In Support of Hopper College

This past Saturday, Yale University President Peter Salovey announced that Yale University would rename Calhoun College—one of its 12 undergraduate residential colleges, which are analogous to Harvard’s houses—after the groundbreaking computer scientist Grace Murray Hopper, who studied at Yale in the 1930s. This overturns the decision made by Salovey in April of last year that Yale would not change the name of the college, which was met with student outcry, and to which we objected at the time.

We commend Yale on the care with which the change was contemplated and subsequently announced. It is evident the decision was not taken lightly; in August, Salovey formed a “Committee to Establish Principles on Renaming”, and thereafter another committee to apply the principles established by the committee to the intricacies of Calhoun College. This second committee eventually led to the recently announced decision by Salovey and Yale’s board of trustees. Moreover, an alternate namesake was already determined at the time of the announcement, so that students did not have to undergo a confusing period of uncertainty—an uncertainty that Harvard students are all too familiar with after the nearly three month lag between the renunciation of “house master” and adoption of “faculty dean”. Peer institutions would do well to pay heed to the way this sensitive decision was made.

Even though we agree with this decision, we do not endorse wholesale revisionism by universities, nor do we believe institutions should do themselves and their students a disservice by effacing a less than agreeable past. Renaming is an inherently ad hoc process, and universities must take into account the particularities of any situation in arriving at decisions. That said, Yale has made the correct decision in renaming Calhoun College after Grace Murray Hopper.

As bears repetition, John C. Calhoun was an avid anti-abolitionist and secessionist, as well as an advocate of the constitutionally dubious policy of nullification. In the eloquent words of Salovey, “John C. Calhoun’s legacy as a white supremacist and a national leader who passionately promoted slavery as a ‘positive good’ fundamentally conflicts with Yale’s mission and values”. This in itself should disqualify him from being the namesake of a college that is intended to serve as a cornerstone of students’ identity at Yale.

By contrast, Grace Murray Hopper was a trailblazing pioneer and brilliant scientist to whom modern programmers are still indebted. After receiving a master’s degree from Yale in 1930 and a Ph.D. four years thereafter, Hopper served in the Navy during World War II, subsequently creating the first computer compiler in 1952 and contributing to the development of the programming language COBOL. Hopper’s illustrious achievements eventually earned the moniker “Amazing Grace”.

It is beyond debate that Hopper is a more deserving namesake than Calhoun. By virtue of Yale’s willingness to scrutinize its previous decisions, we hope current Yale students—and those 100 years hence—will be able to take pride in being members of Hopper College.