The Harvard Crimson - Volume CXLV, No. 115

The Harvard Crimson THE UNIVERSITY DAILY, EST. 1873 | VOLUME CXLV, NO. 114 | CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS | THURSDAY. NOVEMBER 1, 2018

EDITORIAL PAGE 4

NEWS PAGE 5

SPORTS PAGE 6

Harvard should be more open about its ties to Saudi Arabian royal family.

Health Services starts mental health initiative for Asian-American women.

Harvard football will face Columbia this weekend.

HMC Mum On Law Library Publishes Case Law Employee Count

By LAURA C. ESPINOZA and KATHERINE S. LI

CONTRIBUTING STAFF WRITERS

By ELI W. BURNES and ANDREW J. ZUCKER CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

In many ways, Harvard Management Company, the firm that oversees the University’s multi-billion dollar endowment, is a black box. On its number of employees, HMC is characteristically silent.

N.P. “Narv” Narvekar, who took over as HMC’s CEO in Dec. 2016, wrote in a Jan. 2017 letter to Harvard affiliates that he would halve HMC’s 230-person staff by the end of calendar year 2017.

Since the letter, Narvekar has not commented publicly on the size of the company’s personnel. The CEO released a message on the status of Harvard’s endowment in last week’s University Financial Report — and the report did not provide a new employee figure. HMC spokesperson Patrick S. McKiernan declined to comment last week on the number of people HMC employees.

The planned reduction in staff was part of Narvekar’s shift from HMC’s previously large in-house operation toward external management.

As part of this transition, HMC spun off several internal investment teams. In 2017, Bloomberg reported that Harvard would invest at least $300 million in a hedge fund formed by former HMC managers, and in February of this year, HMC’s 22-person real estate team joined private equity firm Bain Capital.

In last week’s financial report, Narvekar wrote that the natural resources team is the only in-house investment team that remains. Harvard’s investments are now primarily overseen by a “Generalist Team,” a new group of employees who “take ownership of the entire

portfolio, regardless of asset class,” according to job posting on HMC’s website. The team is part of the endowment’s shift to a ‘generalist’ model in which asset managers focus on the entire portfolio, not just a specific asset class.

“The HMC Generalist Team was officially formed just prior to the start of fiscal year 2018 and has, therefore, been functioning for over a year. While some team members have been trained as generalists, others bring deep specialist experience,” Narvekar wrote in the financial report.

The company’s website only lists HMC’s top three administrators — Narvekar, Chief Investment Officer Rick Slocum, and Chief Operating Officer Bob Ettl — under the heading “Leadership.” Harvard’s peers, though, take a markedly different approach; all of the other Ivy League endowment offices list their staff members on their websites.

LinkedIn estimates the size of HMC as between 201 and 500 employees, a range determined by the administrator of HMC’s LinkedIn page. It is unclear when the page was last updated.

With little information about the people involved in stewarding Harvard’s $39.2 billion endowment, experts are left to speculate about the extent of Narvekar’s personnel changes.

Charles A. Skorina, the head of a finance executive search firm, put the number of employees at “around 120.”

“The last time I heard it was around 120. That was at least nine months ago,” Skorina said.

In his first letter to Harvard affiliates, Narvekar wrote that

SEE HMC PAGE 3

The Library Innovation Lab at Harvard Law School published a full collection of United States court cases dating from 1658 to 2018 on Monday as part of a years-long project to make case law more accessible.

The initiative, dubbed the Caselaw Access Project, digitized more than 40 million pages of U.S. state, federal, and ter-

ritorial case law documents from the Law School library.

Though basic information for all cases in the database is now publicly accessible, users are limited to five hundred full case texts per day. Harvard affiliates currently have unlimited access to all case texts.

Adam Ziegler, who directed the project, said his team worked on the Caselaw Access Project for more than six years.

“It started with the simple observation that there was

a real need for ready access to court opinions,” Ziegler said.

The project was funded partly through a partnership with Ravel, a legal research and analytics startup founded by two Stanford Law School students. Ravel earned “some commercial rights” through March 2024 to charge for greater access to files, according to Ziegler.

The company, however, has not publicly stated whether they plan to do so.

Representatives from Ravel did not respond to requests for comment.

Several Law School faculty members expressed their optimism about the project and its potential.

Law School Professor I. Glenn Cohen called the project “a game changer,” and Law School Professor Christopher T. Bavitz said the initiative will bring about “enormous

SEE ARCHIVE PAGE 5

Students Cheer Red Sox Victory

By BRIDGER J. GORDON and ELIZABETH X. GUO CONTRIBUTING STAFF WRITERS

Boston Red Sox fans gleefully celebrate the team’s World Series Win. GRIFFIN R. ANDRES—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Hordes of people, decked out in Red Sox gear and chanting “Yankees suck!” in unison, poured out of the Park Street T Station and onto the streets Wednesday morning to celebrate the Boston Red Sox’s ninth World Series win.

With a final score of five to one, the Boston Red Sox defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers on Sunday night to become the 2018 World Series champions.

Thousands gathered downtown Wednesday morning for the team’s victory parade, which began at 11:00 a.m. at Fenway Park and ended near Boston’s City Hall. The jubilant crowd included Boston locals and Harvard students alike.

With confetti floating above

SEE BASEBALL PAGE 3

HUHS Harvard Students Get Spooky for Halloween Debuts Clad in Costumes, Students Health Collect Candy in the Yard Program

By ASPEN H. BUCK, JANIA J. TUMEY, and REBECCA E. XI

By SIMONE C. CHU

CONTRIBUTING STAFF WRITERS

CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

A new Boston-area mental health initiative focused on Asian-American women enrolled its first cohort at Harvard this fall.

The program, called “Asian Women’s Action for Resilience and Empowerment,” launched in September and consists of part group therapy session, part research study. It aims to fulfill a need for mental health care for an under-researched demographic, according to Boston University professor Dr. Hyeouk “Chris” Hahm, who created the program.

Hahm said she first conceived of plans for AWARE while working as a clinical social worker in New York City nine years ago.

She noticed patterns of conflict within immigrant families — especially those from Asia — and in particular among Asian-American women.But Hahm said she found little existing research on this demographic.

“I realized that there were so few studies, so few articles, on these immigrant — particularly Asian-American immigrant — children, as well as their parents,” she said. “In particular, there was so little research done targeting Asian-American women — especially their

SEE HEALTH PAGE 5 INSIDE THIS ISSUE

Harvard Today 2

Students dressed up for the Halloween costume contest and trick-or-treating in Harvard Yard.

MIA B. FROTHING-

HAM—CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

A Halloween-themed Annenberg and an evening of candy and music in the Yard marked an atypical Wednesday at Harvard, as undergraduates paused to celebrate the holiday.

Costumed students strolled around Harvard Yard at a trickor-treat event hosted by the College Events Board, which featured a photo tent, costume competition, and plenty of candy.

Avril Saavedra ’21 and Jennifer Y. Wang ’22 dressed up as “Necromorphs” — characters Saavedra described as “re-

animated corpses from alien bacteria” from the video game franchise “Dead Space.” Saavedra said it took five hours just to build the protruding jaws of their costumes.

“About five hours to build the jaw, and then like three hours to put it all together in the morning,” she said. “All my teachers were terrified. Several of my classmates refused to sit next to me.”

“It’s been fun,” Saavedra added. “Halloween is good on a Wednesday!”

Wang said many people took photos of the duo throughout the day.

John S. Martin, an ID

SEE HALLOWEEN PAGE 3

Houghton Library Hosts Reading of ‘Frankenstein’ in Honor of Anniversary

By JOSHUA S. ARCHIBALD and KEVIN R. CHEN CONTRIBUTING STAFF WRITERS

There was a marathon reading of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein in Houghton Library Wednesday. HAYOUNG HWANG—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

News 3

Editorial 4

Sports 6

Houghton Library hosted a Halloween reading of Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein” in honor of the 200th anniversary of the book’s publication, attracting scholars, students, and members of the public alike.

The event marked the first time the Houghton Library has held a marathon reading, according to lead organizer and Houghton curator Leslie A. Morris. The reading was part of

TODAY’S FORECAST

CLOUDY High: 59 Low: 51

Frankenweek, a week-long celebration at Harvard that featured a symposium on the significance of “Frankenstein” and screenings of eleven different film adaptations of the book.

“It is one of those novels that really has permeated culture in a way. Considering that it was Mary Shelley’s first book, it’s quite remarkable,” Morris said.

Participants could sign up to read aloud a 10-minute section of “Frankenstein,” and a steady stream of people flowed in and out of the room throughout the event, grabbing treats from

the back while listening to sections of the novel. Time slots to read were filled within 36 hours of the sign-up form’s posting, Morris said.

The reading was affiliated with Frankenreads, an international celebration organized by the Keats-Shelley Association of America. People from 46 countries around the world participated in similar marathon readings of “Frankenstein.”

Members of the class English 148: “Modern Monsters in

SEE READING PAGE 5

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THE HARVARD CRIMSON |

NOVEMBER 1, 2018

PAGE 2

HARVARD TODAY

For Lunch Grilled Chicken Thigh Grilled Pizza Sandwich Teriyaki Chicken with Scallions and Garlic

For Dinner Emerald Beef and Vegetable Stir Fry Spanish-Style Roasted Chicken Vegetable Edamame Dumplings

TODAY’S EVENTS

IN THE REAL WORLD

Open House and Celebration Peabody Museum, 4:00 p.m.

Countdown to the Midterms

Held at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, this event celebrates Dia de los Muertos.

Enjoy traditional festivities such as decorating an altar to celebrate loved ones whom have passed, drinking hot chocolate, and dressing up.

In the days leading up to the midterm elections on Nov. 6. Oprah has been hitting the campaign trail in support of candidates, Trump has been asked to stay away from risky election states (shocking), and the state of the election is constantly changing.

Hawaii Top Court Approves Controversial Thirty Meter Telescope

Musical Farkas Hall, 7:30 p.m.

It’s opening night of the Pulitzer Prize winning musical “Next to Normal” in Farkas Hall. Come see some of your more artistically gifted classmates of the opening night of this show.

Lecture Emerson Hall 101, 8:00 p.m.

Another event put on for Sex Weeks, come learn about sexual fetishes from expert Dr. Jill McDevitt in Emerson 101. This presentation should help to facilitate conversation and exploration of your own and others’ sexual fetishes.

Twenty One Pilots, an American musical duo, performed at TD Garden in Boston on Friday.

WILLIAM H. WU—CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Construction on the Thirty Meter Telescope was stopped in 2015 due to the complaints from native Hawaiians that the telescope was on sacred land.

However, official rulings from Hawaii’s top court have opened the site again, amid protests.

DAILY BRIEFING Can Trump End Birthright Citizenship?

Harvard Management Company CEO N.P. “Narv” Narvekar updated Harvard affiliates on a number of his efforts to overhaul HMC in the University’s annual financial report released last week — but the size of his staff still remains under wraps. Narvekar said last year he would halve the company’s 230-person staff by the end of 2017. He has not commented publicly since about whether that reduction indeed occurred, and experts say the company’s silence might be strategic. In other news, Harvard Law School made millions of pages of case law from the last four centuries available online, students and Bostonians celebrated the Red Sox’s World Series win, and a mental health initiative for Asian-American women has launched at Harvard.

Huge controversy has come from Trump’s claim that he can and will end birthright citizenship with an executive order. Critics have questioned his claims about the reasoning behind the decision, the place of birthright citizenship in the global community, and whether Trump has the power to change this through executive order.

AROUND THE IVIES YALE Yale and its campus police union, Yale Police Benevolent Association, ratified a contract Tuesday evening, per the Yale Daily News. The agreement — which will shape campus police officers’ working conditions for the next seven years — follows a 28-month dispute between Yale administrators and union negotiators. Union members, who overwhelmingly supported the final deal, are now among the best-compensated workers on Yale’s campus. Other contract provisions expand YBPA members’ health benefits and increase their presence on University policy committees.

COLUMBIA The Columbia Spectator reported administrators were forced to revise a statement on the shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue after Jewish affiliates complained it did not mention anti-semitism. The original statement acknowledged hate crimes against BGLTQ and African-American victims, but did not explicitly mention Judaism. The new statement, released Tuesday, includes a sentence calling the shooting, which killed 11 congregants at the Pittsburgh synagogue Saturday, a “violent attack on the Jewish community.” One Spectator alumnus said he thought the revised statement still failed to adequately contextualize the event.

BROWN

The Office of Institutional Equity and Diversity at Brown announced intentions to form a Student Equity and Diversity Council by November, according to the Brown Daily Herald. The council will comprise undergraduate, graduate, and medical students, nominated by student government and affinity groups. Although administrators met with students in the past, they said they hope this initiative will formalize that form of interaction, according to the vice president of institutional equity and diversity.

THE UNIVERSITY DAILY, EST. 1873

The Harvard Crimson Derek G. Xiao President Hannah Natanson Managing Editor Nathan Y. Lee Business Manager

Associate Managing Editors Mia C. Karr ’19 Claire E. Parker ’19 Associate Business Managers Dahlia S. Huh ’19 Max W. Sosland ’19 Digital Strategists Jamie D. Halper ’20 Caroline S. Engelmayer ’20 Editorial Chairs Cristian D. Pleters ’19 Emmanuel R. R. D’Agostino ’19

STAFF FOR THIS ISSUE Arts Chairs Mila Gauvini II ’19 Grace Z. Li ’19

Design Chairs Morgan J. Spaulding ’19 Simon S. Sun ’19

FM Chairs Marella A. Gayla ’19 Leah S. Yared ’19

Multimedia Chairs Amy Y. Li ’20 Ellis J. Yeo ’20

Blog Chairs Lydia L. Cawley ’20 Stuti Telidevara ’20

Technology Chairs Nenya A. Edjah ’20 Theodore T. Liu ’20

Sports Chairs Cade S. Palmer ’20 Jack R. Stockless ’19

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.

Night Editor Sarah Wu ’19 Assistant Night Editors Michael E. Xie ’20 Shera S. Avi-Yonah ’21 Story Editors Mia C. Karr ’19 Brittany N. Ellis ’19 Angela N. Fu ‘20 Jamie D. Halper ‘20 Michael E. Xie ‘20 Andrew J. Zucker ‘20

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CORRECTIONS 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.

PAGE 3

THE HARVARD CRIMSON | NOVEMBER 1, 2018

HMC FROM PAGE 1

BASEBALL FROM PAGE 1

HMC Stays Quiet Bostonians Celebrate Red Sox Victory on Employees their heads, Bostonians cheered as Red Sox players, officials, coaches and their fam-

HMC’s shift towards external managers is partly due to competition for talent.

“In recent years… the tremendous flow of capital to external managers has created a great deal of competition for both talent and ideas, therefore making it more difficult to attract and retain the necessary investment expertise,” Narvekar wrote.

The shift also came after criticism Harvard faced for the large compensation packages of its internal investment managers, which sometimes reached tens of millions of dollars.

After Narvekar’s overhaul, some former HMC employees continue to manage Harvard’s money — now, from outside of the University.

According to David L. Yermack ‘85, chair of the Finance Department at New York University Stern and a former managing editor of The Crimson, there could be ambiguity over who counts as HMC staff,

which may be one reason why Narvekar has remained mum about the number of people he employs. Yermack also said there is no law that requires companies to disclose this number.

“HMC probably doesn’t disclose the information because there is no such requirement.

In addition, there are probably numerous subcontractors and consultants who are in a grey area somewhere between inhouse and external,” he wrote.

Skorina speculated that HMC’s opacity may stem from another cause: a concern about the press attention the Harvard name inevitably garners.

“In the case of Harvard, every time you report a staff change there is press, there is media speculation,” he said.

“The idle speculation could do more damage than just not saying anything.” eli.burnes@thecrimson.com andrew.zucker@thecrimson.com

It was amazing to see the players and seeing that they were all super riled up.

Ethan R. McCollister ’20 Parade Attendee

ilies rode on duck boats down the streets.

Ethan R. McCollister ’20 attended the parade and described its atmosphere as “electric.”

“It was amazing to see the players and seeing that they were all super riled up,” McCollister said.

“They’ve been in pro-mode for the whole season and now they can let loose a little bit and it was pretty funny.”

McCollister, a lifelong fan of the Red Sox, was in the Winthrop House common area

watching Game Five, the final game of the series, when the Red Sox triumphed on Sunday.

Along with some friends, McCollister took the subway to the Boston Commons that night to celebrate.

Boston resident and Red Sox fan of 64 years, Peter F. Kasarjian, was also in attendance at the parade.

Kasarjian watched the final game of the Series in his living room with his wife and said that they “kind of expected” the Red Sox’s victory.

Kasarjian, who is a retired Plymouth school teacher, had not until recently been able to partake in Boston sports celebrations due to his work.

Moreover, Kasarjian said that for most of his life, there had not been much to celebrate.

“The Red Sox were the worst team in baseball. The Patriots were the worst team in football for a long time, and 2000 hit and everything changed,” Kasarjian said. “So this is good.”

Not all Harvard students,

however, were as excited by the team’s victory.

Zachary R. Werner ’22, who hails from New Jersey, called the Red Sox franchise “ridiculously pathetic.”

“The Red Sox this year, they were a good team, I’m not denying that,” Werner said.

“But I will say though, them singing ‘New York, New York’ in the locker room after they won, it shows that no matter how successful they’ll

We’re strong for bad things, we’re strong when we celebrate good things.

Pam J. Szkutak Boston Resident

be, they’ll never stop thinking about the Yankees.”

Werner passed on watching the final game of the World Series Sunday and also opted out of celebratory activities with

his friends afterwards.

“As soon as the Yankees got eliminated, I knew it would be best for me to focus on my studies,” Werner said.

“My friends were asking me if I wanted to go to Boston to celebrate the game with all the people. I could never ever stoop to that level, of selling my soul to the Boston Red Sox.” Enthusiasm for Boston’s native team, however, was clear during Wednesday’s parade. Looking on as the Boston crowds tossed a football across the streets, chanting and waving posters, Pam J. Szkutak, Kasarjian’s sister-in-law, described the pure “elation” of the event.

For Szkutak, this year’s World Series win and the following celebration represent more than just a game.

“When they say ‘Boston Strong,’ this is what you’re talking about,” Szkutak said.

“We’re strong for bad things, we’re strong when we celebrate good things. That’s what Boston is made of.”

HALLOWEEN FROM PAGE 1

The latest on student life.

The College Events Board hosted a fun Trick or Treat event in Harvard Yard on Halloween. MIA B. FROTHINGHAM—CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Students Celebrate Halloween Holiday

The Crimson @crimsonflyby

checker in Annenberg Hall, where freshmen eat meals, even called Saavedra’s and Wang’s costumes “outrageous” earlier in the day.

Pat M. Rounds, a graduate student at the Graduate School of Education who is currently interning with CEB, handed out candy from the steps of Weld Hall to trick-or-treaters.

Rounds, dressed up as Thing 1 from Dr. Seuss’s “The Cat in the Hat,” said students seemed to

Never miss a moment.

The Crimson @thecrimson

enjoy the event.

“It’s great, everyone’s coming out and having a good time getting a sugar rush going,” he said.

Crimson Yard Resident Dean Dwight Fee, who sported a leopard print suit at the event, said he appreciated seeing students participate in Halloween festivities.

“Halloween is my favorite holiday. I loved it as a kid,” Fee said.

“Now that I’m a Yard dean, I wanted to see more about how first-years in particular celebrate Halloween.”

“It’s really fun to improvise a bit and come out and see what’s going on,” he added, referring to his costume.

Outside of Wednesday night’s CEB event, many upperclassmen houses hosted Halloween festivities.

Some professors, such as Michael I. Parzen, celebrated the

holiday by dressing up.

Traditional Halloween decorations adorned Annenberg, where, mask-clad Martin greeted freshman walking into the dining hall.

Pumpkins carved by students for a pumpkin-decorating competition lined the sides of the historic building.

The winners of the competition, announced on Friday, won $75 each in subsidies for entryway study breaks.

THE HARVARD CRIMSON | November 1, 2018

Page 4

Editorial The Crimson Editorial board

column

Harvard Must Make Saudi Ties Public

Borders Everywhere are Becoming Real — and Deadly

L

ast spring, Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman visited Harvard on his tour of the United States, a visit that was only the latest in a long string of ties between Harvard and the Saudi royal family. In 2005, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, another prominent member of the royal family, donated $20 million to the University.

This donation established the Alwaleed Islamic Studies Program and created three professorships in his name. Harvard’s ties with Saudi Arabia don’t end there — The Saudi royal family funds at least two programs at the Kennedy School, and it even sponsors leadership courses held during Harvard’s summer programs.

In light of Saudi Arabia’s alleged involvement in the murder of Jamal Khashoggi and its egregious human rights violations elsewhere — including its ties to the 9/11 attack and its actions in Yemen that have resulted in a devastating worst humanitarian crisis — we believe it is necessary for Harvard to act. Harvard must publicly condemn the killing of Khashoggi, but that is not enough. The University must go a step forward and critically assess its relationship with the Saudi regime, and begin by making its history and current involvement with the Saudis public.

We have previously opined that Harvard’s funding sources should be evaluated in a nuanced way, and we recognize that Harvard cannot and should not unequivocally reject donations from all controversial donors.

Furthermore, we are not equating other controversial donors with the brutal

Saudi regime. However, when it comes to funding from controversial sources, Harvard’s transparency problem is obvious and can be easily corrected. Even if Harvard accepts money from such places, it is still crucial for the University to be as open as possible with its financial sources. Thus, we demand that when it comes to funding, Harvard improve transparency across the board, specifically by making public lists of sources and direct funding.

Harvard must publicly condemn the killing of Khashoggi, but that is not enough. The University must go a step forward and critically assess its relationship with the Saudi regime, and begin by making its history and current involvement with the Saudis public.

Furthermore, by associating itself with the Saudi regime, Harvard – one of the best universities in the world – runs the risk of legitimizing both the authoritarian nature of the regime and the brutal policies it carries out abroad.

By continuing to strengthen this relationship, Harvard turns a blind eye to Saudi atrocities. For Harvard to continue to cultivate close ties with a regime almost certainly engaged in serious human rights abuses and war crimes

is clearly unethical, and the University must do better. Furthermore, the secretive nature of these ties seems to reflect the University’s own qualms about the optics of this situation. Thus, it seems clear that rather than continuing to build a strong relationship with the Saudis, Harvard should take a critical look at the money it is benefiting from.

Finally, we wish to honor Khashoggi for his courage and determination to speak the truth, for which he paid the ultimate price. The murder of a columnist for speaking out against injustice is a direct affront to the values that journalists and editorial boards such as this one hold dear. It is as critical as ever to continue speaking truth to power and exercising our freedom of speech — especially at a time when leaders from Riyadh to Moscow to Washington work their hardest to make that challenging.

We hope that Harvard will consider its own motto in the light of Khashoggi’s murder, and will honor him adequately.

More than anything, we hope that Harvard will reconsider its ties to the Saudi regime and will seek to ensure that all ties that the University builds truly further our commitment to veritas.

—Kaivan K. Shroff is a first-year masters in public policy student at the Harvard Kennedy School.

—Henry N. Brooks ’19 is a Social Studies concentrator in Currier House. His column appears on alternate Thursdays.

Close Harvard on Election Day

O

n Tuesday morning, I received an email from the dean of the Kennedy School, Douglas W. Elmendorf.

“Please vote!” read the subject line. The leader of Harvard’s public policy school then proceeded to rally the HKS community to participate in the upcoming election next week: “I encourage all eligible students, staff, and faculty to take the time to vote. Although the Kennedy School will be open as usual next Tuesday, I believe that fulfilling your civic responsibility is compatible with fulfilling your responsibilities to the School.” He then implores, but does not require, professors to make informal accommodations for students who arrive late or miss class in order to vote.

The Kennedy School and the wider university should cancel classes on Election Day this year and every year after. If Harvard’s goal is to educate future leaders across all sectors, performing basic civic duties is an integral first step.

On its face, encouraging voting is a positive and productive step for a dean in Elmendorf’s position to take. As communications chair for the Harvard Votes Challenge at the Kennedy School, an initiative to achieve 90 percent student voter registration at the school, I was stunned to learn that in 2014, the last “midterm” election, just 64 percent of eligible Harvard students were registered to vote and a mere 23.6 percent turned out to vote. Across graduate schools at the University, just 16.4 percent of those eligible engaged in our

W

Finally, Harvard can lead by example. For decades, Americans have called for Election Day to be a national holiday. After all, democracy and civic action are central to the American ethos and narrative, though in practice we fall incredibly short. Elite institutions, for better or worse, have cultural capital to set standards and test best practices. If Harvard gives its nearly 40,000 community members Election Day off this year or next, studies the impact of the decision, and starts to build a movement, our society will be better off. I deeply encourage University President Lawrence S. Bacow to take this bold step forward — one of the many required to reorient the university not only towards the best ideas, but engagement with the world around us.

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.

Op-ed

single most important civic responsibility. While I am proud we exceeded our 90 percent registration target last week — and the school was incredibly supportive of this initiative — a deeper consideration of Elmendorf’s email reveals a glaring missed opportunity.

The Kennedy School and the wider university should cancel classes on Election Day this year and every year after. Prioritizing voting in this way is important for a multiplicity of reasons.

First, big picture, if Harvard’s goal is to educate future leaders across all sectors, performing basic civic duties is an integral first step — surely education is not simply about ideas, but also actions. It is far too easy for students to get swept away in the Ivy League bubble and forget about the communities around us and the communities we are from. While perhaps the Kennedy School of Government has an unique onus to live the values of public leadership by remaining closed on Election Day, the official mission of Harvard College is “to educate the citizens and citizen-leaders for our society.” While it’s true students can find time to vote, we know that each additional barrier to voting decreases participation.

Cancelling classes sends a message that Harvard is prioritizing voting and eliminates a real reason that students may be too busy or too tired to go to the polls. While ideally students themselves would take every step possible to engage in this civic process, we know this is not the case — and Harvard can use smart policy to change that.

Moreover, Harvard employs over 15,000 staff and faculty members. Only 56 percent of the voting age population went to the polls in the 2016 election — and non-voters cited being too busy or having a scheduling conflict as the second biggest impediment to casting a ballot. Harvard has the resources and

Socially Liberal, Fiscally Liberal ith Trump promising military action at the southern border in response to a highly publicized migrant “caravan,” it’s easy to let our historical amnesia set in about the recentness of the border and our fears of Mexican and Central American crossers.

Between 1846 and 1853, we had no recognizable boundary with Mexico — this due to a mix of factors including Native American raids against surveyor camps, an unexpected death in the joint border-planning committee, and poorly drafted map materials. Between that time and Mexican “repatriation” in the 1930s — when our government sent many Mexican-Americans south to their “historic” homeland — impromptu migration northward was not uncommon, whether for farm-work for other opportunity. The United States did not have any quota or cap on Mexican migration like it did for other regions.

All the way into the 1960s, it was common for Mexicans to enter the country under seasonal farming permits from the “Bracero Program,” which accommodated historical migration patterns based around the agriculture economy. Certain Native American bands continue to border-hop to this day under protections designed to preserve traditional ranges of movement.

(A 1983 law secured these rights for the Texas Kickapoo. A similar policy applies for Arizona’s Tohono O’odham people.)

Call these pictures what you will; they are certainly not the hermetically sealed border of GOP fantasy. And understanding this paves the way for an even shorter history of other global borderlands.

Before 1957, almost none of sub-Saharan Africa existed under its current political arrangement. Where borders did boast official legal status, their defense was often impossible in practice, and the lines themselves often assumed the loyalty of their inside occupants.

Such was the case in Namibia (formerly “South West Africa”) under South African rule, where most of the 900-mile northern border was demarcated by indigenous tribal reserves.

In Asia, it was much the same story. The first country to gain independence was Yemen in 1918. It was only a small sliver of desert (and a fraction of today’s Yemen).

Everywhere, borders are — as they always have been — hasty, imaginative affairs. Yet, perhaps paradoxically, they conjure real, and violent, worldviews from their faulty premises.

Underlying the problem is a worldview based on neat divisions. The hope to perfectly regulate human movement is an unfortunate dream of the modern state, and where it comes nearest to reality, its effects are visibly disfiguring. The Korean “Demilitarized Zone” is perhaps today’s only example of a perfect border: heavily guarded and completely surveilled. On either side, one is totally protected against the contagion of the other.

This sense of protection comes at great human cost.

At our own southern border, 412 migrants died in 2017, adding to 341,000 who were taken into temporary or long-term custody. In 2016, the total figure for apprehended persons was nearly double that (the lower figures after 2016 reflect a combination of demoralized potential emigrants and new opportunity in Mexico).

Since then, custody camps for Central American refugees have sprouted up in the borderlands, like halfway houses for those fleeing war, sexual violence, and poverty. The accounts of living conditions in these camps are distressing. Residents speak of overcrowding, illness, ridiculing from guards, and jail-like conditions.

Many detainees end up getting deported after weeks or months in stir.

A similar (if more extreme) phenomenon is unfolding in Xinjiang, China’s westernmost administrative region (bordering former-Soviet Central Asia). There, the government is waging a demographic war, using a system of detention camps to house, reeducate, and sometimes torture Uyghurs, a transnational Muslim minority. Estimates put the total number of detainees at one million (high-end estimates suggest three times that).

If the problems of “border logic” aren’t obvious, consider the point raised by Bengali historian Sudipta Kaviraj that states view borders as ends in themselves, often fighting to secure control over empty, barren, remote, or depopulated space. Such was the case in the now-forgotten Paraguayan War, when Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay launched a bloody invasion of Paraguay over empty interior regions of South America.

The pretext, sure enough, was an untenable border line left over from the colonial era.

My own studies focus on the history of the US-Mexico borderlands, so naturally I am partial to (and especially concerned by) that case. It is nonetheless an undeniably global problem that we are facing.

Where we can effect any sort of policy change — at the polls this November, for instance — we must move to do so. That means voting for Democrats who will advocate uncompromisingly for an end to refugee detention, an overhauled immigration system, and aid for countries sending migrants. It also means demanding the kind of international coalition-building that can make it unfashionable to commit border genocide — in Myanmar, Gaza, Xinjiang, or here at home.

If we can’t defuse the bomb of nationalism, the risks might be unprecedented. One scenario — a worst case — is what the Hungarian historian Istvan Hont ominously called, in a moment of commendable clarity, the “permanent crisis of a divided mankind.”

Awnit singh marta—Crimson Photographer

By Kaivan K. Shroff

Henry N. Brooks

autonomy to empower its workforce to express their political will. In fact, it is the very workers who keep the University running who may have the least voice and seek to gain or lose most from election outcomes.

Elite institutions, for better or worse, have cultural capital to set standards and test best practices. If Harvard gives its nearly 40,000 community members Election Day off this year or next, studies the impact of the decision, and starts to build a movement, our society will be better off.

PAGE 5

THE HARVARD CRIMSON | NOVEMBER 1. 2018

ARCHIVE FROM PAGE 1

READING FROM PAGE 1

HLS Opens Case Law Archive benefits” for teaching, research, and legal analysis.

“Case law is the product of public resources poured into our court system,” Cohen wrote in an email.

“It’s great that the public will now have better access to it.”

The Caselaw Access Project will greatly reduce the cost of accessing historical court cases, according to Bavitz.

“If we want to ensure that people have access to justice, that means that we have to ensure that they have access to cases,” Bavitz said. “The text of cases is the law.”

Apart from cost, the new digital repository also makes it easier for programmers to efficiently access large sets of raw court case data.

Researchers can now access text files that enable them to conduct large-scale computer processing, Ziegler said.

He also said he expects to see the public use the database

Library Hosts Shelley Reading

The Harvard Law School library at Langdell Hall is open only to Harvard law affiliates during exam periods. CALEB D. SCHWARTZ—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

to understand how courts influence one another and reveal disagreements between courts.

“The best lawyer can’t even

read one percent [of all court cases in U.S. History],” Ziegler added. “But a computer can, and can do it efficiently.”

Legal experts, like Bavitz,

are hopeful about future developments that can grow out of the materials from the Caselaw Access Project.

“It really invites others

to come along and build new tools on top of that,” Bavitz added. “I think we’re all excited to see what tools people build to tap into this stuff.”

HEALTH FROM PAGE 1

treatment than members of other racial groups.

Asian Americans were the demographic least likely to seek mental health treatment, according to a University of Michigan and Boston University-based study that surveyed over 43,000 United States undergraduate and graduate students from 2012 to 2015.

Hahm first launched AWARE at Wellesley College in 2017, and later extended the program to Boston University.

Jenny H. Hsi, a student at the Harvard School of Public Health who helped implement the program at Harvard, said AWARE is helpful because it gives participants a space to discuss important issues with people of similar backgrounds.

“Part of the reason why we are offering this as a group experience, and not as an individual experience, is also because getting people who may have similar or resonant experiences together in a room often helps

It’s an important moment to reflect on how language intersects with how we relate with each other.

Allison Pingree Director at HILT

Harv. Debuts Mental Health Program sexual risk behaviors, depression, and suicidality.”

Citing the “model minority myth” — the idea that Asian Americans can succeed in the United States regardless of their background — Hahm said people tend to generalize Asian Americans’ experiences and that as a result Asian-American women may feel that their concerns are misunderstood.

“They put them all in one category: if you’re Asian, then you’re great at math, you’re well-off, you’re ambitious, you do well. You don’t have problems,” she said. “In the meantime, our children, our young people, are still suffering.”

Hahm said Asian Americans experience stress from conflicting identities, and — in the cases of many children from immigrant families — the weight of growing up in a “high pressure, high stress, high ambition, but low support” environment. She added that Asian Americans are less likely to seek mental health

Literature and Film” participated in the event because they had studied “Frankenstein” as part of the course. “I was a little nervous when I started, but once you get into the flow of things, it’s so easy to read it because you can feel the emotion of the words,” said Aislinn S. Devlin ’21, a student in the class.

Several participants said they found the event rewarding.

“I like reading aloud,” said reader Hannah M. McCormack ’18. “I think it’s a really fun dynamic that gets added to reading. When I was little, my dad used to read to us aloud for an embarrassingly long time — it was the best way to hear a story.”

English Professor Stephen J. Greenblatt, who also read at the

University Health Services provides care for the Harvard community. MEGAN M. ROSS—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

validate people’s experiences and difficulties,” Hsi said.

Harvard University Health Services is “piloting” the program, and Hsi said the therapists who administer the group sessions at Harvard are of East Asian backgrounds themselves.

The group sessions are focused on topics such as par-

enting styles and disempowerment, body image and discrimination, and sex and substance abuse.

Hahm and Hsi both said previous participants identified the sessions about parental relationships as the most helpful.

“What we do want to get across is that parents who come

Transformative coverage.

The Crimson thecrimson.com

from various Asian cultures who may not have had the same experiences as their children growing up here, they’re operating from a different context,” Hsi said. “The goal is to help the two sides understand each other better.” simone.chu@thecrimson.com

event, said he found the experience of hearing the novel “intellectually illuminating” and emphasized the book’s significance over the past two centuries. “It’s not a small achievement to create a modern myth that anticipated our current anxieties about artificial intelligence, about science fiction creatures, about the human capacity to create life and the possible consequences of creating life,” Greenblatt said. “I mean, she did this miraculously really far anticipation of the actual means that we’ve now developed to do some of the things she was dreaming about.”

Allison Pingree, director of cross-school programming at the Harvard Initiative for Learning and Teaching, said she initially planned to leave after reading her section of the text but decided to stay.

“I think it was about the combination of the celebration, the text, and the community that brought me here, and it’s been wonderful to hear,” she said. “It’s an important moment to reflect on how language intersects with how we relate with each other.”

SPORTS

IN OTHER NEWS

MEN’S ICE HOCKEY

WOMEN’S SOCCER

The team searches for its first win this weekend as conference foes Quinnipiac and Princeton both pay visits to Bright Landry. Its record stands at 0-1 after dropping its opener to Dartmouth.

Women’s Soccer concludes its season this Saturday at home against Columbia.

It will also pay tribute to its seniors, who will be suiting up for the final time.

FOOTBALL

Around the Ivies: Tussle at the Top, Columbia Visits

By JACK STOCKLESS CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Imagine for a moment that you’re driving into New Hampshire’s White Mountains. Palatable fall temperatures have plummeted into the mid-30s, and to make matters worse, freezing rain is in the forecast.

The rain pelts the road and smacks the windshield.

You see taillights ahead, then hazard lights. “Why are these people being this cautious?” you wonder. “The roads won’t freeze at this temperature.”

Not two minutes later, you feel your wheels slip out from underneath you. Luckily you don’t skid off the road, but you realize you could just as easily have ended up in a roadside ditch.

I use this story to open up this week’s Around the Ivies because—if you’ve been paying any attention recently—my Ivy League football picks have belonged in a ditch for a couple of weeks now. At this point, they’re realistically buried there with no true hope of escape, especially since the season is almost over.

If you choose to read on, fasten your seatbelts, throw on your flashers, and stay far, far away from that roadside ditch. ­

PENN AT CORNELL According to The Daily Pennsylvanian, Penn alumnus and Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has plans to open a high-speed transit tunnel in December. The tunnel will span approximately two miles and will be located near the

SpaceX campus in Hawthorne, Calif.

On that note, I think Musk should consider coming back to the East Coast and opening up a transportation hub here.

Sure, you can buy a train ticket to New York or plane ticket to Philadelphia, but there would be nothing quite like a 150mph, $1 train ticket to Cornell or Penn from Cambridge.

The Quakers won’t get to test Musk’s new system this weekend when they travel to western New York. Travel shouldn’t play much of a factor in this one, however.

Penn by 7.5 DARTMOUTH AT PRINCETON

66-0.

No, that’s not a score coming from the women’s rugby team.

Last week, Princeton delivered a smackdown on Cornell, a team that bested Harvard nearly a month ago. The Big Red fell behind, 45-0, at halftime and failed to make any progress chipping into the Tigers’ nine-touchdown and a field goal lead.

This is easily the biggest game of the season. Each team is undefeated overall and in league play, and they stand head and shoulders above the competition. Whichever squad prevails sets itself up nicely to take the conference championship.

With that said, this is also easily my biggest pick of the season. My reputation quite honestly lies in limbo. With a correct pick, I cement my legacy as one of the greatest prog-

nosticators of Ivy League football. Of. All. Time. With a miss, however, my career goes down in flames, tarnished like the New York Yankees’ hopes of getting out of the first round against the Red Sox. Drum roll, please...

Princeton, pick ’em BROWN AT YALE I think I was wrong about Brown.

My co-writer may still have hope, but I just don’t think this is the Bears’ year. At 0-4 in league play, they still have an outside shot at respectability, but after this weekend against Yale, that will likely prove unsalvageable. After picking Brown to win several games that resulted in opposing teams blowing out the Bears, I am officially DONE. I’m off the Brown bandwagon.

Yale by 9.5 COLUMBIA AT HARVARD Owing to a trip to Fenway Park to take on Yale in just over two weeks, this is Harvard’s last true home game of the season. In keeping with the tradition of a team’s last contest on its home turf, the Crimson will celebrate its seniors before the game. However, this matchup coincides with First Year Family Weekend, a fitting time for freshmen to reflect on their first few months in Cambridge as well as the years ahead.

I joined The Crimson’s Sports staff my first semester on campus and began covering the football team during my sophomore fall. As I find myself on

AGAINST THE ELEMENTS Stewart looks for a target in the downpour. TIMOTHY R. O’MEARA—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

my way out, I’ll reflect on what I have learned by taking in the last three seasons of Ivy League football.

I have learned that Columbia may be doomed for all eternity. I have learned that Brown may be in the same predicament.

I have learned that Penn is trying to hold its own in the battle for NFL supremacy. While Harvard currently boasts the most former football players that have advanced to the NFL ranks—led by a healthy dose of FitzMagic—the Quakers are gaining with the addition of the GOAT himself Justin Watson.

I have learned nothing about Princeton’s campus, as I missed out on Harvard’s trip to

New Jersey in 2016 and the two teams have clashed in Boston for the past two seasons. However, I have learned that its football team is pretty decent.

I have learned never to doubt Cornell. Instilled with a contempt for Ithaca, N.Y., ever since I attended my first Sports board meeting, I have grown to appreciate the Ivy League’s arctic outpost and its team’s apparent ability to erase any Harvard lead, no matter how large or how much time is left on the clock.

Finally, I have learned that the game looks a lot different up in the press box than it does down in the concrete bleachers of Harvard Stadium. I have witnessed celebrations in both

places—once favorable, as I found myself amid a roaring crowd in the Crimson’s riveting 14-13 win over Dartmouth in 2015, and once not so favorable, as Yale radio broadcasters broke the 100-decibel mark when the Bulldogs upset Harvard in 2017. Each setting has its advantages: in one, I am able to root openly for my school’s team, and in the other I get free food and get to avoid shattered panes of glass raining down on my head (looking at you, Dartmouth).

I think that covers just about everything.

Harvard by 9.5 jack.stockless@thecrimson.com

MEN’S WATER POLO

New Coast, Same Results for Water Polo’s Sechrest

By JAMES JOYCE CONTRIBUTING WRITER

The California Kid shouldn’t even have been in the weight room that day.

For Austin Sechrest, mornings were forged in persistence.

Early alarms? Not a problem.

Back-breaking workouts? No big deal. Before-school training sessions?

Bring it on. As three-year captain of the Capistrano Valley High School water polo team, Sechrest was used to the pain.

Thus, even when sick, he saw it necessary to make it to morning practice––he may have been too ill to lift weights with his teammates, but nowhere near sick enough to skip out on lifting their spirits.

Little did Sechrest know that much more than an upset stomach would come out of that early morning lift.

“I was really sick that day, so I wasn’t even lifting – I was

just sitting in the weight room with my team,” Sechrest said.

“That’s when I officially found out, via a phone call from the admissions office, that I was going to get in [to Harvard].

Right after I got the call, I told one of my buddies, and then he told one of my other buddies, and the whole team found out pretty quickly. We all left the weight room and told my coach that we were going to go get burritos to celebrate. Afterwards, I dropped everyone off at school and just went home because I was still really sick.”

For Sechrest, now a junior co-captain for the Crimson, post-victory celebrations are both a welcome and frequent part of his water polo career.

Whether the enthusiasm comes from getting into Harvard or tossing the ball into the net during a high-stakes game, success has never had any trouble finding the former Capistrano Valley Cougar. Most recently, Sechrest had a signature

moment in the squad’s Sept. 15 match against the California Golden Bears.

“Our peak this year was definitely beating Cal, the No. 3 team in the country at the time,” Sechrest mused. “I watched the video of it afterwards, and right when we won, the entire team jumped up in the same exact celebration at the exact same time, and everyone in the pool made the same exact fist-pump.”

The underdog victory against the Golden Bears was secured with two crucial goals from Sechrest.

He not only sent the match into extra time with a buzzer-beater past the goalkeeper, but scored the game-winning golden goal in the second overtime period. “it was incredible, something that just shocked the water polo world for sure,” Sechrest said. “The Big Four, which is UCLA, USC, Cal, and Stanford, is generally con-

Sechrest and fellow junior captain Bennie Seybold have led the Crimson to a 19-7 record thus far this season.

sidered untouchable for East Coast teams, so to pull off that win was really special.”

However, as team captain, Sechrest has found himself in an unusual spot. Because both he and his co-captain, defender Bennie Seybold, are juniors, the Harvard water polo squad is one of only two Crimson teams in history to not have at least one senior captain.

Though this situation certainly comes with its obstacles, Sechrest credits much of the team’s recent success with Seybold’s position as a role model.

“Bennie’s a great guy – he’s one of my roommates and my closest friends,” Sechrest said.

“He’s just one of the hardest workers I know, which is why he got elected captain in the first place. He was coming off an injury last year and wasn’t able to play, but every day we saw how hard he was working to get back. He definitely has kept that up and leads by example really well.”

TIMOTHY R. O’MEARA—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

The hallmark of the co-captains’ tenure has been their ability to foster camaraderie among members of the team.

As captains, not only must Sechrest and Seybold promote conviviality between those who have been on the team before, but they must also ensure that new team members seamlessly mesh with the rest of the squad.

“I think we’re getting into a part of the season where we’ve all spent a lot of time together, which is great,” said Nathan Ondracek, a senior attacker on the team.

“I think the freshmen are fully integrated into our system and the existing culture.”

However, Sechrest credits much of his success in creating a coalescent team to the nature of past Harvard water polo squads.

“In general, over the past couple of years, we’ve had a really strong connection between teammates; we’ve had great team camaraderie,” Sechrest said.

“The team is just a fun group of guys to be a part of and we love going out there and battling together.”

Because water polo is a sport that relies on quick and efficient communication between team members, an atmosphere of trust and unity is essential to ensuring long-term success.

According to Ondareck, the bonds between his teammates have been integral both in and out of the pool.

“Having this really close team has definitely helped us in games,” Ondareck said. “We’ve been able to play our best in everything from reading what’s happening in games to making passes and interpreting body language.”

Of course, fostering a close team environment has certainly not been easy for the junior captains.

As third-years, they must straddle the fine line between leading the squad through games and working with their fellow seniors. “[Being captain as a junior]

can definitely be tough, as it’s been a lot of balancing leadership with dictating in a sense,” Sechrest admitted. “At first, it was tough to find a balance between the senior leadership and myself and Bennie, but I’d say that as the season’s gone on, the seniors have really stepped up and done a great job of leading me as well, and I’m really appreciative of that. We all get along well and have been able to join and lead the team together.”

Though the responsibilities of a captain involve serving as the foremost role model for his team, Sechrest and Seybold are not the only water polo players that have stepped into this position.

Rather, many of the seniors on the squad have found their place as example-setters for younger team members this year.

“When we’re in a close game, we need leaders that lead by example and get the team fired up,” Ondareck said. “We have plenty of people doing that, including seniors, so that’s been very helpful to our success.”

However, for the Crimson, the real work is just beginning. Though the team is still focusing on the regular season games that lie ahead, its eyes are set on the upcoming NEWPC Championships.

“We started the season off really strong with a couple of signature wins, but since then, we’ve hit a lull over the past couple of weeks,” Sechrest said.

“I’d say we bounced back pretty well this past weekend, and we’re definitely trending up as we’re going toward our conference championship tournament.”

For Austin Sechrest, the transition from Cougar to Crimson has been anything but easy.

However, the persistence that he embodied over the course of his high school years has certainly carried over into college.

Going into the postseason, Sechrest’s drive will be essential in nailing down yet another one of his celebration-worthy victories.