The Harvard Corporation has begun the search for the successor to President Neil L. Rudenstine. In mid July, it announced the membership of the search committee and outlined initial steps the committee would take to solicit both nominees and views of the University's future.
Under Harvard's charter, the Corporation elects the president, with counsel and consent from the Board of Overseers. As in the 1990-91 search for Derek Bok's successor, the Corporation will involve Overseers as members of a nine-person search committee consisting of the six Corporation members other than the president (Robert G. Stone Jr. '45, Senior Fellow and chairman of the search committee; University treasurer D. Ronald Daniel, M.B.A. '54; Hanna Holborn Gray, Ph.D. '57; Conrad K. Harper, J.D. '65; James R. Houghton '58, M.B.A. '62; and Herbert S. Winokur Jr. '65, Ph.D. '67) and three Overseers (president of the board Sharon Elliott Gagnon, Ph.D. '72; Thomas E. Everhart '53; and Richard E. Oldenburg '54).
Beyond their Harvard experience, several of the committee members have been professionally involved at senior levels in higher education. Everhart and Gray, for example, were, respectively, presidents of the California Institute of Technology and of the University of Chicago; and Gagnon was president of the University of Alaska board of regents.
Stone has invited "perspectives and thoughtful counsel" from across the University community. In addition to meeting with individuals and groups at and beyond Harvard, the committee expects to send more than 300,000 letters to faculty, students, staff, alumni, and others soliciting information and suggestions. The mailings began this summer and were expected to continue into the academic year.
Correspondence, which will be held in confidence, may be addressed to the Harvard University Presidential Search Committee, Loeb House, 17 Quincy Street, Cambridge 02138.
