Cliffs Notes: Senior Gift

Complicated social benefit calculations, a desire to improve financial aid, or just plain old gratitude to this institution—the beauty of the Senior Gift campaign is the range of creative and genuine justifications that guide the individual decisions of seniors to give or not to give. Rolled out every year in early April, the Senior Gift campaign asks every senior to donate a nominal amount of money back to Harvard. Around the same time, dining halls and common rooms across campus fill with heated and sometimes bitter exchanges over the merits of giving.

After three years of reading and listening to the same back-and-forth, it’s my thought that summarizing these arguments might give people a running start in thinking about their own choices. To me, the central goal of the campaign is less about money and more about sparking debate about giving back to Harvard. I’ll provide the flint; you be the tinder. We’ll see if we reach the same conclusions.

Some seniors wonder why Harvard needs another $10 after extracting $160,000 from their parents. In truth, however, these seniors’ qualms with the Gift campaign extend much deeper than money alone. Indeed, the first point that detractors and proponents of the Gift campaign determine is that the amount of money donated via Senior Gift doesn’t really matter. In fact, it does. A $250 donation can—no surprises here—buy more Erlenmayer flasks than the minimum $10 donation. If a wealthier Harvard is objectively a good thing, then so is encouraging seniors who can afford it to donate proportional to their means. But no proponent of Senior Gift can legitimately claim that the withholding of a single $10 donation will materially hurt Harvard. And no detractor can feign great enough financial distress to justify their refusal to plunk down the cash equivalent of a beer and a burrito. Harvard subsidizes everyone’s yearly tuition at least to the tune of $20,000 (more if financial aid is in the picture). Bottom line: It’s never really about the money. It’s about the principle.

For some, the principle is tied up in a desire to squeeze the most social good from every dollar. If $4 a week can save a child in Africa from starvation, what’s the point of giving Harvard $20 to spend on wireless Internet? Gift proponents answer that Harvard’s research and grant-giving have saved many such children in the past, and that a Harvard education provides a different type of social good. Giving money to fill the stomachs of African children need not preclude giving money to feed the minds of African young adults, who are eligible for financial aid from Harvard.

For others, the principle is about where the money actually goes. Senior Gift now allows givers to specify that their gifts go to fund only financial aid or only student life if they wish. Still, many seniors would rather donate to their Houses’ House Committees or to the clubs with which they identify. Gift proponents retort that these organizations can only exist within the context of a vibrant and diverse University. And, in any case, more specific giving also need not preclude giving to Senior Gift.

For still others, the principle is whether or not they think Harvard deserves their money. Last year’s Senior Gift Plus campaign was predicated on this notion. “Plus” allowed seniors to withhold their donations until the University divested endowment money from Chinese companies doing business with the Sudanese government. In doing so, Plus turned the Gift on its head, treating donations as leverage to further another good cause instead of as support for a good cause in itself. Senior Gift Plus aside, other seniors believe that they should withhold their donations because of perceived slights from Harvard. As any Harvard student can attest, there is a lot that the University could do to enhance the academic and social environment on campus. I know of at least one 2005 senior who didn’t give out of anger over University President Larry Summers’ comments about women in science. To Gift proponents, these stances seem petty and shallow. Seniors (and alums) should not give to Harvard blindly. But neither should they let the bad overshadow the good. Whether Harvard has a student center or not does not affect the fundamentally positive things that Harvard accomplishes. Enforcing narrow administrative or academic accountability by rejecting the Senior Gift makes as much sense as refusing to pay for your parents’ retirement home because they wouldn’t let you see R-rated movies when you were in high school.

Finally, a great many seniors waver on Senior Gift simply because they think it better to donate after the wage-paying world has swelled their savings accounts. If Senior Gift is partially about increasing future giving, then why should students who know they will donate later give to Senior Gift now?

To me, the answer is simple. Harvard represents an objectively good cause, though one of many. And when Harvard asks me for money, I will give what I can. For all the over-analysis that will consume this campus during the Senior Gift campaign, the wise will keep the arguments simple. And the wisest, I dare say, will donate enthusiastically.



Alex Slack ’06, a former Crimson editorial chair, is a history concentrator in Leverett House. He is the co-chair of the Senior Gift campaign in his House. His column appears on alternate Mondays.