Business Rules To Face Review

College administrators are putting together an “informal” committee to review the College’s relationship with student-run businesses and organizations, administrators confirmed this week.

And although student business leaders said that the College currently has a minimal relationship with student businesses, administrators this week were mum as to what reforms the committee might recommend.

“It has been roughly five years since the rules pertaining to student businesses were changed and the Student Business Advisory Committee was formed,” wrote Associate Dean of the College Judith H. Kidd in an e-mail.

All student businesses that operate on campus are subject to approval from the Business Advisory Committee, which is chaired by Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71, according to the Handbook for Students.

“It is standard practice to review new initiatives after five years to see whether they are working as planned and whether they need to be tweaked to better achieve our goals,” wrote Kidd. “If any changes are recommended they will be submitted to Dean Gross for review.”

Gross wrote in an e-mail that the committee would review “policies, which were established some time ago in a different business world.”

Harvard Student Agencies (HSA) President Brian Feinstein ’07 said that the College maintains minimal contact with student businesses.

“Our relationship with the University in terms of specifics works on an ad hoc basis,” he said.

Feinstein added that the relationship between HSA and the University is currently limited to work on the Harvard Pub Commission.

The student organization’s bylaws require that University officials sit on its board of directors. Six University officials currently serve on the HSA board, including Harvard College Director of Financial Aid Sally C. Donahue, according to the HSA website.

Kidd had previously served on the HSA board but resigned.

Despite the presence of Harvard officials in the HSA leadership, Feinstein denied that HSA receives favored status.

“HSA has no involvement, no voice, and no ability to influence the decisions of the University on whether or not it allows student businesses on campus,” Feinstein said. “If you want to start a business on campus, you have to submit an application to a committee. We don’t know when that committee meets, we don’t know who is on that committee.”

But Michael E. Kopko ’07, co-founder of DormAid, a student-run cleaning service that was launched in 2004, said that the College’s close relationship with HSA makes it difficult for new student businesses to get off the ground.

“It is particularly tough for young businesses to get started when they don’t have those relationships started,” Kopko said. “They have to really earn their credibility, which is required of all businesses.“

It is unclear what policies, if any, will change with the review.

According to the Handbook for Students, “Harvard permits undergraduates to undertake modest levels of business activities on campus.”

Kopko said he did not know what the committee might discuss, although he hoped that it would outline “a much more clearly defined path of approval” for student businesses.

“Their policies are fine,” he said. “I think in general, [they should] state the philosophy that entrepreneurship is fundamentally a good thing. I don’t think that comes across.”

—Staff writer Alexander D. Blankfein can be reached at ablankf@fas.harvard.edu