Harvard’s President Lawrence Bacow Will Step Down Next Year

Something of a darkish horse candidate for the presidency when his choice was introduced in 2018, Dr. Bacow was a member of the Harvard Corporation, the Hauser chief in residence at Harvard Kennedy School of Government’s Center for Public Leadership, and on the committee to pick a successor to Dr. Faust.

The committee had reviewed 700 completely different candidates earlier than selecting one in every of its personal members, Dr. Bacow himself.

Dr. Bacow was credited with lobbying Congress for extra lenient visa insurance policies for worldwide college students through the pandemic, for asserting a university-wide local weather change initiative, and for investigating the college’s ties to slavery, lately asserting an endowed Legacy of Slavery Fund, permitting students and college students to carry Harvard’s connections to slavery to mild for generations to return.

The college has dedicated $100 million to the hassle, with a few of the money earmarked to hint descendants of enslaved individuals at Harvard and in addition to create trade applications between college students and college members at Harvard with these at traditionally Black faculties and universities.

Dr. Bacow’s tenure at Harvard has not been with out controversy.

Last year, Cornel West, thought-about one of many nation’s most outstanding Black philosophers and progressive activists, introduced he had resigned from Harvard Divinity School on account of a tenure dispute. At the time, Dr. West attacked Harvard, calling it an establishment in “decline and decay.” Dr. Bacow, who had declined to touch upon the specifics of the case citing the confidentiality of the method, however defended the college’s dealing with of it.

In one other extremely publicized controversy, three feminine graduate college students filed a lawsuit in opposition to Harvard this year, accusing the college of ignoring allegations that John Comaroff, a professor of African and African American research and anthropology, had sexually harassed college students.

By the time the case was filed, Dr. Comaroff, who denied the allegations, had been positioned on depart after the college discovered he engaged in inappropriate verbal conduct — however he was discovered not chargeable for undesirable sexual contact.