The Harvard Crimson - Volume CL, No. 2

THE HARVARD CRIMSON THE UNIVERSITY DAILY, EST. 1873

RODENTS

| VOLUME CL, NO. 2 |

CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS

NEWS

SPORTS

Harvard Biochemist Christopher Walsh Dies at 78

Women’s Basketball Holds Steady Ivy League Streak

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PAGE 15

|

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2023

CAMBRIDGE POLICING

‘These Are Smart Mice’: Quincy Plagued by Rodents RATS! Quincy House residents report rodent sightings in the dining hall and mice droppings in their living spaces.

SEE PAGE 7

OPINION

The One that (Almost) Got Away KENNETH ROTH. The best apology Harvard can give Kenneth Roth is its improvement. We worry about what this case says about the status of academic inquiry at a school like Harvard.

SEE PAGE 9

MARCH TO CPD

A Reckoning on Cambridge Police ONE MONTH OF PROTESTS over the fatal shooting of Cambridge resident and 20-year-old college student Sayed Faisal by Cambridge Police have renewed longstanding questions on policing and public safety. Residents and activists continue to demand answers and police reform amid the district attorney’s investigation into the killing.

SAMI E. TURNER—CRIMSON DESIGNER

KENNEDY SCHOOL

Misinformation Expert Joan Donovan Forced to Leave by Kennedy School Dean, Sources Says

BY MILES J. HERSZENHORN CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

H Protesters Rally at Cambridge Police HQ POLICE PROTEST. Activists and residents gathered to protest the police killing of Sayed Faisal at a march from Somerville High School to the Police Station with a set of written demands for the city.

SEE PAGE 11

arvard Kennedy School Dean Douglas W. Elmendorf is forcing out online misinformation expert Joan M. Donovan from her role at the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy and ending her research project, according to three HKS staff members with knowledge of the situation.

Donovan was told she has until summer 2024 to end the Technology and Social Change project and depart from her

WOMEN’S ICE HOCKEY

AND SOPHIA C. SCOTT CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

NEW NOODLES

SLURPING IN. Ramen shop WakuWaku celebrated its opening in Harvard Square with a live DJ on Wednesday.

SEE PAGE 11

extended transition — because it does not have intellectual and academic leadership by a full HKS faculty member, as required of all long-term research and outreach projects at HKS,” Smith wrote.

As part of the School’s decision to end the Technology and Social Change project, Donovan is not allowed to raise new funding, according to the three HKS staff members. The project is also facing a hiring freeze and spending constraints on existing funding, the staff members said.

Donovan declined to comment on her status at HKS and the termination of her project.

Donovan received her Ph.D. in sociolo-

gy and science studies from the University of California San Diego in 2015, before joining the Data and Society Research Institute in 2016, where she served as research lead on a team studying media manipulation.

In 2019, Donovan joined the Shorenstein Center to serve as the director and lead researcher of the Technology and Social Change project.

At Harvard, Donovan was a leading force in bringing the study of misinformation and disinformation to prominence in academia. Donovan has testified in front

SEE PAGE 6

PEABODY MUSEUM

Ice Hockey Coach Faces Peabody Museum Allegations of Abuse Transfers Alutiiq Kayak

BY PATON D. ROBERTS

WakuWaku Walks Into Harvard Square

role at HKS, according to the staff members. Donovan, who is not a tenure-track professor, has led the project since its inception in 2019 and serves as the Shorenstein Center’s research director. Donovan has also taught at HKS as an adjunct lecturer in public policy.

In addition, Donovan was told her prominence at the school led Elmendorf to end her time at the Shorenstein Center, two HKS staff members said.

HKS spokesperson James F. Smith confirmed in an emailed statement that the project is ending.

“The Technology and Social Change project is winding down — through an

Harvard has not publicly responded to allegations of abusive behavior by Harvard women’s ice hockey head coach Katey Stone reported in a Boston Globe investigation Friday.

The Globe reported that 16 former players, including former captains, voiced complaints about Stone’s inappropriate comments and behavior — alleging she has “denigrated” players “in ways that made them demoralized, anxious, confused, or seeking mental health support.”

The Globe’s report contains accounts from players who claim Stone was insensitive to players’ mental health issues and downplayed injuries. Stone faced a monthslong formal review in 2022 — after she allegedly made discriminatory remarks following a disappointing game — but remained in place as head coach.

Stone did not respond to a request for comment regarding the allegations.

In an email sent to the women’s ice hockey team and its affiliates on Jan. 18 — prior to the publication of the article — Stone addressed the impending report and said she has “tried to consistently listen to suggestions and accept feedback” from players and Harvard Athletics.

“This year, I have made it a priority as your coach to acknowledge and respond to direct feedback from the women in my program about my coaching style, and make concerted effort to better support my players’ experiences,” Stone wrote.

“With that goal in mind, I have sought to strengthen my communications and engagement skills,” she added.

Ahead of the article’s publication, 46 team alumni wrote a letter to Robert T. Hohler — the Globe journalist who investigated Stone — offering their contact information in order to give a “broader

SEE PAGE 7

BY JASMINE PALMA AND TESS C. WAYLAND CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Harvard’s Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology recently transferred ownership of an ancestral Alutiiq, or Sugpiaq, kayak to the Alutiiq Museum, a cultural museum and tribal repository in Kodiak, Alaska, according to a Jan. 24 press release from the Alaskan museum.

The relocation of the kayak — which spans 14.5 feet in length — is part of the Peabody’s ongoing efforts to repatriate cultural artifacts of Native American origin. The announcement comes nearly two years after Harvard was accused of being in violation of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act by the Association on American Indian Affairs.

The Alutiiq Museum requested the ownership transfer in the fall of 2022, citing spiritual reasons. Due to its seams

embellished by human hair, the kayak was likely used for “talismanic purposes.”

Complete with a wooden frame covered in oiled seal skin, the boat is a “rare example of a complete ancestral kayak,” according to the press release.

April G. Laktonen Counceller, the executive director of the Alutiiq Museum, said in the press statement that Alutiiq tradition places strong cultural significance on artifacts containing hair, which are said to serve as a spiritual conduit between the original ancestor and whoever is in current possession of the object.

“Our ancestors incorporated hair into garments, tools, and ceremonial items like dolls to forge spiritual connections,” she said in the release. “It appears that the symbolic and spiritual qualities of another person bolstered the person who paddled this boat. For the Alutiiq/Sugpiaq people, the boat is a spiritually powerful object and best cared for by our

SEE PAGE 8

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THE HARVARD CRIMSON

LAST WEEK

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

IN MEMORIAM

UNIVERSITY

INSTITUTE OF POLITICS

Reporter Gwen Knapp ’83 Dies at 61

Tindal Appointed Campus Curator

Fellows Discuss Political Polarization

KNAPP REMEMBERED. Mary “Gwen” Knapp ’83 — a sports journalist at The Harvard Crimson, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the New York Times — died on Jan. 20 at age 61 after a year-long battle with lymphoma.

Before her career as a professional sportswriter, Knapp got her start as an associate sports editor of The Crimson. In addition to covering athletics on campus, Knapp swam for the women’s swimming and diving team. Gwen Knapp is survived by her three sisters, as well as her father, Laurence Knapp. BY PATON D.

INAUGURAL CURATOR. Brenda D. Tindal will serve as the inaugural chief campus curator for Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences starting Feb. 13, FAS Dean and University President-elect Claudine Gay wrote in an email Wednesday.

The chief campus curator role was created at the recommendation of the FAS Task Force on Visual Culture and Signage in December 2021. The novel role entails reevaluating and modernizing the University’s historical and cultural spaces, signs, and curricula. BY JASMINE PALMA AND TESS C. WAYLAND—CRIMSON

NEW FELLOWS AT FORUM. The newly-announced Harvard Institute of Politics Spring 2023 resident fellows gathered on the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum Stage Wednesday for a panel moderated by interim IOP director Setti D. Warren on bipartisanship and the 2024 election. The fellows include Quentin Fulks, the campaign manager for Senator Raphael G. Warnock, and former Rep. Jamie Herrera Butler, one of 10 Republicans who voted to impeach former President Donald J. Trump.

ROBERTS AND SOPHIA C. SCOTT­—CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

STAFF WRITERS

BY ASHER J. MONTGOMERY—CRIMSON STAFF WRITTER

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The Week in Photos

AROUND THE IVIES PRINCETON UNIVERSITY ANNOUNCES INCREASED MINIMUM SALARY FOR POSTDOCS, POSTDOCS SAY IT’S NOT ENOUGH

MARCH FOR FAISAL CALLS FOR JUSTICE. Hundreds of residents and activists marched from Somerville High School to the Cambridge Police Department Monday protesting the death of 20-year-old college student Sayed Faisal, who was fatally shot by a Cambridge Police officer on Jan. 4. CAM E. KETTLES—

A group of more than 400 Princeton affiliates signed a letter to the Dean of the Faculty and Provost of Princeton stating that an increased minimum salary for postdoctoral researchers of $65,000 was insufficient to cover living expenses, the Princetonian reported Tuesday. The letter calls for an additional $3,500 in base pay, experience-based increases, and an annual pay increase to adjust for cost-of-living.

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

THC

THE DAILY PRINCETONIAN

Read more at THECRIMSON.COM

PENN SENIOR CHARGED WITH ALLEGED ASSAULT AT 2021 CASTLE PARTY FOUND NOT GUILTY The Daily Pennsylvanian reported Tuesday that UPenn senior Nicholas Hamilton was found not guilty of assault by the Municipal Court of Philadelphia. Hamilton had been accused of injuring a then-sophomore at a party thrown at the house of his fraternity, Psi Upsilon, in September 2021.

The incident had sparked days of protests and demands that the fraternity be removed from the house, known as “Castle.”

THE DAILY PENNSYLVANIAN

MEGAN RANNEY TO SERVE AS NEXT DEAN OF SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH AT YALE Brown professor Megan L. Ranney ’97 will leave the university to serve as the next dean of Yale’s School of Public Health, the Yale Daily News reported Tuesday. Ranney, a graduate of Harvard College, will begin her post on July 1, replacing interim dean Melinda Pettigrew. The move comes as Brown’s School of Public Health transitions into an autonomous professional school.

THE YALE DAILY NEWS

CONVERSATION WITH MLK III. Martin Luther King Jr. III speaks at Sanders Theatre Thursday evening in a conversation moderated by Brandon M. Terry, the John L. Loeb associate professor of the Social Sciences. ­BY JULIAN G. GIORDANO—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

COLUMBIA LAW PROFESSOR APOLOGIZES FOR CURSING AT STUDENT AFTER VIRAL VIDEO

LUNAR NEW YEAR. The Harvard Chinese Students and Scholars Association celebrated the Lunar New Year in the Ivy League Spring Festival Gala, the first in-person celebration since 2019. BY MADELEINE A.

AFTERNOON TEA. The long standing tradition of Lowell House Tea hosted by Lowell’s Faculty Deans brought together students and faculty for freshly-baked confections and, of course, hot tea. BY JULIAN

HUNG­—CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

G. GIORDANO—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Columbia Law School professor Daniel Capra apologized to his class after a video of him cursing at a student went viral on TikTok and other social media, the Columbia Spectator reported Wednesday. In the video, a student approaches Capra at the front of a classroom and asks him to speak slower, citing the presence of international students in the course. Capra declines the request, and as the student walks away, mutters “f-ck you.” In an email to his students, Capra said he was “truly regretful, appalled, and embarrassed.”

THE COLUMBIA SPECTATOR

CHOMSKY AT HLS. MIT professor Noam Chomsky spoke with Harvard Law School professor Jon D. Hanson at a two-day conference hosted by Hanson’s initiative BY ADDISON Y.

WAKUWAKU OPENS. Located on 33 Brattle St., the Harvard Square location celebrated its grand opening yesterday and is the second WakuWaku establishment. BY SANTIAGO A. SALDIVAR—

MAKEUP EXAMS. Harvard College students took makeup final exams for the fall semester in the days before the beginning of the spring semester.

REPARATIONS FORUM. Scholars and activists discussed reparatory justice movements for Black Americans and the legacy of reparations pioneer Callie G. House at a Harvard Institute of Politics forum on Thursday evening. BY JULIAN J.

BY JULIAN J. GIORDANO—CRIMSON PHOTOG-

GIORDANO—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

LIU—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

RAPHER

NEXT WEEK

THE HARVARD CRIMSON FEBRUARY 3, 2023

What’s Next

IN THE REAL WORLD POLICE KILLING OF TYRE NICHOLS SPARKS NATIONWIDE PROTESTS Activists across the country rallied for justice after footage was released of the Jan. 7 killing of Tyre Nichols by Memphis police officers. Protesters gathered in Memphis, Seattle, Detroit, Washington, Atlanta, and New York, the New York Times reported. Five Memphis police officers were charged with second-degree murder, per the prosecutors’ announcement Thursday.

The officers — all members of the specialized police unit Scorpion — used pepper spray and beat Nichols while restraining him. Medics who arrived at the scene waited more than 16 minutes before beginning treatment of his injuries, which were ultimately fatal.

AP AFRICAN-AMERICAN HISTORY COURSE CURRICULUM PARED DOWN Following a decision by Florida Governor Ron Desantis to ban the Advanced Placement course in African American Studies in the state of Florida, the College Board announced Wednesday that they would cut pieces of the course’s curriculum. The controversy is a part of a larger pattern of educational debates, including conflict over critical race theory. Among the cuts made in the curriculum are materials on Black feminism and the Black Lives Matter movement, according to the New York Times. David Coleman, head of the College Board, stated that the changes were made for “pedagogical reasons” and were finalized in December, before Desantis’s announcement.

3

Start every week with a preview of what’s on the agenda around Harvard University

Friday 2/3

Monday 2/6

Wednesday 2/8

SCIENCE BOOK TALK LIVE!

AFRICAN STUDIES WORKSHOP

THE EVOLUTION OF THE GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS MOVEMENT: A THREE-DECADE PERSPECTIVE

Science Center, 7 p.m. - 8:15 p.m.

Johns Hopkins professor and noted theoretical physicist Sean Carroll comes to Harvard to discuss his new book, “The Biggest Ideas in the Universe: Space, Time, and Motion.”

Saturday 2/4 HASTY PUDDING WOMAN OF THE YEAR PARADE

Harvard Square, 1:45 p.m.

Hasty Pudding Woman of the Year Jennifer Coolidge will lead a parade around Harvard Square before heading to Farkas Hall for a celebratory roast at 7 p.m. If you’re going to go, stay safe, and stay warm!

Center for African Studies, 4 p.m. - 6 p.m.

Independent curator and sociologist Khanyisile Mbongwa will speak at this workshop centered on the theme of political economies and cultures in Africa. A discussion drawing from Mbongwa’s current work will be moderated by Peabody curator Sarah Clunis.

Harvard Kennedy School, 6 p.m. - 7 p.m.

Former Human Rights Watch executive director and HKS Carr Center fellow Kenneth Roth will speak on a panel on the global human rights movement at this JFK Jr. Forum hosted by the Institute of Politics.

Tuesday 2/7

Thursday 2/9

STEVEN PINKER ON RATIONALITY: WHAT IT IS, WHY IT SEEMS SCARCE, WHY IT MATTERS

XI JINPING’S ABOUT FACE: IMPLICATIONS FOR CHINA’S ECONOMY, POLITICS, AND RELATIONS WITH THE WEST

Science Center, 6:30 p.m. - 8 p.m.

Harvard psychology professor and renowned public intellectual Steven Pinker will discuss his new book on the psychology of rationality.

Sunday 2/5

Harvard Kennedy School & Virtual, 12 p.m. 1:15 p.m.

Scott Kennedy, an advisor for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, will give a hybrid seminar on Chinese geopolitics.

Friday 2/10

EQUINOX FLOWER

Harvard Film Archive, 7 p.m.

Come see this screening of Yasujiro Ozu’s film “Equinox Flower” — his first film in color and final collaboration with noted Japanese actress Kinuyo Tanaka.

THE FROMM PLAYERS FEATURING KLANGFORUM WIEN

Sanders Theatre, 8 p.m. - 10 p.m.

Viennese contemporary music ensemble Klangforum Wien will perform new works from composers Enno Poppe and Chaya Czernowin at this free concert in Sanders Theatre.

U.S. ANNOUNCES INCREASED MILITARY PRESENCE IN THE PHILIPPINES In response to China’s actions towards Taiwan and presence in the South China Sea, the United States and the Philippines announced plans for expanding US military presence to four additional bases. The move comes with an $82 million allotment from the U.S. for infrastructure at five Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement sites, as well as four new sites in other regions of the nation, per the Associated Press. The agreement was announced as U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin visited the country and follows an October request by the U.S. for increased numbers of its forces and weapons in five additional military camps.

A WINTER NIGHT

FBI FINDS NO CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS IN SEARCH OF BIDEN’S VACATION HOME The Federal Bureau of Investigation conducted a search of President Joe Biden’s home and discovered no classified documents, according to Biden’s lawyer Bob Bauer. The search, which lasted more than three hours, was conducted in cooperation with Biden’s attorneys. The FBI did not find any classified documents but did retrieve some handwritten notes and other materials for further review, according to CNN. Earlier this year, the FBI conducted a search of Biden’s home in Wilmington, Delaware, on Jan. 20 that did turn up files containing classified material. Neither search required a warrant.

JULIAN J. GIORDANO—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

THE HARVARD CRIMSON Cara J. Chang ’24 President

STAFF FOR THIS ISSUE Brandon L. Kingdollar ’24

Cynthia V. Lu ’24

Managing Editor

Business Manager

Magazine Chairs Io Gilman ’25 Amber H. Levis ’25

Design Chairs Sophia Salamanca ’25 Sami E. Turner ’25

Eleanor V. Wikstrom ’24 Christina M. Xiao ’24

Blog Chairs Tina Chen ’24 Hana Rehman ’25

Multimedia Chairs Joey Huang ’24 Julian J. Giordano ’25

Arts Chairs Anya L. Henry ’24 Alisa S. Regassa ’24

Sports Chairs Mairead B. Baker ’24 Aaron B. Schuchman ’25

Technology Chairs Kevin Luo ’24 Justin Y. Ye ’24

Associate Managing Editors Leah J. Teichholtz ’24 Meimei Xu ’24 Editorial Chairs

Associate Business Manager Derek S. Chang ’24 Copyright 2023, The Harvard Crimson (USPS 236-560). No articles, editorials, cartoons or any part thereof appearing in The Crimson may be reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the President. The Associated Press holds the right to reprint any materials published in The Crimson. The Crimson is a non-profit, independent corporation, founded in 1873 and incorporated in 1967. Second-class postage paid in Boston, Massachusetts. Published Monday through Friday except holidays and during vacations, three times weekly during reading and exam periods by The Harvard Crimson Inc., 14 Plympton St., Cambridge, Mass. 02138

Night Editors Sarah Girma ’24 Vivi E. Lu ’24 Assistant Night Editors Rahem D. Hamid ’25 Yusuf S. Mian ’25 Paton D. Roberts ’25 Elias J. Schisgall ’25 Claire Yuan ’25 Emily L. Ding ’26 Thomas J. Mete ’26 Story Editors Isabella B. Cho ’24 James R. Jolin ’24

Ariel H. Kim ’24 Brandon L. Kingdollar ’24 Vivi E. Lu ’24 Leah J. Teichholtz ’24 Meimei X­­­­­u ’24 Eric Yan ’24

Christopher L. Li ’25 Addison Y. Liu ’25 Nathanael Tjandra ’26

Design Editors Toby R. Ma ’24 Sami E. Turner ’25 Laurinne P. Eugenio ’26

Sports Editors

Editorial Editor

Sidnee N. Kline ’25

Mairead B. Baker ’24 Aaron B. Schuchman ’25 Arts Editors

Photo Editors Cory K. Gorczycki ’24 Joey Huang ’24 Julian J. Giordano ’25

Zachary J. Lech ’24

CORRECTIONS The Harvard Crimson is committed to accuracy in its reporting. Factual errors are corrected promptly on this page. Readers with information about errors are asked to e-mail the managing editor at managingeditor@thecrimson.com.

4

THE HARVARD CRIMSON

COVER STORY

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

Cambridge Mourns Sayed Faisal Hundreds gathered at Cambridge City Hall on Jan. 9 to protest Faisal’s killing.

CONTENT WARNING:

Descriptions of violence and death. If you or someone you know needs help at Harvard, contact Counseling and Mental Health Services at (617) 495-2042 or the Harvard University Police Department at (617) 4951212. Several peer counseling groups offer confidential peer conversations. You can contact a University Chaplain to speak one-on-one at chaplains@harvard.edu.

You can also call the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 or text HOME to the Crisis Text Line at 741741.

ONE MONTH of protests over the fatal shooting of Sayed Faisal by police have renewed long-asked questions on public safety.

BY RYAN H. DOAN- NGUYEN YUSUF S. MIAN AND JOHN N. PEÑA CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

­O

n the afternoon of Jan. 4, 20-year old Sayed Faisal, a Cambridge resident and Bangladeshi American college student, was shot and killed by a Cambridge Police Department officer.

His death has thrown Cambridge into an uproar, leading to protests across the city, confrontations with city officials at public meetings, and the storming of Cambridge City Hall. Some demonstrators have charged that Faisal’s death was an incident of police brutality, racism, and Islamophobia.

Protests over the fatal shooting of Faisal come amid a national reckoning on policing, marked by outrage against systemic racism and police violence brought on by high-profile police killings. Just days after Faisal’s death, 29-year-old Tyre Nichols was beaten and killed by Memphis police, sparking nationwide outrage and demonstrations that reached Harvard’s campus.

Faisal’s case has come under an international spotlight and ignited scrutiny into CPD practices, while activists and some local leaders have renewed calls for police reform and public safety alternatives, arguing that police are

JAN. 4 Police Fatally Shoot Sayed Faisal

ill-equipped to respond to mental health crises.

Two days after Faisal’s death, the Massachusetts chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations issued a statement from his parents, Sayed Mujibullah and Mosammat Shaheda.

Faisal — whom they called Prince — was “loving,” “generous,” and “deeply family-oriented,” they wrote.

“Prince was a normal law-abiding citizen who had no record of any kind with law enforcement. He was never violent towards anyone,” they wrote. “We want to know what happened and how this tragic event unfolded.”

Facts of the Case At 1:15 p.m. on Jan. 4, a 911 caller reported that a man — later identified as Faisal — had jumped out of a window and was harming himself, according to a CPD statement.

Following a foot chase through five blocks of Cambridgeport, Faisal allegedly moved towards officers wielding a knife, and an officer shot him with a non-lethal sponge round.

When that failed to stop him from advancing, a CPD officer fatally shot him.

There is no body camera footage of the shooting, as CPD officers are not equipped with cameras. Surveillance footage released by the department shows a shirtless Faisal being chased by at least four officers.

CPD spokesperson Jeremy C. Warnick wrote in an emailed statement that Faisal’s death marked the first fatal officer-involved shooting by Cambridge Police in more than 20 years.

Warnick also shared that the officer who shot Faisal is a seven-year veteran of the department who has never received a complaint before.

The killing is currently under investigation by Middlesex County District Attorney Marian T. Ryan, while the officer has been placed on paid administrative leave.

Following the shooting, Cambridge Police Commissioner Christine A. Elow pledged full cooperation of CPD with the investigation.

City officials have opted not to release the names of the officers involved in the killing, citing department practices. The names of the officers and the police re-

RYAN H. DOAN-NGUYEN—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

ports corresponding to the incident are expected to be released upon completion of the district attorney’s investigation.

‘No Justice, No Peace’ In the month following Faisal’s death, Cambridge has been rocked by protests railing against police violence. Outrage against city officials culminated in the disruption of an otherwise ordinary Cambridge City Council meeting on Jan. 23.

As public comment came to a close, dozens of protesters simultaneously rose from the gallery and began chanting “Release the names,” “No justice, no peace,” and “Send those killer cops to jail.”

The Council immediately motioned to recess.

Boston Party for Socialism and Liberation organizer Suhail P. Purkar, who led the council meeting protest, said in an interview that Faisal’s killing “hit very close to home.”

“We can’t allow them to have

‘This happened to us,’ how can we say there was a full investigation?” Purkar said.

Activists have repeatedly called for the officers involved in Faisal’s killing to be named, terminated, and ultimately prosecuted.

Cambridge’s wave of protests began outside City Hall on Jan. 5, the day after Faisal was killed. Demonstrators returned on Jan. 9 — some carrying a large hand-painted portrait of Faisal — rallying for justice and reform on the same day that protesters in Dhaka, Bangladesh, formed a human chain to protest his killing.

Rallies spilled into Cambridgeport — the site of Faisal’s death — on Jan. 11, Harvard Square on Jan. 14, and the district attorney’s office on Jan. 21.

Throughout the demonstrations, protesters have voiced demands for police demilitarization, public safety alternatives, and reallocation of police funding. These demands were delivered directly by protesters to city officials at Cambridge Police headquarters on Jan. 29 at the

“

If the names of the officers aren’t released, and members of the community don’t have the opportunity to come forward and say ‘This happened to us,’ how can we say there was a full investigation?

Suhail P. Pukar Boston Party for Socialism and Liberation Organizer

business as usual,” he said. “So we need to have some sort of disruption.”

Demonstrators marched from the Council chamber to Cambridge Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui’s office, confronting her and demanding she release the officers’ names.

“No justice, no peace,” they chanted outside City Hall.

Purkar said he takes issue with the City’s decision to wait until after the investigation to publicize the officers’ names, adding he has “no faith whatsoever” in the investigation.

“If the names of the officers aren’t released, and members of the community don’t have the opportunity to come forward and say,

conclusion of a nearly two-mile march from Somerville High School, Faisal’s alma mater.

Several organizers entered the police station in hopes of delivering their demands to Elow directly.

“They’re calling to see if Police Commissioner Christine Elow is here and if she’s brave enough to actually face her own community,” Purkar told attendees.

After being informed that Elow was not available to speak with them, organizers left their written demands and led chants of “We’ll be back!”

A Grieving City Faisal, an only child of Bangla-

deshi immigrants, leaves behind a city in grief.

His family came to the United States roughly a decade ago, according to the Boston Globe. Faisal then enrolled at the Winter Hill Community Innovation School, a pre-kindergarten to eighth grade public school in Somerville.

Sara Halawa, an organizer with Safe Schools Somerville, said Faisal was involved in several organizations for immigrant youth. He contributed artwork to the Mystic River Mural Project, an environmental art project spanning more than two decades, according to Halawa. He also spoke at a Center for Teen Empowerment Peace Conference and served as an interpreter at Somerville’s Welcome Project, which provides language learning and civic engagement services for immigrants.

“This was someone who worked hard — who participated in the community,” Halawa said.

At an emotional Harvard Square demonstration, organizers read statements from Faisal’s friends and teachers.

According to one friend’s statement, Faisal enjoyed customizing shoes and would spend days perfecting them. Faisal, a computer engineering student at the University of Massachusetts Boston, hoped to pursue a career creating video games.

“He had hopes and dreams, and the Cambridge Police stole that away from him,” the statement read.

Mujibullah, Faisal’s father, said through a translator that Faisal “was a very meritorious student” in a Jan. 5 interview with WCVB, adding that he had hoped his son would become a doctor or engineer.

“Now, all hope is gone,” he said.

Maria Khwaja, who taught Faisal at Somerville High School, said she couldn’t believe it was him when she read news of the shooting.

“I sat in my garage, and I cried for 30 minutes because this kid should have been okay,” she told protesters. “I have never lost a student like this.”

On the steps of Cambridge City Hall, Amtiaz Uddin broke down in tears as he reflected on his best friend’s life, recalling days spent playing cricket, riding bikes through the city, skateboarding, and going to the gym together.

“Someone can never hate

him,” Uddin said. “No one can feel uncomfortable around him.”

At a Jan 11. vigil held at the Cambridgeport corner where Faisal was killed, community leaders directed prayers in different faiths — Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, and Christianity — as residents held candles and laid flowers at an altar created in his honor.

In the wake of Faisal’s death, the Bangladeshi Association of New England launched a GoFundMe to support his family. As of Thursday, the campaign had raised more than $70,000 of its $100,000 goal.

“I’ve struggled to find the words to address everyone amidst this tragedy,” Siddiqui told residents at a Council meeting the week following the shooting. “As your mayor, as a South Asian immigrant deeply connected to the large Bengali community here in Cambridge, I offer my deepest condolences to the family and friends of Sayed Arif Faisal.”

‘The Model for Policing’?

Before Faisal, the last police killing in Cambridge took place in 2002, when CPD officers fatally shot a man armed with a hatchet in his East Cambridge home.

Daniel Furtado, a 59-year-old with a history of mental illness, allegedly charged at officers after they fired tear gas into his house and broke down his door, leading officers to open fire.

In the intervening years, the department has repeatedly faced calls to change its response to health emergencies.

In April 2018, CPD arrested a Black Harvard undergraduate after the College’s Yardfest concert, sparking allegations of police brutality. Harvard University Health Services had transferred 911 callers reporting a naked man standing in Massachusetts Ave. to CPD. Videos and an official report later released by CPD showed that officers tackled the student — whom they believed to be under the influence of narcotics — and punched him five times in the torso.

Following the arrest, the student was bleeding and was transported to a local hospital.

Three days after the incident, then-CPD Commissioner Branville G. Bard, Jr. defended the officers involved in the arrest.

JAN. 5

JAN. 9

JAN. 11

JAN. 12

JAN. 14

First protest at Cambridge City Hall

Protest at Cambridge City Hall and public comment at City Council meeting

Interfaith prayer and vigil for Faisal at Fort Washington Park

Community meeting at MLK school

Protest at Harvard Square

COVER STORY

THE HARVARD CRIMSON FEBRUARY 3, 2023

“I absolutely do support the officers,” he said. “You have to judge their actions within the context of a rapidly evolving situation and not within an ideal construct.”

The incident led to significant public backlash, including protests against the department on Harvard’s campus and the creation of an office within CPD tasked with monitoring racial bias and use of force.

An independent review of the arrest found that officers did not violate department policy and there was “no evidence” of excessive force.

But hundreds of Harvard students and affiliates viewed the incident differently, calling on Harvard to develop a “medical emergency response team” that would respond to drug and alcohol-related calls — and remove CPD from the process entirely.

CPD has also faced calls to demilitarize. In July 2020, the department released a report detailing the extent of its armory at the direction of the City Council.

The report revealed that the department owned numerous assault weapons and one Lenco BearCat. The BearCat — a $350,000 armored vehicle — was previously used at a Black Lives Matter prayer march in 2016 as CPD officers wearing military gear observed a rally with the vehicle parked in front of protesters.

Under the leadership of Bard, CPD made strides toward demilitarization. In 2021, the department agreed to eliminate 20 percent of its long guns and end the

use of camouflage uniforms for its officers. CPD also changed its policies to ensure that the BearCat could only be used with the police commissioner’s direct approval.

Warnick wrote in a statement that CPD will release an updated inventory for 2022 next week and confirmed that the BearCat is still in the department’s inventory but needs the commissioner’s approval to be deployed.

The surge of protests around Faisal’s killing came almost exactly a year after Elow’s appointment as CPD’s permanent commissioner in January 2022. In a CPD press release at the time, Elow said she hoped to make the department “the model for policing” in the United States.

In a Feb. 16, 2022, interview with The Crimson, Elow said she viewed the Yardfest arrest as a learning experience, adding that she hoped to work with universities to offer “amnesty” to students in crisis.

The Search for Alternatives The search for alternatives to policing in Cambridge had been years in progress when Faisal was killed.

In response to the 2020 murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, the Cambridge City Council looked to create changes to public safety.

Cambridge City Councilor Quinton Y. Zondervan called for the reallocation of police funding to programs to “better support

young people, especially Black youth.”

Ultimately, city councilors passed a policy order calling on the city to reexamine its approach to public safety, leading to the establishment of the Cambridge Public Safety Task Force.

In May 2021, the task force released their final report, writing that while CPD was “looked to as a national leader in proactive, progressive, community-based policing,” it was necessary to reconsider “what the best practices

passed a policy order considering funding for Holistic Emergency Alternative Response Team, an independent public safety organization first proposed by The Black Response, a group that supports police abolition.

In an interview, Stephanie Guirand — who serves as president of HEART — said frustration with Cambridge’s approach led her and others to create HEART as an entity outside the oversight of the city.

“We asked a city councilor to

“

It’s a dark moment in Cambridge’s history that we will never forget. Yet here we are someow trying to process the reality that a Cambridge Police officer shot and killed a young man from our community while he was experiencing a crisis.”

Quinton Y. Zondervan Cambridge City Councilor

in public safety truly ought to be.”

The primary recommendation of the report was to create the Cambridge Department of Community Safety, which would respond to some 911 calls, such as emergencies involving mental health crises, substance abuse, and unhoused residents.

As the city weighed the department’s creation, the City Council

put in a policy order for task force transparency and it failed, so at that point we doubled down on creating a very, very public process that we would facilitate ourselves,” she said.

Last year, the City Council considered action on both the Community Safety Department and HEART, but ultimately opted to fund the former with $3 million

for fiscal year 2023. By contrast, CPD was provided $73.5 million in funding, up from $69 million in 2022.

The Community Safety Department remains in its implementation process.

In the interim, Elizabeth M. Speakman, who serves as coordinator of domestic and gender-based violence prevention for the city, is leading the emerging department.

Purkar expressed concerns about the newly created department’s proximity to the police department and current emergency response system.

“They do collaborate closely with the police department, and that is essentially where the calls get rerouted to,” he said. “So that’s actually something that we don’t support whatsoever.”

Guirand said following the killing of Faisal, HEART’s call volume has “almost tripled,” adding that the team hopes to add additional responders, as it only has seven at present.

The City Council has also taken up consideration of changes to policing practices at several special meetings in the wake of Faisal’s killing.

At a Jan. 18 meeting, following questioning from councilors on the city’s use of force policy, CPD officer Cameron Deane said lethal force is sometimes necessary, adding that pursuing suspects without lethal force “can’t be the only option.”

Zondervan called for disarming CPD officers.

“The problem is not the train-

5

ing. It’s the gun,” he said.

At a Jan. 25 continuation of the Council’s special session, councilors debated implementing body cameras for CPD. Six councilors spoke in support of body cameras, while Zondervan opposed them out of privacy concerns.

Massachusetts legislators reintroduced a proposal for a Medical Civil Rights Act on Jan. 20. The act would require police officers to “immediately request emergency medical services” during any medical crisis.

The right to medical care has never been guaranteed by law in any state.

Advocates of the bill, which has also been introduced in Connecticut and Maine, say that it would help protect individuals — particularly those experiencing mental health crises — when interacting with police.

Zondervan said during a Jan. 9 Council meeting days after Faisal’s killing that the city needs to “drastically change” its approach to public safety.

“We’ve heard that Cambridge is special and that our progressive approach to policing sets us apart,” Zondervan said. “Yet here we are somehow trying to process the reality that a Cambridge Police officer shot and killed a young man from our community while he was experiencing a crisis.”

“It’s a dark moment in Cambridge’s history that we will never forget,” he added. ryan.doan-nguyen@thecrimson.com yusuf.mian@thecrimson.com john.pena@thecrimson.com

Residents gathered for a Cambridgeport vigil to honor Faisal, laying flowers at the corner where he was killed.

At a Harvard Square rally, protesters demanded the name of the officer who shot Faisal.

RYAN H. DOAN-NGUYEN—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

RYAN H. DOAN-NGUYEN—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Demonstrators held signs reading “Justice For Faisal!” as they gathered in Harvard Square.

Rallygoers in Harvard Square called for greater police accountability and spoke in support of alternatives to police.

RYAN H. DOAN-NGUYEN—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

RYAN H. DOAN-NGUYEN—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

JAN. 18

JAN. 20

JAN. 21

JAN. 23

JAN. 25

First Special City Council meeting

Medical Civil Rights Act Introduced

BANE protest at District Attorney’s office in Lowell, MA

Protesters storm Cambridge City Hall

Second Special City Council meeting

6

THE HARVARD CRIMSON

NEWS

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

TYRE NICHOLS

Harvard Mourns Tyre Nichols’ Death CONTENT WARNING:

Descriptions of violence and death. If you or someone you know needs help at Harvard, contact Counseling and Mental Health Services at (617) 495-2042 or the Harvard University Police Department at (617) 4951212. Several peer counseling groups offer confidential peer conversations. You can contact a University Chaplain to speak one-on-one at chaplains@harvard.edu.

You can also call the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 or text HOME to the Crisis Text Line at 741741.

Demonstrators hold up signs in front of the Mass. State House to protest the police killing of Tyre D. Nichols. ELIAS J. SCHISGALL—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

‘THE SKY IS CRYING’ Harvard students and Bostonians mourned the death of Tyre Nichols in a protest and a vigil.

BY DARLEY A. C. BOIT, NIA L. ORAKWUE, AND ELIAS J. SCHISGALL CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

­D

R

Tenzin R. Gund-Morrow ‘26 embraces Alyssa M. Gaines ‘26 on the steps of Memorial Church. ADDISON Y. LIU—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

SHORENSTEIN FROM PAGE 1

Joan Donovan Forced Out of HKS

ozens of Harvard students mourned the death of Tyre D. Nichols — the 29-year-old Black skateboarder and photographer who died after being beaten by Memphis police officers following a traffic stop — in a vigil in front of Memorial Church on a drizzly Sunday evening.

The vigil came days after the Memphis Police Department released graphic body camera and surveillance footage of officers beating Nichols, which sparked nationwide fury over police brutality. In the video clips, officers

address these topics,” Smith added.

In a Thursday morning email obtained by The Crimson, Shorenstein Center Director Nancy R. Gibbs wrote to center affiliates that the decision to shut down the Technology and Social Change project was “solely driven” by HKS policy of only allowing full professors to lead research projects.

“While there can be limited exceptions, those can’t continue indefinitely without a faculty member as the principal project leader and academic head,” Gibbs wrote in the email.

Donovan declined to comment on the contents of the letter.

The Technology and Social Change project — which lists a team of more than 25 people on its website including staff, fellows, contributing researchers, and research assistants — has been led by Donovan since 2019.

Gibbs sent the email hours after The Crimson first reported that HKS would end the Technology and Social Change project by summer 2024.

Gibbs wrote that other initiatives led by faculty members related to the study of misinformation and disinformation would continue at the Shorenstein Center, including the Facebook archive project and the Misinformation Review, an online academic journal.

In recent weeks, Elmendorf has been the subject of controversy.

He faced backlash in January over his rejection of a fellowship for former Human Rights Watch head Kenneth Roth.

Elmendorf, who allegedly blocked Roth over anti-Israel criticism, reversed his decision regarding the fellowship after more than 1,000 Harvard affiliates signed an open letter calling for his resignation. miles.herszenhorn@thecrimson.com

ily shares that he loved to skateboard in his free time and was an avid photographer who enjoyed watching the sunset every night.”

“All of which are things he can no longer do, because he has been taken from us,” Razon added.

In a speech, GAASA Treasurer Michaela K. Glavin ’25 called on the audience to “pause to mourn.”

“We need to feel the sadness, feel the pain, feel the anger that comes with losing a life. We know that the police do not care about our lives,” Glavin said. “If we get so desensitized to the point that we stop feeling loss, we are stripped of the love that makes up the very fabric of what it means to be Black in America.”

In an interview after the vigil, Allison M. Hunter ’26 called on Harvard to publicly acknowledge Nichols’ death, saying the situation could not be treated as “business as usual.”

“The sky is crying, like today,” Hunter said, referencing the sparse raindrops falling over Harvard Yard, “because of how much we’re going through and the injustices that are possible.”

“We need a break,” she added. “We need a place to cry and a place to be Black unapologetically.”

Harvard spokesperson Jason A. Newton declined to comment.

The Memphis Police Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The videos’ release — and the fatal police shooting of University of Massachusetts Boston student Sayed Faisal in Cambridge earlier this month — spurred a protest and march in the Boston Common on Saturday. Saturday’s protest was organized by the Boston chapter of the Party for Socialism and Liberation.

More than 150 protesters — in-

cluding a handful of Harvard undergraduates — rallied across the street from the Massachusetts State House before marching through downtown Boston, singing “Which Side Are You On?” and chanting “Justice for Tyre” and “No good cops in a racist system.”

Speakers and protesters reiterated demands that the Cambridge Police Department release the names of the officers involved in Faisal’s death, as well as the unredacted police report.

In a statement, CPD spokesperson Jeremy C. Warnick said all relevant police reports and the names of responding officers, including the one who shot Faisal, would be released following an inquest led by Middlesex County District Attorney Marian T. Ryan.

Ben B. Roberts ’23, who attended the protest, said he found Nichols’ and Faisal’s deaths “horrifying,” but that he was inspired by the protest’s turnout.

“It’s pretty inspiring to be in crowds like that and to know there’s lots of other people out there who don’t think this is acceptable, who want to do something, who want to change something,” Roberts said. “It makes you feel like you’re part of something, not just angry on your own.”

Jason “Kojo” Acheampong ’26, another attendee of Saturday’s protest, said students “live in a bubble” on campus and urged other students to not become “desensitized” to people being killed by police.

“This is what happened in America today,” he added. “This is the function of police.” darley.boit@thecrimson.com nia.orakwue@thecrimson.com elias.schisgall@thecrimson.com

Harvard Corporation Members Donations’ Lean Heavily Democratic

BY MILES J. HERSZENHORN AND CLAIRE YUAN

of House and Senate subcommittees on the spread of misinformation online.

Tensions between Elmendorf and Donovan rose in fall 2021, according to three HKS staff members, around when Donovan started to work on HKS’ Facebook archive project, fbarchive.org.

The archive will provide researchers and journalists with access to photos of documents obtained by Frances B. Haugen, the 2021 Facebook whistleblower who disclosed internal Facebook research on its technologies’ negative effects.

A year later, at the start of the fall 2022 semester, Donovan was informed that the Technology and Social Change project would ultimately end in summer 2024.

In mid-September 2022, HKS professor Latanya A. Sweeney joined Donovan as co-principal investigator for the Technology and Social Change project, the first time Donovan was not its sole head.

Donovan taught the HKS course Democracy, Politics and Institutions 622: “Media Manipulation and Disinformation Campaigns” and co-authored a widely-read study in July 2022 that found a plurality of participants in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol were motivated by their support for Trump.

In September 2022, Donovan published a book titled “Meme Wars: The Untold Story of the Online Battles Upending Democracy in America” about the online spread of right-wing media political conspiracy theories.

Smith, an HKS spokesperson, wrote in the statement that the school is continuing to promote scholarship in the field of misinformation and disinformation.

“Harvard Kennedy School is committed to the teaching and study of misinformation and disinformation,” Smith wrote.

“Several faculty members are leading significant projects that

beat Nichols and threaten violence, while he appears to lie on the ground.

Around two weeks after Nichols’ death, the five officers involved in his arrest were fired.

Last Thursday, all five were indicted on charges of second-degree murder. The Memphis Police Department also disbanded the controversial SCORPION Unit to which the former officers belonged.

During Sunday’s vigil, organized by members of Harvard’s Black Student Association, several speakers expressed intense grief over Nichols’ death and fiercely critiqued the American policing system.

Rothsaida Sylvaince ’24, the president of the Black Students Association, told the somber crowd she was “disappointed, tired, angry, and upset.”

“Every time I sit here, and I think about what this unjust police system does to us, does to Black people, the way that it sheds our blood without a care or thought, the way that the police system exercises and abuses its power to subjugate Black people in this country, in a way that’s been done for hundreds of years, I’m angry,” Sylvaince said.

“And I don’t want to keep coming here, having to mourn the light and love of our people,” she added.

Ricardo R. “Ricky” Razon ’25, the vice president of the Generational African American Students Association, spoke in remembrance of Nichols, whose “life was taken from him far too soon at the hands of the shameful and cowardly Memphis Police Department.”

“Tyre Nichols was the father to a young Black boy who was four years old,” he said. “His fam-

CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Members of the Harvard Corporation, the University’s highest governing body, contributed more than $1.5 million in political donations to federal candidates and political action committees in 2021 and 2022.

Of that number, just $12,900 went to Republican political causes.

Members on the 13-person board donated overwhelmingly to Democratic causes ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, according to The Crimson’s analysis of Federal Election Commission data.

The Harvard Corporation is the most powerful governing body at Harvard, participating in major decisions on the University’s direction and endowment.

With the exception of outgoing University President Law-

rence S. Bacow, all Corporation members served on the presidential search committee that selected President-elect Claudine Gay. Within the Corporation’s ranks are two former Obama administration officials, two billionaires, and three heads of private investment firms.

Ahead of the 2020 election, Corporation members financed over $1 million to Democratic campaigns and PACs. Senior Fellow Penny S. Pritzker ’81, who served as the U.S. Secretary of Commerce under President Obama, contributed the most out of the board’s members, supplying Democratic causes with more than $750,000 ahead of the 2022 midterms.

She gave similarly in the 2020 election cycle, with $861,000 in support of Democratic candidates.

Pritzker, who joined the Corporation in 2018, became the first woman to serve as senior fellow on July 1, succeeding former Se-

CORPORATION CONTRIBUTIONS BY PARTISAN STATUS

ANDY Z. WANG—CRIMSON WRITER

nior Fellow William F. Lee ’72 after he reached the 12-year term limit for Corporation members.

Part of one of America’s wealthiest families, Pritzker has a net worth of $3.1 billion. Jay Robert “J.B.” Pritzker, Pritzker’s younger brother, has served as governor of Illinois since 2019.

Paul J. Finnegan ’75 was the sole Corporation member to donate to GOP candidates, giving $5,000 to former U.S. Representative Adam D. Kinzinger (R-Ill.) and $2,900 to Jesse L. Reising, who lost in the 2022 GOP primary in Illinois’ 13th Congressional District.

Finnegan also contributed $5,000 to Kinzinger’s PAC. Kinzinger voted to impeach former President Donald J. Trump for inciting the Jan. 6 insurrection and served on the House Jan. 6 Select Committee investigating the attack on the Capitol.

Finnegan also supported several Democratic candidates with total contributions of over $20,000, including contributing $5,000 to the campaign of U.S. Senator Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.).

Finnegan also contributed $155,000 to PACs that support a bipartisan group of candidates.

Collectively, members of the Corporation donated more than $800,000 to the Democratic National Committee and its Congressional and Senate campaign arms.

They also contributed more than $110,000 to various Democratic PACs. Other Corporation members who donated to political campaigns include Theodore V. Wells, Timothy R. Barakett ’87, Kenneth I. Chenault, and Diana L. Nelson ’84.

Besides Pritzker, Chenault led the group with nearly $400,000 worth of contributions to political campaigns.

The Crimson did not find records of political spending from other members of the Harvard Corporation ahead of the 2022

midterms, including billionaire David M. Rubenstein.

Rubenstein is a close friend of President Joe Biden. During the first two years of his presidency, Biden stayed at Rubenstein’s Nantucket home for Thanksgiving.

Bacow has not contributed to political campaigns since he took office in Massachusetts Hall in 2018, according to Federal Election Commission reports.

Prior to his appointment to Harvard’s top post, Bacow funded Democratic candidates, including Hillary R. Clinton and Michael S. Dukakis.

Incoming University President Claudine Gay has not made any recorded political contributions in her career, according to Federal Election Commission data.

University spokesperson Jason A. Newton declined to comment for the article.

Methodology The Crimson compiled data for this analysis from publicly available Federal Election Commission records of contributions to federal election candidates and political action committees.

Contribution records were compiled for current members of the Harvard Contribution, including all known variants of names, and cross-checked against publicly available occupation data.

Federal election laws require donors to truthfully disclose their occupation and employer.

Federal law also requires the disclosure of political spending exceeding $200 on a single candidate within an election cycle.

The data do not include contributions made to independent expenditure campaigns, super PACs, or nonprofit groups organized under section 501(c)(4) of the tax code which engage in electioneering communications. miles.herszenhorn@thecrimson.com claire.yuan@thecrimson.com

NEWS

THE HARVARD CRIMSON FEBRUARY 3, 2023

OBITUARY

IN MEMORIAM. Christopher Walsh ’65, a Harvard Medical School professor, died on Jan. 10 at the age of 78. Walsh made significant contributions to biochemistry.

Christopher Walsh ’65, 1944–2023

BY DORCAS Y. GADRI AND AMMY M. YUAN CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

­C

arolyn R. Bertozzi ’88, winner of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, first heard Harvard Medical School emeritus professor Christopher T. Walsh ’65 speak when she was a graduate student attending an American Chemical Society meeting.

Bertozzi recalled the speakers giving “pompous” lectures that were hard to follow.

But when Walsh took the stage, “it was a total inversion,” she said. Bertozzi said he picked the research project of one of his postdoctoral fellows at the time, introduced it as a “mystery we wanted to understand,” and led the audience through the hypothesis, data, and lessons learned along the way.

“That has been the model that I’ve used ever since then,” Bertozzi said. “That was more than 30 years ago, and that lesson has been a guiding principle for me.

And so when I give lectures, that’s what I try to do — exactly what Chris did in that moment.”

Walsh, a renowned biochemist, died on Jan. 10 at the age of 78.

He received his undergraduate degree in biology from Harvard College and his Ph.D. in life science from Rockefeller University. In 1987, HMS recruited Walsh from MIT, where he had established himself as a leading researcher in the field of biological chemistry.

Throughout his career, Walsh made significant contributions to the field of biochemistry, particu-

Harvard Medical School professor Christopher Walsh ‘65, who died on Jan. 10 at the age of 78.

larly in the areas of enzyme function, metabolic pathways, and antibiotic biosynthesis. Under his guidance as chair of the Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, HMS became a leader in structural biology. His work contributed to the development of novel antibiotics and advancing knowledge of enzyme structure.

HMS Dean George Q. Daley ’82, who served as a faculty member alongside Walsh in the BCMP Department, recognized Walsh’s work at MIT, HMS, and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in a Jan. 12 statement.

“Everyone around him aspired to work harder and be more rigorous because he respected excellence and inspired excellence in others,” Daley wrote.

Stephen C. Blacklow ’83, who currently occupies Walsh’s former role as the chair of the BCMP Department, wrote in an email that Walsh had a “tremendous influence” on many people’s careers, including Blacklow’s own.

“He was well-loved by many in our community for his generosity of spirit, and wry sense of humor, and was deeply appreciated for his intellectual rigor and tireless dedication to excellence,” he added.

Blacklow wrote that Walsh’s death was “so tragic, and so sudden.”

“I still keep hoping it’s just a nightmare from which I will soon awaken,” he wrote.

Walsh’s approach to research allowed him to make connections

COURTESY OF GRETCHEN ERTL

between seemingly unrelated areas of study.

David E. Golan ’75, dean for Research Operations and Global Programs at HMS, said Walsh proposed the “interesting experiment” of combining the departments of biological chemistry and pharmacology, which resulted in the BCMP Department.

“He had an uncanny knack for choosing people with tremendous potential and for seeing what the scientific fields were going to be that were going to make a difference,” Golan said. “As department chair, he really transformed both departments.”

Golan said Walsh helped strengthen the fields of structural biology and chemical biology as well as HMS’ research in the field of chemistry.

“He made a concerted effort when he came to hire the best structural biologists in the world and the best chemical biologists in the world,” Golan said.

“Chris saw the future and he took active steps to make sure that we were well-represented with people who would be at the cutting edge in terms of their research as well as recruiting students,” he added.

In addition to his research, Walsh’s colleagues said he was also a dedicated educator. Bertozzi, a colleague of Walsh during his time as an adjunct professor at Stanford, called him a “consummate scholar, teacher, and mentor,” pointing to the numerous textbooks he wrote.

“All of them have been widely used and highly influential in

7

educating the next generation of scientists,” Bertozzi said. “He has provided us with this incredible arsenal of beautifully-digested and synthesized information so that we can teach our students about the kind of work that he was interested in.”

JoAnne Stubbe, who shared the 2010 Welch Prize in Chemistry with Walsh, said Walsh’s model of teaching was “the greatest gift” he gave her.

“From looking, watching him do it, he taught me how to teach,” Stubbe said. “I didn’t know anybody that had that ability to take all this complex stuff and turn it into something that people get really interested in.”

Bertozzi and Kari C. Nadeau, a professor of medicine and pediatrics at Stanford University, said Walsh was an advocate for women in science.

“It was challenging sometimes for women to find positions where they would have good mentorship in science and have someone to help support their career aspirations,” Bertozzi said.

“Chris Walsh was a person who had many women in his lab, and many of them he advocated for and are now very famous in their own right.”

Nadeau — who was mentored

by Walsh as an M.D. Ph.D. student at HMS — described him as an “extraordinary scholar, a visionary leader, and a genuine human being.”

She recalled how Walsh would greet his mentees at the laboratory each morning.

“I’d always get to hear his footsteps first, and I knew that the next thing that I would see in the morning is a bright smile coming in and asking, ‘How are things going?’” Nadeau said. “I absolutely love that memory because it’s so special that a lab mentor will take the time every day to come down the hallway and meet with us.” dorcas.gadri@thecrimson.com ammy.yuan@thecrimson.com

WOMEN’S HOCKEY FROM PAGE 1

Abuse Allegations Leveled Against Women’s Hockey Coach and more complete picture of players’ experiences.”

“We respect every person’s individual right to communicate their story and their truth, and the importance of doing so for one’s own healing, as well as to promote positive change,” the alumni wrote in an email communication obtained by The Crimson.

After her team’s first-round loss to Princeton in the Eastern College Athletic Conference playoffs, Stone allegedly went on a “degrading and dispiriting” tirade, describing the group as a team “with too many chiefs and not enough Indians.”

Maryna G. Macdonald ’23, a starting player from the Ditidaht First Nation of Canada’s Vancouver Island, told the Globe that Stone looked directly at Macdonald when she made the remark.

After Stone’s remarks, Macdonald reported her to Harvard Athletics, and Stone soon apologized to the team, according to the Globe.

In an April 8, 2022, email obtained by The Crimson, Harvard Athletics Director Erin McDer-

mott shared with members of the team a plan for a formal review of Stone, referencing a recent meeting and “conflict.”

“The greater understanding that we have from different people will best inform any next steps that we identify, with the aim of improving your experience, whether that’s athletically or academically, or both,” McDermott wrote.

“We are using this opportunity to take a ‘deeper dive’ into your experience and be as helpful as possible in the end,” McDermott added.

After a monthslong administrative review, McDermott sent an email on July 19 to the team with the subject line “Onward and Upward,” writing, “Coach Stone is our head coach and will remain our head coach.”

“The findings of the review affirm that decision while also identifying opportunities for improvement, particularly with communication across several areas,” McDermott added.

Macdonald ultimately left the team, along with Taze E. Thompson, a descendant of the Cree Na-

tion of Alberta, Canada, who was named the 2021-22 Ivy League Rookie of the Year.

team since 2016, according to the Globe’s investigation.

The Federation of Sovereign

“

Racism has no place in our society or locker rooms. A place where we entrusted our First Nations young women would be free from abuse and racism. This abuse should not be tolerated by any university, especially a highly regarded institution such as Harvard University.

Aly Bear Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations Third Vice Chief

Thompson transferred to the hockey team at Northeastern University following the 20212022 season.

Macdonald and Thompson are just two of the 14 recruited athletes who have quit the

Indigenous Nations — an organization representing 74 First Nations in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan — publicly called for Stone’s resignation on Tuesday and sent a letter to Harvard Athletics demanding her remov-

al as head coach.

“Racism has no place in our society or locker rooms. A place where we entrusted our First Nations young women would be free from abuse and racism,” FSIN Third Vice Chief Aly Bear said in a statement.

“This abuse should not be tolerated by any university, especially a highly regarded institution such as Harvard University,” she added. “I truly hope Harvard will stand with the Indigenous students and protect future students from this type of racist behaviour.”

Sydney Daniels ’17, a member of the Mistawasis Nehiyawak First Nation of Saskatchewan, left her position as assistant coach and later filed a complaint against Harvard for alleged racial and other forms of discrimination related to Stone and the athletics department, according to the Globe.

Harvard has until Feb. 8 to respond to the complaint.

The Globe also reported that Stone has been accused of exhibiting “little tolerance for those confronting emotional challeng-

es.”

Stone allegedly told a former team leader who was receiving mental health care to “toughen up and not be a burden to your teammates.”

Harvard spokesperson Rachael Dane declined to comment on the allegations against Stone, citing Harvard Athletics policy against commenting on personnel matters.

Dane wrote that athletes are made aware of processes for filing complaints regarding their experience at the start of each academic year.

“Student-Athletes initiate a process by reaching out to their respective sport administrator via email or scheduling a meeting, if they have complaints,” Dane wrote. “An appropriate process follows of interviews with affected individuals.”

“Decisions are made in consultation with Harvard administrative offices when necessary of how to move forward,” she added in the statement. paton.roberts@thecrimson.com sophia.scott@thecrimson.com

Rodents Plague Some Quincy House Residents

BY ELLA J. JONES AND JOHN N. PEÑA CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

When Harvard Quincy House resident Mia A. Colman ’23-’24 returned to campus for the spring semester, she was surprised to find her bedding in a plastic bag.

Next to the bag was a letter from Quincy Building Manager Dick Nerden, which stated that a pest control service had found mouse droppings on the bed and proceeded to vacuum the excrement and place traps in the room.

Shortly after reading the note, Colman said she had a surprise encounter with one of the trespassers.

“There was a mouse who was half-alive stuck in one of the glue traps that had been put in,” she

said. “It was actually kind of sad.”

“It was kind of cute, but it definitely had been through it,” she added.

A number of rooms in the New Quincy residence hall of Quincy have been plagued by a rodent infestation going back to at least last November, prompting surprise and disgust from several residents who reported mice and droppings in their living spaces.

Cole H. Petersen ’23, who has also been dealing with mice since last semester, said there were four dead mice in one of the rooms of his suite when he returned from winter break.

“There was one living in a food container that was closed that jumped out at us,” he said.

“You hear them in the radiators at night — which is not great.”

Petersen also said there was a

mouse living in his roommate’s room, which left droppings in his sheets and “all over his room.”

“The mice are in the dining hall at night — you can see them very openly, out in the open — just running around,” he added.

In a Jan. 26 email to residents, Nerden said Quincy is working with a pest control company and Harvard’s Environmental Health and Safety team to address the ongoing issues.

Nerden also advised residents to be “extremely diligent” about avoiding leaving food and trash in their suites and asked affected dorms to report sightings through the house’s work request system.

Harvard spokesperson Aaron M. Goldman wrote in an emailed statement that the residential facilities team is working to address

concerns in Quincy “quickly and thoroughly.”

“Ensuring a clean and healthy living space for all students is always a priority,” he wrote. “Several steps are being taken to mitigate the issue, including the assignment of pest control and custodial crews making regular visits and treating points of entry.”

Quincy resident Chloe S. Wilson ’24 said she and her suitemates have implemented additional rodent countermeasures, including draft protectors to prevent movement between rooms and devices that repel mice with high sound frequencies.

Still, Wilson said her efforts have been largely ineffective.

“One time we literally saw one of the mice jump over the trap,” she said. “These are smart mice.”

Annika S. Huprikar ’24 said the mice have led her suite to make late-night calls to pest control and devise homemade traps.

“We even tried making one of our own traps with peanut butter from the dining hall,” Huprikar said.

Quincy resident Nabin Poudel ’24 wrote in an email that he originally thought the house was “rodent-resistant” after sightings were confined to the courtyard, but he later spotted a mouse in his third-floor common room in the fall.

“Over winter break, I spotted two more rodents, which were smaller, and probably rats,” Poudel wrote. “I haven’t noticed any damage so far, except the occasional surprise that we get.”

Poudel added that he has not seen any rats since the start of the

semester.

Huprikar said Quincy has been proactive in entering suites to address a problem that has become “widespread” in some parts of the house.

“They’ve been entering all the suites this entire week to just sort of assess what is going on and where the problem could be,” she said.

Though Petersen said “the house has been pretty good” about attempting to deter the mice from entering residents’ dorms, he said the problem has “definitely gotten worse” since November.

“It’s just not great to be sharing a living space with them,” Petersen said. ella.jones@thecrimson.com john.pena@thecrimson.com

8

THE HARVARD CRIMSON

NEWS

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

SEAS

SEAS Dean Search Begins SEARCHING THE SEAS. Following the impending departure of SEAS Dean Francis J. Doyle III, FAS Dean Claudine Gay officially launched the search for his successor.

BY EDONA COSOVIC AND MERT GEYIKTEPE CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

T

he search for the next dean of Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences has officially kicked off, Faculty of Arts and Sciences Dean and University President-elect Claudine Gay announced in an email to SEAS affiliates Thursday afternoon.

Gay announced a 13-member faculty advisory committee tasked with spearheading the search process. The committee will “gather community feedback” to assist Gay in assessing the candidates.

Gay also invited all SEAS members to share their thoughts and recommendations by March 10 on “the challenges and opportunities” at the School and “the most important qualities needed in the next SEAS Dean.”

Francis J. Doyle III will step down as dean of SEAS on June 30 to become Brown University’s next provost. Thursday’s announcement comes as three other Harvard deans are set to depart

their roles at the end of the academic year.

In her email, Gay praised Doyle’s contributions during his tenure.

“I’m deeply grateful to Frank for his ambitious and forward-thinking leadership of SEAS, his collaborative efforts across the University and beyond, and his energy and enthusiasm,” Gay wrote.

Gay said she is looking forward to the next chapter for the School.

“This is an exciting moment to identify a dynamic new leader for SEAS, who will build on the important successes of the past several years,” she wrote.

SEAS Dean Search Faculty Advisory Committee Stephen Chong Professor of Computer Science, Harvard College Thomas R. Eisenmann ’79 Professor of Business Administration Jennifer E. Hoffman ’00 Professor of Science Sham Kakade Professor of Computer Science, Professor of Statistics Frank N. Keutsch Professor of Engineering and Atmospheric Science, Professor of

Harvard’s Institute of Politics hosted a discussion on the legacy of Callie G. House on Thursday evening. JULIAN J. GIORDANO—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Harvard kicked off it search for the next dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. JOEY HUANG—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

Chemistry and Chemical Biology

Elie Tamer Professor of Economics

Jennifer A. Lewis Professor of Biologically Inspired Engineering, Professor of Arts and Sciences

Gu-Yeon Wei Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science

Na Li Professor of Electrical Engineering and Applied Mathematics

Sarah M. Whiting Dean of Graduate School of Design, Professor of Architecture

Vinothan N. Manoharan Professor of Chemical Engineering, Professor of Physics

Robert J. Wood Professor of Engineering and Applied Sciences

David J. Mooney Professor of Bioengineering

AND CLAIRE YUAN CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Harvey A. Silverglate, a 1967 Harvard Law School graduate who is staging an outsider campaign for election to the Harvard Board of Overseers, said he will probably not meet the signature threshold to see his name on the ballot, but pledged to continue his bid with a write-in campaign.

Silverglate is in the final days of a petition campaign to appear on this year’s ballot for the Board of Overseers, the University’s second-highest governing board. Silverglate, who is running on a platform of downsizing Harvard’s administration and upholding free speech, has 330 of 3,000 signatures needed to appear on the ballot as of Tuesday.

All Harvard alumni — except current Harvard faculty, administrators, or members of the Harvard Corporation, the University’s highest governing body — are eligible to vote to elect overseers to the 30-member body.

The Harvard Alumni Association nominating committee tapped eight candidates for the ballot this year, but candidates can also join through a petition campaign if they receive signatures from 1 percent of the number of eligible voters in last year’s election by Feb. 1. Voting in the 2023 Board of Overseers election is set to open on March 31.

This is not the first time Silverglate has run for the Board of Overseers. He managed to gather enough petition signatures to appear on the ballot in 2009, but his campaign was ultimately unsuc-

cessful.

With only a sixth of the requisite signatures, Silverglate cast blame on recent changes to the Board of Overseers electoral system for the petition campaign he expects will fall short.

“The Board of Overseers made it harder in recent years for people to get in by petition and nomination,” Silverglate said. “By making it so difficult, you tend to get people who agree on everything and who don’t understand that the modern university, especially Harvard — certainly, including Harvard — has gone off on a wrong direction.”

University spokesperson Christopher M. Hennessy declined to comment.

Since Silverglate ran in 2009, the Board of Overseers has passed several amendments to its electoral processes.

The board increased the threshold to appear on the election ballot as a petition candidate in 2016, raising the requirement from just over 200 signatures to 1 p ercent of the number of eligible

voters in the previous election.

The change represented the first major hike of the signature threshold in a century, with the first election after the 2016 reform mandating roughly 2,650 signatures to get on the ballot — more than a tenfold increase from the previous year.

Harvard announced in 2020 that it would allow only six successful petition candidates to sit on the Board of Overseers at any given time. The other 24 members must be elected from a list of candidates selected by the HAA nominating committee.

The 2020 changes were unveiled one month after three petition candidates backed by Harvard Forward won election to the board. Harvard Forward was founded in 2019 with the goal of increasing recent alumni representation and support for fossil fuel divestment among overseers.

Harvey A. Silverglate is running an outsider Board of Overseers campaign. COURTESY OF ELSA DORFMAN

BY DYLAN H. PHAN CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

edona.cosovic@thecrimson.com mert.geyiktepe@thecrimson.com

Silverglate Will Not Be on Overseers Ballot

BY MILES J. HERSZENHORN

IOP Hosts Forum on Slavery Reparations

Nathán Goldberg Crenier ’18, who co-founded Harvard Forward, said the electoral reforms show that “Harvard is joining a growing anti-democratic strain of politics.”

“They don’t like student activism, they don’t like faculty activism, they then have this avenue for alumni to express their voice, and when it’s used they say, ‘No, not like that,’” Crenier said.

Crenier said the reforms to the Board of Overseers after victories by Harvard Forward-backed candidates showed that Harvard’s “reaction to a democratic election that they did not like was to move away from democracy.”

“The administrators in University Hall right are not the heartbeat of Harvard,” Crenier added. “So the fact that the bureaucrats essentially are saying, ‘Ok, well, we disagree with what students, faculty, and alumni are saying, so we get the final call’ is, I think, a little short-sighted.”

Silverglate, who was not endorsed by Harvard Forward, said he is calling on Harvard to fire 95 percent of its administrators and reduce tuition by 40 percent.

“Even if I don’t get enough signatures to get on the ballot, and even if I don’t get enough writeins, I think I did send a message — and I’m hoping that justifies the amount of time and energy,” Silverglate said.

“But Harvard has both a leadership position and it’s also a symbol,” he added. “If we can straighten Harvard out, the rest of the country will follow.” miles.herszenhorn@thecrimson.com claire.yuan@thecrimson.com

Scholars and activists discussed reparatory justice movements for Black Americans and the legacy of reparations pioneer Callie G. House at a Harvard Institute of Politics forum on Thursday evening.

The panel, co-hosted by the IOP and the William Monroe Trotter Collaborative for Social Justice, was part of a campaign calling on President Joe Biden to issue a posthumous pardon for House, known as “the foremother” of the slavery reparations movement.

Cornell William Brooks, a Harvard Kennedy School professor, moderated the discussion, which featured University of Pennsylvania history professor Mary Frances Berry, reparations researcher Dreisen Heath, and author and folklorist A. Kirsten Mullen.

The conversation began with an overview of House’s legacy as one of the first leaders of the movement calling for reparations for formerly enslaved people and their descendants.

“I think she ought to be honored,” Berry said of House, commending “the courage she showed,” “the sacrifices that she made,” and her willingness to “put her body and soul in this movement.”

Speakers called for the implementation of a reparations plan that would end the United States’ racial wealth gap.

“I argue that any true reparations plan must eliminate the nation’s huge Black-white wealth gap,” Mullen said. “Black Americans, descendants of U.S. slavery, represent about 12 percent of the nation’s population, but possess less than 2 percent of the nation’s wealth.”

The panelists also said it was important to acknowledge the federal government’s role in “the creation and maintenance of the racial wealth gap.”

“In the 20th century, the federal government advantaged whites with the G.I. Bill — subsidies for home mortgages and building enterprises — while actively disadvantaging Blacks,”

Mullen said.

During the panel, Mullen also discussed how statistics from the Covid-19 pandemic are a consequence of systemic discrimination against Black Americans.

“Nationwide, 146,108 Blacks have died from Covid-19, a mortality rate 1.7 times that of whites,” Mullen said.

The panel talked about the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, in which a white mob attacked the Greenwood district of Tulsa, Oklahoma — an area known for its affluent Black American population.

“We’re talking about post-Reconstruction era Black wealth,” Heath said. “That’s a target for the white folks in the surrounding neighborhoods who conspired with the city, the county, the state to destroy this community.”

Heath also said many Black Americans have concerns about local harms, and she called on the U.S. government to address these harms at the federal level.

“They want a federal reparations program,” Heath said.

“They have specified specific harms within their communities perpetuated by local leaders in conjunction, maybe, with private companies.”

Mullen said the feasibility of a federal reparations program is more dependent on public willingness to create change rather than the program’s possible expense.

“We certainly know that the United States has the capacity to pay a debt of that size,” Mullen said. “The question is, do we have the will to do it?”

“In 2000, only 4 percent of white Americans thought that reparations — cash payments for Black Americans — was a good idea,” Mullen said. “Now we’re looking at a number that is slightly over 30 percent.”

Reflecting on this increase in support, Mullen expressed hope for the future of the reparations movement.

“The trend is moving in the right direction,” Mullen said. “I don’t have a crystal ball, so I don’t know if it will continue to move in the right direction, but I’m very encouraged.” dylan.phan@thecrimson.com

KAYAK TRANSFER FROM PAGE 1

Harvard Repatriates Kayak to Museum community.”

The boat has been displayed at the Alutiiq Museum since 2016, where it has been displayed on loan as a part of an exhibit on maritime technology. It originally entered the Peabody’s collection in 1869, as a gift from U.S. Army Officer Edward Fast, where it was kept in storage until conservation efforts in 2011.

Peabody Director Jane Pickering called maintaining relationships with tribal groups “fundamental” to the museum’s curatorial work.

“We are pleased, as the University considers the return of cultural items in its collections, that the kayak will remain at the Alutiiq Museum, at the heart of the community,” Pickering said

in the press release.

The Alutiiq Museum is now undergoing renovations to its facilities and hopes to have the kayak as one of its central gallery pieces.

“The kayak is one of our visitor’s favorite objects, and we plan to install it on a display about spring hunting,” Counceller said in the press release.

“Preserved in its wooden frame, lashings, and skin cover are construction techniques used by a skilled ancestral boat builder that can help us continue to learn while we honor the ancestors whose skill and essence are preserved in the vessel,” she added. jasmine.palma@thecrimson.com tess.wayland@thecrimson.com

EDITORIAL

THE HARVARD CRIMSON

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

COLUMN

STAFF EDITORIAL

SCIENCE’N TRADITION

Kenneth Roth: The One that (Almost) Got Away

The Possible Plague of John Harvard’s Foot DOES TOUCHING THE urinated-upon bronze foot bring luck or dread?

BY SANDHYA KUMAR

W

alking into Harvard Yard for the first time, my eyes immediately settled on the prominent statue of John Harvard — commonly known as the statue of three lies. An icon of Harvard’s campus since 1884, the statue draws copious admirers every year, many of them at the ready with clicking cameras.

On any given day, people line up to take a picture with John, and — advertently or inadvertently — end up rubbing his left foot in the hopes of earning good luck for themselves.

John Harvard’s foot has become a symbol of hope for tourists, whose frisky fingers have since polished the foot’s bronze cast into a gleaming gold.

Every time I have passed by the statue, I have found at least one person at John’s foot — sometimes even a few — hauling up their small children, potential incoming Harvard students, to do the honors.

Despite the cheerful backdrop, I can’t help but cringe at the millions of visitors who come to try their luck.

As a Harvard student, I know what students do at the preeminent left foot as one of the college’s three most extreme traditions: urinate on it. So does touching the urinated-upon bronze foot bring luck or dread?

In my column, I will explore Harvard’s traditions through the lens of science, highlighting the often-overlooked empirical evidence one should consider when making decisions.

As tourists and students alike, we get so caught up in the grandeur of traditions like touching John’s foot that we don’t really think of the potential health risks associated. In John’s case, the main safety concern is harmful bacteria, viruses, and other microorganisms that might accumulate on John’s foot over time, making it a fomite for disease.

NO PRICE, PERSONAL OR PECUNIARY, can approach the

value of free academic inquiry at an institution dedicated to truth-seeking

BY THE CRIMSON EDITORIAL BOARD

F

rom “godfather” of human rights to Harvard reject: After nearly three decades of holding those in power accountable as the executive director of Human Rights Watch, Kenneth Roth’s fellowship appointment at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Carr Center for Human Rights Policy was vetoed by Dean Douglas W. Elmendorf. Why? Roth alleges that this decision was punishment for HRW’s coverage of Israel during his tenure, which included accusations that Israel was committing crimes of apartheid against the Palestinian people.

Even though Elmendorf has since reversed his veto, we cannot help but be struck by the enormity of this initial failure — the unconscionable dismissal of a man who transformed human rights from a fellowship at a center that studies human rights, which nearly consigned Roth to the eternal status of being the Carr Center’s “one that got away.”

In our view, this outrageous (and outrage-inducing) decision can be understood two ways, both of which place the blame squarely on Dean Elmendorf. In one version of events, Elmendorf heard criticisms of Roth, fundamentally misunderstood who he was and what he stood for, and pressed the red button. In another, Elmendorf knew exactly what he was doing as he rebuffed the world’s leading human rights expert because he lacked the courage to weather any blowback for Roth’s positions.

Either way, we worry about what this case says about the status of academic inquiry at a

school like Harvard — one enmeshed in this nation’s headiest networks of power, where the risk of improper influence by outside actors on academic decisions may be uniquely high. This is especially true at HKS, which features strikingly close ties to government officials and the national security complex. Strolling through the annexes of 79 John F. Kennedy Street, it is not out of the ordinary to encounter a Congresswoman holding forth amid a gaggle of students or a former General with a star or four chatting it up over coffee. One can imagine without difficulty how such interpersonal proximity — not to mention the influence of the well-monied donors that support it — could create quid pro quo dynamics with which we should all be uncomfortable.

No price, personal or pecuniary, can approach the value of free academic inquiry at an institution dedicated to truth-seeking. Without exaggeration, one can say that the principles of academic freedom and free speech have made possible some of humankind’s greatest triumphs — its moon landings, its peacemakings, its Pulitzers, its democracies.

Suffice it to say, the influence of donors within our institution should never be applied to suffocate academic freedom. Our University’s leaders must have the courage to ensure that this is so.

Given everything, we ought to acknowledge that it is possible that these dynamics had the effect of curtailing academic freedom at Harvard even prior to the well-publicized case of Kenneth Roth. The reversal of Dean Elmendorf’s decision is hardly the norm when it comes to hiring decisions based on reasons immaterial to the nature of a candidate’s work in the school. If this can happen to Roth, a venerable titan within a globally-renowned field,

9

it can happen to anyone — and those without Roth’s connections or cache will be, and almost certainly have been, hard-pressed to hold the University accountable.

As we have previously argued regarding tenure, transparency is essential. While preserving appropriate standards of confidentiality in the hiring process, Harvard should take the opportunity to establish robust accountability measures regarding prominent academic placements across the University, including the incorporation of faculty committee oversight so as to insulate these decisions from any improper financial influence.

To his credit, Dean Elmendorf has agreed to bring faculty into the fellowship approval process; we expect that the University will clearly communicate the accountability structure of such a faculty committee to both our community and the public. In the same vein of transparency, we call on President Bacow to initiate an official investigation into why Dean Elmendorf rejected Roth’s fellowship and determine, among other things, whether claims of donor influence can be substantiated.

The best apology Harvard can give Roth is its improvement. We hope it will. We hope this incident will serve as an opportunity for Harvard to boldly and ambitiously double down on its commitment to academic freedom in hiring University-wide.

–This staff editorial solely represents the majority view of The Crimson Editorial Board. It is the product of discussions at regular Editorial Board meetings. In order to ensure the impartiality of our journalism, Crimson editors who choose to opine and vote at these meetings are not involved in the reporting of articles on similar topics.

OP-ED

“

As a Harvard student, I know what students do at the preeminent left foot as one of the college’s three most extreme traditions: urinate on it.

While recent studies have found bacteria in urine, that doesn’t necessarily mean infection is incoming: Researchers believe these bacteria may constitute a urinary microbiota, a normal and healthy community not unlike one’s gut.

Urine is unlikely to transmit most major diseases, with one notable exception being typhoid. Although typhoid vaccination is not required for Harvard students, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports an estimated 5,700 cases in the United States each year, most of which are thought to originate from international travel.

A potentially overlooked source of pathogenic bug exchange at John’s foot is the tourists themselves.

The constant traffic of touches creates an effective environment for such critters to proliferate. However, disease transfer through a bronze surface is rare, as the disease-causing agent would need to survive on the surface long enough to be transferred to a new individual.

Furthermore, we need to take into account the porosity of the naked bronze of his toe: Because bronze is a porous metal, any bugs deposited by tourists’ hands may sink into the surface and away from future touches, instead of finding, ironically, a foot or toe hold.

According to science, this tradition appears to be innocuous. Despite the likely layers of bodily fluid on the statue’s foot, I’d wager that touching John Harvard’s left foot is probably as safe as touching any other public surface, like doors, phones, and pedestrian buttons.

You should take similar safety precautions with the foot as you would with contact on any of those other surfaces.

Harvard’s maintenance staff already does, power-washing John like a car five or six times a year. To further rid John of pathogens, Harvard should consider periodically deep-cleaning and disinfecting the statue.

Even if we’re not sure how safe it is, people’s indulgence in this tradition is a fascinating part of Harvard’s history. Touching the foot is a way for individuals to connect with Harvard, and be a part of the University’s culture.

As for the luck derived from this act, the jury is still out. It is difficult to know whether you can really derive luck from touching any object. I’m personally not superstitious, but I’m a little stitious. A simple change in mindset can significantly impact how you view life’s challenges.

When I visited campus as a tourist, I fully believed touching John’s foot was really going to skew college admissions in my favor, giving me the subsequent boost of confidence to try to sneak into Annenberg Hall.

Although that attempt was ultimately unsuccessful, a few months later, I was accepted to the College.

So go ahead and try your luck — regardless of the verdict. But be wary of what may be lurking in the surfaces you’re interacting with, and don’t forget to sanitize afterward!

–Sandhya Kumar ’26 lives in Greenough Hall. Her column, “Science ‘n Tradition,” runs on alternate Tuesdays.

EMILY N. DIAL– CRIMSON DESIGNER

Harvard Needs a Rat Liasion

BY MERLIN A. D’SOUZA

T

hrough all the ups and downs of my two years at Harvard, from Housing Day to the Harvard-Yale Game, one constant has persisted in the background.

A small, usually brown animal, scurrying along across the street, or flattened unceremoniously on the road. An animal glorified in Ratatouille and studied in labs across our campus.

If you haven’t caught on by now: Yes, I am writing about rats.

In my most recent encounter, just a month ago, I jumped on my swivel chair as I viewed the engorged body of a rat in its attempt to enter my well-warmed bathroom. My screams resulted in the rat running back to its hiding place: my closet. My scream became a cacophony when my roommate realized what I saw, and we immediately called Yard Operations in our panicked consternation.

When we told them about the problem, they started to laugh, assuring us that someone would arrive at our dorm in five minutes. While I appreciated their responsiveness, I was confused about why they were not similarly disgusted.

Upon arrival, our Yard Ops representative was similarly confused, because he assumed it was our neighbors who had called — apparently, they also had a rat situation. He told us that rats had been slowly working their way up the dorm, reaching the third floor, a level above our own.

As I attempted to fall asleep in a room I was actively scared to stay in, with my desk lamp firmly on, I wondered how we got into this situation, and what I had done to attract these obnoxious rodents.

Cambridge is not alone in facing a rat prob-

lem; many of the surrounding residential areas are also battling an influx of rats exacerbated by the pandemic. Experts speculate that the growing suburban population, milder winters, and pandemic closures of high-producing trash areas like restaurants mean that the local rats have turned their wandering noses toward residential areas. This development has led to Cambridge creating a position of rat liaison, to serve as a point of contact between the public and Cambridge City Council for all rat-related complaints and information.

All I could think about, as I tried to fall asleep that terrifying night, is why we need a specialized rat liaison — not just the multipurpose tool of Yard Ops — here at Harvard. More than a sassy guide, we need a compassionate, human individual to guide us in our legitimate rat-inspired plight.

Although the proper methods to handle animal infestations might be obvious to students who come from New York City or rural areas, that isn’t true for everyone, making dorm-wide coordination difficult. At home in Arizona, although we have roof rats, my family easily controls our indoor rodent population because we inhabit every room in our house, leaving no crevice for stray rodents. In a community of people with different habits of food storage and trash removal like Harvard’s undergraduate dorms, it is much harder to stop the invasion.

A rat liaison could help to coordinate connecting living areas and inform each inhabitant about practices to decrease the rat population. In my own Russell Hall, if we were able to end the infestation on the first floor, or at least stop the rodents from traveling upwards, then my neighbors and I on the second floor need not have experienced this calamity.

Another aspect in which a rat liaison could be helpful is providing a guide for living with

such undesired roommates if preventative efforts are unsuccessful; I know I would have appreciated a crash course in how to live with rats. The week before the break, when I had to deal with the rats, I slept with most of my head covered, scared that I would wake up to a furry face close to my own. My sleep was rocky, culminating with a dream in which the Transportation Security Administration detained me for transporting animals domestically because they found a dorm rat in my luggage.

I know this sounds ridiculous, but it’s ridiculous to have to coexist with an extra roommate that does not pay rent.

Rodents such as rats can carry diseases like hantavirus, rat bite fever, or lymphocytic choriomeningitis, which are all transmittable to humans. During finals week, it would have been nice to have a good night’s rest and be able to turn my lamp off, or even just to have someone at which to vent about infestations.

If my life imitated art, this would be the point where I have a change of heart. I would let go of my disgust and fear of the rat living in my dorm. Slowly we would become friends, and my dorm rat would inform me that they are cousins with Remy from Ratatouille. They would turn out to be a pastry chef and produce culinary delights, and slowly my rat would replace Harvard University Dining Service with a Pâtisserie.

But unfortunately, my life does not imitate this particular arc of Ratatouille. While my current dorm in Adams House will be renovated soon, I know my troubles will not end here. With a liaison, I could dream of pastries instead of rats — once I slow down my heart to an acceptable pace.

–Merlin A. D’souza ’25, a Crimson Editorial editor, is a Human Developmental and Regenerative Biology concentrator in Adams House.

10

THE HARVARD CRIMSON

EDITORIAL

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

OP-ED

COURTESY OF KELISHA M. WILLIAMS

BFFR

BLACK HISTORY MONTH

BY KELISHA M. WILLIAMS

B

e f-cking for real, says the small white girl with beach blonde hair and dressed head to toe in bright pink preppy clothes. “Be f-cking for real,” the newest phrase meaning “be serious,” or in response to something so incredulous it cannot be real.

Yes, “be f-cking for real” is correct. But not in the way she probably means it.

The phrase, originating from a Black woman, has now been adopted and popularized by white creators in America. There is nothing new about this phenomenon — dominant populations have co-opted minority culture, ideas, and innovation for their own use throughout recorded history — and this theft will, in all likelihood, continue to occur unless something changes.

However, this seeming inevitability should not discourage marginalized communities from fighting back, and being vigilant in protecting their intellectual property.

Perhaps the word “theft” is too strong. A more accurate term would be “borrowed,” because white creators frequently take ideas and phrases from minority communities, only to discard them and move on to the next trend. “Borrowed,” because once they get tired of playing with our culture, they throw it

onto the floor, like a doll that has exhausted its temporary lifetime, and play with their other toys. All the while we, the ones who created the ideas in the first place, lie battered and used on the floor, unwanted and unseen.

African-American Vernacular English — the unique grammar, vocabulary, and accents used in Black communities — is not the only aspect of our culture that has been borrowed by white American society. The pattern extends to fashion trends as well. For example, in recent years, the aesthetic of wearing a slick bun with chunky gold hoops, which originated from Latina and Black women, has resurged into mainstream media but has been rebranded as the “clean girl” aesthetic by white women.

Another example is the trend of “Brownie glazed lips,” popularized by celebrities such as Hailey Bieber. Where this trend originated, however, goes unacknowledged by Bieber when describing a style that was seen predominantly in Black and Latina cultures throughout the 1990s. This “revamp” of Black and Latina culture, which includes the use of other “borrowed” phrases by white TikTok creators, not only erases the cultural significance of these trends but also perpetuates the marginalization of those communities.

We’re told that it’s not inherently harmful to us that these trends are being borrowed. But as Black

and brown women around the world have shared tidbits of knowledge from their cultures, the tremendous oversaturation of consumer culture has made it more difficult for the people for whom the products were originally intended to acquire them.

For instance, Mielle Organics Rosemary Mint Scalp & Hair Oil, a version of a product used in Black and brown cultures for generations, has found its way into white women’s hearts recently due to a video posted by the famous white TikToker Alix Earle. The problem with this recommendation is not the product itself, but that the over-purchase of this oil, designed mainly for curlier hair, in stores across America has caused the product to go scarce.

To be clear, we as Black and brown women are not trying to harm white women, or imply that they do not deserve to thicken their hair, as the oil claims that it can help them do. Instead, the issue is that since hair care companies often appear to prioritize white women, their Black and brown counterparts have less accessibility to hair care products, thus highlighting the disparities between us.

Additionally, and worryingly, some Black hair companies have in the past allegedly abandoned formulas created especially for Black hair in favor of reworking their products to appeal to a white audience, strengthening the market dominance of white women. The contagious effects of this market power lead to panic among marginalized groups to stock

up on things before formulas change, which exacerbates the problem of product scarcity. The overarching domino effect set off by a single video is what minority creators have been trying to spotlight, to little avail.

The perspectives of oppressed populations must be sought out and amplified in order to remedy this problem while addressing white influencers’ liability for their behavior. White influencers should make an effort to learn about the cultural relevance of the trends they are supporting, seek out and work with creators from underrepresented groups, and utilize their influence to advance representation and equity in their fields. It is crucial that society as a whole amplifies the voices of marginalized communities within the fashion and beauty industries, for the purpose of providing fair representation, resources, and opportunities.

It isn’t difficult to solicit the perspective of the people whose culture is being appropriated before promoting a product or homogenizing a new phrase. And to those that tell us that that’s too much to ask, I say…

Be f-cking for real.

–Kelisha M. Williams ’25, a Crimson Editorial editor, is a Psychology concentrator in Kirkland House.

This piece is a part of a focus on Black authors and experiences for Black History Month.

STAFF EDITORIAL

The (Mis)Education of ChatGPT AI CAN BE CHANNELED towards greater human flourishing without compromising the holistic cultivation of students as thinkers.

BY THE CRIMSON EDITORIAL BOARD

­A

s school districts across the country rush to ban ChatGPT, a free-to-use AI chatbot developed by OpenAI, other education stakeholders including Salman Khan, founder of the well-known free internet learning platform Khan Academy, have expressed concerns regarding such blanket bans.

Speaking at a webinar at the Graduate School of Education, Khan said that banning ChatGPT completely is the “wrong approach,” calling it “transformative” for the future of education. We agree with Khan to the extent that a blanket ban on ChatGPT does not suffice.

As a board, we are organized around and greatly cherish the principles of deep engagement, critical thinking, discourse, and writing — principles whose importance is seriously threatened by the development of AI. At first glance, ChatGPT mimics these virtues. It often writes well, can generate a logical analytical essay faster than a human can title their Word document and even crack jokes. However, the writing and pseudo-thinking that ChatGPT does, even when

the product is nearly identical to human handiwork, loses something essential.

Writing is more than arranging words on the page in order to convey information. Writing is the physical manifestation of human thought — everso essential to critical thinking and intellectual discovery. It is an arena in which vague, embryonic notions transform into precise, developed ideas through bursts of prosaic creativity. The process of writing is just as important as the end result, as many of the ideas that enrich our work are only developed through the mundane endeavor of articulation.

If we outsource to ChatGPT, we won’t simply be shipping away the busy work like pulling quotes and smoothing out paragraph transitions — we will also be mutilating our own generative abilities and atrophying our creative muscles, contrary to the skill augmenting case often made for ChatGPT. Our second area of concern, although not unrelated to the first, has to do with the current lack of response from the Harvard administration regarding this technological development. Right now, ChatGPT appears relatively innocuous — a source of novel meme content or a headache for instructors, at most.

But given Moore’s law, which posits that computing power will double every two years, we can only assume that the speed and capability of AI applications will increase in the coming years — and one thing that we can be sure of right now is that Har-

vard, having released no College-wide policy on AI in the classroom, appears to be woefully unprepared.

The age of AI is upon us; we have no time to lose.

Harvard should begin an intense evaluation of the manifold ways in which the development of AI can be channeled towards greater human flourishing without compromising the holistic cultivation of students as thinkers.

On a pedagogical level, Harvard must immediately establish a working group on the role of AI tools in pedagogy, with an eye towards the implementation of methods like long-term projects, inclass work and discussions that are relatively insulated from AI tools and can be can be applied to all educational levels from elementary to graduate school. Moreover, finding domains in which AI can offer genuine skill augmentation without shortchanging users of learning will be important as further applications are developed.

Harvard should also fund development of more robust tools to detect the residual “fingerprints” left by the use of AI tools so that instructors may implement individual classroom policies that, while respecting a University-wide policy of not outright banning AI tools, are ultimately commensurate with the nature and goals of their respective courses.

As we have previously argued, the prospect of Artificial General Intelligence whose values do not align with that of humans may represent an exis-

tential risk to humanity. AI development as a field is not immune to the profit incentivizing nature of corporate America, which may compel companies to roll out AI products as fast as they can without thoroughly considering potential consequences.

There is still limited understanding of the intricacies of how AI models make decisions, and as such, AI research should advance with precaution and the highest standards of ethics. Funding for such research should be independent and not exclusively stem from donors with pecuniary incentives related to the success of AI products.

To many of us, AI still remains a nebulous concept, and mis-education regarding its future abounds. Nonetheless, we are confident that a blanket ban on ChatGPT would not advance education at Harvard. Schools that are too trigger-happy with bans on AI will run the risk of placing their students at a serious educational and competitive disadvantage, particularly relative to other countries that may be more receptive to AI than our own. Education must prepare young people for the future — and the future seems to involve a great deal of ChatGPT.

–This staff editorial solely represents the majority view of The Crimson Editorial Board. It is the product of discussions at regular Editorial Board meetings. In order to ensure the impartiality of our journalism, Crimson editors who choose to opine and vote at these meetings are not involved in the reporting of articles on similar topics.

METRO

THE HARVARD CRIMSON FEBRUARY 3, 2023

CAMBRIDGE EDUCATION

City Discusses School Equity Audit EQUITY AUDIT. The Cambridge City Council and Cambridge School Committee discussed plans for an “equity audit” by a Harvard-affiliated consulting group on Monday.

BY JINA H. CHOE SALLY E. EDWARDS AND AYUMI NAGATOMI CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

T

he Cambridge City Council and Cambridge School Committee discussed plans for an “equity audit” by a Harvard-affiliated consulting group at a joint budget meeting Monday.

Councilors and committee members detailed an impending two-year assessment of its budgeting process by Thrive! — a consulting group incubated in Harvard Innovation Labs — as well as other plans for the future of the district and its 2024 budget at the

relationship to best understand their practices and obtain points from their perspective,” Fatiregun said.

The meeting also explored the city’s other educational initiatives, including those to support increased math and literacy proficiency and a universal preschool system.

City Manager Yi-An Huang ’05 outlined a long-term implementation process for the city’s proposed universal preschool initiative. Huang said universal preschool would have a “pretty significant impact on the budget,” and may be more feasible in fiscal year 2025, but that the city can “create a bit of a ramp” by beginning to plan in this year’s budget.

“There’s a lot of planning that needs to happen before universal pre-K happens,” he said.

Victoria L. Greer, superintendent at Cambridge Public Schools, discussed the district plan for the next three years, outlining the School Committee’s

2024 focus on the areas of college and career experiences, universal preschool, self-evaluation systems, and professional learning.

“It was extremely important to our School Committee and our administration that we not only have realistic goals but also aspirational targets,” Greer said.

The School Committee began planning and analyzing the next year’s budget during the fall, before developing the proposed budget early this year. The budget will undergo review by the School Committee between mid-March and early April. Once adopted, the budget will be submitted to the city manager and City Council for final approval and adoption into the city budget.

During Monday’s meeting, the committee discussed the goal of increasing literacy and math proficiency to 100 percent of grade-level expectations by 2025.

Greer said the committee hopes to allocate a portion of the budget to a “pretty comprehensive plan

for not only strategic tutoring but also targeted tutoring.”

Spinner said the budgeting process prioritized collaboration with students and their families.

She added that the district held four community meetings and offered multilingual materials on the budget process throughout last year, as well as conducting a survey of families in the district earlier this month.

“As part of our overall budget planning process, we do have a fairly robust community engagement process,” Spinner said.

The School Committee will host an additional meeting with students to discuss the budget for the upcoming fiscal year Tuesday morning at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School. The final budget proposal will be presented by Greer to the School Committee on March 14. jina.choe@thecrimson.com sally.edwards@thecrimson.com ayumi.nagatomi@thecrimson.com

Protesters hold up signs calling for justice after the deaths of Sayed Faisal and Tyre Nichols.

Both were killed this month by police. CAM E. KETTLES—CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Demonstrators March to Cambridge Police Station to Demand Accountability for Killing of Sayed Faisal AND YUSUF S. MIAN CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

Hundreds of activists and Cambridge residents gathered Sunday for a rally at Somerville High School and a march to the Cambridge Police Department headquarters to protest the police killing of Sayed Faisal earlier this month.

The fatal shooting of Faisal — who was a 20-year-old student at the University of Massachusetts Boston — by Cambridge Police on Jan. 4 has sparked outrage, including several rallies, a tense community meeting, and the storming of a recent City Council meeting by protesters. The killing is currently under investigation by the Middlesex County District Attorney’s office.

The demonstration began at Somerville High School, where Faisal graduated in 2020, with protesters chanting “Justice for Faisal,” listening to speeches from organizers, and singing “We

Nightclub Reopens After Two Decades

BY SIDNEY K. LEE

virtual meeting Monday evening.

The School Committee is set to partner with the Cambridge Community Foundation to implement the audit of the district’s budgeting practices beginning in 2024.

“There is a consultant group — Thrive! — which will be conducting an assessment of our expenditures and policies with the purpose of exploring how our budget process and resource allocation aligns to equity and success for students,” said Claire B. Spinner, Chief Financial Officer for CPS. Thrive! — founded by Omolara O. Fatiregun ’00 — will use its academic research on investments in equity to compare and assess the district’s performance.

Fatiregun said in Monday’s meeting that the group’s work is most effective when conducted in partnership with school officials.

“It was most important to get school board, the district really partnering with us through a

Protesters marched to Cambridge Police headquarters after the fatal shooting of student Sayed Faisal by a CPD officer on Jan. 4. JULIAN J. GIORDANO—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

BY CAM E. KETTLES

11

Shall Not Be Moved.” Protesters then participated in a nearly twomile march to the CPD police station, where organizers delivered a set of demands to city officials.

The demands — addressed to Cambridge Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui, City Manager Yi-An Huang ’05, and Police Commissioner Christine A. Elow — included calls to release the names of the officers involved in Faisal’s death, and terminate and prosecute them. Protesters also demanded police demilitarization, funding for an alternative emergency response team, and reallocation of police funding towards community safety initiatives.

The names of the officers involved as well as the unredacted police report will be released following the completion of the district attorney’s investigation.

Matthew Kennedy, an organizer with the Party for Socialism and Liberation, said that he was “heartbroken” and “angry” after the killing of Faisal.

“A murder like this can’t happen again,” he said. “Cambridge

needs to fully fund an alternative emergency response program separate from the police department.”

After delivering demands to the police department, organizers entered the station and asked to speak to Elow.

“

“We need for them to be fired immediately.

We need for them to be in jail – not tomorrow, not next week, not in February 2024.”

Suhail P. Purkar Organizer, Party for Socialism and Liberation

“They’re calling to see if Police Commissioner Christine Elow is here and if she’s brave enough to actually face her own community,” said Party for Socialism and Liberation organizer Suhail P. Purkar.

While Elow did not address protesters, the organizers left written demands at the station with the hope that they are delivered to Elow.

CPD spokesperson Jeremy C. Warnick wrote in an emailed statement that the department “will always support residents exercising their 1st amendment right to peacefully protest, demand action, and results.” Warnick added that CPD filed a report after the protest alleging that demonstrators “tagged” a memorial honoring fallen officers.

Several of Faisal’s teachers from his time at Somerville High School were present at the rally.

Maria Khwaja, who taught Faisal his senior year, said that he was “so full of this beautiful, gentle light.”

“It’s my job to save these lives.

That’s my job. Not kill them,” she added. “They’re not threatening.

Even if they were threatening — I’ve never found a child threatening — but even if they were, it’s still my job to save them.”

Sara Halawa, an organizer

with Safe Schools Somerville, also talked about Faisal’s involvement as a student at Somerville High School.

“He immediately got involved in every community organization that we have set up for immigrant youth,” Halawa said.

“This was someone who worked hard, who participated in the community,” she added. “This should not have happened.”

Some protesters also referred to the recent killing of Tyre Nichols by Memphis Police earlier this month, noting that the investigation moved faster than in Faisal’s case. The five officers involved in Nichols’ killing have been terminated by the department and charged with second-degree murder.

“That’s exactly what we need,” Purkar said. “We need for them to be fired immediately. We need for them to be in jail — not tomorrow, not next week, not in February 2024. Right now.” cam.kettles@thecrimson.com yusuf.mian@thecrimson.com

CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Beloved Cambridge nightclub ManRay reopened to partygoers last Wednesday, almost 20 years after it shut down.

Located on 40 Prospect St. in Central Square, the alternative nightclub serves as a self-avowed sanctuary for counterculture groups, goths, LGBTQ+ people, and more. Its new space boasts a brand new dance floor, as well as lighting and sound systems.

In its early days, ManRay functioned as an underground club with “artsy intentions,” according to Chris Ewen, former resident DJ. “We catered to different crowds of people on different nights, and it evolved through time and it became a home for LGBTQ+ people and fetish underground,” Ewen said.

“We became a home for lots of really cool subcultures,” he added.

Inclusivity formed a central component of ManRay’s original purpose, according to Ewen.

“It was understood that you would find like-minded people and you wouldn’t be harassed while you were there,” he added.

Despite closing its doors in 2005, ManRay’s loyal patrons didn’t disappear. According to hostess and promoter Xtine Santackas, ManRay would host Twitch and Zoom parties throughout the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns.

“It was part of the feeling of memory that we certainly weren’t going to let go of,” Santackas said.

“We did our best to nurture that even though the doors were shut.”

In 2021, ManRay took over ImprovBoston’s former space in Central Square.

Reopening during a global pandemic, however, was no small feat, Ewen said.

Contractor difficulties and supply chain shortages were just some of the issues the nightclub faced, according to Santackas.

“It was a nightmare,” bartender Terri Niedzwiecki added.

When ManRay reopened its doors earlier this month, however, “the cheer could be heard from Central Square to Porter Square,” Santackas said.

“It’s a really strong community that goes there,” Niedzwiecki said, “And opening night, it was like all everyone kept saying was, ‘I’m home now.’”

In the future, ManRay plans on working with a rotation of artists, go-go dancers, and new DJ’s, hoping to make their mark on the alternative scene, according to Santackas.

ManRay intends to keep its original vibe, but bring in “different perspectives on what nightlife is today and try to keep it fresh and exciting,” Ewen said.

Ewen added he believes spaces dedicated to subculture groups and marginalized identities are still as vital as they were in 2005.

“It would be nice to think that you can be a trans person or a drag queen, or just wear all black, and go into a space and not be looked at funny,” Ewen said.

“There still needs to be viable and safe spaces,” he added. sidney.lee@thecrimson.com

WakuWaku Ramen and Sake Walks Into Harvard Square Location

BY CAROLINE K. HSU AND SIDNEY K. LEE CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

WakuWaku Ramen & Sake celebrated its grand opening yesterday in an event featuring live music from a DJ and futuristic decor.

Located on 33 Brattle St., the Harvard Square location launched in a soft opening last Tuesday and is the second WakuWaku ramen establishment ever built. The first WakuWaku restaurant opened in the spring of 2021 in Boston’s Chinatown neighborhood.

Along with a diverse selection of ramen and sake, the restaurant’s offerings include shaved ice, specialty salads, and chicken karaage.

On opening night, customers entered through the restaurant’s black curtains before being transported to what they called a “unique” and “cyberpunk” space adorned with neon lights. Local resident Efim Karlson wrote in a statement that it “felt like a fullsize celebration” and that the food was “phenomenal.”

Classic electronic dance music hits played before DJ Tao, a Boston-based entertainer, took the stage later in the evening.

With a DJ setup on the second floor, Dixon Leung, operating partner in charge of Harvard Square’s WakuWaku, said that the restaurant has plans to host a DJ around two times a week.

“We are trying to provide a different vibe,” Leung said. “Younger, more futuristic, more night-

life-y — all mixed together.”

Leung said that Harvard Square was the ideal location to expand the restaurant chain because of its busy “college and tourist area.”

The Harvard Square location features a slightly different menu from the WakuWaku in Chinatown. Exclusive to the Harvard Square location is WakuWaku’s Lobster ramen, which Leung described as a “must-try.”

Jiaqi Zhu, a server at WakuWaku, said her favorite part of the job is the food. She particularly enjoys the restaurant’s gyudon, a Japanese beef rice bowl.

Hannah Tam, a research assistant at Harvard’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and a customer on the day after opening night, described the food as

“not stellar, but okay.”

The restaurant felt like a nightclub but “in a weird way, because it’s 6 p.m.,” per Tam. Leung said WakuWaku’s ramen is prepared in a “different” way from other ramen locations in the Square. The chicken and pork broth are boiled for 16 hours, without the use of MSG. WakuWaku is also the only ramen shop in the Square which stays open until midnight.

When asked about his goals for the new restaurant, Leung said he hopes to “attract more people to hang out at WakuWaku, instead of just eating and going.”

Leung shared that the chain is looking at opening new locations in Central Square, Quincy, and potentially Allston.

The WakuWaku Ramen web-

WakuWaku Ramen opened a new store in Harvard Square this week at 33 Brattle St. SANTIAGO A. SALDIVAR—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

site mentions plans to build a chain of 500 locations in the United States in the next decade.

caroline.hsu@thecrimson.com sidney.lee@thecrimson.com

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THE HARVARD CRIMSON

ARTS

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

COMEDIAN and writer Karen “Big Dog” Chee has cracked the code on combining comedy with kindness, making people smile by prioritizing the silly parts of life.

BY STELLA A. GILBERT CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

K

aren Chee ’17 is a comedic “big dog”—or at least that’s what her coworkers call her. But what did she do to earn such a noble title?

“Oh I gave myself that nickname,” said Chee in an interview with The Harvard Crimson. “They had written my phone number down incorrectly on a contact sheet at work so when I went to correct it, I asked them to please also write my name as Karen ‘Big Dog’ Chee.”

Now, when Chee goes to work as a writer at “Late Night with Seth Meyers,” her coworkers refer to her as “Big Dog,” though anyone who has spent any time talking to kind and mild-mannered Chee knows this intimidating name to be inapt. She describes herself as “a bit of a square,” recalling a daily to-do list that consisted solely of making chocolate chip pancakes, finishing a book, and doing a puzzle.

Regardless, the name has stuck with the “Late Night” staff. Chee’s default Zoom username is now a perfectly imperfect description: “Big Dog (she/her/hers).”

Chee—former Quincy House resident, dedicated alum of the Harvard comedy scene, and one of the Harvard Class of 2017’s Fifteen Most Interesting Seniors— now works on a variety of projects as a comedian, writer, and actor. Besides writing for “Late Night with Seth Meyers,” she is also developing a movie, writing for the TV series “Pachinko,” and working on a book along with other assorted projects while regularly performing stand-up comedy in New York.

When asked about her experience working for Seth Meyers—a man with a demeanor that she compares to “that friendly neighborhood dad who coaches the local soccer team”—Chee smiled.

“It’s great. Genuinely I am a big Seth Meyers fan outside of work,” said Chee. “But I don’t need to say that, we don’t want his ego to explode,” she added after a moment of reflection.

Beyond writing for “Late Night,” Chee also has her own re-

CULTURE

Artist Profile: Comedian Karen ‘Big Dog’ Chee COURTESY OF BRIDGET BADORE

curring segment on the show entitled “What Does Karen Know?”

Created by fellow writer Matt Goldich, the segment pokes fun at Chee’s young age, as she joined the writing team at only 23 years old.

“I’d write a joke about SpongeBob or Neopets and everybody at work would say ‘Karen, no one will get this, it sounds like a lie,’” said Chee, shaking her head.

“That shocked me to my core.” In her new non-scripted segment,

Meyers presents Chee with a variety of iconic cultural touchstones from his generation, and she attempts—often unsuccessfully— to guess what each of them are from her millennial frame of reference.

“The segment was really nerve wracking for me because I had to hopefully be funny enough without getting to prepare in any way,” said Chee, recalling her first time on air for the live segment. “But then once I was up there I realized

I’m just with Seth, who is one of the funniest people in the world, and it just felt like hanging out.

While also being filmed.”

Despite being significantly younger than many of her fellow writers, Chee expressed a thoughtful appreciation for the support she received when she joined the “Late Night” staff, especially as a young woman of color.

“There’s a generation or two above me that genuinely felt really uncomfortable when they first

joined the comedy scene so now when they see somebody like me looking very lost, they’re like, ‘we’re gonna be there for Karen!’” said Chee, grinning.

In her time at Harvard, Chee was her own force of inclusivity in the comedy scene, taking part in the Immediate Gratification Players improv group, Satire V humor publication, and On Harvard Time comedy news show.

“The comedy community when I got to Harvard was ex-

tremely white,” said Chee. Despite befriending a diverse group of people, Chee couldn’t shake the feeling that the school was “built for wealthy white boys to have a good time.” However, this sentiment didn’t stop her from uplifting other people of color, all while still pursuing her passion for comedy.

“My friend and I put on a show where we tried to get every comedian who wasn’t a straight white dude to perform,” Chee said.“That was a really nice moment, just knowing that there were a lot of us. And we were all in the same room laughing together.”

Slowly Chee grew comfortable in Harvard spaces, even ones “where all the paintings were white people, and in the very old libraries that didn’t have women’s bathrooms on the floor,” she recalled. By the time Chee graduated, she left behind a more empowered Harvard comedy scene in her wake.

“It kind of felt like I defeated the final boss of white people,” said Chee, smiling.

Since graduation, Chee has continued developing her craft, attributing her comedic voice to a variety of inspirations—from her own mother and grandfather to British comedian Bob Mortimer, and even DW from PBS’s ‘Arthur,’ who she called her personal idol.

The result of this wholesome blend of comedic influences is Chee’s uniquely positive voice. Although she used to write a lot of political satire, Chee has recently settled into a particular brand of silliness she referred to as “Gooftown, U.S.A.” “I just want to be a big goofball and say funny, silly, random things,” said Chee. “Things that aren’t coming from a place of weight, just a place of lightness.”

Chee wielded this type of lighthearted comedy during the pandemic as well. While she was quarantined in Korea with family, her grandmother had to spend some time in the hospital.

“I remember thinking very clearly: ‘My job right now in Korea is Morale Team Captain,’” said Chee, recalling how she tried to be “gently funny” throughout that time. “Once Grandma and I were so giggly that the nurses came in and asked us what was going on because we sounded like we were having so much fun!”

Karen “Big Dog” Chee has cracked the code on combining comedy with kindness, making people smile by prioritizing the silly parts of life. For that, she’s certainly lived up to her noble title. stella.gilbert@thecrimson.com

Artist Profile: Stove God Cooks is Poised for the Limelight

BY RYAN S. KIM CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Syracuse rapper Stove God Cooks is one of the most distinctive and exciting artists to emerge from the Northeast hip-hop underground in decades. Cooks’s calling card is his melodic approach to boom-bap, combining ’90s-style with sonic elements from gospel and soul. First entering the scene around 2015 as a rookie protégé of Busta Rhymes, Cooks spent several years developing his chops with the East Flatbush legend. Cooks’s 2020 debut album “Reasonable Drought” — which was produced by New York City-based rapper-producer Roc Marciano — caught the ear of Griselda Records president Westside Gunn and established the Syracuse rapper as a notable up-and-comer.

Now a signee with GxFR/ Babygrande Records, Cooks has matured into the rap equivalent of a veteran five-tool player; appearing on nearly every 2022 release from the Buffalo-based Griselda camp to provide sung melodies, spoken hooks, and guest rap verses.

“We push each other. I’m rapping with the most elite in this shit right now,” Cooks said in a phone interview with The Harvard Crimson. “Just to be included in the conversation and that I can stay afloat with some of the best doing it, I’m good with that.”

With his forthcoming debut album under Griselda scheduled to release this year, Cooks is poised to push his singular hardedged style further into the mainstream of modern rap.

“It’s curated by Westside Gunn,” Cooks said. “We’re gonna give you another classic. We’re gonna keep pushing the culture forward. I’m going to keep talking the shit I talk and giving the fans these melodies.”

“This one is gonna be like ‘Reasonable Drought’ on steroids,” the rapper added.

In Syracuse, Cooks grew up surrounded by music. He spent his youth in his grandfather’s church and taught gospel choir music by his mother. His older brother showed him how to rap and educated him on Golden Era hip-hop titans like Nas, AZ, the late Half A Mill, and the late Big Pun. As Cooks got older, the rapper found himself gravitating towards artists like Puff Daddy and The LOX. “For me The LOX, Mase, Big, were all really lyrical,” the rapper said. “How Puff was doing it then was exactly what I came from: gospel mixed with the streets.”

A young Stove God Cooks had dreams of becoming a star like his Golden Era heroes. However, he faced the disadvantage of coming from Syracuse, a place that is not particularly known for its music.

“There was no one to look up to and say, ‘Oh, yeah, we can do that.’ It’s not like being outside in Brooklyn, like, ‘Oh ya, Biggie from here. HOV from here.’ There was nothing like that in Syracuse.”

In 2015, the rapper garnered his first major recognition outside of his hometown. Busta Rhymes offered to sign the Syracuse artist after hearing some of Cooks’s music on Twitter. It was actually Busta’s close friend and collaborator Lord Jamar that had initially found Stove God Cooks

online.

“My people were telling me, ‘You need to put [songs] on Twitter. I’ve never been an internet or social media person. It was really them pushing me like, ‘Put this shit on there and the right person might hear it.’”

Beginning in 2015, Cooks locked in with Busta Rhymes, absorbing the Flatbush legend’s creative process and learning about the business side of the music industry.

“Buss is a fucking genius,” Cooks said. “I’m talking every night for like three years from 7 p.m. to 4 a.m. Every night. Buss don’t take days off. To be in the game for that long and still be that dedicated just blew my fucking mind.”

It was through his mentor Busta Rhymes that Cooks was introduced to one of his closest collaborators, legendary NYC rapper-producer Roc Marciano.

Marciano had also begun his career with Busta Rhymes, first joining Busta’s Flipmode Squad back in 2000. Cooks first became acquainted with Marciano after the rapper-producer respectfully declined to contribute vocals to a Flipmode reunion album that Busta was organizing. According to Cooks, Marciano made the decision in order to stay true to the new sound he had pioneered since stepping away from Flipmode.

“I understood it, honestly,” Cooks said. “I understood that he kept his sound raw while everybody gave up on it. While everybody chased the South. While everybody chased Houston.

Whatever they was chasing, he stayed true to that real New York

sound.”

Around 2019, Cooks felt like he still had something to prove to his peers and him and Marciano bonded over that. They quietly began work on a collaborative album that would become “Reasonable Drought.”

“I knew if I brought them into my world. I knew they would understand. If they could live with it, I knew it was over. He knew if he got the right person to get on his beats. He could prove what he wanted to prove with his production.”

Released in March 2020, the album also marked the debut of the Stove God Cooks name, a decision that, according to the Syracuse rapper, came about as a result of his personal satisfaction with the music.

“Once the project started coming together, it just felt like this was me for real. Like I said, ‘If I bring them into my world, it’s over.’ I’m really gonna bring you into the kitchen and this shit gonna feel like a conversation with me and my n****s while we cooking. And I’m God. The God of the Stove.”

With “Reasonable Drought,” Cooks and Marciano delivered on their goal. Blogs, fellow rappers, and industry executives alike quickly identified “Reasonable Drought” as one of the best rap LPs of 2020. The buzz from the project led Westside Gunn to contact Cooks directly.

“West reached out to me for “Awesome God.” These were his exact words: ‘I got three joints.

You got a classic album, but nobody knows. You do these three joints and they’re gonna go back to your album and give it the re-

COURTESY OF RAMON “1000WORD$” LAZO

spect it deserves.’”

Since his three song guest appearance on Gunn’s July 2020 album “Flygod is an Awesome God 2,” Cooks has recorded over 20 guest verses for numerous releases. In the process, he has become one of the most highly sought-after feature artists in the game.

Cooks features prominently on Gunn’s highly-anticipated album “10,” released in October 2022.

The project’s eighth track “Science Class” hears the Syracuse rapper match wits with a guestlist including Busta Rhymes, Raekwon, and Ghostface Killah.

Yet despite all his success, Cooks remains humble, sharing that he does not think of himself as being famous. Last November, the Syracuse rapper attended a Celtics game with Westside Gunn and Ramon ‘1000WORD$’ Lazo, eliciting cheers from players and fans alike. Such a greeting made Cooks feel like he has officially made it as an artist.

“There’s only been a handful of moments where I felt like a real rapper. That was one of them,” Cooks said. ryan.kim@thecrimson.com

ARTS

THE HARVARD CRIMSON FEBRUARY 3, 2023

13

FILM

Damien Chazelle on ‘Babylon,’ Harvard THE CRIMSON interviewed Damien Chazelle ’07 ahead of the release of “Babylon,” discussing his sources of inspiration.

BY HARPER R. ORECK AND JADEN S. THOMPSON CRIMSON STAFF WRITERS

T

hroughout his career, director Damien Chazelle ’07 has distinguished himself as an adept chronicler of the creative process, weaving intricate portraits of artistic projects great and small. His breakout second feature, “Whiplash,” tracked a young drummer’s feverish obsession with his craft with heart-stopping urgency, bringing basement practice sessions and bombastic performances to life onscreen. Chazelle later won an Oscar for his next film “La La Land,” which told the story of two young performers struggling to make it in Hollywood’s cutthroat film and music industries, painting the city and its creative cultures in vibrant detail. Chazelle has spent the last several years unraveling a new epic of artistic discovery with his fourth film, “Babylon,” released in Dec. 2022.

Years before he became the youngest person to win the Academy Award for Best Director, Chazelle was living in Currier House at Harvard College, alongside his friend and artistic collaborator Justin Hurwitz ’08, who has composed the scores for all of his films. The two have most recently collaborated on “Babylon,” a sprawling tragicomedy about the end of Hollywood’s silent era.

The Harvard Crimson interviewed Damien Chazelle ahead of the release of “Babylon,” discussing his inspiration for the story as well as his experience studying film at Harvard.

In both “Whiplash” and “La La Land,” Chazelle explored the lives of artists and the difficult, often unforgiving industries they navigate. Chazelle has never shied away from showcasing the harsh realities of the music or film industries; from the abuse jazz drummer Andrew endures from his teacher in “Whiplash,” to the constant rejection faced by aspiring actress Mia in “La La Land.”

“Babylon,” however, exposes an even grittier, darker, dirtier side of Hollywood; a wide cast of characters gets caught up in the corruption and excess of the 1920s and ’30s, including silent era star Jack Conrad (Brad Pitt), rising star Nellie LaRoy (Margot Robbie), jazz trumpeter Sidney Palmer (Jovan Adepo), and assistant-turned-studio exec Manny Torres (Diego Calva).

Chazelle, who also wrote the

script for “Babylon,” discussed his vision for the film; he spoke of the dissonance between the art of filmmaking and the industry that surrounds it.

“Whereas ‘La La Land,’ for instance, was almost purely an affectionate love letter, here I wanted to put a spotlight on the more sordid qualities of Hollywood and Hollywood history, and the darker underbelly that Hollywood is often adept at sweeping under the rug,” he said.

The story that unfolds in “Babylon” revels and reels at the drug-fueled, sex-saturated chaos of early Hollywood, showing how newcomers Nellie and Manny are inducted into the wild parties and dysfunctional showbiz scene of early twentieth-century Los Angeles. In this world, movie sets aren’t scenes of serene collaboration—instead they are barely workable, bogged down by logistical nightmares, drunken actors, manipulative businessmen, and the rapidly-changing demands of the film ecosystem. However, Chazelle didn’t want to focus solely on the depravity of Hollywood—he also worked to highlight the duality of the industry.

“If you’re trying to tell a panoramic story, a big story about Hollywood and its origins, you kind of have to include both high and low, beautiful and ugly. Because I think [what] makes Hollywood so fascinating is that the two coexist, sometimes even in the same frame,” he said. “You know, to only condemn Hollywood, or only celebrate it, I think, is to miss a big part of the picture.”

In ambitious, gripping, and sensory-rich sequences, Chazelle illustrates how movie magic arises from the ashes of chaotic productions. In one standout scene, Manny gets his first on-set gig assisting Jack on the set of a giant war epic, where the hectic dysfunction of the set makes it seem like the day will end in disaster— until, at the last moment, Manny salvages the shoot, enabling a cinematic marvel that belies the behind-the-scenes drama.

“There’s a mercilessness to it, but there’s also of course this tremendous beauty to it as well, and, to the work that Hollywood has created, and to my mind the entire lineage of Hollywood history,” Chazelle said.

Chazelle’s vision of early Hollywood unfolds on the backdrop of an almost-unrecognizable Los Angeles, as its characters navigate the scattered sprawl of mountain top mansions, ramshackle sets, and underground parties that popped up long before Los Angeles grew into a bustling city. With this portrait of early Los Angeles and its rapidly-expanding footprint, Chazelle tackles a different side of the city’s legacy than he illustrated in “La La Land,” but continues his exploration of the city’s relationship to the industry it has become

synonymous with.

“I think there’s something in the DNA of L.A. that’s inextricable from the movies,” Chazelle said.

“The movies themselves were this unprecedented industry, no one had seen anything quite like it, like this sort of technology parade and art form … where people would just flood in from all over the country, like moths to the flame, trying to be part of this thing. It was like a circus on a bigger scale than had ever been seen before,” Chazelle said.

Like his earlier work, the film portrays Los Angeles as a city of dreamers, although ambition manifests in different kinds of behavior in this film. “The idea of that kind of a dream factory driving the growth of a city, it attracts a certain kind of person, it attracts a certain kind of behavior.

I think a lot of that helps explain the particular kind of hysteria and madness, intensity, extreme living, so to speak, that characterized Hollywood and Los Angeles at that time,” he explained.

When asked which old Hollywood movies served as inspiration for “Babylon,” Chazelle immediately mentioned “Singin’ in the Rain,” the classic 1952 Technicolor musical that tells the story of a silent era actress who struggles to adapt to the talkies. The legacy of “Singin’ in the Rain” is a through-line in “Babylon,” which more grimly depicts Hollywood’s adaptation to the advent of talkies—as hilariously captured in a scene when Nellie goes to record her first film with an on-set microphone and the challenge nearly brings the entire production to its knees.

“It’s one of my favorite movies of all time, and it definitely plays a big role in ‘Babylon.’ You know, in some ways, ‘Babylon’ is kind of this weird indirect origin story for ‘Singin’ in the Rain,’ almost like a making of without being a making of. But you see the roots where ‘Singin’ in the Rain’ came from. And I found that really interesting. ‘Singin’ in the Rain,’ of course, being this great example of Hollywood turning its gaze on itself, and sort of spoofing its own growing pains,” he said.

Chazelle also discussed how his time at Harvard impacted his career. He studied film in the Visual and Environmental Studies department (now the Art, Film, and Visual Studies department.) “I’ve always wanted to be a filmmaker … before I even knew what movies really were,” he said.

From his earliest years watching animated Disney movies, he felt an instant connection to the art form. While he always had a passion for film, his Harvard education only deepened his understanding of the craft.

“The professors at Harvard really kind of opened my eyes to … this whole other world of making cinema that was outside the Hollywood mainstream, outside the

COURTESY OF SCOTT GARFIELD

normal commercial avenues,” he said. “And it was sort of liberating, it was the epitome of having your eyes opened wider.”

Chazelle emphasized that Harvard didn’t provide him with a mainstream Hollywood education—and he’s extremely grateful for it.

“What was actually, in retrospect, the greatest thing about the Harvard film program was that it wasn’t some sort of echo of Hollywood. It wasn’t like, ‘We’re going to try to give you the Hollywood experience before you go to Hollywood,’ it was the opposite of that … and it was actually really helpful and liberating to have this grounding at Harvard, in something completely outside of that, something even oppositional to that.”

At Harvard, Chazelle studied alternative forms like cinéma verité, documentary-style film, experimental film, and the avant garde, all of which helped shape

him into the dynamic filmmaker he is today. He fondly remembers several professors from the film department, including Alfred Guzzetti, Robb Moss, and J.D. Connor; “I can’t emphasize how much I learned from them, and how much they helped me grow, not just as an artist, but even just thinking about film.” He explained that to this day he still attempts to infuse his fictional work with his knowledge of documentary and experimental-style filmmaking that he picked up at Harvard.

Chazelle’s very first feature film, a musical-romance called “Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench,” began as his senior thesis project at Harvard, and eventually premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2009, a year after his graduation. Discussing how his earlier films prepared him to embark on a project as ambitious as “Babylon,” which replicates the dramatic scope of early film sets

complete with hundreds of extras and an expansive main cast, Chazelle noted that he faces the same challenges in projects of all different scopes.

“You still always feel like you don’t have enough money, you don’t have enough time, you can’t get this shot because the sun is going down, you have to run against time,” he said. But Chazelle highlighted how his fundamental approach to filmmaking hasn’t changed. “The footprint might grow larger, but you’re still, at the end of the day, just kind of putting pen to paper alone when you’re writing the script, or when you’re on a film set, just rolling a camera with an actor or two, trying to capture a moment that feels true, or that feels beautiful, or that feels interesting in some way.

And that’s been the same as when I was making movies at Harvard.” harper.oreck@thecrimson.com jaden.thompson@thecrimson.com

‘The Merry Widow’ Preview: ‘A Big Party’ for HCO’s 30 Years

BY ZACHARY J. LECH CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

Impressive productions are Harvard College Opera’s bread and butter. In the past decade, the group has successfully brought the likes of Mozart’s “Die Zauberflöte” and Jules Massenet’s “Cendrillon” to the stage. But this year’s production of Franz Lehár’s “The Merry Widow,” running through Feb. 5 at the Agassiz Theater, might be the most special still.

The fact that the group advertises “The Merry Widow” as such—and not under its German title, “Die lustige Witwe”— is already telling, a sign of the fact that the operetta is sung in translation. The bold creative decision was hardly accidental: It was done with the goal of making this year’s production, coinciding with the group’s 30th anniversary, as accessible as possible.

“We wanted to keep in mind that this was HCO’s 30th anniversary year,” said stage director Olympia M. A. Hatzilambrou ’23’24. “We wanted a show that was

going to be really fun and a big party, and was going to get people really excited about working on it.”

And “The Merry Widow” proves just that: An operetta thoroughly accessible not just to anyone thinking of getting involved in staging it, but also to the Harvard audience in general—in large part due to its appealing story.

In the performance, Hanna Glawari (Sophie M. Choate ’22’23), a rich widow from the fictional Balkan principality of Ponteverde has moved to Paris and hopes to remarry. But if she were to do so, her fortune would pass into French hands, bringing the country to financial ruin. Only the Ponteverdian diplomat and Hanna’s former fiancé, Count Danilo Danilovitsch (James P. Rose ’22-’23) can save the principality by winning her over.

“It’s just a great show about a lot of the ridiculousness of elite societies … dishonesty and disingenuousness between married couples, and people sort of lusting after this woman who has a lot of money,” said producer Lu-

COURTESY OF SHUHENG A. ZHANG

cas J. Walsh ’24.

“Don’t take the plot too seriously. It’s mostly about having a good time and [about] romance,” said cast member Eliza R. Zangerl-Salter ’26.

According to Dora Woodruff ’24, the same holds true for what is arguably the operetta’s key selling point: the music.

“There’s some music in operas that’s kind of hard to listen to. You have to put intellectual energy into unpacking it. And this music, you know, it’s not simple—I don’t want to condescend to it—but it’s very beautiful. It’s like the kind of music that can get stuck in your head,” Woodruff said.

But despite the seeming simplicity, the music posed some challenges. “The Merry Widow” premiered in 1905, thus putting it firmly within the public domain.

But Franz Lehár had not composed an overture for the operetta until 1940, making that part of the score copyrighted. Unfortunately, the Harvard College Opera did not manage to secure the rights for that segment of the original composition. But Benjamin T. Rossen ’23, the produc-

tion’s music director, stepped up and composed an original piece.

“This is a totally new composition for this opera. So it’s been really exciting being a part of playing it,” Woodruff said.

Perhaps unsurprisingly for a production featuring dozens and involving over 25 in the orchestra itself, there are more moving pieces than just the music.

“All of the artistic disciplines figured very prominently in the show,” Hatzilambrou said.

But perhaps the most notable is the role of dance, as the “The Merry Widow” is one of the operas where choreography plays a significant narrative role.

“The dancing really progresses the story and the dancing characters are extremely important to the plot,” Hatzilambrou said. “My musical favorite moments are the dances.”

For Hatzilambrou, the answer came easily. But between the music, choreography, and singing, the audiences might have a hard time deciding what their favorite parts were. zachary.lech@thecrimson.com

14

THE HARVARD CRIMSON

FIFTEEN QUESTIONS

­S

oyoung Lee is the Landon and Lavinia Clay Chief Curator of the Harvard Art Museums. She specializes in Korean and Japanese ceramics from 1400-1700 as well as cross-cultural exchange in East Asia. Before coming to Harvard, she was a curator of Korean art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for 15 years.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

FM: Your niche is Korean and Japanese ceramics from 1400 to 1700. I was wondering how you got into this? Was there an “a-ha” moment?

SL: I fell into art history as a college major by accident, or serendipitously, because I honestly didn’t know that art history existed as a field of study. I went into college at Columbia thinking I was going to major in English.

Columbia at the time had very extensive core requirements, one of which was called Art Humanities or Art Hum. I took that

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

Q&A:

SOYOUNG LEE ON HARVARD ART MUSEUMS, CERAMICS, AND HER BRITISH ACCENT HARVARD ART MUSEUMS’ HEAD CURATOR Soyoung Lee chatted with Fifteen Minutes about her background, the curatorial process, and museum highlights. “That’s how I see museum work: it’s about translating the things that I’m familiar with for others,” she says. “It’s about the absorption of knowledge and partnerships and context of communications.”

BY MILA G. BARRY CRIMSON MAGAZINE ASSOCIATE EDITOR

The collection — not only is it big, but it’s fascinating and it’s amazing. Just in numbers, there are roughly a quarter million works.

FM: I’d love to hear more about your personal research and the projects you’ve done over the past few decades.

SL: One of the things, more recently, which I see as having enabled my coming here, was an experience called the Center for Curatorial Leadership.

Most curators are academic researchers, and it’s for those who are interested in expanding beyond the curatorial role and thinking more holistically about how an institution operates, your role in it, and potential for leadership.

My career at the Met, I was obviously blissfully happy to be doing the curatorial work, but looking to see if there’s a way to transition to more of a leadership role.

I’m so grateful for that opportunity, but I’m also just so appreciative that Harvard took a chance on me.

The collection — not only is it big, but it’s fascinating and it’s amazing. Just in numbers, there are roughly a quarter million works. For any museum in this country, that’s big.

FM: Despite your relative fame on campus, do you think there’s something about you that most students don’t know about? Any hobbies hidden from public view?

RK: I go to hot yoga a lot, but I don’t know if that’s a hidden hobby. I’m also a huge reader. I can constantly be found with my nose in a book whenever possible; I’m reading whether I’m in line, queuing up for something, or I have like 15 minutes to drink something, I’ll reach for a book that I’m reading. Right now I’m reading “Enduring Love” by Ian McEwan.

in my freshman year, loved it, got into art history, and went to grad school straight after graduating because I didn’t know what else to do and I got into a program.

I knew, going in, I wanted to focus on Korean and Japanese art and the history around the end of the 16th century is really interesting. There was a major invasion by the Japanese warlord of Korea. The ultimate goal was getting to China, but the result was this massive transfer of potters and skilled and unskilled laborers. There’s a whole industry of Japanese ceramics, which to this day, was one of the highlights of Japanese culture, and there’s continuing traditions now — living artists who come from that lineage. So it was a really interesting cultural, historical moment that I wanted to explore.

Anything having to do with ceramic history is actually a lot about archaeology. I wasn’t so much an archaeology major at that time — meaning actually digging into the ground and the whole methodology in that field. So that was a whole thing that I had to learn — fantastic.

The region that I studied was not in Tokyo, but Kyushu, which is the westernmost island.

FM: How does the museum decide what pieces go on display and how long?

SL: I will say when I first arrived at Harvard — and I knew the renovation but I hadn’t seen it post-reopening — when I walked through the galleries, I thought it was just a brilliant job. I think it’s a gorgeous building. There’s so many layers to it.

But knowing the collection, I walked around: ‘Wait, where all the galleries?’ Just felt like there wasn’t enough gallery space for the collection.

In the initial stages, because I’d never worked at an academic museum, I wasn’t fully convinced of giving space to a study center versus gallery. But it’s really part of our DNA, and it’s really what makes us special and I think it’s really what’s in service of students and really the whole community.

FM: Do you have a favorite piece?

FM: How did your life and career take you to all sorts of different places and then how did you eventually end up here at Harvard?

SL: I’m a daughter of a South Korean diplomat.

I was born in Jakarta, Indonesia, which is where my father was first stationed, and I’ve actually only lived in Korea, pre-adulthood, for a total of about five years. So we moved around. That was the nature of his job, so Sweden, then London.

No ESL, because this was early 80s, back in the dinosaur days.

That was a tough experience, because you couldn’t understand anything, you couldn’t speak it, but on the other hand, it was a good test case for the sink or swim model, and so I learned to swim really fast.

That’s where I learned English and retained it and unfortunately lost my British accent when I came to the U.S. So again, the U.S. was with my father’s diplomatic job beginning of high school — L.A., New Jersey, and then I stayed on for college and remained in this country. I’ve been in the U.S. for most of my life. I had still retained South Korean citizenship only because Korea doesn’t recognize dual citizenship.

South Korea was, 80s, 90s, changing so fast, and the contemporary culture at the time was in-

come, and so that was memorable, and it really did make a difference in people’s reactions and perceptions and understanding.

MARINA QU—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

credibly dynamic, but what my parents retained was old fashioned. So when finally in college, I did a semester in South Korea. My mom would say, ‘Make sure you wear you dress conservatively.’ You get to Seoul and everybody’s dressed more vibrantly and edgy. I think this is a phenomenon for those who leave one’s home country and travel and retain the culture of the moment that they left, when in fact the home culture changes more rapidly.

My dad’s role was partly related to the arts, but I never saw myself becoming either an artist or doing museum work. I wasn’t really conscious of what the museum world was when I was a child, but the way it shaped me is that I’ve always thought of myself as or have been comfortable in the role of a cultural translator. That’s how I see museum work: It’s about translating the things that I’m familiar with for others.

FM: What’s a museum or art experiences from anywhere in the world that you think should be on everyone’s bucket list?

SL: Oh my gosh, that’d be hard to narrow down. This is what everybody’s going to say, but partly because personally and professionally I was associated with the Met for so long, it will always hold such a special place. There are nooks and crannies within the Met that only can be discovered on repeat visits.

I think back to a lot of places that I visited in Japan that have been memorable. There is a museum called — and this is going to sound very old-fashioned — the Museum of Oriental Ceramics. That is their English term, although I know the term oriental is controversial now in this country, but it’s a museum of mostly East Asian ceramics based in Osaka, Japan. It just has such a stellar collection.

And then the London’s V&A is one of those places that’s such a hodgepodge. It’s not your straightforward paintings and sculptures collection. The V&A distinguishes itself in being more about the decorative arts and fashion and so forth.

It’s a fun place. The collection is very eclectic.

FM: You’ve had a really rich career, including 15 years spent doing art curation at the Met. What was the process of putting exhibitions together there?

SL: My all-time highlight at the Met would an exhibition on ancient Korea called “Silla” that I organized with a co-curator in the Asian department and with two Korean national museums, one in Seoul and one based in Gyeongju which is the ancient capital and which is where the kingdom of Silla was based. And this was all gold jewelry and gold accoutrements.

We were able to bring over these beautiful, incredible materials, including one almost life-size Buddha statue that was one of the coveted national treasure pieces. Maybe three months, two months before the exhibition when all of the loan agreements had been signed, there was a little hiccup. The government goes through many personnel changes.

The new person who came on decided the statue couldn’t leave because it’s just too valuable and it can’t travel. It did in the end finally

SL: We have in our collection what’s known as a moon jar. It’s a large porcelain vase, 18th century Korea. It has a little bit of surface stains, but it’s a very special genre of ceramics.

It’s called a moonjar because it’s big and globular, and it’s reminiscent of the moon. It’s also made in two halves; when you throw it on the wheel you can’t compose it in its entirety because it would collapse. So they took two big bowls and put them together.

One of the favorite spaces in the museum for me is the ancient Buddhist art gallery.

FM Fifteen Minutes is the magazine of The Harvard Crimson. To read the full interview and other longform pieces, visit THECRIMSON.COM/ MAGAZINE

SPORTS

THE HARVARD CRIMSON FEBRUARY 3, 2023

15

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

Women’s Basketball Holds Steady Ivy Streak A NEW RISING Harvard women’s basketball team has faced a steady flow of injuries this season but has still found success despite a changing roster.

BY MAIREAD B. BAKER CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

T

he 2022-2023 Harvard women’s basketball team (12-7 overall, 5-2 Ivy League) is not what it used to be: with a new coaching staff, four first-year players, and frequent injuries, this season has surely been a test of its ability to adapt to incessant change.

Despite having a different starting lineup in nearly every game for the past few months, the team has managed to find consistent success. Its Ivy season commenced with a 67-59 defeat of Princeton on December 31 before securing another league victory under its belt, a mighty 30-point win against Brown on January 6, 89-59.

But Harvard’s wins have not come without some grit. With 14 players on the roster, only seven to eight have been able to dress for the majority of the games, leaving Head Coach Carrie Moore a short rotation in her first year leading the Crimson. This has put an extensive amount of pressure on the active players since Ivy games are important deciders for which of the Ancient Eight will make it to the league’s tournament in mid-March, which will be hosted

by Princeton this year.

“We had seven [players] against Dartmouth and that was tough,” team captain and senior guard Maggie McCarthy recalled.

“I remember our coaches were like, ‘We just have to get through this.’ They’re important wins right now at this point in the season, we’re trying to get everyone healthy for the end of the season, including myself.”

McCarthy, who is also a midfielder for the Harvard women’s lacrosse team, suffered a foot in-

jury in November at an 85-63 loss to Purdue in the Cancun Challenge tournament in Mexico, putting her on the bench for the entire month of December.

In an unlucky play, the captain fractured her foot by stepping on another player’s foot when changing directions but ended up playing on it for the rest of the game.

This fracture was not the end of the Medfield native’s injuries in her final season for the Crimson. At Harvard’s most recent 66-53 triumph against Cornell — in which only eight players dressed — McCarthy broke her wrist just after her foot healed.

In an attempt to draw a charge on defense, a Big Red opponent knocked the senior down, forcing her to use her wrist to break the fall. Despite the break, she wrapped it up and returned to the court, playing the remainder of the game somewhat one-handed.

“When I had my foot injury, I was like ‘Oh okay, I’ll be back for [the] Ivy League [season],’” the captain said. “It’s kind of what you work for the whole year, and just because we’re so well matched up and so much goes into it.”

“It just reiterates the fact that every Ivy game is so important because the standings get so close, so every win matters and it makes it that much more competitive.”

Currently, the Crimson has only two injured bodies: McCarthy and first-year guard Gabby Anderson. Naturally, these two players happen to be two of the team’s strongest starters. Anderson, a first-year guard hailing from Columbus, Ohio, tore her ACL at the beginning of the fall, keeping her off the court for the rest of t h e ye a r.

This ebb and flow of injury and recovery have encapsulated the team’s rhythm thus far.

“That’s been the theme of the season, honestly – people are in and out, so it’s kind of like winning anyway we can at this point – it doesn’t really matter what it looks like. Just be tough, go out there, and play for the people that are injured.”

In particular, one challenge Harvard has faced is not knowing which players will suit up for a given game, while other teams have the benefit of playing with a consistent starting lineup. McCarthy noted that this has been a particular trial for Harvard’s offense.

“If you play with the same people over the course of three months, your offense is going to flow and look so good because you know where each other are.

The fact that literally every week in practice and every game we don’t know who’s suiting up has changed so much, but we’re still able to find that chemistry.”

Most recently, Harvard delivered a 24-point victory over Penn on Jan. 28. In a game staffed with many fans and students, the Crimson seemed to feed off the energy of the crowd. But the captain credits that win to the preparation they did in practice that week.

“How we play in that game is based on how we prepare in practice that week,” McCarthy commented. “I think this week we were super hype, super connected, we had a lot of good competitive drills in practice, and we were competing.”

Perhaps that is what has kept the team chemistry despite all of the adversity faced this season: sticking to the competition in practices.

“I think that competition brings out the best athletes in us and that turns into chemistry,” McCarthy reflected.

“Competition brings out good team chemistry.”

Due to the myriad of injuries, the Crimson has run through many possible starting line-ups, meaning that most of its roster is comfortable playing with one another and in strenuous situations. This type of conditioning may lead to increased agility

and adaptability ahead of the Ivy games near the end of this season when more players return to full health.

“The hope is that, by the end of the season, we have as many healthy bodies as we can — that will make the win so much sweeter,” the senior guard said. “That’s even what gets me through my injury now, is still believing or visualizing winning in the end — it’ll all be worth it.”

But at the helm of these challenges has been a new coaching staff, spearheaded by Coach Carrie Moore — one that has brought excitement, new energy, and motivation, keeping the team in an upward direction no matter the game at hand.

“They came in really ambitious, in a good way,” McCarthy reflected. “We’ve always wanted to win a championship here, so I think having the new coaching staff on board with that is really great this year.”

Moore was named the head coach for Harvard last spring, taking over for long-time Harvard legend Kathy Delaney-Smith.

The Michigan native, who has a long resume of accomplishments in athletics and even led the nation in scoring her senior year at Western Michigan University, refuses to let adversity get to her players’ heads.

“Our team saying, what Coach Moore came in with, is ‘Believe it,’” McCarthy said. “We have that on some of our gear and we say it in all of our huddles before we break.”

“I think just really believing despite all of the adversity we’ve faced — believing in the process and believing we can win a championship — that’s what keeps us together, even in the hard times.”

Many of the Crimson’s starters and leading scorers air on the younger side. Sophomore guard Harmoni Turner averages a team-high 17.6 points per game, while her backcourt-mate and fellow sophomore Elena Rodriguez has increased her scoring average from 2.0 in the 2021-2022 season to 11.6 this year.

Though these newer players have had to face a learning curve of adjusting to collegiate basketball, older players have had to adapt to a new program direction entirely: one aimed at an Ivy League championship win. The emergence of younger players, such as freshman guard Saniyah

Glenn-Bello, has encouraged senior guard McKenzie Forbes and junior guard Lola Mullaney to elevate their games, as well.

But with the injuries has arisen a new type of leadership from the team: injured players stepping into the role of student coaches.

Senior guard Annie Stritzel has built a strong career for the Crimson program, first emerging as a versatile scorer and tough defensive player as a first-year in 2019-2020.

This March, however, Stritzel announced she had been managing the pain of a diagnosed, career-ending ankle injury since her arrival in Cambridge.

With the injury mounting in severity throughout last season, Stritzel will be unable to take the floor for Harvard in her final year of eligbility. But her ankle injury has not stopped her from pivoting into a new, crucial role for her team. “[Stritzel] can’t play anymore, so she’s kind of like a player-coach for us,” McCarthy said. “But she has been so invested, so involved, and such a great role model for the younger players too. Having that player-coach role is really valuable to us.”

Next up for the Crimson is a weekend road trip to New Haven where it will seek revenge against the Bulldogs. When Harvard last met Yale, a single point kept the Crimson from winning in a 71-70 battle on the court.

When asked about that game, McCarthy joked, “Don’t bring it up.”

“We’re going to get our revenge,” the captain declared. “It will be very similar to the way we went into Penn. We know it’s a huge game, [we’re] definitely in the stretch right now, we have seven more Ivy League games — every win matters.”

This time around, it seems that the Crimson have been armed with healthier bodies and an idea of what it is up against in Connecticut.

“I don’t know if we went in too lightly our first time or what it was, but there’s no chance we’d ever make that mistake.”

Harvard will take on Yale at 6:00 p.m. EST this Friday before swinging up to the Ocean State for a Saturday evening matchup against the Bears at 5:00 p.m. EST. mairead.baker@thecrimson.com

Freshman Gabby Anderson shoots a three-pointer back in November.

The Harvard women’s basketball team celebrates after a 68-59 win over Boston College on Nov. 10. SAMUEL M.

SAMUEL M. BENNETT—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

BENNETT—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

GAMES TO WATCH THIS WEEK FRIDAY

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

SATURDAY

SUNDAY

Women’s Ice Hockey vs. Princeton 3:00 pm, Bright-Landry Hockey Center Men’s Basketball vs. Yale 5:00 pm, Lavietes Pavillion

Men’s Ice Hockey vs .No. 2 Quinnipiac 7:00 pm, Bright-Landry Hockey Center

Women’s Water Polo vs. Marist College 9:00 am, Blodgett Pool

Men’s Basketball vs. Brown 6:00 pm, Lavietes Pavillion

Women’s Water Polo vs. Pomona-Pitzer 11:30 am, Blodgett Pool

Women’s Water Polo vs. La Salle University 4:00 pm, Blodgett Pool

Women’s Water Polo vs. LIU 3:00 pm, Blodgett Pool

WEEKLY SCORES RECAP WOMEN’S ICE HOCKEY VS. CORNELL

W, 7-6

WATER POLO VS. VILLANOVA SWIM AND DIVE VS. YALE

W, 23-11

W, 210-90

SQUASH VS. COLUMBIA

W, 5-4

MEN’S

ICE HOCKEY VS. CORNELL BASKETBALL VS. PENN SWIM AND DIVE VS. PRINCETON WRESTLING VS. PRINCETON

W, 6-2

L, 83-68

W, 181-172

W, 20-18

READ IT IN FIVE MINUTES WRESTLING DEFEATS PRINCETON For the first time in ten years, the Harvard wrestling team beat Princeton, 20-18 in a battle that came down to the last match.

Senior captain Yaraslau Slavikouski sealed the deal at 285 lbs, taking down Princeton’s Travis Stefanik.

Harvard’s roster consists of a young, talented group, made up of 16 underclassmen, three of whom – firstyears Joseph Cangro, Jack Crook and sophomore Diego Sotelo – had important victories over the Tigers.

HARVARD SQUASH: ON TOP OR NOT? With the defeat of Columbia, the women ended their conference play with a perfect record and claimed their seventh-straight Ivy League title. To accompany a hardfought women’s Ivy crown, the men’s squash program, which is currently undefeated, also secured the Ivy League championship with its win over Columbia on the same day. The number-oneranked men, who missed out on the Ivy title last year as a result of a narrow loss to Penn., reclaimed the conference title with an 8-1 win.

MEN’S ICE HOCKEY BEATS CORNELL In a 6-2 showdown at Bright-Landry, the No. 8 Harvard men’s ice hockey team defeated arch-rival No. 11 Cornell in a highly anticipated matchup. In its most complete victory of the season, this domination stands as a critical stepping stone as Harvard enters the most challenging stretch of its campaign. For the team’s senior leadership, a 4-1-1 career record over a bitter rival was especially meaningful.

16

THE HARVARD CRIMSON

SPORTS

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

SWIMMING AND DIVING

Harvard Readies For the Ivies IVY READY ­Men’s swim and dive took home the HYP title, while the women readied for another Ivy League championship run.

BY THOMAS G. HARRIS CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

L

ast weekend the hot, humid atmosphere of Blodgett Pool was especially active as both the Men’s and Women’s swimming and diving teams competed in the Harvard-Yale-Princeton Meet.

On Friday, the men’s team came out hot right away, with seniors Umit Guresand and Ryan Linnihan, first-year David Greely, and junior Marcus Holmquist winning the 200 yard freestyle relay by almost a second.

While the Crimson did not keep up their blistering early pace, Harvard (7-0) still ended up winning four out of the 10 events that night, securing a strong start to the meet.

On Saturday, the Crimson again started strong with another relay win. Harvard also emerged victorious in the 1 meter dive event, with sophomore Adam Wesson clinching the win. This came after Wesson fell to the Tigers’(7-3, 5-2 Ivy league) Taso Callanan on Friday evening in the 3 meter dive.

Junior Will Grant also displayed backstroke prowess, winning two backstroke events by a second each.

Coming into HYP, Holmquist was not feeling 100%, but he still had an especially eventful meet, including some strong relay performances.

“I was a little bit more nervous than usual. I had some issues with illnesses the previous week and felt pretty bad in the water.

But once I got to the competition, I turned my brain off and went on autopilot,” Holmquist said.

After winning the opening

200 yard relay, Holmquist also anchored the final relay, the 400 yard freestyle This race was set to decide the meet between the Crimson and the Tigers, who were tied coming into the final stretch.

“Relays capture why I love swimming, because it brings the team aspect to the sport. It is all about stepping up when it matters the most,” he continued.

Holmquist realized that Harvard needed to win the race to win the meet, but he did not realize that they were down by a third of a second as he entered the pool.

“I kind of saw that we were trailing a little bit but came in with confidence and realized that regardless of who is next to me, I could beat them if I swam my own race. I tried not to over swim the first 35 yards, I turned at the fifty and saw that I was catching up, and put on the jets.”

Harvard won the race by a flat second, and the Crimson ended up edging the Tigers 181-172 while decisively beating the Bulldogs 239-113. The victory represented Harvard’s fifth straight win in the HYP meet.

Later on Saturday, Harvard Women’s swimming and diving (6-2, 5-2) took to the pool. Coming into the meet with an undefeated record on the year, a loss to both the Bulldogs (9-0, 7-0) and the Tigers (8-3, 4-3) might seem like a disappointment for the Crimson. However, coach Stephanie Morawski ‘92 had a specific strategy in mind for HYP, considering the longer-term goals for the team this season, including a run at a Ivy League Championship for the second consecutive campaign.

“It may not have been what we wanted but the score was what we expected,” the coach of 26 seasons said. “We have one goal in mind and that is winning another Ivy Championship. We want to make sure that physically, mentally, and emotionally, we are ready.”

But Coach Morawski was quick to highlight that this meet

Harvard, Yale, and Princeton swimmers get set on the blocks at the HYP Meet on Jan. 28. CORY K. GORCZYCKI—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER

had another special point of significance for the team, as it also represented Senior Night.

Since the teams (male and female) can only continue to the Ivy League championships with a smaller team, this also marks the last time some of the seniors would swim, many of whom had been on the team since before the Covid pandemic.

“They did an amazing job, and we were 100 percent behind them,” Coach Morawski said. “These seniors have had the unique experience of Swimming with us before, during and post Covid.”

For senior captain Evie Geier, the last day of the meet was a difficult and emotional one. “[Saturday] was difficult, we got to the end and knew it would be our last meet at home. But, we are surrounded by some of the best teammates and best women at Harvard,” Geier said. “Definitely on my last dive I had tears welling up, but I was able to push through and finish strong,” she continued.

Geier finished Saturday’s 1 meter dive in sixth place, with a score of 266.70.

This meet did have one especially bright spot on the score-

board for the women’s team, and that came from sophomore Mandy Brenner.

Brenner, a Crimson sports editor, won the 50 yard freestyle race, setting a new personal collegiate record of 22.89 seconds.

“The nerves were high but having the team behind me definitely felt good,” Brenner said..

Having this time in the books before the Ivy league championship was especially meaningful to the sophomore, considering the intensity and pressure that comes with the Ivy Leage Championship races.

“HYP is a practice run for the

Ivies. Having this race, and being nervous for the race gets me in the mental mode for Ivies, and I feel very good about that,” she remarked.

Next up for both teams is the Ivy League conference championship.

Women’s swim and dive will be in action from February 15th to February 18th at Princeton University in Princeton, NJ., while men’s swim and dive will dive into the water from Feb. 22 to Feb. 25 at Brown University in Providence, R.I. thomas.harris@thecrimson.com

WRESTLING

Harvard Defeats Princeton In 20-18 Battle

BY SYDNEY E. FARNHAM CRIMSON STAFF WRITER

After dropping the first match of its Ivy League campaign to the No. 5 Cornell University Big Red, the Harvard wrestling team made a resounding statement on January 27th in its 20-18 defeat of the Princeton University Tigers, the team’s first defeat of the Tigers in a decade. The dynamic of the sport has allowed for many individual success over the course of the season, but wins like this are a special reflection of team culture and commitment.

The effort that went into this weekend began back in September and lasted throughout the fall. The Crimson consists of a young, talented group, made up of sixteen underclassmen. On Friday night, three underclassmen in the lineup — first-years Joseph Cangro, Jack Crook, and sophomore Diego Sotelo – all had key victories over the Tigers to power the Harvard victory.

Longtime head coach Jay Weiss credits hard work in the off season to this season’s successes.

“I felt that they were going to be a lot different in the second semester, and they are — they’re wrestling a lot better,” Weiss reflected. “A good two, three months of training and repeating, and then all of a sudden, January, February rolls around and they’re ready to go. So I was pretty pleased.”

The Crimson won six of its ten matches against the Tigers, securing victories at the 125, 141, 149, 157, 174, and 285-pound weight classes.

Cangro won by major decision in his home state of N.J. at 141 lbs, and senior Trevor Tarsi also emerged victorious in the 157 lbs weight class.

Captain Philip Conigliaro sizes up his opponent against the Penn Quakers on Feb. 1, 2020. ZING GEE—CRIMSON STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Sotelo (11-5), who is ranked 22nd in the nation at 125 lbs, remained unbeaten in Ivy League matches, blanking Princeton junior Nick Kayal 6-0. The Plainfield, Ill. native, who was injured last season, has been eager to make his mark and step up for the Harvard wrestling program in his return to the mat this season.

“Being able to come back with more drive on my part and being able to be in a room every day with my teammates and my coaches has been great,” said Sotelo when asked about his successes thus far and looking forward. “I feel we’ve been making big jumps as a team – I’m ​​ really excited to make a big statement for myself and for the team.”

Philip Conigliaro, who is ranked No. 21 at 174 lbs, returned to Harvard’s mat for the first time in 2023 after a knee injury kept

him from competition, earning his first dual win in the process.

Last season, the Dedham, Mass. local won the EIWA title and First Team All Ivy Honors, securing himself a spot at the NCAA Championships, where he ultimately fell to national runner up Shane Griffith of Stanford, posting a 3-2 mark. Prior to the NCAA tournament, the captain held an impressive 11-1 record in his matches for the season. “[Conigliaro] busted his tail off to get back in and he’s got another month to get ready,” said the head coach in reference to the upcoming NCAA tournament in March.

“He’s one of the best, he really is. He definitely wasn’t 100% this past weekend, but he will be – he will be for sure,” Weiss added.

Following Conigliaro’s victory at 174 lbs, the Crimson dropped two matches, leaving the compe-

tition in the hands of Harvard’s heavyweight senior captain Yaraslau Slavikouski, who wrestles in the 285 lbs weight class. Ranked at No. 9, Slavikouski has already engineered an impressive campaign to start this season, posting a 20-3 record and placing third at the Cliff Keen Classic back in December.

“At the end of the day, it is just another dual, just another competition for the team,” said the senior captain, who hails from Belarus. “I think the mentality and the mindset, we always remain the same. We go out there to compete, to fight and win.”

His mentality certainly came through in a solid 4-1 victory over the Tigers’ senior wrestler Travis Stefanik, which secured a team victory for the Crimson at the dual.

This victory marked Har-

vard wrestling’s first victory over Princeton in ten years. Slavikouski, the former Ivy League and EIWA Rookie of the Year, is locked in on bigger competition in March after missing the past two championship seasons due to the Covid-19 pandemic and injury.

When asked about his injury, Slavikouski said, “It provided me with the insights and gave me an appreciation of the time I have here — it just makes it that much better. Just getting the opportunity to step on the mat and compete for Harvard, represent the school, the team, and the coaches.”

After a loss to No. 25 Penn last Sunday, the Crimson moved to a 1-4 record for the season so far. Despite the previous losses, Coach Weiss is proud of his team and feels they are being prepared for the postseason.

“I personally like to put them in situations where it’s going to be tough. I like tough competition because I think you’re either going to rise to the occasion or not,” said Weiss, who will enter his 30th season as head coach for the wrestling program next year, which he has played a colossal role in reshaping over the years.

“We wrestle that top competition that gets us ready early in the year, because that’s what we’re gonna see at the end of the year.”

The Crimson will not wrestle this weekend, but will return to the Malkin Athletic Center for two matches next weekend against Columbia and Hofstra as it looks to improve its record and sharpen its skills before the EIWA Championships, which will be held March 3 to March 5 at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA. sydney.farnham@thecrimson.com

BY THE NUMBERS

1

Harvard defeated Princeton by one second to clinch victory in the 400 yard freestyle and secure its fifth consecutive HYP title.

24 Harvard women’s basketball defeated the University of Pennsylvania Quakers by 24 points on Jan. 28. Elena Rodriguez led the Crimson in scoring with 28 points.

10 It has been 10 years since Harvard wrestling defeated the Princeton Tigers, but the Crimson finally emerged victorious against their New Jersey rivals on Jan. 27, prevailing after a 20-18 battle.