Faculty Spars With Summers At Meeting

Yesterday’s Faculty meeting was not remarkable for its virulent discourse, but as the unusually large collection of administrators and professors shuffled out of University Hall, there was a palpable tension between the administration and faculty members.

While a change in the name of the Committee on Degrees in Women’s Studies and curricular review announcements were the top priorities on the agenda, University decision-making was the unspoken theme of the day, as professors quizzed administrators on whether they would be consulted on Allston planning and fiscal belt-tightening.

Following his appearance at last month’s Faculty meeting, when he joined his colleagues in protesting a perceived lack of consultation over Allston, Professor of German Peter J. Burgard directed the first question of the open discussion period to whether the Allston plans would be up for a full vote by the Faculty.

“We will be voting today on changes to the Women’s Studies department,” Burgard stated. “Will we vote on Allston as well?”

University President Lawrence H. Summers had a quick reply: “No.”

Burgard’s follow-up question, “Why not,” was met with a prolonged silence.

“It has not been the practice of the Faculty to vote on new buildings, on the physical plant or on questions relating to the allocation of slots,” Summers said. “Dean [of the Faculty William C.] Kirby and I will consult extensively with members of the Faculty, but for reasons deeply rooted in University governance and tradition... matters that are curricular are matters of the Faculty, but matters regarding the allocation of resources by Massachussetts Law are reserved for the Harvard Corporation.”

While professors shifted in their seats, Summers continued to delineate the role of the Faculty in the physical planning of Allston.

“Obviously it is the Faculty who sets the intellectual agenda, which has implications for the other aspects of physical planning,” Summers said.

Later in the meeting, following the subsequent vote on the change in name of the women’s studies committee (please see story below), Kirby rose to discuss Allston and the financial state of the Faculty.

”Let me repeat a warning that I had to give also last year at this point,” Kirby began. “Our financial picture remains difficult.”

While Kirby noted that the 2 percent payout from the Corporation was an unexpected plus (please see story at left), he said that the rising costs of the Faculty, combined with increases in fringe benefits rates, offset the payout increase.

“Obviously, this cannot continue for long,” Kirby said. “Budgets, in short, will be even tighter. And we will have to make careful financial decisions.”

“If we are not very careful financially now, we will be in real difficulty soon,” he added. “Our unrestricted funds are already stretched thin. I will be asking for, and I will need, your cooperation in curbing spending and, where appropriate, in using restricted restricted funds to meet the goals and standards of the Faculty.”

Kirby also sketched out the role he envisions for professors in the planning of Allston.

“As we go forward, we fully expect there to be ample opportunities for this faculty and our colleagues across the University to contribute to the conversation and process in substantive ways,” he said. “It is a central task of our deans, and of our Faculty, to ensure the appointment of a strong and diverse faculty at every rank.”

While Kirby’s budget concerns were not news, two professors rose to question the scrimping that has of late become a standard part of administrative vocabulary.

Plumber Professor of Christian Morals Peter J. Gomes recalled the long tradition of these warnings—and “25 years of institutional restraints”—saying that the goals of expansion and fiscal tightening were hard to reconcile.

“We cannot afford to continue in this pinch-penny lifestyle,” Gomes said. “I keep waiting for the moment when you will say that relief is in sight.”

Kirby replied to Gomes’ comment by saying that prudent fiscal management was critical to keep Harvard above the water, at a time when other universities are particularly constrained and facing more severe budget cuts.

Summers, too, replied, noting the $6 billion dollar increase in the University’s budget since the early 1990s.

“It would be a mistake of the highest order to say the last decade was a decade of poverty,” Summers said, noting last year’s 12 percent gain in the endowment. “But we would all do well to be very prudent in the use of our resources.”

Professor of the History of Science Everett I. Mendelsohn then took the floor, probing what he saw as Harvard’s overly conservative fiscal approach. “We’re not quite in crisis,” Mendelsohn said.

Comparing the 12 percent endowment increase to the 2 percent growth of payout, Mendelsohn wondered what happened to the other 10 percent.

The remark kicked off a back-and-forth between Mendelsohn and Summers, their debate complicated by the arcane language of budgetary planning.

Summers interrupted Mendelsohn, citing the fact that the percentage of the endowment being paid out has in fact increased.

“Far be it for me to argue with an economist of your stature,” Mendelsohn replied. “But payout is less than half of what it’s been to the Faculty in the past few years.”

The pair circled each other for another round, Summers replying that the decreased purchasing power of the endowment was the more salient statistic, necessitating the Faculty’s frugality.

“I’ll take it up with your colleagues,” Mendelsohn said before taking his seat.

Kirby then took a stab at addressing Mendelsohn’s concerns.

“We have invested in the future of this Faculty,” he said, noting the new funds for undergraduate financial aid, various Faculty building projects and the expanded dimensions of ‘need-blind’ admissions.

“We need to build on the prudent management of the past. We cannot compromise on undergraduate financial aid, or support of our physical plant,” Kirby said.

Some professors said last night that they left the meeting with a concern that the faculty are not being given a forum to express their opinions about administrative decisions.

“There is a feeling in the Faculty that important decisions which may or may not be good are being made with insufficient consultation,” said Mendelsohn after the meeting. “I was reminded of Lord Justice Coke—justice must not only be done but be seen to be done, and in terms of consultation there must be a sense that consultation is really occurring.”

Burgard, too, expressed ambivalences last night about the lack of glasnost with which the University has handled its decision making.

“I would have thought the Faculty meeting would be a forum for discussion before the move is a fait accompli, but with the planning for the move already on the docket, it seems as if it is a fait accompli,” he said.

When asked whether he thought the faculty had a say in this matter, Burgard said, “My impression is that the dean has a say for the faculty, and he supports it, but that the faculty as a whole has not been given a chance to have a say in the matter.”

In regards to the president’s statement that the Faculty does not have a right to vote on Allston decisions, Burgard said, “I didn’t know that was the policy, and I’m not sure that I agree with it. It seems to me that the very idea of moving part of the faculty to the other side of the river has curricular implications.”

The banter of yesterday’s meeting, wasn’t all antagonistic.

In what Summers later deemed “the best performed question” at a Faculty meeting during his three-year tenure, Gomes suggested that the administration’s move to ban fires in undergraduate Houses deprived students of the amenities to which they were duly entitled.

“I know there must have been some good reason,” Gomes said. “But does it have to do with the actual outbreak of any fire?”

Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71 dryly replied that, while he regretted the loss of fires, he suggested cold students spend more time at Sparks House, where the Reverend lives—and fires are still permitted.

—Staff writer Rebecca D. O’Brien can be reached at robrien@fas.harvard.edu.