President of Harvard University

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Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates Template:Infobox official post The president of Harvard University is the chief administrator of Harvard University and the ex officio president of the Harvard Corporation.[1] Each is appointed by and is responsible to the other members of that body, who delegate to the president the day-to-day running of the university.

Harvard's current president is Alan Garber, who took office on January 2, 2024, following the resignation of Claudine Gay. In August 2024, the Harvard Corporation announced he would be in the position until mid-2027.[2]

Role

The president plays an important part in university-wide planning and strategy. Each names a faculty's dean (and, since the foundation of the office in 1994, the university's provost), and grants tenure to recommended professors. However, the president is expected to make such decisions after extensive consultation with faculty members.

Recently, however, the job has become increasingly administrative, especially as fund-raising campaigns have taken on central importance in large institutions such as Harvard. Some have criticized this trend to the extent it has prevented the president from focusing on substantive issues in higher education.[3]

Each president is professor in some department of the university and teaches from time to time.

The university maintains an official residence for the president's use, which from 1912 until 1971, was President's House, and since then has been Elmwood.[4]

Influence

File:HarvardUniversityPresidents1829-1862.jpg
Five Harvard University presidents, sitting in order of when they served. Left-to-right: Josiah Quincy III, Edward Everett, Jared Sparks, James Walker and Cornelius Conway Felton.

Harvard presidents have traditionally influenced educational practices nationwide. Charles W. Eliot, for example, originated America's familiar system of a smorgasbord of elective courses available to each student; James B. Conant worked to introduce standardized testing; Derek Bok and Neil L. Rudenstine argued for the continued importance of diversity in higher education.

History

At Harvard's founding it was headed by a "schoolmaster", Nathaniel Eaton. In 1640, when Henry Dunster was brought in, he adopted the title of president. Since Harvard was founded for the training of Puritan clergy, and even though its mission was soon broadened, nearly all presidents through the end of the 18th century were in holy orders.

All presidents from Leonard Hoar in 1672 through Nathan Pusey in 1971 were graduates of Harvard College. Of the presidents since Pusey, nearly all earned a graduate degree at Harvard. The only exception has been Drew Gilpin Faust, who was the first president since the seventeenth century with no earned Harvard degree.

Presidents of Harvard

No. Image Presidents Term of office Length Notes
– File:Noimage.svg Template:Sortname 1637–1639 Template:Time interval Referred to as "schoolmaster" of Harvard College
Fired for "embezzlement and beating students"[5]
1 File:Noimage.svg Template:Sortname 1640–1654 Template:Time interval Forced to resign for speaking out against and interrupting infant baptisms[6]
2 File:HarvardPresidentCharlesChauncy.jpg Template:Sortname 1654–1672 Template:Time interval Died in office[7]
3 File:Noimage.svg Template:Sortname 1672–1675 Template:Time interval Forced to resign[8]
4 File:Urian Oakes tomb - Cambridge, MA.jpg Template:Sortname 1675–1680 (acting); 1680–1681 Template:Time interval (total);

Template:Time interval (acting); Template:Time interval

Died in office[9][7]
5 File:Harvard president John Rogers.png Template:Sortname 1682–1684 Template:Time interval Died in office[10][11][7]
6 File:Appletons' Mather Richard - Increase.jpg Template:Sortname 1685–1686 (acting); 1686–1692 (rector); 1692–1701 Template:Time interval (total); Template:Time interval (acting); Template:Time interval (rector); Template:Time interval Forced to resign[12][7]
– File:Appletons' Willard Simon - Samuel.jpg Template:Sortname 1701–1707 (acting) Template:Time interval Resigned due to illness[13]
7 File:John Leverett.gif Template:Sortname 1708–1724 Template:Time interval First lawyer to serve as president. Died in office.[7][14]
8 File:BenjaminWadsworth 1stChurch Boston.png Template:Sortname 1725–1737 Template:Time interval Died in office[11][7]
9 File:John Singleton Copley - Edward Holyoke (1689-1769) - H6 - Harvard Art Museums.jpg Template:Sortname 1737–1769 Template:Time interval At 79, the oldest president; died in office.[11][7]
– File:JohnWinthropAstronomer.jpg Template:Sortname 1769 (acting) Declined presidency on a permanent basis on grounds of old age[15]
10 File:Noimage.svg Template:Sortname 1770–1773 Template:Time interval Resigned after fathering a child out of wedlock[16][1]
– File:JohnWinthropAstronomer.jpg Template:Sortname 1773–1774 (acting) Declined presidency again on a permanent basis on grounds of old age [2]
11 File:Noimage.svg Template:Sortname 1774–1780 Template:Time interval Students petitioned the Corporation to dismiss him and he resigned.[7][17]
– File:Edward Wigglesworth II.jpg Template:Sortname 1780–1781 (acting) [3]
12 File:Coat of Arms of Joseph Willard.svg Template:Sortname 1781–1804 Template:Time interval Died in office[18]
– File:Eliphalet Pearson.png Template:Sortname 1804–1806 (acting) Acting president after death of Willard
13 File:Noimage.svg Template:Sortname 1806–1810 Template:Time interval Died in office[19]
– File:Henry Ware Sr. (1764-1845).jpeg Template:Sortname 1810 (acting) Served as acting president after Webber's death.[4]
14 File:JohnThorntonKikland.jpg Template:Sortname 1810–1828 Template:Time interval Suffered a stroke, was accused of financial mismanagement by the Harvard Corporation, and resigned [5]
– File:Henry Ware Sr. (1764-1845).jpeg Template:Sortname 1828-1829 (acting) Served as acting president after the resignation of Kirkland [6]
15 File:Josiah Quincy 1772-1864.jpg Template:Sortname 1829–1845 Template:Time interval Retired[20]
16 File:Edward Everett, 1794-1865, three-quarter length portrait, standing, facing left (cropped closein 3x4).jpg Template:Sortname 1846–1848 Template:Time interval Resigned due to dissatisfaction with the job.[21] Later became United States Secretary of State and United States Senator.
17 File:Jared Sparks.jpg Template:Sortname 1849–1853 Template:Time interval Resigned due to dissatisfaction with the job[22]
18 File:James Walker Harvard.jpg Template:Sortname 1853–1860 Template:Time interval Resigned due to arthritis[23]
19 File:Cornelius Conway Felton (cropped).jpg Template:Sortname 1860–1862 Template:Time interval Died from a disease of the heart en route to Washington, D.C. for a meeting at the Smithsonian Institution[24]
– File:Andrew Preston Peabody.jpg Template:Sortname 1862 (acting) Served as acting president after the death of Felton
20 File:Thomas Hill b1818.jpg Template:Sortname 1862–1868 Template:Time interval Resigned due to poor health[25]
– File:Andrew Preston Peabody.jpg Template:Sortname 1868-1869 (acting) Served as acting president after the resignation of Hill due to illness[26]
21 File:Appletons' Eliot Charles William.jpg Template:Sortname 1869–1909 Template:Time interval[27] At 35, the youngest president.[28] Longest term of office.[29][30] For a portion of 1900-1901[31] and 1905, Henry Pickering Walcott served as acting president while Eliot was on vacation.
22 File:Picture of Abbott Lawrence Lowell.jpg Template:Sortname 1909–1933 Template:Time interval Retired[32][33]
23 File:James Conant 1932.jpg Template:Sortname 1933–1953 Template:Time interval Retired to become Allied High Commissioner for Occupied Germany and later U.S. ambassador to Germany[34]
24 File:Nathan Pusey Boston College 1963 (cropped).JPG Template:Sortname 1953–1971 Template:Time interval "Pusey called in the Cambridge police to end a student sit-in" in 1969. "Sharply criticized for his handling of the situation, he announced in 1970 that he would retire the following year".[35][36]
25 File:Noimage.svg Template:Sortname 1971–1991 Template:Time interval[37] Henry Rosovsky served as acting president in 1984 and 1987 when Bok traveled and took brief sabbaticals.[38][39]
26 File:Noimage.svg Template:Sortname 1991–2001[40] Template:Time interval Provost Albert Carnesale served as acting president for three months, from November 1994 to February 1995, during Rudenstine's medical leave of absence.[41]
27 File:Lawrence Summers 2012.jpg Template:Sortname 2001–2006 Template:Time interval First Jewish president[42][43][44][45][46] Shortest tenure since Civil War. Resigned following several clashes with faculty resulting in a no-confidence vote.[47][48][49][50]
– File:Noimage.svg Template:Sortname 2006–2007 (interim) Template:Time interval Served as acting president after the resignation of Summers[51][7]
28 File:Women in Economic Decision-making Drew Gilpin Faust (8414040540) (cropped).jpg Template:Sortname 2007–2018 Template:Time interval First female president[7][52]
29 File:Lawrence Bacow in San Francisco pictured 2006.jpg Template:Sortname 2018–2023 Template:Time interval Retired[7][53]
30 File:Inauguration of Claudine Gay as President of Harvard University (2) (cropped).jpg Template:Sortname 2023–2024 Template:Time interval First black president.[54] Shortest serving president; resigned following congressional hearings into antisemitism on campus and multiple allegations of plagiarism.[55]
31 File:Alan Garber at the George W. Gay Lecture at Harvard Medical School (2015) 04.png Template:Sortname 2024–Present Template:Time interval Appointed as interim president after Gay's resignation[56][57] Appointed permanently in August 2024 as 31st president until 2027, when Harvard will appoint a successor.[58]

Timeline of Harvard University presidential terms

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References

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External links

Template:Presidents of Harvard University Template:Harvard Template:Authority control

  1. ↑ Central Administration Template:Webarchive Governance of the University, from Office of the Provost
  2. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
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  40. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  41. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
  42. ↑ YUNews Director of the National Economic Council, Dr. Lawrence H. Summers, is Keynote Speaker at Yeshiva University's Annual Hanukkah Dinner and Convocation on December 13, November 18, 2009
  43. ↑ The Harvard Crimson Harvard's First Jewish President, March 8, 2006
  44. ↑ The Harvard Crimson Did Summers' Faith Affect His Fall?, March 3, 2006
  45. ↑ The Harvard Crimson A Milestone of Faith, October 14, 2001
  46. ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
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