Summers to resign at end of academic year

[MissMillie]

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2006/02/21/summers_to_resign_at_end_of_academic_year/

Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers announced today that he will resign June 30, after a brief and sometimes bitter tenure at the helm of one of the most prestigious universities in the world.

Derek Bok, who was president of the university from 1971 to 1991, has agreed to serve as interim president until Harvard’s governing corporation can find a replacement for Summers, who was appointed less than five years ago.

Summers, a former treasury secretary under President Clinton, took charge of the university in July 2001, and almost immediately alienated some faculty with his blunt and brusque management style. In January 2005, he sparked an uproar when he speculated about women’s aptitude in science, which led to a vote of no-confidence by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.

The same faculty had scheduled a second, unprecedented vote a week from today, after their dean, William C. Kirby, stepped down. Some professors said Summers had forced Kirby out of the position. The episode, the latest in a stormy tenure, was said to have led Harvard’s governing board to consider Summers’ ouster.


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We all got an email from Summers announcing his resignation.

[mike_c]

1. I'm available...

...but I really don't have time for all the CV polishing necessary-- otherwise I'd apply for the job....

[MADem]

2. Probably a good thing

Regardless of whether or not he "meant it" or "misspoke"--words have meaning, and they can cause hurt. To paint an entire gender with a broad brush like that was just a stupid and wrongheaded thing to do. And it makes me wonder if the guy IS, in fact, harboring a bit of bias. Maybe he'll be haunted by the ghost of Marie Curie for his sins!

But hell, when you look at all these freaking "geniuses" coming out of the Ivy League schools, I'd venture to say that someone is getting ripped off, big time. Apparently the thing you do there is make connections...if the Yale/Harvard Business Monkey is an example of the "superior education" one receives at these pricy private piles of brick, you're probably better off at a community college (assuming you can get a grant, now that High-Heeled Monkey has cut that program...).

[Mend]

4. I once read that 70% of American Nobel Laureates attended small

no-name colleges. And, btw, I would match my triple-boarded M.D. female scientific skills with that dipshit any day of the week.

[napsi]

11. Words only mean things if you take some fool

seriously. Why is it we get so offended by some asshole from an Ivy League school? We need to get some balls and stop whining about what somebody says and start taking our message to the American people. In essence, we need to take a page from the frigging repugs and shove it down their throats. (ie: Howard Dean)

[annofark]

3. Bub-BYE

As the #1 Representative for the worlds TOP institute of Education he should have thought about what he said in the public realm more. Time to go.

[Burried News]

5. Looks like the Harvard Faculty isn't responding to Howard Dershowitz's

advice. But hey Howard Gonzo still agrees with you.

[Maat]

10. Where did you get that great ad about Gonzo?

Link?

[ckramer]

6. Summers stepping down as Harvard president in June

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - Lawrence H. Summers, the polarizing Harvard University president, said Tuesday that he is resigning at the end of the academic year, brought down by clashes with faculty and missteps including his comments that innate ability may partly explain why few women reach top science posts.

“I have reluctantly concluded that the rifts between me and segments of the Arts and Sciences faculty make it infeasible for me to advance the agenda of renewal that I see as crucial to Harvard’s future,” Summers wrote in a letter posted on Harvard’s Web site.

link

Had enough of the tough crowd?

[Tom Joad]

7. Thank God, or whoever. Racist, sexist, fool.

[stepnw1f]

8. awwwwwwwwwww... BIGOT! (nt)

[Burried News]

9. Guess Larry found out the hard way that he wasn't the smartest guy in the

room.

[arealliberal]

12. Too bad for Harvard. I guess they weren't up to the challenge.

I'm sure his replacement will make everyone feel "secure."

[Nikia]

15. See my post #14

A college president isn't supposed to be underminding the presence and achievements of his students.

[megatherium]

13. It wasn't just the stupid things he said, it was the corruption.

He supported his crony Andrei Schleifer in the economics department, even though Schleifer's illegal money dealings in Russia cost Harvard a $44 million legal decision. (Or so I've read.)

[Nikia]

14. He said something that a college president shouldn't say

He leads what is supposedly the best university in the United States. It is a coeducational institute with female undergrad, graduate students, and professors in the science departments. By making his statement, he was underminding their presence and achievements there. In his position, he is supposed to be supporting all students and faculty. Saying what he said, was being unequal in his support for women in science there.

[CTyankee]

16. At the time of his remark about women

several "liberal" commentators supported him as a matter of free speech. One even compared him to Socrates!

Oh, and the Cornell West thing. Do ya think he would have criticized a white professor for taking part in say, a madrigal singing group?