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HUPA Calls for Independent HUPD Review
By EMa r. schu er Crimson Sta Writer
The executive board members of the Harvard University Police Association union said Monday that they do not have a high de gree of confidence in the ongoing climate review of Harvard’s police because of department leadership’s involvement.
The four officers who sit on HUPA’s executive board — Pres ident Michael J. Allen, Vice President Joseph E. Steverman, Treasurer Louis W. Favreau, and Secretary Michael E. Dav enport — said in Monday interviews that they want an independent third party to carry out and oversee the review.
“We as an e-board believe the department has the right to have a review,” Allen said. “We just feel and have heard from many union members that any such re view should be done by external persons who then report to the University.”
“We don’t believe anyone in ternal should be involved in the review,” he added.
Harvard University Police Department Chief Francis D. “Bud” Riley began a review into the culture of his department at the beginning of February.
In an email sent to depart ment employees, Riley wrote that the review was prompted by a January Crimson investi gation, which found repeated instances of racism and sexism within HUPD and cited allega tions that the department’s leadership displays favoritism toward some and retaliates against officers who raise concerns.
Two weeks ago, Riley wrote in an email to the department that he appointed a pair of out side law enforcement experts to oversee a review of the depart ment’s culture and its dealings with the University more broad ly.
Riley also wrote that he had selected five HUPD employees and a Harvard Human Resourc es representative to serve on the review’s “working group,” The Harvard University Police Association union reported doubts about an ongoing review about the department. james s. bikales—contributing photographer
which he tasked with review ing HUPD’s procedures for handling internal complaints and employee morale, among other issues.
Members of the working group will solicit feedback from HUPD employees and Univer sity affiliates outside of the department.
The working group will re port their findings to Riley as well as University Executive Vice President Katie N. Lapp, ac cording to Riley’s email.
University President Law rence S. Bacow said in an interview last week that he supports the HUPD internal review. He deferred all questions regarding the review to Lapp.
Harvard spokesperson Jona than L. Swain declined to comment on the union’s concerns on Lapp’s behalf.
When asked for comment, HUPD spokesperson Steven G. Catalano wrote in an email that the review will seek advice from outside experts and will share its findings at the end of the ac ademic year. He added that the working group has begun con ducting interviews.
Steverman said a review of HUPD is “a step in the right di rection” but cited concerns with the current review’s structure.
Steverman said he does not believe the review will shed light on officers’ concerns be cause they are reluctant to speak openly to the working group. The working group consists of HUPD employees spanning the department’s ranks who are supposed to periodically update Riley on their findings.
“I think that the level of trust is not the level of trust that’s nec essary to get an honest answer,” he said.
Steverman also said he is aware that some officers have questioned whether the con cerns they disclose to the working group would be kept confidential.
Catalano wrote in his email that the working group has of fered department employees channels for expressing con cerns anonymously.
Favreau said he believes Ri ley’s involvement in the review will prevent it from objectively interrogating his leadership.
“It’s an internal review of the department,” Favreau said. “Shouldn’t that also include the chief?”
Favreau also said the Univer sity should initiate a review conducted entirely by an independent party if it wants to accurately assess Harvard’s police force. “I would imagine any compa ny — if they want to truly find out what’s going on within — they get people from without to do the investigation,” he said. The ongoing review marks the fourth formal assessment of HUPD during Riley’s tenure.
In 1999, criminologist and Harvard Kennedy School re search fellow George L. Kelling wrote a report of the depart ment that was commissioned by Harvard and Riley. Kelling cited poor morale inside the depart ment and conflict between Riley and some employees in his find ings.
In 2008, former Harvard Hu man Resources representative Ann Dexter conducted the sec ond review of the department during Riley’s leadership. The University declined The Crim son’s request for Dexter’s findings.
The following year, prompt ed by a series of incidents involving HUPD officers and minority Harvard undergraduates, then-University President Drew G. Faust appointed former Suffolk County District Attor ney Ralph C. Martin II to assess HUPD’s relationship with Uni versity affiliates.
As a part of the current re view, Riley tasked the working group with assessing the extent to which the department has im plemented those previous reviews’ recommendations.
Law enforcement experts Ronald L. Davis and Brenda J. Bond-Fortier will bring feder al law enforcement experience to oversee the department’s re view.
Davis previously directed a branch of the United States De partment of Justice that wrote policy regarding communi ty-oriented policing. Former U.S. President Barack Obama chose Davis to direct a task force on innovative policing practices. Bond-Fortier, who is a pro fessor of public service at Suffolk University, formerly conducted criminal justice research at the Harvard Kennedy School. She currently serves as a law en forcement adviser to the Justice Department.
ema.schumer@thecrimson.com
Tes ing From Page 1 Harvard Testing Two for Virus
wrote.
In his statement, Nguyen added that the results of the testing will likely be reported to HUHS in the next few days, but there is no “guaranteed turnaround time.”
Nguyen laid out a series of preventative measures to take in the email to Harvard affil iates, including being “vigilant” in taking hygiene measures and contacting HUHS if they have a fever or respiratory symptoms.
Nguyen also pointed stu dents toward Counseling and Mental Health Services, and faculty and staff toward the Employee Assistance Program, if the current situation on cam pus causes “stress and anxiety.”
News of the two tests comes a day after University Presi dent Lawrence S. Bacow announced students must vacate campus by Sunday at 5 p.m. Af ter spring break, classes will move to an online platform.
Additionally, Massachu setts Governor Charlie D. Baker ’79 declared a state of emergency on Tuesday after the number of cases in the Bay State doubled overnight.
There are 95 confirmed cas es of coronavirus in Massachusetts.
More than 1,000 Massachu setts residents are currently being quarantined.
Nguyen directed Harvard affiliates toward the Univer sity’s coronavirus website for further updates on the out break.
fiona.brennan@thecrimson.com
league From Page 1
Ivy League Cancels All Competitions
mates, we poured so much of our time and energy into this. It was something I was really looking forward to, like, completely gut ted I would say.”
Tuntivate — who was sched uled to compete in the men’s 3000 meter race and the mile race — wrote in a text message that he felt “gutted.”
Tuntivate also said in an in terview that his absence from the championship meet could negatively impact his desire to run professionally. He ex plained that the tournament is an important barometer for tal ent. Tuntivate broke the Harvard all-time record in the men’s mile last month with a finish of 3:57.36, the second fastest time in Ivy League all-time records. “It’s hard to imagine it hap pening,” he said.
The Ivy League’s decision left it up to individual schools to decide if their winter sport stu dent-athletes could compete in postseason competitions.
Harvard Athletics Direc tor Robert L. Scalise wrote in an email to coaches and depart ment staff that Harvard’s athletes would not partake in these games.
“We understand the dis appointment that will be felt by many of you and many in our community, but we must be guided by what is best for the health and safety of all,” he wrote.
Juul said she did not under stand Harvard’s decision to not let her run.
“I do understand to a certain extent why the University and the Ivy League as a whole chose to cancel spring sports, as heart breaking as it is,” she said.
“I don’t understand why they are not allowing us to compete one last time for the winter sea son.”
Tuntivate said he had been emailing top administrators in the University and NCAA re questing they reinstate him. As of Wednesday evening, he said no one had replied.
ema.schumer@thecrimson.com
businesses From Page 1
Square Businesses Anticipate Financial Hit
announcement.
“We have a spectacular re lationship with Harvard University, with the Harvard athletic programs, and with especially the Harvard student body. Having them leave in what would have been our two biggest months of the year, it’s a real blow.”
Students know El Jefe’s for its late hours; the restaurant is open until 4 a.m. every day. Schall, who co-founded El Jefe’s four-and-a-half years ago, said he has no plans to change the eatery’s hours.
“We’re open ’til 4 a.m., and we will always be open ’til 4 a.m.,” he said.
Schall estimates that stu dents make up 35 percent of his clientele. Felipe’s Taque ria — which has been a staple in Harvard Square for more than 16 years and serves as the chief competitor to El Jefe’s — also is not planning on making chang es to its operations.
“We’re confident of our busi ness, and we’ll be fine,” Felipe’s co-owner Thomas J. Brush said. “We’re not at risk or any danger of long-term effect. But it will certainly affect our sales for the next few months.”
Harvard Square Business Association Executive Direc tor Denise A. Jillson said her organization is “working on a response” to Harvard’s an nouncement.
She said it would not be “un founded or unprecedented” for property owners of local busi nesses to give their tenants relief of some sort.
“So many of our proper ty-owners are local,” Jillson said. “They’re right here in the Square, side-by-side with their tenants. And they have relation ships.”
“There’s a tremendous ly strong sense of community,” Jillson added. “I can think of 10 or 12 property owners who are in the Square every single day. They know exactly what’s go ing on. They know the foot-traffic patterns, they know the purchasing habits, they understand the Square down to the granu lar level. That’s really important as we all confront this crisis together.”
Jillson also said the state of emergency declared by Massa chusetts Governor Charlie D. Baker ’79 will provide area busi nesses with some support.
“That allows our smaller businesses to access programs that are available through the state and federal government that will help them through these next few months,” she said of the declaration.
George Papalimberis, who has owned the La Flamme Bar ber Shop on Dunster Street for more than 40 years, said he is preparing for significant losses with students leaving town and the state of commencement and College reunions unknown.
“We’re going to get hurt badly,” Papalimberis said. “We have a lot of students here and we have developed a good rela tionship with our students. We try to keep our prices low for the students.”
Papalimberis — whose list of clients over the years has in cluded former United States President Barack Obama, U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas), former Democratic presiden tial candidate Peter P. M. Buttigieg ’04, Facebook founder and former College student Mark E. Zuckerberg, ex-Massachusetts Governor Michael S. Dukakis, and the musician Yo-Yo Ma ’76 — estimated that Harvard affil iates represent “at least 40 percent” of his shop’s clientele.
Victor Escajadillo, an em ployee at Asa Hair Design in the Garage Mall who works three part-time jobs, said University students departing town cre ates “a legitimate fear” for local workers.
“If the richest school in the United States — and possibly the most famous school in the world — is telling their students to not come back, that to me is scary because even they don’t have the means to contain or to try to take all the precautions to make it the most safe or sani tary,” Escajadillo said.
Schall, the El Jefe’s co-own er, emphasized that all area businesses will experience the fallout of the University’s deci sion.
“The University plays a huge role in the businesses around Harvard Square,” he said. “It’s going to affect everybody.”
jasper.goodman@thecrimson.com
Houses Scramble to Prep Students for Move-Out prep From Page 1
our community in the midst of this rapidly evolving situation.” This information comes one day after Harvard announced that students must vacate their dorms by Sunday, March 15th at 5 p.m., due to the ongoing coro navirus pandemic. This decision has resulted in confusion and concern among students, faculty, and staff across the Uni versity.
Khurana’s update follows an earlier email from Faculty of Arts and Sciences Registrar Michael P. Burke that informed students that the College will provide up to a $200 subsidy for students on financial aid in or der to offset the cost of off-campus storage or shipping.
The move-out deadline has forced House staff to quickly mobilize. Beginning Tuesday, the Houses began distributing thousands of boxes purchased by the University for departing students. College staff and represen tatives from the Dean of Students Office congregated in dining halls across campus to help students finalize travel plans. According to Burke, the costs incurred from booking travel will be applied to students’ term bills.
Burke also noted that stu dents will receive financial assistance for their travel that reflects the overall amount of financial aid students receive.
House faculty and resident deans have also stepped in to provide support to students as they transition off-campus.
Mather House Faculty Deans Amala K. Mahadevan and Lakshminarayanan Ma hadevan urged students in an email to remember the posi tive aspects of this year, including Mather’s top ranking for intramural rankings, and to keep in mind the graduating seniors who concurrently began their time at Mather with the facul ty deans.
Lowell Faculty Dean David I. Laibson ’88 wrote in an email to The Crimson that he and Fac ulty Dean Nina Zipser are especially focused on seniors in Lowell.
“Nina and I have spent lots of time listening to Lowellians,” he wrote. “They have shared their concerns, their fears and their hopes with us. We have been particularly focused on con necting with and celebrating our seniors, who are experienc ing an especially deep sense of loss.”
Dunster House will imple ment its own drop-off service for library books, according to an email to students from Dun ster House Building Manager Lucia Baldock. This system will allow the House to collect and return students’ borrowed items to the College library sys tem. “We hope that this gives you one less thing to worry about as you prepare to leave campus,” Baldock wrote.
Efforts to aid students span beyond the Houses as well.
In an email to members, the Harvard Graduate Student Union and United Auto Work ers announced they will volunteer their resources — cars, storage space, housing, physical labor — to assist students during move out.
In an email to English con centrators, Professor Stephanie Burt ’93 — who also serves as the director undergraduate studies of the department — wrote that a number of departmental facul ty are willing to store students’ belongings in their offices.
“We know it’s an emergen cy, but it’s better than nothing,” Burt wrote.
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Parents Petition Against Move-Out
By Juliet E. Isselbacher Crimson Staff Writer
Several disgruntled parents of Harvard undergraduates, who were instructed to evacuate campus by Sunday, have start ed a petition lambasting the College’s “unfair” and “unilateral” mandate.
Self-identified Harvard par ent Olla Birman created the petition Tuesday, which has since garnered more than 140 signa tories as of Wednesday evening. “Parents of Harvard College students disagree with the Col lege [sic] unilateral decision to close its facilities to students and to send them home. In these unprecedented times students should be allowed uninterrupt ed access to college education and college services,” the peti tion reads. The petition further demanded Harvard retract its “unfair” mandate for students to evacuate by Sunday.
“It’s up to you to show leader ship in hard times, and not to run for cover,” it concludes.
Dean of the College Rakesh Khurana wrote to undergrad uates Tuesday morning that dorms would not reopen after spring recess under the threat of a looming coronavirus pandem ic.
In the aftermath of the an nouncement, several parents expressed frustration with the College over what they characterized as sparse communication and sequestered decision-mak ing during a time of crisis.
Renée Wetstein, the parent of a senior, said she was “con cerned” that the College did not engage students and parents in its policy-making.
“I just question this decision — how it was made, how it was told, and is there any way to re verse it? Because if this is gonna end in two or three weeks or four weeks, why do people have to take their belongings with them? That, to me, is insanity in terms of the expense,” she said. “Why can’t belongings be left in houses? Decisions like that make no sense to me.”
“I feel like whatever the deci sions, the thinking has not been provided to students or parents,” Wetstein added.
Other parents said the man date lacked the nuance student and parent feedback could have supplied. Durga Kalavagunta, the parent of a senior, wrote in an email that the administration could have done better to con sider “all sections of the population” in their decision-making. “I can only speak to the com munity of the class of 2020… who are Seniors and were very much looking forward to enjoying the last couple of months of their college experience,” she wrote. “I hope the administration will consider the Senior[s’] experi ences more seriously.”
Yun Shen, another Class of 2020 parent, wrote in an email that the decision to evacuate un dergraduates was overly “dramatic” and a “man made disaster.”
“This was an absolutely hasty and irresponsible as well as inconsiderate decision,” Shen wrote. “It was made without dif ferentiating the real situation and different needs of different student communities.”
“Obviously, we can take him in,” Wetstein said about her son. “But I’m sure there’s families that financially it’s going to re ally impact them to have a child back home that they didn’t ex pect to be home.”
Beyond saying the College was not communicative or con siderate in their decision making, parents further charged the College with actively endan gering students and their families. Wetstein said the evacuation mandate could send potentially infected students home to vulnerable or immunocompro mised family members.
“These students are being sent out, getting on airplanes, potentially affecting more peo ple that could be at a higher risk, going home, potentially infect ing parents, affecting younger siblings, affecting grandparents,” she said. Vania Winters, who is also the parent of a senior, said a forced evacuation imperils stu dents from high-risk areas. She added that since her family is based in Washington state — a current coronavirus hotspot — she instructed her son to stay with friends and not come home. “He has a choice. He has con nections, and he can do that, and our thoughts go to the kids that don’t have that,” Winters added. College spokesperson Ra chael Dane wrote in a statement that, per Khurana’s email to stu dents, Harvard’s commitment to the health of its affiliates and its responsibilities to the “larg er community” guided the decision.
“Public health experts have advised us that the best way to delay the virus transmission and to contain any breakout is to de crease the number of people on our campus, and as a result, the decision was made in a timely manner and communicated as soon as it could be,” Dane wrote. Winters said that, in this un certain time, she is anxiously awaiting information about con tingency plans for commencement.
“What about graduation? The big celebration that we all have been waiting for for years,” Winters asked. “Not one word.”
juliet.isselbacher@thecrimson.com
Students Scramble to Find Housing
Graduate students at the Harvard Kennedy School and others have also created their own spreadsheets listing people who have available living and storage space.
GoFundMe Created by First Generation Harvard Alumni
The Phillips Brooks House Association has created a form where people can volunteer to host students unable to make alternative arrangements or return home or wish to stay on campus to keep PBHA’s Har vard Square Homeless Shelter and Y2Y youth homeless shel ter open.
Primus — a student group for first-generation, low-in come students at the College — created a similar form for stu dents.
First Generation Harvard Alumni has also been soliciting donations to cover or subsidize the costs of students’ airfare, alternative housing, and stor age, and to offset the impact of lost employment for students with term-time jobs.
“It is an unprecedented time on campus in light of recent news that Harvard College is canceling in-person classes and requiring students to leave campus in less than a week,” the group’s GoFundMe page reads.
“While this transition is beneficial to the health and well-being of students, it is causing extreme financial stress for our students to man age in such a short period of time,” the page adds.
Individual students have also been crowdfunding finan cial aid by connecting students with donors who can fund re cipients’ costs via Venmo, PayPal, Cash App, and other mobile payment services.
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Dean Fitzsimmons Explains Application Decrease
By benjamin l. fu and dohyun kim Crimson Staff Writers
A nationwide decrease in the number of high school seniors could contribute to this year’s seven percent drop in appli cants to Harvard College’s Class of 2024, according to Dean of Admissions and Finan cial Aid William R. Fitzsimmons ’67.
Fitzsimmons said in a inter view with The Crimson that additional factors accounting for the drop could include so cial disruptions such as natural disasters, school shootings, and a shortage of college coun selors, as well as inexpensive public universities closer to ap plicants’ homes.
States with large applicant pools, such as California, Flori da, and Texas, showed declines in applicant numbers from the previous class pool – of 12, 10, and 8 percent, respectively – that surpassed the overall per cent decrease.
“In California, the ratio of counselee to counselor is about 750 to one in the public schools,” Fitzsimmons said. “But then, if you have wild fires and school closings, some shooter incidents, there were lots of things going on. So there was less time than ever for the one counselor to deal with the 750 average number of people.” Meanwhile, in light of the spread of coronavirus, Fitz simmons spoke about how the pandemic could affect the in coming class, highlighting the difficulty his office has expe rienced in evaluating the yield for this year’s class.
“This will be the most diffi cult I think in our history, because of coronavirus,” Fitzsimmons said. “There will still be a lot to learn about what happens from this virus.
Fitzsimmons said the coro
William R. Fitzsimmons ’67 Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid
navirus outbreak will also affect future applicants, espe cially international students who are planning to take stan dardized tests.
With respect to the unpre dictability of the situation, Fitzsimmons said he hopes the programs at Harvard to sup port international or low-income students will attract admits and future applicants alike.
“Could it be, when, in times of uncertainty, people go to se curity?” Fitzsimmons said. “So will Harvard represent to them a certain degree of security? Strong financial aid program, great resources, will that make Harvard more attractive in a time like this?”
“People might decide that the security is staying closer to home in uncertainty,” he add ed.
Fitzsimmons also discussed a new financial aid initiative that eliminates the summer work expectation for students receiving aid from the College. “You want them to be able to have the time in the summer to explore future careers, for example,” Fitzsimmons said. “But if we’re going to get more people to, which I hope, to go into the academic world or to do public service and commu nity service, then I think what we’ve done now with this is we’ve opened up all the pro grams we have in the summer here.”
The uncertainty regarding current global events prompt ed Fitzsimmons to question the possible logistics of interna tional students of future classes matriculating at the College. “Will they be able to leave?” he said. “Will we end up having an increased number of people decide that they would come another year — so take a gap year?”
benjamin.fu@thecrimson.com dohyun.kim@thecrimson.com
For Harvard’s College Class of 2021, there were 40,246 students who applied, marking the lowest number of applications in three years. Sílvia ca acuberta puig—Crim on photographer
Surveyed Faculty Want Review of García Peña Decision
By kevin r. chen Crimson Staff Writer
A majority — 61 percent — of respondents to a Crimson survey of Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences said the Univer sity should review the circumstances behind its decision to deny tenure to Romance Lan guages and Literatures associate professor Lorgia García Peña, whose research engages with race and ethnicity.
Hundreds of students and ethnic studies scholars have signed onto letters condemning the University’s decision to deny García Peña tenure. The denial prompted a surge in activism for a formalized ethnic studies pro gram, for which Harvard affiliates have lobbied for nearly half a century.
Sixty-five percent of faculty respondents agreed that Har vard should create a formalized ethnic studies program, where as 35 percent disagreed.
In December, more than 100 faculty members called on FAS Dean Claudine Gay to review tenure procedures in the wake of García Peña’s case. Gay agreed to initiate such a review during the 2020-2021 academic year — though she specified in an inter view last week that the review will not examine individual ten ure cases such as García Peña’s. The Crimson distributed its faculty survey to more than 1,000 members of the FAS in late February, polling Harvard’s flagship faculty on key Universi ty policy decisions, pressing issues on campus, and challenges they face as academics. Emeri tus, tenured, tenure-track, and non-tenure-track faculty all re ceived the survey.
The 74-question survey gar nered more than 400 responses, though not all respondents an swered each question. The anonymous survey, a link to which was emailed to nearly every member of the FAS, was open from Feb. 20 to 27. The Crimson did not adjust the data for possi ble selection bias.
The three previous install ments of The Crimson’s 2020 faculty survey series explored faculty perspectives on national politics, the University adminis tration, and Harvard’s campus culture.
This final installment exam ines faculty opinions on academic and institutional matters, including tenure procedures, the admissions lawsuit against Har vard, and the graduate student union.
Tenure
While a majority of faculty respondents agreed that the University should review the circumstances behind its deci sion to deny García Peña tenure, opinions diverged by academic division.
A large majority — 82 percent — of respondents from the Arts and Humanities agreed that the University should conduct such a review. In contrast, a slim ma jority of faculty from the Sciences and Social Sciences — 51 percent and 52 percent, respectively — disagreed that a review should take place.
Opinions on whether the University should create an eth nic studies program also varied by academic division. While 79 percent of Arts and Humanities faculty respondents agreed, 62 percent from the Social Sciences did, compared to only 48 percent in the sciences. A large majority — 94 percent — of faculty respondents from all divisions said they support Gay’s decision to launch a review of the FAS tenure promotion pro cess. Only 6 percent said they did not.
Nonetheless, a majority — 57 percent — of respondents said they do not feel a colleague in their department has been un justly denied tenure, whereas 43 percent of respondents said they do. The difference in opinions across divisions was not statisti cally significant.
In addition, 56 percent of re spondents agreed FAS provides enough support to tenure-track faculty in their department, in cluding 17 percent in strong agreement. Twenty-seven per cent said they neither agree nor disagree, and 17 percent dis agreed.
The faculty most likely to say FAS provides enough support to tenure-track faculty were the tenure-track faculty them selves, with 72 percent of tenure-track faculty in agreement. Meanwhile, 64 percent of ten ured faculty agreed, and 40 percent of non-tenure-track faculty agreed. Furthermore, 54 percent of respondents agreed that their voices are adequately rep resented in tenure decisions, whereas 46 percent disagreed. Respondents overwhelming ly said that their research played the largest role in their own ten ure decisions — though many disagreed that research is their primary role as a professor in a separate question.
Out of respondents who said they are tenured professors, 97 percent said that their research played the largest role in Har vard’s decision to grant them tenure. A plurality — 40 percent — of total respondents said their pri mary role is research, but a nearly equal proportion — 37 percent — said their primary role is un dergraduate teaching. The remainder chose a mix between graduate teaching and under graduate and graduate mentorship, among other items, as their primary roles.
Universi y Affairs
Faculty generally agreed with the College’s defense of its admissions policies in the law suit brought against it by anti-affirmative action group Students for Fair Admissions.
Filed against the University in 2014, SFFA’s suit alleged that Harvard College’s race-con scious admissions policies illegally discriminate against Asian Americans.
While a federal judge ruled in favor of Harvard in October, SFFA submitted its appellate brief in February.
Sixty-nine percent of facul ty respondents said they agree with Harvard’s defense of its admissions policies, including 31 percent who strongly agreed. Twenty-three percent said they neither agree nor disagree, while only 8 percent disagreed. Faculty opinion on the Uni versity’s negotiations with the Harvard Graduate Students Union-United Automobile Workers was more mixed.
Prior to HGSU-UAW’s deci sion to go on strike in December, the union met for 28 bargain ing sessions after the University negotiations began in October 2018. Despite reaching 12 tenta tive agreements, the two sides did not agree on the three core issues for the union — compen sation, healthcare, and an independent third-party grievance procedure for adjudicating sex ual harassment and discrimination complaints — prompting the union to strike.
Four weeks into the strike, the union announced it will end the strike without a contract and accepted a University offer to en gage federal mediators.
Half of survey respondents said Harvard should agree to HGSU-UAW’s demands for a third-party harassment and dis crimination grievance procedure, including 30 percent who “strongly agreed.” Twenty-nine percent disagreed, and 21 per cent neither agreed nor disagreed.
The distribution of opinions regarding the strike itself were similar. A plurality — 48 percent — of respondents agreed with the decision of HGSU-UAW to go on strike last December, in cluding 31 percent who strongly agreed, whereas 32 percent dis agreed, and 20 percent neither agreed nor disagreed.
Me hodology
For its 2020 Faculty Survey, The Crimson collected elec tronic responses through Qualtrics, an online survey platform, from Feb. 20 to 27, 2020. A link to the anonymous survey was sent to 1,341 FAS and SEAS fac ulty members through emails sourced in October 2019 from Harvard directory information. The pool included individuals on Harvard’s Connections da tabase with FAS titles, including emeritus, tenured, tenure-track, and non-tenure-track faculty.
Of those faculty, 476 accessed the link to the survey. A total of 416 participants answered at least one question, while 263 participants completed every question in the survey.
To prevent participants from accidentally taking the sur vey more than once, The Crimson enabled Qualtrics’ browser cookie functionality to register unique survey sessions on each device. This device data is con trolled by Qualtrics, and The Crimson does not retain infor mation that could identify devices accessing the survey with anonymous responses.
In an effort to check for re sponse bias, The Crimson compared respondent demographics with publicly available information on faculty demographics provided by the University — in formation regarding gender, minority background, SEAS affiliation, and ladder versus non-ladder status. Overall, respondent demographics tracked with fac ulty demographics. Of survey respondents, 41 percent identified themselves as women and 20 percent identified themselves as minorities. Based on data in the 2019 FAS Dean’s Annual report, women and minorities make up 39 percent and 24 percent of FAS ladder faculty, respectively.
According to the Dean’s re port, 41 percent of the FAS were non-ladder faculty — a term syn onymous with non-tenure-track faculty. By contrast, 39 percent of respondents to The Crimson’s survey identified themselves as non-ladder faculty. Of facul ty who were sent the link to the survey, 127 — or 9 percent — are affiliated with SEAS. In compar ison, of respondents who indicated their divisional affiliation on the survey, 7 percent reported an affiliation with SEAS.
kevin.chen@thecrimson.com
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