Amid a wave of rising anti-Asian violence, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Claudine Gay said in a Wednesday interview that Harvard aims to âpursue durable changeâ in diversifying its faculty and fostering an inclusive climate.
After a 21-year-old gunman killed eight people â including six Asian women â at three Atlanta-area spas last month, Gay and other administrators, including University President Lawrence S. Bacow, condemned the rise in anti-Asian violence in a series of emails.
In his message, Bacow instructed Harvard affiliates to contact the Universityâs police force if they have knowledge of a âracist attack.â A dozen Harvard student organizations signed a letter criticizing Bacow for the suggestion, calling it an âunacceptable and harmful remedyâ for anti-Asian violence at the University.
Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Claudine Gay said in a Wednesday interview that Harvard plans to follow a normal academic calendar in the fall semester as it transitions back to in-person operations.
Gay announced in March that the FAS planning a full return to residential life and classroom instruction in the fall semester, including providing as much in-person learning as possible. To prepare for an in-person fall, the FAS is currently piloting in-person learning experiences, which Gay said began “late last week.”
“The first pilot class was in CS, and throughout the next several weeks, there’ll be a number of class sessions in Harvard Hall,” Gay said. “I also understand that [the Office of Undergraduate Education] is conducting some outdoor pilot sessions, including a singing class in the tent that’s going to set up behind Sever, a performance art class in Farkas, and also some sessions of undergrad lab classes.”
University President Lawrence S. Bacow said during a meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Tuesday that Harvard plans to experiment for the remainder of 2021 with incorporating more opportunities for remote work into employees schedules.
Bacow announced in late March that the University is aiming to welcome back faculty, staff, and researchers to their on-campus offices on Aug. 2. He clarified during Tuesday’s meeting that while all faculty and staff will be “free to return to their offices” on that date, some individuals may choose to continue working remotely.
Though he recognizes many Harvard affiliates are eager to return to on-campus operations, Bacow said the University is considering how aspects of remote work may be carried forward into fall 2021 and beyond.
Attorneys defending former Chemistry department chair Charles M. Lieber, who was charged with lying to federal authorities examining his ties to China, said during a status conference last week that Lieberâs cancer diagnosis and deteriorating health call for an expedient trial.
As the trial looms, legal experts spoke with The Crimson about Lieberâs possible defense strategies, which might implicate Harvard and draw attention to University policies around foreign funding disclosure.
Federal authorities arrested Lieber in January 2020, alleging that he made fraudulent statements to officials investigating his funding sources. Lieber reportedly lied to the Defense Department and the National Institutes of Health about ties he allegedly had to Chinaâs Thousand Talents Plan, a talent recruitment program.
Eighty percent of surveyed members of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences said they think a remote semester is not as valuable as an in-person semester for students, with 43 percent of respondents indicating âstrongâ disagreement.
Simultaneously, nearly 73 percent of survey respondents said that the FAS and the University provided them with sufficient guidance and resources for remote instruction, and 71 percent felt the transition to remote instruction was managed well by FAS.
The Crimson distributed its faculty survey to more than 1,100 members of the FAS in late February, polling Harvardâs flagship faculty on key University policy decisions, challenges they face as academics, and pressing issues on campus â including the repercussions of the Covid-19 pandemic. Tenured, tenure-track, and non-tenure-track faculty all received the survey.