Cleaning Toilets for the Core

AFTER A FIRST YEAR marked by a conspicuous lack of courses that counted for anything, I was experiencing a touch of academic angst. I had cores and concentration requirements to fulfill, people to meet and places to go. I had nightmares throughout the summer about Dean of the College L. Fred Jewett '57 flogging me with my Plan of Study under the Statue of the Three Lies while students chanted "Six courses a semester" over and over again.

When I got to school two weeks ago, I knew I had to come up with creative ways to get my first year of Harvard to count for something, and fast. For peace of mind and soundness of body, I had to get this Core Curriculum monkey off my back. So I decided to petition to get my work on Dorm Crew last spring to count for Core credit.

I can just see it listed in the course-book as "Social Analysis 50: Harvard Dorm Crew and the Proletarian Life." The course description would read as follows:

"Examines the basic dynamics of dominance, submission and cleanliness in the context of taking out trash, sweeping, damp-dusting, spot-washing, and waxing Harvard students' rooms, and scrubbing their toilets. Note: This course consists of two intensive weeks before and after Commencement. Sign up in Weld Basement."

Now don't get me wrong. I am not making fun of Dorm Crew because I did not like the work. Personality, I could clean toilets all day--with the right music, the right pair of industrial strength gloves and just the right mix of volatile chemicals. Can I help it if Dorm Crew is manual labor in the spirit of the Core?

My experience last spring taught me valuable lessons in sociology, psychology and economics. From that first very hot, then rainy and then very cold day in May when I got my cleaning assignment. I had a strange feeling that something was wrong.

"You will clean Currier House," the note read. "And you will make it shine like the top of the Chrysler Building." When I got my rooming assignment for Matthews North, the sly tricks of my employers became clear to me. The Dorm Crew Powers-That-Be were trying to isolate me from my fellow workers and alienate me from my home and work. They wanted to prevent me from socializing with my peers and thus agitating for better working conditions.

STUDENTS LIVED IN isolated corners of campus--in Matthews, Greenough, Mather and the Quad. And the dorms we cleaned had no relation to where we lived. Once, walking up to Currier, I bumped into a friend who was living in Mather and cleaning Cabot and then bumped into one of her friends who was living in the Quad and cleaning Mather. The first few days were tough--I felt lost and alone.

To add to my considerable stress, we dorm crew workers had to put all of our possessions on our beds before going to work, so we could never quite feel unpacked and settled in our rooms. Even worse, we had to survive amidst constant rumors that we'd all be moved to Mather at the end of the first week. More trauma.

At first, my only solace was my buddies on the crew. We were a scrappy bunch at currier House. But as soon as we got too close we were separated by our captain--a tyrant named Josh who exhibited classic manifestations of short man's complex (one of the many valuable psychology lessons Dorm Crew has to offer).

By the third day, my partner and I were openly defiant: whistling, singing work songs, playing "two lies and a truth" and, most importantly, working the kinks out of a system where you can clean a whole Currier single without ever having to stand up. The next day, I was moved to Holworthy, and she to Thayer. A nascent workers' union was ripped asunder by Dorm Crew superiors and the historically significant Holworthy-Thayer feud.

After my initial trials, the lessons became more topically specific. One day I learned the ins and outs of anal retentiveness. Early in the morning, one of my many captains looked at my toilets and said something to the effect of, "Okay, Dan. Really, okay. But not okay enough. Now I know you can't see the dirt, but I can. So you should keep scrubbing for another hour or so until the toilet water has no bitter aftertaste."

Later that morning, one of my new partners asked me how I spot-washed the walls. I told her I looked for spots on the walls, and if I saw any, I washed them. She looked me in the eye, bit her lip, pointed at me and snarled, "No! You must spot wash left to right. Left to right!" She never talked to me again--only gave me scary looks.

After lunch, a Dorm Crew bigwig--I think it was the "Generalissimo," but it could just as easily have been the "Czar" or "Grand Poobah"--taught my crew how to wax floors. To wax correctly, one must saturate one's mop with wax and then squeeze exactly 70 percent of the wax back into the bucket. There is no other correct method.

Another day, I learned all about negative reinforcement. One of my many captains, another weenie by the name of Josh, caught my partner and me loafing for just a minute one afternoon after sweeping a very dusty, but very artsy, Adams House suite.

The next morning he announced that everyone except my partner and me was shipping out to Claverly. Mike and I were to report from now on not to a Dorm Crew captain, but to Manny and Tyrone, the Adams House janitors. For the remainder of the week, our job was to clean as many bathrooms as we could. (We did 15 or 20.)

EVEN THOUGH wallowing in feces for eight hours a day is not my idea of fun, working in Adams House had its moments. Manny and Tyrone were great bosses, not petty and immature like Josh and Josh. And some of the Adams House bathrooms were truly works of art. One particularly memorable john had "I Love You" scrawled in the toilet bowl with a substance not of this world. Maybe I should also get Lit and Arts C credit for trying to clean that bathroom. I can only hope that non-ordered choice does not ruin the character of Adams House powder rooms.

Aside from the aesthetics of Dorm Crew, there were other, more positive lessons in topics like redistribution of wealth. I appreciate the people who bequeathed me posters and postcards, a pair of Doc Martens shoes and a Boston Bruins jersey. And I also appreciate the large paycheck.

So there it is. Dorm Crew teaches you lessons you could only get by taking Social Analysis 10 ("Principles of Economics"), Social Analysis 38 ("Social Stratification") and Social Analysis 44 ("Individual and Social Responsibility"). In Dorm Crew, you don't just study Social Analysis--you live it.

Dorm Crew offers all the basics of a Social Analysis class: Sociology, psychology and meaningless work.