Harvard Extended

Final thoughts about the Harvard Extension School

2008-09-07T05:50:00.000-07:00

(New: Updates to Q&A section, summer 2009. A long review of Dean Michael Shinagel's history of the Extension School, "The Gates Unbarred", Sept. 2009. Launched @HarvardExtended twitter feed, April 2010. Updated answers to professional ALM and résumé sections after degree requirements changed, summer 2010. Launched Ipso Facto on Harvard Law School blogging platform in September 2011, with the first post a criticism of the Harvard Extension School's reckless expansion into online education. See also: More evidence of problems with distance education at Harvard Extension.)

After writing more than 400 entries, I've decided to bring the Harvard Extended blog to a close. This is the final post. It's a long one, filled with observations, praise, and criticism of the Harvard Extension School and its degree programs. There are also four "top ten" lists of popular, controversial, and interesting posts that I've written up over the years, grouped into topic areas (my thesis experience, views of the Extension School, research interests, and miscellaneous). After today, I won't be adding any new material to the blog, other than to reply to comments. I'd like to thank long-time readers for their curiosity, participation, and support over the years -- if you're interested in following me elsewhere online, or staying connected with the Harvard Extension School community, I have some links for you further down.

If you're a new reader and you've reached this page, it's probably because you searched online for information about the Harvard Extension School. Or, maybe someone told you about the obscure blog run by a graduate student there, and you wanted to read some first-hand insights into the school and its programs.

You've come to the right place. I was an Extension School student from 2003 to 2008, and, until recently, operated one of the few non-official sources of information about the Extension School -- the Harvard Extended blog, which you're looking at right now.

Over the years, many ~~tens~~ hundreds of thousands of people have visited Harvard Extended. I've received scores of emails from people all over the world, plus many blog comments, asking about the Extension School. I'd first like to get some of these questions out of the way, and then I'll talk about my own experience before highlighting the "top ten" posts:

Questions about the Harvard Extension School

Is the ALM/Master of Liberal Arts program challenging? Does it represent a quality degree? (Updated) For those students who take all or most of their classes in person on the Harvard campus and complete the degree requirements, the ALM/liberal arts degrees absolutely represent quality (I don't feel the same way about online classes, however. Scroll down to see why). Students who register for on-campus coursework study under Harvard professors and recognized experts in their fields, and truly engage with them in the classroom. Harvard faculty demand a lot from students, and often use the same reading materials and assignments for their Extension School and GSAS sections.

The course offerings in a few liberal arts fields are superb. Harvard has a large number of extremely talented faculty who are used to working with very bright colleagues and students, and the university has world-class libraries and other facilities. The rich Extension School course catalog reflects these factors. It is a wonderful feeling to browse through the course offerings before the semester starts, seeing what's available and who's teaching certain sections. Where else would you be able to study genetics with a Harvard Medical School professor; a class titled "American Protest Literature from Tom Paine to Tupac" that is taught by two Harvard faculty members with expertise in literature, history, and African-American studies; or classes on the history of Christianity, led by an expert from the Harvard Divinity School? Besides enrolling at the Extension School, the only way to have these types of educational experiences would be to attend Harvard College, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the Harvard Medical School, or the Harvard Divinity School.

Quality is also manifested in the tough requirements for admission to the ALM/Liberal Arts program. Students have to prove they can handle the coursework and research requirements before they can matriculate. However, the element that really sets the ALM/Liberal Arts program apart is the thesis. It is a major research and writing project that is guided by a Harvard faculty member, and prepares students for advanced research elsewhere. It takes years to complete, and is probably the most difficult research project that most students will ever undertake, with the exception of those who go on to write a doctoral dissertation or book. Just a tiny percentage of the graduate students who come to the Extension School ever complete the ALM thesis. For all degree programs, including the undergraduate ALB and professional master's programs which don't require a thesis, the overall graduation rate relative to the number of people who register for courses is 3% (Source: Dean Michael Shinagel, 2009 address to degree recipients).

The quality and rigor of the ALM/Liberal Arts program attracts high achievers. In my graduating class, there were successful professionals as well as students who had completed their undergraduate and earlier graduate degrees at Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Georgetown, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Those who are unprepared for serious study won't get very far. Some prospective degree candidates assume that the experience will be akin to a typical continuing education program. They quickly learn otherwise. While anyone can take a class at the Extension School, students who want to study for a degree have to prove they can walk the walk before they are admitted. Harvard instructors have extremely high expectations of HES degree candidates, and the workload can be absolutely brutal. Classes, homework, papers, exam preparation and thesis research will dominate students' evenings and weekends for years (four is typical).

The washout rate is high. People who sign up for classes and expect to float through the ALM program won't make it past the admissions requirements. Matriculated students who can't keep up with the academic demands will eventually be forced out by poor grades (a B- or higher is required for each course and students must have a 3.0 GPA to graduate) or their inability to complete the thesis. Nine out of ten people who enroll in Extension School classes will never receive an ALM or ALB degree, and even among matriculated students who have been admitted to one of the ALM/liberal arts programs, half won't make it to Commencement.

What about the ALM degrees in information technology and management? (Updated) I can't answer that question -- I never took any IT or management classes at the Extension school.

But I can talk about other aspects of the programs. Despite being called "master of liberal arts" degrees, they are actually professional degrees. And, unlike the Liberal Arts ALM degree, the professional ALMs no longer have any Harvard instructor requirements.

This is a shocking development. The Extension School has portrayed the end of the Harvard instructor requirement as a positive move, saying that it enables more flexibility in course selection. Unfortunately, it also takes away one of the primary reasons for attending the Extension School -- being able to study under real Harvard faculty.

A little history is necessary to explain why the Extension School administration decided to jettison one of its core competencies for its professional degree programs. When the professional degrees were grown from the much smaller professional certificate programs, the Extension School attempted to duplicate the "Harvard Instructor" requirement that governs the liberal arts-focused ALB and ALM degrees. In fact, the printed 2002-2003 Extension School catalogue actually used the term "Harvard Instructor" for both liberal arts and professional degree requirements.

The professional degree programs were a hit. However, the school had difficulty attracting Harvard faculty to teach the professional classes. Sometimes it was because Harvard's other schools didn't have faculty who taught those subjects -- for instance, there is no journalism or media studies department from which the Extension School could recruit instructors for its graduate journalism degree. In other cases, Harvard professors could not be enticed to teach at the Extension School. In his book The Gates Unbarred, Dean Michael Shinagel admitted this was a problem.

This situation caused the Extension School to loosen the criteria to include "Harvard-Affiliated Instructors", including working professionals and non-faculty researchers from Harvard's huge staff. The school also greatly ramped up its reliance upon pre-recorded distance education classes featuring Harvard faculty, which by their very nature limit direct interaction between faculty and students. This, in turn, greatly expanded the potential customer base outside eastern Massachusetts, increasing demand for more online course offerings.

As for the Extension School turning to affiliates to teach its professional classes, many of them bring huge amounts of experience and talent to their respective programs. However, they are not Harvard faculty members responsible for driving research and academic dialogues at the University. In addition, in many cases the affiliates' experience is specific to Harvard's own operations, which may not apply to the wider world.

According to a letter sent to me by an officer at the Extension School in July 2010, the professional programs' affiliate requirement is being replaced by "advisory board oversight," which the Extension School officer suggests will provide "better quality control". The letter further suggests that the change will allow the Extension School to recruit more talented faculty from other area schools as well as working professionals from outside Harvard.

While recruiting professors from Boston University, Bentley, Boston College and UMass will improve the quality of the instruction in these programs, it is a tacit acknowledgment that the professional degree programs have failed to fit the model established by the Extension School to offer a Harvard academic experience led by Harvard faculty members to students. It further sets a precedent for launching new professional degree programs that have no connection to the University's existing areas of study, and opens the door to criticism that Harvard Extension School degrees aren't "real" degrees because they no longer represent study under Harvard's top-notch faculty.

President Lowell, who established the Extension School more than 100 years ago, would have been disappointed. From the archives of The Crimson:

"President Lowell, in speaking of the relations of the University to the community, laid special stress on the importance of confining university extension to fields in which the existing resources of the university could be placed at the service of the community. It was much better, he said, to have substantial instruction of a high grade given by a few of the most eminent and stimulating teachers than to have superficial or merely entertaining courses of a popular nature."

There are a few additional things I would like to note about the ALM in Management program. Completing the ALMM degree requirements will not result in a Harvard MBA, which can only granted by the Harvard Business School. The Business School is a completely different campus entity that has no direct connection with the Extension School. The pedagogy at the two schools are different -- for instance, the Business School stresses the case method and team-building exercises based on class cohorts, and does not incorporate online instruction. For these and other reasons, the Business School's MBA program and the Extension School's ALMM program are not comparable. Further, it is impossible to study for a Harvard executive MBA or a Harvard online MBA -- neither school offers such a degree. (For insights into the student experience at the Harvard Business School, I recommend Philip Delves Broughton's Ahead of the Curve: Two Years at Harvard Business School).

Nevertheless, the ALM/Management program is extremely popular. It has grown to hundreds of students since it was introduced in 2007. The Extension School recently decided to tighten up the ALMM requirements, by demanding a 3.33 GPA for admissions and requiring six out of twelve classes to be taken on campus. I believe the new rules are appropriate -- the program really was getting too large, and attracted some people who seemed to value online convenience over academics.

The Extension School's ALB program for undergraduates -- is it worth it? I received my undergraduate degree from Boston University, so it's hard for me to judge the ALB, which is a non-residential program tailored to the needs of working adults. However, many of my Extension School classes had undergraduate and graduate sections, so I can attest to the quality of in-class instruction (but not distance education classes, many of which have little or no interaction between faculty and Extension School students). I would also recommend some of the following posts (be sure to read the comments):

Do Extension School graduates go on to complete advanced degrees at Harvard's other professional schools? (Updated) Yes. There are a small number of ALB and ALM recipients who are admitted to masters and PhD programs at Harvard's other professional schools, including the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the Law School, the Harvard School of Public Health, and the Harvard Graduate School of Education. For instance, in 1996 10 HES grads received degrees from other Harvard schools, including a PhD in English and American Literature and Language from GSAS.

The Extension School no longer publishes the names and degrees of alumni who receive additional Harvard degrees, but the trend has continued into the 21st century, according to Post Harvard (the alumni website, which includes a directory of all Harvard graduates). I did a quick search for a single year's HES graduates in the 2000s, and for that year found about a half-dozen alumni who had received masters degrees from other Harvard schools, as well as one PhD.

Not only does this indicate that some Extension School graduates are being accepted to some of the world's most selective graduate programs, it also proves that the Extension School is giving its students the skills that are required for advanced research and study elsewhere.

However, note that an Extension School degree is *not* a guarantee of admission to another Harvard school. Admission to most masters and PhD programs depends on many factors, including the number of applicants, the specialties/needs of the academic program, applicants' research and work backgrounds, GPAs, adcoms standardized test scores, admissions essays, recommendations, etc.

Will an Extension School degree look good on my résumé? Will it help me get a good job?

I proudly list my Extension School degree on my C.V., and know that many others do, too. But if adding "Harvard" to your résumé is the sole purpose for attending, as opposed to learning, then you are going to the Extension School for the wrong reason and will probably end up wasting a lot of time.

The number one reason for attending the Harvard Extension School is to be exposed to some of the best teachers and researchers in the world and study topics that truly interest you (perhaps as a precursor to further graduate studies elsewhere). Some who manage to get through the degree requirements look back at their studies as a transformative learning experience. Getting a degree from Harvard is the icing on the cake.

That said, it must be acknowledged that an Extension School degree will not hold the same cachet as a Harvard College AB or an MBA from the Harvard Business School. Students at those schools are heavily recruited by multinational corporations, technology powerhouses, and well-known management consulting firms and boutique service providers. The Extension School programs are not as well known, and some employers may be skeptical of any degree that does not represent full-time study (this is an existing issue for some EMBA and part-time MBA programs).

I personally think the Extension School's ALM/Liberal Arts and ALB degrees will look good on résumés -- both are quality academic programs and represent serious study and research at one of the top educational institutions on the planet. However, I can't tell you whether it will lead to a good job. That depends on a host of factors, including work experience, work-related skills, job interviews, and the attitudes/requirements of employers. I've hired people before, and the number one requirement is relevant work experience, not where they attended college or graduate school.

I also feel that the expectations of employers regarding the Extension School's professional degrees (management, information technology, journalism, etc.) are going to become less aligned with what the Extension School delivers, owing to the administration's move in 2010 to end the last vestiges of the Harvard instructor requirement. If I were an employer, I would expect that someone putting "Harvard" on his or her résumé would have been exposed to the research and world-class faculty that the Harvard brand represents. Therefore, my advice to students interested in those programs would be to make every effort to take Harvard faculty-taught classes that match your interests (at least while they are still offered) and make an effort to attend symposia, special lectures, and other campus activities that allow Harvard students to get direct exposure to the intellectual and academic life of the University.

Surely the Extension School has other drawbacks. What are they? (Updated) It's true. Besides some of the issues described above, I have found several notable shortcomings with the Extension School's degree programs.

The biggest problem is the University's resistance to accepting the Harvard Extension School and Extension School students as equals. Yes, students get ID cards and Harvard email addresses. They can use libraries and other facilities on campus. But they are treated as inferiors in several other important areas.

For instance, ALB and ALM candidates who have completed their studies aren't granted degrees in history, biology, or other concentrations. Instead, they receive degrees in "Extension Studies." Dean Michael Shinagel has tried to fight this, but has been opposed by some FAS professors and members of the Harvard College community.

Another example of the Extension School's unequal status: It is the only school at Harvard whose graduate students are not allowed to cross-register. A student at the Harvard School of Dental Medicine could conceivably enroll in a class at the Kennedy School of Government, but a government concentrator in the Extension School's ALM program could not. It's unwarranted, unfair, and insulting. Elitism is one reason for this state of affairs, but a misunderstanding of the Extension School and its bifurcated student body is also partially responsible (see my comments regarding the name issue, below).

I have some specific complaints about the ALM/Liberal Arts program, starting with the limited opportunities for specialization. I was able to take lots of courses in my field (Chinese history) and locate a thesis director in the FAS Department of Government who had very specific insights and expertise relating to my research questions and methodology. Other fields are poorly represented in the Extension School course offerings and among Harvard faculty. For instance, I wouldn't have been able to take many classes related to African history, and I've heard of several ALM students who have had difficulty finding a thesis director who has expertise or an interest in the topic they want to research.

Another program-specific drawback was the lack of departmental affiliation. Outside of the classroom, academic support for matriculated graduate students at the Extension School consists of writing help, thesis research study groups, limited academic advising and guidance for the thesis proposal. It's also possible to serve as teaching and research assistants for instructors and FAS professors. Other than that, students are on their own. They can use Harvard's library facilities and attend open seminars elsewhere on campus, but the Extension School does not have full English, biology, or history departments that bring concentrators together on a regular basis or organizes guest speakers, special research projects, or other activities. I am not blaming the Extension School for this state of affairs -- I realize that it has limited resources and can't support full departments with dedicated faculty and staff. Still, it's disappointing to graduate students who are very serious about their studies and want to get the most out of their Harvard experience.

This brings up a related issue: The limited Extension School student community. There are a few clubs, and the Harvard Extension School Student Association (HESA) tries hard to organize social and academic activities, but the number of people who get involved is small relative to the total number of matriculated students. It's not surprising, considering most students live far from campus, have full-time jobs, and often juggle family responsibilities as well. The creation of an online community for Extension School students has helped, but it is also quite small -- even though more than 300 have registered, I estimate less than one-sixth are active participants in the discussions there.

Online education is a huge growth area for the Extension School, but the technologies used today are not a suitable replacement for in-class instruction and discussion. Unlike traditional face-to-face classes at the Extension School, contact with Harvard faculty in the online classes is limited (Example: "Last term was my first semester at HES and I was surprised at the lack of assignment and test feedback that I received in the courses"). Even though many distance education students work extremely hard on assignments and tests, watching videos on the Extension School website and participating in limited online discussions does not represent a "Harvard-caliber" academic experience, as the Extension School claims. I strongly disagree with the Extension School's liberal online credit policies, which allow students in the undergraduate ALB and graduate ALM in IT programs to complete upwards of 90% of their coursework online, without ever sitting in the same room with their classmates or professors. Tellingly, neither Harvard College nor Harvard's professional schools offer online classes to their own students for degree credit.

You can see more of my thoughts about online education at the Extension School here, or read about the online math class I took for credit at the University of California at Berkeley Extension School in 2010. Bottom line: The convenience was addictive, but there was no sense of community or classroom discussion. I was basically "taught" by a textbook (the online element included some light reading, homework, and tests), and received university credit for it. To equate this form of online learning with a traditional, on-campus seminar or lecture is a major stretch.

Lastly, I must address issues relating to the Harvard Extension School's name. When President Lowell established the school nearly 100 years ago, "Extension School" made sense: It was a small program intended to give local residents a taste of the Harvard experience, and for a tiny number of people (for decades, just a couple of students per year), it offered a chance of earning an associate of arts degree. But the school has since outgrown its original mission, as I noted in June:

While the casual population remains (see "The Extension School's 88% dilemma") there is now a significant contingent of undergraduate and graduate students attempting to complete the requirements for the ALB and ALM (graduate) degrees. Forget the outdated student profiles promoted in this 1951 Crimson article -- nowadays, the ALB/ALM student body includes many high achievers and people from all over the world interested in taking advantage of the school's stellar academic offerings. Extension School undergraduates sometimes match or outperform their College counterparts, and among my own graduating class for the ALM/liberal arts degree were a Harvard Divinity School graduate, a Harvard Medical School instructor, and students who had already earned JDs from two of the top law schools in the country before coming to the Extension School.

The problem with the Extension School name -- and the even worse replacement that the administration is promoting, "The Harvard School of Continuing Studies" -- is they reflect the temporary experiences of the majority, as opposed to the dedicated, long-term academic commitments of the minority. "Continuing education" and "continuing studies" suggest casual, open programs of study. That matches the Extension School's original mission, and meets the needs of the many thousands of students who take a class or two because they're curious or want to sample the Harvard educational experience. However, it does not reflect what I and others in the ALM/Liberal Arts program had to go through, in terms of completing graduate coursework and a major research and writing project, or the many years of dedicated studies that are required to receive a degree or certificate through the Extension School.

This is not an attempt to slight continuing education or open enrollment at the Extension School. Continuing education helps individuals and benefits society. I've taken classes for personal enrichment and/or career advancement, such as the Mandarin courses I took at the Taipei Language Institute and my very first class through the Department of Continuing Education -- an introductory short story writing class that I took through the Summer School in 2002. But these experiences simply do not compare to my ALM journey.

It's quite clear that the Extension School's degree programs have outgrown Lowell's original mission and the Extension School name. Harvard could tolerate casual class takers and an associates degree program that graduated a handful of people every year, but it never anticipated the school would become a significant campus presence in its own right. The ALM program, which was launched in 1980, now has more graduates every year than the Harvard Medical School, the Harvard Divinity School, the Harvard School of Dental Medicine, and the Harvard Graduate School of Design. This is hardly what President Lowell envisioned when he established the Extension School. I also doubt most other people in the University community are even aware of what's going on at the Extension School -- at Commencement, I remember our gigantic procession passing the Kennedy School graduates outside of the Yard before the ceremonies started, and overhearing one remarking to her classmate, "the Extension School has degrees?"

Getting back to the name issue: I do not have any specific suggestions for a new school name, and frankly, I don't think it's possible to come up with a suitable name that reflects the school's greatly expanded mission and two disparate populations (casual class takers and serious degree candidates). But this leads me to think that it's not the name that is the root issue. Rather, it's the under-the-radar departure from the school's original mission and the resulting bifurcated student population.

As one might expect, these are sensitive topics among the Extension School student body. I am proud to list my ALM degree on my résumé, but I've found that many Extension School students and alumni play down their Extension School affiliations. The ALB and liberal arts ALM programs require a tremendous amount of work to complete and are quality degrees, yet many alumni would rather state they graduated from "Harvard University" (Harvard does not discourage this -- see the official Harvard Extension School résumé guidelines which say "Harvard University, Master of Liberal Arts, concentration in history" is acceptable).

There is also a high-profile minority of students and alumni who misrepresent themselves as being affiliated with Harvard College, the Harvard Business School, the GSAS, and other professional schools at Harvard. When their lies are inevitably exposed, they not only embarrass the people making the false claims, it also hurts the reputation of the Extension School. These incidents are sometimes reported in the press, further damaging the reputation of the school and its students.

However, these issues should not detract from the quality of the course offerings, the top-notch instruction, and incredible learning experiences available through various Extension School programs. I know three people who have received Extension School degrees and have decided to start again in another HES degree or certificate program. If I had the time and the inclination, I would probably do the same, despite the problems listed above.

My Extension School experience

Like many students, I was introduced to the Harvard Extension School through work at Harvard University. Staff are allowed to enroll in classes at Harvard's professional schools at a greatly reduced cost through the Tuition Assistance Program (TAP). Many of my colleagues at the Alumni Affairs and Development Office pursued degrees at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, or took classes casually or for credit at the Extension School and Summer School. I took a Summer School course in 2002 on a casual basis, liked it a lot, and decided to take advantage of Harvard's TAP benefit. I had no interest in the programs at the Ed School, but was impressed by the Extension School catalog, and intrigued by the possibility of earning a masters degree there. I decided to register.

It took me five years to complete the ALM requirements. My first graduate-level class, History E-1830 (The Emergence of Modern China) started in January 2003, and my final elective, Humanities E-105 (Survey of Publishing, from Text to Hypertext) ended in January 2008. I graduated in June of 2008. I wasn't taking classes or working on my thesis for five whole years -- I took off one semester in the fall of 2004 when our second child was born, and there were several months-long breaks in 2006 and 2007 after my thesis proposal and final draft of the thesis were approved. With the exception of one archaeology class, I took all of my classes in the evening, and spent thousands of additional hours at night or on weekends studying, writing papers, and carrying out a seemingly endless set of database queries for my thesis research. I completed all of my courses on campus (as opposed to online) so I had to deal with commutes and parking as well. During the five-year period, I practically gave up reading for pleasure. There just wasn't enough time.

I also had work-related pressures to deal with, especially after I left Harvard in early 2005 and returned to the world of technology journalism. The pay was better, but the hours were longer and my office was far from campus. In addition, I no longer had the TAP benefit, so tuition, books, and other costs rose from a few hundred dollars per class to nearly $2,000 per class, on average. It was expensive, but it was absolutely worth it.

I was a history concentrator. With the exception of two American history classes, most of my coursework related to ancient and modern Chinese history. I studied under Philip Kuhn, who has researched and taught Chinese history at Harvard for many decades. My thesis was completed under the guidance of Professor Alastair Iain Johnston, the Governor James Albert Noe and Linda Noe Laine Professor of China in World Affairs. The title: "Making a Case for Quantitative Research in the Study of Modern Chinese History: The New China News Agency and Chinese Policy Views of Vietnam, 1977-1993." Unlike most history theses that rely upon traditional qualitative methods, mine was quantitative in nature. I designed and carried out an extensive computer content analysis (also known as computer-assisted text analysis) to test a disputed issue relating to Post-Mao foreign policy using Xinhua, China's official news agency. You can read about my thesis here, and you can also read some of the other research papers I wrote when I was a student.

Besides studying Chinese history, I also used my time at the Extension School to explore two additional academic interests: Virtual worlds and the Chinese Internet. There were many opportunities to branch out in these areas. I wrote an op-ed piece for the South China Morning Post about how the Internet and consumer technologies were eroding the power of China's government. I was a guest author on Terra Nova, an academic blog focused on virtual worlds and massively multiplayer online games, and was invited to take part in State of Play V, an international conference devoted to these emerging technologies. In my last year at the Extension School, I joined the Harvard Interactive Media Group, and for my final research paper for the survey class wrote an extensive analysis of the future of computer-generated 3D environments and the World Wide Web.

Best of the Harvard Extended blog

I launched Harvard Extended in mid-2005 to keep myself motivated as I started the most difficult stage of the ALM degree: The thesis. By reading the posts listed under "My ALM Thesis Experience: Top Ten Posts," you'll get an idea of the intellectual and practical challenges involved. Only a tiny percentage of the people who take graduate-level coursework at the Extension School ever complete the ALM degree requirements, thanks in large part to the thesis.

You'll also find many other posts about the Extension School, classes, and student life. I've come to the conclusion that the Harvard Extension School is one of the best educational deals in the country. I also believe the Harvard Extension School ALM program that I enrolled in was more academically challenging than many full-time graduate programs at Harvard and elsewhere. Nevertheless, I did not always blog about the good stuff and the high points. A range of opinions are covered in "Extension School Commentary: Top Ten Posts" section links further down the page.

I frequently used Harvard Extended as a platform for exploring other scholarly and professional interests, including virtual worlds, Chinese media, and the Internet. See "Research and Professional Interests: Top Ten Posts" for more information. Miscellany has a top ten list, too.

Harvard Extended has 414 entries, totaling well over 100,000 words, but the four lists below include what I consider to the most informative and interesting posts, essays, and asides. If you want more, you can read all 400+ posts by cycling through the monthly index on the right side of the Harvard Extended home page, starting with May 2005.

My ALM Thesis Experience: Top Ten Posts

Extension School Commentary: Top Ten Posts

Research and Professional Interests: Top Ten Posts

Miscellaneous: Top Ten Posts

Staying Connected

If you would like to follow blogs by other Extension School students, I highly recommend the following:

ClueHQ, written by an undergraduate (ALB) candidate

There are Facebook and Post.Harvard groups devoted to the Extension School as well, but as of this writing they are not nearly as active as ExtensionStudent.com.

As for me, the end of my Extension School studies does not mean the beginning of advanced studies somewhere else. Many ALM graduates leverage their research experience into graduate and doctoral programs at Harvard and elsewhere, but I am not interested in risking the interests of my family and my media career on an expensive PhD program in a crowded social sciences discipline. I have already spent enough nights and weekends over the past five years taking classes, conducting research, and writing. Now it's time for me to spend more time with my wife and kids. Additionally, the end of my last class in early 2008 coincided with the start of a new job as managing editor of The Industry Standard. This position is extremely demanding, but it's also quite exciting, and allows me to indulge my curiosity in a number of areas, including several that overlap with my research interests listed above. (In 2010, I left journalism and returned to graduate school full-time as an MIT Sloan Fellow.)

My own blogging will shift over to I, Lamont, and you can also keep up with my day-to-day experiences on Twitter, either from the feed on the right side of this page, or by visiting my personal Twitter page. I have also created a special @HarvardExtended twitter account, and update it with news and views that have connections with the Extension School or education.

It's been a good three-year run, but this is where Harvard Extended ends. Thanks for reading!

Ian Lamont
ALM '08

Distance education at Harvard: I'm not convinced

2008-09-03T05:48:00.000-07:00

This post was originally part of my epic last entry for the Harvard Extended blog, but I have decided to split it off and post it now.

It's a criticism of the Extension School's aggressive expansion into online/distance education. It's difficult for me to express, considering a good friend in the ALB program is completing his degree remotely. In addition, I have never taken an online class for credit at the Extension School -– all of my coursework was completed in person on Harvard's campus. Still, I have given this issue a great deal of thought, and I want to discuss it here.

I feel the Extension School's distance education push has gone too far. It's one thing for the Extension School to offer online lectures to people who want to sample Harvard's incredible faculty and course offerings. But permitting students in some programs to get most of their degree credit sitting in front of a computer terminal, often with few opportunities for direct interaction with faculty and classmates, is a mistake. Two of the Extension School's most popular degree programs -- the undergraduate ALB and the graduate ALM in IT -- allow students to complete 88% and 90% of their coursework online, respectively. Students can earn certificates in environmental management or applied sciences without ever stepping foot inside a Harvard classroom.
I don't doubt the drive or abilities of these students (after all, some ALB candidates get better grades than their Harvard College counterparts in shared classes) but I am questioning the degree to which the Extension School has embraced for-credit online classes as an alternate means of educating students and awarding degrees. At the same time, I accept that the Internet offers benefits that are impossible to realize in the Extension School's real-world campus. Do the benefits outweigh the drawbacks? I am not convinced that they do – at least not yet.

The Internet and its role in education have been discussed for many years at Harvard. In May of 1996, in an address to the First Harvard University Conference on the Internet and Society, President Neil Rudenstine recognized that the Internet was not just another mass media or communications technology, like the telegraph, radio, or television. In the educational sphere, the Internet represented a "real transformation." It was a technology that broadened access to data and course materials, reinforced methods of study, and enabled the sharing of knowledge in new and exciting ways:

"We know that the constant exchange of ideas and opinions among students -- as well as faculty -- is one of the oldest and most important forms of education. … The Internet allows this process of dialogue -- of conversational learning -- to be transferred easily and flexibly into electronic form. Communication can be carried on at all hours, across distances, with people who are on-campus or off-campus."

(Source: Neil L. Rudenstine, Pointing Our Thoughts. Harvard University Press, 2001, 123.)

For students at the Extension School, the Internet has certainly provided a special link. None of us live on campus. Many of us don't even live in Boston or Cambridge. Email, instant messaging, and the Web have provided connections to the school and to each other. These technologies have brought us closer, and they have also empowered us. My own thesis would have been impossible out without the Web. I used it to access HOLLIS and the LexisNexis Academic service, download text analysis software, and pass drafts back and forth with my thesis director while he traveled between Cambridge, Washington, and China. This blog is a product of the Web revolution, as is ExtensionStudent.com, where students and alumni gather to discuss classes, share advice, and debate issues relating to the Extension School.

But I am skeptical that distance education based on asynchronous Internet technologies (i.e., prerecorded video, online forums, and email) is a substitute for live classroom discussion and other on-campus interaction. Distance education students can't raise their hands to ask instructors questions or participate in discussions, and it's difficult or impossible for them to take advantage of faculty office hours. Teaching assistants don't always respond to email, and online class discussion boards can be neglected by students and faculty alike. In this sense, the "process of dialogue" is actually limited by technology. The main benefits of distance education become issues of convenience and access – being able to watch lectures at any time from any location, replay important sections, and see lectures by professors who otherwise don't teach live classes at the Extension School.

President Rudenstine saw some of these limitations. "No one should believe that electronic communication can be –- or should be -– a substitute for direct human contact," he said in his 1996 address. He stated that some technologies "permit an extension of the scope, continuity, and even the quality of certain forms of interaction," but added "communication over the network lacks other absolutely essential aspects of ‘real' conversations in the presence of ‘real' people."

Since then, the University has treaded very cautiously with online education. There have been a few isolated initiatives, and online video lectures and downloadable course materials are offered to Harvard alumni. But only the Extension School has made a serious attempt to develop an online curriculum and allow some students who live in other states or other countries to complete the majority of their classes remotely. Every year I see an increase in the number of online options, and the HES website currently boasts more than 100 online classes, out of more than 600 total.

This leads me to ask: If Harvard's other professional schools -– not to mention practically every other institute of higher education in America -- fail to regard online education as an acceptable substitute for in-class instruction, then why does the Extension School put them on the same plane? In the absence of any official explanation, I will offer my own speculation:

The school really believes the convenience of online education and the chance to expose students to special Harvard faculty outweigh the disadvantages outlined above. If this is the case, the Extension School has failed to communicate or explain its reasoning, other than offering feel-good marketing copy ("Harvard Caliber, Course Credit") on the HES website. Also, if the DCE feels that distance education is an acceptable substitute for in-person instruction, then why do certain degree programs (such as my own, the ALM/Liberal Arts) insist on a much higher level of in-class experience than the ALB and ALM in IT?
Opening up the course catalogue to out-of-state and international students has greatly expanded the Extension School's customer base, and increased revenues. The interest in these programs is huge -- every week, my Web traffic stats for Harvard Extended show visitors from all over the world searching for terms like "Harvard online MBA" and "Harvard online degree." The Extension School does not offer an online MBA, and the undergraduate ALB requires 16 out of 128 credits to be taken on campus, but no matter: The course offerings, the Harvard brand, and the possibility of completing between 50% and 90% of certain degrees' class requirements online are attractive enough for thousands of people take HES distance education classes casually or for credit. This has generated many millions of dollars in revenue for the Extension School over the last 10 years. However, it's not clear whether annual revenue is enough to offset costs -- distance education classes require a great deal of coordination to prepare and teach, not to mention significant hardware and software investments (hosting, editing, cameras, etc.)
Distance education dovetails with the Harvard Extension School's mission to offer Harvard's educational resources to members of the community. Dean Shinagel references this in his welcome message on the HES website, noting that "we stand ready to serve the community, be it local or global."
Harvard recognizes that the Internet is going to fundamentally transform education, and it wants to be prepared for the inevitable revolution. The Extension School has become Harvard's laboratory of sustained innovation and experimentation for distance education technologies and best practices.

The last theory is a stretch, but it intrigues me the most. The Internet has already transformed many aspects of society and human communication, and it's not unreasonable to imagine a future in which people participate in "conversational learning" and the "process of dialogue" even if they are not physically sitting at desks in the same room as their professors and classmates.

In fact, I agree with this vision. I just don't think it can be realized with streaming video, email, and online discussion forums alone.

Virtual worlds offer some hope for making highly interactive distance education a reality, and in fact the Extension School is a pioneer in this field, thanks to a partnership with the Harvard Law School's Berkman Center for Internet and Society. But, as of mid-2008, the virtual world platforms and applications used for distance education are only halfway there. The interfaces are difficult to use, the environments are hard to build and prone to unexpected problems in terms of behavior and connectivity, and in-world meetings can't scale. This technology definitely is not ready for large-scale adoption (Disclosure: I am a board member of the non-profit Immersive Education initiative, which is trying to develop and promote virtual world technologies and best practices for education).

Where does that leave the Extension School? Certainly, it's in a great position to capitalize on powerful technology and social trends, and potentially become a model for Harvard's other schools. But in the meantime, the technology is just not there. While I believe distance education is a worthy experiment, it is not a substitute for real-world instruction and discussion, and mostly online degrees should not be a part of a part of the Extension School's offerings.

Later this month, I'll be taking my first online class, Michael Sandel's Justice. It won't be for credit, but will give me some more insights into distance education. Maybe it will even change my mind. I also welcome other Extension School students to post their own thoughts on distance education below. What are some of the benefits and drawbacks that I missed? Can anyone describe what the academic research says about distance education? Am I being unfair to the Extension School and students working remotely? To what degree should distance education for credit be allowed using current technologies? What is the future of online education?

Update: Richard at ClueHQ has posted a lengthy response: Is Distance Education a Problem at Harvard?. He is a distance ed student in the ALB program, and his insights are definitely worth reading.

2nd Update: I have responded to Richard's essay in a comment on ClueHQ. Here's the preamble:

I think one of the biggest differences in our respective arguments is you are defending online distance education from the point of understanding course materials. I am approaching this issue from the point of what a “Harvard education” means.

It’s not just about having the campus experience, mastering course materials, or getting better grades than students who attend class in person. I firmly believe that a Harvard education — indeed, a university education — entails spending time in the same room with other human beings, listening to what instructors and classmates have to say, and asking questions. This is the process of dialogue that President Rudenstine referred to in 1996 — the discussions and sharing of knowledge that takes place when people are talking with each other in a direct manner, in person. It’s old school, but it works.

I describe specific advantages of in-class dialogue vs. their online components in the comment as well. You can read the entire comment here.

3rd Update: I have written about my own experience with distance education after sampling a class through the Harvard Alumni Association. See "Follow-up: My online education experience" on the I, Lamont blog.

4th update: Since writing this post, I have taken an online math class for credit, and have this to say about the online education experience:

My online math class: Convenience gets an 'A,' but at what cost?

Some of my other writings about online education:

In the digital age, Widener is "almost a museum"

2008-08-30T18:31:00.000-07:00

Earlier this week, I was lamenting the state of research and the dissemination of knowledge in academia. Despite the incredible tools at the disposal of students, scholars, and professors, paper is still the medium of choice when it comes to publishing research and sharing knowledge.

I am not alone. This morning I was reading the September-October issue of Harvard Magazine, and spotted this quote from Venkatesh Narayanamurti, the outgoing dean of Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences:

"I believe that the liberal-arts education of the twenty-first century has to be different," he says, noting that information is no longer centered in Widener Library. "The library made Harvard -- we have always had the rarest things, the best repository of knowledge, [but] information now is digital; it is on the Web. Widener Library is very valuable, but it is almost a museum."

When it comes to publishing, the Extension School is also very much oriented toward paper. Theses are bound in buckram and end up on shelves in Grossman Library. They may never be seen or read outside of the university community.

I really hope to see the Extension School and other academic units at Harvard embrace digital publishing and other Web-based ways of distributing knowledge in the next few years, so our collective efforts can be truly shared with the world, rather than being restricted to the museums of paper that dominate the campus.

Update: I just found out that in February of 2008, Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences approved a plan that will "post finished academic papers online free, unless scholars specifically decide to opt out of the open-access program." The source indicates that the policy applies to professors, but it's not clear whether student papers or research will be published online as well.

Taking Sandel's online "Justice" course

2008-08-29T06:33:00.000-07:00

I received an invitation through the Harvard Alumni Association to take "Justice" online. The class is taught by Professor Michael Sandel of Harvard's government department. I've heard about this class for years, and the preview looked fascinating. It's a great opportunity to take it online for free.

It looks like it will require a significant time commitment. There are 24 streamed sessions starting in September, plus opportunities to discuss the class with other alumni and even Professor Sandel. But it's a commitment I am willing to make. This is not just because the class looks interesting, but also because I have never taken online classes at Harvard, even though they were offered at the Extension School when I was a student there. I have some strong opinions about online education and its place at Harvard (which I will discuss in my final post for Post Harvard), but also realize that my viewpoints are limited by a lack of experience.

Thoughts on research, and saved by Scribd

2008-08-26T04:54:00.000-07:00

When scholars from the year 2058 look back on the current state of academic research and the dissemination of knowledge, they surely will marvel at the fact that so much of it remained oriented toward printed words on paper.

It is a surprising situation. Never mind that nearly all educated members of early 21st century society are already familiar with the World Wide Web, the most extensive and accessible publishing and communications tool ever invented. Despite this, many facets of the academic world remain firmly planted in the ways of the early 20th century. Whether it's writing a term paper or conducting a major research project, the fruits of students' and scholars' efforts usually end up as printed sheets of paper destined for a professor's mailbox, a filing cabinet or a university library. Even a doctoral dissertation that takes years to complete is probably going to exist as a paper hard copy in just one or two locations. The insights contained in it may never be read by more than a handful of people.

This is not to suggest that academics are Luddites. Far from it -- most students and educators are very familiar with email, search engines, online databases, and Microsoft Word. But even if students use software programs to make and distribute a term paper or thesis proposal, electronic copies hardly ever venture beyond the hard drives of the students who created them, or the inboxes of the professors who received and graded them. On occasion, high-level research will be deemed good enough for a wider audience, but all too often these works remain restricted to books or journal articles that can only be seen in university libraries or expensive, password-protected databases. Fifty years from now, the scholars of the future will marvel at all of the ideas, hypotheses, evidence, analysis that were expressed but were only shared with a limited slice of humanity, despite the ubiquity of the Web and the many software tools at our disposal to share them with a much wider audience. This system will not only be viewed as inefficient, it will be regarded as isolating researchers from potential sources of knowledge and preventing them from making discoveries and improving our understanding of the world around us.

But there is hope. I have mentioned initiatives at MIT, Berkeley, and elsewhere that are attempting to leverage the power of the Web to spread knowledge more widely (see Online education, sharing knowledge, and a proposal for Harvard and UC Berkeley's free lectures on YouTube). Harvard Extended itself represents my own personal effort to share my experiences, observations, and research findings with a wider audience, and has succeeded beyond my wildest expectations -- Google Analytics tells me that more than 3,000 visits to Harvard Extended have taken place in the past 30 days, and nearly 85,000 visits have occurred since I first started using the tool in May of 2006.

Still, I want to do more. My blogging on Harvard Extended will come to an end in the next week, and it bothers me that the class papers I worked so hard on over the years do not have a permanent online home. Collectively, they took many hundreds of hours to research and write, and were shaped by my interactions with Extension School instructors, including members of Harvard's faculty. What a waste if they were to be resigned to a box of old papers in my basement, or a file directory on my hard drive. When I was still a student at the Extension School, I posted some of them to a fas.harvard.edu Web server. Unfortunately, I lost my FAS computing privileges when I graduated earlier this year, but I think I've found an alternate solution: Scribd.

Scribd is kind of like the YouTube of electronic documents. Registered users can upload their PDF or Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, and random .txt scribblings. Anyone with a Flash-enabled Web browser can view them, or even embed them on their own websites, just like you can do with YouTube videos. The database is searchable and indexed by Google, meaning that people anywhere can readily find specific documents, if they use the right search terms.

So, I've taken a half-dozen papers and uploaded them to Scribd. The idea is to share them with my readers on Harvard Extended, and anyone else who finds them interesting. I've linked them below, and embedded one of them in this post -- my final research paper for HUMA E-105 (Survey of Publishing, from Text to Hypertext). You can read them in your Web browser, or download a PDF copy, but I've disabled text and Word exports to discourage plagiarism. Here are the papers, starting with the research proposal I prepared as part of my proseminar back in the winter of 2003:

Defining a Territorial Sea: China's South China Sea Policy in the 1950s and its 1958 Declaration on the Territorial Sea (research proposal)

January 2004. Harvard DCE/SSCI E-100B (Graduate Research Methods and Scholarly Writing in Social Sciences), Joe and Doug Bond, Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University

Historical Nationalism: How Interpretation of China's Past is Used to Build Unity in the Present

August 2004. Harvard DCE/Archaeology S-171 (Archaeology of the Silk Road), Irene Good, Peabody Museum, Harvard University

China's Emerging Overseas Chinese Policy in the Late 1970s and Implications for Ethnic Chinese Communities in Vietnam and Kampuchea

May 2005. Hist E-1834 (Chinese Emigration in Modern Times), Professor Philip Kuhn, Harvard University

Evaluating Official Attitudes Toward Post-Mao Chinese Film Through a Quantitative Lens

August 2006. History S-1855 (Film and History in Postwar Japan and Post-Mao China), Prof. Charles Hayford, Visiting Scholar, History, Northwestern University

Proposal for a Thesis in the Field of History in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Master of Liberal Arts Degree

February 2006. Prof. Donald Ostrowski and Prof. Alastair Iain Johnston, Harvard University

The Rise of the Press in Late Imperial China

November 2007. HUMA E-105 (Survey of Publishing, from Text to Hypertext), Matthew Battles, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

I am also embedding the last paper I ever completed for the Extension School in January of this year, which was also for Battles' excellent survey class. It's quite fitting that it should end up here, as the class discussed the history of the written language from the time of the Sumerians through Gutenberg's printing revolution and finally the beginning of the current publishing revolution taking place on the Web. I took things a step further, and looked at emerging Web-based software technologies and photorealistic 3D environments. It's entitled Video, Computer-Generated Environments and the Future of the Web:

Video, Computer-Generated Environments and the Future of the Web - Upload a Document to Scribd

One thing that's missing from this small collection of papers is the most important paper of my Extension School career: my thesis (title: Making a Case for Quantitative Research in the Study of Modern Chinese History: The New China News Agency and Chinese Policy Views of Vietnam, 1977-1993). There's are several reasons I have not included it here. While Scribd is a very easy way to host documents, one thing that Scribd does not have is a vetting process or a reputation for reliability. The contents of an academic journal will have been vetted by experts and editors, and quality will be high. On Scribd, anybody can publish anything without it being vetted by anyone, and quality is mixed. For academic papers published on Scribd, the good appears alongside the bad. You'll find astounding creative works and rigorously designed research projects, as well as limp efforts at scholarly writing and even deliberate misinformation. Users can flag offensive content and copyright violations, but the process is flawed and leaves a lot of bad content on Scribd's servers. Interesting or quality content can also be highlighted by readers and illuminated with comments, but this system is imprecise in that it does not differentiate the praise from a 15-year-old kid trying to finish his homework and a 60-year-old university professor who stumbles upon a great paper on Scribd through a search on Google.

You'll have to take my word that all of the above papers were submitted to Harvard faculty or Extension School instructors for review, and all received excellent grades. However, the weaknesses in the Scribd system have convinced me to hold off on reposting my thesis on scribd.com. I want it to have the largest possible impact on my field, and I don't believe it will have that impact if posted to Scribd. Instead, I am holding out hope for a Harvard-sponsored solution. Nearly two years ago, I petitioned the Extension School to archive masters theses in the same electronic database used for doctoral dissertations at Harvard, ProQuest UMI (Update: My thesis is now available through UMI/ProQuest). While this is a closed database that can only be accessed through university library systems, it is restricted to vetted, accepted research from university masters and doctoral programs. It is widely used in academic circles -- in fact, the literature review in my thesis referenced several dissertations that I had located in the ProQuest UMI database. I hope that someday my own thesis might also be useful to future scholars of modern Chinese history, Cold War history, and Chinese media studies, if Harvard decides to extend this resource to ALM theses from the Extension School.

Couldn't have said it better myself ...

2008-08-03T18:40:00.000-07:00

I just noticed this on the ALM/Biotechnology admissions page:

Because most of our students are experienced professionals, we believe an applicant’s ability to do honors-level work at Harvard is a more relevant predictor of academic success than standardized test scores or undergraduate grade point averages. Thus, a prerequisite of admission is the successful completion of three courses from the program curriculum.

What a great way to describe admissions at the Extension School. Note that "successful completion" means a B or better in each of the three classes, and in order to graduate, students have to maintain a 3.0 grade point average. In other words, it's a meritocracy, from matriculation to graduation. Students who can't cut the coursework won't be admitted, and those who can't complete the thesis and other requirements won't get a degree.

I wish the Extension School could use this text on the admissions page for the Liberal Arts ALM programs, but relatively few of us can be considered experienced professionals, and even those of us who are often study academic subjects outside of our career backgrounds.

Where I'm writing

2008-07-26T07:38:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the delay in posting. There're a few essays in progress, and later this summer I will be wrapping up Harvard Extended (but keeping the blog online as an archive) with a long, final post.

In the meantime, you may want to check out some of the writing activity over at my other personal blog, I, Lamont, and on The Industry Standard (scroll down below the list of friends to see the headlines and links). I actually updated I, Lamont last night, with the following items:

A final farewell to Randy Pausch

A silver ASBPE award for "Interactive Community"

I am also regularly updating my Twitter feed, which is kind of like a mini blog that features quick thoughts and interesting links. You can visit the page directly, or I have the five most recent "tweets" appearing on the right-hand side of Harvard Extended and I, Lamont (you may have to scroll down to see them).

Hope you are all having a nice summer ...

Random thesis notes

2008-07-06T17:31:00.000-07:00

I've updated a post from last year that described the completion of my thesis, and thanked various faculty and family who helped me during the long research and writing process.

Besides adding the final grade report from Prof. Johnston (my thesis director), I also removed the broken link to the archived PDF version of the thesis. It had been stored on my personal FAS Web account, but that expired in April and I have yet to find an alternate solution. I've considered Scribd, or hosting it my own, but would much prefer a database that's associated with the University, and can be used by other scholars studying Chinese media and foreign policy during the 1970s, 1980s, and early 1990s.

Update 3/15/2009: My thesis is now available via UMI/ProQuest's widely used academic database. You can read it here. Information about how it came about can be read here.

The coming Video 2.0 storm

2008-07-02T15:41:00.000-07:00

This afternoon around lunchtime there was a severe hailstorm in my neck of the woods, about a quarter mile from the junction of I-90 and I-95 (about 10 miles west of Boston). Our family has a Flip video camera, so I grabbed it and took three quick clips, including this one:

Posting video on blogs is not a big deal nowadays, but as I went through the process, I was struck by how much things have changed in just a few short years. We really are entering the age of Video 2.0, and it's happening so fast.

Consider this: Five years ago, shooting and posting video was a very convoluted process. Most cameras did not record to disc, meaning that tape had to be played through cables to a PC and potentially converted to some Web-friendly format. Then you had to find server space, which basically limited homegrown video to techies who knew the ins and outs of FTP and had access to a server to host the file. At that point, you could send the link around or promote it via your blog, and maybe if you were lucky, someone bigger would also link to it or it would show up at the top of Google search results for people interested in the topic at hand.

A couple of developments have occurred since then which greatly change the way video is consumed and distributed online. First, there was a watershed event in world of news and user-generated video, the Indian Ocean Tsunami (I discuss this disaster at the bottom of this page). Second, the rise of free video-hosting sites such as YouTube not only took care of the hosting problem with easy-to-use interfaces, but also handled format conversion automatically and created search-enabled clearinghouses for millions of consumers. Third, cheap consumer gadgets such as the Flip (see my Flip review) and video-enabled phones made it easy for people to capture and send video to friends and hosting sites.

The hailstorm video above took 30 seconds to shoot, about a minute to get onto my computer (thanks to Flip's built-in USB connector) and about 10 minutes to upload to YouTube. Before I uploaded it, I used YouTube's interface to tag it, add a description, and even "geotag" it through the integrated Google Maps function. I then sent the link via IM to friends and even left it in a comment thread on a local newspaper blog. The editor at the blog then took the YouTube syndication code and published it under another blog entry, enabling more people to see the power of the storm ... and the power of Internet-enabled video.

This type of video will really change the way we understand the world in the coming years. For my final Extension School course (Survey of Publishing: From Text to Hypertext, see a blog description here) I devoted my term paper to the discussion of video, 3D animation, and the Internet. The paper was called "Video, Computer-Generated Environments and the Future of the Internet", and I'd like to share one of the sections here:

Members of the public not only happen to witness news, they often gain access to people and places that broadcast news professionals cannot or will not see. They are able to capture vivid, on-scene accounts of major and minor events. The Zapruder and Rodney King home movies were early examples of this movement. Then, the devices were relatively expensive and there was no way to distribute the video to a wide audience, except through traditional media outlets such as television news. Now, cheap webcams, video cameras and mobile phones with built in cameras make it possible for practically anyone to record news events. The Internet lets them distribute the footage to a huge audience, and lets them bypass traditional gatekeepers, their professional editing requirements, and ethical codes. The footage they shoot is raw and real. It can be brutally honest and compelling, but also provocative and biased. The December 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami was a watershed moment in this respect. For the first time, global awareness of a major news event was shaped in large part by footage shot by amateurs and distributed via the Internet. The footage was disturbing, but captured the scope of the destruction far more effectively than broadcast news outlets, which had no reporters on scene when the waves first struck the beaches.

While my 38-second hailstorm clip is not as important as a riot video, it really is a sign of things to come. When hundreds of people are witnessing and videotaping storms, disasters, political meetings, crimes, and sporting events, and there are technologies to aggregate this content or highlight the best parts, local TV news created by a relatively small team of expensive anchors, reporters, videographers and editors will be unable to effectively compete using traditional newsgathering methods.

Another Harvard College AB/Extension School ALB comparison

2008-06-28T20:38:00.000-07:00

This week I received a comment on an older post, comparing the Harvard College AB degree with the Harvard Extension School's ALB degree. "Chris" says forget about the differences in the two undergraduate curriculums or the academic abilities of students -- he found that cost and the Extension School's original mission set it apart from the College:

Back in 2000 I worked as a student assistant at the Office of the Governing Boards, Loeb House. I had a very candid discussion with one of the Fellows regarding the Extension School and the school's status at Harvard. For the most part, the President & Fellows of Harvard College do feel that the degree programs at the Extension School are a strong component of Harvard's philosophical mission. Unlike most other Ivy League institutions, Harvard is the ONLY university to offer a true, world-class education to academically-enabled non-traditional, adult learners. While Columbia and Penn do have programs aimed at non-traditional students, the cost and slim evening course offerings are prohibitive to many working adults. According to this Fellow, the primary goal of the Corporation, as far as the Extension School is concerned, is to keep the programs affordable to adult students that may already be over-burdened with a variety of real-life expenses. The fundamental difference between Harvard College and the Harvard Extension School is NOT in the curriculum (as the ALB is heavily modeled after the traditional AB) but in the cost of attendance. If you compare the cost of attendance at Harvard College with the cost of attendance at the Harvard Extension School, you'll immediately notice a stark difference. That difference is of phenomenal benefit to the academically-enabled non-traditional student. We will earn a bachelor's degree from Harvard University, study with a world-class faculty, have access to a variety of resources (libraries, email accounts, facilities, many clubs/organizations etc.) and we will become alumni of Harvard University, just as anyone else graduating from the University.

I don't agree with Chris' statement about the curriculum -- the Extension School can't match the sheer number or breadth of offerings available to College undergrads, and the Extension School does not have the core curriculum or many opportunities for specialization -- but his comments about the attitude of the Harvard Corporation toward the Extension School is interesting. The Corporation is a small but powerful group that makes many important decisions about University affairs, including choosing Harvard's president. I don't think the Extension School figures prominently in the Corporation's meetings, but if the governing body truly is dedicated to the Extension School's original mission of providing affordable access to non-traditional students, that's a good thing. The Extension School is a fabulous deal, providing access to world-class faculty and facilities at a relatively low cost, and it should stay that way.

However, one thing that the Corporation and the rest of the University needs to realize is the Extension School has outgrown its limited community and academic mission. For decades it was populated by casual students from neighboring cities and towns as well as a minuscule population of students interested in getting an associate of arts degree. While the casual population remains (see "The Extension School's 88% dilemma") there is now a significant contingent of undergraduate and graduate students attempting to complete the requirements for the ALB and ALM (graduate) degrees. Forget the outdated student profiles promoted in this 1951 Crimson article -- nowadays, the ALB/ALM student body includes many high achievers and people from all over the world interested in taking advantage of the school's stellar academic offerings. Extension School undergraduates sometimes match or outperform their College counterparts, and among my own graduating class for the ALM/liberal arts degree were a Harvard Divinity School graduate, a Harvard Medical School instructor, and students who had already earned JDs from two of the top law schools in the country before coming to the Extension School.

Chris touches on a few other points, including work/life/school balance, and his experiences in the Harvard clubs of Boston and New York. You can read the entire comment here (warning: Long, and no paragraph breaks!)

See also:

Thoughts on the ALB program: "The best undergraduate education possible"

Chinese character stroke order

2008-06-18T17:13:00.000-07:00

Learning Chinese characters is perhaps the most difficult aspect of studying Mandarin. It's not just a matter of memorizing what a character looks like, the constituent parts (known as radicals), or the etymology. There is also a fairly precise "stroke order" that governs writing. It can be very frustrating for Western students.

I was reminded of this as my young daughter attempts to learn some traditional Chinese characters, which are used in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and some overseas Chinese communities (China uses simplified characters, see my essay here for a quick history). Her inclination is to write the characters any way she pleases -- much like I did when I started studying Mandarin many years ago -- but my wife and I had to correct her. The general stroke order is top to bottom, left to right, but there are some exceptions. We weren't helped by a cheap Taiwanese children's character booklet which had the incorrect stroke order for several basic characters -- for instance, the instructions for xiao (小, small) had her starting with the left dian instead of the central stroke. I am hardly an expert on characters, but it still seemed strange to me. When my wife saw it, she was puzzled, too. "That's not the way we learned it," she frowned.

She was right. I found a great online resource, the YellowBridge Online Character Dictionary, which has a very useful lookup function and animated character tool which shows the proper stroke order. It backed up my wife in almost every case. Still, as she tried it out, she was reminded that there are some alternate writing methods for certain characters, such as guo (國, country), below, which places the top right dian second to last in the stroke order, instead of near the beginning, which is how many people in Taiwan write it in order to save time.

Harvard Extension School Commencement

2008-06-05T19:08:00.000-07:00

(Note: Videos and pictures of the June 5 ceremonies are available below) Commencement 2008 is finally over. It wasn't just today's exhausting slate of ceremonies -- it was a whole week of activities and get-togethers that brought students back to campus over several days this week.

For the Liberal Arts ALM recipients, there was a pleasant Faculty Club reception on Monday in which prizes were announced. On Tuesday, there was also an alumni reception and dinner at Quincy House (see photo, below, from the Quincy House courtyard), the first I've ever attended, in which I got to meet some older ALM and ALB graduates, as well as some members of the class of 2008. Last night, some of us got together at Daedalus after making plans on ExtensionStudent.com. At all of these events, it was a good chance to reflect, trade war stories, and talk about the future. The stories I heard were fascinating -- some people had to go through incredible struggles to complete their degrees, and others managed to complete their degrees despite years-long interruptions, travel and family obligations, and high-powered careers. Examples that spring to mind include the ALM/Women's Studies student who stopped her coursework to get a degree from the Harvard Divinity School, the Harvard Medical School doctor who managed to get her ALM in Literature and Creative Writing and write a prize-winning thesis, and an ALB student and honor's society member (I believe Phi Beta chapter of the Alpha Sigma Lambda society) who completed her final four courses online in one semester while working a full-time job in Korea and Japan.

But Commencement was the main event. I've never participated in anything like it, and probably never will again. There are so many memories, and it involves many traditions, ranging from the archaic to the raucous. And it was all quite splendid. Highlights included a bagpipe-led parade from 51 Brattle Street to the rear of Sever Hall for the morning exercises; the Middlesex County Sheriff bellowing for the tens of thousands of people in Tercentenary Theater to come to order; the spontaneous chants of "Vincimus!" (we conquer!) during the Latin Oration; the sobering yet encouraging Graduate English Address by Anthony Christopher Woods, an Iraq war veteran who just completed his studies at the Kennedy School; the playful waving of inflated globes, pills, gavels, bills, and lanterns as the various school populations received their pronouncements from President Faust; and the final, joyous diploma ceremony at the Loeb Theater, with family and friends watching.

And let's not forget the crowds, the drizzle, the confusion. And the waiting. Lots of waiting -- for parades to start, for the black- and crimson-clad graduates to get into Tercentenary and Loeb theaters, and finally, the wait for the speeches to end so we could receive our diplomas.

Here are some photos from the day ...

Our marker in the Sever Quad, around 8 am. I'd say around 300-350 of us gathered here after marching from 51 Brattle Street behind a piper. This figure includes ALB and ALM students, but not the certificate recipients, who don't participate in the Tercentenary Theater exercises.

ALB and ALM graduates, seated in the center of the throng between Widener and Memorial Church, where the addresses were made. The ALB (undergraduates) wear all black, while the ALM (masters) have red academic hoods draped over their shoulders (the same regalia as our counterparts from the College and the other schools). About eight of us in various ALM programs received the Class Marshal Award for Academic Distinction, which meant we also got to add a red tassel to our hats and carry a small baton.

Looking toward the steps of Memorial Church, where Faust, the deans, and the honorary degree recipients were seated. It drizzled lightly at times, and the trees above us also dropped twigs and little buds in the wind, but it did not rain. Divinity was in front of us, and the College houses off to the left.

人山人海

Widener steps, after the morning exercises.

Around 1:30 pm, ALM Liberal Arts grads gather in the back alley of Christ Church, for the short march to Loeb/ART on Brattle Street. In back of us were the ALM/IT graduates. The ceremony for the ALM Management (103 graduates, and the program is only two years old!), ALM/Museum Studies and one or two other concentrations took place in Loeb while we were waiting here -- even if there were a large enough hall to hold all of us and our families, the ceremony for such an event would last three or four hours, including the speeches and prize announcements.

I also wanted to include a video of part of the final ceremony, in which prizes were announced and our diplomas given to us. Dean Shinagel gave a short speech in which he described some of our accomplishments and some stats about the ALM program. He also named the winner of the "tortoise award," an amusing title for something that truly is awe-inspiring:

(There are about a half-dozen additional videos from Commencement 2008 posted on my YouTube account)

One final thing I'd like to mention about Commencement 2008: The morning exercises is the only event in which all of the diploma-earning students from the University -- College, Extension, Divinity, Education, Government, Public Health, etc. -- are brought together in a shared Harvard experience, one of the oldest and most important ceremonies at Harvard. As we watched the other 2008 cohorts parading into Tercentenary Theater, wearing similar regalia and sporting similar smiles, I was very conscious of the fact that we really were actually quite similar. Our respective schools may teach different things and have different requirements, but for years we all shared a dedication to study and a drive to succeed at one of the most special learning environments on the planet. This was the day when we finally all came together, after which we all will go our separate ways, forever.

A return to books, and thoughts on translations

2008-06-03T21:33:00.000-07:00

I've been reading a lot lately, following the completion of my last class and a change of jobs. After being hired as managing editor of The Industry Standard at the beginning of the year, I decided I needed to brush up on the history of Silicon Valley and the first Web bubble, so I tackled The New New Thing, The Nudist On The Late Shift, and a history of The Industry Standard itself, Starving To Death on $200 Million. I also read The Search, by Industry Standard and Wired founder John Battelle, and the first half of a dry tome on UIs and GUIs entitled The Human Interface.

I read fiction, as well. Since I was a teenager I have been a fan of fantasy and science fiction, and re-read The Hobbit as well as a newer book by an old favorite -- The Knight, by Gene Wolfe. Historical fiction is another genre that I love to explore, and one that I sorely missed when I was deep into my thesis and had no time to read for pleasure. The Piano Tuner has been sitting on my shelf for at least two years, and I was pleased to finally pull it down and finish it in a few days. Last month when we were on vacation, I finished Thomas Harris' Imperium, which is a depiction of several episodes in the life of Cicero. It was interesting, yet disappointing. I had greatly enjoyed Harris' earlier book about ancient Rome, Pompeii, and loved watching the first season of Rome on DVD with my wife, but Imperium came across as too disjointed, and too focused on Cicero's Machiavellian conspiracies in the Late Republic. This was perhaps a result of Harris' desire to remain true to the historical record as it relates to Cicero's life. Unfortunately, many of the extant primary sources consist of Cicero's political and legal treatises -- hardly ideal fodder for a gripping piece of historical fiction.

There are two other books that I have also been reading at a far slower pace. Both relate to Chinese history. They are Anthology of Chinese Literature: From Early Times to the Fourteenth Century, edited by Cyril Birch, and Return to Dragon Mountain: Memories of a Late Ming Man, by Jonathan Spence.

These books aren't meant to be rushed, especially the anthology. The appeal of the two books ties into my studies here -- much of my coursework centered on ancient and modern Chinese history. Both of them contain beautiful English translations of ancient texts written in classical Chinese, and I have to appreciate the skill involved in bringing them to life. Classical Chinese carries a special set of challenges in terms of translation, that goes beyond simply knowing Chinese characters or reading modern prose. The following is an excerpt from one of my last school papers, written for Matthew Battles' history of publishing course, entitled "Written Chinese: An Elitist Script, or a Language of the Masses?" In it, I explain the nature of classical Chinese, and some of the difficulties related to understanding it:

The Zhou dynasty (1122 – 256 B.C.E.) saw the rise of several important Chinese religious and philosophical movements, including Confucianism, Daoism, and Legalism. These sophisticated concepts were recorded in a series of important texts using a spare writing style called wenyan wen (lit. “literary language,” or “patterned words”). In English, it is known as “classical Chinese,” in reference to the five Confucian classics. Owing to a lack of audio recordings or historical descriptions of common speech, it is uncertain how closely the vernacular and written matched during the Zhou dynasty, but by the Han dynasty (206 B.C.E. – 220 A.D.) spoken Chinese (baihua wen, or “unadorned speech”) had evolved to a considerably different state from written Chinese.

For this reason, classical Chinese was (and still is) difficult to read. While spoken Chinese contains numerous words made up of two or more syllables, most classical Chinese consisted of monosyllables, or single characters. Sparse passages tended to suggest meaning, as opposed to clearly (or precisely) describing it.

My source for this information was Richard J. Smith's China’s Cultural Heritage: The Qing Dynasty, 1644-1912, 2nd ed. (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1983). On page 105 was a very interesting comparison of a famous passage from the philosopher Mencius, written in both vernacular and classical Chinese. The vernacular version was 38 characters, compared to just 24 in the original classical text. My wife -- a native Chinese speaker who grew up with traditional characters and has been exposed to classical Chinese through her own education in Taiwan -- understood all of the characters in the original, but was unable to translate the passage itself when I showed it to her. When I showed her the passage written out in vernacular Chinese, "Ah!" -- she got it right away.

So, when I read the beautiful translations of essayist Zhang Dai's (张岱) autobiographical accounts in Spence's book, and especially the poetic renderings by Arthur Waley and Ezra Pound in the anthology, I not only had to appreciate their skills as translators, but also their talents as writers.

They may have even taken poetic license a little too far in some cases. Consider this poem by the Tang's Han Yu (韓愈), translated by A.C. Graham, and appearing on page 262 of the anthology:

The Withered Tree

Leaf and twig are gone from the old tree,
Winds and frosts can harm it no more.
Its hollow belly has room for a man,
Circling ants quest under its peeling bark.
Its single lodger, the toadstool which lives for a morning;
The birds no longer visit in the evening.
But its wood can still spark tinder.
It does not care yet to be only the void at its heart.

(There is a footnote at the end of the last line says "The phrase equates the hollow hear of the tree and the Void Mind of Buddhism, emptied of desire and illusion")

This is a stunning poem in English, but I have to wonder about the challenges of making an appealing translation while remaining true to the original Chinese literary devices and references. In my years of working as a journalist in Taiwan (often with translators, editors, and other native Mandarin and Taiwanese speakers) I found that it was very difficult to take a Chinese phrase that includes complex emotions, concepts, or artistic expressions, and turn it into natural-sounding English that conveyed an accurate sense of the original. Incorporating literary flair involved an extra dimension of complexity.

The footnotes and other explanations by Spence, Birch, and the others are very helpful in terms of putting these works in context. It would have been helpful to include some of the original Chinese, but I understand the technical and economic reasons for not doing so. While I can't read classical Chinese, I do know a few hundred characters, and it's fun to look up others in the dictionary or ask my wife about them.

(Below: Classical Chinese in cursive script by Wang Duo (王铎), who grew up in the late Ming era and painted this sample in the early Qing. From the University of Maine website, which was sourced from the Shanghai Museum)

401 posts!

2008-06-03T21:30:00.000-07:00

I just discovered that I've written 401 posts on this blog since May of 2005, including this one. In my final post, which I'll put together sometime in the next few weeks, I'll do a rundown of some of the highlights.

Caps, gowns, and batons

2008-06-02T19:31:00.000-07:00

I went to the Coop this evening to pick up my cap and gown for Commencement. The gown rental is $75, but we get to keep the cap and tassle. I am getting up very early on Thursday morning -- we have to be on site at seven in the morning, meaning I will probably leave my home at around 6:30 in the morning. I'm taking a cab -- parking in and around Harvard Square will be very difficult as tens of thousands of grads and guests descend upon Harvard Yard.

After getting my regalia, I attended a reception at the Harvard Faculty Club for ALM Liberal Arts concentrators. Maybe 40 or 50 of us were there, and it was nice to see some old friends and talk with other 2008 grads whom I had never met. More than a few people had traveled from out of town to be here for Commencement on Thursday, and it was interesting to hear their stories.

ALM program heads also revealed the names of the ALM prize winners. There are a few prizes that ALM Liberal Arts concentrators are eligible for, on the basis of high GPAs or outstanding theses, including The Thomas Small Prize and the Crite Prize (see descriptions and the list of 2006 winners here). It was fascinating listening to the titles and descriptions of some of the thesis work, especially among the ALM biology and biotech concentrators. Their thesis directors -- most of whom are Harvard Medical School Professors -- had very high praise for their work. A few will apparently see their work published in a journal or other format, which says a lot about the quality of the biology and biotechnology programs.

There was also one ALM/humanities concentrator who wrote a thesis on Shakespeare's plays that questioned the conclusions of a book written by a top Shakespeare scholar and Harvard faculty member. Her thesis director? The very same faculty member! He was hard, but the result was a top-notch thesis that won the Dean's Prize for Outstanding ALM Thesis in the Humanities.

I didn't win a prize, but my 3.96 GPA resulted in another honor: I was recognized as one of two Class Marshals for the ALM/Liberal Arts class of 2008. We have some special responsibilities, and will even be wielding batons during the morning and afternoon ceremonies. So you there -- back in line!

Tomorrow is another reception, my first for the Harvard Extension Alumni Association (HEAA). I know one of the HEAA officers and recent grads, but it will be great to meet others who have graduated from the ALB and ALM programs.

The Kennedy School remarkets itself

2008-05-29T20:32:00.000-07:00

I just noticed this today: The Kennedy School of Government -- which used to be referred to as "The Kennedy School" or "KSG" by University staff, when I worked there -- is now the HARVARD Kennedy School. Check it out -- the old Web URL, http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/, now redirects to http://www.hks.harvard.edu/, and the once blue-themed website has been replaced by a sparse white and crimson design with a prominent new logo for the HARVARD Kennedy School.

The Crimson article on the name change cites Dean Elwood as saying "lack of a consistent shorthand" is behind the change, but soon the real reasons emerge: The old name wasn't "Harvard" enough. From the article:

“One of our key findings was that we were not leveraging our affiliation with Harvard as effectively as we could be,” [communications officer Melodie L. Jackson] said, adding that the school shares the Kennedy name with more than 900,000 other institutions around the world.

Jackson said the rebranding is a response to poor name recognition of the school beyond Harvard.

“There’s a lot of confusion out there as to who we even are,” she said.

Wait a minute. There are 900,000 other Kennedy Schools of Government around the world? Or people are confusing the Kennedy Middle School in Cupertino with the Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge?

Whatever the case, there is no confusion anymore, with the new name and new logo with the uppercase HARVARD in its name.

Or is there? I noted this quote from one of the HARVARD Kennedy School students, about a very important word that's now missing from the new name:

Stephen C. Chan, a second-year joint degree student at the Kennedy School and the Business School said, “I think it’s strange that the school is focusing on something superficial.”

Chan also expressed surprise at the removal of the term “government” from the school’s new name as it falls in line with Harvard’s other professional schools.

D'oh!

Now that's dedication: Dealing with the HES residency requirements

2008-05-29T20:08:00.000-07:00

These days, a lot of people are taking advantage of the Extension School's distance education offerings. Courses are mostly offered as a combination of streaming video, class websites, and online discussions via email and other tools (there are a few exceptions -- see my earlier discussions of virtual world-based instruction at the Extension School).

But it's currently impossible to get an ALB or ALM degree just by taking online courses. For instance, the undergraduate ALB degree has a 16-credit residency requirement. Students who live far away -- and many of them do -- have a few options to attend classes in person, short of moving to the Boston area for two semesters. One is by taking four classes through two terms of the Harvard Summer School, which has shorter sessions and on-campus housing. Another, as Richard over at ClueHQ describes, is commuting ... by plane!

It’s not easy. From my front door to Harvard Square, it’s about 4 hours if everything goes right. When it doesn’t, it’s about 6-8 hours. That leaves me with about 12-24 hours in Boston before I was on another flight back. My days were about 36 hours straight, after which I would crash into bed.

Richard tried a bunch of strategies to handle the evening classes, including sleeping at the airport (not easy), hanging out at an all-night cafe, and eventually, springing for a hotel. It was expensive (he says commuting costs were about $4000 per semester) but worth it, as he describes in this paragraph:

It’s amazing what we can do when we really want something. It isn’t often that you hear of self-sacrifice when it comes to attending school, but it isn’t entirely uncommon either. Many, many people work long day jobs and then spend all evening on-campus in class to finish a degree. Students at HES are no exception.

But it is instructive to see just how far a person will go to attend this prorgram and that speak volumes about its quality and the experience it offers. If you live within a plane flight of Boston and you think you might be willing to give it a try, I encourage you to contact me and ask what I think of your plans.

Richard also relates the story of another ALB student who is commuting from Detroit every week to attend classes in Cambridge for his residency requirement, on top of having a full-time job and a family with young children.

2008 ALM Thesis Forum

2008-05-27T10:49:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the late notice about this, but I only just found out that the second annual thesis forum is taking place this week, from May 27 to the 29th. It's at Hilles, and the thesis presentations are grouped by concentration: Humanities on Tuesday night, biology and social sciences on Wednesday night, and professional concentrations on Thursday. Names, titles of presentations, and other details are here.

I participated in the first thesis forum last year, and really enjoyed it -- it was an opportunity to discuss my research with a wider audience, and also hear about what other ALM candidates and graduates had been working on. I won't be able to attend this year -- I'm traveling this week -- but I encourage other ALM students to check it out.

Publisher buys 02138, but quality may not improve

2008-05-12T05:42:00.000-07:00

The independent Harvard alumni fashion magazine, 02138, has been sold to a small magazine publisher, reports the New York Times:

Manhattan Media bought 02138 from Atlantic Media, publisher of The Atlantic and National Journal, and the magazine's young founders, Bom Kim and Daniel Loss, who held a minority stake. The price was not disclosed.

The deal was something of a surprise; Manhattan Media's involvement had been kept quiet, and published reports said in April that Sandow Media, publisher of Worth magazine, was on the verge of buying 02138, which is named for Harvard's ZIP code.

The plan is to expand 02138's web presence -- including social networking -- and create additional alumni titles based on the other Ivy League alumni populations.

I have to say that the Web ideas are way overdue; the original 02138 blogs effort was poorly handled and the 02138 RSS feed is seldom updated. However, creating a new Harvard social network will be a tough sell, considering Harvard alums already have two established competitors -- post.harvard and Facebook.

I also don't hold out much hope for an improvement in editorial quality under the new owner. According to the New York Times article, 02138 founder Bom Kim will be staying on as publisher and Manhattan Media hopes executive editor Richard Bradley will stay as well. These are the same folks behind 02138's current editorial character, which I find to be lacking. At the top of this page, I described the publication as a "fashion magazine," and that was only half in jest. While 02138 has gotten one or two scoops and puts out some interesting profiles, its advertiser-friendly "Passions" section ("Harvard-meets-Hollywood lifestyle: where to live, where to go to get away, how to get there in style, and the clothes and jewelry that will guarantee you look the part") limits the publication's journalistic integrity. I also question the dedication to quality and accuracy after reading pieces like "Open Enrollment," which mistakenly described Harvard Extension School programs as a way for people to "purchase the Harvard brand" and called HES degree programs a "perk."

You know your FAS account has been deactivated when ...

2008-04-30T13:10:00.000-07:00

... The hourly flow of redirected spam ceases flowing to your Yahoo inbox!

Seriously, I won't be missing Harvard's FAS email system, or, for that matter, Harvard's computer services for students. The spam, the 1990s-style UIs, the constant prompts to log back in to the Harvard PIN server, the weird password policies ... this was the reality of using Harvard's student-oriented computing systems.

I have better hopes for Post.Harvard, the alumni website. So far, no spam, I appear to remain logged on even after several weeks of inactivity, and I see they just updated the interface.

A Korean recipe for admission to the Ivy League

2008-04-27T06:13:00.000-07:00

Today's New York Times takes a look at the Daewon prep school and the Minjok Leadership Academy in South Korea. Both schools have perfected a system for admissions to Harvard, Yale, and top-tier colleges in the United States, which includes a regimen of non-stop cramming, instruction from foreign teachers in writing and other subjects, and an enormous amount of pressure from parents and administrators to succeed. Naturally, there is little time for personal interests, suggests the article:

Both schools suppress teenage romance as a waste of time.

“What are you doing holding hands?” a Daewon administrator scolded an adolescent couple recently, according to his aides. “You should be studying!”

But the administrators at the other school, Minjok, appear to be a little less heartless -- the school recently deactivated the dormitory surveillance cameras used to prevent students from dozing off in late-night study sessions.

According to the article, Korean society grants great social status to people who graduate from Ivy League colleges in the United States. This certainly helps explain why parents and students are willing to accept the Daewon and Minjok lifestyle, and may also explain the Azia Kim episode at Stanford and a recent string of scandals in South Korea involving high-profile figures who lied about their U.S. academic credentials.

I don't agree with the methods and attitudes at the two Korean schools, but students have to be admired for being able to do so well on the American SATs, coursework, and especially their writing skills, considering English seems to be a second language for most of them, and they are growing up in a Korean-language environment. They're not getting into Harvard based on legacy status or the Z-list ...

Rules for Harvard freshman: 1741 edition

2008-04-24T07:02:00.000-07:00

Spotted on the Boston 1775 blog, operated by writer and historian J.L. Bell: A list of rules that Harvard frosh had to follow in 1741. A sample:

... 18. No Freshman shall call or throw anything across the College yard, nor go into the Fellows’ Cuz-John.

19. No Freshman shall mingo against the College walls.

20. Freshmen are to carry themselves, in all respects, as to be in no wise saucy to their Seniors.

21. Whatsoever Freshman shall break any of these customs, he shall be severely punished.

"Mingo" is a piece of street slang that passed out of usage long ago, and while rule #20 no longer holds at Harvard, it is alive and well in our nation's military academies.

The remaining rules can be seen on Bell's blog, or in the book that I believe Bell says it originally came from, John Patrick Diggins' biography of John Adams.

(Ref: Universal Hub)

Extension Student forum goes offline

2008-04-23T12:19:00.000-07:00

Richard over at ClueHQ alerted me to a problem with ExtensionStudent.com, which I now see is offline. If you visit the URL, you'll see that the domain is "parked" with a bunch of cheesy hair extension ads. This probably means that the registration or hosting expired, which would make sense, because the site was created last April 23 (see my interview with the founder) and registrations typically last for one year, after which time you can renew ... if you receive the notice from the registrar.

The situation is bad, but hopefully the founder, Catamount, can get back the domain and the data. I tried to email him, but his old FAS email address is no longer in operation -- which may explain why he didn't receive the expiration notices.

Update: Extension Student is already back online. That was quick ...

An open letter from a disillusioned Harvard KSG acceptee

2008-04-07T07:17:00.000-07:00

I was just cc'ed on a letter to President Faust from someone who has a big problem with Harvard's graduate student financial aid policies (my own commentary follows the excerpts):

A few weeks ago, I received the wonderful news that I have been accepted to study at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government (KSG), but my initial euphoria was soon stamped out as a second KSG email arrived announcing that I would only be offered loans as financial "aid." KSG suggests that I take out more than $130,000 in loans to pay for my two-year Master's program. $130,000? I want to attend KSG to get the best possible preparation to enter the public sector. How am I supposed to work in the public sector strapped with $130,000+ of education debt? Being accepted to KSG has turned out to be a pyrrhic achievement indeed. So, I write this letter to bring attention to my dilemma in the hopes that future KSG acceptees do not have to face the choices currently before me.

At first, I thought KSG must have made a mistake in calculating my aid, considering my limited financial resources (I have spent the last two years as a volunteer in a developing country) and considering Harvard's much publicized push to increase financial aid, even to upper-middle-class undergrads. But no - KSG considers my financial need "met," by offering loans only. The KSG Financial Aid website says, "Financial assistance is a partnership." I have kept my end of the bargain - I live frugally, I do not have much consumer debt, and I applied (in vain) to a number of external funding sources. I do not feel like much of a partner in this relationship, however, as KSG is not offering me a single penny of assistance.

The author then discusses the contradictory messages sent by the KSG administration, which on the one hand stresses public service, while at the same time forcing students to take on hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of debt (if interest is included) to attend Harvard. He or she concludes with this:

I therefore implore you, KSG, and Harvard University to increase financial aid to KSG students - through fundraising, through a capital campaign, through bake-sales, or however - so that future students are indeed able to enter public and non-profit service after their education at KSG instead of having to sell themselves as private sector consultants in order to be able to pay back their loans. Otherwise, KSG is guilty of making this country and this world worse, by pushing those who are most able and motivated to serve in the public and non-profit sectors into the private sector. Crass financial calculations are not sufficient justifications for this.

The author brings up a lot of valid points. It is unrealistic to expect students interested in entering the public sector to take on such huge amounts of debt. Moreover, if Harvard can do so much for College undergraduates in terms of tuition wavers and other financial aid, why can't similar benefits be extended to students at Harvard's other schools?

Update:

The full text of the letter can be found on the Critical Mass blog, along with some comments.

Legacy admissions and the "Z List" at Harvard College

2008-04-05T07:30:00.000-07:00

The New York Times takes a satirical look at legacy admissions at Harvard College:

Here at Harvard’s Office of Admissions, we have some very exciting news for you. While your SAT scores and grade point average fall below the threshold for acceptance to Harvard’s class of 2012, your Harvard parents’ dogged participation in our annual fund-raising appeals — including their generous contributions to Harvard’s recombinant DNA lab and IMAX theater — have gained you admission to a unique new program called LegacyPlus™.

With LegacyPlus™, you, the Harvard double legacy, will enjoy all of the perks of students who actually got into Harvard — except for the education part.

There's more than a grain of truth here. Earlier in the decade, The Crimson's Dan Rosenheck documented Harvard College's "Z List," which the admissions office strenuously denied was a legacy list. Rosenheck did some digging, and found otherwise:

... If you talk to enough of these students whom the admissions office makes a special effort to bring to Cambridge, you’ll find they do have something in common: Their parents went to Harvard.

The Crimson obtained information about the legacy status of 36 of the approximately 80 Z-list students at Harvard in 2001-02. Though McGrath Lewis insists the Z-list is “not a legacy list,” 26—or 72 percent of the 36-student sample—were legacies, compared with 12 to 14 percent of the class as a whole.

Even if none of the remaining 44 or so Z-list students were legacies, 33 percent of the 80 students would be legacies—still well above the proportion of legacies in the class as a whole.

College counselors at Harvard’s feeder schools—high schools that routinely send large numbers of students to the College—are nearly unanimous in characterizing the Z-list as Harvard’s preferred conduit for qualified legacy candidates who don’t make the first cut.

Daniel Golden was even more critical in his special feature in the inaugural issue of 02138:

Harvard actually has different levels of legacy preference, systematically and in some ways elaborately distorting its standards on behalf of a certain group. While children of middle-class alumni enjoy a modest edge, which may be heightened somewhat if the parents volunteer to interview applicants or organize reunions, the offspring of major donors receive in effect double preference - both as legacies and "development cases," whose admission is considered vital to fundraising. They fly first-class through Harvard admissions, often enjoying personal interviews with Fitzsimmons and slots on the exclusive "Z" list, which ushers in, via a one-year deferment, well-connected but often academically borderline applicants.

(Golden also wrote a book on this topic, see Harvard College and the children of America's elite).

This is one area where the Harvard Extension School's undergraduate ALB program holds a definite edge over the College. Family alumni status and wealth have no impact on admissions, and neither do standardized tests. The only thing that will get you into the program are several semesters of dedicated study and good grades. In other words, it's a meritocracy.

About the author: I am an Extension School graduate and the co-founder of Invantory, a Massachusetts Craigslist alternative that lets you sell tables, chairs, sofas, desks, cribs and other types of furniture, as well as other items.