It's a Wonderful Life

HELP WANTED: Three hours of teaching a week. Unlimited access to one of the most extensive library systems. Prime lab space for scientific research. Large studies available in the second largest library in the country. Mortgage subsidies for Cambridge houses.

Send resumes to: Dean of the Faculty A. Michael Spence, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138.

Many learned scholars have answered similar calls to service, leaving academic institutions around the country and the world to accept tenured posts at the nation's oldest university.

Harvard traditionally fills the vast majority of its senior faculty positions by luring professors from other universities to Cambridge. Harvard's ability to draw new senior professors has been based on the strength of its reputation and its facilities. But as other universities have employed new techniques to pull in the big fish, Harvard has had to create new programs to remain competitive in the academic market.

"Harvard has always received a much higher proportion of senior professors from other faculties. We have been able to do that because of our pulling power, and this ability has greatly contributed to the reputation of our faculty today," says President Bok. "It has been a deliberate and very successful strategy that has produced some of our most eminent senior faculty."

To strengthen the lure of coming to Cambridge, over the years, Harvard has baited its hook with a series of benefits designed to ensure that professors maximize their opportunities to use the extensive facilities the University has to offer.

While Harvard's junior faculty members struggle with heavy teaching loads and meager salaries, the senior faculty enjoy the good life. Some of the perks that make the Yard an attractive place for tenured professors to go every morning include Widener Library studies that allow academics to work close to reference materials, subsidies that help professors moving to Cambridge from other universities find comfortable housing near campus, and access to laboratory facilities that meet the often demanding needs of specific research projects.

Lifetime of Study

In an historic move this fall, Higginson Professor of History Emeritus John K. Fairbank gave up his Widener study when he retired. Never before has a professor relinquished a coveted library office for reasons other than death or resignation from the faculty.

The 120 Widener and Pusey Library studies, which vary in size and location, carry with them prestige and convenience. Professors consider them the most desirable on campus because they are close to most of the University's library stacks.

"The studies are desirable to people involved in stack-centered research, because they can keep their books and materials in the library," says Margaret A. Bailey, administrative assistant for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences office of physical planning.

Bailey calls herself "the keeper of The List" for the studies, now 20 names long. The turnover on the studies is extremely slow because once a professor moves from The List to a study, it's his for life. The next step is a shorter, separate list, one with the names of 10 professors waiting for the chance to move into a larger, more lavish study.

The studies in Pusey are often not as desirable, Bailey says, though they include such amenities as air conditioning. Pusey studies are uniform in size, while the Widener offices vary. Occasionally the professor at the top of the waiting list will pass up the first available study if it is in Pusey, Bailey says.

On the top floor of Widener, surrounding the domed center of the hallowed library, are the most expansive and elite studies, marked by letters A-Z rather than by the numbers of the more common studies. Only professors who have achieved the first plateau--those who have made it off The List--can earn a spot on the special waiting list. These faculty members have the first option on any study--the ultimate lettered ones or just more desirable normal ones--that is vacated.

Hollis Professor of Divinity Emeritus George H. Williams, who holds the oldest endowed chair in the U.S., has occupied Widener Library K for 14 years. Williams says he shared a carrel in 1947 when he came to Harvard, was moved to a single carrel in 1948, and landed Widener Library 47 in 1949.

"Forty-seven was a good study--it was on the first floor. But it was a smaller study, and now I'm on the top floor," Williams says.

An ad hoc committee of faculty and administrators chaired by Coolidge Professor of History and Professor of Economics David S. Landes was convened for the sole purpose of considering the justice of the policy for allocating the studies. The committee, which met throughout the 1986-87 school year, decided to enforce the existing policy of assigning studies in order of the waiting list, according to Bailey.

A Professor's Castle

Only five Harvard faculty members and administrators traditionally enjoy free housing. Bok, Spence, Radcliffe President Matina S. Horner, the Rev. Peter J. Gomes, Plummer Professor of Christian Morals, and Divinity School Dean Ronald Thiemann all live rent-free.

Most of the University's professors do not have the opportunity to live in the traditional yellow Sparks House or Bok's mansion on Elmwood Ave. The select few professors who become house masters also inhabit grand houses designed for entertaining, but the remainder must face the perils of the Cambridge housing market.

Since the Cambridge area has one of the highest costs of living in the country, sometimes it takes substantial incentives to convince professors at other schools to leave inexpensive, comfortable homes within walking distance of their offices.

As the cost of Cambridge real estate has skyrocketed in recent years, Harvard has stepped up its efforts to ease housing problems for incoming faculty--one of the most essential services Harvard provides.

Professor of Economics Robert J. Barro, who left the University of Rochester last year to come to Harvard, says that he would not have been able to buy the house he now inhabits in Weston without Harvard's help. "The housing market here is much more expensive than where I came from," he says.

Each of the University's nine faculties has the option of establishing a housing subsidy program specifically designed to meet its recruitment needs. The Faculty of Arts and Sciences offers a mortgage subsidy program to help senior faculty members recruited from other schools to buy houses comparable to the ones they previously owned.

"This lets them buy a house that is reasonably comparable to the one that the faculty member had at the place he came from," says Associate Dean of the Faculty for Finance Candace R. Corvey. "We try to neutralize the potential disadvantages that someone coming to Harvard could encounter."

"I wouldn't have come to Harvard without the housing program," says Professor of Physics Gerald Gabrielse, who left the faculty at the University of Washington last fall. Gabrielse was able to buy a house in Lexington with the mortagage subsidy plan. "It wouldn't have been possible for me to live here otherwise," he says.

For a few years beginning in 1978, Harvard offered two University-wide programs that helped senior faculty members buy houses from Harvard or in the Cambridge area by providing low-interest mortgages. Some tenure track professors at schools such as the Law School also reaped benefits from these programs. Former Supreme Court nominee Douglas H. Ginsburg bought a Cambridge house with subsidies from Harvard before receiving tenure from the Law School.

In 1982, after the University ended its housing programs, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences established its first mortgage subsidy plan. In the last six years, the program has become more flexible, tailoring subsidies to individual needs.

"We have found from our experience in recruiting that if we aren't able to address very individual situations, we could be in danger of losing the best possible person," Corvey says. "The equity considerations are a priority. It isn't one package."

Corvey uses the location of housing as an example of individualized issues. Some people were accustomed to living within walking distance of campus, while others preferred to live in the country. All of these preferences are factors in considering what is "comparable" for each incoming professor.

Harvard Real Estate also sometimes allows tenured professors to bid on properties for which it has first-purchase options. In addition, there is an in-house real-estate consultant who helps incoming professors find housing in the area.

Space for Igor

Harvard's top scientists remain at the University because they have access to extensive lab facilities. Because most major projects are funded by government and private grants, lab space is often distributed according to the amount of outside money a professor receives for his work.

Associate Professor of Biology James A. Birchler says the labs at Harvard are comparable to those at any research university. Birchler, who came to Harvard three years ago from the University of California, Berkeley, says that the lab space was one of the factors that convinced him to join the Harvard faculty.

"When I was interviewing for positions I looked at five places, and in terms of lab space Harvard had the best to offer," Birchler says. "That was certainly one of the considerations in my coming here."

The allocation of this desirable lab space is one of the decisions every department must make.

"Lab allocation is handled by the lab director, who allocates space on the basis of an assessment of needs, research support and number of students, and tries to make the best decision," says Applied Sciences Dean Paul C. Martin '52.

The amount of funding a professor receives determines both the number of student workers and the amount of research equipment he can afford. Both these factors in turn are weighed in the space allocation process.

"There can't be any department in which the needs are uniform across the board," Martin says. "We feel that it's important to have flexibility in order to allow people to take on extra research and get extra space if it is available."

Martin says that occasionally professors are shifted to a smaller lab to make way for someone could make greater use of the space.

But Martin stresses that the departments try to protect professors from temporary expansion by one member of the department. "We are wary of projects that call for a tremendous amount of activity and large number of research associates over a relatively short period of time," he says. "We try to avoid sudden glitches."

Jay L. Taft, director of administration for the Organismic and Evolutionary Biology and Allied Institutions Department, says that professors notify the department of their needs when they enter the division. He says that no professor has had to move labs since he has been in the department.

"A professor tells us whether he needs mostly computer facilities or a wet lab," Taft says. "We have a varied department, and the professors have very different needs which are expressed when they join the faculty."

The School of Public Health has a faculty space committee, which reviews any requests for major changes in allocation, such as a department needing additional space, says Dean for Administration Kenneth P. Barclay. The committee also reviews space assignments over a period of time to ensure that all needs are adequately addressed, Barclay says. The school is currently considering space needs on a long-term basis as well.

"In addition to distributing space in the three buildings we are now occupying, we are trying to predict any future needs which might require more space," Barclay says. "This way we can try to take care of any expansion we might anticipate."

"The transition is based upon progress in science, and it is a question of looking at realistic needs now versus realistic needs 10 years ago," Barclay says.

Whether it is houses, labs or offices, the nation's oldest and richest university has a multitude of benefits it can shower on those whom it deems worthy of a Harvard chair. For tenured professors who accept Harvard's call, Cambridge can indeed be the setting for a wonderful life.