College Reacts Correctly to Theft

As Natalie J. Szerekes '97 is arraigned Friday for her alleged embezzlement of more than $7,500 from the Currier House Committee, the College has wisely decided to avoid a confrontation with students over the autonomy of student organizations.

Although Szekeres' alleged theft appalls us in its brashness and dishonesty, we believe the decision of Dean of the College Harry R. Lewis '68 to avoid stricter regulations is the only way to preserve Harvard students' freedom.

"We're not planning to change our policy if we can possibly avoid it," Lewis said in response to Szerekes' supposed deed. "I do think the autonomy of the student organizations can be maintained."

The temptation to implement stricter regulations on student group finances is great, especially in the wake of embezzlements that have occurred in the past few years. In the fiasco involving the Eliot House ice skating benefit An Evening with Champions, Charles K. Lee '93 and David G. Sword '93 confessed to taking $127,000 from the gala's accounts. In addition, the Krokodiloes general manager resigned after it was discovered he took $3,000 from the group.

Yet the key word here is "autonomy." Students at Harvard must be allowed to maintain control of their organizations, lest the clubs quickly become not "student groups" but "groups nominally run by students but really controlled by the administration."

Harsher financial controls for groups which have already been in trouble, such as a required yearly audit for An Evening with Champions, make sense. And if the administration would like to require internal audits for all student groups, instead of the somewhat flimsy annual financial reports required now (official bank statements not needed), we would not object. After all, former Perspective president Joshua A. Feltman '95 said last year that such annual reports were "kind of a joke," and other student leaders echoed his assessment.

But anything beyond a routine audit infringes on students' rights to control their own organizations. In addition, the costs of prevention, of College administrators as police officers, outweigh the benefits. Student groups with fishy finances must be held responsible for their actions. The administration does have a place in law enforcement once it is discovered that laws have been broken.

Presently, the Dean of Students' office runs short financial accounting seminars for student groups which help them maintain and organize their bank accounts. These should be better publicized as a preventative measure.

In the future, we hope Harvard students will be smart enough to realize that if they embezzle thousands of dollars from a group bank account, they will eventually get caught. They might as well learn it here before they get to the real world. And we hope that Harvard students will live up to the trust that has been placed in them.