Shots In The Dark

U-Colorado professor Ward Churchill may not get fired for his controversial remarks about 9/11...but he might get the boot for being a plagiarist, according to an article in InsiderHigherEd.com.

It also turns out that Churchill may not be of Native American descent, as he has claimed.

Key quote: "The report also examined an unusual allegation that has been raised: That Churchill is not an American Indian.... Churchill has always identified himself to the university as an American Indian, and the university received complaints from Indian leaders 10 years ago that Churchill was being untruthful. At the time, the university concluded that self-identification was an appropriate way for Churchill to declare himself an Indian, so the matter was dropped."

This question of self-identification has become an issue at Harvard as well. If a student applies to the school and identifies him or herself as a minority—presumably creating some small advantage in the application process–does Harvard have any obligation to verify the claim?

I am reminded of an old friend of mine, a TV reporter with just about the WASPiest face and name you could imagine. She wanted to get out of her small market station, but despite being a terrific reporter, couldn't get hired anywhere. So she changed her preppy surname to a Hispanic one, and got a job offer within days—no matter that she couldn't have looked less Hispanic. Thus breeding cynicsm all 'round.

Two thoughts:

1) Winston Churchill shouldn't get fired for saying something political and stupid...but these other allegations are definitely firing offenses, if true.

2) The debate over "self-identification" is going to heat up....

The NBER transcript has been re-posted on President Summers' website....

Remember how, in a spirit of openness, Larry Summers posted the transcript of his NBER remarks on his website? Well, glasnost didn't last long. Now, if you click on the site, you get a message saying that if you want a transcript, call the president's office.

Where I'm sure they'll take your name down very carefully.....

A fascinating piece in the Times looks at how New York governor George Pataki has privatized and politicized the state university system. Harvard afficionados will note the byline on the story belongs to Pat Healy, who used to cover Harvard for the Boston Globe. This is a thorough and nuanced piece of reporting. Not to mention a good read.

The ubiquitous David Horowitz promotes his "Academic Bill of Rights" here. Horowitz worries that lefty professors have taken over the academy, and so his bill aims to promote "intellectual diversity."

Key quote: <Why do we need legislation? There are too many people like Ward Churchill—the University of Colorado professor who compared 9/11 victims with Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann—on faculties across the nation. They confuse their classroosm with a political soap box.>

Horowitz then gives a whopping two examples, both at small schools in Colorado. (What is with Colorado professors, anyway? It's not exactly a blue state.) At least one of those examples—a professor who asked students taking a criminology exam to argue that the invasion of Iraq was a criminal act—sounds defensible to me.

(Although better if the professor had said: "The invasion of Iraq was illegal. Agree or disagree." But who knows? Maybe he did.)

Legislators need to get involved, Horowitz concludes, to ensure that schools are "educating our kids, not brainwashing them."

Mmmm. Because there's so much intellectual diversity in our legislatures these days, right?

(Sorry. That was a cheap shot.)

The point is, the kind of political sermonizing Horowitz is up in arms about just isn't widespread. And when it does occur, universities can address it on their own, without any help from politicians.

What Horowitz really wants is affirmative action for conservative professors...

According to a survey by the Princeton Review, more American students consider New York University their "dream college" than any other.

Harvard was ranked second, followed by Stanford, Yale and Princeton.

The Review interprets this as evidence that students are choosing an "urban" college experience, largely because of the internship and employment opportunities New York provides.

Let's hope that this is indeed the case, and it's not just that the Olsen twins go there....

Lee Bollinger, who lost the Harvard presidency to Larry Summers, talks about free speech at universities here.

Bollinger was specifically addressing the allegation that the department of Middle Eastern Studies at Columbia is a hotbed of anti-Semitism.

The Columbia president, a First Amendment scholar, strikes a reasonable balance. Just because they have tenure and the right to free speech, he said, professors can't say anything they want, and shouldn't use their classrooms to promote their own political agendas.

Then Bollinger adds this very important caveat: "When there are lines to be drawn," he said, "we must and will be the ones to do it. Not outside actors. Not politicians, not pressure groups, not the media. Ours is and must remain a system of self-government."

People at Columbia tell me that Bollinger's agenda is very similar to Larry Summers' at Harvard: centralizing the president's authority, expanding the campus, building up the sciences, etc.

And yet, for some reason, the Harvard president is embroiled in controversy while Bollinger looks like the public intellectual Summers was supposed to be....suggesting that it's not necessarily Summers' agenda that has gotten him into trouble, but his personality.

And then some.

The College has announced that tuition will rise 4.5% next year, going up to $41, 675, once again outpacing the rate of inflation. Simultaneously, Harvard says that it will increase its college scholarships to $84.6 million. As much as that sounds, it's still less than a third of total revenue from tuition. My rough estimate: assuming that Harvard has 6, 400 undergraduates, they pay $266, 604, 800 in tuition every year.

I know that many students who want to go to the nation's finest colleges think that such exorbitant amounts of money are well-spent. The reward is economic success in later life.

I can't help but wonder, though, if the very purpose of college isn't being warped by such prices. The higher the price of tuition, the less likely students can afford to do anything but go into high-paying fields like law and finance after they graduate....

Dormaid's "general counsel," a sophomore economics concentrator named Joseph T.M. Cianflone, makes the case for Dormaid in this Crimson op-ed.

Key quote: <<The most important issue at hand is economic freedom. The principles of free enterprise and the right of every citizen in a just and fair society to decide how and when to purchase what they will are the cornerstones of any democratic meritocracy. Dorm life is not a mandatory egalitarian process imposed upon us by the College to distort our view of how societies run best. Nor is it a system designed to paternalistically decide what is fair and unfair consumption based upon income brackets.>>

Well, there you have it: For today's students, the most important right is the right to purchase whatever they want. That's the "cornerstone" of meritocracy.

Kudos to Cianflone for stating the case so forthrightly. But I couldn't disagree more. Harvard College should not simply be a luxury mall at which shoppers purchase the services they want--courses, maids, a diploma, whatever--and then depart, prepped for success in the outside world. Any college that means something should aspire to educate its students outside the classroom as well as inside. Who really wants to attend a college which teaches that money is everything?

Wait a second—don't answer that question.

It's not fashionable to say that a college should teach values, I know. But Harvard should—and Dormaid doesn't.

The New York Times reports on the latest in the heartbreaking case of Terri Schiavo. I say "heartbreaking" not just because of the sadness of Schiavo's condition, but because of how Congress has exploited Schiavo for political gain. (And not just Republicans—a lot of Democrats voted for the ghastly "Palm Sunday compromise.")

Here's something I don't understand: why all the people who want Schiavo's feeding tube reinserted are so appalled at the idea of her passing.

Don't get me wrong: I don't worship death, and I'm not exactly looking forward to my own moment of reckoning with the Grim Reaper.

But it seems to me that part of honoring life is accepting that death—preferably death with dignity—is a part of the human narrative. And the Schiavo protesters want to deny her that death.

Anyway, don't these folks believe in heaven? After all, they're the same people who don't want evolution taught in schools....

Tom Scocca has a smart piece on the Summers presidency in this week's New York Observer (and not just because he quotes yours truly). Scocca looks skeptically at some of the much-touted Summers "accomplishments"—Allston, the curricular review—and compares his management style to that of Howell Raines, late of the New York Times.

Key quote: "Mr. Raines lamented 'the destructive power of a change-resistant newsroom.' What he—and Mr. Summers—overlooked was the constructive power already in place. The procedures, structures and habits of Harvard or the Times had been built up by generations of smart people, trying to figure out the best way to do their jobs. They worked."

I think Scocca's on to something: All the talk about how Summers was supposed to "shake things up" has obscured any meaningful discussion of what, exactly, needed shaking up, and whether shaking up was really the best means of effecting whatever change was required. There are lots of smart people at Harvard—not just the president.

...and it's Summers by a nose. As the Crimson reports, Harvard graduate students rejected the vote of no-confidence by 699 to 608.

Tough to know what this vote means, if anything, which was part of the reason why some students were not entirely supportive of having it. Ninety students abstained, and 146 said they "need more information."

But certainly, when you're down, you take your victories where you can, and Summers should be pleased by this outcome.

My prediction: It won't be a day before a conservative pundit uses this vote to proclaim that the professors are more out of touch than the students, just a bunch of aging '60s radicals....

It's worth noting that the grad students also voted on the second resolution, the milder censure originally proposed by Theda Skocpol. They passed that overwhelmingly, by a vote of 945-362, with 149 abstaining and 87 saying they needed more information...

Last night I watched the long-delayed film "Prozac Nation" on Starz (how I hate to write those five letters), and this morning I read Dana Steven's review of it in Slate. I liked the movie less than Stevens did, but I agree with her that the movie's fundamental problem is that protagonist Elizabeth Wurtzel is wholly unlikeable.

(Full disclosure: I know Elizabeth and don't find her wholly unlikeable at all. Yes, she has a penchant for saying things that get her in trouble, but she's also a very talented writer; I published an excerpt from her book, Bitch, in George because it was the most insightful essay about Hillary Clinton I'd ever read.)

Part of the movie's problem is that the impact of Wurtzel's collegiate environment is absent. There's no sense of why being at Harvard was such an important part of her story. (There are some shots of the campus in the film, but most of it is set at some other bucolic university.)

An important element of Prozac Nation was the contrast of feeling like a train wreck at a place filled with overachievers....a feeling that many Harvard students can still understand.

Here's my favorite part of today's Crimson story on Ellen Lagemann's resignation:

<Lagemann said she left yesterday's faculty meeting 25 minutes early to discuss public relations strategy with University Provost Steven E. Hyman.>

Oh, my. Where does one start with that?

The Crimson also points out that the five ed school deans preceding Lagemann each served at least eight years, rather than Lagemann's three.....

The Times runs its take on the Dormaid story—"At Harvard, An Unseemly Display of Wealth or Merely a Clean Room?"

The article hinges on whether Dormaid is a legitimate campus business or a way of reinforcing class distinctions at Harvard.

Key quote from a Dormaid founder: <<"There's so many ways in which on our campus you're able to display wealth in so much more obvious a fashion than having someone quietly clean your room," said Mr. Eisenberg, 20, a psychology major from Westfield, N.J.. He said class differences were evident in clothes, cars and entertainment, even in a campus laundry service that would wash, fold and place students' clothes in a "very noticeable" yellow bag.>>

I love the use of the word "quietly" there. Doesn't he actually mean "meekly"?

Harvard has made a huge mistake in sanctioning Dormaid. Everything about it appalls: that it allows students to pay others to pick up after themselves; that if one roommate can afford it and the other can't, Dormaid will happily accept money from the former and leave the latter's room untouched (as co-founder Michael Kopko hilariously puts it, "to avoid stratifying people, if one roommate does not want the service, DormAid will clean only the rooms of those who do"); that one reason Dormaid was approved was that the founders agreed to appoint one student to "oversee" the adult cleaning crews.

Forgive my class consciouness, but this is exactly how Harvard students are trained to oversee the workers of the world.

If you don't believe me, just look at the picture that accompanies the article.

The photo shows a white male student—it's an unfortunate bit of symbolism that he happens to be German—happily striding through his (filthy) apartment, while below him two women, one black and one Latina, are literally on their knees cleaning.

But Harvard is not the only elite institution which has a problem with classism. Guess which participants in this debate the Times didn't think important enough to interview?

It's almost too easy: the people doing the cleaning.

Or were they afraid that their boss, the Harvard sophomore, would fire them if they spoke to the press?

The Daily Pennsylvanian's article on Larry Summers advances the story with quotes from Richard Summers, one of Larry's younger brothers.

Key quote: "There is a national, increasing tension in large universities between [the] corporate needs of a complex institution and the old-style university governance, a community of scholars," Richard Summers said. "Larry's found himself in the crosshairs of that kind of conflict. The faculty at Harvard want to be in charge."

Some caveats: Richard Summers neatly skips over the role of his brother's personality and leadership style. And I think he overstates the case. The faculty at Harvard doesn't want to be "in charge." Go to any faculty meeting and see how low the attendance is, and you'll see just how involved in university governance the faculty wants to be. They don't want to run the place...but they do want to be involved in running the place. The difference may be subtle, but it's real.

Still, Richard Summers does put his finger on something that's true at Harvard and elsewhere: the corporate model versus the community of scholars model. You might even call it the struggle for the soul of a university.

Shots in the Dark, March 16, 2005: "In a year or so, once the dust settles, Summers [may resign] in a way that allows him to claim some measure of success as a 'change agent.'"

The Daily Pennsylvanian, March 22, 2005: "I think he was asked to be president of Harvard to be a change agent," said Richard Summers, the president's brother and associate director of the psychiatry residency program at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

Marcella Bombardieri in the Boston Globe picks up on Ellen Lagemann's departure. Bombardieri writes that tensions with Larry Summers might have had something to do with it. Howard Gardner, a friend of Lagemann's and a Summers' critic, tells the Globe that "by all accounts their relationship was very rocky."

But Lagemann denies it. Key quote: "[Summers] is more interested in K-12 education than possibly any president of Harvard has ever been," she said in a phone interview. "No dean of the education school before me has had the kind of support I've had from Larry. We have a wonderful time arguing about issues in K-12 education, and I would say he has been very supportive of this school."

Lagemann adds that she's 59, she's "not going to live forever," and she has a book she wants to write.

Hmmm. Let's parse this.

It's my impression that Lagemann is right: Summers is indeed interested in K-12 education. He talks about it frequently, often using his daughters as examples of educational phenomena. (What their textbooks said about the Industrial Revolution, for example.) And he knows that for Harvard to find low-income students who are truly capable of doing the work there, public schools around the country have to improve.

However, it's also my impression that Gardner is also right. Stories about an argumentative relationship between Summers and Lagemann have been floating around campus for her entire 2.5-year tenure.

It wouldn't surprise me if Summers' interest in lower education (is that the right term? sounds too politically incorrect, but I like it) were, in fact, the reason for Lagemann's departure. When Larry Summers takes an interest in your subject, it's a mixed blessing. On the one hand, you have the president's interest. On the other hand, you have the president's interest. And when Summers is watching over something, he's not shy about telling you what you should do.

It's worth noting that Lagemann's politic statements might have something to do with the fact that she'll now be teaching at the ed school while she writes her book.

As she put it, she's almost 60. If she makes nice now, she can comfortably teach at Harvard for five years while she writes—a nice transition into retirement. At the same time, she knows that people in the community will suspect that there's more to the story than the fact that she wants to write a book.

Saying the gracious thing in public seems like the smart play here.....and who knows? Maybe it's even true.

A high-profile woman at Harvard is on her way out. Ellen Condliffe Lagemann, dean of the school of education, has announced that she will leave at the end of the school year. The timing is curious, to say the least. With just about two months to go before commencement, Lagemann's not exactly leaving a lot of time to find a successor—these searches take time. Also, you'd think that Larry Summers would do everything in his power right now to keep one of his three female deans (the others are at the law school and the Radcliffe Institute) from leaving.

Somehow I have a feeling there's more to this story....

The Yale Daily News offers its take on goings-on at Harvard here.

(Think folks in New Haven are enjoying this much?)

The most interesting part is this contribution from Yale history professor John Morton Blum, a former member of the Harvard Corporation, who spoke about the impossibility of knowing where the Harvard Corporation truly stands.

<<"We don't know what the feeling in the corporation is," Blum said. "I don't know whether Mr. Houghton is speaking for himself or for a majority of the corporation or for the whole corporation."

Even if the corporation fully supports Summers now, its support may be tentative, Blum said. But chances are slim that the corporation would fire Summers outright, due to a "tradition of civility" that exists among institutions of higher learning, Blum said.

"What they would do would be to go to the president and say, 'We no longer support you, you've got to resign,'" he said, noting that former Harvard President Nathan Pusey, unpopular among students and faculty alike for his handling of a riot during the 1960s, was ousted in this way.>>

Blum indirectly touches upon a crucial point: that "tradition of civility" in institutions of higher learning. That's exactly what the faculty is saying has been lost under Larry Summers. Ironic that the very tradition he has scorned may keep him from getting fired.

A fascinating trio of letters in the Harvard Crimson.

The first, by J. Robert Moskin, class of '44, is almost a parody of the grouchy old alum. "Enough of this disgraceful public bickering by teachers who are expected to know better." And so on.

The second, by Samuel S. Robinson, class of '54, isn't much better. Robinson talks about how Harvard once protected its professors from McCarthyism, and now is turning on its own president. "Who would want to succeed University President Lawrence H. Summers, or indeed even teach at or attend a place so disconnected from its glorious past?"

Not quite sure I follow the logic there.

David G. Winter, class of '60, sounds like a man who graduated just a little ahead of his time. "The Harvard Corporation—one of the oldest absolute oligarchies in the Western Hemisphere, and a bastion of the American ruling class—is in no way bound to act on the faculty’s views," he writes. "And so as expected, it has announced its continued confidence in Summers."

Isn't it remarkable how all these letters seem not just reflective of the men who wrote them, but the era in which they graduated?

And again, a point I've made repeatedly in this space: People outside the university simply do not understand that, particularly at Harvard, it is customary for the faculty to have a say in the running of the place. Not necessarily a decisive one, but a voice that is taken seriously and considered with respect.

Here's Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney at the St. Patrick's Day breakfast, an annual and venerable Bay State rite. (Spirits were, um, high, so the translation is loose.)

"I know I need to reach out to other constituencies, so I thought about the chances of organizing a 'Democrats for Romney' group....About as good as starting a 'Female Mathematicians for Larry Summers' group."

Having said that...

I am surprised that race has not become a bigger part of the discussion at Harvard. Because if women are concerned about their lack of visibility in the university's higher echelons, African-Americans and other minorities have even more reason to be angry. Look around at the Summers administration—it's not exactly the Rainbow Coalition. In fact, "not exactly" is giving Summers too much credit. This group is whiter than a doily.

Summers sometimes seem to think that the rules which apply to everyone else don't apply to him. Even as he talks about diversity and its importance to the student body—even as he co-authors New York Times op-eds in favor of affirmative action—he has not appointed a single minority to a high level post in his administration. Not one African-American, Latino/a, or Asian-American. So while I have no idea if Desiree Goodwin's lawsuit has merit, I do think that, unless things change, sooner or later Summers is going to get hit with a discrimination lawsuit in which he'll be the named defendant.

The declining numbers of female faculty members at Harvard is a scandal. So is this.

I have no knowledge of Desiree Goodwin's situation, but I should say that she came to my reading at the Old South Meeting House and asked what I thought was a smart question.

In James Traub's August 2003 profile of Larry Summers in the New York Times Magazine, there's a curious anecdote. While meeting with a group of students, Summers was asked about the incident of the snow penis, the sculpture built by some male Harvard undergrads and knocked down by some female students. Was the sculpture's destruction justified or an unacceptable violation of free speech?

Summers responded by challenging students to think about the issue. What if a student had written "nigger" in the snow? he asked. Would that change your feelings?

Goodwin wanted to know my reaction to that story and whether I thought Summers was racist.

Tough question.

Because when I first read Traub's profile, I was a little shocked by Summers' use of the n-word. For one thing, because he didn't actually need to say it—he could have done what I just did, and said "the n-word."

But then, that isn't his style.

Summers was clearly using the word in a context aimed at showing its offensiveness. Still, it's risky to throw out that word in a crowded room. Especially when you don't really need to; when your use of it has more to do with an instinctive dislike for euphemisms, or perhaps the sense that it was so obvious that he was using the word in a critical way, no one could find fault with him.

Still...this is the kind of thing that gets Summers in trouble. Because not everyone will understand his intention. And his almost casual use of the word opens him up to the charge that he's racist in effect, if not intent.

My answer to Goodwin: I don't think Summers is racist. But I do think that incident is an excellent example of how Summers can be so clinical, he doesn't realize when he's playing with fire.

The book's mentioned in two news stories today, this one from the Boston Herald and this one from the Baltimore Sun.

The Herald reports on the ongoing lawsuit of Desiree Goodwin, a former Harvard librarian who is suing the university, claiming that a supervisor told her she was "too sexy" to be taken seriously. Goodwin, who is black, also claims that she was repeatedly passed over for promotion while less qualified whites were advanced. She and her lawyer were hoping to call Larry Summers to testify. The judge ruled against Goodwin on the grounds that Summers had no direct knowledge of her situation and that his appearance "would only be for the purpose of harassment and publicity."

The Herald also reports that Goodwin's lawyer wants to introduce Harvard Rules as evidence.

Key quote: <<Goodwin's attorney Richard D. Clarey wants to show jurors a new book, "Harvard Rules—The Struggle for the Soul of the World's Most Powerful University," whose author claims Summers oppossed Condoleeza Rice as a graduation speaker by saying he would not let "affirmative action" dictate his choice.>>

More on this momentarily.

The Baltimore Sun piece is called "Tell-All Books are a Dose of Poison in Harvard's Ivy," which is the kind of title that gets you irritated at newspapers. The article is about the campus reaction to Harvard Rules and Ross Douthat's book, Privilege, and neither work really falls into the tell-all category. But never mind. Here's the key quote in Ellen Gamerman's story.

<With a faculty fight over Harvard's leadership resulting in the largest faculty group's no-confidence vote against President Lawurence H. Summers last week, as well as two new tell-all books offering an unflattering glimpse behind Harvard's red-brick walls, the university with a seemingly unassailable brand name is finding itself on the defensive.>

Gamerman has a point: Whatever side you take in the Summers controversy, there's no doubt that it has tarnished Harvard's reputation. The left sees Summers as a tyrannical, sexist caricature; the right sees the faculty as a politically correct mob. What impact will this have when students receive their acceptance letters in a couple of weeks? Or will the youth of America simply base their decisions on the great soul-killing force of our era— celebrity?