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103-476: The first distinct building for worship at Harvard University was Holden Chapel, built in 1744. The college soon outgrew the building, which was replaced by a chapel inside Harvard Hall in 1766, then a chapel in University Hall in 1814, and finally by Appleton Chapel, a building dedicated solely to worship sited where Memorial Church now stands. Standing for 73 years before the current building, Appleton Chapel

206-675: A 21-acre (8.5 ha) campus in the Longwood Medical and Academic Area in Boston , about 3.3 miles (5.3 km) south of the Cambridge campus. Several Harvard-affiliated hospitals and research institutes are also in Longwood, including Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center , Boston Children's Hospital , Brigham and Women's Hospital , Dana–Farber Cancer Institute , Joslin Diabetes Center , and

309-735: A 358-acre (145 ha) campus in the Allston section of Boston across the John W. Weeks Bridge , which crosses the Charles River and connects the Allston and Cambridge campuses. The university is actively expanding into Allston, where it now owns more land than in Cambridge. Plans include new construction and renovation for the Business School, a hotel and conference center, graduate student housing, Harvard Stadium, and other athletics facilities. In 2021,

412-548: A Free Society , was published by Harvard faculty, which remains one of the most important works in curriculum studies , and women were first admitted to the medical school . Between 1945 and 1960, admissions were standardized to open the university to a more diverse group of students. Following the end of World War II , for example, special exams were developed so veterans could be considered for admission. No longer drawing mostly from prestigious prep schools in New England ,

515-605: A considerable interregnum Eliot succeeded to that office in 1869. Early in 1869, Eliot had presented his ideas about reforming American higher education in a compelling two-part article, "The New Education," in The Atlantic Monthly , the nation's leading journal of opinion. "We are fighting a wilderness, physical and moral," Eliot declared in setting forth his vision of the American university, "for this fight we must be trained and armed." The articles resonated powerfully with

618-555: A faculty composed less of faithful teachers than of productive scholars for whom the campus would provide the conditions for creative work. The latter implied a shift of focus from undergraduate, liberal education to graduate work in the most important professional fields. During his tenure, Eliot opposed football and tried unsuccessfully to abolish the game at Harvard. In 1905, The New York Times reported that he called it "a fight whose strategy and ethics are those of war", that violation of rules cannot be prevented, that "the weaker man

721-605: A fine curve ball. I understand that a curve ball is thrown with a deliberate attempt to deceive. Surely this is not an ability we should want to foster at Harvard. During his lengthy tenure as Harvard's leader, Eliot initiated repeated attempts to acquire his former employer, the fledgling Massachusetts Institute of Technology , and these efforts continued even after he stepped down from the presidency. The much younger college had considerable financial problems during its first five decades, and had been repeatedly rescued from insolvency by various benefactors, including George Eastman ,

824-449: A legacy left to him by his grandfather Lyman." After a bitter struggle over the Rumford chair, Eliot left Harvard in 1863. His friends assumed that he would "be obliged to cut chemistry and go into business in order to earn a livelihood for his family." But instead, he used his grandfather's large legacy and a small borrowed sum to spend the next two years studying the educational systems of

927-495: A people may be inferred from the variety of its tools. There are thousands of years between the stone hatchet and the machine-shop. As tools multiply, each is more ingeniously adapted to its own exclusive purpose. So with the men that make the State. For the individual, concentration, and the highest development of his own peculiar faculty, is the only prudence. But for the State, it is variety, not uniformity, of intellectual product, which

1030-587: A physical reminder of Harvard's spiritual heritage. Since its inception, the Harvard Memorial Church has had weekly choral music provided at its Sunday services by the Harvard University Choir , which is composed of both graduate and undergraduate students in the university. 42°22′30″N 71°06′58″W  /  42.3749095°N 71.1161574°W  / 42.3749095; -71.1161574 Harvard University Harvard University

1133-444: A research university in the service of the nation, specialized expertise could be harnessed to public purposes. "When the revelation of his own peculiar taste and capacity comes to a young man, let him reverently give it welcome, thank God, and take courage," Eliot declared in his inaugural address. He further stated: Thereafter he knows his way to happy, enthusiastic work, and, God willing, to usefulness and success. The civilization of

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1236-414: A separation of the sexes when it came to education. While Eliot was president of Harvard many firsts happened when it came to the education of African Americans . Richard Theodore Greener was the first African American to graduate from Harvard. W.E.B. Du Bois was the first African American to earn a PhD from Harvard's History Department, and from Harvard overall. Also, during his presidency, Eliot saw

1339-531: A structure that would complement the imposing edifice of Widener Library . This created an open area known as the Tercentenary Theatre, where Commencement Exercises are held. The current Memorial Church was built in 1932 in honor of the men and women of Harvard University who died in World War I . The names of 373 alumni were engraved within alongside a sculpture named The Sacrifice by Malvina Hoffman . It

1442-439: A thorough knowledge of what France has found useful for the development of her resources, may someday enable me to be of use to my country. At this moment, it is humiliating to read the figures which exhibit the increasing importations of all sorts of manufactured goods into America. Especially will it be the interest of Massachusetts to foster by every mean in her power the manufactures which are her main strength. Eliot understood

1545-672: A trustee. Between 1908 and 1925 he served as the chairman of the Museum's Special Advisory Committee on Education. Served as vice president for the National Committee for Mental Hygiene from 1913 till his death. Eliot accepted election to be the first president of the American Social Hygiene Association . In 1902, he became vice president of the National Civil Service Reform League , and president of

1648-572: A union. Bacow retired in June 2023, and on July 1 Claudine Gay , a Harvard professor in the Government and African American Studies departments and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences , became Harvard's 30th president. In January 2024, just six months into her presidency, Gay resigned following allegations of antisemitism and plagiarism . Gay was succeeded by Alan Garber , the university's provost, who

1751-568: Is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts , United States. Founded October 28, 1636, and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard , it is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States. Its influence, wealth, and rankings have made it one of the most prestigious universities in the world. Harvard was founded and authorized by

1854-411: Is considered the legitimate prey of the stronger" and that "no sport is wholesome in which ungenerous or mean acts which easily escape detection contribute to victory." He also made public objections to baseball , basketball , and hockey . He was quoted as saying that rowing and tennis were the only clean sports. Eliot once said: [T]his year I'm told the team did well because one pitcher had

1957-510: Is needful. On the subject of educational reform, he declared: As a people, we do not apply to mental activities the principle of division of labor; and we have but a halting faith in special training for high professional employments. The vulgar conceit that a Yankee can turn his hand to anything we insensibly carry into high places, where it is preposterous and criminal. We are accustomed to seeing men leap from farm or shop to court-room or pulpit, and we half believe that common men can safely use

2060-538: Is rare among historians: It was due to Eliot's insistent pressure that the Harvard faculty abolished the Greek requirement for entrance in 1887, after dropping required Latin and Greek for freshman year. His and Harvard's reputation, the pressure of teachers trained in the new learning, and of parents wanting ‘practical’ instruction for their sons, soon had the classics on the run, in schools as well as colleges; and no equivalent to

2163-799: The Allston neighborhood of Boston ; and the medical campus in Boston's Longwood Medical Area . Harvard's endowment , valued at $ 50.7 billion , makes it the wealthiest academic institution in the world. Harvard Library , with more than 20 million volumes, is the world's largest academic library . Harvard alumni, faculty, and researchers include 188 living billionaires , eight U.S. presidents , 24 heads of state and 31 heads of government , founders of notable companies, Nobel laureates , Fields Medalists , members of Congress , MacArthur Fellows , Rhodes Scholars , Marshall Scholars , Turing Award Recipients , Pulitzer Prize recipients, and Fulbright Scholars ; by most metrics, Harvard University ranks among

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2266-580: The American Civil War , under Harvard president Charles William Eliot 's long tenure from 1869 to 1909, Harvard developed multiple professional schools, which transformed it into a modern research university . In 1900, Harvard co-founded the Association of American Universities . James B. Conant led the university through the Great Depression and World War II , and liberalized admissions after

2369-516: The American Revolution . In the 19th century, Harvard was influenced by Enlightenment Age ideas, including reason and free will, which were widespread among Congregational ministers and which placed these ministers and their congregations at odds with more traditionalist, Calvinist pastors and clergies. Following the death of Hollis Professor of Divinity David Tappan in 1803 and that of Joseph Willard , Harvard's eleventh president,

2472-523: The Carnegie Classification . The medical school consistently ranks first among medical schools for research, and biomedical research is an area of particular strength for the university. More than 11,000 faculty and 1,600 graduate students conduct research at the medical school and its 15 affiliated hospitals and research institutes. In 2019, the medical school and its affiliates attracted $ 1.65 billion in competitive research grants from

2575-490: The Darfur genocide , and tobacco , fossil fuel , and private prison industries. In the late 1980s, during the disinvestment from South Africa movement, student activists erected a symbolic shanty town on Harvard Yard and blockaded a speech by South African Vice Consul Duke Kent-Brown. The university eventually reduced its South African holdings by $ 230 million , out of a total of $ 400 million , in response to

2678-452: The Faculty of Arts and Sciences , including Sever Hall , Harvard Hall , and freshman dormitories . Upperclassmen live in the twelve residential houses , located south of Harvard Yard near the Charles River and on Radcliffe Quadrangle , which formerly housed Radcliffe College students. Each house is a community of undergraduates, faculty deans, and resident tutors, with its own dining hall, library, and recreational facilities. Also on

2781-591: The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences , the John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) , and the Division of Continuing Education , which includes Harvard Summer School and Harvard Extension School . There are nine other graduate and professional faculties and a faculty attacked to the Harvard Radcliffe Institute . There are four Harvard joint programs with MIT , which include

2884-534: The Harvard Annex where they could receive instruction from Harvard faculty. Within a decade this program grew to 200 female students, and resulted in the creation of Radcliffe College . In the aftermath of the formation of the college, Eliot, with reservations, countersigned the degrees of women who attend Radcliffe certifying the degrees received by these students are equivalent in everyway to those received by students at Harvard. He still maintained that there must be

2987-631: The Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences expanded into the new Allston-based Science and Engineering Complex (SEC), which is more than 500,000 square feet in size. SEC is adjacent to the Enterprise Research Campus, the Business School, and Harvard Innovation Labs, and designed to encourage technology- and life science-focused startups and collaborations with mature companies. The university's schools of Medicine , Dental Medicine , and Public Health are located on

3090-624: The Harvard–MIT Program in Health Sciences and Technology , the Broad Institute , The Observatory of Economic Complexity , and edX . The university maintains 12 schools, which include: Harvard is a founding member of the Association of American Universities and a preeminent research university with "very high" research activity (R1) and comprehensive doctoral programs across the arts, sciences, engineering, and medicine, according to

3193-597: The Hasty Pudding . Although he had high expectations and obvious scientific talents, the first fifteen years of Eliot's career were less than auspicious. He was appointed Tutor in Mathematics at Harvard in the fall of 1854, and studied chemistry with Josiah P. Cooke . In 1858, he was promoted to Assistant Professor of Mathematics and Chemistry. He taught competently, wrote some technical pieces on chemical impurities in industrial metals , and busied himself with schemes for

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3296-718: The International Health Board , as well as serving as a trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation from 1914 to 1917. Eliot helped found the Institute for Government Research ( Brookings Institution ) and served as trustee. He acted as a founding trustee of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace from its beginning in 1910 until 1919. Eliot was an incorporator of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts in 1870, and

3399-492: The Massachusetts General Court , the governing legislature of colonial -era Massachusetts Bay Colony . While never formally affiliated with any denomination , Harvard trained Congregational clergy until its curriculum and student body were gradually secularized in the 18th century. By the 19th century, Harvard emerged as the most prominent academic and cultural institution among the Boston elite . Following

3502-485: The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court rendered a decision that effectively cancelled plans for a merger, and MIT eventually attained independent financial stability. During his life, Eliot had been involved in at least five unsuccessful attempts to absorb MIT into Harvard. On October 27, 1858, Eliot married Ellen Derby Peabody of Salem Massachusetts (1836–1869) in Boston at Kings Chapel . Ellen

3605-646: The National Institutes of Health , more than twice that of any other university. Harvard Library , the largest academic library in the world with 20.4 million holdings, is centered in Widener Library in Harvard Yard . It includes 25 individual Harvard libraries around the world with a combined staff of more than 800 librarians and personnel. Houghton Library , the Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on

3708-787: The Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering . Additional affiliates, including Massachusetts General Hospital , are located throughout Greater Boston . Harvard owns Dumbarton Oaks , a research library in Washington, D.C., Harvard Forest in Petersham, Massachusetts , Concord Field Station in Estabrook Woods in Concord, Massachusetts , the Villa I Tatti research center in Florence , Italy, and

3811-601: The Yale family of Yale University . Another son, Samuel Atkins Eliot II (August 24, 1862 – October 15, 1950) became a Unitarian minister who was the longest-serving president of the American Unitarian Association (1900–1927) and was the first president granted executive authority of that organization. The Nobel Prize -winning poet T.S. Eliot was a cousin and attended Harvard from 1906 through 1909, completing his elective undergraduate courses in three instead of

3914-413: The 20th century, as its endowment burgeoned and prominent intellectuals and professors affiliated with it, Harvard University's reputation as one of the world's most prestigious universities grew notably. The university's enrollment also underwent substantial growth, a product of both the founding of new graduate academic programs and an expansion of the undergraduate college . Radcliffe College emerged as

4017-930: The Center for Hellenic Studies in Greece. https://greece.chs.harvard.edu the Harvard Shanghai Center in Shanghai , China, and Arnold Arboretum in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston. Harvard is governed by a combination of its Board of Overseers and the President and Fellows of Harvard College , which is also known as the Harvard Corporation. These two bodies, in turn, appoint the President of Harvard University . There are 16,000 staff and faculty, including 2,400 professors, lecturers, and instructors. Harvard has

4120-748: The Harvard Library system include Baker Library/Bloomberg Center at Harvard Business School , Cabot Science Library at Harvard Science Center , Dumbarton Oaks in Washington, D.C. , Gutman Library at the Harvard Graduate School of Education , Harvard Film Archive at the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts , Houghton Library , and Lamont Library . Charles William Eliot Charles William Eliot (March 20, 1834 – August 22, 1926)

4223-694: The History of Women in America, and the Harvard University Archives consist principally of rare and unique materials. The nation's oldest collection of maps, gazetteers, and atlases is stored in Pusey Library on Harvard Yard , which is open to the public. The largest collection of East-Asian language material outside of East Asia is held in Harvard-Yenching Library . Other major libraries in

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4326-544: The Old World in Europe. Eliot's approach to investigating European education was unusual. He did not confine his attention to educational institutions, but explored the role of education in every aspect of national life. When Eliot visited schools , he took an interest in every aspect of institutional operation, from curriculum and methods of instruction through physical arrangements and custodial services. But his particular concern

4429-775: The Union victory in the Civil War , triumph over the moral and physical wilderness and the establishment of mastery required a joining of industrial and cultural forces. While he proposed the reform of professional schools, the development of research faculties, and, in general, a huge broadening of the curriculum, his blueprint for undergraduate education in crucial ways preserved — and even enhanced — its traditional spiritual and character education functions. Echoing Emerson, he believed that every individual mind had "its own peculiar constitution." The problem, both in terms of fully developing an individual's capacities and in maximizing his social utility,

4532-498: The United States took account of industry and commerce as well as the field of academic endeavor. To be the chief executive officer of a particular business offered only a limited range of influence; but to stand at the intersection of the realm of production and the realm of knowledge offered considerably more. In the 1800s, American colleges, controlled by clergymen , continued to embrace classical curricula that had little relevance to an industrializing nation. Few offered courses in

4635-466: The businessmen who controlled the Harvard Corporation. Shortly after their appearance, merely 35 years old, he was elected as the youngest president in the history of the nation's oldest university. Eliot's educational vision incorporated important elements of Unitarian and Emersonian ideas about character development, framed by a pragmatic understanding of the role of higher education in economic and political leadership. His concern in "The New Education"

4738-574: The churches when our present ministers shall lie in the dust." In its early years, the college trained many Puritan ministers and offered a classical curriculum based on the English university model many colonial-era Massachusetts leaders experienced at the University of Cambridge , where many of them studied prior to immigrating to British America . Harvard never formally affiliated with any particular Protestant denomination, but its curriculum conformed to

4841-454: The classics, for mental training, cultural background, or solid satisfaction in after life, has yet been discovered. It is a hard saying, but Mr. Eliot, more than any other man, is responsible for the greatest educational crime of the century against American youth—depriving him of his classical heritage. By contrast recent scholars such as Richard M. Freeland, emphasize that Eliot appreciated how Harvard needed to modernize: Eliot believed that

4944-409: The female counterpart of Harvard College, becoming one of the most prominent schools in the nation for women. In 1923, a year after the percentage of Jewish students at Harvard reached 20%, A. Lawrence Lowell , the university's 22nd president, unsuccessfully proposed capping the admission of Jewish students to 15% of the undergraduate population. Lowell also refused to mandate forced desegregation in

5047-455: The following year, a struggle broke out over their replacements. In 1805, Henry Ware was elected to replace Tappan as Hollis chair. Two years later, in 1807, liberal Samuel Webber was appointed as Harvard's 13th president, representing a shift from traditional ideas at Harvard to more liberal and Arminian ideas. In 1816, Harvard University launched new language programs in the study of French and Spanish , and appointed George Ticknor

5150-507: The following year. In 1638, the university acquired British North America 's first known printing press . The same year, on his deathbed, John Harvard , a Puritan clergyman who emigrated to the colony from England, bequeathed the emerging college £780 and his library of some 320 volumes; the following year, it was named Harvard College . In 1643, a Harvard publication defined the college's purpose: "advance learning and perpetuate it to posterity, dreading to leave an illiterate ministry to

5253-480: The founder of Eastman Kodak Company . The faculty, students, and alumni of MIT often vehemently opposed merger of their school under the Harvard umbrella. In 1916, MIT succeeded in moving across the Charles River from crowded Back Bay, Boston to larger facilities on the southern riverfront of Cambridge, but still faced the prospect of merger with Harvard, which was to begin "when the Institute will occupy its splendid new buildings in Cambridge." However, in 1917,

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5356-469: The hiring of Harvard's first African American faculty member George F. Grant. Yet, despite these changes Eliot continued to believe in racial segregation , anti-miscegenation , and eugenics . Unlike his successor, A. Lawrence Lowell , Eliot opposed efforts to limit the admission of Jews and Roman Catholics . At the same time, Eliot was radically opposed to labor unions, fostering a campus climate where many Harvard students served as strikebreakers; he

5459-431: The house, secretary of the board of education, and president and treasurer of the university, together with thirty other persons, and these other persons were elected by joint ballot of the two houses of the state legislature. An opinion had long been gaining ground that it would be better for the community and the interests of learning, as well as for the university, if the power to elect the overseers were transferred from

5562-470: The intellectual welfare of the general public. President Eliot edited the Harvard Classics , which together are colloquially known as his Five Foot Shelf and which were intended at the time to suggest a foundation for informed discourse, "A good substitute for a liberal education in youth to anyone who would read them with devotion, even if he could spare but fifteen minutes a day for reading." Eliot

5665-479: The interdependence of education and enterprise. In a letter to his cousin Arthur T. Lyman, he discussed the value to the German chemical industry of discoveries made in university laboratories. He also recognized that, while European universities depended on government for support, American institutions would have to draw on the resources of the wealthy. He wrote to his cousin: Every one of the famous universities of Europe

5768-421: The kinds of changes they wanted. On his return to the United States in 1865, Eliot accepted an appointment as Professor of Analytical Chemistry at the newly founded Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In that year, an important revolution occurred in the government of Harvard University. The board of overseers had hitherto consisted of the governor, lieutenant-governor, president of the state senate, speaker of

5871-552: The largest university endowment in the world, valued at about $ 50.7 billion as of 2023. During the recession of 2007–2009 , it suffered significant losses that forced large budget cuts, in particular temporarily halting construction on the Allston Science Complex. The endowment has since recovered. About $ 2 billion of investment income is annually distributed to fund operations. Harvard's ability to fund its degree and financial aid programs depends on

5974-456: The late 19th century, Harvard University's graduate schools began admitting women in small numbers. In 1900, Harvard became a founding member of the Association of American Universities . For the first few decades of the 20th century, the Harvard student body was predominantly "old-stock, high-status Protestants , especially Episcopalians , Congregationalists , and Presbyterians ," according to sociologist and author Jerome Karabel . Over

6077-468: The league in 1908. In celebration of President Eliot's 90th birthday, congratulations came in across the world and notably from two American Presidents. Woodrow Wilson said of him, “No man has ever made a deeper impression of the educational system of a country than President Eliot has upon the educational system of America,” while Theodore Roosevelt exclaimed, “He is the only man in the world I envy.” Upon his death in 1926, The New York Times published

6180-422: The legislature to the graduates of the college. This change was made in 1865, and at the same time the governor and other state officers ceased to form part of the board. The effect of this change was to greatly strengthen the interest of the alumni in the management of the university, and thus to prepare the way for extensive and thorough reforms. Shortly afterward Dr. Thomas Hill resigned the presidency, and after

6283-562: The longest term in the university's history, and was honored as Harvard's first president emeritus. He lived another 17 years, dying in Northeast Harbor, Maine , in 1926, and was interred in Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts . Under Eliot, Harvard became a worldwide university, accepting its students around America using standardized entrance examinations and hiring well-known scholars from home and abroad. Eliot

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6386-543: The main campus in Cambridge are the Law , Divinity (theology), Engineering and Applied Science , Design (architecture), Education , Kennedy (public policy), and Extension schools, and Harvard Radcliffe Institute in Radcliffe Yard. Harvard also has commercial real estate holdings in Cambridge. Harvard Business School , Harvard Innovation Labs , and many athletics facilities, including Harvard Stadium , are located on

6489-416: The morning prayer services and too small for the Sunday services. Following World War I , Harvard University President Abbott Lawrence Lowell (1909–1933) combined the idea of a war memorial with the need for a new chapel. Appleton Chapel was torn down after the 1931 Commencement. The University Architects Coolidge, Shepley, Bulfinch & Abbott , were enlisted to design the new building, and they planned

6592-424: The nation's growing plutocracy , making it the wealthiest private university in the world. Eliot's leadership made Harvard not only the pace-setter for other American schools, but a major figure in the reform of secondary school education. Both the elite boarding schools , most of them founded during his presidency, and the public high schools shaped their curricula to meet Harvard's demanding standards. Eliot

6695-437: The national industries for ten or twenty years. The Puritans thought they must have trained ministers for the Church and they supported Harvard College—when the American people are convinced that they require more competent chemists, engineers, artists, architects, than they now have, they will somehow establish the institutions to train them. In the meantime, freedom and the American spirit of enterprise will do much for us, as in

6798-443: The newly chartered Massachusetts Institute of Technology , about to offer its first classes in 1865. Others proposed abandoning the classical curriculum, in favor of more vocational offerings. Harvard was in the middle of this crisis. After three undistinguished short-term clerical Harvard presidencies in a ten-year period, Boston's business leaders, many of them Harvard alumni, were pressing for change — though with no clear idea of

6901-436: The normal four years, which were the last three years of Charles' presidency. After Ellen Derby Peabody died at the age of 33 of tuberculosis , Eliot married a second wife in 1877, Grace Mellen Hopkinson (1846–1924). This second marriage did not produce any children. Grace was a close relative of Frances Stone Hopkinson, wife of Samuel Atkins Eliot II, Charles's son. Eliot retired in 1909, having served 40 years as president,

7004-442: The offer, turned it down. One of his biographers speculated that he surely realized by this time that he had a strong taste for organizing and administration. This post would have given it scope. He must have felt, even if dimly, that if science interested him, it was not because he was first and last a lover of her laws and generalizations, not only because the clarity and precision of science was congenial, but because science answered

7107-452: The past .... While Eliot was in Europe, he was again presented with the opportunity to enter the world of active business. The Merrimack Mills , one of the largest textile mills in the United States, tendered him an invitation to become its superintendent. In spite of the urgings of his friends and the attractiveness of what for the time was the enormous salary of $ 5000 (plus a good house, rent free), Eliot, after giving considerable thought to

7210-476: The performance of its endowment; a poor performance in fiscal year 2016 forced a 4.4% cut in the number of graduate students funded by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences . Endowment income is critical, as only 22% of revenue is from students' tuition, fees, room, and board. Since the 1970s, several student-led campaigns have advocated divesting Harvard's endowment from controversial holdings, including investments in South Africa during apartheid , Sudan during

7313-432: The pressure. Harvard is a large, highly residential research university offering 50 undergraduate majors, 134 graduate degrees, and 32 professional degrees. During the 2018–2019 academic year, Harvard granted 1,665 baccalaureate degrees, 1,013 graduate degrees, and 5,695 professional degrees. Harvard College , the four-year, full-time undergraduate program, has a liberal arts and sciences focus. To graduate in

7416-559: The prophecy of a natural bent, and in the value of a discipline concentrated upon a single object, amounts to a national danger. Under Eliot's leadership, Harvard adopted an "elective system" which vastly expanded the range of courses offered and permitted undergraduates unrestricted choice in selecting their courses of study — with a view to enabling them to discover their "natural bents" and pursue them into specialized studies. A monumental expansion of Harvard's graduate and professional school and departments facilitated specialization, while at

7519-453: The questions of practical men and conferred knowledge and power upon those who would perform the labors of their generation. During nearly two years in Europe he had found himself as much fascinated by what he could learn concerning the methods by which science could be made to help industry as by what he discovered about the organization of institutions of learning. He was thinking much about what his own young country needed, and his hopes for

7622-521: The reform of Harvard's Lawrence Scientific School . But his real goal, appointment to the Rumford Professorship of Chemistry, eluded him. This was a particularly bitter blow because of a change in his family's economic circumstances—the financial failure of his father, Samuel Atkins Eliot , in the Panic of 1857 . Eliot had to face the fact that "he had nothing to look to but his teacher's salary and

7725-458: The same time making the university a center for advanced scientific and technological research. Accompanying this was a shift in pedagogy from recitations and lectures towards classes that put students' achievements to the test and, through a revised grading system, rigorously assessed individual performance. Eliot's reforms did not go without criticism. His own kinsman Samuel Eliot Morison in his tercentenary history of Harvard gave an opinion that

7828-539: The sciences, modern languages, history, or political economy — and only a handful had graduate or professional schools . As businessmen became increasingly reluctant to send their sons to schools whose curricula offered nothing useful — or to donate money for their support, some educational leaders began exploring ways of making higher education more attractive. Some backed the establishment of specialized schools of science and technology, like Harvard's Lawrence Scientific School , Yale's Sheffield Scientific School , and

7931-413: The seven-league boots of genius. What amount of knowledge and experience do we habitually demand of our lawgivers? What special training do we ordinarily think necessary for our diplomatists? — although in great emergencies the nation has known where to turn. Only after years of the bitterest experience did we come to believe the professional training of a soldier to be of value in war. This lack of faith in

8034-423: The surrounding Harvard Square neighborhood. The Yard houses several Harvard buildings, including four of the university's libraries, Houghton , Lamont , Pusey , and Widener . Also on Harvard Yard are Massachusetts Hall , built between 1718 and 1720 and the university's oldest still standing building, Memorial Church , and University Hall Harvard Yard and adjacent areas include the main academic buildings of

8137-455: The tenets of Puritanism. In 1650, the charter for Harvard Corporation , the college's governing body, was granted. From 1681 to 1701, Increase Mather , a Puritan clergyman, served as Harvard's sixth president . In 1708, John Leverett became Harvard's seventh president and the first president who was not also a clergyman. Harvard faculty and students largely supported the Patriot cause during

8240-494: The top universities in the world in each of these categories. Harvard students and alumni have also collectively won 10 Academy Awards and 110 Olympic medals , including 46 gold. Harvard was founded in 1636 during the colonial , pre- Revolutionary era by vote of the Great and General Court of Massachusetts Bay Colony , one of the original Thirteen Colonies of British America . Its first headmaster, Nathaniel Eaton , took office

8343-557: The traditional college, with its rigid curriculum and preoccupation with "virtue and piety," had become irrelevant to producing successful leaders for the industrial, urban nation of the late nineteenth century. Influenced by his observations of German universities, Eliot saw that conditions favored academic institutions dedicated to the secular achievements of the intellect, places that would nurture contemporary thinking on socially significant subjects and enable ambitious, talented men to demonstrate their abilities. The former objective required

8446-498: The undergraduate college became accessible to striving middle class students from public schools; many more Jews and Catholics were admitted, but still few Blacks, Hispanics, or Asians versus the representation of these groups in the general U.S. population. Over the second half of the 20th century, however, the university became incrementally more diverse. Between 1971 and 1999, Harvard controlled undergraduate admission, instruction, and housing for Radcliffe's women; in 1999, Radcliffe

8549-400: The university's freshman dormitories , writing that, "We owe to the colored man the same opportunities for education that we do to the white man, but we do not owe to him to force him and the white into social relations that are not, or may not be, mutually congenial." Between 1933 and 1953, Harvard University was led by James B. Conant , the university's 23rd president, who reinvigorated

8652-428: The university's creative scholarship in an effort to guarantee Harvard's preeminence among the nation and world's emerging research institutions. Conant viewed higher education as a vehicle of opportunity for the talented rather than an entitlement for the wealthy, and devised programs to identify, recruit, and support talented youth. In 1945, under Conant's leadership, an influential 268-page report, General Education in

8755-531: The university's first professor for these language programs. From 1869 to 1909, Charles William Eliot , Harvard University's 21st president, decreased the historically favored position of Christianity in the curriculum, opening it to student self-direction. Though Eliot was an influential figure in the secularization of U.S. higher education, he was motivated primarily by Transcendentalist and Unitarian convictions influenced by William Ellery Channing , Ralph Waldo Emerson , and others, rather than secularism. In

8858-500: The usual four years, undergraduates normally take four courses per semester. In most majors, an honors degree requires advanced coursework and a senior thesis. Though some introductory courses have large enrollments, the median class size is 12 students. The Faculty of Arts and Sciences , with an academic staff of 1,211 as of 2019, is the largest Harvard faculty, and has primary responsibility for instruction in Harvard College ,

8961-472: The war. The university has ten academic faculties and a faculty attached to Harvard Radcliffe Institute . The Faculty of Arts and Sciences offers study in a wide range of undergraduate and graduate academic disciplines , and other faculties offer graduate degrees, including professional degrees. Harvard has three campuses: the main campus, a 209-acre (85 ha) in Cambridge centered on Harvard Yard ; an adjoining campus immediately across Charles River in

9064-478: Was a key figure in the creation of standardized admissions examinations, as a founding member of the College Entrance Examination Board . As leader of the nation's wealthiest and best-known university, Eliot was necessarily a celebrated figure whose opinions were sought on a wide variety of matters, from tax policy (he offered the first coherent rationale for the charitable tax exemption ) to

9167-433: Was an American academic who was president of Harvard University from 1869 to 1909, the longest term of any Harvard president. A member of the prominent Eliot family of Boston , he transformed Harvard from a respected provincial college into America's preeminent research university . Theodore Roosevelt called him "the only man in the world I envy." Eliot was born a scion of the wealthy Eliot family of Boston . He

9270-400: Was an administrative reformer, reorganizing the university 's faculty into schools and departments and replacing recitations with lectures and seminars . During his forty-year presidency, the university vastly expanded its facilities, with laboratories, libraries, classrooms, and athletic facilities replacing simple colonial structures. Eliot attracted the support of major donors from among

9373-415: Was an articulate opponent of American imperialism . During his tenure as Harvard's president he denied women's demands to be allowed the same educational opportunities as men. In response to these demands he was quoted as saying "the world “(knows) next to nothing about the natural mental capacities of the female sex.”" Regardless of Eliot's opposition, women were able to find educational instruction through

9476-460: Was appointed interim president. In August 2024, the university announced that Garber would be appointed Harvard's 31st president through the end of the 2026–27 academic year. The 209-acre (85 ha) main campus of Harvard University is centered on Harvard Yard , colloquially known as "the Yard," in Cambridge, Massachusetts , about 3 miles (5 km) west-northwest of downtown Boston , and extending to

9579-516: Was called by some "the greatest labor union hater in the country." Charles Eliot was a fearless crusader not only for educational reform , but for many of the goals of the progressive movement —whose most prominent figurehead was Theodore Roosevelt (Class of 1880) and most eloquent spokesman was Herbert Croly (Class of 1889). Eliot was also involved in philanthropy. In 1908 he joined the General Education Board , and in 1913 served on

9682-698: Was dedicated on Armistice Day on November 11, 1932. The knight's face in The Sacrifice was modelled on the British World War I flying ace, Ian Henderson . Since then, other memorials have been established within the building commemorating those Harvardians who later died in World War II , the Korean War , and the Vietnam War . For seventy-five years, it has stood in Harvard Yard opposite Widener Library as

9785-423: Was embedded in the material world and consisted of measurable progress of the human spirit towards mastery of human intelligence over nature — the "moral and spiritual wilderness." While this mastery depended on each individual fully realizing his capacities, it was ultimately a collective achievement and the product of institutions which established the conditions both for individual and collective achievement. Like

9888-454: Was formally merged into Harvard University. On July 1, 2007, Drew Gilpin Faust , dean of Harvard Radcliffe Institute , was appointed Harvard's 28th and the university's first female president. On July 1, 2018, Faust retired and joined the board of Goldman Sachs , and Lawrence Bacow became Harvard's 29th president . In February 2023, approximately 6,000 Harvard workers attempted to organize

9991-542: Was founded by Princes or privileged classes—every Polytechnic School, which I have visited in France or Germany, has been supported in the main by Government. Now this is not our way of managing these matters of education, and we have not yet found any equivalent, but republican, method of producing the like results. In our generation I hardly expect to see the institutions founded which have produced such results in Europe, and after they are established they do not begin to tell upon

10094-490: Was home to religious life at Harvard until 1932. Its namesake is preserved inside Memorial Church, as the Appleton Chapel portion of the main building houses the daily service of Morning Prayer. When Appleton Chapel was built in 1858 thanks to the generosity of Samuel Appleton , Morning Prayer attendance was compulsory. When attendance became voluntary in 1886, the college was left with a building that had become too large for

10197-413: Was not merely curriculum, but the ultimate utility of education. A college education could enable a student to make intelligent choices, but should not attempt to provide specialized vocational or technical training. Although his methods were pragmatic, Eliot's ultimate goal, like those of the secularized Puritanism of the Boston elite, was a spiritual one. The spiritual desideratum was not otherworldly. It

10300-497: Was the daughter of Ephraim Peabody (1807-1856) and Mary Jane Derby (1807-1892), great-great-granddaughter of Elias Hasket Derby (1739-1799), and the sister of architect Robert Swain Peabody . They had four sons, one of whom, Charles Eliot (November 1, 1859 – March 25, 1897) became an important landscape architect , responsible for Boston's public park system. He married Mary Yale Pitkin, granddaughter of Rev. Cyrus Yale , members of

10403-521: Was the son of politician Samuel Atkins Eliot and his wife Mary (née Lyman), and was the grandchild of banker Samuel Eliot and merchant Theodore Lyman of the Lyman Estate . His grandfather was one of the wealthiest merchants of Boston. He was one of five siblings and the only boy. Eliot graduated from Boston Latin School in 1849 and from Harvard University in 1853. He was later made an honorary member of

10506-400: Was to present him with a course of study sufficiently representative so as "to reveal to him, or at least to his teachers and parents, his capacities and tastes." An informed choice once made, the individual might pursue whatever specialized branch of knowledge he found congenial. But Eliot's goal went well beyond Emersonian self-actualization for its own sake. Framed by the higher purposes of

10609-481: Was with the relation between education and economic growth: I have given special attention to the schools here provided for the education of young men for those arts and trades which require some knowledge of scientific principles and their applications, the schools which turn out master workmen, superintendents, and designers for the numerous French industries which demand taste, skill, and special technical instruction. Such schools we need at home. I can't but think that

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