There are numerous inconsistencies between Harvard’s policies on campus and those of its companies. Last year, food service workers at Harvard Law School asked the University for a fair process to unionize. Harvard agreed, remaining neutral in their unionization process and respecting the majority of workers’ request to form a union. However, at the DoubleTree Hotel in Allston, also owned—but not managed—by Harvard, workers have not been granted a fair process to create and join a union without intimidation or interference from managers, despite repeated requests. In fact, workers at the DoubleTree even filed suit with the National Labor Relations Board in April 2013, alleging that management illegally interfered with their unionization process. Why should the workers at a hotel directly owned by Harvard be treated any differently than workers on this campus?

Harvard directly owns at least 11 companies in Chile. One, Agrícola Brinzal, is currently being sued by CONAF, the National Forestry Corporation of the Ministry of Agriculture of Chile, for multiple violations of Chilean law against deforestation. Another Chilean company owned by Harvard, Agrícola Duramen Limitada, was fined by Chilean courts for similar activity. A company owned entirely by Harvard should not be engaging in alleged illegal logging practices.

As members of the Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition, we ask that Harvard University and Harvard Management Company be responsible owners with all funds and companies in which it holds a controlling stake—that is, in which it is a majority shareholder, majority owner, or full owner. We demand that Harvard act to ensure that the policies of these companies comply with basic standards of responsibility.

First, Harvard’s companies must comply with all local, national, and international laws and treaties in all areas where the company is operating, whether or not these laws are rigorously enforced by local authorities.

Second, Harvard must ensure that its companies are acting as sustainably as possible, as Harvard has committed to do on campus. The University’s website states, “Harvard University believes universities have an accountability to the future—a special role and a special responsibility to address global challenges as large as climate change and environmental sustainability.” Harvard’s Sustainability Principles note, “The University has an affirmative record of responsible compliance with environmental and safety regulations and a proven effective system of environmental management accountability.” Harvard’s companies should embody these principles too.

Third, Harvard’s companies must recognize workers’ right to collective bargaining and union representation, as well as promise neutrality and a fair process for unionization, even if these rights are not enshrined in local legislation. They must also guarantee parity in wages and benefits between directly hired and sub-contracted employees.

Fourth, Harvard’s companies must respect land rights, including the rights of small farmers and indigenous people. They must not infringe on any legitimate land tenure rights, including where such rights are not formally recorded, and they must seek to prevent all violent conflict over land tenure rights.

Fifth, Harvard’s companies must adhere to Harvard’s hiring and employment policies. The University’s own published non-discrimination policy states that “Any form of discrimination based on race, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, age, national or ethnic origin, political beliefs, veteran status, or disability unrelated to course requirements is contrary to the, principles and policies of Harvard University.” The same policy must apply for all of Harvard’s companies.

Finally, Harvard’s companies must be transparent and accountable. They must produce and publish online annual reports disclosing all political contributions, lobbying activities, the position and compensation of the top 10 highest-compensated employees, and conflicts of interest.

We have laid out these principles—and a way for Harvard to enforce and remain accountable for them—on the website of the Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition. We demand that Harvard become a responsible owner now, by working toward a fair unionization process for the workers at the DoubleTree, by rectifying any alleged illegal deforestation in Chile, and by adopting our proposed Standards for Responsible Ownership for all of its companies.

Harvard’s companies should not be harming the environment, their workers, or the world. Harvard has the ability to bring about change in the companies it controls, and the moral obligation to do so.

Kevin S. Wang ’16 lives in Stoughton Hall. Alexi White, MPP '13, is a student at the Harvard Kennedy School. Caroline T. Zhang ’16, a Crimson news writer, lives in Wigglesworth Hall.

The list goes on and on and on. From the inappropriate SAT and family financial status questions to the unanswerable “How did you get in?” (wouldn’t I like to know) question to the much more normal college experience questions, we get these a lot. Just ask my teammate, who, during our tournament, was literally followed around a Goodwill store between games by members of a certain men’s club basketball team who wanted desperately to know her SAT score (and probably her number, but that’s a different story). However, this time what really struck me about her questions was the never asked, but very much underlying question, “What is Harvard?”

This is a doozy of a question—one with a plethora of possible answers depending on the context, your experiences, and even your mood. Two days ago, though, it hit me that the responses to another popular question could provide a pretty accurate answer to “What is Harvard?” It’s a question that has been part of every Harvard conversation recently: “What are you doing this summer?”

In the summer, Harvard comes alive. During the year, Harvard students certainly do incredible things. The classes we have to take, the assignments we must do, and even our extracurricular commitments, regulate our lives. Even though we each have unique classes and activities, our ultimate schedules stay fairly similar. In the summer, though, our true interests and passions emerge. We travel to the Middle East, work at summer camps that promote peace between students in Israel and Palestine, raise HIV/AIDS awareness in Tanzania, dedicate ourselves to start-ups, or work long hours in internships to try to figure out where our futures lie. Simply, we do everything in pursuit of our passions.

How does this define Harvard, though? Our summers define Harvard because our summers are what we came to Harvard for. Ultimately, we chose to go to Harvard because we wanted to have to opportunity to find and pursue our passions. During the year, we prepare for our futures and expand our minds, but though Harvard may grant us an opportunity for a better education, students at any other university attend classes for the same reason. However, in the summer Harvard students’ paths diverge from those of other students. Harvard gives us not only the opportunity to pursue our passions, but also the opportunity to see and change the world in a way that is very unique.

So what is Harvard? On the verge of the end of school for the year, Harvard is anything and everything. Harvard is internships. Harvard is globetrotting. Harvard is service projects and start-ups. Harvard is having the chance to do something truly incredible for three months. So take that. Make use of the opportunities that Harvard gives you and run. Change the world, discover yourself or maybe just have a ton of fun. We only get three college summers, so take advantage of them. Harvard grants us a wonderful chance to truly be ourselves and do what we want to do during the summer, so do it. Have a great summer!

Tessa A.C. Wiegand ’15 is an engineering sciences concentrator in Mather House. Her column appears on alternate Mondays.

This isn’t Theodor Herzl’s Zionism. The father of Jewish nationalism thought Jewishness should serve as an ethnic base for an atheistic polity. Though Lapid is an avowed secularist, he has not demanded the abolition of the rabbinate, a state body, now controlled by the ultra-Orthodox, which regulates Jewish marriages, conversions, and burials and oversees kosher certifications. Yesh Atid’s Knesset membership is drawn from a wide range of Jewish traditions. Dov Lipman is an ultra-Orthodox rabbi from the United States who made his name fighting religious extremism in Beit Shemesh. Ruth Calderon is the founder of a progressive, egalitarian beit midrash. Shai Piron is a religious Zionist and headmaster of a yeshiva.

Yesh Atid supports the central planks of the secular agenda. Lapid has endorsed civil marriage, military service for the Haredi, and the right of non-Orthodox Jews to pray as they choose at holy sites. With his new government portfolio as finance minister, he has reduced funding for Haredi schools, places where zealotry is encouraged and math is treated like goyishe nakhes. He has also proven himself an adroit foe of Israel’s kibitzing theocrats, forcefully rebuking Knesset members from religious parties who chided him for using social media on the Sabbath.

What distinguishes Yesh Atid from previous secular parties, however—including the one Lapid’s father headed up—is that it is unafraid to speak in the language of Jewish tradition and refuses to concede Judaism as the demesne of Haredim.

Citing Torah and Talmud, national epic and personal narrative, Calderon gave an inaugural speech to the Knesset that called for “the creation of a new Hebrew culture in Israel,” reconciling secular and religious, past and future. Shortly after, she attended a conference of religious Zionists and clarified just exactly what that message meant. Calderon assailed rabbinical injunctions prohibiting property sales or rentals to Arabs as a form of racism. She denounced homophobia and transphobia as “bigotry, injustice, and a profanation of God’s name.” Briefly interrupted by a pisher’s heckling, she corrected his Hebrew.  “All people,” Calderon affirmed, “non-religious and religious, women and men, homosexuals and heterosexuals, Jews and non-Jews, all were created in the image of God.”

That universalist appeal is usually associated with liberal theology, but it also has deep roots in general Jewish religious thought. Consciously or not, Calderon channeled Yitzhak Halevi Herzog, the first chief rabbi of Israel and a prominent advocate of a halakhic state. Claimed as an idol by rabid Arab-haters, he actually condemned discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, and sex.

Whether One Nation Jewishness is an answer to the Palestine question remains to be seen. Yesh Atid’s record is mixed thus far. During the campaign, Lapid committed to good-faith negotiations with Palestinians, and backed a limited settlement freeze. His party recently scotched a bill that would have required a settlement be approved in a nation-wide referendum. Yet he has pledged to keep all of Jerusalem in Jewish hands, a considerable stumbling block for Palestinians who want the eastern half of the city as their capital.

While Yesh Atid desires a less corrupt, less divided, and more prosperous Israel, this is, after all, a vision of Israel. Many party voters are cozily ensconced in the Tel Aviv bubble. They don’t read the papers, and, if they do, they skip over news from the West Bank. This year, they went to the polls because the price of cottage cheese was prohibitive and the rent was too damn high. The denizens of Tel Aviv and Ramallah inhabit different species of time: one good, another bordering on inhuman.

After a visit to the West Bank, Adi Kol, a Yesh Atid MK from Tel Aviv, recounted how jarring the experience was, writing on Facebook about the humiliation she faced at checkpoints and the abject poverty she saw along the road. “I am afraid, afraid that we will continue to live this way, afraid of the fear,” Kol confessed.

I am afraid, too. But I am less afraid than I was last year. There is a future.

Daniel J. Solomon ’16 is a Crimson editorial writer in Matthews Hall. His column appears on alternate Tuesdays. Follow him on Twitter @danieljsolomon.

Whether such an attitude is responsible for the gender disparity that exists at the Law School we cannot say. What we can say is that the disparity is glaring and troubling. Though men and women enter on equal footing, female students (despite blind assessment) soon fall behind in grades and honors. They comprise less than 20 percent of tenure-track faculty. Their representation on the prestigious Harvard Law Review is nearly as bad. School culture, characterized by cutthroat competition and the Socratic method, may also take a greater toll on women than on men, as was suggested by the “Shatter the Ceiling” coalition, founded to address systemic gender disparities at the Law School.

“The law leaves much room for interpretation, but very little for self-doubt,” Woods’s professor warns her class. When the truth is ambiguous, masculine volume and confidence can sound a lot like well-reasoned argument. The spike in women’s marks following the Law School’s introduction of a blind-grading policy is evidence that some critics will hold the same quality of work in lower regard when they know it was produced by a woman. Even when women deserve respect, subtle issues of perception—even in the absence of outright discrimination—mean that they are less likely to get it.

History is also a problem—HLS did not admit women until the 1950s; they did not make up a significant portion of the student body until recently. The disadvantages we observe may be in part the legacy of an old boys’ club.

But social psychology and history are explanations, not justifications, for the gender disparity. The more difficult and pressing question is: What can be done to address the inequity?

We hesitate to encourage the Law School to discard the Socratic method, a remedy endorsed by the Shatter coalition. It does women an extreme disservice to suggest that they are incapable of learning under a particular pedagogy. The Socratic method may be harsh, but we believe it prepares lawyers for a profession that requires rigorous and sometimes rapid analysis.

Prominent women like U.S. Supreme Court Justice and former Law School Dean Elena Kagan, former Law School professor and sitting U.S. Senator Elizabeth A. Warren, and current Dean Martha L. Minow inspire confidence. But their efficacy as role models for ambitious female law students is limited if their successes are viewed as the exception and not the rule. More work should be done to even out representation on the HLS faculty. Even if the same could not be said 20 years ago, we doubt very seriously that there are fewer qualified up-and-coming female attorneys than there are males.

Moreover, solutions to complex problems are rarely aided by a lack of transparency. We believe HLS, at the very least, should release data on grades, something it has not done since the implementation of its honors, pass/fail system. We would also encourage students and professors to reflect on personal biases. If the disparity is in part the result of underlying social and perceptual problems, it cannot be fixed overnight. But incremental changes will likely precede systemic ones.

Hopefully, if there is a 2021 movie about a woman attending Harvard Law, the audience won’t be laughing.

Reflecting on my time here, there is nothing I would rather do than thank Harvard for all that it has done, and how better to thank an academic institution than to list all that it has taught me. So Harvard, a sincere thank you for teaching me the following:

How to deal with failure. I am a strong proponent of the maxim that hard work can take you anywhere. But at Harvard, trying your best does not always lead to success. I have been rejected from several job offers, scholarship awards, and even extracurricular activities. A proud person in a similar situation would have called it quits. But these failures built in me a resilience I could not obtain any other way. As many of my peers can probably identify with, I was not used to failure at my public high school, where I accomplished whatever I set my mind to. Ask me during high school about failure, and I would have stated it was not an option. Now, perhaps drunken from senioritis, I understand failures are a part of life. There will be people better than me, and working hard might not be enough to compete against them—but that’s okay. Failure doesn’t mean the end; it just means you have to find a more interesting route to get what you want.

How to relax. Perhaps an addendum to the last item, in which I learned that everything tends to work out in the end as long as you keep trying. Harvard has taught me the importance of relaxation. To paint a picture of how nerdy I was before coming to Harvard, I was the girl who chose to attend a Future Problem Solvers competition during Harvard’s pre-frosh weekend. I never relaxed in high school, and so I didn’t enjoy what I was doing as much as I could have. From Harvard, I take away the term “brain break” and will apply it to my everyday schedule.

But also how to not relax too much. I remember how relieved I felt after my five o’clock moment—humbled beyond belief, but also glad that my life seemed set. I was going to a great institution and there was no way I could end up failing after graduating from there. What I didn’t realize until coming here, however, is that Harvard does a great job of ensuring greatness from its students, but these countless opportunities need to be sought after. So underclassmen, shamelessly take advantage of these opportunities! Take a class from a Nobel laureate, experiment at Harvard’s Innovation Lab, and go to that next talk by a Supreme Court Justice. Because you will never get opportunities like this anywhere else, let alone for free.

How to seize the day. A friend once joked with me about how she flashes her Harvard ID at museums hoping to gain free admission. Riffing from the previous point, take advantage of what Harvard has to offer and use it for your benefit. Materialistically, this means getting any free merchandise that comes your way—I have more water bottles than could possibly be useful. But Harvard’s “carpe diem” extends to other opportunities that might add more to your intellectual and personal wealth, like taking challenging classes and talking with professors who are leaders in their fields.

How to be appreciative and thankful. It is easy to complain about Harvard, but when we stop to really think about how much Harvard has shaped us and helped us with our future plans, we should sheepishly accept that these complaints are meaningless compared to what Harvard offers us. If you’re still skeptical, take a minute to think of all the great things you’ve done at Harvard that would not be possible anywhere else.

This list could extend for pages, but these top five items are the ones for which I am most thankful. Harvard, it’s been a great four years, and I wouldn’t take back any of it for a second. Thank you for making me the person that I am today, a more relaxed, more confident Harvard graduate, ready to pursue my dreams without abandon.

Gina Yu ’13, a Crimson editorial writer, is a biomedical engineering concentrator in Dunster House. Her column appears on alternate Thursdays.

Certainly, some of the reforms are quite refreshing. We are glad to see that regular classes are no longer allowed to take place during reading period. This mainly affects language courses, which previously would often continue to meet and cover new material during reading period. This change better reflects the spirit of reading period as a time for study. Under the new policy, it is clear that reading period is a time for review of the past semester’s content in preparation for a culminating assessment, as opposed to simply another week for more content to be squeezed in before finals.

Other issues are left ambiguous. The language of the new finals period, now officially titled “Final Examination and Project Period,” specifies exams “up to three hours in length.” Currently, classes holding exams are required to schedule a three-hour test. This model is unreasonable for all classes, especially those that also include other forms of final assessment like a project. In some circumstances, a one- or two- hour exam could suffice to assess students’ knowledge of relevant material. Briefer and more concise exams would certainly benefit students, freeing up time and reducing the stress of lengthy testing. As such, we hope that the new phrasing in the exam policy translates into increased flexibility for professors in constructing exams.

But the revised plan also leaves untouched several fundamental problems with reading and exams periods. Under the new policy, final assessments such as papers or projects must be due “no earlier than the fourth day of Reading Period” but before a class’s assigned examination date. While modifying the formally permissible range in which these assignments could be given, in all likelihood this will not meaningfully change students’ schedules. Papers and projects can still be due during reading period at professors’ discretion, and students can still easily be left facing multiple major assignments with closely coinciding due dates. In addition, by shortening reading period and extending finals period, the new plan simply recategorizes the time in which papers and projects can be due. While under the new plan assignments would be due during “finals” period, it is not clear that this would be substantially different in practice from the status quo.

FAS’s new reading and exam period policy brings much-deserved attention to the stress involved in finals period. Though a small step forward, this change is far from sufficient.

The overemphasis of China as an economic powerhouse, both at home and abroad, has drastic implications. For one, it suggests that China can only influence the world through economic power rather than through the power of its culture. Second, the Chinese may become indifferent to the characteristics of the individual, thus diminishing the personal responsibilities that good citizens should have for their country and society as a whole.

We have repeatedly seen the impersonal, obedient representations of China and Chinese people in international media. Economic figures, mass labor, pollution, violation of human rights, and IT hacks are some examples of how China is seen through the Western lens. Due to market incentives, Hollywood movies often add a scene in Shanghai or Hong Kong and throw in a few minor Chinese characters. These representations are often faceless, mysterious, and uninteresting business or political men or women. Recent controversy on a Chinese edition of Iron Man 3, the only version that includes Chinese actors, exemplifies how the representations of individual Chinese characters are of marginal importance to the rest of the world; these characters are included in movies because of Chinese market demand rather than any sort of international appeal. We must chide the movie producer for selectively excluding these characters and thereby perpetuating the representation of their insignificance.

However, some Chinese people also have to take partial blame for the marginalization of their countrymen. In recent years, some Chinese people have not made a good name of themselves. From Hong Kong to the U.S., Chinese tourists are increasingly characterized by their buying power and their unsocial and disrespectful behaviors. They are welcomed largely as an economic necessity.

The marginalization of the Chinese as individual persons is partially caused by the focus on development that can be measured in numerical scales. Since Deng Xiaoping opened up China’s markets to the outside world, we have seen economic development and political reform at an impressive pace. Some of what people say is true: Chinese people are diligent, hardworking, and oftentimes put the group before the individual. But the modern Chinese also often focus more on things that can be measured, like achievements and gains, rather than on personal growth and development, which is naturally more ambiguous and difficult to measure.

Great nations leave a legacy to the rest of the world. Economic benefits come and go, but crafts, actions, and beliefs are passed on to the rest of the world for centuries to come. The U.S. has many problems with its democratic system, from an inability to carry out meaningful policies to chaotic congressional discussions. However, one thing the U.S. does have is its resilience. Despite its many past mistakes, including the recent failure to pass background checks on weapons, its people have shown instances where they are willing and able to "run again." So I must ask: What is China's legacy and character as a nation and as a people?

China must take human and character development as an important building block to fulfilling the "Chinese Dream." Besides offering its citizens the opportunity to own a car and a house, China must take on something more substantial and long lasting. It needs more than ephemeral wealth to characterize and glue its people together. Culture and personality will be the key. Only through a realization of human and character development can China truly offer more than what the misleading, dull representations suggest. From an economic lens, this type of development would enhance innovation and creativity. From a humanistic lens, the Chinese people would maintain a higher level of happiness through community, in spite of economic fluctuations, and offer their rich and historical array of cultural and spiritual ideas to the rest of the world.

Representations of Chinese by both themselves and the West do not present a full picture. I have known many Chinese friends who have equal potential for empathy and creative thinking as the entrepreneurs and humanitarian workers we see in mainstream media. These people, who could truly contribute to the wellbeing of their fellow man, have yet to be able to exert themselves as a representation of the Chinese character. China has the ability to offer its own citizens and the rest of the world much more than material progress.

Daniel J. Dong ’16 is a Crimson editorial writer in Matthews Hall.

In her unveiling of the bill, Warren pointed out that it “isn’t right” that the Fed charges banks an interest rate of .75 percent, while the unsubsidized Federal Stafford Loan program charges students 6.75 percent. There are, however, many right reasons why the rates are different. The .75 percent discount rate is for overnight loans, which are loans only available to banks in good financial condition and which provide collateral for their loans. It is also not a day-to-day financing option for banks, but rather a last resort to ensure financial stability during events such as the September 11 attack. Student loans, on the other hand, are mostly risky long-term loans to individuals without credit history and collateral. Banks are very unlikely to default on their overnight loans, while 17.3 percent of student loans which originated in 2009 are expected to default over their lifetime. The suggestion that banks and students should have the same interest rate may be politically popular, but it shows Warren’s lack of understanding of debt and finance.

Senator Warren’s legislation aims to give young Americans access to artificially cheap financing options, but it could end up hurting the same people she is trying to help. The federal student loan programs make it easier to finance higher education, which increases the demand for higher education. The laws of economics predict that higher demand would increase both the price and enrollment of higher education. Indeed, between 2000 and 2010, college enrollment increased by 37 percent, while tuition increased by 71 percent. Tuition hikes cause students to borrow even more for their education, as student debt soared nearly 500 percent to $900 billion during the same period. The supply of artificially cheap loans has caused an arms race between tuition rates and increase of individual debt, and yet Senator Warren’s solution is to make student loans even cheaper.

One does not need to look far to find a historical metaphor for the student debt crisis. In many ways, the growing student debt is looking increasingly like the subprime mortgage bubble that plunged America into a recession. Both home-ownership and college education are part of the American Dream, the crux of the once-prosperous American middle class. In both cases, the government supported the expansion of credit to low-income communities. The political aura of equality and gauzy temptation of the American Dream disguised both bubbles as infallible "investments" that cannot possibly go wrong while ignoring the less promising economic reality.

Unfortunately, if the subprime bubble is any lesson, the student debt bubble will eventually pull down those who try to climb the increasingly steep economic ladder. Students who are encouraged by the government to make bad financial decisions at 18 may be excluded from future economic opportunities due to their poor credit histories. As more young people face an economically incapacitated life, the economy also suffers, as a generation of home buyers, consumers, and entrepreneurs are indentured to their student loans. The graduates’ ability to manage their debt is further deterred by persistent structural unemployment and global competition. A recent meeting between the Federal Reserve and an advisory body highlighted the macro-economic risks of high student debt, as the total student debt surpassed credit card debt and automobile mortgages. Given these grim signs, passing Senator Warren's bill would not be dissimilar to providing government-backed 0.75 percent home mortgages to everyone in the home-buying age at the brink of the subprime crisis. In the unlikely event that this bill becomes law, the bill’s poor timing and cavalier language will almost certainly make Senator Warren an easy target for political blame for a mess that she did not create but to which she merely added the final straw.

Given the poor economics of the bill, I can only hope that Senator Warren’s real intention is to garner publicity and popularity rather than actually implementing her policies. Senator Warren could, however, tone down her rhetoric and propose more realistic solutions. First, most student loans have notoriously inflexible terms. Making financing options more flexible will give graduates more financial autonomy on their existing debt. A floating rate on student loans can also allow new applicants to enjoy the current low interest rate. An ideal student loan system should also be more market-oriented. Students with different majors and who attend different types of colleges should have different risk profiles, and their loan rates should reflect these differences. Differentiating student loans would also encourage students to make more prudent educational and financial choices.

During her successful Senate campaign, Senator Warren established herself as a hardline liberal. However, as the subprime mortgage crisis and debt ceiling debate have shown, simple-minded rhetoric does not create good policies on complicated economic issues. It is perhaps time that Senator Warren puts more economic reasoning and less political point scoring behind her future bills.

Jonathan Z. Zhou ’14 is an applied mathematics concentrator in Eliot House. His column appears on alternate Wednesdays.

The upcoming capital campaign is an exciting and long overdue development. The last capital campaign ended in 1999, and our peer schools have raised record sums of money since then. This campaign is an exceptional opportunity to strengthen the University and develop our campus and programs for a world that is very different than it was 14 years ago. The University should aim high, not just in terms of the fundraising total but also in its priorities and vision for the future.

There are few who doubt that this capital campaign is necessary. Many of our Houses have long since passed the point where quaint and charming turns into hopelessly outdated and, in some cases, borderline dilapidated. The School of Engineering and Applied Sciences shows real promise, but it needs more funding to grow. In a time of federal budget austerity, the new capital campaign will allow the University to fund crucial basic research even as the government fails to do so. There is so much that is great about Harvard and so much to be done.

The performance of recent capital campaigns at our peer schools is encouraging, but their success underlines the urgency of this campaign. Stanford’s recent campaign aimed to raise $4.3 billion. Instead, it raised $6.23 billion. The Stanford Challenge, as the campaign was called, supported various education and research initiatives, including $2.33 billion earmarked specifically for seeking solutions to global problems. Yale managed to renovate its residential colleges largely without the help of a capital campaign, but that school’s  renovations put their residential amenities ahead of Harvard’s—a competitive disadvantage in the fight for the most talented college students. Harvard should not fall behind as our peers build up their fundraising.

As Harvard determines the priorities for the campaign, administrators should give students and faculty a stake in the planning, prioritizing, and fundraising. This campaign will be a University-wide effort, so it is crucial to involve the entire University community. Students and faculty have day-to-day knowledge that will be crucial in planning big-ticket items like House renewal and other campus improvements.

Above all, the University should be bold. Some projects, like the roughly $1 billion House renewal, are expenditures of necessity. As important as they are, those projects will not define the future of the University. It is projects like the new developments in Allston, an undergraduate student center, funding for cutting-edge research, and many more projects still to be announced that will advance the University’s mission and help the University adapt to an ever-changing world. The University’s goals should reflect tremendous optimism and high hopes for the future.

Deathbed narrations of decadent men fascinate us. These haunted, semi-lucid ravings attract us for their reflective melancholy that dissolves the gaudy veils of wealth and power around rotten cores of misgivings and dejection. Orson Welles created the anguished Citizen Kane who can only call for his childhood sled in his last minutes, and Carlos Fuentes set an entire novel in the dying words of the megalomaniacal tycoon Artemio Cruz. Seeing the finality of our end, often rudely unannounced, brings our suppressed uncertainties to the fore.

Last week, the Obama administration came to see its inevitable irrelevance arrive much sooner than expected. Rather than waiting for the traditional two-year long festival of gridlock and dysfunction celebrated after a President’s last midterm election, the lame duck has unexpectedly begun quacking earlier. Inconvenient scandals, whether real or imagined by obdurate Republicans, along with a disconnected and distant messaging style, will leave the Obama administration only able to communicate powerless swan songs while it waits for its termination.

“I’d call it a cover-up,” Senator John McCain gleefully accused the administration after embarrassing revelations of extensive revision of Susan Rice’s talking points in the aftermath of the attacks in Benghazi that resulted in the death of four Americans, including the American Ambassador J. Christopher Stephens. For a while, it seemed that the Benghazi attacks were the obsessive focus of Republicans and the echo chambers of Fox News because both desired a cudgel to batter Obama’s national security record. Now, like man-children discovering presents on Conspiracy Theory Christmas, Republicans suddenly have an embarrassing inconsistency to exploit.

The IRS, no one’s favorite government agency to begin with, recently apologized to Tea Party and Patriot groups for additional auditing on the sole basis of their group’s name. This actualizes and gives some flimsy support to the parasitic conservative mythology where Obama is a Kenyan socialist, government overreach will destroy capitalism, and Christians are an oppressed majority, as Sean Hannity recently implied when he baselessly claimed that the administration was “cleansing” the military of Christians.

These scandals themselves might not be enough to derail a presidency, but in the hands of the reputable bunch of self-interested Congressmen, it will surely give some legitimate standing to delay needed legislation for political grandstanding. The House recently spent two full days debating an utterly uncontroversial bill on the Federal Helium Program, eventually passing 394-1, in order to avoid actually doing its job of addressing salient issues like unemployment.

Republicans in Congress have made unprecedented, irresponsible use of the filibuster to block nominees to critical government positions like Secretary of Labor or director of the Environmental Protection Agency. After childishly disrupting the government, waiting for a screw-up, Republicans disingenuously blame government in order to legitimize further cuts and disruptions. As Grover Norquist, the anti-tax demigod, tellingly said, “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.”

And so President Obama has to realize that the mountains of Congressional hearings, the column inches and sound bites devoted to faux indignation will effectively entomb a Congress that has seemed intent on walling itself off from the public since its election. The prospect of Congress passing actually progressive bills seemed dismal to begin with—expanded background checks were filibustered despite having the support of 90 percent of the public, and the ostensibly bipartisan immigration reform bill was buried under 300 amendments.

The resurfacing of the debacle surrounding the Guantanamo Bay detention center, which remains open despite Obama’s strident campaign pledge, highlights the infuriating inefficacy of the administration. Scapegoating Republican obstinacy is a liberal pipe dream that ignores the real failures in the administration’s disdain for outreach. The president’s recent so-called charm offensive, one of those oxymorons flooding the Beltway lexicon, is a step in the right direction, but too little too late.

Instead, seeing the writing on the wall, the administration may begin to wonder what could have been done differently: a less controversial, better-argued healthcare bill, avoiding the detrimental austerity of the debt ceiling, sidestepping the self-harm of sequestration. Arriving at the recognition of his own irrelevance, as the media whips itself into 2016 frenzy and Congress stonewalls, President Obama should ponder the mistakes of his term and consider what could have been done differently.

As the poet John Greenleaf Whittier once wrote, “Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: ‘It might have been!’”

Idrees M. Kahloon ’16 is a Crimson editorial writer in Weld Hall. His column appears on alternate Wednesdays. Follow him on Twitter @ikahloon.

Thus far, the Obama administration has prided itself on the lack of scandals embroiling the president’s term in office, an achievement both notable and admirable given the size and aggressiveness of the government under this nation’s 44th leader. Political opponents have attempted to tie President Obama to misdeeds of Solyndra and Van Jones, but as of yet such endeavors have been futile. Unfortunately for both the president and the nation, this weekend’s big story that the Internal Revenue Service has unduly targeted Obama’s political opponents could and should leave an indelible mark on the president’s heretofore unsullied legacy.

The news that the IRS has gone after “social welfare groups” that have the words “patriot” and “tea party” in their names is incredibly damning, and it must not go unnoticed. While the person in charge of the IRS’s tax-exempt division, Lois Lerner, has passed the buck down to unnamed “low-level employees,” this ignominy allows Americans to hark back to the service’s shadowy and praetorian history as an agency frequently suborned to harass those with political agendas discordant to that of the Commander-in-Chief.

The tale of the attack dog IRS begins with the days of Franklin D. Roosevelt, whose IRS chief, Elmer Lincoln Irey, not only used the agency to prosecute Al Capone, but also engaged in investigative activities against former Republican Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon and FDR’s chief Democratic rival, Louisiana Governor Huey Long. Of course, the most renowned and nefarious chapter in the IRS history book dates to Richard M. Nixon, who ordered the institution at his disposal to probe his 1972 electoral opponent, George McGovern. It should not be forgotten that Nixon’s abuse of this executive power became, famously, an impeachable offense.

When politically conservative groups began complaining about having to fill out unprecedented questionnaires during the presidential campaign, the IRS brushed off the allegations as paranoiac, asserting, “Yes, I can give you assurances…There is absolutely no targeting.” The New York Times applauded the increased scrutiny of conservative outfits in a bold editorial entitled “The IRS Does Its Job.”

Yet, the IRS’s job is not to “bury [its enemies] in time and money,” as the Tea Parties characterize the ordeal. The IRS’s job is to collect taxes. That the nation’s purported “paper of record” would lampoon those that unjustly suffered from the IRS qua NKVD is despicable. During the Nixon administration, the American populace benefited from the so-called adversarial press’s obsession with uncovering the transgressions of the nation’s Republican leader. Now, with a Democrat in the White House, the fourth estate seems comfortable with its position as indifferent to the president’s malfeasance. Both Obama and The Times need to apologize for this depravity.

In his commencement address to Ohio State University, Obama glibly denounced those who warn about government overreach: “Unfortunately, you’ve grown up hearing voices that incessantly warn of government as nothing more than some separate, sinister entity that’s at the root of all our problems ... They’ll warn that tyranny is always lurking just around the corner.” He went on to characterize his critics as believing “that our brave and creative and unique experiment in self-rule is somehow just a sham with which we can’t be trusted.” Unfortunately, Obama has now given those opponents prime ammunition to continue making claims that his government actually cannot be trusted.

The admission from Lerner that the IRS has known of the service’s Tea Party targeting since 2011 demonstrates the extent to which the government can hide its ability to abuse its power. No one should overlook this imbroglio as run-of-the-mill or simply lamentable. When the IRS said “there were not partisan reasons behind this,” it was being mendacious. Yet, the reaction of an informed and guarded citizenry should not be partisan. As Harvard graduate Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. once reminded us, “We should be eternally vigilant against attempts to check the expressions of opinions that we loathe.” Democrats, Republicans, Tea Partiers, and Occupiers alike should be in unison in their uproar. If the government can silence holders of one political ideology, there is no stopping it from continuing on to others. Both Nixon and Lyndon B. Johnson used the IRS to target proponents of civil rights and protestors of the Vietnam War. Unless you agree with the administration on 100 percent of the issues (which, if that is the case, I am dying to meet you) your political beliefs might put you at the mercy of a dark and shady mechanism for quenching your freedom of expression.

Various public officials have called on Obama to apologize. A mea culpa is only the first step. Hopefully, this situation can bring to attention the dangers inherent in a politicized tax collector beholden to our nation’s leader. During the Nixon days, people took seriously the threat of IRS instigation. It was taken for granted, despite his insistence to the contrary, that Nixon “was a crook.” While those inside the White House wants to deify Obama as its “North Star,” the potentiality of corruption in his administration must not be overlooked. President Obama must proceed carefully if he doesn’t want to end up with an eerily Nixonian legacy of disgrace.

John F. M. Kocsis ’15, a Crimson editorial writer, is a government concentrator in Eliot House. His column appears on alternate Fridays. Follow him on Twitter @jfmkocsis.

“I don’t know why I’m here.”

I have only heard this statement in a few settings at Harvard. I’ve heard it said in philosophy courses, as students try to comprehend the upper limitations of their cognitive abilities. I’ve heard it said at the Hong Kong, as students try to comprehend the lower limitations of their cognitive abilities. And I’ve heard it said in Annenberg, as students try to compare their cognitive abilities to those of others.

The first two make some sense to me: One is a very sobering thought we all probably have at one point or another. The other is much less sober, but still understandable. The third situation though is something I’ve come to realize, personally, can be harmful and debilitating—the notion of comparing talents in college.

Healthy comparisons are everywhere. Historians draw comparisons with the past to talk about the future. Politicians compare and weigh policies. Our economics—the competition of products, job applications, and prices—is based in the realm of comparison. Even this sentence is being used in a comparative fashion.

And comparisons are nowhere more prevalent than in our schools. Students, even if not graded on a curve, compete for grades on relative scales. They try to impress their professors among their peers for recommendations. They make arguments in their papers and exams by weighing sources and logic. They compete to earn spots in performance, writing, and social groups. And these comparisons, while sometimes harsh, can often lead to personal growth.

Probably the main source of comparison in the college experience, however, stems from its birth—the admissions office. Admissions is an institution based solely in comparison: Among a batch of high-school kids who could be deserving of attending a university, the office only selects a certain portion whose presence on campus, comparatively, will contribute most to the university’s well-being. But, especially at private colleges, this comparison can be extremely difficult. When schools like Harvard are committed to building classes based, at least in part, on economic, ethnic, and geographic diversity, the process is like comparing apples to orangutans. Sure, they both taste great. But beyond that, there aren’t many similarities between them to evaluate on the similar scales, making some admissions decisions seem arbitrary.

And this leads to the root of the problem at Harvard—that one weird speech at Visitas. Even though I, like this year’s class, skipped out on Harvard’s visiting weekend, I’ve heard about the infamous speech given every year to the admitted students, which welcomes them by bragging about the attributes of their peers. It apparently goes something like this: “Among your class of 2,024 students, there are 2,400 valedictorians, 50 debate champions, 12 former clowns, five of the original cast of High School Musical 2, Batman (which one of you he is, we still don’t know), and a rubber ducky with a surprisingly high GPA.”

The speech basically amounts to a statement of, “Look at all the apples and orangutans we have compared and compiled for you.” Later on, you find out that among those 50 debate team champions there can be an opera singer; that among those clowns, there is a card-counter; that the rubber ducky has high aspirations for her (didn’t know what the PGP was here) acting career. And, for me at least, it was hard not to feel a bit envious.

Historians, politics, economics, and schooling had pushed me to compare. For some reason, when the zeal of freshman fall wore off, I felt I wasn’t good enough. I wrote for some publications, but didn’t do much else. I began trying hard activities I knew I didn’t like in a test of self-worth. A lot of things began to matter less than they used to, and I got less and less happy. Soon, I felt that there was no community for me to be a part of. I was merely one of the admissions office’s arbitrary mistakes—one of those in Annenberg who questioned their seats at its tables. Although I probably would not have admitted it (or admitted myself), I felt I could never be good enough.

And I was right. I can never be good enough. That’s because there is no such thing as “good enough.” The reason that any college gives admission to students is because they stand out. They’re different in some way that makes them valuable to a university. How they succeeded in their own lives depended on their own definition of success, which was different from many others’. I realized that I was applying the competitive drive that helped me get here in the wrong way—I had to test myself again and pursue my own goals, without worrying about the rest.

At some point, I finally let go. It all fell back into place. I enjoyed the differences more in those around me rather than envied them, and I enjoyed more of the activities I already knew I liked doing or discovered. The pressure subsided, and I finally felt more of a belonging—I was being myself again, which was the same self that the admissions office first selected to “belong” in the class of 2016.

As strange as it seems, differences are what bring students together. And it can be only through embracing and learning from those differences, rather than comparing them, that students will remain together. I’ve tried both ways, and trust me—it doesn’t even compare.

Dashiell F. Young-Saver ’16, a Crimson editorial writer, lives in Grays Hall.