A Tough Balancing Act

In trying to enhance its reputation as the leading theological school in the country, Harvard Divinity School has balanced itself on a budgetary razor's edge. A variety of progressive curriculum innovations in the last four years-in women's studies. Jewish-Christian relations and other multicultural approaches to religion-have boosted enrollment substantially, but the Divinity School has had a hard time finding the money to pay for it all.

The major problem the Divinity School faces rests in insufficient endowment funds. About a decade ago, more than 55 percent of the Divinity School's budget came from interest on the endowment, but that figure has dropped steadily to 39 growth did that figure has dropped steadily to 39 percent for 1982-83, largely because endowment growth did not keep up with inflation. To insure that the actual value of the endowment does not drop, the school has had to spend less and less of the interest from the fund, which now stands at about $40 million.

Even at the relatively low 39 percent figure, the Divinity School still ranks as the Harvard faculty which relies the most on endowment. But Dean George E. Rupp says he wants to see the figure move higher.

"The difference in endowment income between now and the mid-70's is, frankly, killing us." Rupp says. "The reason that it has to be so high is that we labor under a number of very serious liabilities in amassing resources."

Primarily, Rupp says, the fundrasing problem is that "our alumni body, to put it gently, is not wealthy." Also, the federal government and most major corporations shy away from giving money to the school because it is a religious organization.

Donations from the Ford and Rockefeller foundations have gone a long way toward paying for the Divinity School's women's studies program, which began in 1973 and evolved into a major program in 1980 when new funds brought five full time scholars to the school.

"We have that funding in spite of the fact that we're a divinity school," Rupp says. "It's been very clear from the foundations that we're giving this to you because we like your women's studies program, but we're dubious about the fact that you're a religious organization."

Loss

The school lost about $100.000 in 1980 and has achieved nominal surpluses since, but the financial situation remains precarious. To make ends meet, the school has trimmed small expenses like building maintenance. Many students now do paid maintenance work like plastering and painting, which Rupp calls "a kind of folksy example, but there are a lot of other examples that don't show as much."

Enrollment at the Divinity School has shot up about 40 percent since 1979, helping ease the budget crunch by bringing in more tuition money. But Rupp and other officials say they are sensitive to the fact that the 168-year-old school--the oldest grad school at Harvard--must hustle to keep enrollment rising.

Tuition, at $8300 a year, stands as the lowest of all Harvard's grad schools but the highest for divinity schools in the country. Although the school counts all its pennies everywhere else. It has managed actually to increase the amount of money available each year for financial aid. But because enrollment has increased so much, less aid per student is available than five years ago.

Rupp and others say they are confident that Harvard remains the best divinity school in the country. "[We are] the only theological school in the country that has the highest intellectual standards and also is committed to prepare people for ministry," says Rupp.

"But the pool nationwide for people going into ministry or theological education is certainly not growing. We've been fortunate in getting an in creasingly larger slice of a not-so-growing pie." Rupp says, adding that "I don't think we are under any enrollment pressures here at the moment. We've worked hard to avoid having that happen."

Spread the Word

Constance H. Buchanan, director of the women's studies program, spends a good deal of her time "getting the word out to the world about Harvard Divinity School We've taken a far more assertive role in presenting our academic identity and performance."

The school offers four degree programs, and combined enrollment has grown from 300 in 1979-80 to about 460 this year. Slightly less than half of students follow the three-year Masters in Divinity course, which ordinarily leads to ordination in one of the Protestant or Catholic faiths. The more purely academic degree, the Master of Theological Studies (MTS), usually requires two years and attracts another third of the student body. Two smaller degree programs-the one-year Master of Theology and the two-year Doctor of Theology-involve about 100 students altogether.

Despite the steady growth in enrollment. Rupp says the school simply must boost its endowment to insure that the quality of the programs doesn't slip. Toward that goal, the school will begin a major fundraising program later this year.

Rupp emphasizes that the fundraising effort will not operate on the strict timetable of a normal capital campaign--"It will be an ongoing effort to generate funds, rather than a campaign with a timeline and it set goal. The reason for that is that the Harvard constituency is, for easily understandable reasons, not ready for another endowment fund. They're just barely going to be getting out from under a major effort to raise $350 million."

No specific goal exists for the drive, but Rupp says he would like to see the endowment grow to $60 million. "If our endowment were now $60 million instead of $40 million, we would be in healthy shape," says the dean.

Associate Dean Roger H. Martin says that as part of the drive the school hopes to endow a chair in women's studies at a price tag of $1.5 million. Martin also says he hopes donors will fund chairs in each of the major religions at the school's affiliated Center for Study of World Religions.

More mundane shopping list items for the school include an expansion for its 370.000-volume library, which has waited for an addition of two new floors since the 1960s and is now bulging at the seams. Its buildings--Andover Hall, holding the chapel and administrative offices, and Rockefeller and Divinity Halls, both dormitories--need substantial maintenance work on the scale of the ongoing undergraduate House renovations. "There's a lot of sort of bricks-and-mortar work that needs to be done." Martin says.

Academic Problems

While the Divinity School grapples with its pressing financial problems, it has also confronted major academic changes during the last several years. Rupp's philosophy of what the Divinity School should be relates to fundamental problems in the world at large: the emergence of a worldwide community and the struggle for world understanding.

Rupp's mission for the school meshes "out double capacity to represent a particular religious community effectively and at the same time relate it positively to other religious traditions and to the broader society."

To achieve that goal, the school beefed up its women's studies program in 1980 and attracted funds for an Albert A. List visiting professorship, which hosts a different professor each year in the field of Jewish-Christian relations. Working with the Center for the Study of World Religions, the Divinity School also founded a program in comparative social values.

"The project is designed to promote the development of a community of scholars who collaborate across traditional disciplinary divisions to clarify similarities and differences among traditions of social values," says Rupp, "and to reflect on the policy implications of those similarities and differences."

The women's and intercultural programs try explicitly to bring outside scholars to Harvard. But during their research the scholars also teach seminars and meet with the community is speeches and forums. The school seeks to use these programs to attract a more broad-based, diverse community of students, and students say the idea is working.

"I think it's one of the most exhilirating schools I've ever been in. I like the diversity a great deal," says Vicky C. Phillips, second-year Master of Theological Studies students who hopes to go into journalism.

"One of the strong points of the Divinity School is that there's a good mix of people who have primarily academic interests and people who have more practical aims," says Richard E. Cohen, another second-year MTS candidate who studies the Jewish-Christian relationship.

But many students say that while the Divinity School succeds fabulously at attracting a wide range of students, they don't feel the school really coalesces into a community.

Social Life

"Community' is a big word here, but people really have to try to make their own communities. There's really nothing setup in the divinity school to encourage a community feeling," says MTS student Allan E. Janik, who says a good deal of the problem stems from simple shortcomings like a lack of a student lounge or late-night snack spot.

"I think the idea of alienation is a little harsh, but in many cases it is the situation. Each person is on his own, more or less," Janik says. "If we're advocating the pluralism, we should make it happen."

"I'm not as positive about how strong a community it is. For a divinity school, you'd expect there would be a real warm sense of community," adds Cohen.

But while some have misgivings about the quality of life in general, the Divinity School earns uniformly high marks for the quality of its instruction and for combining theological study with other areas.

Most notably, the Divinity School and the Graduate School of Education offer a joint program which trains secondary-school teachers who want a religious background. That program is the only officially organized joint degree, but students have found ways to combine the MTS with disciplines from law and education study to joint religion-politics courses.

Ann-Marie Marcialle, for instance, has carved out a four-year program which will give her a JD from the Law School and a Master's from the Divinity School. Concentrating on the concept of power as a legal and religious tool. Marcialle says she plans to become a public interest lawyer when she graduates and later move into politics.

Dean of Students Guy V. Martin says that although an increasing percentage of students have opted to become ordained when they graduate--90 percent of last year's M Div. class--he says he sees more students studying joint programs than ever before and more coming to the Divinity School in their 30's after beginning a career in law or medicine or other fields.

But while the school continues to grow in many directions, the central obstacle to a rosy future remains the shortage of money. Rupp makes no bones about the school's rough times. "I think there's a case to be made that we are the poorest school at Harvard. I think that between the Design School, the Graduate School of Education and the Divinity School, you could argue about which is the worst have-not." The challenge to the school, Rupp adds, is to attract the donations and keep down expenses, to insure that the school can continue to grow.