The Report Card
And you thought I forgot, didn't you? (And at least one of you hoped I'd forgotten.)
Here it is: graduation day for Larry Summers' first class of freshmen. Today marks the end of Larry Summers' first four years as Harvard president. And what a wild ride it's been! Who could have guessed, back in March of 2001, that naming Larry Summers to the presidency of Harvard would produce such interesting headlines?
Let's recap:
October 2001: Summers criticizes African-American professor Cornel West, saying that he disapproves of West's scholarship, travels away from campus, and political views. Weeks later the Boston Globe reports the story, leading to months of politically-charged headlines. Then West leaves for Princeton.
May 2002: Senior and Commencement speaker Zayed Yasin inadvertently kicks off a controversy when he titles his graduation speech "My American Jihad." A furious Summers forbids his staff to say anything publicly supportive of Yasin.
September 2002: Summers gives a Morning Prayers talk at Appleton Chapel in which he says that signers of a petition seeking Harvard's divestment from Israel are "anti-Semitic in their effect if not their intent." More headlines follow. While the talk is appreciated by many, others feel that Summers has just called several dozen Harvard faculty members anti-Semitic, and think that possibly there was a better way to address the divestment issue.
Fall 2002: Summers directs a million—dollar alumni gift to the DuBois Institute so that Henry Louis Gates, Jr. won't depart Harvard in Cornel West's wake.
November 2002: With Larry Summers' approval, English department chair Larry Buell cancels a speaking invitation to outspoken (and probably anti-Semitic) poet Tom Paulin. Concerned about the precedent, the English department votes to re-invite Paulin, who never accepts the invitation.
March 2003: With Summers' approval (at the very least), FAS dean Bill Kirby fires Harry Lewis, the dean of Harvard College, for not being a team player.
November 2003: Summers declines to stand up for gay students who want Harvard to protest the federal government's enforcement of the Solomon Amendment, which would cut off federal funds to universities which banned military recruiting. His rationale: the issue was not important enough to risk offending the Republicans.
February 2004: The Harvard Crimson editorializes about Larry Summers' hostility to the open flow of information at Harvard. "Summers' tactics...hint at contempt for students and faculty," the Crimson says. "Why does the ivory tower seem to have been occupied by sentries?"
2003-2004: Out of 32 new tenure appointments, only four are women—a 30% drop from the last year of Neil Rudenstine's presidency.
January 2005: Summers suggests that the lack of female faculty in the sciences and mathematics may be a result of "innate differences." You know the rest.
February 2005: Publication of
Harvard Rules adds fuel to the fire. Summers' critic Randy Matoril will later cite the book in a faculty meeting, suggesting that it be mandatory reading for every Harvard professor. (The author concurs.)
March 2005: The faculty votes that it lacks confidence in Larry Summers' leadership.
Today: Commencement. Summers to speak on Harvard in the world, dodge any substantive discussion about the past
annus horribilis.
And now....the grades.
Larry Summers Report Card, 2001-2005:
Allston: B-. The project is moving forward, and that's not nothing, especially for a development of this magnitude. But the secrecy surrounding it has made it hard to evaluate Summers' plans and left the Allston development without a core constituency. Even some of the scientists who are supposed to benefit have misgivings. Meanwhile, Summers' troubles have probably hurt efforts to raise money for the Allston development.
The Curricular Review: D. In the end, it probably won't be a complete disaster, and that's about the best you can say for the review, which Summers used to talk about as one of his grand projects but now conspicuously omits. Again, the problem is secrecy. Well, that and contempt for the faculty, who have felt ignored and/or slighted throughout the entire process. Ultimately, the review is going to be a matter of tinkering around the edges. There's a total lack of vision and coherence to the project that is unbecoming to our greatest university.
Globalization: B. Students will be going abroad more in the Harvard future, and very likely more students from abroad will be coming to Harvard. Summers himself has also traveled extensively to promote Harvard (and himself) overseas—to Europe, Asia, and South America. It's a shame that the biggest question about globalization has gone largely undiscussed: How will it change the identity and purpose of what is historically an
American university, in every sense of that adjective.
Boosting the Sciences: B. The Stem Cell Institute is probably a good idea, as is Summers' constant promotion of biotech. And he's right, of course, that knowing more about science is i mportant to the average student, and important for the competitiveness of American students in a shrinking world. But he loses points because of the AIDS grant scandal.
Improving the college experience: B. Give Summers credit: He's tried to make himself accessible to the students, and he has talked up the goal of improving teaching at Harvard College. (Some easy steps have gone un-taken, though.) Jarred by a poll among peer universities that showed Harvard near last in student satisfaction, Summers has almost manically pressured administrators to do whatever it takes to get the numbers up. If that means students will drink more pub beer, so be it. At the same time, though, Summers clearly doesn't think much of athletics or extracurriculars, which raises that nagging question: Shouldn't he really be president of MIT?
Leadership/Management:
F. Look at this in context: No president had ever faced a faculty vote of no confidence in Harvard's almost-400 year history. It took just three years of manifest contempt for and bullying of the faculty for Larry Summers to provoke one—and lose it.
Alumni Relations/Fundraising: C. Alumnae can't stand him, codgers and right-wingers support him, and everyone else has mixed feelings. Despite what the fundraising types say, this polarization of the alums has surely had an impact on fundraising, at the very least causing delays in the implementation of the university's capital campaign. How much longer will the alums put up with a president who,
a majority of them believe, is damaging the reputation of their university?
Public Relations/Media: C. On the one hand, some media types (Tom Friedman, James Traub) like Summers. But all too often, he's become a figure of satire, shorthand for sexist thinking. True, he's made the Harvard president a national figure again, a public intellectual. Only problem is, half the people who know of Summers think he's a Neanderthal. Moreover, Summers' hostility to, manipulation of, and disdain for the press has caught up to him; he doesn't get the benefit of the doubt, or the lazy puff piece, any more.
Overall Grade: C. This has been a painful four years for Harvard. Rarely has any leader entered an institution with so many natural advantages (both the leader and the institution) and so much goodwill and squandered both so quickly. And for no good reason, other than ego. Everything that Summers has done could have been achieved just as quickly and probably better by a man with a more diplomatic leadership style. And with none of the attendant controversy, division, and setbacks.
After four years, the questions are more urgent than ever: Can he change? Should he stay or should he go? Are Larry Summers' best interests and those of Harvard the same, or have they diverged?
And an extra, bonus grade goes to:
The Harvard Corporation: F. For its complete lack of leadership and bizarre detachment during a time of crisis. The Corporation, stacked but for two with Summers appointees, has never been more discredited; at the moment, it borders on the illegitimate. Is there an independent bone in this body? Or is Harvard suffering from a profound crisis of governance that can only be addressed by the very same people who embody that crisis?
