The History of Alternative Senior Gifts

Senior Gift Plus may have a catchy name, but it’s not the first campaign to contend with Senior Gift. In the past 10 years, alternative senior gift campaigns have supported causes ranging from the tenuring of more women and minorities to supporting the Cambridge Boys and Girls Club.

1997

Megan L. Peimer ’97 and Ezra W. Reese ’97 established an Alternative Senior Gift campaign, which asked students to withhold Senior Gift donations from the University and hold them in private accounts until Harvard hired more women and minorities as tenured Faculty.

2000

Joshua A. Edelman ’00 and Greg A. Novak ’00 created an Alternative Senior Gift campaign, which allowed seniors to donate to needy charities instead of contributing to Senior Gift.

2004

Anne G. Beckett ’04, Rachel S. Bloomekatz ’04, Celeste R. LeCompte ’04 and Amy C. Wagner ’04 established an Alternative Senior Gift campaign in order to raise money for the Cambridge Boys and Girls Club. Tamiko A. Tsurudome ’04, Senior Gift co-chair, claimed that the Alternative Senior Gift campaign detracted from the effectiveness of Senior Gift. The founders of the Alternative Senior Gift campaign claimed that they had no problem with students donating to both gift campaigns.