Professor Summers is scheduled to teach his first course since stepping down as President this Spring. This is his only teaching assignment this academic year. While the syllabus of the course is not yet available here's a link to a description of the course.

http://ksgaccman.harvard.edu/courses/course.aspx?number=ITF-225

The course is co-taught with Professor Lant Pritchett, who also teaches a year-long course and a case workshop on international development.

Pritchett, now a Professor of the Practice of International Development, was an aide to Larry Summers and, allegedly, the author of the infamous 'Summers Memo' on toxic waste:

DATE: December 12, 1991
TO: Distribution
FR: Lawrence H. Summers
Subject: GEP

'Dirty' Industries: Just between you and me, shouldn't the World Bank be encouraging MORE migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs [Least Developed Countries]? I can think of three reasons:

1) The measurements of the costs of health impairing pollution depends on the foregone earnings from increased morbidity and mortality. From this point of view a given amount of health impairing pollution should be done in the country with the lowest cost, which will be the country with the lowest wages. I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.

2) The costs of pollution are likely to be non-linear as the initial increments of pollution probably have very low cost. I've always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly UNDER-polluted, their air quality is probably vastly inefficiently low compared to Los Angeles or Mexico City. Only the lamentable facts that so much pollution is generated by non-tradable industries (transport, electrical generation) and that the unit transport costs of solid waste are so high prevent world welfare enhancing trade in air pollution and waste.

3) The demand for a clean environment for aesthetic and health reasons is likely to have very high income elasticity. The concern over an agent that causes a one in a million change in the odds of prostate cancer is obviously going to be much higher in a country where people survive to get prostate cancer than in a country where under 5 mortality is 200 per thousand. Also, much of the concern over industrial atmosphere discharge is about visibility impairing particulates. These discharges may have very little direct health impact. Clearly trade in goods that embody aesthetic pollution concerns could be welfare enhancing. While production is mobile the consumption of pretty air is a non-tradable.

The problem with the arguments against all of these proposals for more pollution in LDCs (intrinsic rights to certain goods, moral reasons, social concerns, lack of adequate markets, etc.) could be turned around and used more or less effectively against every Bank proposal for liberalization.
 

L'Affair C. West brought into light the question of the productivity of University Professors.

For those interested in the productivity of the lastes Harvard University Professor, his web-site documents it well:

An introduction to an edited volume, last (sixth) coauthor in a report, a book review and 20 op-eds.

http://ksgfaculty.harvard.edu/Lawrence_Summers

How does that compare with Professor West's scholarly productivity?
 

How do you know U-profs make $400,000 a year? More than deans?
 

University Professors can choose how much teaching they do, so Larry Summers is within his rights to teach one course per year.
 

What an odd remark, apparently made in Summers's defense. Aren't all professors within their rights to do lots of things that Summers used to call them on the carpet for doing? The shoe feels different when it is on your own foot, I guess.
 

Was University Professor West not within his rights to decide how to spend his time at the time President Summers called him to discuss his 'outside activities'?
 

That's just wrong about University Professors. They have teaching obligations just like everyone else.
 

"Administrators are always interested in the productivity of their faculties. Harvard's former president,
Lawrence H. Summers, famously alienated one of the institution's most prominent faculty members,
Cornel West, in 2001 when he questioned whether Mr. West, then a professor of Afro-American
was producing the quality of research befitting a Harvard professor."
From: A New Standard for Measuring Doctoral Programs
Annual index ranks departments according to their scholarly output — but its methods rankle
some college officials

Hopefully this CV on KSG's web-page is dated, the latest scholarly publications are over a decade ago:

http://ksghome.harvard.edu/~lsummer/cv.pdf
 

Why is the syllabus of a spring course not yet available to students when the course starts in less than two weeks?

Aren't Harvard students within their rights to have their professors attend to their teaching obligations?
 

1:58 PM is wrong: University Professors do not have to teach any particular course load. It's up to them. Some continue to teach a full load, others decide to teach less.
 

but surely if University Professors don't need to keep a regular teaching load it is because they are expected to remain productive in other ways. Perhaps devoting more of their time to important scholarly research.
 

Do twenty op-eds count?
 

No, neither does working for a hedge fund.
 

C'mon, I still wanna know... do U-profs really make 400K?
 

C'mon, I still wanna know... do U-profs really make 400K?
 

The core of the challenges to Professor West focused on his involvement in the Sharpton Presidential bid. Professor Summers is surely not involved in any Presidential campaign in the same way.
 

Some people believe that faculty members reach the peak of their productivity before the age of 40. Perhaps this is only proving that point!

"The aging of the faculty, caused in large part by the absence of mandatory retirement, is one of the profound problems facing the American research university," said Lawrence H. Summers , who as Harvard president pushed for the hiring and tenure of more younger scholars. "It defies belief that the best way to advance creative thought, to educate the young, or to choose the next generation of faculty members is to have a tenured faculty with more people over 70 than under 40, and over 60 than under 50."
 

4:40's:
Someone authoritative-seeming (I forget who) once told me a U Prof. has to be paid more than any other prof. at the University (i.e. including HBS, HLS). If so that figure is probably in the ball park. Speaking of which Pats win. Go Cheeseheads!
 

Actually, it's not correct that the Sharpton thing was the core of Summers' criticism of West. It was just one of several things, as described in Harvard Rules. West told me this in an on-the-record interview.
 

surely the Kennedy school can afford to pay 400K a year to someone of Professor Summers' stature, even if they don't have to teach a heavy load. Their mere presence on the faculty bolsters the prestige of the school and increases the number of applicants to the many degree programs in that school. A University Professor of Summers' stature is an investment in the brand name of the school, so to speak.
 

What has been the increase in the number of applications at KSG since Professor Summers joined the faculty?
 

KSG doesn't pay, that's why it's called a University Professorship, and also why Pres. Summers, as then president of the University, felt he could give then University Prof. Cornel West a talking to about his take on Prof. West's teaching and scholarship.
 

In calling University Professor Cornel West to have a conversation about his scholarly pursuits, his teaching and his outside activities early in his presidency, Larry Summers was not only within his rights as a president, but he was also sending all members of the University Community a most important signal: that no-one in the University community is above the basic obligations to contribute to Harvard’s core mission: to advance knowledge and to teach. It would be good for Harvard if her presidents could, more often and more deliberately, engage in these kinds of conversations with faculty and administrators.

What is unfortunate about the postings on this thread is that they convey that no one at present, at the Kennedy School or in Mass Hall, could engage Professor Summers in a similar conversation. If that is in fact the case, it appears that things have not moved forward since Summers resigned as president.
 

If there is something Larry Summers should be recognized and thanked for is for how deeply he cared about Harvard.

He cared so much about the place that he put all his energies and his intellect behind trying to improve every aspect of the life of the University.

He was also sufficiently secure of himself that he paid little attention to what others thought of him as he discharged his duties as President to the best of his ability.

Summers was blunt and forthcoming, and sometimes brutal, when he conducted those conversations. If he had known that the number of applications at KSG had declined, or that the quality of the applicants had diminished, he would have confronted the Dean and asked him to explain what was going on and what he planned to do about it. Summers did that, for KSG and for other schools. He had the same interest in the quality of teaching in the college and at the graduate schools. He has similar interests in the quality of the research carried out at Harvard.

If he thought a University Professor, or any Professor, was not working in ways appropriate to the best University in America he called them to talk about it. He did it on these and other topics.

He felt Cornel West was not being held accountable on his excessive outside activities and that is why he called him to his office. He did not single West out for this, this was Summers’ signature as a President. That was his substance.

His style, as is publicly known, left much to be desired. Let us hope that in looking to have someone with a different style, the University has not also lost the substance that characterized Larry’s presidency.
 

While I respect the sincerity of this last post, I have to strongly disagree with it on points of fact.

Larry Summers cared very deeply about what other people thought of him (still does). He hired the first press secretary exclusively for the president Harvard had ever had,he chose writers (not me) whom he thought likely to fawn over him (and they did, usually), he tried to take over Harvard magazine to make it more of a presidential puffer. And so on.

Now, it's probably true that he didn't care all that much what the faculty thought about him, but that was more likely a bad thing than a good one; it reflected his lack of respect for large segments of the Harvard professoriat, which was part of what cost him his job.

On the Cornel West matter, I really wish that everyone would read the relevant section in Harvard Rules. On the points on which Summers challenged West, he was, simply put, wrong. (And most disturbing, there's evidence that he knew he was wrong, and didn't care.) Did West skip classes? No. Was he less productive than other University Professors? No. Was he wrong in supporting Al Sharpton? Well, let's just think about the implications of a university president criticizing one of its professors on the basis of what presidential candidate he supported. That is chilling indeed.

West's style and the often popular nature of his work clearly weren't for everyone. But given West's ethnicity and background, is it really so different for him to record a spoken word hip-hop album than it is for Larry Summers to write a column for the Financial Times? They are both speaking in their own vernacular to groups they think are important—West on racial justice, Summers on the economy.

Most important, there is absolutely nothing that West was doing that wasn't well within the definition of the role of a University Professor. The same holds true for Larry Summers right now. The job requires its holders to do one thing: nothing. Either West and Summers are both wrong in what they chose/have chosen to do with the position, or they are both right. It's as simple as that.

Did Larry Summers care so much about Harvard that he devoted all his energies to trying to improve it? Well, I think the first part of that question is essential. I've always thought that Summers had a love-hate relationship with Harvard, perhaps having to do with its rejection of his undergraduate application, perhaps having to do with attitudes he acquired during his time in Washington. It didn't take long for people to pick up on the "hate" part of that. The "love" part was far more elusive.
 

How is his dedication to Harvard elusive? and if it is, why has the number of applications to several graduate schools dropped precipitously, along with the rankings of those schools in US News, since Larry was forced out? and, why has the level of fundraising dropped concurrently? and, more serious perhaps, why are these matters handled so elusively now?
 

Answering a series of implicitly rhetorical questions is a pointless exercise, especially when they are based upon data that isn't provided. Simple enough to say that when two things happen sequentially, it does not automatically follow that the latter stemmed from the former.
 

On the other hand, if you'd care to address any of the specific, substantive points I made in my prior post, I'd welcome your response.
 

By 10:52 AM's logic, you'd expect that at least enrollments in the KSG would have increased now that Larry Summers is based there. And you'd also expect that donations to KSG would have increased. Why haven't those things happened?
 

since The Crimson is keen to publish when applications to the College increase, we have to assume the same has not happened at KSG, HBS and other professional schools. Why aren't these figures public in the same way they are for the College?
 

because it's hard to face a drop of 40% in five years.
 

11.15AM, of course Larry Summers could increase the number of applications and the gifts to KSG tenfold, if he chose to. Doing this is the job of Deans, however, not of Professors.
 

I wasn't suggesting that Larry Summers should solicit student applications or do fundraising for KSG. Usually, the mere presence of a distinguished faculty member attracts both students and funds.
 

how do you know it hasn't done that already?