philadelphia.

Harvard’s performance in nonconference play seems to be a huge turnoff for bracketologist Joe Lunardi and company, and for good reason. The Crimson went 5-10 outside of the Ivy League and suffered losses to George Washington, Holy Cross, and Manhattan. However, its play since conference games began cannot be overstated.

Like the Quakers, the Crimson went undefeated in league play at home and has played a consistent brand of basketball that has become a hallmark of Amaker and Donahue-coached teams.

Operating through sophomore forward Chris Lewis and Towns, Harvard has ridden its young core to its first conference championship since 2015.

Penn sophomores Ryan Betley and AJ Brodeur are surrounded by an experienced and talent cast of role players, and Donahue has brought a renais-

“Penn men’s basketball is good, but is it great?”. Fast-forward a month and most pundits would agree that neither Penn nor Harvard would be described as great, but neither ball club deserves a 16-seed next week. Hopefully, the committee will be tuned into ESPN2 on Sunday afternoon.

Now to the picks: No. 1 HARVARD vs. No. 4 CORNELL We lied.

Here we were last week thinking that we had closed out the season and wrapped up all hateful commentary on the amalgamation of somewhat esteemed institutions that make up this league, but we somehow forgot that there was still a conference tournament to be played.

We’ve never been easy on the school that calls Ithaca home and in our last hurrah ever, we’re not planning on changing that. For these reasons, we’ve decided to go quite plain and simple and we’ve decided to make a call to arms in the last iteration of this column: Remove Cornell from the Ivy League.

Somehow this school finds itself in the Ivy Tournament with a losing re-

cord overall and in conference. This is inexcusable.

Pick: Harvard No. 2 PENN vs. No. 3 YALE Let’s talk about the elephant in the room—why the hell should the No. 2 seed get to play at home for the conference tournament?

We’re not asking for Madison Square Garden, but the fact that Penn gets home court advantage for both the men’s and women’s tournaments is borderline stupid.

Sure, it was an easy enough call when the Quakers were expected to be trash last season and the four seed this year, but it is just really, really, really stupid and plainly unfair.

Last season, the Quakers entered the conference tournament with a losing record and took a Princeton team that had gone undefeated in conference into overtime in front of what was largely a Penn crowd.

Had the Quakers won, the three and four seeds would have been playing on Sunday to represent the conference in the tournament.

We’re not sure who calls the shots in the Ivy League, but that should’ve been more than enough of a lesson in letting one of the schools in the conference host the tournament.

Stupid location aside, there’s a lot to be said about both teams in this matchup.

If there was an award for worst closeout to a game ever, Penn’s ending to last weekend’s game against Yale would run away with the crown. The last minute could deserve a whole story of its own, but in short, the Quakers were up three with just over five seconds to go and somehow lost. In regulation.

Pour one out.

The weekend didn’t end there for the Quakers, though. After clinching a share of the Ivy League title with their win against Brown on Saturday, the team returned to Philadelphia where they cut down nets at the Palestra at two in the morning.

No hate here, but someone clearly didn’t tell them that’s not how cutting down the nets really works.

We’d like to take the Bulldogs, but Penn clearly has a contact somewhere in the Ivy League.

Pick: Penn No. 1 HARVARD vs. No. 2 PENN If nothing goes too wrong this is the most likely matchup we’ll see on Sunday.

Cornell has about two basketball players and Penn is playing at home. As we call it a career, though, we have to admit these things aren’t objective and they never have been.

So if the committee is reading this, a No. 2 Duke vs. No. 15 Harvard game in San Diego on Friday would be incredible. Thank you.

Pick: Harvard Staff writer Troy Boccelli can be reached at troy. boccelli@thecrimson.com.

Staff writer Stephen J. Gleason can be reached at stephen.gleason@thecrimson.com.

Page 10 | MARCH 9, 2018 | The Harvard Crimson

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