Harvard Pres. Faces "Crisis" of Faculty Confidence

<p>Maybe this excerpt from an essay by Lottie Lazarsfeld Bailyn who graduated from Swarthmore in 1951, got her PhD. at Harvard, and became the first female professor at MIT's Sloan School would help Dr. Summers better grasp the historical barriers at his University:</p>

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[quote]
I never doubted the equality of men and women until I went to Harvard for my doctoral training in the Social Relations Department. There, I discovered I was not a Harvard student but a Radcliffe student and therefore not eligible for Harvard fellowships. I also discovered that there were no dorms in which I could live, that I couldn't be a resident tutor in an undergraduate house, that I couldn't enter the main college library, and that I had to enter the Harvard faculty club by the rear door. All because I was a woman.

[/quote]
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<p>Or, for a tale of women scientists from the same era, here's a terrific essay by Maxine Frank Singer, former head of the Carnegie Institution:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.swarthmore.edu/news/meaning/singer.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.swarthmore.edu/news/meaning/singer.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>I am probably the farthest thing from a bleeding heart liberal on CC, but I find Summer's beliefs on women to be offensive and arrogant. If I were one of the members of the female half of Harvard's undergrad population (hey, they must have had something going for them, right?), I would be livid.</p>

<p>Summers pretty much insulted every female student and faculty member on the Harvard campus. Makes me feel better I did not attend Harvard.</p>

<p>I agree that it is wonderful to have provocative people on campuses. And I also think that it is possible that a president can provide provocation and that he doesn't have to JUST be a diplomat, fund-raiser, etc. But the things that are being said about Summers, especially governing by intimidation and threats, don't sit well with me at all. You can be a vibrant, innovative,bold president without being offensive and polarizing, and it kinds of seems like that is what he is. A tall order, to be sure, but then after all this is one of the top colleges in the country and it seems that they could have chosen somewhat more wisely than this.</p>

<p>Tenisghs:</p>

<p>I don't normally reply to question worded the way yours is; if you want to know what I was talking about, just follow the post by Patuxent to which I responded.</p>

<p>Tenisghs....I agree--that was an incredibly inappropriate way to speak to anyone, but Marite in particular--one of our warmest, most brilliant, most generous-with-her-time-and-knowledge posters. You should apologize to her.</p>

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<p>The faculty has tenure. Summers does not.</p>

<p>OR</p>

<p>Yes, Summers has tenure as prof, but not as president." </p>

<p>(from marite)</p>

<p>Now please ask me why should I apologize? What does tenure have to do with being President of Harvard? Most college presidents are college professors and/or hold at least a Ph.D. Summers does have a Ph.D. (I believe) in Economics and teaches courses there so he is qualified for the job. Is he doing a great job? That's up in the air. I don't need to apologize for anything when her posts don't make any sense.</p>

<p>Marite's posts made perfect sense to me.</p>

<p>Tenure is all about being able to do what you please because you are assured your job for as long as you care to have it. Tenured professors can exert considerable pressure on a university, if only because nobody wants to hear them bellyache for the next thirty years. They are also the only group at Harvard that Summer can't fire.</p>

<p>The fact that the faculty "lynch mob" (for lack of a better word) has tenure and Summer does not (as President) is a key factor in how this will all play out.</p>

<p>The very fact that the confrontation took place as it did makes it difficult for Summer to lead effectively.</p>

<p>I understood the posts perfectly too. She was saying that Summers does not have tenure as President; he can lose that post, although he may not be able to lose his tenured professorial post. She was contrasting his appointed/hired role as President with that of the tenured faculty who are apparently standing fairly united in opposition to him. </p>

<p>Although the issues were different, once Donald Kennedy had resigned as President of Stanford, I think he fairly quickly accepted a post outside of the University, although he may still hold his chair at Stanford or have an emeritus position. And he was a much more effective president throughout his tenure as president, and popular with faculty too, I believe.</p>

<p>And when a youngster like yourself speaks that disrespectfully to someone as lovely as Marite--and then refuse to apologize--you can fairly expect to find a number of parents taking umbrage, and probably holding it against you into the future. Bad manners.</p>

<p>Yeah, there was no call to speak to Marite that way. I have "known" her in two very contentious online communities for more than two years, and she never loses her cool even under considerable provocation. That's maturity, which is something that young people applying to college should consider an attribute worthy of imitating.</p>

<p>If I remember correctly, Kennedy resigned after financial improprieties were uncovered by govenrment auditors. I don't think there was anything else he could do. Summers' mistakes are nowhere near that serious. I've just finished reading the Crimson. It is clear that there is a real difference of opinion about Summers among the faculty in Arts and Sciences and the professional schools. As the Crimson coverage makes it clear, he has his supporters among the faculty, the alumni, students, and above all the Corporation. Unfortunately, the accumulated ill will will make it difficult for Harvard to focus, at least for a while, on far more substantive issues than his leadership style.<br>
I was hoping that the curricular review would be completed by the time my S enrolled, but it looks like this won't happen soon.</p>

<p>I have never heard of 'tenure' being used for a President/CEO/Director leadership position. That is why I called her out for that. The Board of Directors or elected membership vote for who will be their leader, representative, etc. Even if he loses his seat as Prez, he can still do whatever he wants since he's a tenured professor.</p>

<p>Interesteddad,</p>

<p>Before you banish the entire Ivy league remember, they are 8 distinctively different institutions. Princeton, for example, has women as President and Director of Admissions (Swat has men in these positions). Princeton's President is a scientist to boot! The fact that the Ivys were sexist 30 years ago (undergraduate segregation) or 50 years ago (the PhD analogy) isn't terribly relevant to today's topic. You should make sweeping conclusions on larger sample sizes than one speech. Having said that, it was a dumb for an economist (Summers) to dabble in topics he knows nothing about (genetics, neuroscience, psychology) and especially so since he so publicly represents an institution. He should know better!</p>

<p>Hahahaha! Agreed, wox. Although the information on women and Ivy institutions (from what Interesteddad stated) still hold some valid background. Women in the past 30-40 years have made some great strides in accomplishments in every field and continue to succeed. We just didn't need comments like what Summers said at that conference to debunk those accomplishments! His psychology experiment on his daughter did not improve his credibility but worsen his position.</p>

<p>Marite, that's what he was accused of, but ultimately I believe that the whistleblower ended up being fairly heavily discounted. The similarity was that many on campus still supported Kennedy and felt that he was the victim of a smear campaign; while others felt he handled the issue ineffectively. A similar division to what is going on at Harvard, I imagine. My point was that if one resigns because of issues with one's Presidency, rather than through a desire to pursue other endeavors, it is hard to stay on at the University in one's tenured position, too.</p>

<p>I'm not banishing the entire Ivy League. Just pointing out that the Ivy League club was an "old boys club" until just one generation ago. </p>

<p>Some of the schools have done an admirable job of trying to overcome their historic institutional biases against women. Others, apparently, are quite content to endorse blatant sexism ("women aren't smart enough for math and science careers") in their highest leadership positions. That is their perogative. But, I think it's fair to judge an institution accordingly. It would certainly be fair to question Summers' (and therefore Harvard's) commitment to teaching, hiring, and promoting women.</p>

<p>Lets face it. The guy is an old-fashioned "chauvanist pig" to borrow a phrase from my generation. He's grabbing at any "theory" he can to support his opinions. He's trotted out the "too busy having babies", the "not smart enough", and the "better at playing with dolls" rationalizations, all in one glorious fell swoop of arrrogance. Even if you don't hold that against him, you have to question his judgement. It doesn't take a rocket scientist (male, of course) to figure out that saying "women aren't smart enough and they are too busy having babies" is probably going to generate a firestorm in the People's Republic of Cambridge. Is the guy just lookin' for trouble for trouble's sake? Or is he that clueless?</p>

<p>Of course, there were a number of women in the 7 sisters who said who needs 'em:cool:</p>

<p>patient: I agree with your analysis.
Interesteddad: I suspect the firestorm would not have reached such heights had women not gone to Summers earlier in the fall to register their concern over the dearth of tenure offers to women under his presidency. He should also realize that whatever a university president says in a public (albeit closed) conference sooner or later gets reported, especially when it's Harvard.</p>

<p>I respect woman as I have a mother, a wife and a beautiful daughter. However, I see present crisis nothing but liberals playing dirty politics (similar work is done by conservatives in taking control of white house). They want to remove a person who expressed his opinion in a private frank discussion. Is this a crime? Probaly not. Is this a gaffe? Probably yes. Some of these faculty members are going too far to pursue their agenda.</p>

<p>God this country is going away from free speech and going to to the path of political correctness. This does not bode well when one can not even participate in a healthy discussions. No wonder we are more red and blue state. God help us.</p>

<p>Summers should be enlightened by facts that woman are as competenet as man. The drive to remove him is not the solution.</p>

<p>"Is the guy just lookin' for trouble for trouble's sake? Or is he that clueless?"</p>

<p>Having known him, I'd say the latter.</p>

<p>"My point was that if one resigns because of issues with one's Presidency, rather than through a desire to pursue other endeavors, it is hard to stay on at the University in one's tenured position, too."</p>

<p>Exactly right. It's hard enough to be in a place where half the people don't like you when you're the boss. This is a personal fight, and if he loses it he won't stay around to teach economics.</p>

<p>Laura Ingraham was talking about the Harvard "crisis" this morning on her radio show, which prompted me to go back and re-read the whole transcript along with Q&A so helpfully linked in post #25. What leaped out at me was how incredibly poorly this whole thing reflects on Harvard's faculty. What an incredibly lame response from the supposedly elite-of-the-elite in academia.</p>

<p>One would think that the supposedly greatest minds of one of the supposedly greatest research universities in the world would respond to a challenge with reasoned discourse, perhaps a few citations of studies. That's what Summers called for in his closing remark, for Pete's sake! "[My ideas] may be all wrong. I will have served my purpose if I have provoked thought on this question and provoked the marshalling of evidence to contradict what I have said." Think about it. Instead of rising to an intellectual challenge, the wonderful Harvard faculty stages a collective hissy-fit. Hands over their ears shouting "Can't hear you, can't hear you!) over and over until the apostate has to quit, and then they can go back to cozy unchallenged lives.</p>

<p>This was a conference convoked for the express purpose of stimulating new ideas as to why there aren't more women in the sciences--but they apparently only wanted to hear reinforcement of the old shibboleths that differences in outcome are always the result of socialization and prejudice. </p>

<p>As for Summers running the university through "intimidation," have there been any specific examples? I mean, it's always "intimidating" when your boss calls you into his office and says, "hey Cornel, how about a little more scholarly output and less rap records and Larry King appearances?" But there's nothing wrong with tweaking an institution's actual performance instead of just coasting on its brand name. In the end, that's what this is all about--a political fight--and this issue is just the soundbite bludgeon that all too often takes the place of ideas in our political fights.</p>