They Never Left Harvard

Classmates such as Robert E. Cook, Howard Georgi, Peter B. Zimmerman, Harry R. Lewis and Nancy E. Kleckner won't have far to travel to their 25th reunion.

They are already here, having returned to Harvard to pursue their careers and carry on their lives.

Some of these alums from the Class of 1968 have come back to teach, like Lewis, who is McKay professor of computer science. Some have come back to manager, like Vic A. Koivumaki III, who as executive director of the Harvard Law School Association and secretary for alumni affairs is responsible for linking up Law School graduates.

Some, like Cook, have come back to do both. Cook is Arnold professor of dendrology and director of the Arnold Arboretum.

"When I was an undergraduate I saw Harvard with one set of eyes," says Cook, "and when I was a professor I saw things with another set of eyes, and now, as an administrator, I see things with a third set of eyes."

"And right now I see a place that has maintained its intellectual diversity while pushing itself to maintain a level of greatness," Cook says.

Kleckner, professor biochemistry and molecular biology, never really left.

She studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology after graduating from Radcliffe, and then returned to this end of Cambridge, only to remain permanently.

"Harvard has one of the best departments in the country in my field," she says. "And it was easier to stay here than to look for a position somewhere else."

Like Kleckner, Assistant Professor of Statistics Alan Zaslavsky came to Harvard through graduate studies at MIT.

"It was totally coincidental," he says. "I never would have believed that I would ever be back here when I graduate 25 years ago."

Zaslavsky says that the strong connections he had formed with members of the faculty brought him back here, in addition to the prestige of the institution.

Lewis concurs that, when offered a position on the faculty, "the chance to work at one of the premier institutions in the nation is fairly irresistible."

"It's like what a lot of students say about accepting Harvard's offer of admission over those of other schools," he says. "When Harvard wants you, you don't turn them down."

Alumni also cite the "unique opportunities" Harvard affords to members of its community as incentives to return.

Henry Lee, executive director of the Energy and Environmental Policy Center in the Kennedy School of Government, attributes his 1979 return to Harvard to the "sheer quality of opportunities Harvard had to offer in my field."

"A better question is why I stayed," he says. "Harvard is unequalled as a place for someone who has an electric mind, for someone who is willing to explore a wide variety of intellectual ideas."

Lee and other alums who have found their way back to Harvard agree that "Harvard-Radcliffe" has become more open and tolerant since 1968. When recalling the past, they say "Harvard" or "Radcliffe."

"In '68 in many ways Harvard was very much a boys' school," Zaslavsky says. "It took me a while not to do a double take every time I'd see a woman walking out of a house."

"Today the concept of the Harvard community is much broader," Cook says. "The administration is more open, democratic and responsive, embracing diversity rather than shying away from it as we had done in the past."

Perhaps Arthur S. Lipkin, research associate in education, is in a position to be most personally aware of the increase in tolerance which has evolved both on campus and off.

After teaching at Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School for 20 years, Lipkin returned to Harvard "hoping to find the kind of nurturing place where I could do the kind of research I wanted to."

So far, Harvard has met his expectations, fostering his continued involvement with the Harvard-Radcliffe Gay and Lesbian Caucus.

"Harvard welcomes diversity in a way that it didn't back in the '60s," he says. "Rather than the more fragile institution it seemed to be back then, I think Harvard is much stronger now."

Returnees say they see a new Harvard, one which is more free of the tension and strife which tainted their undergraduate careers and the world at the time.

"One of the things that sets Harvard today apart is the memory of 1968, which was not a very happy time," Lewis says.

"The [Vietnam] War was just an overwhelming thing which dominated the feelings of my class," he says.

"People had to make difficult and destructive choices, partly because they didn't have certain options," Lewis says.

To avoid the draft, students who might have benefited from taking time off were forced to remain in school, says Lewis.

"That led to a lot of people wasting a lot of time," he says. "Whereas today there is a certain freedom which is a very good freedom to have."

Lipkin says that while his undergraduate years were a very trying time as students dealt with the war, the draft and a pair of assassinations, "threats that face students today are not as immediate."

Zaslavsky agrees. "There is no anti-war movement, and therefore the political activism is less militant and confrontational, which, to me, is progress," he says.

Still, change comes slowly at Harvard, and alumni identify the threat of institutional inertia as the University's greatest challenge.

"Unfortunately, the self-importance and basic elitist flavor of Harvard is one thing that has not changed," Zaslavsky says.

"There are both positive and inevitable changes," he says. "Institutions change because they have to.

"Hopefully, the people around Harvard and Radcliffe are smart enough to realize that it doesn't help to wait until change is forced down your throat," he says.

Lee says delaying change has its costs, but he adds that when the change does come at Harvard, "It takes root and holds."

Lipkin would contend that there are some needed changes yet to be addressed by the administration.

"I don't know that the course offerings right now reflect what they could in terms of gender and gay and lesbian studies," he says.

"But we are moving forward," he adds. "The Afro-American Studies Department provides a challenging model for us to move forward, through encouraging and supporting gay and lesbian research and scholarship."

Above all, however, the alumni who have returned to Harvard and Radcliffe exude a pride in their connection to the University, and in their roles in maintaining, even furthering, the quality of education offered by the institution.

"When I was an undergraduate, someone told me that the value of my degree in 25 years would depend on Harvard's role in the world then," says Koivumaki. "I am proud to be working here, trying to maintain the excellence we exhibit in 1993."

Echoing Koivumaki's sentiments. Cook says that he sees his loyalty to Harvard as something of a restitution for what he gained from his undergraduate experience.

Even more than restitution, the question of esteem remains for members of the class of 1968 who have returned to pursue careers at Harvard Radcliffe.

For Lee and his classmates, familiarity does not breed contempt. "The more I've been affiliated with Harvard, the more respect I have for the quality of the Harvard experience."