The Harvard Crimson - Volume CXLIX, No. 76

THE HARVARD CRIMSON

A Throwback Nobody Asked For

STAFF EDITORIAL.

The harm of David Kane’s presence at Harvard and Simmons has transgressed the space-time continuum in a rerun of the past that proper attention to DEI would have prevented.

TITLE

Title IX Complaints Rise PostPandemic

BY THE NUMBERS.

The total number of Title IX complaints and dis closures submitted by Harvard affiliates dropped significantly in fiscal year 2021 before returning to pre-pandemic levels in fiscal year 2022, per a University report re leased Tuesday. The report marked the first time the University has disclosed Title IX data in roughly 18 months.

Ivy League Yield Rates Continue to Rise

BY RAHEM D. HAMID AND NIA L. ORAKWUE CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Across the United States, many colleges and universities are struggling to fill seats.

Between 2009 and 2020, the number of undergraduates enrolled in American colleges shrank by more than 1.6 million.

In Massachusetts, the rate of high school seniors immediately enrolling in college has dropped by approximately 10 percentage points over the last five years.

But as schools across the country scramble to meet enroll ment goals, the Ivy League has the opposite problem.

Yield rates at the eight Ivy schools have soared over the past 30 years, according to a Crimson analysis — and show no sign of slowing. At Harvard, the percent age of admitted students who choose to enroll has gone up by 8 percentage points since 1992.

At most other Ivies, the growth is even more stark: Cornell has seen a 22 percentage point rise in its yield rate over the same period.

“I don’t think the yield land scape for the Ivies is going to change significantly,” wrote Brennan Barnard, director of college counseling at Khan Lab School. “At some point it gets high enough that there is not much room for improvement and it is unlikely to drop.”

The rise isn’t all an accident: highly-selective institutions have admissions tools that can manipulate yield rates, such as restrictive early action and early

Starbucks to Rejoin Harvard Square in New Location

No. 15 Field Hockey on Five-Game Winning Streak

Does Harvard’s AdvisingSystem Work?

Endowment Returns May Bring Bad News

BY ERIC YAN CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Since N.P. “Narv” Narvekar took charge of Harvard’s investments in December 2016, he has avoided a year of negative returns, something his two immediate predecessors could not.

That could soon change.

Last year, Harvard’s endowment soared to its highest ever value, $53.2 billion, after it reported a whopping 33.6 percent return on its investments in fiscal year 2021. But with high inflation and ris ing interest rates rattling financial mar kets, the Harvard Management Company, the University’s investment arm, could be on the brink of delivering its first negative annual returns in five years.

Financial experts say the turbulent market conditions have likely caused

MUSEUMS

Harvard’s investments to struggle over the past fiscal year.

“It has been a challenging fiscal and calendar year for most asset classes,”

Rutgers Business School professor John M. Longo wrote in an email. “I would be surprised to see Harvard or any large en dowment generate meaningful positive returns in the current reporting cycle.”

The Wilshire Trust Universe Compar ison Service estimates that the median university endowment fell by 10.2 percent during the past fiscal year, which ended on June 30.

HMC has not reported a negative re turn on its investments since fiscal year 2016, when the endowment lost almost $2 billion in value.

Since then, HMC has undergone sweeping structural changes, spearhead ed by Narvekar, who arrived in December 2016.

Narvekar instituted a five-year restruc turing plan that moved the endowment away from its “hybrid” investment mod el, under which HMC retained a large inhouse investment staff while also hiring external fund managers to oversee por tions of its assets. Since the completion of the plan in 2020, the vast majority of the University’s investments have been exter nally managed.

Harvard’s endowment is heavily skewed toward alternative investments, such as private equity and hedge funds. In fiscal year 2021, HMC invested 34 percent of the endowment in private equity funds and 33 percent in hedge funds.

It remains unclear whether the com position of Harvard’s endowment will help or hurt its performance.

New York University finance professor David L. Yermack ’85 said he believes al ternative investments will cause univer

sity endowments to perform worse than funds that hold more stocks and bonds, such as pension funds.

“It’s been a bad year for everybody, but the people with the more non-traditional investments are going to get hurt worse,” said Yermack, a former Crimson manag ing editor.

But he added that private equity man agers have “a lot of wiggle room” in inter preting the value of the companies in their portfolios, which could skew the figures that schools ultimately report.

“My own feeling is that these markets have dropped a great deal, but the in vestment managers are going to be very reluctant to admit that and will probably be rather cautious in writing down the value of their investments,” he said. “But I think it’s going to be hard to defend any

Descendants Call for Immediate Return of Human Remains in Harvard Museum Collections

BY CARA J. CHANG AND TARAH D. GILLES CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Harvard agreed to return the remains of 19 likely enslaved individuals to their descendants in a report published last week. But some descendants of enslaved individuals and Native American scholars voiced concerns about a lack of specificity on repatriation timelines.

Tamara K. Lanier — the plaintiff of a high profile lawsuit alleging the Univer sity illegally possesses daguerreotypes of two of her enslaved ancestors, Renty and Delia — condemned Harvard for “saying all the right things” while failing to return the photographs to her.

“They have to recognize that now they are under an obligation to do the right thing and can no longer cover up their past indiscretions, how they have in the past flouted the law,” Lanier said.

Lanier questioned Harvard’s motiva tions in promising to ethically steward and repatriate human remains in its col lections in light of her own court battle

with the University.

A Harvard spokesperson declined to comment on the pending litigation.

Under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990, Harvard is required to return the human remains and associated cultural items removed from Native American lands to their descendants. Since 2020, a separate NAGPRA committee housed within the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography has overseen the returns of Native American human remains.

Last week’s report urged Harvard to accelerate the return of approximately 6,500 Native American human remains at Harvard. Some Native American scholars and advocates called for the immediate return of Native American human re mains and voiced concerns about the lan guage used to describe Native American ancestors.

University of Cincinnati Associate Pro fessor Kenneth B. Tankersley wrote that the University has not published “time lines when all Native American remains, funerary objects, and items of cultural patrimony will be repatriated.”

Harvard should “cease all research on the collections and repatriate all of the Native American and African American human remains,” Tankersley wrote.

Anthony Trujillo, a Harvard Ph.D. can didate in American Studies and member of the Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo, also said the University should prioritize returning the human remains within its collections immediately.

In October 2021, the Peabody Muse um of Archaeology and Ethnography an nounced an interim policy that bars any research, including analytical sampling, on Native American human remains or associated funerary objects “without per mission from authorized Tribal represen tatives.”

The moratorium applies to both cul turally affiliated artifacts — referring to the 30 percent of the Peabody’s collection of Native American ancestral remains that have been connected to at least one tribe — and those deemed culturally un identifiable.

The report on human remains also rec ommends a research and teaching mora torium on any human remains referred

to the newly created Human Remains Re turns Committee, a group charged with repatriating the human remains of the 19 individuals who were likely enslaved and overseeing the return of other human re mains.

Colleen Medicine, program director of the Association on American Indian Affairs and member of the Sault Ste. Ma rie Tribe of Chippewa Indians, also said she felt the report has a “very cold” tone and does not include the language Native Americans use.

We always capitalize the ‘A’ in Ances tors,” Medicine said. “We were taught that when you do use that capital, it lets our ancestors know that we’re still thinking of them in that sacred way.”

Kiani Ku’uleimomi Akina ’25, a Native Hawaiian student, also wished the report had included an acknowledgment of sto len Indigenous land, given how Harvard is located on the ancestral lands of the Mas sachusett Tribe.

Still, Trujillo said he was grateful that the report criticized Harvard’s practices

ADVISING HOLDUPS Harvard lauds its advising system as “the key” to ensuring students can fully explore the school’s cur ricular and co-curricular opportunities. But some students and advisers are less convinced of its success.

SEE PAGE 6

DSO Reaffirms HUA Independence

AAAS Awards W.E.B. Du Bois Medal

HKS Elects Student Body Government

AROUND THE IVIES

Starting this semester, students at Yale College will be able to receive a certificate in Islamic studies. The certificate is joining the ranks of education studies, medieval studies, and trans lation studies as an interdisciplinary certificate offered to undergraduates. Students pursuing the certificate will need to complete five courses that fall under the categories of Islamic society, Islamic history, Islamic religion, and Islamic art, architecture, or literature.

THE YALE DAILY NEWS

The Russian languages and literatures depart ment at Dartmouth is rebranding to the depart ment of East European, Eurasian, and Russian studies, in an effort to be more inclusive. The change comes on the heels of a petition signed by more than 100 Dartmouth affiliates and is part of a larger effort to create more diverse course offerings in the field of Russian and Slavic studies.

THE DARTMOUTH

Dozens of affiliates gathered on the main lawn at Brown University to protest the removal of two graduate students from their programs. The protestors were primarily other graduate students and supporters of the Graduate Labor Organization. The two graduate students were removed for various personal reasons, but the GLO will meet with university administration soon regarding their status.

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Princeton University filed a request last week to dismiss a religious discrimination lawsuit against the school. The lawsuit alleged that Princeton fired its former budget analyst Kate McKinley due to her religious objections to the Covid-19 vaccine and other pandemic proto cols. The filing claims the university did not discriminate against McKinley, who allegedly requested exemptions from the vaccine, testing, mask-wearing, and contact tracing without specifying her religious reasonings for request ing those accommodations.

The Week in Pictures

ACTIVE MINDS. Backpacks owned by victims of suicide were displayed in the Yard on Sept. 26 to symbolize the impact of college student suicide. The exhibit, called “Send Silence Packing,” was put together by the Harvard chapter of Active Minds, an organization focused on addressing the mental health struggles of young adults.

THE

BROWN

ELECTION ATTEMPT. It took two elections, two debates, and eight days longer than expected, but the Harvard Kennedy School has finally elected a new student government. Sam Yoon, a second-year master’s of public policy student, was elected student body president of the Kennedy School on Wednesday. Yoon’s running mate, first-year MPP student Cara E.Oneal-Radigan, will serve as executive vice president.

BY MILES J. HERSZENHORN

HIGHEST HONORS. Seven individuals — including basketball legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and actress Laverne Cox — will be awarded the W.E.B. Du Bois Medal, Harvard’s highest honor in the field of African and African American studies, next month. The awards will be handed down by Harvard’s Hutchins Center for African and African American Research, which announced the recipients last Wednesday.

BY CARA J. CHANG

STUDENT-LED. Representatives from the Dean of Students Office reaffirmed the independence of the Harvard Undergraduate Association in a Monday interview amid controversies surrounding the student government’s early months. The results of the HUA’s first-ever referendum were voided last week because the organization had not yet appointed an election commission. HUA leadership had initially said the DSO would fulfill the role of the election commission until its formal appointment.

BY AUDREY M. APOLLON AND DEKYI T. TSOTSONG

BY JULIAN J. GIORDANO — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

EU LAUNCHES INVESTIGA TIONS INTO NORD STREAM PIPELINE EXPLOSIONS

Two explosions in Nord Stream 1 and 2, two giant natural gas pipelines that run from Russia to Germany, have heightened tensions in Europe and spurred investigations. The EU has pledged a “robust and united response,” according to the Washington Post. Poli cymakers say sabotage by Russia is the likely cause of the explosions. Experts say the explosions could result in the largest-ever single release of methane into the atmosphere, but it may not be enough to have a major impact on climate change. If all the gas from the three sections of damaged pipe reaches the atmosphere, it would be equivalent to about 1/1,000th of estimated annual global methane.

HURRICANE IAN MAKES WAVES IN FLORIDA

Hurricane Ian touched down in Florida late Wednesday, wreaking havoc in the state. Millions of Florida residents faced flood conditions and power outages as one of the strongest storms to ever hit the state moved inland toward Orlando. Ian was a Category 4 hurricane when it touched down near Fort Myers but de creased to a Category 2 by the end of the night. The New York Times reports that the storm had knocked out power for more than two million customers state wide as of Wednesday night, in addition to submerging cars and knocking over hous es. The storm caused significant damage in Fort Myers, Fla. As residents in the state begin to assess the damage, the storm is how headed toward South Carolina.

RUSSIA PLANS TO ANNEX PARTS OF UKRAINE

After a series of staged referendums by the Russian government in occu pied territories of Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin is set to annex key parts of the country. The vote on an nexation took place Sept. 23-27 in Rus sian-controlled parts of the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia re gions. According to the Wall Street Jour nal, the referendums were extremely coercive, with police knocking on doors to collect ballots and reports of explicit threats and people being forced to vote at gunpoint. The Russian government has reported numbers as high as 97% in favor of joining Russia, but Kyiv and Western governments are calling the vote a sham.

Friday 09/30

PARKER QUARTET CONCERT

Paine Hall, 8 p.m. - 9:30 p.m.

Attend a performance by the Grammy Award-win ning Parker Quartet, part of the music depart ment’s Blodgett Chamber Music Series. The concert is open to the public and free with ticket reserva tions.

Saturday 10/01

PARTS OF US: 13TH ANNUAL NIGERI AN INDEPENDENCE DAY GALA Harvard Northwest Labs, 6 p.m. - 10 p.m.

Observe Nigerian Independence Day with the Har vard Nigerian Students Association at their annual gala. The event features student performances, speakers, and traditional Nigerian food. Traditional or semi-formal attire is recommended.

What’s Next

with

preview of what’s on the

Sunday 10/02

FILM SCREENING: GOOD MANNERS

p.m.

around Harvard University

Tuesday 10/04

p.m. -

Quincy Street,

Good

Film

Monday 10/03

ENERGY POLICY SEMINAR: “DE COUPLING FROM CHINA IN CLEAN TECH”

HKS Rubenstein Building R-414 Ab and Virtu al, 12 p.m. - 1:15 p.m.

Attend an energy policy talk led by Michael David son, Assistant Professor in the School of Global Policy and Strategy and the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department at the Uni versity of California San Diego. Buffet-style lunch will be served if attending in-person.

VISUALIZING CAPITAL PUNISH MENT: SPECTACLE, SHAME, AND SYMPATHY

HLS Library Caspersen Room, 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.

The Law School is hosting an exhibition that focus es on using imagery to change perspectives about the death penalty. The exhibition draws material from the Law School’s Historical and Special Col lections and features English execution broadsides, political cartoons, and modern art pieces.

MOVING MOUNTAINS - DEIGHTON ABRAMS

Ceramics Studio, 10 a.m. - 4 p.m.

Check out a new series of ceramic sculptures by Artist In Residence Deighton Abrams that explores the duality between isolation and solitude, science and spirit, human and Nature.

LATINO PIONEERS IN BOSTON Smith Campus Center, 6 p.m. Celebrate Latinx Heritage Month with a documen tary screening of Latino Pioneers in Boston, a trib ute to leaders within the Hispanic community. The screening will be followed by a panel featuring doc umentary maker Blanca Bonillo and several Latino Pioneers and a reception with free food.

The Senate voted on Tuesday to pass a temporary spending package that avoided a government shutdown, as government agencies would have run out of money Friday, Oct. 1. The stopgap legislation will fund government agencies through Dec. 16, in addition to allocating around $12 billion to as sist Ukraine and $2.5 billion to address damage from a wildfire in New Mexico.

According to NPR, passage of the stop gap bill required Democrats to drop an environmental permitting proposal that would have made it easier to build renewable energy infrastructure across the country. The provision was originally included in the legislation to fulfill a prom ise to Democratic Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia.

CORRECTIONS

TIX Disclosures Rise in FY22

HUA Proposes Lofty First Budget in Inaugural Year

BY J. SELLERS HILL CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

The Harvard Undergraduate Association discussed its up coming budget process and the formation of a student election commission at its weekly meet ing on Saturday.

“The election commission will work with the HUA officers and co-presidents to set stan dards for voting operation and ensure fair voting processes with regards to referenda, con stitutional amendments, and elections,” she said.

BY ANJELI R. MACARANAS AND MAYESHA R. SOSHI CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

The total number of Title IX complaints and dis closures submitted by Harvard affiliates dropped sig nificantly in fiscal year 2021 be fore returning to pre-pandem ic levels in fiscal year 2022, per a University report released Tuesday.

Harvard released its annual report on sex and gender-based harassment for fiscal year 2021, along with preliminary disclo sure data for fiscal year 2022. This marks the first time the University has disclosed Title IX data in roughly 18 months — a delay University Title IX Co ordinator Nicole M. Merhill at tributed to complications from the Covid-19 pandemic.

According to the report, the total number of disclosures of potential sexual harassment or other sexual misconduct de creased significantly between fiscal year 2020 and fiscal year 2021, down to 252 from 449 in 2020.

The report attributes the large decrease in disclosures to the campus-wide shift to re mote learning during the pan demic.

TOBY R. MA — CRIMSON DESIGNER/FLOURISH CHART

munity,” Merhill wrote in a let ter included in the report.

More than half of all disclo sures in fiscal year 2021 came from students, with the Col lege’s Title IX office receiving 37 percent of all disclosures.

The report identified 38 per cent of potential perpetrators as students, noting that another 35 percent were faculty, staff, or postdoctorates.

Harvard also saw a decrease in the number of formal com plaints in fiscal year 2021. Pri or to 2021, the number of com plaints to the University’s Office of Dispute Resolution stagnated at around 43. But in 2021, that

Title IX Office rose by nearly 90 percent from fiscal year 2021, an increase of 226 disclosures. The number of formal complaints filed with ODR also increased, rising 52 percent from 27 to 41.

The report also included the demographic information of sexual misconduct cases span ning the last six years. Since fis cal year 2015, Harvard officials saw 66 complaints of unwel come touching other than pene tration and conducted 60 inves tigations into concerns of retal iation.

From fiscal year 2015 to 2022, 63 percent of formal com plaints were filed by females

workshops, and presentations. According to the report, Har vard delivered 199 in-person Title IX training sessions and reached a total of 7,638 partici pants virtually.

Merhill also co-led a work ing group of the National Acad emies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Action Collabo rative from 2019 to 2021.

The group published guid ance on how to utilize campus climate surveys to measure the prevalence of sexual harass ment within colleges.

Tuesday’s report marks the last annual report to be released by ODR in conjunction with the

The meeting saw a change of scenery as the team gathered in the HUA office, rather than the Collaborative Commons, in the Smith Center. The turnout in cluded seven HUA officers in cluding the co-presidents and one student attendee.

HUA Co-Presidents LyLena D. Estabine ’24 and Travis Al len Johnson ’24 kicked off the meeting by unveiling the Asso ciation’s budget process for the 2022-2023 academic year. HUA leadership will submit their proposal by Monday afternoon and meet with the Dean of Stu dents Office Thursday to final ize the budget.

Estabine also presented the Association’s plans for the for mation of a student election commission. Last week, the re sults of the organization’s first referendum were declared void on the grounds that a student election commission had not yet been established.

The application for the HUA election commission opened Friday evening and will close on Wednesday.

Other HUA officers shared updates on their respective teams’ projects.

Allen Johnson presented a new HUA initiative called Fall Town Halls. The HUA will or ganize three town halls during the fall semester to better facil itate communication with the students, he said.

The first town hall will like ly take place in mid-October, Al len Johnson said.

“Something we’ve been re ally debating or discussing as a team is meeting people where they are, so not always hav ing to tell them to come to us at our meetings, but also going to them,” he said. “We want to hear directly from the students about the types of projects and initiatives that they’d like to see HUA work on and prioritize.”

sellers.hill@thecrimson.com

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HGSU, Univ. at Odds Over Benefits Coverage

qualify to apply for employee benefit pools.

But for students like Kaspar ek who conduct independent re search and do not teach, Nock wrote, “benefits are determined exclusively by their student sta tus with the University.”

BY CLAIRE YUAN AND SOPHIA C. SCOTT CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Harvard’s graduate stu dent union is at odds with the University over whether graduate students who are not employed as instructors or research assistants — but still conduct research as part of their graduate programs — are eligible for union benefits.

The Harvard Graduate Stu dent Union-United Automobile Workers’ contract with the Uni versity guarantees student work ers at the school access to benefit funds that cover health expenses, child care, international student services, and more.

The union filed a grievance against the University on be half of students in the Psycholo gy Department last April, claim ing Harvard violated its contract by blocking students who are not hired as instructors, teaching fel lows, or research assistants from applying for benefit funds. The complaint said Psychology stu dents should qualify for student worker benefits because they conduct research as part of their graduate programs. But as the union and University continue to navigate the grievance process, the Psychology Department reaf firmed the ineligibility of some of its students from union coverage.

Steven W. Kasparek, a sec ond-year Ph.D. candidate in the Psychology Department, said he attempted to apply for the HGSU medical and dental reimburse

ment funds in early 2022.But he discovered he was not consid ered a student worker by the Uni versity, a distinction he believes to be a result of the external fund ing he receives from the Nation al Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.

“So I reached out to some union folks, and they said that that was incorrect and that our contract very clearly states that

any student who does research under the supervision of faculty … regardless of funding source, is covered by the contract,” Kaspar ek said.

The union initially helped Kasparek draft a personal griev ance.

“Throughout that process, we realized that there were a lot of students in the Psychology De partment who were in similar

Harvard Says Insurance Co. Should Cover Fees in SFFA Case

BY RAHEM D. HAMID CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Harvard told a federal judge last week that its insurance compa ny was aware of a high-profile lawsuit challenging its race-con scious admissions process, say ing the firm, Zurich American In surance Company, should have to cover the University’s legal fees.

In a brief filed last week, law yers for Harvard asked Judge Al lison D. Burroughs to take its law suit against the insurance firm to trial. The filing comes one month after Zurich asked the court to throw out the case with a summa ry judgment.

Harvard sued Zurich last September, alleging the firm vi olated its contract by refusing to cover the legal fees Harvard racked up in its ongoing litigation against the anti-affirmative ac tion group Students for Fair Ad missions, which currently sits be fore the Supreme Court. Zurich says it should not have to cover Harvard’s legal fees because the school did not notify it of SFFA’s

lawsuit in time.

Harvard purchased an ex cess insurance policy with Zu rich in 2014 for legal fees exceed ing $25 million. The school had also bought a different insurance policy with the American Inter national Group the same year to cover the first $25 million.

Lawyers for Zurich wrote in an August filing that the Univer sity had to notify the firm within 90 days of the AIG’s policy period ending in order for it to cover the excess fees. The 90-day window ended in January 2016, but Har vard did not provide formal no tice until May 2017, according to court filings.

The University has acknowl edged in court filings that it did not formally notify Zurich until May 2017, but it argued in briefs submitted last week that Zurich’s own internal files indicate it was aware of the ongoing suit, which has received widespread nation al media coverage.

“Zurich surely knew about the SFFA Action in the year after it was filed, especially given the sig nificant, ongoing attention that the suit received in local and na tional news,” Harvard’s lawyers wrote.

situations,” Kasparek said. “So we decided to drop the personal grievance and instead file a group grievance for all of Psychology.”

On Sept. 22, Psychology De partment chair Matthew K. Nock sent a statement to grad students “to clarify for our students our understanding of the current HGSU-UAW contract.”

In the statement, Nock differ entiated graduate student teach

ing fellows and research assis tants from graduate students “who are admitted to the Depart ment as students only.” Accord ing to Nock, the students who as sist faculty with instruction or research are recognized as mem bers of the HGSU-UAW bargain ing unit because they are “hired to provide valuable services to the University.”

As part of the union, they

“These students are not stu dent workers covered by the terms of the HGSU-UAW con tract,” he wrote

HGSU released a petition on Sept. 15, which has since gar nered more than 70 signatures from University affiliates, de manding “the Harvard adminis tration immediately grant Psy chology graduate students their rightful in-unit designation.”

The petition claims the union’s contract designates any student who “performs research” while “under the supervision of faculty” as a research assistant — a position protected under the contract.

“This clearly describes ALL Psych PhD work,” an HGSU tweet reads.

The ineligibility of some grad uate students, like those in the Psychology department, from union benefits is “inherently a di versity, equity, and inclusion is sue,” the union wrote in a Sept. 15 tweet.

It added that “students from lower-resource backgrounds, who often also hold other mi noritized identities” are dispro portionately impacted by the policy.

University spokesper son Jason A. Newton wrote in an emailed statement that the mat ter is “working its way through the contractually negotiated grievance and arbitration pro cess, therefore we have no com ment.”

claireyuan@thecrimson.com

Harvard Ed. School Prof. Testifies on Learning Loss in Latin America

BY PATON D. ROBERTS CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Harvard Graduate School of Ed ucation professor Fernando M. Reimers told a Congressional subcommittee last week that Covid-19 has “exacerbated in equalities” in Latin America by reversing decades of improve ments in public education.

Reimers, who leads Harvard’s Global Education Innovation Initiative, testified before a U.S. House subcommittee on Latin America. He told the commit tee that two principal factors af fected peoples’ experience of the pandemic: social class and na tionality.

“The choices that nations made — and not just nations, but what state you’re in, and so on — made a huge difference,” Re imers said in an interview.

you’re helping them with surviv al, education becomes a luxury,” he said.

The pandemic-spurred ineq uities were particularly stark in Latin America, where the sus pension of in-person activities stretched longer than any other world region, he wrote in written testimony submitted to the sub committee.

Reimers began studying Covid-19’s impact on education in March 2020 after speaking with a colleague at the Harvard School of Public Health and re alizing the disease’s potential to become the “most serious crisis in the history of public educa tion,” he said.

The move to virtual instruc tion disproportionately harmed poorer children, many of whom had had limited access to neces sary technologies, he said.

tive collaborations between gov ernments and businesses, which he said occurred at an “unprece dented rate.”

“For a brief period, there was this sense [that] we all thought we could die,” he said. “We real ized we were in this together and that there were goals bigger than ourselves — our narrow inter ests, the bottom line of our com panies — that made it worth our while to collaborate.”

Over the past 25 years, Latin America has invested more on education as a share of govern ment expenditure and GDP than any other region in the world. However, much of the progress was erased during the pandem ic, Reimers said.

Zurich did not pay Harvard for the excess costs once the cap was exceeded, telling the University that it “did not receive timely no tice of the SFFA claim,” according to the school’s initial lawsuit.

Spokespeople for Zurich American Insurance Company and Harvard declined to com ment, citing pending litigation.

While learning suffered across the board during the pan demic, Reimers said poorer chil dren were affected the most.

“If you don’t learn for a year, and your family’s poor, and now

“Many governments made decisions that were not real ly made with the poorest chil dren in mind when they thought about how to continue to edu cate,” he said.

Reimers also lauded effec

“Two decades of progress were wiped out,” he said, “but I have to emphasize it was not wiped out by the virus. They were wiped out by a combination of the virus, poor leadership, and these other vulnerabilities that compounded the impact of the pandemic.”

The Psychology Department is headquartered in William James Hall CORY K. GORCZYCKI — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

HGSU-UAW has filed a grievance claiming Har vard improperly excludes grad students who are not employed as TFs or RAs from benefits.

Kevin J. O’Brien ‘74

Partner at Ford O’Brien Landy

You can’t argue that [Harvard] were the beneficiaries of the scheme instead of the victims. beneficiaries of the scheme instead of the victims.

Does Harvard’s

Advising System Work?

BY LEAH J. TEICHHOLTZ AND VIVI E. LU CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

When Alejandro Gaytan Zepeda ’24, a first-gen eration, low-income student, first stepped onto cam pus, he was surprised by aspects of Harvard life.

“I took college courses my high school years, and that was very different from actually com ing on the residential campus — opposite side of the country, the $50 billion endowment where the top one percent are,” Gaytan Zepeda said.

Like other freshmen, he re ceived a first-year adviser, meant to facilitate his transition from high school to college. But Gay tan Zepeda said he soon realized Harvard’s formal advising sys tem was ill-equipped to provide the necessary support.

“The infrastructure wasn’t re ally there for me,” he said. “I don’t think the adviser had the proper training in terms of how to pro vide resources. I had to do a lot of digging myself.”

Gaytan Zepeda said he ulti mately leaned on upperclassmen for support.

Harvard undergraduates re ceive a series of advisers over the course of their four years at the College. During freshman year, students receive a first-year ad viser, who may also be their livein proctor. Freshmen also receive a Peer Advising Fellow — upper classmen assigned to check in with individual freshmen.

During sophomore year, stu dents are paired with a tutor in their house before receiving a concentration adviser specific to their declared field of study.

Though Gaytan Zepeda de scribed his first two years at Har vard as “difficult” due to insuffi cient support from his assigned advisers, he acknowledged the advising system’s “crucial role” in helping students from all back grounds succeed in the face of Harvard’s rigor.

Indeed, Harvard lauds its ad vising system as “the key to en suring that [students] are able to explore fully all of the curricu lar and co-curricular opportuni ties that exist as part of the liberal arts and sciences education,” ac cording to its website.

But some students and advis ers are less convinced of its mer its.

‘15 Minutes Over Zoom’

For some undergraduates, assigned advisers have fulfilled their roles well, serving as valu able guides through the uncer tainties and challenges of under graduate life.

Sidnee N. Klein ’25 said her first-year adviser helped her steer through both the social and aca demic pressures of Harvard.

“My first-year adviser was re ally helpful,” Klein said. “I felt like our advising sessions were si

Of

multaneously about my mental health but also the trajectory of my classes and [the adviser] was very supportive.”

Victoria M. Zhang ’24 said her advisers were not overbearing but always available when she reached out for help.

“The advisers I’ve had, most of them have been not super handson — which I like,” Zhang said. “Anytime I reach out to them, they respond quickly with very good feedback.”

But others have pointed to gaps in advising system’s ability to provide individualized coun sel, particularly in light of the unique and varied backgrounds of Harvard’s undergraduates: Of the current freshman class, 15.3 percent hail from outside the United States, and a record-high 19.4 percent are the first in their family to attend college.

Alida S. Andon ’25, a first-gen eration college student, said her first-year adviser and proctor were unable to provide sufficient guidance on how to navigate premed requirements.

“I didn’t really have great ad vising until sophomore year. I feel freshman year, they just weren’t really guiding me in the direction I needed,” Andon said. “I didn’t know any of the requirements. I didn’t know the pre-med track.”

and someone that can not only direct you but you can build that connection with.”

Dissatisfied with Harvard’s formal system, some students have turned to older classmates for advice on how to navigate classes, social scenes, and ca reers.

“I’ve actually had more advis ing on classes and what to take and what not to take and more advice from my classmates and peers than my actual adviser,” Marcella R. Ruppert-Gómez ’23 said.

shifts, and identifying what gaps or challenges exist with advising, with an eye to future change and enhancement,” Bhimani wrote.

The Other Side

Advisers are typically Har vard staff members, faculty, or graduate students who opt to ad vise undergraduates on top of their full-time roles.

Kenneth Alyass, a non-resi dent tutor in Leverett House who advises History concentrators, said he was “amazed” by the ad vising Harvard offered its stu dents compared to his under graduate experience.

At the same time, Alyass ques tioned the “trade-off” the system creates for those who choose to be advisers.

son and virtual training sessions, recorded sessions, presentations and a robust tool kit of resources in a new centralized online Advis ing Portal,” Bhimani wrote. “Reg ular communication to members of the advising network contin ues to support the community throughout the year via newslet ters, active Slack groups, on-go ing training sessions, and con sultation with the APO when challenges arise.”

In addition to training, all firstyear advisers — excluding PAFs — receive confidential informa tion about their students, includ ing their Common App materials and test scores, in order to facili tate personalized advice.

Upon arriving on campus, freshman at the College step into advising network that includes an ac ademic adviser, a proctor, a Peer Advising Fellow, and the Resident Dean of FirstYear Students.

are the first in their family to attend college, and 15.3 percent are international students.

Andon attributed the chal lenges to the fact that it was her proctor’s first year in the role and added that her adviser, who also held a dean position, was “really busy.”

Aracely J. Davila ’25 said a “lack of communication” charac terized her freshman advising ex perience.

“I only talked to my advis er twice my whole first year, so I think communication is what was lacking,” Davila said. “It was really up to me to go and find those resources in the first year.”

Before registration each term, students are required to meet with their adviser to get their classes approved and registra tion hold lifted. In contrast to her previous advising experience, Klein said her sophomore ad viser’s role has been relegated to signing off on courses she has al ready selected.

“I’ve needed to navigate — al most advise — myself and then just get confirmation from my ad visers,” Klein said of her experi ence this semester.

Ruppert-Gómez said meet ings with her adviser have been condensed into meeting once per semester for “10, 15 minutes over Zoom” to get her registration hold lifted.

She added she feels there is “a gap” in her relationship with her concentration adviser be cause her career questions are of ten outsourced to other resourc es like Harvard’s Office of Career Services.

“There’s some barrier some how, and I don’t know how to overcome that,” Ruppert-Gomez said. “It’s hard to find someone to really direct you, in my opinion,

In an emailed statement, Ad vising Programs Office Director Aliya S. Bhimani wrote that Har vard students are encouraged to seek informal advisers such as peers and faculty members, not ing that “everyone is willing to help in our community.”

“The beauty of the College’s broad advising network is that it includes peer advising fellows (PAFs), who are in fact older stu dents,” Bhimani wrote. “An advis ing network is large, and students shouldn’t feel bound by certain individuals alone, but should feel empowered to reach out widely.”

Aeden Marcus ’25 said she has been “very happy” with her as signed advisers but finds it “frus trating” that most academic ad vising happens so close to the time of course registration.

“It sometimes is frustrating to not be able to get advising until the week before you choose class es or the week that you’re choos ing classes,” Marcus said. “Har vard does everything so late, but now we don’t have shopping week — it’s different.”

In May, more than 60 percent of Harvard’s faculty voted to re place shopping week — a long time scheduling quirk that al lowed students to sample classes during the week before the start of term — with previous-term registration. The faster registra tion timeline is set to go into effect in spring 2024, raising the ques tion of how the role of academic advising may be impacted.

Shopping week was over whelmingly popular among un dergraduates, with more than 96 percent voting in favor of keeping it during a Sept. 2021 referendum.

Bhimani, the APO direc tor, said the adoption of previ ous-term course registration “ne cessitates change” in Harvard’s advising programs.

“Efforts have thus far gone into understanding how advis ing and support networks cur rently work back on campus af ter the pandemic necessitated

“I feel like universities want to do this stuff really well, but on the cheap, too,” Alyass said. “You think about these roles — con centration adviser, res adviser, all these various advisers, proc tor positions. Ostensibly, they could all be full-time faculty po sitions that just emphasize advis ing and teaching a bit more than research, similar to what they do at private liberal arts colleges.”

Alyass said the system might be improved if faculty members were to fulfill the advising role.

“Would it look differently if we had full-time staff members do ing this stuff instead of grad stu dents or other weird positions?” he added.

One proctor, who spoke to The Crimson on the condition of an onymity out of job security con cerns, said they feel “stretched” by having to provide academ ic advising they feel unprepared for. Last semester, The Crimson reported some proctors felt ele vated levels of burnout and ten sion, with some proctors advis ing double the typical number of students.

“Other universities don’t just outsource this important role to the community. They hire folks who have studied this and know the ins and outs of the curriculum and can really advise students in meaningful and individualized ways,” they said. “Harvard can do better and I hope that they do pay knowledgeable staff to be the ad visers for students in the future.”

In response to concerns about Harvard’s advising system, Bhi mani wrote that “there are many models for success.”

Outside of the College’s aca demic advising system, Harvard hires full-time staff in the Office of Career Services, who answer students’ career questions.

The proctor also said they felt “ill-prepared” to provide academ ic advising for freshmen transi tioning into college, despite at tending trainings hosted by the Board of First-Year Advisers.

Bhimani wrote in her state ment that the Advising Programs Office “leaned in heavily on train ing and supporting all advisers ahead of this academic year.”

“Advisers were offered in-per

“I’m very grateful that Har vard actually gave me all this con text. Otherwise, I would have been very uncomfortable just walking in blind and having to force the student to tell me all these things,” said Pablo Lozano, a new proctor this year. “Harvard was pretty kind in the sense that they weren’t making the students have to retell their story over and over and over again.”

As upperclass men, their support network transitions to a sophomore ad viser, a concen tration adviser, a resident tutor, and a resident dean.

Kenneth Alyass Leverett House Non-ResidentTutor

Outside of offering academ ic advice, proctors and advisers also provide emotional support for students.

“The fine line between aca demic advising and proctoring isn’t always clear because I think oftentimes personal issues blend into the academic aspect,” Loza no said. “I’ve genuinely appreciat ed being able to be a resource that can be accessed at any hour of the day, anytime of the week.”

“It’s just helpful to have some one there constantly reminding you and showing you what re sources and opportunities are available at an institution like this,” he added.

‘An Ideal World’

In a September interview, Dean of Harvard College Rakesh Khurana said the College is cur rently focused on improving freshman advising.

“What we’re going to be look ing at in the future is how we strengthen advising for first-year students who have not yet arrived on campus, and how to under stand how to navigate their aca demic choices as well as under stand the Harvard system more critically,” Khurana said.

Khurana said he hopes “factbased information” becomes more accessible and accurate, making advising more efficient

Freshmen in the Class of 2026 are advised by one of

proctors hired by the College to ease the transition into

life and studies.

The unprec edented size of Harvard College’s Class of 2025 led to an uptick in the number of advisees per proctor during the 2021–2022 academic year. As a result, some proctors experi enced burnout and tension with administrators, an investigation by The Crimson found in April..

The Faculty of Arts and Sci ences Advising Programs Office typically hires 190 upperclass men as Peer Advising Fellows each year.

CORY K. GORCZYCKI — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Sidnee N. Klein ’25

I’ve needed to navigate — almost advise — myself and then just get confirmation from my advisers

“

Would it look differently if we had full-time staff members doing this stuff instead of grad students or other weird positions?

“

for both parties.

“In an ideal world, the advis ers would then spend more time working with certain questions and hearing the student’s per spective and points of view in stead of looking for that informa tion,” Khurana said.

What we’re going to be looking at in the future is how we strengthen advising for first-year students who have not yet arrived on campus...

Rakesh Khurana Dean of Harvard College

In her statement, Bhimani wrote that the APO in the last year has focused on improving train ing for both proctors, non-res ident first-year advisers, and broader College staff.

Maria Keselj ’23, a three-time PAF, said training this year was more substantial than what the APO provided in past years.

“This last year was my first time getting official PAF training. We arrived on campus three days early and had full days of speech es from people and going through scenarios,” said Keselj, a former Crimson Editorial editor.

“My first year being a PAF it was the complete opposite — I was kind of just thrown into the deep end,” she added.

The APO expanded the PAF role this year, training PAFs for the first time to provide academic advising to freshmen — a shift Ke selj described as a “complete 180.”

“Just this year, they intro duced an academic advising portion to the role,” Keselj said. “There’s a perspective that I feel upperclassmen can give on class es, which students can’t other wise obtain through academic advisers or proctors, so it was a good change.”

Still, some students expressed hope for reforms to Harvard’s up perclassman advising system as well.

Gaytan Zepeda said he hopes the College can include an “FGLI voice” in designing changes going forward.

Darian I. Benitez Sanchez ’25 said he misses the many “links to support” that he had through his freshman advising network.

“I really liked the structure where, especially for first-years, you have a PAF and you have your proctor, it’s so many links to support,” Benitez Sanchez said. “That was the best part about the advising system. And if there’s a way to really ramp that up, that would be great.”

leah.teichholtz@thecrimson.com

Internet Culture Boosted Trump to the Presidency, Harvard Scholars Say

BY MILES J. HERSZENHORN CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Harvard professors and re searchers discussed the role memes played in former Pres ident Donald Trump’s success in 2016 during a Harvard Institute of Politics forum on Monday.

Garrett M. Graff ’03 — director of cyber initiatives at Aspen Digital — moderated the panel, which featured Gabriella Coleman, a Harvard profes sor of anthropology; Joan Donovan, a research director at the Shorenstein Center; Emily Dreyfuss, a senior man aging editor of the Shorenstein Cen ter’s Technology and Social Change Project; and Brian Friedberg, a senior researcher at the Shorenstein Center’s Technology and Social Change Proj ect.

Donovan launched the event by discussing the effects of the commer cialization of the internet, which she said led to diminished privacy and in creased dependence on the virtual world.

“We could say the internet be came a problem the first time some one bought a pizza on dominos.com,” Donovan said. “That layer of com merce online moves us away from this free space of information.”

The internet’s ability to track con sumers across apps and search en gines using their personal and fi nancial information coupled with society’s increasing dependence on the internet has led to what some scholars describe as “surveillance capitalism,” according to Donovan.

“It could just be capitalism,” Don ovan added. “But by and large, we’re dealing with a system that is a bit of a trickster in the sense that it is many things to different people.”

For President Trump, the internet was a place where he found some of his earliest supporters.

Dreyfuss said a fringe internet movement that promoted its causes through popular culture and memes quickly embraced Trump because “he was and remains almost the perfect archetype of a meme leader.”

“His hair was already a meme,”

Students in Cronkhite Overflow Housing Petition for Dining Hall

BY DEKYI T. TSOTSONG CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

More than 30 undergraduates liv ing in Cronkhite Center, a former graduate student dormitory cur rently serving as overflow hous ing, have signed onto a petition urging administrators to serve hot food within the building’s din ing hall.

This year, 11 of the 12 upper classman houses have been forced to accommodate students in separate overflow housing. Some students who normally re side in the Radcliffe Quadran gle houses are currently living in Cronkhite Center, which is lo cated next to the Admissions Of fice and roughly a 15-minute walk from their houses.

Cronkhite serves continen tal breakfast, bagged lunch, and Brain Break snacks. Despite liv ing remotely, Cronkhite students are expected to eat hot food in their respective dining halls lo cated in the Quad — an unneces sary burden, some residents say.

The petition, which has gar nered 36 signatures, calls on Har vard administrators to open and fund Cronkhite Center’s own dining hall, citing inequity and harm to house culture. The peti tion was sent to Dean of the Col lege Rakesh Khurana, Dean of Students Katherine G. O’Dair,

and the faculty deans of the Quad houses on Sept. 6.

“This policy burdens all Cronkhite students, either be cause of the tight scheduling that tends to happen around lunch and dinner windows or because of chaotic events in our lives that necessitate being able to quickly grab food,” the petition reads.

“Many of us will wind up not eating—or only eating snacks— for certain meals, which dispro portionately hurts those of us who are low-income and don’t have the financial means to regu larly eat out for $15 meals in Cam bridge,” it continues.

Author Matt C. Mauriello ’2425 wrote in the petition that the lack of in-house dining hall ac cess has negatively impacted the mental and physical health of Cronkhite students, particularly those of first-generation, low-in come backgrounds.

Matthew M. Kim ’25, who signed the petition, said the lack of dining hall access in Cronkh ite is financially “unfair” to its res idents.

“We found it unfair how we’re paying the same board as every body else, but everyone has ac cess to their own d-hall,” he said.

Kim suggested the College re imburse Cronkhite residents through a stipend like Board Plus, a request also stated in the petition.

Cronkhite resident Sebas tian G. Herrera ’25 said there is no “quick access” to hot meals for students living in the build ing. Herrera, who did not sign the petition, said he would have if he had known about the effort.

“I don’t like ordering [food],” he said. “I don’t like wasting mon ey, but if it’s raining, you have to go out in the rain and get your food.”

Gemma C. Rushton ‘25, who did not sign the petition, said she is sometimes forced to eat meals that are not nutritious.

“Some nights, if I work late, then I miss dinner or something, I end up just having a bagel for dinner, which is not the most bal anced, super nutritious meal,” she said.

Currier House Faculty Deans Latanya Sweeney and Sylvia Bar rett wrote in an email response to the petition that student con cerns were “heartfelt and credi ble.”

The deans wrote that they are exploring possible options with the College though “decisions are beyond the house itself.”

“The time seems ripe now, at the beginning of the term before snow falls and courses get too de manding, to find a win-win sus tainable solution,” the deans wrote. “Your message seems to want the same too.”

Sweeney and Barrett also of

Dreyfuss said. “He stood for a certain kind of New York wealth, and power and masculinity to these communi ties, and then he also swore and was not appropriate and did crazy things.”

While the members of this fringe movement did not all share politi cal views and beliefs, they collective ly embraced Trump because he was “willing to trouble the system and push the limits of the system,” Drey fuss said.

Far right-wing political operatives like Steve Bannon and Roger Stone also identified that Trump could ap peal to those who felt disenfranchised by mainstream political movements, according to Dreyfuss.

“They understood that he would be catnip to these alternative media systems and to these folks who want ed something different,” she said. “So they played them.”

Donovan said Trump’s success is also attributable, in part, to “a major unraveling of the DNC.”

“You had the birth of PizzaGate, which is a vehicle for getting people to pay attention to the Podesta emails,”

she said, referring to a conspiracy the ory that developed from leaked emails belonging to Hillary Clinton’s cam paign manager.

While Clinton’s campaign was con sumed with controversy, it lacked the virality that seemed to follow Trump.

“Hillary Clinton was not memora ble, nor was she meme savvy,” Dono van said.

Since Clinton’s loss in 2016, the Democratic Party has increasingly embraced the use of memes in politi cal campaigns.

John K. Fetterman, a Harvard Ken nedy School graduate running for Senate in Pennsylvania, has gained at tention for his social media accounts, which adopt memes and pop culture trends.

But Dreyfuss cautioned against the Democrats embracing meme wars as an effective political strategy for win ning elections.

“Ideally, the meme wars would not be what drives our politics,” Dreyfuss said.

‘REMAINS’ FROM PAGE 1

Descendants Call for Return of Remains

said.

fered to meet with the signatories and College and University ad ministrators to discuss the con cerns.

When asked about the stu dent petition, Associate Dean of Students Lauren Brandt said in a Monday interview that the Col lege views mealtime gatherings as one of the “crucial elements” of residential life.

“The hope, as I understand it, is really to encourage students to connect with their house com munities and the meals that are offered in their dining halls,” she said.

Still, some Cronkhite students say the physical distance between Cronkhite and their tradition al houses makes back-and-forth travel difficult.

Rushton said that adding a shuttle stop directly in front of Cronkhite would be helpful. Five Harvard shuttle routes include a stop at Radcliffe Yard, a roughly five-minute walk from Cronkhite Center.

Herrera said “Cronkhite being part of Cabot means nothing.”

“If you were to ask if I feel dis connected from Cabot, then, yeah, for sure,” he said. “When ever there’s Cabot events, I nev er go.”

“It’s so ridiculously far,” he added.

in obtaining and caring for the remains.

But he added that he hoped for more specificity in the re port regarding next steps. As Harvard works to implement its new policies and return human remains, Trujillo said he wants the University to provide regu lar progress reports on an an nual, if not biannual, basis.

Jaidyn J. Probst ’23, co-pres ident of Natives at Harvard Col lege and member of the Lower Sioux Indian Community, also said she would like to see con crete evidence of returns and dialogues between the Univer sity and tribes.

While the vast majority of human remains are housed at the Peabody Museum, Trujillo and Probst both said repatria tion is a University-wide issue.

“At the end of the day, it’s an institutional problem,” Probst

In a message to affiliates ear lier this month, University Pres ident Lawrence S. Bacow de scribed the report as a “clear roadmap for our community as we seek to fulfill our obliga tions to those individuals whose remains are held by the Univer sity.”

But the implementation of the report’s 13 recommenda tions — as well as the adminis tration of Harvard’s Legacy of Slavery initiative and its $100 million commitment — will largely be left to Bacow’s suc cessor when he leaves the role in June.

Trujillo said he hopes the repatriation of the human re mains is “front and center” in the presidential search.

cara.chang@thecrimson.com tarah.gilles@thecrimson.com

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From left, Garrett M. Graff, Gabriella Coleman, Joan Donovan, Emily Dreyfuss, and Brian Friedberg discuss the role of memes in politics. JULIAN J. GIORDANO — CRIMSON PHO

TOGRAPHER

MEMES FORUM

The Throwback Nobody Asked For

broadly, we commend every student journalist (yes, even our colleagues at the Yale Daily News) committed to truth-seeking and accountability. In this case, it was reporting by student journal ists at the Simmons Voice that brought accusa tions against Kane and his capacity as an instruc tor to question.

BY THE CRIMSON EDITORIAL BOARD

Alot has changed since 2020 — we have cautiously put Covid-19 past us, yet anoth er Harvard shop has tragically replaced the Harvard Square Starbucks, and so on and so forth. But this fall, just like the Starbucks that is set to return to the Square in November, some fix tures from the past have resurfaced — and unlike the holiday-flavored drinks we’re sure to enjoy come wintertime, they leave us with a decidedly sour taste in our mouths.

The figure in question: former Government preceptor David D. Kane, whose employment at Simmons University recently made headlines. In fall 2020, Kane came under fire for moderating the website “EphBlog” and allegedly authoring racist posts under the pseudonym “David Dudley Field ’25” — posts which, among many other hor rific claims, disputed the worthiness of Black stu dents at elite institutions and complained about the criticisms against a literal neo-Nazi organiza tion on Williams’ campus.

This fall, two years after the scandal that led to the end of his contract at Harvard, Kane was hired as a section instructor for the course Statistics 118: “Introductory Statistics” at Simmons University. What happened next was eerily similar to the sit uation that unfolded at Harvard: Simmons stu dents, having discovered the allegations against their new instructor, protested Kane’s hiring by confronting Kane about the EphBlog posts and dropping out of his section. Less than two weeks into the semester, Simmons University canceled Kane’s class after its enrollment numbers dipped below the minimum threshold and subsequent ly announced that his contract with Simmons would not be renewed.

In a statement, Simmons Interim Provost Rus sell Pinizzotto wrote that Kane’s blog posts “did not surface” during the hiring process. We are not quite sure why that was the case: Informa tion on controversies surrounding David Kane’s moderation of EphBlog and alleged authorship of its highly discriminatory content can be easily found with a quick Google search. At best, this in dicates porous hiring protocols in need of review; at worst, this signals willful negligence of an insti tutional commitment to inclusivity.

Given this oversight, we are glad that Kane is no longer teaching for the foreseeable future — a measure which is rightfully owed to the Simmons students who spoke out to protect their campus community and to deny someone with alleged ly racist views a platform and authority as an in structor on campus. To the students who tipped the Simmons Voice, protested, and confronted Kane during class: We commend and applaud you for your hard work and courage.

Historically, student activism has propelled meaningful action on campuses across the coun try and around the world. Just as students have entered institutions and inherited some of their legacies, students have also stepped up to create new chapters in university (and even global!) nar ratives. Student journalists have, in many instanc es, played a crucial role in such student activist initiatives by keeping the student body informed of major campus issues and by holding universi ty administrations accountable. Our colleagues at The Crimson certainly have done so, but more

As we praise Simmons students for their val iance, we sympathize with them for having to go out of their way to make the Simmons campus a safe, welcoming, and inclusive space — a respon sibility that lies in great part with the university administration, and one which was evidently ne glected in the hiring of Kane. Placing the burden on students to opt out of courses taught by faculty who allegedly hold discriminatory views reflects not only questionable professional standards for what constitutes ethical and responsible pedago gy but also a degree of institutional apathy that has tangible, damaging effects on students.

Many universities, Harvard and Simmons in cluded, have pledged an institutional commit ment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. We wish to remind universities writ large that such com mitments require proactive and continuous ac tion in order for such words to function as more than disingenuous PR stunts. DEI is not some ab stract, unattainable ideal that universities can only strive toward but never achieve. As we have opined before, initiatives such as multicultural centers, more consistent and thorough Title IX policies, better accessibility accommodations, and financial aid programs that cultivate socio economic diversity are all steps universities can pursue to actualize their DEI statements. At the same time, we encourage university adminis trators to demonstrate their institutional com mitments to DEI through a review of preexisting policies and protocols — including, as this case makes painfully clear, the hiring process for new instructors.

Students’ concerns about diversity, equity, and inclusion on campus point to a fundamental concern about their sense of belonging. This is sue is directly connected to academic excellence: Rigorous and earnest intellectual engagements that further university missions to educate the next generations of citizens and produce worth while knowledge cannot happen when students feel unwelcome and unsafe. But as students who have felt the same pain, hurt, and confusion as those blindsided by this instance of institutional neglect at Simmons, we believe the most import ant argument here is moral: Time and time again, a lack of attention to DEI — at Harvard and else where — has inflicted mental, physical, and emo tional harms upon students that are, quite plain ly, wrong.

Separated by two years and approximately 2.8 miles, the harm of Kane’s scandal-inducing pres ence at Harvard and Simmons has transgressed the space-time continuum in a rerun of the past that the physics of proper attention to DEI would have prevented. Some unexpected visitors from 2020 are more than welcome; we’ll keep the Pep permint Mochas and holiday-themed cups. But out of concern for the well-being of all our fellow students, we hope we never wake up to another student newspaper headline about Kane again.

David Kane is Harvard’s Institutional Failure

UNIVERSITY HIRING PRACTICES DO NOT EXIST IN A VACUUM; they are another point in a continuum of failed practices that tolerate foul misconduct by professors while forcing students to bear the consequences alone.

BY TOMMY BARONE AND CHRISTINA M. XIAO

Just one short year after he left Harvard mired in scandal, David D. Kane was back and then gone once again.

Kane, once a preceptor for Government 50: “Data” at Harvard, left the University in fall 2020 after allegations arose that he had authored a se ries of racist blog posts under a pseudonym and his contract was not renewed. Barely a year lat er, Kane was poised to make his return to teach ing at nearby Simmons University earlier this fall until students, with the help of excellent student journalism from the Simmons Voice, discovered his checkered past. Protests ensued, and Kane’s class was canceled due to plummeting enroll ment. His contract will not be renewed.

This Editorial Board has spoken before on the strength of the allegations against Kane, con demning the unacceptable harm his alleged posts caused Black students. Now, as then, we re main displeased with the failure of universities to properly vet instructors before hiring them. In this matter, however, we choose to write in dis sent to emphasize that university hiring proce dures do not exist in a vacuum; rather, they are another point in a continuum of failed practic es that, year after year, tolerate foul misconduct by professors while forcing students to bear the consequences alone.

This latest episode in the David Kane saga speaks to a culture of negligence in higher educa tion around issues of diversity, equity, and inclu sion that extends far beyond the hiring process. There is a long, ugly history of Harvard and other universities failing to decisively address miscon duct by professors. This latest instance shows vividly how such dereliction of duty, particular ly by an institution with the power and prestige to make change, allows the rot to fester across ac ademia.

dents to Kane. To that extent, Simmons failed.

But the blame for Kane’s return and the harm it caused lies primarily with Harvard. The very first time misconduct harmful to students oc curs, the administration should respond force fully. When the misconduct is as severe as Kane’s was alleged to be, the instructor should be fired. Information on the fireable offenses should be provided when potential future employers ask for employment records or references. There is no argument for universities to keep information on this sort of misconduct from future employ ers who could use that information in making their own hiring decisions. As a highly influen tial figure in academia, Harvard has immense power here to prevent noxious instructors from spreading their vitriol to other institutions. They didn’t with Kane, and Simmons students paid the price.

“Deep institutional negligence means that right now such harm regularly begins at Harvard.

As students at Harvard, we know that our in stitution commands power. We want Harvard to use that power to prevent every possibility of fu ture abuse of students by instructors. As a lead er among its peer universities, Harvard can and should prevent harm.

Instead, deep institutional negligence means that right now such harm regularly begins at Harvard or is propagated through it. Our Uni versity fails to create decisive, forceful, thorough structures to deal with misconduct, sweeping in cidents under the rug and allowing bad apples to fester at our University and now at others.

We want prevention at the moment that mis conduct occurs — not one career appointment later. No more situations like those of Roland G. Fryer, Jr., Jorge I. Domínguez, or John L. Coma roff, where reports of harmful misconduct built and built before the administration stepped in. It does not escape us that, as we write this, two of those three men continue to teach students. It also does not escape us that a lawsuit by three graduate students against Harvard alleging gross negligence in Title IX arbitration rages on, now with support from the Department of Jus tice.

Harvard should use its reputation amongst universities to remove rot as soon as it’s discov ered. The longer it fails to do so, the deeper the blight of misconduct will fester and spread. Stu dents, for want of a Google search, will contin ue to suffer.

When Simmons hired Kane, they failed to protect their students by failing to conduct a background check thorough enough to turn up the well-publicized controversy surround ing EphBlog. Universities must carefully inves tigate the instructors they hire — student safety demands it. Harvard’s own failures to do so reek of negligence: For example, a new lawsuit claims that Harvard was warned of allegations of sexu al misconduct against John L. Comaroff but went ahead in hiring him as a professor of Anthropol ogy regardless. Lo and behold, he now faces nu merous accusations of the same kind. In the mat ter at hand, just one Google search would have been enough to avoid exposing Simmons’ stu

Tommy Barone ’25, an Associate Editorial Ed itor, lives in Currier House. Christina M. Xiao ’24, an Associate Editorial Editor, is a joint con centrator in Computer Science and Government in Eliot House.

This staff editorial solely represents the major ity view of The Crimson Editorial Board. It is the product of discussions at regular Editorial Board meetings. In order to ensure the impar tiality of our journalism, Crimson editors who choose to opine and vote at these meetings are not involved in the reporting of articles on sim ilar topics.

DAVID KANE’S SCANDAL-INDUC

ING PRESENCE has transgressed the space-time continuum in a rerun of the past that the physics of proper attention to DEI would have prevented.

Dissenting Opinions: Occasionally, The Crim son Editorial Board is divided about the opinion we express in a staff editorial. In these cases, dis senting board members have the opportunity to express their opposition to staff opinion.

“Universities must carefully investigate the instructors they hire — student safety demands it

Harvard Dreams, Allston Nightmares

BY TOMMY BARONE

In 2007, Harvard professor Peter L. Galison wrote of Allston dreams and All ston nightmares.

At that time, just af ter the University had an nounced ambitious plans to expand its presence in Allston, Professor Galison’s piece was an argument for smart design: for a space that would bring together Harvard’s best scientists and hu manists and that people would not want to leave as soon as the day was out. For, in other words, creating an Allston that would be a “fundamental piece of the dy namic center of Harvard Univer sity.”

Maybe Professor Galison got his dream. The SEC is an impe rious, environmentally-friend ly, mixed-use fortress for STEM. The neighboring Enterprise Re search Campus will provide the restaurants, storefronts, and amenities of a vibrant, walkable urban center.

For Harvard, this is a triumph, the summit of a climb decades in the making. But with each angu lar, glistening building, Allston has become less a home for All stonians and more a sandbox for Harvard’s billion-dollar dreams.

Housing costs have risen. Streets have grown more congested. Lo cals have been pushed out. As Harvard has built its dreams, too many Allstonians have lived nightmares.

From 2011 to 2019, the average price of a home in Allston rose by 43 percent, average rent jumped by 36 percent, and, in the biggest change of all, median household income increased by 67 percent. Theoretically, this increase in median household income could just reflect an influx of wealthier people. However, Census data in dicate that the population of All ston not living in group quarters (i.e. non-college-students) has hardly grown since 2010.

This is almost certainly not a story of a few well-monied pro fessors and graduate students moving across the river to join the long-time residents of All ston. Common sense cautions that it almost certainly isn’t a sto ry about thousands of low-in come people miraculously dou bling their income in just eight years, either.

This is a story about Allsto nians being pushed out.

Like almost all American housing crises, supply is the is sue. When high-demand areas like Allston don’t have enough

STAFF EDITORIAL

places for people to live, available residences are subject to vicious bidding wars. In Allston, this has had profound consequences. A report by the Allston Brighton Community Development Cor poration, a housing non-prof it, found that “rising rents have led to closing doors for renters, homeowners and homebuyers.”

In an interview with The Crim son, Anthony P. D’Isidoro, pres ident of the Allston Civic As sociation, described watching “absolutely absurdly ridiculous” price conditions displace locals from his hometown.

This all traces back to Harvard Harvard owns 360 acres of land in the neighborhood — about a third of Allston’s to tal landmass. These properties, which include athletics facilities, the Business School, and the SEC, serve predominantly Harvard af filiates while effectively foreclos ing huge swathes of Allston to residential development. Conse quently, as the Allston Brighton Community Development Cor poration put it, “the lack of vacant land in Allston Brighton makes it nearly impossible to increase the affordable housing stock signifi cantly.”

There are some notable ex ceptions, sure. Harvard has an nounced plans to construct around a thousand residential units across roughly 20 acres of land. It has donated $25 million to support housing affordabili ty in Allston (though this finan cial support might not be need ed if Harvard were required to pay its fair share of taxes). But, as soaring prices in the area demon strate, neither 20 acres nor $25 million can fill a 360-acre void. No neighborhood can remain liv able when almost a third of its land is totally off limits.

people. Nothing decides the course of your life like where you grow up. Housing determines the air you breathe, the food you eat, the schools you attend, the peo ple you know, the crimes you suf fer. Where you begin your life, in a greater sense, decides where you will end it.

In this respect, the experi ence of housing crises across the country makes abundantly clear how Harvard’s Allston adventur ism can hurt people — it has the power to make them poorer, sick er, more isolated, more unhappy, and, in the worst cases, homeless. It can kill.

In light of all of this, unless Harvard expands tenfold its ma terial commitment to replacing the housing it has robbed from Allston, there is unequivocally one just answer to this abject fail ure: Stop building in Allston. Sell the unused land. Clear the way for developers to build housing on it.

It saddens me that, with this most recent staff editorial, the Ed itorial Board has failed to see that — an especially ironic failing giv en our not-so-distant precedent on UC Berkeley’s housing short fall, in which we called on the uni versity to build more housing be cause of the “particular value of access to education.” For this Board to recognize the impera tive of housing for mostly well-off students at elite colleges but not low-income people in our own community is, at best, woefully inconsistent.

But this Board is not alone, and this misstep is no unique moral or intellectual failing. In this na tion, the housing crisis rages on because we fail to imagine some thing better — to consider an al ternative to uninspired and un welcoming low-density sprawl. At Harvard, that means finding innovative new ways to increase density: Building up, down, side ways, every which way but out.

Paul Farmer’s Vision Lives On

BY VIKRAM H. PATEL

How can a research uni versity address problems of health care delivery, especially for the poor or otherwise vulnerable?

The late Paul Farmer asked that same question to open an op-ed published in The Crimson eleven years ago this past May. As we com memorate his remarkable life and legacy at a University-wide memorial event on Octo ber 1, revisiting this question has never been more urgent.

At the heart of Paul’s vision for mobilizing universities to address global health inequi ties are two powerful ideas: That health care is a human right and that disparities in health outcomes and access to quality health care are symptoms of deep historical injustices. This moral clarity guided his life’s work, an essential part of which was his commitment to building global health as a vibrant disci pline for education, research, and service.

The past few years have seen the coinci dence of two major global forces which have highlighted the importance of universities in addressing global health inequities.

First is the growing acknowledgement that health disparities are inseparable from the global history of colonialism which led to the inequitable distribution of power and resources within and between nations — the subject of Paul’s final book.

Second is the deepening of existing health inequities by the pandemic. Witness, for ex ample, higher Covid-19 mortality rates in low-income communities and the offering of now multiple rounds of boosters in wealthy countries while many in less-resourced countries had not even received their first dose. These inequities are all set to worsen as the health consequences of climate change begin to bite deeper, hitting the already worse-off the hardest.

As these global challenges mount, we are called to embrace and advance the legacy Paul left us.

We must do so with a clear moral vision. Strong collaborations with institutions that serve low-income or marginalized popula tions are at the heart of our efforts to realize global health equity. Such partnerships must be founded upon the kind of long-term, con sistent commitment necessary for building deep and mutually rewarding relationships.

how we might further his vision of “accom paniment” — an approach to global health that calls for universities like ours to part ner deeply with less-privileged institutions that closely align with our mission. There is no place in global health for those who wish to bungee jump in and out of contexts like tourists. Accompaniment requires a deep and long-term investment in mutual capac ity across fields and disciplines. It is essen tial for these collaborations to be acknowl edged as central to the University’s mission to create a more equitable world. Our part ner institutions offer unprecedented and privileged access to populations in disad vantaged contexts that is essential for global health research and practice. Moreover, we need to emphasize that investing in partner ships with such institutions is not an act of charity but a fulfillment of duty.

We must also acknowledge that global health is not just about people in other coun tries; vast health disparities persist in the U.S. despite the fact that we spend much more on health care than any other country in the world. Our partnerships must also embrace domestic institutions serving populations with poorer health outcomes and limited ac cess to quality care, including rural commu nities and low-income neighborhoods.

In the concluding remarks of his op-ed, Paul wrote that “taking global health from a hobby to a serious pursuit is well within our reach if we commit adequate resources to a series of tasks that include research, train ing, and improved delivery of quality care.” We pride ourselves on being a University committed to solving the world’s most press ing problems through education, research and service, and there can be few issues as important as global health equity.

The responsibility for the All ston housing crisis is unambig uously Harvard’s, and it should make anyone who proclaims to care about justice absolutely fu rious.

There is no way to overstate how much housing crises harm

Professor Galison’s call for a shining new frontier of cam pus just across the Charles end ed with a reminder that “times have changed” — that we can re imagine what our University is. Today, 15 years later, it is precise ly because times have changed in Allston that I call on us to reimag ine how we approach Allston yet again.

Harvard’s dreams and All ston’s nightmares are one and the same. It’s time for both to end.

Tommy Barone ’25, an Associate Editorial Editor, lives in Currier

As Paul argued in his op-ed, it is insufficient to invest solely in one’s own students and fac ulty; instead, he argued that “every training program at Harvard should be ‘mirrored’ by similar commitments to help our host coun tries address their own training needs, since in each of these countries there are talented students and trainees who would also like to devote themselves to improving the health of their fellow citizens.” Turning these stirring words into bold action, Paul spearheaded the founding of the University of Global Health Equity in Rwanda in 2014, which has since emerged as a major force in the field in the Global South.

The best memorial we can offer for Paul’s untimely passing is critical reflection on

Eleven years after Paul called on us to treat global health as more than just a hobby, it is time for the University to rededicate itself to the goals and vision that he lived by and an imated so brilliantly through partnerships with institutions serving the poor and mar ginalized. Harvard’s commitment to redress its role in slavery by financing partnerships with historically Black educational institu tions in the U.S. offers a model for how we might similarly nurture partnerships with institutions in the Global South. We need to do this both because of our moral respon sibility to support equity, social justice, and human rights and dignity and because such partnerships represent a fundamental asset to nurture, support, and value global health. Without this kind of commitment, the mis sion of Harvard Medical School to “nurture a diverse, inclusive community dedicated to alleviating suffering and improving health and well-being for all through excellence in teaching and learning, discovery and schol arship, and service and leadership” cannot truly be realized.

Vikram H. Patel is the Pershing Square Pro fessor of Global Health at Harvard Medical School and a professor in the Department of Global Health and Population at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Allston and Harvard’s Growing Pains

BY THE CRIMSON EDITORIAL BOARD

Apologies Cam bridge loyalists: Allston is here to stay.

A year after Harvard opened its landmark Science and Engineering Complex in Allston, growing shares of the student body are frequently visiting the neighborhood for classes, shifting our institutional center of gravity towards the Charles’ shores. Harvard’s ambitious spurt, years in the making, is finally coming to life — and with it comes increased scru tiny on the hidden costs behind our newest lecture halls.

Our board has opined on the Allston initiatives repeatedly in the past, trac ing Harvard’s progressive expansion year after year; we have come to accept the path of ‘progress’ — of glimmering architectural complexes and Veritas prints — as almost inescapable. Assess ing the overall toll of our University’s presence remains, on the other hand, an ongoing and daunting task.

Harvard’s presence in Allston, while relatively disruptive, is not necessarily a bad thing — nor does it have to be, as suming responsible stewardship and investments to minimize our institu tion’s growing pains. The new cam pus isn’t just a boon for the swarms of students who now get to take classes in slightly newer, far away buildings: If one believes in the productive im pacts of academia writ large, the busy lecture halls and labs across the riv

er are bound to facilitate the sort of knowledge creation that can prove im mensely socially beneficial. The School of Engineering and Applied Sciences complex, for example, might spur the expansion of research programs wres tling with some of the biggest questions in medicine, climate science, or other deeply impactful fields.

The upsides to the expansion ar en’t exclusively hypothetical. Har vard’s growth will bring — has brought, in some cases — undeniable, tangible benefits to the Allston community. The proposed Enterprise Research Com plex, for example, has been dubbed a project “for everyone” by Universi ty President Lawrence S. Bacow, and claims to offer opportunities to All ston’s own residents. Outside Harvard’s vast confines, the sheer influx of affili ates into Allston will almost certain ly increase foot traffic in the area, ex panding the customer base of Allston businesses and hopefully boosting the neighborhood’s sometimes meager economy.

Promising initiatives and glim mering buildings do not, however, ful ly capture the development’s local footprint — nor do they convey its po tentially taxing impact on some resi dents. Allstonians have good reason to be skeptical of Harvard’s good faith. The University’s secretive land-buying strategy — which saw it purchase acres across the river under a generic devel oper’s name for eight years, in what has been deemed exemplary of “the high

est level of arrogance” — sowed right ful distrust between the University and town leaders. The ensuing rift will not heal overnight, and Harvard’s lacklus ter, contemporaneous response, which dismissed years’ worth of mischarac terizations as “fiscally prudent,” hardly helped. The University must, if nothing else, acknowledge that it understands how its past behavior feeds current ret icence. Moving forward, transparen cy (and not financial prudency) must be the norm: Future and ongoing plans shouldn’t be kept secret for the benefit

ready committed some $25 million to affordable housing in Allston. Com mendable as that investment may be, it pales in comparison to the estimated $1 billion tab for the SEAS complex.

Housing affordability is an almost intractable issue and often involves hefty amounts of bureaucracy, but Har vard, using its institutional heft, ought to at least make an effort to engage with the Allston government to push for the zoning changes that would make af fordable housing projects more feasi ble. The University should, at the same

should serve its old residents just as much as its new ones. Every University decision — land purchase disclosures, urban investments, housing initiatives — must convey an understanding of the colossal impacts of our growth on some locals, and reflect a willingness to maximize the benefits they will reap.

While our Allston chapter will, in all likelihood, bring forth substantial benefits for academia and society alike, that progress must not come at the ex pense of the people whose community we are transforming.

SEPTEMBER 30, 2022 THE HARVARD CRIMSON EDITORIAL 9 “

Harvard must keep engaging, hum bly and respectfully, with the govern ment and the local community in All ston while planning new projects, lest it falls into the all too common tenden cy to frame itself as an economic ac tivity-spurring savior while sweeping away the concerns of those we claim to be helping.

of Harvard’s finances to the detriment of locals. Residents of the communities our development plans might affect are entitled to helpful, timely updates regarding our institutional expansion.

Those future plans should also in clude tangible benefits for the most vulnerable in Allston — the families and individuals who will likely face rising rents as their secluded corner of Boston becomes a vibrant Crimson hotspot. Harvard has, to its credit, al

time, remain mindful of other exter nalities of its presence in the area, en suring that future projects remain en vironmentally friendly (as exemplified by the surprisingly ‘green’ SEAS build ing) and continue pushing for public transportation improvements in the area; our multi-million dollar pledge to a new planned MBTA stop is a good start.

The bottom line, for our Board, is that Harvard’s developments in Allston

Harvard is on track to make Allston a second Cambridge. But as we rush to wards our new, expansive campus, we ought to remember that we aren’t the only ones — nor the first ones — to call the neighborhood home.

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 or der to ensure the impartiality of our jour nalism, Crimson editors who choose to opine and vote at these meetings are not involved in the reporting of articles on similar topics.

The responsibility for the Allston housing crisis in unambiguously Harvard’s.

Moving forward, transparency (and not financial prudency) must be the norm: Future and ongoing pans shouldn’t be kept secret for the benefit of Harvard’s finances to the detriment of locals.

Starbucks Set to Return to Square

BY KATE DELVAL GONZALEZ CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Just in time for peppermint and holiday drinks, Star bucks will return to Har vard Square in November — right down the road from its previous location on Massachusetts Ave nue.

The new location will join the recently renovated El Jefe’s Taqueria and the new Central Rock Gym in the Abbot Building, which previously housed the fa mous Curious George Store.

Since 2018, three Starbucks coffee shops have closed in Har vard Square — the most recent one in November 2021, when the company closed its popular 1380 Massachusetts Ave. location.

A Starbucks spokesperson wrote in a November email that the decision to close the store last year came “after careful consid eration” and a review “to ensure a healthy store portfolio.” The loca tion has since been taken over by the Harvard Shop.

Harvard Square Business As sociation Executive Director De nise A. Jillson said many who frequent the Square were left mourning the loss of the last Star bucks shop after its doors closed.

“There has been a lot of lamenting since Starbucks at Harvard Yard closed, because,

as you might remember, we had four Starbucks at one point,” Jill son said.

“You discover how much you really miss something when it’s no longer there,” she added.

Nearly a year later, students said they are excited about the re turn of Starbucks to the Square.

Peter A. Jin ‘25 said he thinks “it makes sense that there should be the option for Starbucks for anyone” on a college campus.

Jillson described the incom ing manager of the new Star bucks store, John Corredor, as “a veteran Starbucks employ ee” who is “very familiar with the

Square.”

Corredor previously worked at the Harvard Yard Starbucks lo cation.

“Starbucks has been a longtime member of the Harvard Square Business Association. They are terrific community partners,” Jillson said.

Though the new Starbucks lo cation in the Abbot building will be smaller, Jillson said the Square is “delighted to have them back.”

“We’re anxious for November. We’re anxious for that iconic lo cation,” Jillson said.

kate.delvalgonzalez@thecrimson.com

State Officials Detail Plans to Improve Herter Park

BY DANISH BAJWA CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Massachusetts state officials out lined plans on Wednesday to re vitalize Herter Park in Allston by improving access to the Charles River and narrowing Soldier’s Field Road to create space for “green transportation.”

The state released its 2022 Herter Park Master Plan earlier this month, which outlined pro posals to improve the 56-acre area alongside the Charles River.

Ginna Johnson, deputy chief of design and project manage ment at the state Department of Conservation and Recreation, said the plan will help “enhance public access” to the river, “re store a healthy riverbank and parkland ecology,” and “reflect the cultural values” of the park.

The master plan outlines rec ommendations to improve ac cess to the park by instituting a “road diet” that would eliminate the westbound lanes on Soldier’s Field Road in favor of a shareduse path. The eastbound lanes would be reconfigured for twoway traffic.

Under the plan, high school rowing operations would also be relocated to part of a revitalized Herter Center.

The master plan would “re duce the volume of runoff that reaches the sewer system or the Charles River, through the reduc tion of impervious surfaces and the use of bioretention and vege tated swales,” it said.

It would also seek to improve community gardens by adding raised garden beds and mesh fencing.

But some attendees at the meeting raised concerns about

the state’s plans for the park, cit ing prolonged construction time lines.

Longtime Allston resident An thony P. “Tony” D’Isidoro said at the webinar that the construc tion period required for the “road diet” would hinder access to the river over the next several years.

“Development activity in the community has not ceased — as a matter of fact, it’s being accel erated, especially along Soldier’s Field Road and Western Ave.,” D’Isidoro said. “And it has a direct impact on access and safety to all the great work that the DCI wants to do to Herter Park.”

Johnson, the Massachusetts DCR representative, said the con struction would be worth it in the long term.

“We like to say that DCR is in the forever business — projects feel like they take forever,” she said. “This one is coming just as quickly as a new project can.”

Galen Mook, the executive di rector of Massachusetts Bicy cle Coalition, said he supports the “road diet” plan, but worries about communication between city and state agencies.

“I’ve been to these meetings and I don’t have confidence that the left hand and the right hand are talking to each other,” he said, referring to the city of Boston and the DCR.

Mook called for more “pub lic facing” dialogues between the two governments. Other attend ees said the proposal would in hibit vehicular traffic, including ambulances, on the road.

“There’s a range of opinions here,” Johnson said. “DCR has a lot of work to do to balance per spectives and to analyze metrics.”

danish.bajwa@thecrimson.com

Cambridge to Create Racial Equity Committees

BY ELIAS J. SCHISGALL CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

The Cambridge City Council dis cussed plans to create a pair of committees to address issues af fecting the city’s Black residents during a Thursday meeting.

The public hearing, held by the Council’s Civic Unity Commit tee, centered around two policy orders — one to establish a Task Force To Examine the Status and Wellbeing of the City’s African American/Black Population and the second to create a Commis sion on the Status of Black Men and Boys.

The Council adopted both or ders at the beginning of August.

Councilor E. Denise Simmons, who sponsored both policy or ders, said in an email she hopes the two committees will serve as a lasting force for combating ra cial inequities in Cambridge.

“I’m interested in figuring out how we can implement some thing that is solution-oriented, that becomes a part of the City’s DNA, and that is built to evolve and gain momentum long after a new crop of elected officials and administration officials have ar rived,” Simmons wrote.

While discussions around ra cial equity in Cambridge have been ongoing for decades, she said, the city has failed to make it a priority in practice.

“As a city, we tend to place our focus on the most urgent prob lems of the moment,” she wrote.

“After we have made that head way, another, newer problem ris es up and grabs our attention, and maybe we take our eye off the ball from the original issue we were addressing.”

The second policy order is modeled off a similar program in Boston, which has had a Black Men and Boys Commission — housed in the city’s Office of Black Male Advancement — since 2021.

Boston’s Black Men and Boys Commission was initially pro posed by a city councilor in 2014, but it was vetoed by former Bos ton Mayor Martin J. Walsh.

Isaac H. Yablo, the policy and

research director at the Boston Office of Black Male Advance ment, originally proposed that Cambridge create its own com mission in a policy recommenda tion sent to the Council in May.

Yablo said in an interview that a government body dedicat ed to advocating for Black men and boys specifically — rather than people of color in general — would help address inequities in the cities of Boston and Cam bridge.

“There’s plenty of data that show that there is a need for this commission to exist,” Yablo said.

“Particular marginalized popula tions within the BIPOC commu nity often get forgotten.”

According to Yablo’s propos al, similar offices or commissions focusing on advocacy for Black men also exist in Portland, Ore., Baltimore, and Philadelphia.

In her email, Simmons said it was “imperative” that the city also consider the experience of Black women and girls in Cam bridge.

“I believe we need to see what the experience of ALL these in dividuals is, what programs we have that are currently support ing these folks, and what addi tional supports could be effec tive,” Simmons wrote.

The proposed Commission on the Status of Black Men and Boys will give policy recommenda tions to the Council and the city manager on a range of issues, in cluding housing, economic op portunity, education, incarcera tion, and public health, according to the policy order.

elias.schisgall@thecrimson.com

The Abbott Building is set to become Starbucks’ new home in Harvard Square. The chain was previously located on Massachusetts Ave., but closed the store in November. ADDISON Y. LIU — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Isaac H. Yablo, Office of Black Male Advancement

Particular marginalized populations within the BIPOC community often get forgotten.

Zelensky Accuses Russia of Trying to Draft Ukrainians into Military

a Ukrainian student about how people studying abroad can use their knowledge to help rebuild Ukraine after the war, Zelensky said that the “key resource” of any nation is its people.

READ IT IN FIVE MINUTES

BY MILES J. HERSZENHORN CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Ukrainian President Volo dymyr Zelensky accused the Russian government of staging a set of referendums in an effort to draft thousands of Ukrainians into the Russian mil itary while speaking at a Har vard Institute of Politics forum on Tuesday.

Speaking via Zoom to a packed IOP crowd, Zelensky said Russia will soon announce its annex ation of Luhansk, Donetsk, Kher son and Zaporizhzhia — the four partially occupied Ukrainian re gions where voting ended on Tuesday in the staged referen dums.

Russian state media reported that over 96 percent of voters in each referendum supported join ing the Russian Federation — but Zelesnky and other Western gov ernments have called the elec tions a “sham.”

Zelensky said the “so-called” referendums and Russian Presi dent Vladimir Putin’s partial mo bilization of the Russian military last week represented a calculat ed effort by the Russian govern ment to use Ukrainians to fight its war against Ukraine.

“They did it in preparation of annexation, with a clear aim to also muster and call up residents at those occupied territories —

to force hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians of the occupied territories to be enlisted in their army,” Zelensky said through a translator.

Zelensky, who appeared in one of his trademark mili tary-green T-shirts, was greeted with a 30-second standing ova tion and a flurry of laudatory questions from audience mem bers at the IOP. Zelensky urged members of the crowd to take Russia seriously in its threats to use nuclear weapons.

“Even at the level of rhetoric, this already amounts to a crime,” Zelensky said. “Nuclear black mail, annexation threats — the mere statements already earn some rigid action in response to prevent any such catastrophic scenario.”

Zelensky also discussed how the war has forced Ukrainians of all ages to become leaders.

“We’ve become leaders in war,” Zelensky said. “We were compelled to become those in our sheer attempt to withstand

the evil.”

“Meanwhile, we have many Ukrainians who are demonstrat ing the newly discovered leader ship skills every day on the front line,” he added. “We have kids col lecting donations for the front line, we have kids who even sim ply bring water to our servicemen at checkpoints, we have wonder ful health care professionals, we have nurses doing the utmost to help those wounded and maimed in the war.”

In response to a question from

Harvard, from the Law School to Longwood.

Ukraine will need to rebuild its infrastructure and revive its universities and other intellectu al institutions, Zelesnky said.

“Given the amount of dam age inflicted by Russian troops, I think there will be time and place for you, with your head, with your brains, with your education,” Zel ensky said.

In an interview after the event, former Harvard Kennedy School Dean Graham T. Allison ’62 ar gued that Western universities should be opening their doors to educate and train Ukrainian and Russian students alike.

Zelensky has previously called on Western countries to ban all Russian citizens from crossing their borders — regardless of whether they support Putin.

Allison, who sat in the front row during the forum, said Zelen sky’s call for a blanket ban on Rus sian citizens is “not sensible.”

“I’ve argued, to the contrary, that the U.S. should be recruit ing super-talents out of Russia to demonstrate, as [Zelensky] said today, that ultimately, a country is the talent of its people,” Allison said.

“If the most talented people get up with their feet and walk out of a country that’s led by a leader they don’t respect, into a blind al ley that they don’t want to go into, that country will be weaker in the long run,” he added.

miles.herszenhorn@thecrimson.com

William, the Prince of Wales, will come to Boston with his wife Catherine on Dec. 2, for the 2022 Earthshot awards, according to the Boston Globe. The Prince planned to attend the Earthshot Prize Innovation Summit in New York City, but was unable to come due to the death of his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II. The Earthshot prize is awarded to five of fifteen final ists who present solutions to ad dress climate change, according to its website. The ceremony in December will be held at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Dorchester. The name of the award is a reference to the moonshot pledge made by former President John F. Kennedy ’40, in which he committed the United States to landing a man on the moon.

The Cambridge Ordinance Committee voted 7-1 on a pro posal to eliminate parking min imums citywide on Wednesday. The proposal is set to expire on November 1 and is now headed to the City Council where it will need two council votes to become law. Currently, developments are re quired to have minimum parking spaces based on various factors such as building and lot size. Bur han Azeem, one of the councilors who voted in favor of eliminating parking minimums, said the ex isting policy creates unnecessary costs and that the new proposal will not reduce parking. The Planning Board voiced concerns about the proposal and stated it was unable to recommend imple mentation.

‘RETURNS’ FROM PAGE 1 estimate that isn’t pretty negative in these asset classes, on the order of maybe a 20 percent drop.”

Endowment Returns Could Bring Bad News

Other experts, however, said HMC’s tendency toward alterna tive investments may work in its favor. Harvard Business School professor Luis M. Viceira said HMC’s investments in hedge funds are designed to “cushion” losses in other parts of its portfo lio.

“We hope that the hedge fund side of the portfolio is doing the job and helping to smooth out any falls in valuations and any nega tive returns probably the endow ment is going to experience on the equity side — which is the largest side of the investments,” he said.

Ultimately, experts said, a like ly decline in HMC’s investment performance during the past fis cal year is more a reflection of market conditions than bad strat egy.

“They did well last year and crowed about it,” Charles A. Sko rina, the head of a finance execu tive search firm, said. “This year, they’re going to have to say, ‘Oops, guess we didn’t do so well — be cause the market tanked.’”

eric.yan@thecrimson.com

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks via Zoom at a Harvard Institute of Politics forum on Tuesday.

The discussion was moderated by former U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter, the director of the Harvard Ken nedy School’s Belfer Center. CORY K. GORCZYCKI — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

PRINCE OF WALES TO VISIT BOSTON

PROPOSAL TO END PARKING MINIMUMS

WAR IN UKRAINE

ON TUESDAY, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zel ensky spoke via Zoom to a packed crowd at a Harvard Institute of Politics forum event.

YOUNGJAE

ON IDENTITY, PERFORMANCE, AND HIS RECENT SUCCESS

BY STELLA A. GILBERT

WRITER

Rapper, track and field athlete, and engineering sciences ma jor Jaeschel O. Acheampong ’24 is unlimited. Also known as “YoungJae,” Acheampong navi gates three different worlds with a deft touch.

In an interview with The Har vard Crimson, the rapper de scribed his tripartite identity.

“The student is good in front of parents, church elders…That’s the LinkedIn Jaeschel,” he said with a smile. “As the athlete — whether it’s CEOs or people who aren’t always on the right path — there’s a certain level of respect given to me. Then there’s the rap per. Honestly, rappers aren’t seen in the best light; they’re viewed as people who are smoking, drink ing, doing nefarious stuff.”

This September, Acheam pong opened for Social House at Harvard’s first in-person Crim son Jam in three years. “I was pac ing the whole time before I went on. My mouth was dry. And I was tired — I had my album release the night before and honestly, I had a problem set due.”

Crimson Jam wasn’t Acheam pong’s first performance, but he was hoping for it to be his best. By his own metrics, he had failed twice before. His first failure was

at Black Convocation 2021 — the audience was seated, floors car peted, and in the church venue he couldn’t use profanity, mean ing he had to alter his set. He performed, but it wasn’t like the “real” rappers that he idolized like Kanye West, The Weeknd, and Kendrick Lamar. He also con siders his second performance, at the Nigerian Students Associ ation Gala, a failure, despite re ceiving generally positive feed back. “I was scared because of the first failure so the second perfor mance just didn’t go how I want ed. I lacked the confidence to pull it off,” he said.

YoungJae didn’t let these two failures limit him. With his self-ti tled album “Jaeschel,” which dropped the day before Crimson Jam, he planned to teach the audi ence his music as he performed. He’d plan to skip some words to catch his breath and confidently hype up the crowd before beat drops, guiding the audience to shape his perfect show.

“I was nervous because I was

0-2,” the artist said. “I knew that if I did this right, it was going to work. I knew where I messed up before, what I needed to fix. So if I just stuck to the plan and per formed, it’d work.”

And it did work. Entering the stage to a chorus of cheers from classmates, teammates, and new fans, Acheampong began with “avenue,” the first song on “Jaeschel.” As the song slowly picked up, building anticipation, the audience doubled, pulling people in for the duration of the show.

The pressure of a spotlight isn’t new to Acheampong. “When I warm up for a track meet, that’s when I feel the real nerves. But on my first full-speed acceleration, when I see myself flying down the track, that’s when I know: ‘Okay. Let’s do it,’” he said. On the first beat drop of “avenue,” Acheam pong clearly hit his stride, shed ding his nerves and winning the crowd over.

The rapper continued his set with “talking to myself,” “in somniac,” and “tuned in,” the audience dancing and cheering

throughout. The crowd was so engaged that as Acheampong prepared to depart, he was met with a chorus of chants demand ing an encore.

Acheampong hadn’t planned an encore. “Mind you, I failed twice before. And now these peo ple I’d never seen before were happy as hell to see me perform. So I said: ‘I want to live this forev er. Let’s do it.’”He performed an impromptu rendition of “tuned in” with fantastic crowd control and audience participation. He left the stage victorious, proving himself worthy of the cheers that echoed across Harvard Yard.

Before Crimson Jam and his album release, Acheampong was able to keep his identities as a stu dent, athlete, and rapper distinct, avoiding the judgments resulting from their apparent contradic tions. Now that Harvard is get ting to know the whole Acheam pong, he’s had to learn how to let all three facets coexist.

Acheampong’s main concern was how members of his identi ty groups would perceive his ho listic self. “I thought my coach [Marc Mangiacotti] wanted that pure student-athlete. But when I started posting stuff and saw he was liking and sharing, I re alized he actually supports this true form of Jaeschel,” he said. His dad, a choir director, showed a similarly appreciated accep

tance of his rap career.

A song that encapsulates his blended identity is “wolves,” from “Jaeschel.” “The first half of the song sounds like a church choir. That’s the student, professional Jaeschel. And I’m rapping about being successful in track, that’s my athletic drive. And then being an artist — the song is the most production I’ve ever done and it features artists from home and Berklee. “Wolves” encapsulates all three things that define me most,” he said.

“I gotta keep running / Run ning so fast Imma crash / But I pick up the pieces and finish / Just sit here in listen / Fuck if my body start failing me I know I got more in my system / So fuck it let’s spin it.” — excerpt from “wolves” by YoungJae.

“Mind you, I failed twice before. And now these people I’d never seen before were happy as hell to see me perform

Zurin Villanueva Shines as ‘Tina’ Takes the Stage

BY OLLIE J. MARINACCIO AND ELLA L. JONES CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

As the lights come on, the audi ence hears chanting and gospel circling the stage while a young girl looks over a woman with the unmistakable silhouette of Tina Turner’s iconic blond hair. The opening scene sets the tone of the production: centered on an adult Tina trying to stay true to her young self, hold onto the ones she loves, and stay committed to her faith, all while building a success ful career.

“Tina” opened on Broadway in Nov. 2019, but like the rest of shows on at the time, experienced a shutdown that lasted over a year. In the summer of 2022, the show announced its closure on Broadway and set out to take on a national tour. On Wednesday, Sept. 21, the show made its debut at Boston’s Citizens Bank Opera House.

The musical is a retelling of the life and career of Tina Turn er, an iconic singer, performer, and Rock and Roll Hall of Fam er. The audience is taken through her life starting from her child hood in Nutbush, Tennessee, ad olescence in St. Louis, to life on the road with Ike Turner, their vi olent marriage and subsequent divorce. In the second half of the

show, Tina exists as a solo artist, taking viewers through her strug gle to establish herself separate from Ike and as the Tina known today.

The musical’s strengths, un fortunately, don’t lie in the plot. The storyline consists of short, loosely connected vignettes over a large timespan. The songs — which were not arranged in the order in which they were released — at times felt out of place in the narrative. That being said, the tal ent of the actors playing Tina, her grandmother, young Anna-Mae, and her mother strengthened the performance enough for au diences to sometimes turn a blid eye at the shortcomings of the plot.

The true hook of the whole show is the incredible range of voices the cast brings. Stunning ly, one of the cleanest and most powerful voices on stage is that of Little Anna-Mae, played by Ayvah Johnson. In an early scene at church, Little Anna-Mae belts out her first chillingly impres sive notes. In the span of only a few minutes, she manages to ex press the complex rollercoast er of emotions of a young child who longs to feel joy, but is put through hell over many years.

Similarly to young Anna-Mae, Gran Georgeanna plays a pivotal part in Tina’s life, reappearing in moments of reflection or doubt.

Ann Nesby, who plays the char acter, is herself a well-established actress and musical artist, a sixtime Grammy solo nominee and two-time winner with her group, Sounds of Blackness. These two characters in particular set teen age Anna-Mae, before Ike names her Tina, to become a deeply pas sionate young woman ready to pursue her dreams at all costs.

Zurin Villanueva, like Tina herself, is phenomenal. She car ries the show on her shoulders as a powerhouse in nearly every song, morphing her voice to age as Tina’s voice did through her decades of music-making. If this musical were a Tina Turner cov er concert by Villanueva and the band, it might well have been an even greater hit.

The musical doesn’t shy away from trying to show how Turn er’s life was affected by abusive men, from her father to her mar riage with Ike Turner. Unfortu nately, not all the actors were up to the task of delivering serious ness and the attention necessary to portray these relationships. Especially the portrayal of Ike Turner by Garrett Turner, which at times felt unserious, creates a character who was more strange than evil. Throughout the show, Ike speaks and sings in a gravel voice, adding an air of comedy to incredibly serious interactions. In the end, much of Tina’s life

story is lost to the effort of making a complicated, R-rated story into something digestible and PG. This simplification paired with the inconsistency between song and dialogue makes events from Tina Turner’s actual life hard to distinguish from her imaginary and emotional world. However,

Acheampong’s identity played a significant role in the de cision to self-title his album. “I used to tell Harvard people that my name was Jae. And my mom hates that, she’d say, ‘I gave you the name Jaeschel, call yourself Jaeschel. Don’t tell people your name is Jae to make it easier on them.’ And that’s when I realized how much weight my name held in my mom’s eyes. I wanted this album to tell a story about the raw Jaeschel. Therefore, the best title had to be ‘Jaeschel,’” he said.

Acheampong recognizes the value, even necessity, of navigat ing all components of his identity together. “In my ideal world, I’m able to excel in each one of those: scholar, athlete, artist. If I can do those three things, it’s the most authentic form of myself. I’ll be unlimited,” he said.

You can find Jaeschel Ache ampong as “YoungJae” on Spoti fy and “Jaeschel” on social media. Support him by sharing his mu sic, and keep an eye out for the de luxe concert version of “Jaeschel” dropping soon.

THE HARVARD CRIMSON

Jaeschel O. Acheampong Musician, “YoungJae”

the plot does well in the scenes where the awareness of awk wardness is clear, like when Tina and Irwin fall for each other to the backtrack of the non-Tina demo of “What’s Love Got to Do with It.” Despite the plot’s shortcom ings, the performance of wellloved songs shines through. As

Villanueva, Nesby, and Johnson sang, the audience was trans ported back in time — as if hear ing Tina Turner herself through each moment of her life.

FILM

Only a few months ago, droves stam peded movie theaters to see the gaudy, campy ode to The King of Rock and Roll that was Baz Luhrmann’s “Elvis.” En tranced by Vegas marquees and Aus tin Butler’s Mississippi-Memphis ac cent, viewers caught a glimpse of the Elvis-manic culture that defined the mid-century. But the Elvis that Luhr mann introduced to the world appears much like the rocker’s candy-red bed room: Too rosy to be true.

Luhrmann brought the most positive version of Elvis back into cultural con sciousness. For months last summer, he trapped viewers in a saccharine shrine to The King, made even sweeter by the almost perfect portrayal that Butler delivered. And now, Sofia Coppola wants to take those same movie-goers back to cotton candy land — maybe.

Contributing writer Avery Britt breaks down this next Elvis biop ic — which will actually center on the rockstar’s wife, Priscilla Pres ley. “When Priscilla’s image is praised, specifically,” Britt writes, “it underpins a culture of manipulation and abuse.”

A Symphony of Flavors? Artistic Tastes and Fine Dining

TRIBUTE.“Great work, brother,” said the man, nodding at the girl who spoke up. “It’s inspiring. She’s always drawing.

BY DANIEL WANG CONTRIBUTING WRITER

T he position of the culi nary arts within the world of creative expression is much like that of a 12-year-old in a college seminar. Our aspir ing seventh grader, being the youngest person in the room, re ceives showers of attention, but the steely-eyed septuagenarian leading “Introduction to Sociolo gy” treats him as an inferior. Sim ilarly, cultural critics view the cu linary arts as artistic, but not an art form in and of itself. They con sider paying £255 for a meal to be ludicrous, but find coughing up $105 million for a five-hundredyear old sheet of fabric covered in egg yolk and colored powder to be a “bargain.” They complain about the most expensive restaurant in the U.S. charging $800 for a threehour omakase experience, but voice no opinions about the going rate for first row seats at Sir Elton John’s farewell concert in Atlanta (Sept. 22, 2022): $9,729.

The debate is not about wheth er anybody should fork over thou sands of dollars to experience art. Rather, this essay questions the arbitrary cultural bias against the culinary arts and the practice of “fine dining.” The present outcry against tasting menus is a case in point. To understand the crux

of this argument, some context about the history and definition of tasting menus is necessary. From where did they originate? What distinguishes them from other forms of dining?

Although chefs have served lengthy menus highlighting sig nature dishes since the early 1900s, it was the French nouvelle cuisine movement of the 1970s that introduced the concept of a holistic culinary experience in which chefs dictated most, if not all gustatory decisions. Such es teemed establishments as Paul Bocuse’s “L’Auberge du Pont de Collonges” and Jean and Pierre Troisgros’ “Les Frères Troisgros” first coined the term “menu dé gustation,” or “tasting menu.”

Based on the number of cours es and the size of portions served, however, these early degusta tions did not resemble today’s tasting menus. Ferran Adrià’s “El Bulli” is the nearest culinary an cestor to the contemporary tast ing menu. Beginning in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, diners at the institution were served fifty plus courses over five hours, each dish no more than several bites.

The basic unifying principle of all tasting menus is a rever sal of traditional power dynam ics between producer and con sumer. At its core, a tasting menu format allows the culinary team to calibrate every element of the dining experience. If Grant Ach atz decides to serve a Coronavi rus-shaped canapé at his three Michelin-starred culinary stal wart Alinea during the height of the pandemic, every table will re ceive a bluish-gray half-sphere

of coconut custard studded with freeze-dried raspberries. This authority is not immune to crit icism. Like all artists, chefs are subject to praise and admonish ment.

Critics oftentimes associate tasting menus with elitist insti tutions due to the prices at which they are offered. Yet, a multi-hun dred dollar price tag is far from a requirement. Indeed, a growing movement of restaurateurs are offering tasting menus at the $50 to $100 range. This reduction is possible partly because providing a tasting menu actually decreas es a restaurant’s expenses. Know ing the specific service menu and the exact number of reser vations for a particular night in forms restaurants’ supply orders. Venues that only serve a tasting menu thus reduce food waste, and, consequently, their operat ing costs. The savings associated with offering tasting menus often allow restaurants to provide liv able wages to employees, too. For instance, at Somerville’s Juliet, minimum hourly compensation is fixed at $16, irrespective of tips and service-charge. Moreover, a raise is guaranteed after work ing at the restaurant for one year. In the best case scenario, owners, employees, and diners all benefit.

Still, Despite the growing movement towards more af fordable tastings, profit mon gering still exists at restaurants exclusively serving degusta tion menus. Moreover, the reve nue earned by posh restaurants such as Blue Hill at Stone Barns does not necessarily lead to high er wages and better working con

ditions for restaurant workers. However, these are issues that plague the entire hospitality in dustry, not just restaurants serv ing tasting menus.

So, what about tasting menus in particular disgusts so many cultural commentators? The cu linary freedom given to chefs and their teams.

According to Executive Direc tor of the Food and Society poli cy program Corby Kummer, the leaders of the tasting menu move ment are “a new army of freshfaced Stalins” that “prepares to spread tyranny across the land.” The diner, Kummer writes, is “like a theatergoer, a passive par ticipant in a spectacle he can ei ther like or lump.”

By that logic, however, ev ery concertgoer should riot at the possibility of a set program. Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony? Why not change that to Mahler’s Second for the evening? That’s treason!

In every field of expression generally recognized as an “art”— think music, drama, dance, and the visual arts — the creator’s imagination is held sacred: ars gratia artis. Yet, in gastronomy, “art for the sake of art” apparent ly goes by a different name: to talitarianism. Sure, patronage exists in all forms of creative ex pression. Nowhere else, howev er, does the patron determine the product like in the culinary art ists. It is time to grant culinary artists the respect they deserve. Just ask the 12 year old.

‘Poor Unfortunate Souls’: The Dangers Of Disney’s Attempts at Representation

BY MARLEY DIAS CONTRIBUTING WRITER

“Disney’s Live-Action ‘Little Mer maid’ Casts Halle Bailey as Ariel” read Variety’s front page on July 3, 2019. These words sent waves throughout the expansive and dark waters of Twitter, conjuring up a villainous — arguably Ursu la-like — tirade against the casting known as #NotMyAriel. Ameri cans spent their Fourth of July de bating whether a natural redhead must play the role of Ariel and raising questions about the hypo thetical possibility of Black peo ple realistically being mermaids.

Regardless of the details, the clear outpouring of anti-Black rhetoric against Bailey revealed that many Americans want to protect their classic Disney tales and were un comfortable with attempts to in clude people of color in the foun dational stories of the “most magical place on Earth.”

Of course, this is not to say that this announcement was not a ma jor win for Black girl representa tion. Halle Bailey is the first Afri can American live-action Disney

Princess ever, following in the footsteps of the original animated film “The Princess and the Frog” (2009) which featured actress and singer Anika Noni Rose as Prin cess Tiana.

Although “The Little Mer maid” presents an opportunity for impactful representation, Dis ney’s decision to remake white films with characters of color of ten fosters racism against the ac tors themselves. Disney must consider making original diverse content and anti-racism a priority not only through their casting but also through their production de velopment. White audiences are sensitive to the traditions of their favorite characters, and without a holistic response from the corpo ration itself, actors like Bailey are left to deal with backlash by them selves.

In n interview two months af ter the announcement Bailey said, “I don’t pay attention to the neg ativity; I just feel like this role is something bigger than me.” But perhaps two things can be true simultaneously. She’s right ––her casting was monumental for Black women and girls — yet the

burden of being a trailblazer re quires unimaginable strength to carry on her own. She was only 19 at the time of her casting, with only five past acting credits.

After the release of a teaser trailer for the film in early Sep tember, it is clear that Bailey’s Ari el is of the same merit as Jodi Ben son’s original 1992 performance. With red locks and angelic vocals, she represents a new kind of Ari el, one which has already impact ed the young girls she represents. Compilations of Black girls’ reac tions to the trailer have gone viral online as an example of the pow er of authenticity and media rep resentation, countering the over whelming 1.5 million dislikes left on the trailer before dislikes were disabled by the Walt Disney Stu dios YouTube channel.

It may be easy for supporters of #NotMyAriel to code their an ti-Blackness as concern for au thenticity, but Disney has histor ically changed the ethnicity of characters, just rarely from cau casian to African American. The same complaints prompted by Bailey’s casting did not apply to Elizabeth Olsen’s casting as Ro

mani character Wanda Maximoff or Tilda Swinton’s portrayal of the Ancient One, a Tibetan character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

A pat of what guarded Ol sen and Swinton from heavy ridi cule for their casting was not only their whiteness but also the fact that their work was more or less original content. Instead of re making movies that audiences have already grown fond of and are eager to defend, they rewrote themselves as the first on-screen iterations of their characters and thus were able to evade the same degree of criticism Bailey faced.

Disney has made advances in the diversity of their content, but remakes with actors of color put these actors under fire and create controversy that limits the suc cess of their projects. Represen tation cannot be limited to the re cycling of white characters and instead should be a top down ef fort to create accurate, moving, and original stories about people of color, both fantastical and real istic.

Heedless of the negative feed back, ABC announced this week that Afro-Filipina singer Gabriel

The line to see Australian singer and songwriter Courtney Bar nett stretched far down the street outside the House of Blues Boston on Sept. 12, showcasing the cities local hipsters in their finest in beanies, Doc Martens, and a variety of uniquely-pat terned pants.

On tour for her latest album, 2021’s “Things Take Time, Take Time,” Barnett is an experienced stage presence. From the moment she first appeared amongst the enthusiastic crowd in an all white outfit that absorbed the color of the blue spotlights, she was already perfectly at home.

The concert was a balance of songs from her newest album, opening with “Rae Street,” and beloved songs from across her dis cography including “Avant Gardener” and “Pedestrian at Best.” Barnett was liberated and unworried on stage, writes Crimson staff writer Lena M. Tinker from front row.

The whole concert felt like an encounter with a unique presence: someone who is trying to be genuine and honest in a difficult world. It is this feeling that makes her fans love her so much, and that made the concert a fully transportive experience.

MUSIC TELEVISION

School is back in session at “Abbott Elementary,” and everyone’s favorite teachers haven’t missed a beat since viewers last saw them. The sophomore season of the lovable, endlessly witty ABC sitcom premiered on Sept. 21 and had no trouble living up to the show’s already-high expectations

“Abbott,” writes Crimson staff writer Brady M. Connolly, sets itself apart from the rest of the crowded television landscape in a quite obvious, yet rather remarkable manner: It tells genuinely fun ny jokes. By constantly shifting between biting sarcasm and heart felt naivete, the show strikes an impressive tonal balance, leaving audiences consistently surprised and delighted by the next highly specific quip about the daily struggles of elementary school teach ers. Never afraid to tackle bigger issues, “Abbott Elementary” thrives as an undeniably charming sitcom with something to say.

la “H.E.R.” Wilson will play Belle in the 30th Anniversary of “Beau ty and Beast” in a blended live and animated special on air this De cember. The public’s response has been more positive than the one to Bailey’s casting, but the project is still missing the mark on success ful representation. Why can’t Wil

son play an original Afro-Filipina princess and show children a mul ticultural narrative? Disney has placed an imaginary barrier on the kind of stories it can tell, creat ing repercussions not just for au diences, but for the industry itself.

Halle Bailey recently made her debut as Disney’s princess Ariel. EPK.TV — COURTESY IMAGE

RCA RECORDS — COURTESY IMAGE

ABC/GILLES MINGASSON— COURTESY IMAGE

FIFTEEN QUESTIONS

Q&A:

DIANA ECK ON INTERFAITH DIALOGUE, LOWELL’S RUSSIAN BELLS, AND HER FAVORITE POETRY

BY AKILA V. MUTHUKUMAR CRIMSON MAGAZINE ASSOCIATE EDITOR

Diana L. Eck, Professor of Comparative Reli gion and Indian Stud ies, served as Lowell’s Faculty Dean alongside her wife Dorothy A. Austin for 20 years. She currently resides right off a busy Cambridge intersection, in a cozy two-story home brimming with books and her two roaming cats. This interview has been ed ited for length and clarity.

FM: You last spoke to FM in 2011. What are some of the big gest shifts you’ve seen in re ligious diversity around you since then?

Diana L. Eck: If I’m looking at the wider United States, I think reli gious diversity has just continued to grow. And I think that’s prob ably true at Harvard as well. At Harvard, we have a dynamic Is lamic community, a Hindu com munity – it’s been a few years since I’ve hosted Diwali at the Faculty Deans’ residence at Low ell House, but it was always huge ly attended: piles of shoes at the front door and at the back door, and no furniture at all; the al tar set up in the living room, fire place, and everyone crowded in elbow to elbow.

It is not the godless Harvard that people used to speak of, in the old days. It’s one in which there is a lot of religious life and also just a lot of cultural life that is not particularly religious.

FM: You launched the Plural ism Project in 1991 to study the changing religious landscape in the United States. What has been the most fulfilling part of the project thus far?

DLE: The most rewarding part of this has been to look over the long haul and look at some of the challenges that have been devel oping in just about every aspect of American public life, whether it’s in hospitals, or city councils, or public schools, or colleges and universities, even corporations, where they have a much more religiously diverse clientele, stu dent, body, citizenry, whatever, and need to think about policies and programs that are workable in this kind of environment. What we have done is to write case stud ies that are a bit like the ones they use at Harvard Business School. They have a protagonist — some one in the city council, or in the mayor’s office, or maybe the may or himself — who needs to think about a new dilemma.

FM: Are there any interviews for these case studies you con ducted that stand out to you?

DLE: A lot of my writing is inter view-based. In terms of the ac tual case studies, most of them have been written by my Senior Researcher, Elinor Pierce, who is brilliant, both as a researcher and also as a writer, and extremely careful and respectful of the peo ple she talks to. She’s been a real boon.

FM: At Harvard, there have been tensions between stu dents and some faith-based or ganizations because of accusa tions about discrimation and homophobia that is perpetuat ed or justified by religion. How would you suggest students ap proach these types of conver sations?

FM: From Montana to India to Cambridge, what has been your favorite place to live?

DLE: I like them all. I love Mon tana. My mother died a few years ago, and I’ve had to deal with her home. I spent one week out there this summer with people I’ve known most of my life. There’s a lot that is grounded in that kind of place, where your roots are so very deep. But I don’t live there now. And I’m not likely to go back and live there.

FM: What do you miss most about living in Lowell?

DLE: The Faculty Deans’ resi dence is connected just a few steps from the dining hall. I’m sort of a late-night person. I get a cup of coffee or cocoa or some thing late at night to see people working and have a chance just to talk for a few minutes. I liked the fact that I could deal with folks in the kitchen and servery staff, as well as the landscaping peo ple because we had a nice little garden in the back, and I used to get down on my knees and plant things every springtime.

FM: In 2008, Lowell returned its bells to their original home in a Moscow monastery in ex change for a replica set. Could you tell me more about the bells’ return?

DLE: We went up to the bell tow er to see these famous bells, and then we realized that they were covered with icons, and it made sense that they were seen as na tional treasures in Russia.

It was really interesting going to Russia to visit foundries, trudg ing around different parts of Rus sia where they had started mak ing bells again, and negotiating a deal. Then they [the Russians] came and made sort of pink rub ber castings of all the decorative motifs on the bells. They rolled all of that up in their suitcases — we went out to Target with them and bought suitcases — took them back to Russia, and created a set of bells that had these same iconographic features. Eventual ly those bells were loaded on the ship and came to Boston.

FM: What is something that you feel you’ve learned through quarantine?

DLE: I’ve learned how import ant the human face is. Dorothy [my wife] has dementia, and it became a little more prominent. She used to be a really great lec turer and teacher and preach er at Memorial Church. Dorothy is someone who really responds to people who she can see, so ev ery time we had only people she couldn’t see [due to masks] it was a little alienating.

FM: How is Dorothy now? DLE: She was one of those minis ters who just loved to stand at the door of the church and hug peo ple as they went out. So all of that was lost, really. But she’s dealing with her life with a lot of digni ty. And I think she realizes how much she’s lost — you can’t un dergo this kind of diminishment of your ability to speak and to move about freely and whatnot, without some inner comprehen sion of that.

FM: You’re known to be a reg ular at Lowell’s Poemicals. What’s your favorite poem?

DLE: Now, I fully admit that there are Christian perspectives that have been and still are condemnatory of homosexual practice. I think it is not only a problem because it is so ex clusive, but I think it’s theologically wrong. There are a lot of Christian bodies, including the church I go to, that are explicitly welcoming of gay and lesbian people and whose the ology is based not on judgment, but on justice and on love. People need a context in which to explore sexu al identity and Christianity. It can be academic or personal, but it needs to go beyond simply complaining or accusations.

FM: How can we seek to under stand other religions?

DLE: There’s a bright thread run ning through most of them that re ally prioritizes relationship and love and human dignity and equality. It might be in relation to the diversity of religious traditions: is it import ant that my religion is true, exclu sive of yours? What does it mean for religion to be true? Where does that

truth reside? Is it somewhere in the sky? Or is it in the human heart?

FM: What role do conversations about other religions have on a college campus?

DLE: There are fairly robust inter faith communities where people ac tually get together and talk about tough issues. [At Harvard], the Inter faith Forum goes on year after year. You don’t have to wait for an enthu siastic group of students to reinvent it. That’s a pretty good sign. But there are a lot of people for whom going to something like that is not their cup of tea. The way in which they learn the most is their freshman room mates, their friend group. Diversity is sort of the life you live; it’s not nec essarily something you go to.

FM: How would you describe how fully you have to engage with a dif ferent religion in a close relation ship?

DLE: A close relationship with someone of a different religious or

cultural tradition requires some knowledge, requires some work. Tolerance won’t take you very far when it comes to the tough issues of life. You need a mutual sense of how much family matters because it could be that the two of you are fine, but marriage isn’t simply something that has two people in it. Families get conjoined in weddings.

FM: How do you bridge these gaps from your own personal back ground and identity to working with people who are different?

DLE: I did grow up Christian. It was a church that really was based more on loving relationships and a real concern for social justice. So we did a lot of things that were very much part of working across what you might call cultural boundaries. I decided to take this opportunity to do a junior year in India and went to Banaras Hindu University. It was a pretty big transition. I learned a huge amount there. And it was real ly that experience that drove me into the comparative study of religion.

DLE: One of the Four Quartets of T.S. Eliot. It’s called “Little Gid ding.”

FM: What is your favorite part about having cats?

DLE: I love their company. They are lap-sitting cats. When they sit on your lap and purr, it’s like nothing else in the world. I will reveal another personal story about this, which is that my least favorite thing about having cats is cleaning their litter box.

Fifteen Minutes is the magazine of The Harvard Crimson. To read other longform pieces, visit THECRIMSON.COM/ MAGAZINE

THE COMPARATIVE RELIGION PROFESSOR sat down to discuss religious pluralism in the United States as well as on Harvard’s campus. “It is not the godless Harvard that people used to speak of, in the old days,” she says.

ADDISON Y. LIU — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Display in Yard Raises Suicide Awareness

BY LUCAS J. WALSH, AND VIVIAN

Roughly 1,000 backpacks symbolizing the annu al toll of college student suicide in the United States were spread throughout Harvard Yard on Friday in a display seeking to raise awareness about student mental health.

The display, called “Send Si lence Packing,” was put together by the Harvard chapter of Active Minds, an organization focused on addressing the mental health struggles of young adults. It was the second year in a row the group organized the display in Harvard Yard.

The backpacks, some of which belonged to students who died by suicide, were donated by people who have lost loved ones. Many backpacks were accompa nied by a laminated sheet of pa per telling the story of the stu dent who once wore it.

The display was first put on by an Active Minds chapter in Washington, D.C., in 2008. Since then, “Send Silence Packing” has been shown more than 200 times, reaching over 1 million visitors.

“We’re just trying to provide support for individuals on many levels,” said Kathryn S. Boit ’23, co-president of the Harvard chapter of Active Minds.

Members of the organization were positioned throughout the Yard on Friday to answer ques tions from passersby and provide resources if necessary. Several clinicians from Harvard Univer sity Health Services’ Counseling and Mental Health Services also

staffed the event.

“I’m really struck by how hon est and vulnerable the conver sations are with people who are visiting the display,” Boit said. “Nobody’s immune to suicid al thoughts or behavior, and it’s just something that hits home for me.”

Planning for the event started in March, Boit said.

Michelle Y. Canas-Garcia ’26, who passed through the Yard while the display was up, said she thought the demonstration was an important way to raise aware ness for suicide prevention.

“It’s a little less triggering than fully speaking on it because it’s almost like you’re reading it, and you’re kind of able to differ entiate yourself and empathize more,” Canas-Garcia said of the display.

Claire Yang ’26, who perused the exhibit on Friday afternoon, said the display was “very mov ing.”

tive Minds member who worked a shift in the Yard on Friday, said the display created a sense of sol idarity around an important top ic.

“I really appreciate that peo ple put together the time to or ganize something like this,” she said. “As someone who has had friends that struggled with men tal health and depression, I think it’s something very important that should be talked about.”

Santiago Salazar ’26, an Ac

“The most important part of this display is knowing that you are not alone in case you need to reach out for help,” Salazar said.

Boit said she hoped the event would help encourage students to point their friends toward get ting help when they need it.

“How we talk about mental health — especially to a friend — could be a matter of whether or not someone gets treatment, whether or not someone seeks out help,” Boit said.

Brammy Rajakumar ’23, co-president of Active Minds, said it is important to have open discussions about mental health at Harvard given the high-pres sure environment at the school, adding that it can be challenging for students to give themselves a break.

“There’s a range of needs,” she said. “These all deserve to be met, and they all deserve access to re sources.”

The Harvard chapter of Active Minds placed roughly 1,000 backpacks in Harvard Yard Friday to symbolize the annual toll of college student suicide. LUCAS J. WALSH — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

The backpacks displayed contained personal stories belonging to students who died by suicide. Students by had the opportunity to read about the lives of those affected. JULIAN J. GIORDANO — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

vivian.zhao@thecrimson.com lucas.walsh@thecrimson.com

Kevin J. O’Brien ‘74 Partner at Ford O’Brien Landy

Nobody’s immune to suicidal thoughts or behavior, and it’s just something that hits home for me.

“

Kevin J. O’Brien ‘74 Partner at Ford O’Brien Landy

“The most important part of this display is knowing that you are not alone in case you need to reach out for help.

As Many American Colleges Struggle to Fill Classes, Ivy Yield Rates Rise

Harvard Democrats Call for Expanded Abortion Access

BY VIVIAN ZHAO CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

The Harvard College Demo crats published an open letter to Harvard University Health Ser vices on Sunday asking for in creased abortion access for stu dents.

HUHS does cover obstetrics and gynecology services for stu dents who opt into the Student Health Insurance Plan, which costs over $4,000 per year. But many students choose to waive SHIP and only pay the $1,300 Student Health Fee, which does not cover gynecological ser vices.

As of Wednesday evening, the letter has been signed by 17 student organizations, includ ing the Harvard Pre-Medical Society, Tech for Social Good, and Our Harvard Can Do Better, an anti-sexual assault advocacy group.

Eleanor M. Powell ’25, the events director for the College Democrats, said the letter asks the University cover the cost of abortion services to ease any potential financial barriers for students while not raising the Student Health Fee.

ments. Roughly 25 students at tended the meeting.

According to the Co-Pres ident of the Harvard College Democrats Luke D. M. Albert ’22-’23, the idea for the letter came up at a Board meeting af ter the Supreme Court held in June that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion and reversed the landmark Roe v. Wade case.

Albert’s co-president, Isaac A. Robinson ’23, said the draft ing process took place over the course of several weeks. “We wanted to make sure that ev eryone was on board, everyone knew what we were asking for, and also that we had our infor mation correct,” Robinson said.

Our Harvard Can Do Better organizer William M. Sutton ’23 said while his organization has a slightly different focus, he ful ly supports the demands in the letter.

“We were sort of trusting in the Dems to know that this was a thing that was an action able demand that they could or ganize behind,” Sutton said. “I think our priorities lie in differ ent projects, but we want to sup port them as best we can.”

TOBY R. MA — CRIMSON DESIGNER

decision programs. And as rank ing systems consider yield, uni versities often have an incentive to work to raise their rates.

“Like a lot of things in the col lege admissions process,” said Bari Norman, the co-founder of college counseling firm Expert Admissions, “It kind of finds its way back to the rankings, unfor tunately.”

‘Trickle-Down’ Admissions

As yield increases at Ivy League universities, the number of stu dents they accept has gone down: most Ivies take fewer students today than they did 30 years ago, though Harvard’s acceptance figures have remained steady.

At the University of Penn sylvania, nearly 5,000 students were admitted to the class of 1996 — compared to 3,500 for the class of 2026.

The trend is driven, in large part, by high yield. As the per centage of admitted students who choose to enroll increas es, universities must admit few er students in order to avoid over-enrollment. In turn, accep tance rates continue to plum met, which can translate into even higher yield rates, accord

WAR IN UKRAINE

ing to Barnard.

“The more selective a school is, people think that indicates quality,” Barnard said. “And therefore, they are more likely to yield at those schools, because they think it’s more desirable.”

USC today than it was for me to get into Yale in the year 2000,” he added.

‘Early Bird Gets the Worm’ Yield rates often increase when early decision or early action programs are implemented at colleges — and tend to sink when the programs are taken away.

When Princeton eliminat ed its early decision program — which allows prospective students to apply early, but man dates that they enroll if accept ed — for the class of 2012, its yield rate fell by 10 percentage points, the largest drop for any Ivy League school since 1992.

rates of the last 20 years when it eliminated restrictive early ac tion starting with the Class of 2011.

But after the program was brought back for the Class of 2016, yield rose by 4 percentage points.

“The early bird gets the worm, right?” Barnard said. “They’re getting their claws into students earlier, and so there’s a great er potential that they will yield them.”

“

Gynecology

Eleanor M. Powell ’25 College Democrats Events Director

Shruti Gautam ’25 — current vice president of the Harvard Chapter of the Massachusetts Menstrual Equity Coalition, a signatory on the letter — said in addition to easing the finan cial burden, covering the cost of abortion would send an import ant signal to Harvard affiliates.

The shrinking acceptance rates at Ivies also creates a “trick le-down” effect, said Hafeez Lakhani, the director of Lakhani Coaching, an educational con sulting firm.

“There’s so much selectivity at the very elite places that real ly high quality students are trick ling down” to other institutions, Lakhani said.

“The sort of winners in that argument are the Tulanes of the world, the University of Miam is of the world, the Americans of the world. It is harder to get into

But following four years of comparatively low yield rates, Princeton reinstituted an early application program in the form of restrictive early action, which allows prospective students to apply and hear back from the school early without an enroll ment requirement.

The following year, Prince ton’s yield shot up 8 percentage points.

“Schools are really default ing to early decision plans,” Bar nard said.

Harvard saw its lowest yield

Expert Discusses Roles of Women in War in Ukraine

ON WEDNESDAY, the Da vis Center hosted an event discussing womens’ role in Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine.

BY ALEXANDER I. FUNG CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Ukrainian anthropologist Oksa na Kis discussed the roles wom en are playing in the ongoing war in Ukraine at an event host ed by Harvard’s Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies on Wednesday.

The event, titled “(In)Visible Agency: Ukrainian Women’s Ex periences of the Russian War on Ukraine,” was moderated by Ro chelle Ruthchild, a research as sociate at the Davis Center.

“If asked what Ukrainian women do in this war, one can re spond with confidence ‘they do everything,’” Kis said during the event.

Kis began the event by ex plaining how Russia’s 2014 an nexation of Crimea has influ enced the role women are playing in the current conflict, which be gan in February when Russia in vaded Ukraine.

She said women made up nearly half of participants in the

beginning of the Euromaidan, a wave of pro-European Union protests that took place through out Ukraine in 2013 and early 2014.

“The female protestors ulti mately regained their sense of active citizenship, and [claimed] their right to be equal and fullfledged citizens who want to con tribute to the nation in their own way,” Kis said.

Attempts from some with in the Euromaidan movement to relegate women to auxiliary roles led to grassroots women’s solidarity movements.

Kis said Euromaidan creat ed an image of “militarized fem ininity” that circulates frequent ly in art posted on social media today in reference to the current conflict.

“Remarkably, those imag es usually combine rather femi nine appearances like long hair and a slim body with military at tributes like guns and uniforms, with clear markers of Ukrainia ness,” Kis said.

“Most importantly, however, these artists also portrayed the cities in the rear, representing the homefront,” Kis said. “Thus, another part of women’s expe riences in war, namely women’s participation on the homefront,

appear as equal and valuable in this art project.” Kis said that in addition to serving as soldiers, women on the homefront have taken up tasks such as healing, volunteer ing in kitchens, producing cam ouflage nets, and sewing military garments.

“Because of the large scale of production, the public purpose of such activities, and the collec tive nature, the meaning of these activities changes drastically as it becomes a socially significant work,” Kis said.

According to Kis, 32,500 women were serving in the Ukrainian military as of 2021 — a figure that has continued to rise since Russia’s invasion.

“Since 2014, thousands of women [have] served on the front line, and proved to be good sol diers, able to master and use dif ferent weapons and to carry out various military tasks,” Kis said during the event. “Without prais ing military service as something desirable or something presti gious for women, we have to ad mit that there are some women who are good in that profession, and this is their way to be agents of the change.”

Lakhani said that universi ties attempt to maintain yield in part to preserve or improve their placement in rankings from groups such as the U.S. News & World Report, which ranks uni versities around the country an nually.

“It becomes a little bit of chicken or the egg,” Lakhani said. “They’re protecting their yields because they know that if they’re ranked 18 on U.S. News, it’ll get them more applicants than if they were ranked 26.”

“Without a doubt, people pay attention to rankings, even if it’s to their detriment,” Lakhani said.

“It feels particularly flagrant that the Student Health Fee does include dermatology, gastroen terology, neurology, orthope dics, podiatry, physical therapy, surgery consults, X-ray, oph thalmology, optometry, allergy, and asthma services, but then doesn’t include gynecology,” Powell said. “Gynecology is ac tually one of the only specialty services that is not included by the student health fee.”

Harvard spokesperson Tif fanie A. Green said HUHS re ceived the letter, but declined to comment.

The College Democrats held a town hall in the Science Cen ter on Wednesday to discuss the letter and current reproductive health offerings at HUHS. The town hall began with a reading of the letter before the floor was opened for questions and com

“The fact that it’s includ ed means it’s endorsed, and en dorsed doesn’t mean you’re promoting it, it just means that you are going to be support ed through that process, and there’s someone here that be lieves that you should have that process,” Gautam said.

Chioma S. Ugochukwu ’23, the former president of Har vard MME, said that while it may take a while, she believes that other universities would be inspired to adopt similar poli cies if Harvard expands its cov erage.

“I definitely think it’s going to be a process, and I’m kind of expecting that we simply will make waves to start,” Ugochuk wu said. “We’ve seen in the past that what Harvard does, what happens at Harvard, definite ly affects other school systems.”

“I’m definitely expecting some sort of ripple effect,” she added.

vivian.zhao@thecrimson.com

RESEARCH

Study Identifies Key Role of Soil Moisture on Crop Yields

BY JEREMIAH C. CURRAN CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

A new research study by Har vard faculty is shedding light on the significant influence of wa ter supply on global crop yields and its connection to climate change.

The team — led by Harvard Earth and Planetary Sciences professor Peter Huybers — in cluded Harvard Center for the Environment postdoctoral fel low Jonathan Proctor, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute postdoctoral fellow Duo Chan, and UC Irvine professor Ange la Rigden. Proctor said while precipitation is often used in studies of crop yield, soil mois ture seemed like a “natural” measurement to consider. The group used soil moisture mea surements from satellite data collected by the European Space Agency, which allowed them to evaluate the role of moisture on crop yields on a “global” scale.

“One of the primary findings of the analysis is that soil mois ture really matters to global ag ricultural productivity as much, and sometimes more than, tem perature,” Proctor said. “That is really important because it means that to understand future

climatic influences on agricul ture, we need to understand how surface metrology will change.”

“

Peter Huybers Harvard EPS Professor

Huybers likened the process by which satellites detect soil moisture from several thousand miles above Earth to the way a kitchen microwave operates. “The reason why we can see soil moisture from space is the same reason that, when you micro wave something, the water mol ecules get hot,” he said. “The na ture of interactions between molecules and radiation is such that if they absorb at a good fre quency, they also emit at that fre quency.”

“When you’re looking at space and you’re looking at the microwave emissions from the surface, those are dominated by the amount of water that’s on the surface. So there are calibra tions that are used to go from mi

crowave intensity to the water content near the surface,” Huy bers added.

Proctor said there are posi tive and negative implications from the study regarding cli mate change and its relation ship with temperature and wa ter.“There are some aspects of the paper that are good news in terms of potentially tempera ture damages from climate change being less severe,” Proc tor said. “But there is also in stantly some bad news in that water is probably going to play a really big role in the future, and there is a lot of uncertainty about how surface soil moisture conditions will change.”He said the group is now looking into how changes in climate might disrupt global food supply and spur human environmental mi gration in response to untenable agricultural conditions.

Huybers said the importance of water on food supply has po litical implications as well.

“Temperature changes pret ty much uniformly everywhere, but water variability is hetero geneous. So climate change is going to map in a really compli cated way on to local water poli tics,” Huybers said.

Temperature changes pretty much uniformly everywhere, but water variability is heterogeneous.”

Lakhani

No. 12 Harvard Splits Matchups at Aggie Roundup

BY SAM E. SHARFSTEIN

STAFF WRITER

The Harvard men’s water polo team split its four games at the Aggie Round Up in California, eas ily handling Occidental College and winning an overtime thrill er against No. 13 University of California Irvine to elevate the Crimson’s ranking to No. 12 in the country.

The contest against UC Irvine (6-6, 0-0), which was the final match of the round-robin tourna ment, saw Harvard (5-3, 0-0) bat tle back from a three-goal deficit heading into the final period to force overtime. First-year utility man James Rozolis-Hill punctu ated his five-goal performance with the winner in the extra pe riod, propelling the Crimson to an 18-17 victory. Junior attack er Alexandru Bucurchipped in four goals for his first multi-goal showing of the year.

Senior attacker and captain Alex Tsotadze hopes that the vic tory will provide confidence to the team whenever it faces adver sity later in the season.

“It gives us hope down the line, if we’re ever in a situation where we’re trailing going into the fourth quarter,” Tsotadze said. “We can always rally be hind those early season victories that we had where we were able to come from behind and play as a unit. It gives us that confidence and state of mind that since we’ve been in this position earlier in the season, we know what it takes.”

Against Occidental (2-8, 0-0), Harvard dominated play early on and led 10-4 heading into halftime. The Crimson put the contest out of reach in the third quarter of the even tual 19-9 win, tacking on seven goals in the period, including five unanswered. Junior center Kaleb Archer, who starred with four goals, led the third-quar ter explosion, which also fea tured goals from Rozolis-Hill, senior defender Gabe Putnam,

and junior attacker Owen Hale. In addition to its victories, Har vard nearly upset No. 2 UCLA and No. 5 University of Pacific on con secutive days.

The contest against UCLA (131, 0-0) was a back-and-forth affair, containing 11 lead changes. Har vard started strong and led 10-7 at the break, but the third quar ter saw a reversal of fortunes, as UCLA outscored Harvard 6-2 in the period. Ultimately, the Crim son lost by a single goal, 16-15. Ro zolis-Hill led the scoring with five goals, while senior goalie Noah Hodges played great defense with nine saves.

In the game against the Uni versity of Pacific (13-2, 0-0), Har vard fell behind early, 3-2 and could never grab the lead. Los ing the third quarter 4-2 put the Crimson in a hole heading into the fourth. The deficit proved too difficult to overcome and Har vard fell 15-11.

Despite the defeats, the team took away key lessons from its battles against highly-ranked teams that will serve it well as the season progresses.

“It was a great opportunity for us to test our schemes and our strategies against the best

teams in the country,” Tsotadze said. “We can take away bits and pieces of tactical things that they do really well and that we can im plement within our program to be more successful moving down the line.”

the conference early on.

“This weekend will be a great opportunity for us to solidify our selves as the number one team in the conference by winning on the road and setting ourselves up to defend our home court advan tage when we play later in the sea son,” Tsotadze said.

The weekend’s matchups con tain both a long-standing rivalry and a chance at revenge.

“Anytime we play Princeton we know it’s going to be a big game because we have a big rivalry with Princeton,” Tsotadze noted. “It’s going to be a great opportunity, especially for the younger guys to play Princeton, at Princeton, for the first time. We’re looking to win there.”

Saint Francis knocked the Crimson out of the conference semifinals season, a loss that the team’s captain hasn’t forgotten.

members on the team.

“They always get a really great crowd out, so it’s a good experi ence for the younger guys to re ally get a game under their belts where there’s going to be a hostile crowd,” he explained.

The team likely won’t have to worry much about the per formance of one first-year of the team. Rozolis-Hill continued his dominant start to the season during the trip to California, scor ing 16 goals throughout the week end. He had a hat-trick in each game – a feat he has achieved in seven of the first eight games –and raised his goal total to 31 on the season. Although it is early in the season, his current goals-pergame average of 3.88 would be a program record.

Looking ahead, the Crim son travel to New Jersey and New York this weekend to face Iona, St. Francis College Brook lyn, and Princeton in the start of Northeast Water Polo Con ference (NWPC) play. The slate represents a chance for Harvard to make a statement to the rest of

“It’s going to be a great oppor tunity for us to get rid of that bad taste we have in our mouths from last year and also play in a really high energy environment at St. Francis,” he said.

Tsotadze expects the trip to Brooklyn, like the games in Cal ifornia, will provide valuable lessons for the less experienced

“It’s been awesome to see James step into a really big role early on,” Tsotadze said. “He’s just so dynamic on the offensive end and he can play any position in the pool. He’s always able to cre ate space to get open and make himself available for the ball. James has really solidified him self as one of the best players on the East Coast already.”

The Crimson

The Harvard men’s water polo team huddles up prior to a game against Wagner College on Sept. 5, 2021. The Crimson’s roster is stacked with skill across all years, including standout talent from first-years like James Rozoils-Hill.

ZADOC I. N. GEE — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

BACK IN ACTION. The Crimson have splashed back into action with a strong start to the regular season (5-3, 0-0 Ivy). Harvard will open its Ivy campaign against rival Princeton on October 2.

Senior co-captain Alex Tsotadze takes a shot against Wagner College, where the Crimson secured a win on September 5 2021.

Tsotadze and senior co-captain Noah Hodge’s leadership has been crucial to the team’s success,

Anytime we play Princeton, we know it’s going to be a big game. It’s going to be a great opportunity, especially for the younger guys to play Princeton, at Princeton, for the first time.

“

Alex Tsotadze Co-captain, senior attacker

The

James Rozoils-Hill

samuel.sharfstein@thecrimson.com.

FIELD HOCKEY

No. 15 Harvard on FiveGame Winning Streak

STRONG START. Harvard field hockey has started the season strong, with a five-game win streak.

BY MAIREAD B. BAKER CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

ith eight games down and six wins under its belt, No. 15 Harvard field hockey is off to a rocketing start this season.

The first four games were against ranked opponents: Miami Uni versity (Ohio), University of Con necticut, University of Maryland, and American University, and the team has since opened Ivy play.

“We play these games to see where we stand and what we can do against those top teams,” said head coach Tjerk van Her waarden. “That’s eventually the level we want to play consistent ly.”

The Crimson defeated Miami 1-0 in overtime and overcame American in a tight 3-2 squeeze after a game-winning goal by sophomore Lucy Leel.

Though Harvard succumbed to Maryland and UConn, those losses are not to be ashamed of. Maryland, ranked fourth in the Division I National Coaches Poll, grasped a Final Four seat along side Harvard last fall. The Terra pins victory did not come easy, however, as the Crimson scored first in the early second quarter with a fiery shot from junior Siof ra Murdoch. Maryland then tied it up, scoring again late in the third quarter. Maryland had to

W“I think that the Maryland game showed us that we have the quality to play at that level, that we have the talent on the field that can compete with teams that are ranked in the top five,” comment ed van Herwaarden, who previ ously helped coach the Terrapins, winning five national champion ships in seven seasons.

“Ultimately I think we’re still very young…I think a game like that early this season showed a lot of potential for us. That game itself created a lot of hope and ex citement for what we’re able to do this season.”

First-year players have made a sizable impact on the success of the team in the past eight games, namely Bronte-May Brough, who was named Ivy League Defensive Player of the Week on Monday.

“Our first years are definitely finding their role on the team…I think that will continue to prog ress as we continue throughout the season” the head coach re marked.

That progress has already be gun to take shape, making it more clear who fits best in certain po sitions, particularly within the of fense. Harvard, notorious for its resilient defense, has illustrated how the offense and defense are beginning to mesh together de spite the newness of the faces of the team.

“In the game against UConn, the game might have come a lit tle bit too early for us…we still had too many people searching for their role, searching for what our best structure would be as a team

EARLY HSUCCESS. The Crimson have won five straight games.

to play for the season,” van Her waarden said.

“We are more fine-tuning our pressing scenarios up front, so it’s all clicking together more… with a few people stepping up to the plate and how the leadership development is, it’s just been a bit better into the swing of things.”

With four of their toughest games behind them, the focus of van Herwaarden’s players right now is to get into the best shape possible for Ivy League competi tion. Harvard understands that people will come to Cambridge intent on beating the reigning Ivy League champions and a Final Four team.

“The reality of it all is that the Ivy games come with a whole level of energy,” said van Herwaarden. “So far every single team has been able to step up against us and play their best game…we need to be able to withstand that with our structure and stay disciplined in our organization.”

Harvard is not taking this preparation lightly: in fact, the team has trained with the Unit ed States Marine Corps in a stren uous physical test and session to get them prepped for Ivy play.

“We really felt it went well… making sure everybody feels in cluded, part of the program, and energized,” reflected the coach.

“[It was] a different type of preparation before Ivy league play. It should get us ready for what we need to do.”

So far, that preparation has worked well for the Crimson, as they got the better of Columbia in a 3-1 contest, with goals from firstyears Brough and Kate Oliver, as well as sophomore Emily Gucki an.

Harvard is now on a five-game

winning streak. It garnered a 1-0 victory against Monmouth by the works of a double-overtime goal from junior Avery Donahue, the same player who scored the over time goal against Lousiville in the first round of the NCAA tourna ment to reach the quarterfinal round for the second time in pro gram history.

In this streak lies three shut outs for Shahbo against Mon mouth, Northeastern, and Bos ton University, the latter of which was the team’s Title IX Celebra tion Game.

As for these teams coming on strong to beat Harvard, it has followed through: in the game against Northeastern, the Hus kies tried to rally near the end after the Crimson secured two hard-fought goals in the sec ond half. However, Harvard has demonstrated that it will push back against the force brought on by its rivals.

“I think we showed that we’ve been able to do that also against Northeastern who wanted to show us up in the final five min utes of the game or so, and we also showed in the games past,” com mented the head coach.

“We need to be fully under standing that every team that comes to Harvard will be the best team that they can be and pres ent enough strength to us and do what we can.”

And still, this mighty team has yet to prove otherwise.

Harvard will next hit the road for a pair of weekend games against Ivy foe University of Pennsylvania and ranked adver sary No. 10 Saint Joseph’s Univer sity in Philadelphia, Pa.

WEEKLY RECAP SCORES

READ IT IN FIVE MINUTES

SAILING GETS RIGHT INTO ACTION

The Harvard sailing team participated in four windy regattas over the weekend. The team ended placing in third of the Sherman Hoyt Trophy and fourth in both the Mrs. Hurst Bowl and the Hood trophy. The Crimson also hosted thier Havard FJ Invitational during which sailors competed in ten races and finished in 13th and 17th. The Crimson will sail into four more important regattas this weekend, three of which will take place in the Boston area.

FOOTBALL SCRAPES OUT WIN OVER BROWN

After leading 35-7 with 15 minutes to go, the Crimson had to face down a potential game-tying drive from the Brown Bears with under two minutes remaining and score standing at 35-28. Still, Harvard (2-0, 1-0 Ivy) hung tight and got the stop, coming away with a gritty win on the road over Brown (1-1, 0-1 Ivy). Senior quarter back Charlie Dean showed up ready to play for the Crimson , securing 20-of-29 passes for a career high passing yards. Senior wide receiver Kym Wimberly similarly secured career high stats.

WOMEN’S SOCCER TIES NO. 17 TEXAS CHRISTIAN

The No. 16-ranked Harvard women’s soccer team bat tled its way to a 2-2 tie with No. 17 Texas Christian Uni versity. The Crimson fought a 90-minute struggle on the field in Fort Worth, Texas, with sophomore Aslaug Gunn laugsdottir scoring two goals. TCU scored six minutes into the game, kicking off a defen sive showdown between the Horned Frogs and the Crim son. Harvard is unbeaten this season, holding a 6-0-1 as they head into the Ivy League play this weekend at the University of Pennsylvania.

The Crimson huddle as they devise a game plan to defeat their opponent. DYLAN J. GOODMAN — CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

fight to score against the tough defense of the Crimson, with de fensive powerhouse senior Ellie Shahbo making six impressive saves.

HIGH SCORERS. The total number of goals scored by Harvard over its first eight games.

A Harvard player carries the ball during a 2019 contest.

DYLAN J. GOODMAN — CRIMSON PHOTOGRA PHER

A Harvard player fights for the ball during a 2019 game against Brown. DYLAN J. GOODMAN —

CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER