Provost Defends Grant Decision

Provost Albert Carnesale yesterday issued the University's strongest and most extensive defense yet of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences's (FAS) recent decision to rescind an offer of admission to Gina Grant when it learned that she had killed her monther in 1990.

The FAS admissions committee canceled the offer of early admission last week to Grant, a 19-year-old Cambridge Rindge and Latin School senior, after the University received newspaper clippings sent by an anonymous person that she had bludgeoned her mother to death in 1990.

The case has sparked a national debate around Grant, who served six months in a juvenile detention center after a judge ruled she had committed voluntary manslaughter.

In an interview yesterday, Carnesale expressed his confidence that the FAS committee made the right decision, given the facts.

"We have processes on admissions, we have a faculty standing committee that has a superb record, a superb record," Carnesale said. "And we have confidence in a group like this, and I think that the record indicates that they perform superbly."

"I'm certainly not going to comment on this specific case or its merits," Carnesale. "I don't have the information even that they have. But their record is pretty good."

Asked if the University was perhaps being too trusting, Carnesale said the committee's record merited it.

"This is their decision, and they have an excellent record at decisions such as this," the provost said. "There would have to be strong evidence to the contrary for me to believe that they made a mistake. I have no such evidence."

Carnesale also emphasized that he and President Neil L. Rudenstine are neither consultants to, or participants in, any admissions decisions--including the one to rescind the offer of admission to Grant.

Carnesale added that there is "no [precedent] that I'm aware of," for the president of the University to step in and reverse the decision of the Committee.

Asked if there was a policy that explicitly prohibiting the president from doing that, Carnesale said he was not sure.

"I've heard of such a thing," Carnesale said. "I have not seen it, I've heard it...I don't remember who said it. That's why I did not say it as if it were fact. I do know that [the president] does not participate as a matter of practice. I believe it may also be a matter of policy, but I'm not sure."

The provost also defended as standard procedure the committee's decision not to contact Grant before deciding to rescind her admission offer.

He denied that the circumstances of the case qualified the case as extraordinary.

"I mean, it's extraordinary in the interest of the news media because of the nature of the crime with which she was charged," Carnesale said. "But it isnot extraordinary that information comes to lightafter the application has been received, or evenafter a students has been admitted, that resultsin rescinding the admission."

`Appalled'

In other news, Stuart A. Pizer '66, aninstructor in psychology in the Department ofPsychiatry at the Medical School, said in a letterto The Crimson he would renounce "all promises andexpectations of financial contributions toHarvard" as a results of FAS's decision on Grant.

"I am now appalled at the appearance ofheartless and punitive rigidity in Harvard'schoice to rescind Ms. Grant's admission," Pizerwrote in the letter, received yesterday afternoon.

Pizer explained in an interview yesterday thathe was not rescinding any pledge that he hadalready made, but merely "future contributionsthat I had expected to give."

"Unfortunately, I'm not a large enoughcontributor that it is going to hurt Harvardenough financially," said Pizer, who added that hecurrently donates "about $100 per year."

In the interview, Pizer pointed to reports thatGrant had been emotionally abused by her motherand her otherwise unblemished records as reasonswhy he disagreed with the University's decision.

"There is no reason to believe that a personwho did violence to a member of their family, atleast in a case where it is implied that there isemotional violence going on--it was an incidentclearly that was horrific," Pizer said. "At thesame time, there is nothing that would indicate apattern in this person's life."

In response to Pizer's announcement, Carnesalesaid that he is not concerned that many alumniwill make similar pronouncements.

"I think that alumni, by and large, as thinkingpeople, would say, "Gee, this is a tough positionfor...the University to be in,' but I cannotimagine that there would be any significant numberof people who would think that we behaved anythingother than judiciously," Carnesale said.

"And notice," the provost added, "that one whodisagrees with the decision at this point is doingso in the absence of even the information that wasavailable to the committee."

Pizer is a psychologist and psychoanalyst whosaid yesterday that he has worked with people whohave been victims of family violence and parentalemotional abuse.

In addition to a bachelor's degree, he earnedat Ph.D. from the University in 1972.

Sarah J. Schaffer contributed to thereporting of this story.

`Appalled'

In other news, Stuart A. Pizer '66, aninstructor in psychology in the Department ofPsychiatry at the Medical School, said in a letterto The Crimson he would renounce "all promises andexpectations of financial contributions toHarvard" as a results of FAS's decision on Grant.

"I am now appalled at the appearance ofheartless and punitive rigidity in Harvard'schoice to rescind Ms. Grant's admission," Pizerwrote in the letter, received yesterday afternoon.

Pizer explained in an interview yesterday thathe was not rescinding any pledge that he hadalready made, but merely "future contributionsthat I had expected to give."

"Unfortunately, I'm not a large enoughcontributor that it is going to hurt Harvardenough financially," said Pizer, who added that hecurrently donates "about $100 per year."

In the interview, Pizer pointed to reports thatGrant had been emotionally abused by her motherand her otherwise unblemished records as reasonswhy he disagreed with the University's decision.

"There is no reason to believe that a personwho did violence to a member of their family, atleast in a case where it is implied that there isemotional violence going on--it was an incidentclearly that was horrific," Pizer said. "At thesame time, there is nothing that would indicate apattern in this person's life."

In response to Pizer's announcement, Carnesalesaid that he is not concerned that many alumniwill make similar pronouncements.

"I think that alumni, by and large, as thinkingpeople, would say, "Gee, this is a tough positionfor...the University to be in,' but I cannotimagine that there would be any significant numberof people who would think that we behaved anythingother than judiciously," Carnesale said.

"And notice," the provost added, "that one whodisagrees with the decision at this point is doingso in the absence of even the information that wasavailable to the committee."

Pizer is a psychologist and psychoanalyst whosaid yesterday that he has worked with people whohave been victims of family violence and parentalemotional abuse.

In addition to a bachelor's degree, he earnedat Ph.D. from the University in 1972.

Sarah J. Schaffer contributed to thereporting of this story.