The final Faculty meeting of the 2024-2025 academic year opened with a celebration of outstanding teaching and advising, as 39 faculty were honored for their exceptional contributions in these areas.
Edgerley Family Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Hopi Hoekstra then reflected on the sobering moment in which the University finds itself and described the planning underway to maintain the teaching and research mission of the FAS during this challenging time, as the federal government continues to threaten the University and higher education overall.
Noting that planning for the FAS will closely align with SEAS, Hoekstra charted a path forward by outlining several new faculty committees she has established: the Research Continuity Committee (initially called the Funding Priority Committee) charged with making recommendations about how to best continue and support scientific research excellence; a new Task Force on Workforce Planning to analyze staffing across the FAS and to develop a set of recommendations for actions; and the Faculty Resources Committee, an advisory body studying implications of the current and future financial landscape to preserve and strengthen the FAS. Hoekstra also acknowledged that the FAS is different from other Harvard schools, in both financial circumstances and reliance on federal funding, and therefore its response to the challenge of research continuity will differ.
“These efforts will not be easy. Nothing about the current time is easy. The issues facing Harvard, and higher education as a whole, are as profound as any time in our nation’s history,” she said. “These federal actions have set in motion changes that will not be undone, at least not in the foreseeable future. It is incumbent upon us as a faculty to move forward, to adapt to this new world, and we will.”
Hoekstra also took the opportunity to thank Danoff Dean of Harvard College Rakesh Khurura, who steps down at the end of this academic year, recognizing his “extraordinary leadership, and . . . all you’ve done to strengthen and sustain the mission of Harvard College.” The packed Faculty Room gave Khurana a standing ovation.
Faculty made quick work of motions to approve Harvard Extension School courses for the upcoming year as well as changes to the Harvard College Handbook for Students. James Bryant Conant University Professor Danielle S. Allen and William Anderson, senior lecturer and director of education in the Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology, gave an update about the Harvard University Faculty Senate Planning Body. Allen noted that the group counts 37 delegates representing eight of the nine schools, and subcommittees are hard at work on bylaws and alternative governance models. The group plans to finalize their recommendations this summer and to socialize the proposed bylaws across schools next fall.
Daniel Gilbert, Edgar Pierce Professor of Psychology, gave the much beloved Faculty Research Minute, presenting his research on the perception of each generation of an “unprecedented decline in human morality.” In fact, he noted, polls dating back to 1949 (Gallup) showed 78 percent of respondents believed the human race was getting worse from a moral standpoint.
“The vast majority of Americans believe morality is declining – and they have believed this for as long as anyone has been asking them about it,” he said.
“The world may be going to hell, he said in closing. “but moral decline isn’t the handbasket in which it’s travelling,”
Added Hoekstra: “We’ll take that as a happy ending.”
Members of three Memorial Minute committees honored three deceased colleagues. Katherine Park gave a reflection on the late Walter Jacob Kaiser, Francis Lee Higginson Professor of English Literature and of Comparative Literature, Emeritus. Professor Warren Goldfarb presented on the life and service of Charles Dacre Parsons, Edgar Pierce Professor of Philosophy, Emeritus. And Professor Gregory Nagy shared remarks on Gloria Ferrari Pinney, Professor of Classical Archaeology and Art, Emerita.
Finally, the meeting concluded with an in camera session that covered two topics: a discussion of the report on the Review of the Administrative Boards of Harvard College and the Harvard Griffin School of Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, as well as a discussion with Provost John Manning.