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.
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:
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
August 2006. History S-1855 (Film and History in Postwar Japan and Post-Mao China), Prof. Charles Hayford, Visiting Scholar, History, Northwestern University
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:
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.
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!)
(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.
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.
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.
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."
... 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.
Today's New York Timestakes 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 ...
... 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.
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 publicizedpushto increasefinancial 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?
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.
The Harvard Z-list is real!
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.
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.
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There's something else I would like to highlight from Tim's post:
I was one of only 14 History majors graduating this year. The Dean of the Extension School stated that, in the 97-year history of the program, less than 1% of people who enroll in the Extension School finish their degree requirements and graduate. (and No, there should not be an extra number after the "1" in 1%).
Wait a second, you say. Didn't the Harvard Extended entry on ABTs a few weeks ago state that the completion rate was 52%? What gives?
Well, the 52% figure that I shared with readers refers to the all-time percentage of matriculated students in the liberal ALM programs who had finished their degree requirements and graduated as of 2006. The number that Tim heard from the dean refers to the percentage of *all* students who enroll in Extension School classes who actually end up receiving their degrees.
I am not sure if the 1% figure just applies to the ALM program, or whether the ALB and certificate programs are also included. Regardless, it points to an important fact about the Extension School student body: The overwhelming majority take classes on a casual basis. One DCE administrator recently told me in an email that "88 percent enroll in a course or two for personal enrichment, career advancement, or to test the waters for future graduate work." I regularly find evidence of this in my Google blog search RSS feed -- see recent entries from Free Range Chick and Unpunished Rapture.
This has been the nature of the student body since President Lowell established the program near 100 years ago, and Harvard has benefitted greatly because of it. Hundreds of thousands of people, most of them from nearby communities, have been able to take classes and sample the Harvard experience while bringing in revenue and furthering the University's community outreach goals.
Harvard Extension School critics
However, this has also led to an unfortunate situation for those students who are not taking classes casually. Amongst some members of the Harvard community and the public at large, the Extension School's reputation is associated with the temporary experiences of the majority, as opposed to the serious, long-term academic commitments of the minority. For instance, a press release that was apparently composed by two Harvard officers named Eric Sinoway and John Longbrake makes a point of distinguishing the Extension School from Harvard's "principal academic units," and describes the student body as casual class-takers. This article in the Harvard alumni magazine 02138 portrays the Extension School as an avenue for people or companies that want to "purchase the Harvard brand," and calls Extension School degree programs a "perk." Alexandra Petri, a columnist for The Crimson, thinks even less of Extension School students, judging by a quip in her recent discussion of the Core curriculum.
Never mind the dedication of the ALM and ALB candidates who can matriculate only after proving themselves in EXPO or the ALM proseminar, the contributions of the Extension School students who work closely with Harvard faculty as teaching and research assistants, or the accomplishments of the 1% who complete their coursework and research requirements and graduate. For those who have never bothered to find out about this subset of the Extension School student body or the degree programs they belong to, the HES does not appear to be much different than the typical continuing education program at a local community college, providing casual classes for people who want to satisfy personal interests or give their careers and educational goals a boost. In their eyes, the 88% defines who we are.
Don't get me wrong: Casual, continuing education is a great thing. It helps individuals and benefits society. I've personally benefited from taking classes for personal enrichment and/or career advancement, such as the Mandarin courses I took at the Taipei Language Institute in the 1990s and my very first class at the Extension School -- an introductory short story writing class that I took through the Summer School in 2002, almost on a whim. It was for undergraduate credit and had no impact on my graduate coursework or research, but it was a lot of fun -- it gave me a chance to indulge my interest in fiction and creative writing, and also produced a short story that was later published in the Harvard Summer Review.
A real review of the Harvard Extension School
My ALM journey was a completely different experience. It was academically rigorous and intellectually demanding, and took years to complete. The ALM thesis requirement goes far beyond the writing and research assignments found in many "traditional" masters programs, and can in no way be considered fun. It therefore disappoints me that those of us who have been admitted to the Extension School's degree programs or have earned our diplomas are not taken seriously in some quarters. On a person-to-person level, it's very easy to correct misperceptions. But when 02138, The Crimson, and Harvard's own officers promote the casual Extension School identity and even negative stereotypes, it's very difficult to highlight another perspective of the Extension School experience. This in turn makes it harder for serious Extension School students -- and the programs we belong to -- to get the recognition we deserve.
Harvard Extension School graduates lining up for Commencement
... Your .edu email address gets cut off! I got this in my inbox yesterday:
Dear FAS Computer Account Holder:
Your computer account is scheduled to expire on Sunday, April 6, 2008 because we are unable to find a current FAS affiliation in your name. If our records are mistaken and you are still an FAS affiliate, your account can be extended by following the instructions below. ...
They probably send the same message to every ABT whose time runs out, but graduates can get a Post.Harvard email forwarding account, which I have already registered for. Going forward, I can be emailed at ianlamont -at- post dot harvard dot edu, not ilamont@fas.harvard.edu.
My Google Blog search feed delivered an interesting item today: An appraisal of the Harvard Extension School's undergraduate ALB program, from a student who just finished his last class. Here's what the author of the Cyber Oppression blog had to say about his academic journey:
Overall I feel that I received the best undergraduate education possible. It was a great honor to study and then be a TA under Tom Hayes and run the Physics 123 lab — I think it’s entirely possible that Tom is the best introductory circuit design teacher in the world, and I know I am in great company. It was also a great honor to study cyberlaw at the Berkman center of Harvard law — as an undergraduate, I was able to take more IP, patent, copyright and digital law classes than are available at most law schools, including Larry Lessig’s former class “The Technology and Politics of Control”. I also learned Spanish with Professora Zetterstrand, studied the history of Boston under Robert Allison, and of course studied number theory, probability, topology, calculus, linear algebra, group theory, graph theory, etc. under professors Martinez, Boller, Winters, Bamberg, Towne. Astronomy at the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Physics in the science center… comparative religious ethics and modern/contemporary American fiction in Harvard Hall. Museum studies with Mary Malloy (and the future directors of a couple dozen museums in the museum studies program), game theory with Neugeboren (who himself studied under Schelling, whose son Robert is also a close personal friend), psychology under Fersch, and the history of electronic music with Marshall all were brilliant courses also. So many of these professors were the best at what they do — leaders in their fields, the ones who wrote the books. And even though this was a "night school" program, Harvard refused to lower the bar and never failed to challenge me; many of the professors talked about how the curriculum in the college vs. night school was exactly the same, and in a number of cases the student projects and work in the night school exceeded that produced by the day students.
The author of Cyber Oppression also discusses how physically and mentally taxing his ALB studies have been over the last six years. I can really sympathize -- as I have noted repeatedly on my own blog, the research and writing demands associated with the ALM program are punishing, and go far beyond simply attending class. For those of us who have full-time jobs and families, study generally takes place late at night and on the weekends, usually at the expense of personal and family life. The ALM or ALB programs at the Extension School are not casual endeavors -- they require major intellectual, academic, and personal commitments, and take years to complete.
However, one of the students quoted in the article noted a problem that many Harvard Extension School students will recognize -- a struggle to build a sense of belonging amidst infrequent campus visits:
[Harvard administrator Mary C. Gerbi] says administrators at Harvard and the conservatory feel the two schools should provide a stronger sense of belonging at the conservatory. This is vital during the first three years of the program, when students make the trek across the river only once or twice a week for private lessons.
"My first year was not that great. I didn't really feel I was a part of the NEC community," says jazz pianist Malcolm G. Campbell '10, a chemistry and physics concentrator. "This year, I made my own initiative to go there more, and it's been great."
At the Extension School, there are many opportunities to participate in on-campus activities, but often I sometimes feel like an outsider at these events, as the other people are usually from different Harvard schools and departments. Even within Extension School programs and activities, there is no sense of class identity. People finish their degrees at their own speed, and some of the friends I've made over the years in class I've lost touch with later on as we've gone on to different classes meeting at different times and semesters. The author of the ClueHQ blog -- an ALB candidate at the Extension School -- once suggested creating class cohorts based on admit year, which is a great idea. We've all been boosted by the Extension Student online community, but the struggle to build and maintain a sense of community is something most HES students will continue to struggle with, particularly the remote students and people in distance-ed programs.
Tonight was the last session of my last class at the Harvard Extension School. My final paper isn't due until the end of next week, but it's already 90% complete. I can submit it via email, so I won't be going to campus ever again to attend class, hit the stacks, or meet with professors.
Graduate school is basically over.
It felt strange leaving Boylston Hall and walking out into the Yard for the last time. It was dark, quiet, and muddy with all of the melting snow. Kind of dank, actually. Not the type of scene that would typically evoke sentimental feelings, but I felt very keenly that it was the end of an era for me. My graduate studies began five years ago this month, and with the exception of the fall of 2004 (when my son was born) and the summer of 2007 (after my thesis was substantially complete) there hasn't been a semester that I haven't devoted major amounts of time to course readings, class, writing, and research. As of next Friday I will have written nine final papers (typical length, 20-30 double-spaced pages), several dozen smaller papers and essays, a thesis proposal and my thesis. Almost all have required multiple drafts and revisions. I will have also spent hundreds of hours in class and many thousands more studying, writing, or conducting paper and thesis research. Even during my commute to work, I am thinking about class and research. After next Friday, all of this comes to an end. It will be odd to not have these requirements and routines dominating my life any longer.
I usually stroll quickly back to my car parked on Mt. Auburn Street, so I can get home before my wife goes to sleep. Tonight, I passed slowly through the dark Yard. I passed Mass Hall and walked through the gate for the last time as a student, and then crossed Mass Ave. On the other side, at the mouth of Church Street, I turned back, and noticed -- for the first time in a long time -- the giant, ornate clock on the upper floors of Mass Hall, facing the street. It was dark, but I could see that the hands read 9:20. Behind it and to the left, I could see the slim steeple of Memorial Church with the lantern burning inside. That steeple at night has always been one of my favorite campus scenes -- it really gives me a sense of peace, even when I have been hurrying to catch a class or have been exiting Widener with a bag laden with books.
This time, even though I am no longer dealing with such pressures, it still brought me a sense of peace, and perhaps a sense of finality as well.
The Boston Globe has a nice writeup of President Faust's first six months in office. The article zeroed in on the administration's quick moves on College financial aid, as well as her openness, which was on display at a summertime gathering in the Yard:
That July day, she gave a self-deprecating talk, then strolled onto the grass in Harvard Yard and mingled with one group after another, attendees recalled. Faust, who had invited faculty, students, and staff at every level to the ice cream social, spoke with all who approached her. And, she listened.
"It defined her presidency," said James Kloppenberg, chairman of the history department. "I wandered by where she was and thought this was unprecedented for a Harvard president to make him- or herself available to anybody who wanted to chat."
A few days ago, the Compete blog published an interview with HLS Professor John Palfrey, the Berkman Center's executive director. He gives a good overview of what the Berkman Center does on a day-to-day basis, as well as its mission:
It’s crucial to us at the Berkman Center that we’re not just another ivory-tower think-tank. It’s important that we do some work that is theoretical and even abstract. We trust also that our work is intellectually rigorous and that our methodologies are sound. But at the same time, we try hard to be certain that we are speaking to an audience online that is bigger than our immediate circle of students and colleagues and other friends.
One way we do that is through our various modes of research, teaching, and activism. We believe in building out into cyberspace as we study it, so we have terrific developers on the team who put up the first blog server at a university, supported the first podcast series, built real-time teaching tools for the classroom, and a whole lot of code for specific research projects. Pretty much everything we do we publish to the web – whether on a blog, on our website, on a podcast, or by video. We are never as successful at this as we’d like to be, but it’s a constant area of focus. We think of our work as relevant to a broad audience and strive to avoid navel-gazing wherever possible.
I wanted to remind local readers that Immersive Education Day takes place tomorrow afternoon (Dec. 8) from 2-5 at Askwith Lecture Hall in Longfellow Hall at 13 Appian Way, Cambridge (part of the Graduate School of Education). If you haven't been there before, it's very close to the Harvard Extension School HQ at 51 Brattle St. -- the map below will show you how to get to 13 Appian Way.
Immersive Education is a suite of virtual reality technologies and processes for education. This is an area in which the Harvard Extension School has a lot of experience, owing to the joint Law School/Extension School classes that have been held in Second Life (see my interview with instructor Rebecca Nesson.) The Harvard Interactive Media Group, a campus group which I recently joined, is putting on the event, and has lined up five experts and practitioners (more info here). Virtual reality has started to make an impact on distance education, and it will be interesting to see what the panel has to say about future development.
Hope to see some other Extension School students there!
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. 
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