Bingo! But it creates a huge disincentive for students to take leave when they should.
5 Likes
Thatās the thing that is such a head scratcher - we are in a pandemic and some people donāt get over Covid right away and develop Post Covid fatigue syndrome which is what is going on with my son. He is MUCH better than he was even a month ago. Of course, how much of his fatigue was mono and how much was post covid, I donāt know.
Heās sitting here saying he feels well enough to go back but we had to make the decision last month. Itās so frustrating. At PT today they have him back to doing regular exercises and he went running today for 25 minutes with no fatigue crash. I still think itās wise for him to sit out the first semester because with this syndrome there is no telling whether the crashes will come back. Iād like him to be crash free for a few months.
Anyway, this is really a buyersā beware to parents who are sending their kids off next year. As I said it would never occur to me a school would make you take off extra semesters even if you are well enough to go back. I would have looked at all of those details about sick leave if it had occurred to me.
2 Likes
My guess is this policy is to address the many mental health leave requests.
5 Likes
If he feels well enough to go back, is there a way to check to see if that is still possible?
There does seem to be SOME degree of flexibility. Perhaps you can have a call with them to see if there is? Iāve copied the statement from Harvard that you posted, bolding language perhaps giving an opening.
I am assuming you have already had detailed discussions with HU about all this? If so, you would be the best judge about flexibility. If not, you should do so at once. Iām also assuming you have discussed all of this with your sonās medical/other professionals to see what they think about the six-month period (e.g., is it excessive in your sonās specific circumstances?)
I am not denying anything youāre saying, but it seems like there is some wiggle room in the rider if a case can be made for it.
Best of luck to you and your son.
Rider
One aspect of the mission of Harvard College is to help students grow through difficult circumstances and ultimately earn their degrees. At times, medical circumstances arise that affect a studentās ability to participate in coursework and residential life, and when these become significant enough to lead to a student taking time away, the College believes it is important to ensure that these circumstances are addressed and ameliorated before the student returns. Given that each student is only allotted eight total terms at Harvard, the College feels it is important that the time spent on campus be as full, balanced, and productive as possible.
Because the College partners with students in ensuring that medical and personal circumstances are ameliorated during their time away, the College expects that when students who have left under significant medical and/or personal challenges request to return to the College, they will participate in certain conversations with Harvard University Health Services (HUHS). Subsequently the College (at a meeting of the Administrative Board) will evaluate whether the student has made sufficient and sustained progress and is ready to return. Formally, this is known as a āHarvard University Health Services (HUHS) rider,ā and is a supplementary condition of an Administrative Board vote that is added to a studentās leave of absence or requirement to withdraw.
In order to ensure that a student is ready to return, the HUHS rider sets out specific expectations for students to meet before they may submit a petition to be considered for return to the College. For significant medical and personal challenges, one of the most important indicators of readiness to return to the demands of college life is a substantial period of stability and engagement in productive activity. Ultimately, these are the main factors that suggest to the Administrative Board that a student is ready to return, and it is important to attend to these early during time away from Harvard. It is often useful for students to have a conversation with their Resident Dean and/or HUHS about how to approach these expectations.
The means by which the College assesses sustained stability is documentation of participation and progress with appropriate health care providers for a period of ordinarily not less than six consecutive months (or more if recommended by those providers). It is the experience of the College that students who have demonstrated stability for this length of time with a health care professional have the best likelihood of a successful return to their studies and can make the most of their time at Harvard College.
In addition to engagement in treatment, successful and productive activity that requires maintenance of a full-time schedule while working with people (other than family members or clinicians), also for a period of ordinarily not less than six consecutive months, usually provides the best evidence for a readiness to return. Most often, students meet this expectation by obtaining a non-academic job in a non-family situation or, potentially, two part-time jobs or volunteer work, held simultaneously. (Please note that students who have been required to withdraw from the College have a more specific work requirement.) The College recognizes that there are legitimate circumstances in which comparable activities also may be able to provide HUHS with the information it needs to evaluate stability and readiness to return.
Checklist for Students Petitioning to Return to the College under a HUHS Rider
Once you and your clinicians have decided that you may be ready to return to the College, you will engage in conversations with the College and HUHS about your readiness to return. This process is outlined below, and involves a statement from you, documentation from health care providers regarding treatment and sustained stability, and documentation of productivity (most normally a significant period of paid or volunteer work, except in cases of a requirement to withdraw which has a more specific work requirement). Once you have completed an HUHS consultation and HUHS has reviewed all clinical documentation, HUHS provides a synopsis of your care and progress to the Administrative Board, and the Board considers that synopsis along with your statement and documentation of productivity and makes a decision about your readiness to return. In many cases, students who leave the College engage in a productive period of treatment and engagement while away and return with renewed energy and focus. In some cases, a petition is not approved given that the Board feels that further treatment and/or time away is necessary to address the challenges experienced by the student. The most common reasons for a decision to not allow a student to return to the College are: (1) there is insufficient evidence of a significant period of stability from a medical perspective, and/or (2) the student did not successfully engage in a sufficient period of productivity in a job or similar activity. Although it is sometimes difficult for a student to understand an Administrative Board decision that does not permit returning for a given term, these decisions in fact are meant to ensure that a returning student is in a strong position to take advantage of all the resources of Harvard College.
ā Step One: INITIATING RETURN. To initiate a petition to return to the College, contact both your Allston Burr Resident Dean/Resident Dean of First-Year Students and HUHS to inform them that you would like to petition the Administrative Board to return to the College. The contact with HUHS must take place by calling Internal Medicine 617-496-5804. These contacts should be initiated no later than:
May 1 for fall semester return November 1 for spring semester return April 1 for Summer School enrollment
Once in contact with the appropriate HUHS department, you should schedule your readmission consultation appointment with HUHS so that it takes place during the appropriate time windows:
late June through early August for fall semester return November through December for spring semester return late April through May for Summer School enrollment
Please note: Students who initiate petitions or schedule readmission consultations after these dates will likely not have their petitions heard in time for the Board to consider their enrollment, and in such circumstances they will need to postpone their petition to a subsequent term.
This readmission consultation is expected to be an in-person conversation at HUHS. There are sometimes extenuating circumstances in which HUHS will consider doing a phone consultation
with you. If you believe there are financial or geographic barriers to arranging an in-person consultation, those must be discussed with HUHS well in advance of your scheduled appointment, and both HUHS and your Allston Burr Resident Dean/Resident Dean of First-Year Students must agree on the format of your readmission consultation.
ā Step Two: PROVIDING DOCUMENTATION FOR IN-PERSON HUHS CONVERSATION. It is very important that you submit all necessary documentation to HUHS at least one week in advance of your scheduled readmission consultation. Please be aware that if HUHS does not receive all of the necessary documents by the deadline, your readmission consultation will likely be rescheduled to a later date. You should allow your clinicians and work/activity supervisor(s) ample time to prepare and submit their letters. We will expect you to submit:
- A PERSONAL STATEMENT, which should address the circumstances leading to your leave, your progress, and why you believe you are ready to return.
- A LETTER FROM YOUR SUPERVISOR(S) AT YOUR PLACE(S) OF EMPLOYMENT OR VOLUNTEER WORK attesting to your performance, timeliness and effectiveness in carrying out your job responsibilities and in interacting with your supervisors and co-workers. This should include official letterhead and contact information for the writer of the letter.
- THE NAMES AND TELEPHONE NUMBERS OF THE HEALTH CARE PROVIDERS ON YOUR TREATMENT TEAM, ALONG WITH ANY AUTHORIZATIONS OR RELEASES that those providers may require to permit them to speak with the evaluating clinician at HUHS and to provide to HUHS any relevant medical records.
- A DETAILED LETTER FROM YOUR HEALTH CARE PROVIDER(S) that includes information about your: (1) initial presentation; (2) current treatment, including current symptoms and/or status; (3) medication regimen; and (4) compliance with treatment. The letter should also evaluate your readiness to return as a full-time student at the College, and should include any recommendations for supports you may need upon such return.
- āAUTHORIZATIONS FOR DISCLOSURE OF INFORMATIONā from HUHS that allow HUHS to communicate about you with: (1) your Allston Burr Resident Dean/Resident Dean of First-Year Students and the Administrative Board (this communication will be limited to your readiness to return, your compliance with treatment, and any appropriate conditions and recommendations for supports on your return); (2) any supervisors/employers (this communication will be limited to your job performance, including timeliness and effectiveness in carrying out job responsibilities and in interacting with superiors and co-workers); and (3) any treating clinicians (such as mental health clinicians and/or primary care physicians), and any other counselors or advisors. Forms are located at the following link:
https://huhs.harvard.edu/med-recs-immunizations/health-information-services- medical-records
These materials may be faxed to Dr. Stelios Maheras at 617-496-0530.
Materials can also be mailed to: Stelios Maheras, MD
Readmission Consultation
Harvard University Health Services 75 Mt. Auburn Street
Cambridge, MA 02138
ā Step Three: PROVIDING DOCUMENTATION TO YOUR ALLSTON BURR RESIDENT DEAN/RESIDENT DEAN OF FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS. Before your readmission consultation at HUHS, the following materials should be sent to your Allston Burr Resident Dean/Resident Dean of First-Year Students (separately from those you sent to HUHS):
- Your finalized PERSONAL STATEMENT
- LETTER(S) FROM YOUR SUPERVISOR(S)
After your readmission consultation, HUHS will communicate in writing with your Allston Burr Resident Dean/Resident Dean of First-Year Students and ultimately with the Administrative Board to provide an assessment of your engagement and progress in treatment during your time away and whether or not you may be ready to resume your studies at Harvard. Please be aware that the Administrative Board will not receive any of the medical records that were provided by you or about you to HUHS.
The HUHS assessment will document your compliance with treatment recommendations, progress to date, and assessment of your readiness to return as a full-time student. It may also contain recommendations for continued care (which could be at HUHS or in the local community). In the case that ongoing care is recommended, the College may expect continued care as a condition of your readmission and ask you to sign a care contract around this expectation.
Once your petition has been considered by the Administrative Board, your Allston Burr Resident Dean/Resident Dean of First-Year Students will communicate the outcome to you.
Please be aware that students who do not fully complete the three steps above ordinarily will not have their petition brought to the Administrative Board. In such circumstances, these students will need to postpone their request to return until a subsequent term.
ā Step Four: ACCESSIBLE EDUCATION OFFICE. If you anticipate the need for academic or other accommodations on a temporary or long-term basis, please contact the
Collegeās Accessible Education Office (AEO) as far in advance as possible before you expect to return to Harvard. The Office can be contacted by telephone at 617-496-8707 (fax: 617-496- 1098; tty: 617-496-3720) or by e-mail at aeo@fas.harvard.edu. Additional information about AEO, the resources that it offers to eligible students, and guidelines for clinical documentation may be found at http://aeo.fas.harvard.edu.
2 Likes
Thatās what a lot of us are speculating, but itās applied to everyone.
My kid had two medical leaves from Harvard. They had never met with such understanding, respect and even kindness. i saw this with others as well.
The policies cited are not written in stone. During their first leave my kid lived with a friend in a city and did creative work. Second leave my kid interned in two organizations, one at a time. Doctors were very involved in documenting readiness and kid met with HUHS MD who sanctions return. After the second leave the Admin Board even offered additional accommodations that my kid had not requested, enabling them to have a wonderful last year and a half.
I am private and donāt write about this, but this thread really kind of forces me to write something about Harvardās policies. I encourage the OP to talk to someone at Harvard to get a clearer picture of what this actually entails and what flexibility there might be.
I would also say that at the school another one of my kids attends, if you take a medical leave you have to reapply for admission. There is no medical leave at all.
Harvard is known for going to great lengths to make sure students succeed and graduate. (It is in their best interest in terms of statistics but we found the admin. and deans to be truly nice people.) The return policy is simply to ensure the student can succeed and finish. With a short term, defined issue like mono, return criteria should be fairly simple, but not sure how long the COVID recovery will be. I hope the clinic can shed light and work with you and Harvard to resolve this.
Were any accommodations offered to avoid withdrawal? Were grades wiped clean when he withdrew?
9 Likes
We had a friend withdraw from Harvard due to mental health crisis due to Covid isolation. He has some treatment and took a cooking course. Re-entered the next year.
1 Like
Iām sorry you and your son are in this position. It must be very frustrating to find out youāre looking at mandatory year long absence.
Could your son take a voluntary leave of absence unrelated to his medical situation instead of the medical leave so heād be able to return in the spring?
If you are unable to convert to a general leave of absence, I also encourage you to reach out to the school to gain clarification on what other types of activities might fulfill the 6 month activity requirement or if theyād consider waiving or shortening it since your son is so close to completing his program.
I am so sorry for your son that heās going through this! How incredibly frustrating - he comes back from long Covid and mono in time to start school, only to be told he essentially has to stay out for an academic year, working full time, to be deemed well enough to return. And after he did so well academically, despite having been so sick.
I agree, try every avenue to withdraw the leave request and have him return next week. I hope his housing placement isnāt already gone. I have heard that some students were told that they still hadnāt been assigned rooms because of overcrowding, so I cannot help but feel that the school is going to be stringent about not allowing exceptions to the sick policy, since theyāre so overwhelmed by the extra 350 students in '25, along with all the upperclassmen who took a year off due to Covid. The upperclassmen houses are jam-packed.
Maybe you and he should look at it this way: If he hasnāt taken a gap year already, this is an opportunity to go get a really great internship for a year, and rejoin with '26, which is not overenrolled, and get farther away from that overcrowded bulge that is '25. The Harvard name seems to open doors for internships everywhere. Hopefully heād have a fantastic experience that helps to sharpen his focus on what he wants to study when he returns.
4 Likes
College recognizes that there are legitimate circumstances in which comparable activities also may be able to provide HUHS with the information it needs to evaluate stability and readiness to return.
I really hope you and/or your son have met with the dean. My kidās leaves were both just one semester though they intersected with summer, which gave more time. Fall semester would provide 5 months, right? That is probably close enough. Are you sure he has to be out for a year>
These generic policies are meant to cover a wide range of issues, including psychiatric, drug use, chronic health conditions and so on. You donāt know yet whether the long COVID is chronic or relatively acute. The mono should be over- is it?
PT can be done intensively while AT Harvard. My kid did PT 5 times a week for months and months. Course load can be reduced. Extensions can be granted. I am just wondering if these types of accommodations were explored before withdrawal. Maybe the break is the best anywayā¦
Once your son is feeling up to it, make sure that the time spent away from Harvard is used well I would say that my kidās leaves were actually life-changing in many ways. Graduating first with one class, then another, then finally a third, didnāt faze them and in hindsight, 10 years later, those semester are a blip.
I really think talking to the dean will reveal more flexibility and your son may be able to return in the spring. Many kids on leave do NOT work 6 months, I assure you.
No matter what happens, bitterness can affect your son while he is healing. Try to convey positivity about his future and, if you can, about Harvard. I really hope that you CAN feel positive after speaking with the dean.
3 Likes
Pre-Covid, Harvard granted ~250 voluntary leaves of absences annually. I suspect that number is far higher since March 2020. The rider is boilerplate; it is not meant to cover every permutation and combination for hundreds of students. Indeed, the rider itself contains many qualifiers, e.g. usually, normally, generally, etc.
What your son needs to do, which it sounds like he has not yet done, is discuss with his Resident Dean what the reentry process looks like for him. Harvard absolutely, positively does not require leaves of a year. I know many who have returned after a semester, both pre- and post-pandemic.
That said, there is a deadline for requesting a return, which for Spring is in November. So the whole conversation is moot if he is not medically cleared by that time.
The priority at this moment is for your sonās health to improve, which is what Harvard hopes for as well. I wish him luck.
11 Likes
Another avenue to pursue is the Center for Accessible Education (Iām not sure what itās called at your sonās college). Have your son make an appointment for an intake interview and they should be able to help him out. This is a new situation for him and the disability advocates have the knowledge to guide him. All my best wishes for a speedy and full recovery. Iām glad that he has been able to improve and continues to do so.
If he does not want to put college on hold, then another option is to do his second year at a community college, then transfer to a transfer-friendly college (possibly your state flagship) that would appreciate his presence more to complete his BA/BS degree.
1 Like
I would have assumed your son was registered with the Accessible Education Office (formerly known as the Office of Disabilities). That office might have helped with accommodations but if attending, your son would have to talk to the professors and perhaps access the support of a dean.
For his current situation, he needs to talk to his resident dean. The dean can help with the Admin Board too. Does he have a good primary care doctor at HUHS?
I will qualify some of my comments after talking with kid. The dean of their house was incredible, casting a rosy glow on our memories. Flexibility was a result of the deanās advocacy. I can detail via PM. In this age of diversity, equity and inclusion , Harvard should look at the language in their pollcy on leaves, because it can alarm people and even cause pain.
For chronic illness, that flares or recurs, these issues are tough. My kid had to go through a lot of hoops in order to get the flexibility they ultimately received. Again, I can PM details.
All I can say here is that there IS flexibility but that the process isnāt always comfortable and it should be.
1 Like
Parent of current Harvard sophomore. In the parentsā FB group, we discovered from other parents that the problem of the 6 month work-rider is real. Parents in the FB group (about 600 of whom many commented) assumed it was just some administrative mix-up that parents would be able to work out. But MWolfās comment is correct: Harvard wants to ensure that students have the staying power to return and they require that they prove it by meeting full-time commitments for 6 months, generally in the form of paid work. They cannot do semesters abroad or anything else, although they can volunteer half time and work half time. In the cases Iāve heard of, this rider was only conveyed to the parent and student after very sympathetic people met with the student and approved the leave, without ever mentioning that it could not be a one term leave, that the 6 month work rider turns it into a full year leave. It doesnāt matter that some years ago your kid got to return from a leave earlier. This is the current policy and as insane as it sounds, especially springing it late on people, it has defensible motivations (as described by MWolf). As someone here pointed out, the student can transfer, and I know of one student who transferred to their state school because they did not want to miss a year of sports participation. But obviously no one goes to Harvard thinking theyāll transfer to their state school. I understand why Jennibc is not responding, the amount of incredulity and the well-intentioned posts that this can be solved with better communication must be frustrating. Anyway, she put the warning out there and people can take it or leave it.
13 Likes
Wow, that is quite shocking. Thanks for posting.
1 Like
It may make a difference whether the leave is fall or spring. A spring leave goes into the summer so the 6 months is easier to satisfy.
I think the problem here isnāt the work (or other f/t activity that satisfies Harvard) but the 6 month duration, which means a fall leave also means a spring leave. I have no idea if there is flexibility with that: apparently not.
I remember arguing with the freshman dean about the 6 month f/t requirement, since recovery takes a few months too. But there was more flexibility in practice. Apparently that is no longer true-?
There is a huge range of issues behind leaves and a one size fits all policy probably satisfies noone other than reassuring the school that returning students can do the work.
We were so traumatized by dealing with public schools for 12 years, that the personal empathy at Harvard had an impact. But the policies certainly need to be more equitable, so that the needs of each student are net.
I also want to add that some schools, in our experience, require you to REAPPLY if you are out for more than two weeks.
But then isnāt it often the case the the criteria for readmission are very different from a regular frosh or transfer applicant? For a former student applying for readmission, the school may be more concerned that any academic, financial, or medical reasons for leaving school are no longer an issue.
2 Likes