What Are You Waiting For?

STICKING TO NEW YEAR'S resolutions is no piece of cake. Before the Big Apple is even comfortably perched atop Times Square, criminals who had repented just moments earlier already begin snagging wallets, George Bush's lips go in reverse as taxes are raised and Oprah's stomach suddenly can't survive on liquids alone.

But even if keeping one's word for a year isn't so easy, staying honest for one semester doesn't seem as daunting. The spring term is thankfully a truncated version of its fall counterpart. It's only three more shopping days and twelve more weeks to the next encounter with reading period. So now is the time to take the plunge and uphold a promise for at least this short segment of the academic year.

Before the hustle and bustle of unit tests, labs, mid-terms and (yes, Dean Dingman, it's true) overcrowded dorm rooms get you down again, stop and think of a way to inject a bit more meaning into this semester's schedule: volunteer, take a break, close the books for even a brief encounter with the real world. Whether it's social action or political activism, do what you can to make a difference beyond the Ivory Tower.

COLLEGE STUDENTS ARE perfectly suited for such extracurricular pursuits. For most, these unique four years mark perhaps the last time that the demands of profession, self-sufficiency and family do not pull at the seams of busy schedules. After graduation, only the most idealistic will sacrifice time and energy in search of truth and justice.

College campus contains the components necessary to produce effective social and political activism--student groups. And we have a ton of them. Phillips Brooks House Association (PBHA), the House and Neighborhood Development program (HAND), Citystep, the Harvard Democrats and Republicans, Harvard for Harkin, Students for Clinton, Students for Kerrey, even Students for Agran. You get the picture.

All these organizations (and more) are salivating to involve new members in planning and programming. They have attracted many students with an array of diverse interests and talents. It's an environment few will find again outside the Yard's gates.

Working together to produce change for the better should not be passed up just because a problem set is due at five.

A good deal of students already subscribe to such a philosophy. Some of them are in PBHA, Harvard's largest student-run group (apparently 1500 members strong). The organization has 41 committees and 75 programs, ranging from recycling initiatives on campus to tutoring kids in the inner city. PBHA tries to offer something for everyone.

Perception has it that getting involved with PBHA is like signing over the semester's grades to the gutter. But not all commitments mean intense chunks of time. Certainly longterm involvement goes furthest in aiding the disadvantaged, but a semester-long social service stint is good for starters.

One's motives don't need to be stellar, either. Whether driven by dreams of intense resume-padding, the chance to test teaching skills on unsuspecting fourth graders or simply the rare opportunity to help those less fortunate, PBHA will gladly accept your contribution. Helping others doesn't mean giving up other pursuits, activities or studies. Just move them over and find out what PBHA has to offer.

NOT ALL STUDENTS ARE attracted to the social responsibility required by community service. Maybe you don't want to spend nights in homeless shelters. That's fine. But that doesn't give you an excuse for ducking out of at least a semester-long commitment to helping someone just because you're going ballistic about your GPA or your position on, say, The Crimson. So what can those non-community service oriented students do to help people? Political activism.

How about getting involved with the Republican or Democrat Clubs or the various presidential candidate support groups that have sprung up? Now is the perfect time.

The current recession has quickly become one of the campaign's major issues. Since real-life job searches are in store for all in the not-so-distant future, the state of the economy is bearing heavily in college students' minds. Demanding steps to address the nation's recession-plagued social and economic woes through political activism fits into the realm of not just seeking help for yourself but for others as well. It's that whole enlightened self-interest thing.

The goals of political action differ only slightly from those of social service. This election season's campaign for the middle class seems to have left out the most needy. Aside from suggestions such as those from Republican Patrick J. Buchanan to sweep streets clean of the homeless and lock them up in jails across the country, little mention is made of the very poor and hopeless.

Few seem willing to take up their cause. Student involvement in the race for the White House can shift debate back to the issues of greatest concern to those most in need of assistance--even though that shift might be spurred by our own selfish fears.

Still, perhaps it is unrealistic to expect active student involvement in the 1992 presidential campaign. For some, the ease with which a spring semester vow can be broken is too tempting to be passed up. But, with nations across the globe waging battle for the right to representative government, it is nothing less than criminal to neglect your ability to help choose the next leader of this country.

With that in mind, the most significant extracurricular step to take this month would be registering to vote in the Massachusetts presidential primary (assuming you're not registered at home). Those not yet on the rolls have until February 11 to add their names to the election list (or change party preference, as this writer plans to do).

WHETHER ONE CHOOSES the path of social or political action, the new tradition of student apathy at Harvard must be broken. The notion that issues worthy of student protest went out with the '60s and '70s is completely misconceived.

When consumer advocate-cum-presidential candidate Ralph Nader spoke at the Kennedy School two weeks ago, he advised students to question campus administrators and their agendas. Undergraduates should demand the disclosure of Harvard's corporate contacts, Nader said. The president of the University should be required to deliver a state of the school address. The seven most powerful figures at Harvard's helm--the members of the Corporation--should be forced to meet with students. Maybe he's right.

Whatever the case, whether one agrees with Nader's suggestions or not, there is clearly a large silence waiting to be broken by the voices of student protest and a void ready to be filled with the activism of social and political groups.

For example, groups have already begun meeting to plan a joint protest in expectation of a possible Harvard address by former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke. Such efforts of student mobilization merit praise. Other students should leave their carrels in Lamont to combat the politics of hate in this election season.

In any case, students may prove to be key in this country's attempts to solve social and political ills. Two candidates for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa and Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, have caught on to this approach and advocate a program whereby the government would provide high school graduates with college tuition money in return for a commitment of community service.

IN HIS FAMOUS "I have a dream" speech, Martin Luther King Jr., who was commemorated yesterday in a Memorial Church service, said "now is the time" for true social change in the United States. That was over 18 years ago.

Today, such words still ring true. This semester is the time to put down the books for just a few minutes each week to get involved in social action groups or political organizations. Because now really is the time. As Ralph Nader said, "If you don't desire to shape the University, when it's at your disposal, it is doubtful you have prepared your-self for the democratic world of the future in which you'll play a part." He was pontificating, to be sure. But he was right.

So if your New Year's Resolution was too hard for you to keep, make a New Term Resolution to make a difference instead. Unlike so many others, this commitment goes beyond yourself and affects the lives of others. Now is the time to keep a promise so often broken.

College students can be the ones to make a difference for many in this country who are struggling. Call me naive. Call me overly-idealistic. But call that struggle real life for many Americans.