I Second That Emotion

For many Harvard students, Valentine’s Day passed unceremoniously, a bleak reminder of their single status. Turns out that Harvard’s dating scene is so notoriously weak that the Undergraduate Council has decided to take action: they’ve formed a task force. Council representative Sungmi A. Choi ’06 will head a dating subcommittee under the aegis of the Campus Life Committee (CLC).

“We always talk about how there’s a lack of dating here,” Choi says. While debaucherous late-night hookups and serious long-term relationships are common, there is very little going on in between, she explains.

“Dating is pretty abysmal at Harvard,” adds CLC Chair Michael R. Blickstead ’05. “We realized it was a problem, so we created a subcommittee to tackle it.”

It all began with Choi and her Holworthy suitemates Camille E. Powe ’06 and Beth E. M. McMillen ’06. Dismayed by the lackluster dating scene, McMillen drafted a bill, which Choi brought before the CLC. “Initially, the idea was for a kind of dating stipend,” Choi says. Though the stipend plan did not pan out, the CLC was enthusiastic about creating a subcommittee to battle Harvard’s dating crisis. Council President Rohit Chopra ‘04 writes in an e-mail, “I always say that as arousing as an IOP forum or an a capella concert might be, there’s definitely a need for more excuses to ask people out.”

The subcommittee will plan activities designed to increase dating by “encouraging people to meet someone new,” Choi says. Among the subcommittee’s projects for this semester is an electronic matchmaker service, based on the one used by the Asian American Association (AAA) for their annual Screw Your Roommate dance. The AAA service allows students to set up their friends with dates on a website. The couple then receives an e-mail informing them that they’ve been “screwed.” The Council version of the service would expand beyond a single dance. “We’re thinking about keeping it open year round,” Choi says, adding that the committee welcomes any suggestions for further solutions.

Choi says reactions from her peers have been mostly positive.  “Some people think it’s funny to have an official subcommittee on dating, but most people are like, ‘Yes, finally! We need more dating at Harvard!’”