Students To Print Yearbook Addition

After several black and Latino student groups were omitted from the 2002 Harvard yearbook, concerned students are publishing a supplement this week and are working with the yearbook staff to change the procedure by which student organizations are chosen for inclusion.

Macani Toungara ’02 originally raised concern about the representativeness of the groups included in the yearbook two weeks ago.

“It is abominable that entire cultural communities at Harvard were not included,” she said then. “The absence of these cultural organizations shows that this yearbook is not a representative cross-section of the diverse Harvard community.”

The yearbook responded that the omissions were the result of miscommunication, missed deadlines and technical problems. Generally, the yearbook contacts student organizations based upon a list of official recognized groups provided by the Dean’s Office, and the first batch of groups—the number depends on available space each year—to meet the requirements are included.

Charles M. Moore ’04, the president of the Black Students Association, which was omitted from the yearbook, said in an e-mail that initial worries that race influenced inclusion procedures are unfounded.

“In fairness to the yearbook staff, it should be said that in no way was the omission of groups, black and Latino groups in particular, due to favoritism or bias by the yearbook,” Moore said. “[The omissions were] the result of procedural issues.”

“Several students still believe that it did have racial undertones. I choose not to explore that route, however,” he said.

After the yearbook and the College said they were unable to produce a supplement—the first due to logistical difficulties, the second because the yearbook is financially independent from the College—Toungara decided to create a supplement herself.

She met last week with the Rev. Peter J. Gomes, who is also Plummer Professor of Christian Morals, and secured funding from him for the project. She then collected information and photographs from interested groups. Her friend Rupal C. Pinto ’02 designed the booklet.

Shea Brothers, Inc., a Boston publishing company recommended by the yearbook, will publish the supplement. Toungara said it is scheduled for delivery Tuesday.

“I’m working out of the Eliot basement,” Toungara said last week. “There’s Pagemaker and Photoshop, just like what the yearbook has.”

The supplement will include 14 prominent student groups that were omitted from the yearbook and will be available free of charge to everyone who purchased a yearbook, though extra copies will be given to anyone who is interested.

Toungara said that, ideally, the supplement will be dropped off to the superintendents of each House to be picked up by students later this week.

“People are welcome to have it,” Toungara said. “We’re not out to make a profit.”

Toungara and Moore have also been working with Denise S. Kim ’03, editor-in-chief of Harvard Yearbook Publications, to minimize confusion and increase the number of student groups included in the yearbook in future years.

A yearbook official said the yearbook has agreed to permanently increase by 16 pages the organizations section of next year’s book.

Additional increases will be determined on a year-to-year basis “if there is special demand for increased size,” the official said.

“I am confident that this will allow all groups wishing to appear in the yearbook to do so,” Moore said.

The three also discussed possible ways in which the yearbook can make their solicitation and selection of student groups more effective.

Because many of the student groups did not receive e-mail notifications about applying to be included in the yearbook, Toungara suggested the senior list be e-mailed with yearbook details.

But the yearbook official said they prefer not to overload students’ inboxes. Instead, she said, they plan to use other advertising techniques.

“We will continue to e-mail groups individually,” she said. “But we also will use other avenues of communication, such as table tents, possibly an ad in The Crimson and an informational flier that we can put in the pre-registration packet that goes to every student organization in the fall.”

Pinto said she believes the controversy should be a catalyst for student action.

“This really shows that the student body needs to show more interest in what groups are included in the yearbook so that we can get a better product,” Pinto said.

The groups that will be featured in the supplement are: the Harvard African Students Association, the Association of Black Harvard Women, the Black Students Association, the Black Men’s Forum, the Harvard Society of Black Scientists and Engineers, the Caribbean Club and Caribbean Club Dance Troupe, Expressions Dance Company, Fuerza Latina, Haitian Alliance, the Kuumba Singers, Latinas Unidas, RAZA, the South Asian Association and the Harvard-Radcliffe Women’s Leadership Project.

—Staff writer Katherine M. Dimengo can be reached at dimengo@fas.harvard.edu.