Conclusions

The HPC concludes that it is inappropriate for Harvard to grant academic credit to the three ROTC Departments for the following reasons:

* The Departments of Military Science, Naval Science, and Aerospace Studies are externally controlled departments and are not subject to regular Harvard institutional control as are regular Harvard departments. Harvard has no assurance that its standards of appropriate academic content and conduct will be met, for its only clear control over the ROTC departments is its power to reject their programs entirely. ROTC Departments are neither purely Administrative Departments nor fully Academic Departments. The ROTC Departments do not have the privileges of recommending tenured Faculty appointments and recommending that academic credit toward a degree be granted for completion of ROTC courses. The extension of this privilege to an externally controlled body represents an undesirable delegation of the Harvard Faculty's autonomy; and, thus, the privilege should be withdrawn.

* Academic credit is Harvard's clearest indication that work is being done which is appropriate for application towards a liberal atrs degree. The ROTC programs clearly pursue military training goals rather than liberal education goals. Therefore, credit towards a liberal arts degree should not be granted for completion of work in the ROTC courses.

A discussion of the status of ROTC at Harvard reveals that many of the existing conditions are the result of the need to conform to certain minimum conditions required by Public Law. The HPC recommends that academic credit for ROTC courses be withdrawn as a first step in a long-term project of analysis, within the Harvard community, of issues involved in the existence of ROTC programs at Harvard. This report has not considered the main financial aspects of ROTC's status nor the political issues involved in ROTC's existence at Harvard. We have directed our attention to educational policy issues and the question of academic credit for ROTC courses solely. The problems of the relationship of Harvard to society are not solved by single recommendations, but rather by a continuing process of analysis and suggestion.