http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2016/5/6/college-sanctions-clubs-greeklife/
Unrecognized non-coed social organizations includes finals clubs, fraternities, and sororities which are not coed.
Penalties for joining such organizations are prohibition on holding captaincy of athletic teams or leadership positions in recognized social organizations, and ineligibility for school endorsement for such things as Marshall and Rhodes scholarships.
These restrictions start for frosh entering in 2017.
I’m personally no fan of finals clubs and all the rest, but I’m not sure I like what this says about freedom of association at Harvard. Captaincy of athletic teams and endorsements for scholarships would be privileges, not rights, but preventing a student’s peers from selecting him/her to lead an organization is pushing the envelope.
Harvard is a private college, and can do what it wants, but that line of argument sounds similar to comments on a recent thread about BYU (another private) explaining why the university is free to expel alleged rape victims for premarital sex. The legal justification is there; I’m not sure the ethical argument is quite so clear-cut.
Some of these changes have been unofficially in place for a while. It is, for instance, well known that if you belong to a Finals Club, you rarely, if ever, get nominated for a Rhodes or Marshall. Those who do get nominated never get selected, leading people to believe that they are given poor recommendations.
Not so different from what Amherst (and Midd?) did, maybe a little less severe actually.
Political correctness taken to its extreme
This will be challenged in court and yes I know it’s a private organization
Sort of ironic that this just came up on my FB today about a sorority girl at Harvard
Yep, sounds like the sorority is really hurting her growth at Harvard and who would ever want such a person to be a captain of a team or leader at the school.
I guess Harvard can afford to lose donations from alumni/ae.
Harvard can do what it wants, but IMO this is pretty stupid.
The school should be supporting things like freedom to assemble, in support of a liberal arts education.
Well, this preserves federal funding apparently. Maybe that balances fewer alumni/ae donations.
The article states that single gender organizations recognized by the University are not affected, such as the South Asian Men’s Collective and the Association of Black Harvard Women.
Everyone agree that a public university couldn’t do this?
But the school won’t recognize an Irish Men’s Collective or an Association of White Harvard Women?
It would seem that Harvard should either support single gender organizations, or not. It would seem this is more about addressing elitism and the assault connection (that is being debated) than about single gender clubs. And federal funding.
I think it’s interesting how it’s being implemented - not affecting any current student or even ones who were just accepted and chose Harvard. It’s for those who would apply this year - or not, if they don’t like the policy.
I can’t imagine anyone turning down Harvard because they won’t be captain of the tennis team if they join a finals club or sorority. But isn’t it a little strange that one can’t be the captain of the men’s tennis team if the person is a member of a fraternity or all male club? It’s okay to be the leader of an all male group if you aren’t also a member of another all male group? My daughter was just chosen captain of her team and, gasp, she’s in a sorority. Her coach doesn’t like the sorority and yet still felt my daughter the best choice for captain. Daughter would give up being captain before giving up the sorority and she doesn’t even like the sorority that much, but doesnt like being told what she can and can’t belong to.
Will all the tour guides be pointing this out this coming year? ‘Oh, you’ve probably heard of these clubs, your father may have been a member, but don’t plan on joining if you want to be a Rhodes scholar or team captain or campus leader.’ That will really cheer up the tours.
Will the groups disappear in 4 years? I doubt it. Maybe they’ll become even more secret. I still don’t understand why the Asian groups or the a black groups, or religious groups can be recognized, even if single sex and even if very exclusive, while others are swept away with a wide broom because there might be a few bad clubs. Are there still single sex singing groups on campus? Why are those okay? If it is because those groups don’t have a rape culture, fine, get rid of the groups that do, but don’t punish every single sex group because some are bad.
What does federal funding have to do with any of this? Schools with single sex groups like Greeks get funding.
Do the tour guides mention the finals clubs? Since they aren’t part of Harvard and haven’t been since the 1980s I would not think they would. I’ve got mixed feeling about this, I hate what the finals clubs represent, but I’m not sure Harvard should be in the business of regulating what you do on your own time.
Because they are open to non-Asian, non-black and non-religious people? I don’t really know about single sex acapella groups and the like. But I know groups formed around ethnicities and religions have to be open to anyone who has an interest.
Edited to add that according to the Crimson article, the recognized groups can be single sex, it’s the unrecognized groups that can’t.
And actually this is an approach that doesn’t go as far as most of the NESCAC schools have. At some you will be expelled if you join an underground greek house.
http://www.newsweek.com/inside-colleges-killed-frats-good-231346
Harvard being a private institution which can also exercise its right of free association on itself and its affiliates by banning student memberships in organizations…even off-campus that it disapproves of.
May not be the best policy from an alum relations/donations standpoint…especially from the legions of wealthy legacy families who sent their scions off to Harvard for generations and encouraged them to join such unrecognized socially exclusive organizations.
And many of them were relative latecomers compared to Oberlin which has had the ban on having/undergrads being members of fraternities, sororities, and secret/socially exclusive societies/clubs being on campus since the 1870’s.
A ban which came about after admins and most of the student body of time time felt their presence was a negative corrosive influence on the campus community they were trying to build and maintain.
I don’t think this has any impact on that. These orgs are unrecognized by the school and “do not exist on campus.” (consider those to be air quotes) It’d be like the federal government punishing Harvard for allowing its student body president to be a member of a mostly white, all male country club in Cambridge a short walk from the dorms.
Not grandfathering the current students greatly increases the chances of a successful lawsuit against them. Not sure that that increase would push it over to a loss for Harvard, but certainly if you can claim “You knew this was the policy when you came here,” your case is exponentially stronger.