Dean William C. Kirby's
Annual Letter to the Faculty

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Dear Colleagues:

For four years now, it has been my privilege to serve you and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences as dean. Together, we have achieved a great deal. Indeed we still have much work ahead of us, for we have set in motion plans that are transforming this institution. As I report on the past year and reflect on the past four years, I want to thank you for your counsel, your hard work, your excellence in teaching and research, and your dedicated citizenship of this Faculty.

The academic year 2004-2005 and the events of this past winter have been unexpectedly challenging. Last year, we engaged in public debates on the diversity of our community, the particular challenges of women in science and women in academia more generally, and broader questions of governance across the University. These discussions led to outcomes that few of us could have predicted.

As you know, I announced this January that I would return to the Faculty at the end of this academic year. President Lawrence Summers decided the following month that he would step down at the end of this semester. Our past and soon interim president, Derek Bok, is now leading the search for the next FAS dean, while the Corporation and the Board of Overseers begin the process of appointing a new president.

During this period of transition, I know that the priorities of this institution will endure. We believe, first and foremost, in achieving excellence in everything we undertake. We seek to make Harvard College the premier college of liberal arts and sciences in this country, and to maintain its central position at the heart of this great research university. We strive to support and mentor our graduate students in ways that will enable them to become truly distinguished scholars. We aim to ensure Harvard's role as a leader in the sciences, in international studies, and the arts, to mention but three areas of recent emphasis. And we envision a Harvard that is more than the sum of its many parts, across both sides of the Charles River, and, in many fields, spanning the globe. These objectives have been broadly shared across the University: from the president, to this dean, to the Faculty as a whole.

I salute this Faculty for persisting in doing the business of this institution. In our review of undergraduate education, we have continued to refine our proposals for change, but we have also begun to implement new measures in the curriculum. In our expansion of the Faculty, we continue to hire the best minds in each field. Yet we are also working to mentor, promote, and otherwise support the faculty who are already our colleagues. In our development of the campus, construction is still underway at several sites in Cambridge, and we continue to plan for Allston. But we now also study, work, socialize, and exercise in newly built or renovated spaces.

Life continues in all these areas of the FAS--driven by the students, faculty, and staff who make up this dynamic institution.

It is my honor to report on the events of 2004-2005, and to record what we have achieved in our four years together.

HARVARD COLLEGE

The past four years have brought major change to nearly every aspect of College life.

In the first year of my deanship, we launched Harvard's first review of undergraduate education in approximately three decades; it has spawned multiple recommendations and actions. At the same time, we created the Office of International Programs, which has expanded dramatically our students' international opportunities--in and beyond the classroom. And over the past two years, we have been reshaping our teaching of science. Dedicated faculty members have created a new series of integrated courses in the life and physical sciences; these take the place of the introductory courses of the last generation.

We attended as a college to student health and well-being, convening three task forces to review the ways we deal with sexual misconduct issues, mental health, and alcohol at Harvard, respectively. These task forces did extremely good work. In response to their findings, we created the Office of Sexual Assault Prevention and Response, we reorganized the services of the Bureau of Study Counsel and Mental Health Services into one unit, and we implemented a broad set of initiatives aimed at reducing dangerous drinking at Harvard.

In the arts, we have built a new Dance Center, expanded our facilities for film and video, and we are constructing a New College Theatre. We are creating other spaces for student extracurricular activities, as I will describe in more detail below.

Moreover, our students now live in dormitories with wireless connectivity, and they work in libraries that have been renewed in many ways. And our athletic facilities, such as the Malkin Athletic Center (MAC) and the Hemenway Gym, have undergone substantial renovations.

Benedict Gross, Leverett Professor of Mathematics and Dean of Harvard College, has been a dynamic leader and strong partner in these projects and others, and has represented well the undergraduate perspective.

For all this change, one thing has remained almost unnervingly the same. The quality of our undergraduates yearly exceeds our highest expectations. Below is a look at this year's freshman class.

Admissions

The Class of 2009 emerged from the largest applicant pool (22,796) and the most competitive admission rate (9.2 percent) in the history of the College. Over 78 percent of those admitted chose to attend Harvard. This yield remains, by a substantial margin, the highest among the nation's selective colleges.

This Class is diverse. For the second time in Harvard's history, there are more women--two, to be precise!--than men in the entering class. African-Americans comprise nine percent of the Class, Asian-Americans are 19 percent, seven percent are Latino, and just over one percent is Native American. Eighteen percent of the Class, up from 17.5 percent last year, are foreign citizens, U.S dual citizens, or U.S permanent residents. The Class of 2010, we now know, will be more diverse still.

Thanks to the Harvard Financial Aid Initiative (HFAI), which has made clear that "you don't have to be rich to go to Harvard," the Class of 2009 is the most economically diverse in the College's history. Twenty-two percent more freshmen this year are benefiting from the HFAI than in its inaugural year. We will continue to do our part to close the socioeconomic gap in this country between those who go to college and those who do not. Starting with the Class of 2010, we will extend the Initiative further still.

All told, two-thirds of Harvard undergraduates receive some form of financial aid, including scholarships, loans, and jobs. Fifty percent of the student body receive need-based scholarships from Harvard. Harvard spent more than $84 million this past year on undergraduate scholarships alone; next year that figure will top $90 million, with an average total student aid package of more than $30,000.

Hurricane Katrina

This past fall, we were reminded that Harvard is part of a broader academic community.

Hurricane Katrina hit the United States in August 2005. It devastated parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. It displaced thousands of residents, many of them students who were at, or about to return to, school.

Two days after the levees in New Orleans broke, I asked the deans of Admissions and Financial Aid, and the deans of the College, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS), and the Division of Continuing Education (DCE) to open their doors to applications from students who could not return to their home institutions. I want to thank these offices, FAS Physical Resources, and the many faculty, staff, and students who offered housing and other forms of support.

Within days, we had enrolled 69 students in the FAS: 35 in the College, 13 in the GSAS, and 21 in the Extension School. We waived tuition, room, board, and fees, and in many cases of need, we paid for students' books and travel to and from Boston.

Our Visiting Students fared very well here, and they have returned to their home campuses with new academic experiences and many new friends. Harvard is grateful to to our Visiting Students for the talent and energy they brought to Cambridge; in return, numerous current Harvard students are working for the reconstruction of the Gulf region during this spring and the coming summer.

The Review of Undergraduate Education

Our review of undergraduate education is now in its third year. Where are we now?

In 2004-2005, following the recommendations of the April 2004 Report on the Harvard College Curricular Review, we formed seven student-faculty committees to look closely at these areas: the concentrations, general education, science and technology, pedagogy, advising and counseling, writing and speaking, and the possibility of a "January term."

By May 2005, six of the seven committees submitted reports and briefed the Faculty at our Faculty Meetings. This past fall, the seventh committee submitted its report, on general education. The recommendations of each group can be read in full at: http://www.fas.harvard.edu/curriculum-review/cr_committees.html.

These recommendations are the collective work of more than one hundred faculty colleagues and two dozen of our students. They have been discussed in Faculty Meetings and in other settings, and several recommendations have been revised in light of those discussions. In all, nearly 60 final recommendations have been prepared for the Faculty. They cover many fronts, but they share in common a guiding principle of the April 2004 Report:¹

[W]e seek to broaden the scope of a liberal education and to expand choices for Harvard College students, crafting an undergraduate curriculum that is defined less by the requirements that it places on students and more by the commitments that the Faculty makes to undergraduate education in the liberal tradition.

Let me comment briefly on several individual reports before returning to the larger picture.

The Committee on General Education proposes to replace the Core Program with a curriculum at once broad and deep, opening up the entire Courses of Instruction for the general education of our students, empowering departments to craft curricula for broader audiences, while summoning the Faculty to mount a new set of foundational courses to serve as portals to large and important areas of knowledge.

The Educational Policy Committee has reviewed the purpose, structure, timing, and scope of Concentrations. Its several recommendations--for example, of later concentration choice and the creation of secondary fields--aim to make the freshman year a time of true exploration, and the upper-class experience one of multiple immersions.

The Committee on Writing and Speaking argues for a more prominent place in our curriculum for the teaching of writing and speaking and for a major reorganization and renewal of our efforts in those domains.

The Committee on Science and Technology has set in motion a new set of introductory courses in the natural and applied sciences, the first fruit of which ripened this autumn, to considerable praise: Life Sciences 1a and 1b.

The Committee on Advising and Counseling addresses, in the most comprehensive report this Faculty has ever produced on the topic, our severe deficiencies in academic advising and suggests multiple paths to improvement, in the knowledge that greater freedom of choice only underscores the need for strong mentoring and advising.

The Committee on Pedagogical Improvement tells us how we can evaluate better teaching and learning across the College and how, as an undergraduate college at the center of a research university, we might further develop communities of learning.

And the Committee on a January Term imagines how, in the aftermath of a possible University calendar change, this dark and cold month, to which our students currently return for weeks of unstructured time culminating in final examinations, might instead be a moment of imagination and innovation.

What common principles underlie all these efforts? There are several, and they are important.

From the beginning of this review, our most important aim has been to recommit our Faculty to the task of educating undergraduates. Harvard grew into a major research university over the course of the past century. Faculty time and energy has naturally been drawn to graduate education and to professional activities beyond the Yard. Yet Harvard College remains at the heart of our enterprise, attracting the best students in the world and setting standards for excellence across and beyond the University.

We recommit ourselves, further, to liberal education. Liberal education presumes a broad education that liberates the individual in several ways: by offering opportunities for foundational knowledge, reflection and analysis, artistic creativity, and an appreciation for the precision of scientific concepts and experiments. It emphasizes Bildung over Übung, resisting pressures for early specialization and professionalization. Professional education is in the proud tradition of many fine universities, but it is not the mission of Harvard College. Our students will devote some significant part of their time to special and concentrated learning, but we aspire above all that they graduate as curious, reflective, and independent thinkers with a commitment to serve the wider world and a lifetime of learning still before them. That is what we mean when we welcome our graduates to the "fellowship of educated women and men."

Our students will enter a globalizing world of national conflicts, of scientific advance and moral challenge, of political choice and economic uncertainty, of artistic imagination and cultural repression. There is no "one-size-fits-all" educational menu for such alternative futures, nor would one be appropriate for the enormously diverse talents that comprise the student body at Harvard College. Thus, while there are of course many curricular routes to liberal education, our reports suggest a curriculum of choice, incentive, and opportunity more than one of restriction and requirement. They aim to allow our students to shape their education, even as it gives departments and individual faculty greater responsibility in helping to shape it. It permits our curriculum to evolve as areas of knowledge advance.

Required courses have captive audiences and, as we have seen in our previous curricular reforms, short intellectual half-lives. If our new, foundational curriculum in the life, physical, and engineering sciences is to succeed, let it be because it is better conceived and better taught, not because any one part of it is unavoidable. If new Courses in General Education are to make their mark in the lineage of great Harvard courses, let it be because they are great courses, not because they are mandated. If, as we expect, the study of the broader world and the languages spoken in it continues to expand, let this be not because of enlarged requirements (for true fluency no requirement could be large enough) but as a result of new opportunities at home and abroad that will make every Harvard undergraduate degree one with a deeply international imprint.

The reforms suggested in our reports make it clear that a liberal education must be the shared endeavor of faculty and students alike. It is an education fostered not only in classrooms and laboratories but also by individualized conversation and advising. The most consistent--and most accurate--criticism of a Harvard education today is that student-faculty contact is much too limited. Our Core Program funnels too many students into too few courses that are on the whole too big. Our current system of concentrations decants too many students, much too early, into too few concentrations that are also too large. Our academic culture is too often one of mutual avoidance between student and teacher.

Taken together, our expansion of the Faculty, the growth of Freshman Seminars, the opening up of general education, the delay in the timing of concentration choice, and the proposal for secondary fields all have behind them the purpose of bringing our students and faculty together in intensive, inescapable ways, making it possible--indeed making it expected--that students and faculty can engage in small-group settings from the first year to the last. Only if we succeed in this effort can we hope to contest the view that the better part of a Harvard education lies outside the classroom.

Finally, we should bear in mind how much we have accomplished already. We have made great progress in expanding the Faculty, which I describe in greater detail below. We have indeed expanded the Freshman Seminar Program; we now offer enough seminars to accommodate the entire freshman class. To give our students an education in the broader world, we have increased opportunities and aid for international study. Now more than half of our students pursue a significant international experience before graduation. To promote deeper scientific understanding, we have launched and are further planning parts of a fundamentally new science curriculum, with new portal courses and four new concentrations. To better mentor and support our students, we are overhauling completely the structures of academic advising in the College. And the Faculty has now approved the concentration reforms recommended by the Educational Policy Committee.

We have, of course, continued to debate and engage with one another, ever more deeply, regarding the importance of undergraduate education. I am proud that so many colleagues and students have taken part in the Working Groups of our first year and the review committees of the past eighteen months; that faculty and students alike have produced substantial essays on education at Harvard;² and that every department and concentration is now discussing curricular renewal.

International Study

Charles Dickens once said of American universities, inspired by a visit to Harvard: "above all, in their whole course of study and instruction, [they] recognize a world, and a broad one too, lying beyond the college walls."

Let me say more about international study.

In the past few years, the College has gone through a sea-change. The academic departments, area centers, and Office of International Programs have aggressively sought out study, research, and internship programs abroad that complement our Cambridge curriculum. We have simplified our administrative procedures, so that applying to study abroad no longer feels like a form of arcane punishment. The number of students studying abroad in term-time has tripled in the past few years; in the summer, it has quintupled.

Three years ago there were two international summer programs for Harvard students. Under the dynamic direction of Dean Robert Lue, the Harvard Summer School has launched a Great Leap Outward in its programs.

By last summer our students studied in ten programs, including the new Harvard-Beijing Academy, which alone enrolled 80 students whose immersion included living in the homes of Chinese hosts and performing public service in their communities. This coming summer there are 15 programs, in places ranging from Beijing to Bolivia, from Oxford to Abruzzo, from the Dominican Republic to the Czech Republic, from Sweden to Honduras. You can also find us in Paris, Rio, Bonn, Olympia, Seoul, Barcelona, Madrid, and Venice. This June we inaugurate our new program with Ca'Foscari University in Venice. Here Harvard students will join Ca'Foscari students in 20 courses taught by 23 Harvard and Ca'Foscari faculty, on growth and fiscal policy, international corporate finance, sustainable development, the ecology and economics of the lagoon, coastal zones and climate changes, the visual landscape of the Veneto, and many other subjects--including, for any who need it, "Survival Italian."

Across the four seasons of 2004-2005, 933 Harvard College students conducted study, research, internships, or work in countries other than the United States. Our goal is to bring that annual number to 1,650, a quarter of the College, so that by graduation every student has had a significant international experience.

Why is this important? Ours is a world of ever-greater contact between cultures and nations that are nevertheless distinct. We aim for substantive knowledge of cultures different from our own, but also the understanding of difference that comes from firsthand experience. This is an education that can only be gained from learning both in Cambridge and beyond it.

Student Life

The academic year 2004-2005 was a banner one for improving students' lives outside the classroom. The College worked hard to address student needs in their extracurricular, residential, and social lives.

Advising. Acting on the strong recommendation of the Curricular Review's Committee on Advising and Counseling, this past December the College created a new office for advising. It has also appointed its first Associate Dean for Advising Programs. Dean Monique Rinere will coordinate Harvard's multiple advising resources, foster greater faculty and student involvement, and improve and extend our academic advising for all Harvard College students.

24 hours! In response to student interest, including a helpful Undergraduate Council survey of study patterns, the College and Harvard College Library (HCL) launched a two-year pilot program this fall to keep Lamont Library open 24 hours a day, five days a week. We can also keep students awake; we are planning to create a café on Lamont's main floor.

Extracurricular Spaces. The Quad Library, occupying the first floor of the reconfigured Hilles Library, opened this past October. The top floors of Hilles will be redesigned as space for approximately 50 student organizations. This project adds 50,000 much-needed square feet for a wide range of student activities. At the same time, the basements of Thayer, Holworthy, and Canaday--which have housed many student organizations in increasingly "traditional," that is, grungy, quarters--will be renovated as common social spaces for freshmen, as group study space, and as offices for a Women's Center and for the Harvard Foundation for Intercultural and Race Relations.

The state-of-the-art Harvard Dance Center opened this fall in the Quadrangle Recreational Athletic Center. Meanwhile, demolition has concluded and foundation construction has begun for the New College Theater in the Hasty Pudding building. Once complete, this theater will be the only facility on campus dedicated exclusively to undergraduate theater production and students' professional development. Roughly 1,500 students each year take part in dance and in theater at Harvard. Now they will have facilities worthy of their talents.

The Pub at Loker Commons. Student social spaces outside of the Houses are few and far between. Loker Commons, happily, is one such place. The smashing success of six "pub nights" in 2004-2005--student band performances, with food and drink in Loker Commons--has led to more pub nights this year and a plan to redesign part of Loker Commons as a permanent student pub. The lines out the door, and the more than 5,500 students who attended these events last year, showed us how much our students crave fun, informal gatherings. (What a shock!)

Athletics. The FAS and Harvard Law School co-funded a major interior rehabilitation of Hemenway Gymnasium, which opened this fall to rave reviews. Students and staff now enjoy twice as much fitness equipment, state-of-the-art cardiovascular and weight machines, three international-size squash courts, air-conditioning, disabled access, and much more. Future renovations to the Malkin Athletic Center have been made possible through the MAC Challenge Fund. And plans are a-turf to put a synthetic field in Harvard Stadium; a seasonal bubble may be placed above the field, allowing it to be used not five Saturdays in autumn but 365 days a year.

Our teams played hard in 2004-2005, and many brought home victories. The men's and women's fencing teams won the NCAA championship for the first time in Harvard history. Both the men's and women's squash teams won Ivy League championships. The men's ice hockey team won the Ivy League title, and both their team and the women's team won the Eastern College Athletic Conference Hockey League tournament and advanced to the NCAA tournament.

Online Harvard. The College continues to make the transition from paper to electrons. This fall, students registered online, created course "shopping" schedules online, and built electronic study cards. They also received Electronic Communication Packets. These packets contained information from departments and other groups, tailored to each student's concentration, class year, and House affiliation. CUE Guide evaluations were also conducted in a web-based format for the first time in spring 2005. This method gave students more time for considered responses, and the very high participation rate has convinced the College to move the CUE fully online.

THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

Transitions. I wish to thank Peter Ellison, John Cowles Professor of Anthropology, for his outstanding leadership of the Graduate School for the past five years. During Dean Ellison's tenure, he radically improved graduate student financial aid; he encouraged the growth of the interfaculty Ph.D. programs; he worked tirelessly to develop better graduate student housing facilities; and he pursued ground-breaking fellowship agreements with other countries. I describe some of these achievements in more detail below. His successor, Dean Theda Skocpol, Victor S. Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology, has taken the reins of the Graduate School with vision and energy. I know she joins me in thanking Dean Ellison for his stewardship of GSAS.

Admissions. In 2004-2005, the Graduate School, like most of its peer institutions, experienced a dip in its applicant pool. The pool dipped three percent, from 9,522 in the previous year to 9,237. GSAS maintained its high selectivity and yield, accepting only 13 percent of the applicants, with a 61 percent rate of enrollment.

International Students. Notably, the dip in international applications was slight, compared to the significant drop in international applications in the previous two years. The decline from 2003 to 2005 was due largely to the 50 percent drop in applications from the People's Republic of China--a trend experienced at institutions across the United States. However, applications increased in 2005 from students in countries such as Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom, Israel, Korea, Japan, Singapore, and Taiwan.

Indeed, the entering class in fall 2005 had the largest number of international students--267--in the history of the Graduate School. The yield was an unprecedented 74 percent, compared to 68 percent in the previous year. We are pleased to report that the visa problems so notable after 9/11 have substantially diminished.

GSAS continues to attract leading students from around the world and continues to find new ways to fund them. In 2005, the Graduate School concluded a historic agreement with the Mexican government agency, CONACYT. We now fully support all Ph.D. students attending our programs from that country. We also recently reached an agreement to jointly fund doctoral students from the People's Republic of China.

Dissertation Fellowships. Fall 2005 marked another milestone in the history of GSAS financial aid. During his tenure as dean, Peter Ellison completely overhauled the GSAS financial aid system. Dean Skocpol is taking this commitment further still. The final element of Dean Ellison's plan was a guaranteed dissertation-completion fellowship. Starting with the entering class of fall 2005, every Ph.D. student in the humanities and social sciences will receive five full years of support, including a year of support at the dissertation-writing stage. I am grateful to President Summers for agreeing to co-sponsor this program in its initial stages.

This is an extraordinary development. It goes far to help Harvard attract the most outstanding young scholars. And this aid will enable students to complete their degrees on time, and perhaps even on budget. Degree and time requirements vary somewhat across fields, but I am reminded of the wise words of one of my colleagues in the History Department. Each year he tells the G-1s: "The point of graduate school is to get out!"

New Doctoral Programs. In its first year, the Integrated Life Sciences Program (HILS) generated an impressive increase in applicants to the biological sciences. The HILS program coordinates all 12 Ph.D. biology programs across four Harvard Schools--from biophysics to virology--under a faculty committee led by Professor Christopher T. Walsh, Hamilton Kuhn Professor of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology. The program addresses the powerful reality that collaboration across the disciplines lies at the heart of current life sciences research. Students can enter the Graduate School through one program and then migrate to labs across the FAS, Medical School, the School of Public Health, and the School of Dental Medicine. We are equally gratified by the success of the two newest Ph.D. programs, Systems Biology and Chemical Biology. They recorded impressive yields of 75 percent and 58 percent respectively.

Graduate Student Housing. Over the past four years, enormous progress has been made in providing more graduate student housing. The renovation of 29 Garden Street, the bold new structure at One Western Avenue, new housing in the Longwood area, and (now under construction) the Graduate Commons complex near the Charles River (on Banks Street and Cowperthwaite) improve greatly the housing opportunities for our graduate students and will help create new communities of scholars and families.

Graduate Policy Committee (GPC). The Graduate Policy Committee, modeled on the FAS's Educational Policy Committee, was created in fall 2005 to involve faculty in the oversight of Harvard's Ph.D. programs. GPC members advise Dean Skocpol on policies and resource allocations affecting all Ph.D. programs. They review admissions practices, advising systems, student life, curricular offerings and requirements, temporal guideposts and time to degree, and placement of degree holders.

In its first year, the Committee is considering data collection and analysis on programs in major divisions. It is also addressing policy issues, such as how to implement the recommendations of the Women's Task Forces that were formed last spring. By next year, if not earlier, the GPC plans to talk with individual programs about the wide range of issues described above.

THE FACULTY

It has been one of the highest priorities of my deanship to formulate, and begin to implement, a strategic academic plan for significant FAS faculty growth. To support this process, I created divisional deanships at the end of my first year as dean. These deans for each academic division have helped me assess the needs and interests of their faculty colleagues and to foster cross-divisional collaborations.

In the past three years, the FAS recorded 636, then 656, then 672, and now nearly 700 faculty. By this time next year we will have a faculty well in excess of 700--that is, a Faculty at least 100 members greater than we had at the beginning of the 21st century. That is a mark of our collective success in appointment, promotion, and recruitment. Our growth over the past four years represents the most dynamic growth in such a time period that the Faculty has seen in 35 years.

Our strength, and our standing, as a scholarly institution, flow directly from the talents of our faculty colleagues. Let me turn now to a more detailed discussion of faculty growth, faculty composition, support for our faculty, and the academic plans of our divisional deans.

Faculty Growth

I am pleased to report that as of January 1, 2006, the FAS has just under 700 assistant, associate, and full professors. There are 483 senior faculty and 215 non-tenured faculty (72 associate professors and 143 assistant professors).

Each division has grown. In 2004-2005, the humanities and social science divisions each added 10 junior faculty, and the sciences added 14 junior members.

At the senior level, the humanities division added 8 new members, the social sciences added 4, and the sciences added 11.

Let me say a few words about why this growth is important, and what our future holds.

The FAS derives its strength directly from its faculty. We have a critical mass of talent that annually propels us, and the wider world, forward in each field. Our goal has been to grow strategically, guided by clear intellectual priorities and a perennial concern for balance--in each division, and taking all the divisions as a whole.

A larger FAS faculty increases the range and depth of our academic talent. It allows us to teach our undergraduates better, and in smaller settings. It helps us attract, teach, and mentor truly exceptional graduate students. It keeps our leading edge as a research institution sharp, and allows us to enter into new areas of inquiry. A larger Faculty has also allowed us to create a better leave policy. Professors can now take a term of leave every six semesters (compared to every 12 semesters as previously allowed). These leaves of absence, which I announced in my first year as dean, rejuvenate our scholarship.

For the future, we continue to steer toward our goal of 750 faculty. I hope the FAS will continue to grow beyond that number. But we must also remain flexible enough that we can adjust with the ever-changing state of our finances and other resources. Our growth has been, and will continue to be, a dance between needs and constraints.

The Composition of the Faculty

This brings us to the next question: How should the FAS faculty grow?

Parameters for Growth. Growth can occur in several dimensions. Later in this letter, I list the intellectual priorities that are shaping growth in each division. But we must also build a faculty that is diverse in ethnicity and gender, and that has a productive balance of senior and junior faculty.

Of the FAS's 698 senior and junior faculty, 166 (or 23.7 percent) are women. Ninety-two (or 13.2 percent) are minorities. Women and minorities comprise a much larger proportion of our non-tenured than our tenured ranks--a hopeful sign for the future diversity of our faculty. Women constitute 35.3 percent of our non-tenured faculty (76 of 215), and minorities represent 21.9 percent (47 of 215). This compares to 18.6 percent women (90 of 483) and 9.3 percent minorities (45 of 483) among tenured faculty.

As we expand the faculty, we must be conscious of our efforts to recruit and retain outstanding women and minorities. Given that roughly two-thirds of the FAS is tenured and one-third is non-tenured, we must also ensure diversity by recruiting and retaining far more junior faculty.

Task Forces. Our often tumultuous discussions last spring focused Harvard's attention on important issues of diversity and inclusiveness. For three months in spring 2005, two University task forces examined the status of women students and faculty at Harvard. The Task Force on Women Faculty, chaired by Evelynn Hammonds, Professor of the History of Science and of African and African American Studies, sought ways to improve the recruiting, support, and advancement of women faculty at Harvard. The Task Force on Women in Science and Engineering was chaired by Barbara Grosz, Higgins Professor of Natural Sciences. Its mission was to find ways to build, or improve, the "pipeline" for women in these fields--at every stage of their career, from college, to graduate school, to postdoctoral work, to faculty appointment.

I am encouraged by the growth in awareness and the concrete steps that have resulted from last spring's discussions. The recommendations of the two University task forces dovetail with long-standing, and ongoing, efforts at the FAS. What can we do--what must we do--to create a more representative faculty, and a supportive environment for all?

FAS Efforts. In July 2005, Professor Hammonds was named the University's Senior Vice Provost for Faculty Development and Diversity. At the same time, I appointed Professor Lisa Martin, Clarence Dillon Professor of International Affairs, as Senior Advisor to the Dean, with responsibility for advising me, the divisional deans, and the Faculty as a whole on matters related to gender, racial, and ethnic diversity in the FAS. Professor Martin serves as an FAS liaison to the offices of the president and provost, and she works with her faculty colleagues on best practices in searches, recruitment, and mentoring. She also chairs the FAS Standing Committee on Women.

Already, Professor Martin reports a number of important efforts.

At a retreat for department chairs this past September, attendees tackled the issue of implicit bias in recruiting and promotion. Throughout this year, Professor Martin has worked with search committees and department chairs to devise ways to ensure that women and minority candidates are brought more fully into searches. By fall 2006, Professor Martin will have set up programs to help search committee chairs conduct effective and inclusive searches. A new search handbook will be ready next fall, to provide guidelines and resources as well.

Professor Martin will also publish an annual status report on women and minority numbers in hiring, promotion, and departures. The first report will come out at the end of this academic year. Such data will be key to tracking our strengths and weaknesses as a Faculty. In fall 2005, a climate survey was sent to all FAS junior faculty. Its results will be analyzed this spring, and a second survey will be sent to all senior and junior faculty in fall 2006.

To help build the "pipeline" for young women scientists, we are developing study centers to support undergraduates taking science courses. We are also working on a Summer Undergraduate Research Program, to bring more students into partnership with faculty doing science research.

Throughout my deanship, we have also worked intensely on a wide array of policies that support all our faculty colleagues--but especially those with family responsibilities, and those in the early stages of their careers. I describe those policies in the next section below.

Let us also remember that diversity is to be desired in our leadership, not just throughout our ranks. Twenty-three percent of our department or degree-committee chairs are women. Forty-seven percent of FAS deans, associate deans, and assistant deans are women. Thirty-seven percent of the Faculty Council are women. Forty-six percent of the faculty members of the Educational Policy Committee are women. These are encouraging numbers, and the result of conscious attention. But here too I hope to see improvement in the years to come.

Why Diversity? Let us take a moment and ask ourselves: Why is a diverse faculty important? Why should we make special efforts to attract, and support, women and minorities, as well as men and non-minorities?

If the FAS truly wishes to amass the strongest concentration of talent--across all fields, and from a variety of perspectives--we have an undeniable responsibility to search as hard and as creatively as possible for those minds we wish to bring together under one roof. History, habit, and unintentional exclusion have shaped a Faculty that is out of balance in ways that we must now address. This rebalancing requires a cultural change--a change in the outlook of all of us--as well as sustained practical efforts to modify our procedures, our policies, and our decisions.

There is a Japanese proverb: "Fall seven times, stand eight." In the past few decades, our progress towards a more diverse faculty has taken, and may continue to take, several iterations of effort. But our aim is to stand tall at the end, and we have been taking steps to get there.

Support for Faculty

Once scholars come to the FAS, what can we do to support them? It is not enough to recruit new faculty; we must also mentor, promote, and retain them. Our collective strength compounds with each year that a gifted professor stays on, builds intellectual connections with his or her colleagues, learns better the ways of the classroom, and involves him or herself in the governance of this Faculty. A perennial game of musical chairs with other institutions--swapping our faculty for theirs--is no match for hiring, promoting, and retaining our own, assuming that we only hire and promote at the highest standards of excellence.

How, then, do we assist young faculty who wish to make their careers and to start their families while they are here at Harvard? In 2004-2005, I and the Office of Academic Affairs worked extremely hard to improve tenure procedures, parental leave policies, housing and research support, and other measures of support. Lisa Martin joined this effort this fall.

In spring 2005, I announced a new "opt out" policy for tenure-track faculty who become new parents. We will automatically extend their contract by one year, and postpone any promotion review--from assistant to associate professor, or from associate to full professor--until the subsequent year. We are considering voluntary extension of the tenure clock for all junior faculty. The option of part-time status, for instance, may permit a better work/life balance even in the absence of a brand-new child. Lisa Martin is also developing a new maternity leave policy beyond the present parental leave benefit.

In Summer 2005, at the recommendation of the FAS Alumni Task Force on Women and Leadership, we developed a dependent-care fund to help faculty defray the costs of child-care when they need to travel for conferences or professional development. We established a fund to provide more research support for junior faculty at the critical stage of publication. We are providing better housing aid. I have also asked our departments to involve our junior faculty more actively in matters of departmental governance.

In every way, I have wished to send a clear message to prospective, and current, FAS faculty. We want the very best faculty: from every background, and through every stage of their academic careers. We will work our hardest to support our faculty, so that they find a lasting home at Harvard.

The divisional deans have also paid special attention to diversity issues in hiring, and to creating a supportive environment for tenure-track faculty. Professor Martin, the divisional deans, and department chairs have worked together to improve mentoring programs for untenured faculty. An extra-departmental mentoring program is in the works as well.

Academic Planning

The divisional deans, now in their third year, have worked with their colleagues to identify intellectual priorities to guide the growth of their divisions. The academic deans and I review these plans to encourage overall balance and to facilitate connections across the divisions. Here is a report on each division.

The Humanities

Academic Priorities. The humanities division is committed to deepening strength in areas ranging from film studies, dramatic arts, and public speaking to music, the medical humanities, and the study of literature. The division seeks to develop new curricular offerings that enable students to build on their international experience, to expand their understanding of other cultures, and to explore the creative energy and transformative power of art. With recent growth in the size of the humanities faculty; with the opening of the Harvard Dance Center and, when complete, the New College Theatre; and with the curricular review's emphasis on integrating the arts more powerfully into the undergraduate curriculum, as well as its emphasis on the study of foreign cultures and language, this is a time of opportunity for the humanities at Harvard.

Programs for Faculty. The number of humanities faculty grew by nearly 20 percent between January 2000 and January 2006, with especially notable growth in drama and film studies and in departments such as Music, History of Art and Architecture, East Asian Languages and Civilizations, and English and American Literature and Language.

Now, Dean Maria Tatar, John L. Loeb Professor of Germanic Languages and Literatures, and her colleagues are placing special emphasis on identifying promising new junior faculty and supporting the teaching and research of those who are already here. Department chairs have worked closely with Dean Tatar to create a culture in which tenure-track faculty are welcomed into a community of scholars and given the intellectual guidance and resources they need. Chairs have worked to ensure that they have access to resources, and to put in place mentoring systems.

The Menschel Teaching Program is part of this strategic mentoring effort. The program gives new faculty a chance to meet junior and senior colleagues in all fields, to establish a working relationship with the divisional deans and the divisional assistant deans, and to develop a durable support network. Launched in 2004 for humanities faculty, the program expanded in the summer of 2005 to include social sciences faculty as well.

Film Studies, which became a new track in the Visual and Environmental Studies (VES) concentration two years ago, requires specific equipment and support to function effectively as a field of study. During the summer of 2005, the top floor of Sever Hall was transformed into a vibrant new working space. Students and faculty now benefit from three new film screening rooms, faculty and administrative offices, an animation studio, editing and computer labs, and a video, film, and book library with viewing carrels. VES facilities on the lower level of Sever have also been renovated.

Programs for Students. The Film Studies track is part of a broader effort, inspired in no small part by the curricular review, to expand the FAS's commitment to the arts. The Humanities Division and the FAS as a whole aim to draw the study and the practice of the arts out of the category of "extra"-curricular activity and more fully into the curriculum itself. The new facilities described above empower faculty members to more fully respond to the curricular review and develop courses that integrate performance.

Humanities departments are also considering ways to integrate the international experience into the undergraduate curriculum. These may include introductory courses that combine language training with cultural orientation, to prepare students for study abroad, and re-entry courses for returning students.

In the next several years, humanities scholars also hope to produce a series of foundational, disciplinary, and cross-disciplinary courses in General Education. These courses are part of a renewed commitment to undergraduate education, and they will also enable us to expand the intellectual range of our curricular offerings.

The Humanities Center. After 20 years of service, Professor Marjorie Garber, William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of English and American Literature and Language and of Visual and Environmental Studies, concluded her distinguished tenure as director of the Humanities Center. Professsor Homi Bhabha, Anne F. Rothenberg Professor of English and American Literature and Language, is now leading the Center into its next phase. He is developing programs that build bridges across humanities departments, the FAS divisions, and Harvard's schools. These efforts will include lectures on art and social mobility, workshops on interdisciplinarity, and panels on stem cell research, the age of terror, and the effects of Katrina.

The Social Sciences

Academic Priorities. In 2004, Dean David Cutler, Otto Eckstein Professor of Applied Economics, formed a Social Sciences Advisory Council (SSAC) comprised of senior faculty from most social science departments, to advise and consult with him on division-wide academic planning. The SSAC has looked broadly at some of the best work being done in subfields that are not yet, but may well be, significant future presences in social science departments (e.g., geographic information systems). This kind of trend-spotting can help ensure that Harvard's social science departments stay at the forefront of their fields. In addition, Dean Cutler has worked with the SSAC and with colleagues across the division to think about which fields within the division merit growth, about how to bring the experience of a small department to concentrators in large departments, and about forming linkages with other Harvard schools whose faculty have research and teaching interests that logically connect to work in the social sciences.

Programs for Faculty. Harvard has exceptional across-the-board strength in the social sciences. In 2004-2005, divisional faculty members and the SSAC looked hard at several regions of the world which are under-studied by Harvard's researchers. Faculty convened a series of discussions on Russia, the Middle East, and South Asia. These roundtables engaged scholars from multiple disciplines, and from inside and outside Harvard. They also gave rise to written proposals about how to improve Harvard's work in these areas. These proposals will figure prominently in academic planning for the social sciences.

Dean Cutler is currently working with deans at the Kennedy School of Government, the Law School, and other Schools at Harvard to have some of their faculty teach seminars or other courses in the larger FAS social science departments. These arrangements would give larger departments the chance to offer seminars that they are currently unable to offer; would free core FAS faculty to focus on offering smaller courses; would respond to the desire of many faculty from other Schools to work with undergraduates; and would give social science concentrators--many of whom will pursue careers in applied fields like government, law, or public health--increased exposure to relevant faculty across the University.

Programs for Students. Hiring faculty from other Harvard schools is a potential response to one of the social science division's top priorities: to support the curricular review's emphasis on small-group learning experiences, even in the largest departments. In total, more than half of Harvard undergraduates concentrate in a social science--a full quarter in Economics or Government alone--yet social science faculty comprise only a third of FAS's total faculty. The result, in the past, has been that many concentrators have had limited opportunity for meaningful interaction with faculty.

This year, the Economics Department approved, and the Psychology Department launched, initiatives to give all of their undergraduate concentrators the opportunity to take at least one small (i.e., less than 25 students) course with a faculty member. The success of these initiatives depends on the success of related activities--recruitments or, as suggested above, drawing on faculty from other Harvard schools--but when these plans are fully operational, concentrators in the three largest departments (Economics, Government, Psychology) will be able to take at least one small seminar course during their time at Harvard. At the same time, an inter-School faculty committee explored the possibility of incorporating public policy more directly in the undergraduate curriculum.

The Life Sciences

Academic Priorities. The Life Sciences Council (LSC), chaired by Professor Douglas Melton, Thomas Dudley Cabot Professor of the Natural Sciences and Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, continues to focus on integration: in programmatic initiatives across departments and divisions; in the disciplinary approaches used in new coursework; in faculty hiring across departments; and in shared research facilities.

Two cross-divisional, cross-faculty initiatives launched by the Life Sciences division made great progress in 2004-2005. The Center for Brain Science, under the leadership of Josh Sanes, Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology and Paul J. Finnegan Family Director, recruited several new faculty and is maturing its program for occupancy of the Northwest Laboratory building when it opens in 2008. The FAS Systems Biology initiative began recruiting faculty last fall; it will also partner with the Harvard Medical School in a new graduate program that spans both campuses.

The LSC continues to actively review new proposals for life science initiatives, including some that may be based in Allston. In 2005-2006, the Council will work closely with the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences and the Physical Sciences division to craft a cohesive science plan for the FAS in Cambridge and Allston.

Programs for Faculty. As reported earlier in this Letter, the division of Life Sciences enjoyed a highly productive year recruiting faculty. The majority of faculty searches in 2005-2006 will be joint-departmental appointments, reflecting the Division's multi-disciplinary approach.

The LSC is committed to ensuring that search activities and other initiatives are in keeping with the recommendations from the Women in Science and Engineering Task Force report. The LSC will work closely with the FAS's and Provost's offices to build on existing efforts and to create new initiatives and opportunities wherever possible.

Teaching, research, and faculty recruiting all benefit from cutting-edge shared research facilities. The FAS's Bauer Center for Genomics provides an extraordinary advantage. The Bauer Center has created an array of research and computing core facilities that serve all Harvard sciences on both sides of the Charles River. The challenge for the life sciences is to expand these facilities in coordination with the DEAS and the Physical Sciences Division, as we collectively consider programming for the Northwest building.

Programs for Students. To promote the goals of the curricular review, the LSC formed a Life Sciences Education Committee (LSEC) comprised of the head tutors from the five undergraduate life science concentrations. This committee worked last year to map out a new vision for the life sciences undergraduate curriculum.

Two new introductory courses, Life Sciences 1a and 1b, debuted in fall 2005. These interdisciplinary courses use broad and compelling issues to expose students to the excitement and interconnectivity of science. Life Sciences 1a courses synthesize essential topics in chemistry, molecular biology, and cell biology. Life Sciences 1b courses synthesize topics in genetics, genomics, and evolutionary biology. Both courses make illustrative connections to neurobiology, psychology, and biological anthropology. The LSEC worked with a team of seven life science faculty who are teaching both courses this year. These instructors worked tirelessly in spring and summer 2005 to craft these exciting new courses.

The LSEC has reexamined, and now reinvented, our undergraduate concentrations to ensure that they are best suited for undergraduate education across the rapidly changing world of the life sciences. The LSEC is now looking to enhance students' research experience, in order to improve students' access to information and increase their participation in faculty labs.

The Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences

The academic year 2005-2006 is the eighth in which Venkatesh "Venky" Narayanamurti, John A. and Elizabeth S. Armstrong Professor of Engineering and Applied Sciences and Professor of Physics, has served as Dean of Engineering and Applied Sciences. I am grateful for his leadership, his passion, and his energy. As Dean Venky says, the DEAS's unique set of values--strong community, collaborative culture, and unbounded thinking--has and will continue to sustain the next great generation of scholars and leaders in engineering, technology, and the applied sciences at Harvard.

Over the past four years, the DEAS has accomplished some remarkable things. Graduate student applications have increased by 25 percent. The Division completed the DEAS Challenge Fund, created by an anonymous donor to establish 10 professorships and 10 innovation funds in Engineering and Applied Sciences. The fund will ultimately generate a total of $45 million in new support for the Division. With its emphasis on collaboration, the DEAS has built numerous partnerships not only with faculty colleagues across the FAS, but also with industry. In 2003 and 2004, new space for bioengineering research was created at 60 Oxford Street and 40 Oxford Street, and in 2006, DEAS will be linked to the Laboratory for Integrated Science and Engineering building, which I will describe in more detail below. DEAS created the Center for Research on Computation and Society and is also a collaborator in the Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center established with other universities in 2002. These are just some of the many ways that the DEAS has flourished.

Academic Priorities. Dean Venky and his colleagues have identified the following elements for a long-term strategic plan:

• enhancing engineering and integrating it into all aspects of undergraduate research and learning;
• sustaining foundational applied sciences;
• reinvigorating a culture of experimentation and innovation; and
• translating discoveries and finding ways to make a significant and positive impact on our society.

Programs for Faculty. Over the past several years, the Division's efforts to promote engineering and technology for the social good, especially in the areas of engineering and biology, chemistry, physics, environmental science, and computation, have begun to take shape.

For example, understanding our changing climate and assessing future energy needs will require both new technologies and better informed policies and practices. To that end, the Division has increased the number of joint faculty appointments with the Harvard University Center for the Environment and the Earth and Planetary Sciences department and has promoted broader interactions with policy makers.

Likewise, because computation and information technology underpin almost every aspect of global commerce and communication, the Division has significantly augmented its expertise in areas ranging from mathematical modeling to sensor networks. In addition, the recently formed Center for Research on Computation and Society provides opportunities for social scientists and other experts to engage in research on innovative computer science and technology informed by societal effects.

Finally, the Division has taken a very active role in planning and supporting other University-wide efforts that will make a positive impact on everyday life, especially in engineering and bioengineering. Division members play an essential role in the Systems Biology program and, in collaboration with the Medical School and its teaching hospitals, have begun to define an initiative in biologically-inspired engineering. The ultimate aim of such efforts is to better understand how biological components work together and to develop new techniques that could lead to improved therapies and medicines.

Programs for Students. As with the faculty, so with the students. To inspire undergraduates to take a similarly interdisciplinary approach to learning and research, the DEAS created an applied physics A.B. degree option with the Physics Department. The Division also opened experimental facilities in Pierce Hall that are designed to encourage hands-on learning. And it has developed new social spaces, including a large center in Maxwell Dworkin, to help build community.

The Physical Sciences

Academic Priorities. The Physical Sciences Division--the departments of Astronomy, Earth and Planetary Sciences, Mathematics, Physics, and Statistics--provides a "crossroads" for research, discovery, and innovation at Harvard.

At a June retreat and in subsequent discussions in fall 2005, the Physical Sciences and Engineering Advisory Council (PSEAC) proposed ways to coordinate the long-term goals of the Physical Sciences Division with those of the DEAS. Four broad, interdisciplinary areas were identified as critical for integrative work: Computation, Quantum Science, Engineering, and Society; Physics and Mathematics of Space, Time, Matter, and Radiation; Interfaces of the Physical Sciences and Engineering with Biological Systems; and Environment, Energy, Engineering, and the Human Condition. Faculty groups are being formed to develop an integrated plan-one which emphasizes core departmental needs but also enhances collaborative, interdisciplinary work in these areas.

Programs for Faculty. The Physical Sciences Division grew stronger in 2004-2005, thanks to carefully planned recruitment efforts. We were pleased to welcome 10 faculty members (three of whom are women) with interests spanning all five departments. Equally important has been the rise in the number of searches for, and appointments of, joint faculty positions, such as those among Astronomy, Earth and Planetary Sciences, Engineering and the Applied Sciences, and Physics. Likewise, the Statistics department has been making strides to strengthen its core research mission and foster interesting interdisciplinary connections with the quantitative social sciences.

Programs for Students. As mentioned in the previous section on the DEAS, undergraduates can now concentrate in applied physics/engineering physics. This concentration gives students a deep understanding of critical areas like quantum mechanics, nanotechnology, and electronic and photonic semiconductor devices. Faculty members in the physical sciences have also begun to outline a series of introductory courses intended for life science concentrators.

The PSEAC is framing a number of plans: to increase and sustain diversity at all levels, with special attention to female faculty and students; to improve the curriculum and teaching for concentrators, and develop innovative ways to expose the larger undergraduate population to research in the physical sciences; and to determine future infrastructure needs such as laboratories and high-tech classrooms.

THE DIVISION OF CONTINUING EDUCATION

Overview. Under the leadership of Dean Michael Shinagel, the Division of Continuing Education (DCE) has created multiple points of entry into a Harvard education over the past three decades. Its students learn in the evening, in the summer, online, and even in foreign countries. Their ages range from the teens to the nineties. They are high-school students, college and graduate students, Harvard employees, Boston-area teachers on DCE scholarships, retired adults with a thirst to learn, and so much more.

In 2004-2005, nearly 17,500 students registered: 11,882 in the Harvard Extension School (HES), 4,878 in the Harvard Summer School (HSS), and 579 in the Harvard Institute for Learning in Retirement (HILR). (HES enrollments declined by seven percent, but HSS enrollments rose by eight percent.) Students chose from 586 courses at HES, 268 at HSS, and 112 at HILR.

To complement its Master of Liberal Arts (ALM) concentrations in 19 liberal arts fields, HES sponsored seven professional ALM degrees: biotechnology, educational technologies, environmental management, information technology, journalism, mathematics for teaching, and museum studies.

The international programs offered by our Summer School are greatly expanding our offerings beyond Cambridge and into the world, as I have described earlier in this letter.

International Students. Even in Cambridge, the DCE is a very international community. In 2004-2005, 17 percent of the HES--nearly 2,000 students from 112 countries--came from foreign countries. The largest providers were Brazil, India, Mexico, Japan, and the Republic of Korea. In the HSS, 24 percent--or 1,166 students from 94 countries-were foreign nationals. Leading the way were the Republic of Korea, Japan, Brazil, the People's Republic of China, and Mexico.

Community Connections. The DCE continues its outreach to groups closer to home. Last year, it awarded tuition scholarships to 56 Boston public school math teachers and 141 teachers who wished to take courses in the liberal arts. The Crimson Summer Academy for academically talented, low-income high school students from Cambridge and Boston completed its second year as a tight-knit group with a growing sense of achievement. Still closer to home, 2,139 Harvard staff pursued their education (1,648 enrolling at the HES, 491 at the HSS) with the tremendous savings afforded by the University's Tuition Assistance Plan. A record number of 53 Harvard staff members also earned their undergraduate and graduate degrees and certificates from the HES last year. Congratulations!

Distance Education. In the decade since the DCE first offered a calculus class online, it has steadily built its offerings in distance education. In 2004-2005, HES put a record 55 courses online, including eight Harvard College courses. These courses reached 2,848 students. In 2005-2006, HES is offering 75 online courses, including 12 College courses, and HSS is offering seven courses online.

This past fall, Professor Michael Sandel's popular Core Course, Moral Reasoning 22: "Justice," was filmed in high-definition video, as a pilot project sponsored by the Provost's Office and the FAS. It enrolled 143 students and is being rerun this spring term with an additional 82 students enrolled. This spring, Professor Harry Lewis's Quantitative Reasoning 48: "Bits," will be podcast in addition to being offered as a regular online course. The podcast option will allow individuals around the world to download the audio and video of QR 48 lectures to both personal computers and MP3 players.

THE CAMPUS

What we achieve in every realm of FAS life--our intellectual accomplishments, our social and extracurricular lives, our athletic and artistic endeavors--depends to a great extent on the physical spaces constructed for those purposes.

In the past four years, the FAS has undertaken the largest building and planning boom in Harvard's recent memory. In addition to the projects already mentioned in this Letter, we are transforming the North Precinct with science buildings, developing the largest remaining area in Cambridge available to us. We completed a massive renovation of the Science Center, adding 30,000 square feet of new space (the Putnam Gallery), and renovating an additional 30,000 square feet. The beautiful Center for Government and International Studies, which I describe at more length below, has come to fruition after more than a decade of effort. And the FAS, with Harvard's other schools, conducted the first rounds of serious planning for Harvard's expansion into Allston. The Allston expansion will roughly double the size of Harvard's campus; and the potential benefits to FAS students and faculty are enormous.

The FAS is currently managing approximately $800 million in capital projects. These projects are critically important to our academic mission, as well as to other under-served areas of student and faculty life. Given the scope of these projects, and our current financial climate, the FAS Office of Physical Resources has been vigilant to maximize efficiency, minimize cost, emphasize flexible use in design, and exercise strict controls over scheduling, budget, and other considerations.

Cambridge

Center for Government and International Studies (CGIS). This structure--the physical incarnation of our commitment to international studies--was worth the wait. In November 2005, we celebrated the grand opening of CGIS. The two buildings, one named after our great and longtime supporter, Sidney Knafel, house the Government Department, many of our international centers, and a core group of History faculty whose research interests focus on international issues. CGIS's curving hallways, state-of-the art language translation rooms, flexible meeting spaces, and student study and social areas, are designed to facilitate contact between scholars from different disciplines, and at different stages of their careers. These beautiful and intelligently designed buildings ensure that we cross boundaries and form connections.

New College Theatre. As I have mentioned above, we have begun construction on a new theatre that will improve by orders of magnitude the quality of the undergraduate dramatic experience. This fully equipped 270-seat theatre, which includes multipurpose and rehearsal spaces, will advance students' professional development and increase the number of student performances to up to 10 each year. The New College Theatre is projected to open in time for the fall semester of 2007.

Biology Research Infrastructure (BRI). In sadder news, a catastrophic fire in the BRI destroyed the facility in February 2005, undoing two years of construction that had brought the building to near-completion. Demolition of the building is complete, and reconstruction has begun. We hope to open the BRI this summer in large part thanks to the generosity of Christopher Flowers, AB '79 and Mary H. White, with occupancy projected for the fall of 2006.

Laboratory for Integrated Science and Engineering (LISE). LISE, which will support work in physics, chemistry, DEAS, and the Center for Nanoscale Science, is well under construction. This year, we will complete the excavation, the building of the foundation, and the raising of structural steel. The distinctive shape of this building--including its slender, three-legged perch--will become clearly visible on campus. This past February, the LISE tower was "topped out," when the highest piece of steel was set in place. We expect LISE to be complete in 2007.

Northwest Laboratory Building. The Northwest Laboratory will provide research laboratories and support facilities for the Center for Brain Science, Systems Biology, bioengineering, biophysics, and particle physics. A full floor of teaching labs, auditoria, and seminar rooms will enhance students' learning experience. Because much of Northwest is below-grade, we have installed structural steel which will allow us to mine four floors underground while we build four floors above ground. The Northwest Laboratory should be complete in December 2007.

Allston

University-wide planning proceeds on extending Harvard's campus into Allston. In June 2004, Cooper, Robertson & Partners was selected as the project's planning and design firm. They are collaborating with Frank O. Gehry and Associates and the Olin Partnership, and they have submitted preliminary ideas for comment by the Harvard community, the City of Boston, and the Allston neighborhood.

In September 2005, the University named Christopher Gordon as the chief operating officer of the Allston initiative. In October, an Allston Exhibit Room opened in the Holyoke Arcade, to provide ongoing information about Allston and to invite public dialogue.

This February, the University announced that Behnisch Architects will design the first building in Allston, a science complex that will house the Harvard Stem Cell Institute. And this spring, the University Planning Committee for Science and Engineering, chaired by the FAS's Chris Stubbs, Professor of Physics and of Astronomy, and Andrew Murray, Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology and co-director of the Bauer Center, in conjunction with Harvard Medical School's Professor Christopher Walsh was convened to survey current directions in science in all Harvard's "tubs," and to establish guidelines for future programmatic initiatives and facilities development on the Cambridge, Longwood, and Allston campuses.

THE LIBRARY

The key activities of a scholar at Harvard remain the same through time. We study, we teach, we research: we learn. But, in the past four years, our libraries have changed in numerous ways to improve the ways we learn.

The Library as Place. The library is no longer regarded as simply a repository of books. Our libraries have become important learning spaces where discovery, research, study, and collaboration take place. The Harvard College Library (HCL) has been steadily renovating facilities to improve spaces for users, to make services more visible, and to create welcoming reading rooms that provide comfortable and diverse study environments, wireless connectivity, and better lighting, along with self-service copying and scanning equipment to facilitate research with the collections.

In 2004, we celebrated the rededication of Widener Library, concluding a five-year comprehensive renovation that resulted in a proper preservation environment for its valuable collections and refurbished the Loker and Phillips Rooms, the Stacks, Periodicals, and Newspaper Microfilm reading rooms, and the Atkins Reference Room. Undergraduates, who once regarded Widener as a daunting building, now fill its reading rooms.

The improvements in Widener foreshadowed changes in other libraries. In Lamont, a series of smaller renovations have created the Ginsberg and Donatelli reading rooms and the addition of Morse Music & Media. The realignment of space in the Hilles building has resulted in a redesigned single-level Quad Library with a large reading room, group study space, and new furniture and lighting. The newest addition to HCL is the H.C. Fung Library, in the Center for Government and International Studies. It brings together collections from the Fairbank Center, Reischauer Institute, and Davis Center, as well as centralized services, in an elegant space in the new Knafel Building. Other libraries, including Houghton, Loeb Music, Fine Arts, Harvard-Yenching, Tozzer Anthropology, and Cabot Science have improved their reading rooms in the past several years.

Student Services and Outreach. This academic year Lamont Library embarked on a two-year pilot program, expanding its hours to 24/5 each week. As mentioned earlier, planning is now underway for a café in Lamont. In the meantime, Cabot Science Library continues its successful 24-hour coverage during reading and exam periods.

In collaboration with the College, HCL is developing library instructional modules for all Expository Writing courses; this is an exciting opportunity to reach all undergraduates. Librarians also provide individualized instruction for a wide range of courses, whether it concerns the use of numeric databases and geospatial data or the integration of slides and digital images. Indeed, libraries such as Houghton and Loeb Music are responding to a growing demand from faculty to integrate primary materials such as manuscripts and scores into FAS courses.

Last year HCL redesigned its website to create a research tool for library users. Among its features are links to an array of online research guides. A demanding curriculum, an increase in cross-disciplinary research, and the ease of surfing across all Harvard's libraries means that many users are now working across the boundaries of our libraries--or they may be working remotely from offices, labs, and homes. This adds a challenging dimension for those who provide reference and research services.

Research Collections. The Library has been actively developing its collections, in all formats, to support research and teaching. We continue to acquire books, journals, and other print materials, but increasingly, we are acquiring or licensing large numbers of digital resources. Harvard also continues to attract exceptional gifts such as the Donald and Mary Hyde Collection of Dr. Samuel Johnson, which has long been considered one of the world's most important privately-held collections of 18th century English literature. All forms of acquisitions, whether manuscripts, photographs, maps, films, scores, or sound recordings, require long-term preservation, a challenge that is especially complex for digital objects.

In addition to acquiring digital content, HCL has also contributed to the design and development of digital collections to meet current academic needs. The Library has also been a key participant in the University's Library Digital Initiative and a major contributor to online catalogs such a VIA, OASIS, and the Harvard Geospatial Library, specialized access systems that lead users to vast repositories of images, archives, maps, and spatial data.

Global Involvement. The College Library remains active in the global academic community through its extensive collecting, preservation initiatives, and collaboration with colleagues in Asia, Europe, and Latin America. Museums and libraries offer special opportunities for collaboration on digital programs that will benefit scholars worldwide.

As part of an NEH-supported program at Simmons College, HCL is contributing to the rebuilding of the library profession within Iraq. The Library had the unique opportunity, as a result of the closing of Hilles Library, to make a gift of a humanities and social sciences collection to Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, China. This gift created a strong foundation for that institution's rapidly expanding instruction in English and other Western languages.

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

Over the past four years, the FAS has made significant improvements to its information technology infrastructure. More and more, our success as scholars and administrators depends on the effectiveness of our IT systems. Approximately 10,000 undergraduates and graduate students, 5,000 FAS faculty and staff, and many in the Division of Continuing Education and affiliated programs rely on the FAS's "HASCS"--Harvard Arts and Sciences Computing Services--in order to get their work done.

In 2004-2005, the FAS Standing Committee on Information Technology conducted a comprehensive review and analysis of FAS computer systems. In spring 2005, the FAS created a new position: Associate Dean for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer. Our new CIO, Lawrence Levine, is working closely with faculty, staff, and students on a range of improvements. We are building toward more comprehensive research computing support, stronger infrastructure and general support overall, and the continued development of instructional, administrative, and web-based systems.

Research Computing. Academic research generates specialized IT needs. Some needs are best provided centrally; some are best provided through local service providers. Over time, a number of division, department, group, program, center, lab, and individual IT service providers have sprung up to meet developing needs. Our goal now is to maximize collaboration between these local area providers, minimize redundancy, and provide overall service in the most cost-effective manner. As part of this effort, we will also form a small Research Computing Group to serve new faculty or others needing research computing support.

Wireless Dorms. In fall 2004, the FAS began a major project to extend the wireless network to all indoor and some outdoor areas of its student dorms. As of fall 2005, all but four Houses and dormitories are complete. We expect those four to be completed when they are vacant in the coming summer. Even at this stage, Harvard FAS wireless coverage is one of the most extensive in higher education, with over 2,500 access points and over 70 percent of all campus areas covered.

IT Security. FAS has taken several steps in the all-important area of security. During the summer of 2005, all non-secure email access to FAS was shut down, allowing only SSL-encrypted (Secure Socket Layer) IMAP and POP sessions. In addition, firewalls were added to the most vulnerable network areas. The entire wireless network is now behind a firewall, as are many regions of the wired network such as student residences.

Remedy Helpdesk System. To significantly improve help-desk support, FAS has installed Remedy, the industry standard for tracking and ensuring the resolution of reported computing problems. Computer users and technicians can now track the progress of calls to the helpdesk and see exactly what is being done to solve problems.

Instructional Computing. The number of FAS courses with a web presence continues to grow. In spring 2005, 766 courses used the website provided for them by the Instructional Computing Group (ICG), 78 more than the previous term. Fifty-nine courses put lecture videos online, and ICG hosted 84 collections of instructional streaming media: audio and video clips used as part of FAS courses.

ICG is partnering with iCommons (the Central Administration's computer organization) to create an even better online environment for teaching and learning. Together, ICG and iCommons are creating more ways for teachers and students to perform course-related tasks and access course materials through the my.Harvard portal which deployed in September 2004. The new tools, which launched as pilots in fall 2005 are scheduled for wider release in fall 2006.

In their first-ever collaborative effort, ICG, iCommons, and the Harvard University Library Office of Information Systems (OIS) also created a tool that allows instructors to submit their reserved reading lists online. Since its release in June 2005, this has become the primary means by which College faculty submit their reserve requests. As of September 2005, 250 courses had submitted lists.

ICG also expanded the FAS Presidential Instructional Technology Fellowship (PITF) in 2004-2005. The graduate and undergraduate students in this program helped create 20 summer course websites in 2005 and provided enormous support to faculty members during the academic year. The PITF fellows posted web-material on course websites and consulted with faculty about other ways to use web resources in their teaching.

FINANCIAL STATUS

Since my first Annual Letter three years ago, I have described both the large scale of our ambitions as a Faculty and approaching conditions of financial constraint.

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences is in a time of critical investment and unprecedented growth. By substantially expanding the size of the Faculty, embarking on construction of four major facilities for teaching and research, enhancing financial aid for graduate and undergraduate students, and investing in the undergraduate experience, the FAS is in the midst of a major transformation. This demands a level and intensity of investment that is quite new for the FAS.

The results of the past year are revealing. The FAS ended fiscal year 2005 with a $9.2 million increase in net assets in its operating budget, as compared to the previous year's $22.2 million surplus, which indicates a shift between a period of building reserves in preparation for growth, and a time of major investment. This shift can be seen most in the unrestricted fund, where unrestricted revenues growth of four percent was offset by a larger increase, 12 percent, in operating expenses.

FAS operating and non-operating expenses totaled $858 million in fiscal year 2005, a seven percent increase over the prior year. In fiscal year 2005, the FAS expanded the size of the Faculty to 672. As the Faculty has grown, the costs for compensation, start-up packages, lab and office renovations, and administrative support staff have also increased. Benefit expenses related to employee healthcare and pensions continue to grow dramatically, as they have for many employers. In fiscal year 2005, benefits grew by 31 percent over the prior year. In fiscal 2005, the FAS also experienced a large, one-time increase of 78 percent in University assessments related to the North Campus Development Pooled Fund and the Parking Infrastructure Fund for the development of the Northwest and LISE buildings.

The FAS's revenues totaled $868 million in fiscal 2005, a 5.6 percent increase over the prior year. The FAS experienced 10 percent growth in grants and contracts, despite a challenging sponsored environment. Current use gifts, which include over $20 million of current-use unrestricted giving from the Harvard College Fund, increased by 19 percent, due not the least to increases in fundraising for the Stem Cell Institute, under the direction of Professor Melton.

In the growth of our endowment, the FAS was very fortunate: the market value increased by 14.2 percent. Investment income (primarily on endowment) increased by 4.4 percent, largely due to the increase in endowment payout of four percent and new gifts. Our endowment represents 48 percent of our operating income, with the remainder derived from student income, gifts, and sponsored research. With about 80 percent of the endowment restricted to some degree, most of our growth plans must be funded from unrestricted dollars. Thus it is essential that we continue our efforts to shift spending away from unrestricted funds to restricted endowment and gift funds where appropriate.

In the years immediately ahead, as in the past several, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences will need to make exceptional investments in its people--its faculty and students--and in the physical infrastructure that supports them. Our financial projections show that, in the absence of other steps, the FAS would have faced operating deficits and would deplete its unrestricted fund balances by fiscal year 2008. With a goal of reaching 750 faculty by 2010, faculty growth will add an estimated $28.5 million of costs by fiscal year 2010. The current major building projects will add $71 million of new debt and operating costs by that same year. And programmatic initiatives-which include the science centers and programs, information technology, the curricular review, the undergraduate low income initiative, dissertation fellowships, and FAS administrative growth--will add approximately $29.5 million of new annual expenses by FY 2010.

In sum, by FY 2010 the FAS financials will include about $129.5 million of new expenses largely funded with unrestricted funds. This is offset by $61.2 million in new revenue, resulting in a projected net impact of about $68.4 million in 2010.

As the FAS Resources Committee reported to the Faculty in January, we have developed several approaches to support our priorities and eliminate any projected shortfall. These include: 1) increased fundraising to support priorities; 2) better use of our bountiful endowment through higher payout rates and strategic decapitalization; 3) approaches to improved use of current resources in order to free up funds for new priorities; and 4) a pattern of central support for the FAS during this period of intense investments that aids those FAS initiatives and functions that best serve University-wide interests. I am pleased to report that this plan, which stabilizes our budget for the coming years, is now in place, and that the more active management of our collective resources--restricted and unrestricted--is having a positive effect on our financial health.

Financial Table: Operating Revenue and Expense - FY 2004 and FY 2005
Financial Pie Charts: Operating Revenue and Expense - FY 2005

CONCLUSION

"To learn, and at due times to practice what one has learned, is that not also a pleasure?" Confucius was never a dean, so far as we know, but in this first line of the Analects, he captures the ideal intersection of scholarship and academic leadership.

In leading such a talented and complex enterprise as this Faculty of Arts and Sciences there is no precise science, but rather more art. Any colleague who has been a department chair knows this very well. My job has been to empower and to support the best ideas in scholarship and teaching, and to make sure--as I tell every one of our prospective colleagues--that Harvard is a creative and malleable place, dedicated to learning, and dedicated to its students.

Where, after all, do the best ideas come from? Deans and presidents must make decisions, and set priorities. We must, we should, and we do. But in an academic institution such as this, many of the best ideas--those that deans and presidents will be compelled to support on their intellectual merits--will come from the mistakenly-named "bottom" up, from faculty at the top of their fields, and from our students, whose talents and energy truly distinguish this place. That is why in any realm of academic or curricular planning, the participation of our faculty and students has been so central, and ultimately so influential.

Together, we have accomplished a great deal. We have expanded our faculty in every division and discipline. We have invested in the architecture and infrastructure that give form and space to our new efforts in the sciences, international studies, and the arts. Through curricular review and renewal, we have recommitted ourselves to our students-- for whom, after all, our College and University exist.

It has been a profound honor for me to serve you as dean--to learn from you, work for you, and draw strength from such a talented and dedicated collective. As I have said to you on other occasions, this Faculty of Arts and Sciences is longer-lived than any of us as individuals. But it moves on, from one year to the next, on the strength of each individual member's efforts. Thank you for all you have done, and will do in the future, to keep Harvard strong. I am proud to count myself as your colleague.

Sincerely yours,

William C. Kirby
Edith and Benjamin Geisinger Professor of History
Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences

¹A Report on the Harvard College Curricular Review (April 2004), p. 7.
²See the superb faculty Essays on General Education in Harvard College (October, 2004); and the even more wide-ranging analyses in Emily Riehl and Danny Yagen, eds., Student Essays: On the Purpose and Structure of a Harvard Education (October, 2005).