Students Present Articles to Overseers

When the members of the University's Board of Overseers held one of their regular meetings this weekend, a group of undergraduates presented them with a packet of 15 articles from various campus publications, dealing with issues such as Core reform, section size, minority hiring and the Alternative Senior Gift Fund.

The packet contained new articles from The Crimson, Diversity and Distinction, Perspective and The Salient, as well as a report on the Core endorsed by the Undergraduate Council.

It also included personal essays on pre-professionalism, coping with poverty at Harvard and the University administration.

The students compiled the packet to "get the Overseers to think more about undergraduate issues, to realize more the value of student opinion," according to Ian T. Simmons '98-'99, the project's coordinator.

"The discussions they have directly relate to the quality of decisions [the University] makes and [to] the culture of governance," Simmons said.

"Right now the culture of governance is very exclusionary of student participation in decision-making," he said.

Simmons said he saw "an egregious need" for the packet because he believes it is important for undergraduates to interact with the University's administration.

"Students really care about these issues and their opinions are not necessarily predictable," he said.

Renee M. Landers '77, president of the University's Board of Overseers, said the packets were handed out at the meeting but were not discussed.

She said she appreciated the undergraduates' effort to communicate with and inform the Overseers.

"Overall, I'm impressed by how thoughtful the students are and [by the extent to which] a great many of them see the complexity of some of the issues that the College is confronting," she said.

Landers added that she receives a subscription of The Crimson at her Washington office and reads it to keep abreast of events on campus. She said she did not know whether all of the board's 30 members read campus publications.

According to Landers, the Overseers advise the President and Provost of the University, vote on the senior officers and participate in the selection process for the members of the Harvard Corporation.

She said the Overseers do not have a decision-making role in curriculum issues.

"That's really the Faculty's concern. We're not experts in education," Landers said.

"The overseers like to be informed about curriculum development and to know that there's been thoughtful attention to curriculum design and to advising for students," she said.

Landers also said that the Overseers, who must approve faculty appointments, "would like to see the diversity of the faculty improved over time."

Council Funds Project

According to Lamelle D. Rawlins '99, the President of the Undergraduate Council, the executive board voted on Friday to allocate $50 to pay for the production of the packet.

Rawlins said she hopes the project will be the first in a long line of communication between undergraduates and the Overseers.