Pluralism Enters the Mainstream

September

19--Harvard registers students and distributes pamphlets containing its most direct statement to date on anti-gay harassment. In a related move, the College names Janet A. Viggiani assistant dean for coeducation, and announces that six house masters have named resident tutors for bisexual, gay and lesbian issues.

October

5--Architects confirm the College is considering a "student center" at Memorial Hall. Venturi, Rauch and Scott Brown will draft a feasibility study on a dining hall for freshpersons and meeting spaces. Dean of the College L. Fred Jewett '57 describes the proposal as at the "dreaming stage."

23, 30--By overwhelming majorities, the Undergraduate Council calls on the final clubs to admit women and on Harvard to stop contesting the spring union election of the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers. Both resolutions signal the political birth of the council.

November

7--House masters announce a new lottery proposal introducing random assignment to the houses after nearly 20 years of assignment based on student choice. The measure answers rising concerns of polarizing stereotypes in the houses.

10--A Crimson poll shows 49.4 percent of students favor opening the final clubs to women, with 41.8 percent opposing. Men outpace women in their support of opening the clubs.

December

Results of a major survey on College life of more than 2500 undergraduates last spring are released, in three parts.

4--The Undergraduate Council overwhelmingly votes against the masters' new housing plan.

7--A Harvard employee is raped at midday in the Science Center, sending a charge of anger and fear throughout the College.

9--After a demonstration by women's groups, uniformed security guards replace student checkers at the Science Center.

12--Dean of Students Archie C. Epps III calls on the Harvard University Police Department to review campus security, the possibility of extending its one-car escort service, and to check the lighting of the Yard.

January

10--The Undergraduate Council presents administrators with a petition of 2379 student signatures urging Harvard to improve minority and women faculty recruitment, calling for new appoinments and affirmative action mechanisms.

15--The discovery of racial slurs painted on the walls of the laundry room in the basement of Matthews Hall provokes student outrage and condemnation by administrators. "KKK," "Die Niggers" and "Niggers suck" are among the messages painted over.

19--It is disclosed that a freshperson male was charged with indecent assault and battery in December for sexually molesting a woman in his dormitory while she slept. In November, another freshperson woman was molested in her room by an unidentified man who gained access to a dormitory by posing as a student.

February

1--Dean Jewett announces plans to proceed with 25 percent randomization of houses in the annual freshperson lottery, beginning this March. The plan emerges as a compromise among masters, and only eight of 12 agree to participate. Students express frustration at being ignored.

3--The first mega-conference of area student minority groups begins at Harvard, bringing together approximately 600 students of Black, Mexican, Asian, Puerto Rican and Native American descent from several Ivy League and New England colleges.

9--Yardlings present a petition of more than 1200 signatures opposing the new house lottery plan.

16--About 200 people rally before University Hall demanding action by the Verba Committee on recommendations to improve minority and women faculty hiring. The Undergraduate Council, Minority Students Alliance and Woman's Alliance co-sponsor the protest.

16--Complaints from departments and graduate students of inconvenience prevent a new security program from being implemented at the Science Center.

21--AWARE Week begins, marking the College's major effort at addressing racism on campus and improving race relations. After a promising start, the week of activities--often numbering several panel discussions a day--loses momentum. In the end, activities addressing "racism among the well-intentioned" are questioned about their success at reaching those at whom they are targeted.

24--Gay and lesbian students hold a "kiss-in" protest at Mather House dining hall after a gay man reports he was harassed the weekend before for making advances on a high school senior. The alleged harassment and the kiss-in polarize much of the house.

March

2--Dean Jewett, ending days of speculation, reverses the proposed freshperson housing lottery plan. Abandoned only nine days before it was scheduled to begin, the plan collapses after a majority of masters turn against the idea.

But the dean promises to forward a plan calling for at least 50 percent randomization of all houses in the fall.

5--After the first of what will become a series of assaults on undergraduates near the Yard, three local men aged 19 to 22 are arrested for beating at least two students in Harvard Square on a weekend night.

12--A Harvard senior and his woman friend are assaulted walking between Grays and Weld Halls on Harvard Yard. The confrontation with Cambridge youths takes place in a dimly lighted segment of the Yard pointed out to College officials as unsafe only weeks earlier.

A second attack by the same group of youths is reported, this time in front of Widener Library. The student, who is taken to UHS and released, says a special police telephone on the Yard failed to work properly and may have led to the escape of the perpetrators.

15--Two Black students, in an affair which ignites the Black community at Harvard, charge racial harassment by Cambridge police after being ordered off a University shuttle bus and searched without explanation or apology. Andre L. Williams '89 and Craig A. Cochrane '91 say they were singled out because of their color. Police say they mistook the pair running to catch the bus for a white suspect in a nearby convenience story robbery.

21--About 250 people protest the shuttle bus incident on Harvard Yard. Vice President and General Counsel Daniel Steiner '54 and Dean Epps apologize to the students and issue messages to Cambridge and Harvard police.

April

1--The Harvard hockey team wins the University's second NCAA title and first since 1904 with a 4-3 overtime victory over Minnesota at St. Paul.

2--Cochrane and Williams, after an apology and concessions by City Manager Robert Healey, agree to drop their harassment complaint.

9--More than 900 undergraduates travel to the March on Washington for abortion rights, joining between 300,000 and 600,000 demonstrators on the eve of the Supreme Court reconsideration of Roe v. Wade.

22--Police recordings requested by The Crimson under the Freedom of Information Act show that the police who searched the two Black students on the shuttle in March were told twice beforehand the suspect was a single white male.

23--In a move that shocks the campus and freezes virtually all other activity, the Undergraduate Council votes 41-24 to ask Harvard to reinstitute ROTC.

24--A new activist group--the Anti-ROTC Action Committee (ARAC)--forms and plans a week of protest. Within the council, the liberal Services Committee suggests the ROTC resolution is unconstitutional because of the military's discrimination against gays and lesbians, and urges a re-vote.

26--About 300 people rally against ROTC in Harvard Yard.

28--Black students Cochrane and Williams decide to file a formal harassment complaint against Cambridge police, citing dissatisfaction with Healey, who they say failed to follow through with his promises.

30--The council repeals its resolution on ROTC, 43-39, but discussion on conditions for ROTC's return turn into chaos when Ken Lee cuts off debate.

May

7--The council votes to table further ROTC discussion to the fall.

7--The council discloses that its spring concert, featuring Suzanne Vega, lost $20,000 because it failed to sell out 3000-seat Bright Arena. Council officials blame the ROTC crisis for cutting short advertising.

12--Arnold Brown '89 is arrested for allegedly kicking a man with his foot after being hit by his car. Brown, who is Black, charges racial harassment and says officers preferentially interviewed white witnesses and made racist remarks during his arrest.

18--Harvard announces its yield for the Class of '93 to be 71 percent, 1 percent off last year's level. Asian-American students amount to over 17.4 percent of the class, a record by 3 percent over previous levels. Minority student representation reaches 32 percent, also a record, about a point and a half above earlier levels. Hispanic students also were admitted at record highs, and reached about 6 percent of the class. Black student representation, however, remains set at about 8 percent.