Harvard Crimson Has 800 Editors. Literally.
Uproar at conservative education blog Phi Beta Cons (part of the National Review Online) over the revelation that the Harvard Crimson has literally hundreds of editors. 800 last year, to be exact -- that's one in every eight undergrads. Beta-Con Travis Kavulla, Harvard '06 and former Crimson editor (the real kind) explains,
The designation was meant to convey voting membership in the editorial board, rather than the term's more current meaning of supervisory control. ... The real credential to look for, should you encounter an "editor," is not whether the person is merely a "Crimson editor"-which means he's completed a semester-long "comp" (a training regime which used to stand for "competition" and now stands merely for "competence": no joke) and has a full by-line and a vote in editorial-board meetings.
Fellow Beta-Con and Harvard Law grad David French suspects resume padding:
I myself used to hold the title of "editor" of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, a proudly conservative publication. When I was in school (1991-1994), everyone who helped edit articles was called an "editor," and we were explicitly told that the journal's leadership gave us that title to "make our resumes look better."
French ties the herd-of-editors tactic to the downfall of meritocracy, or maybe the annoying availability health care for co-eds (would Mr. French prefer it to be less available?). We just want to know how many editors signed off on this, and whether they received promotions for it. --MAUREEN O'CONNOR
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August 24th, 2007 at 12:54 am
That’s a real stupid thing to make a fuss about.
August 24th, 2007 at 1:25 am
good point Sam, especially considering that 100% of Ivygate is a staff editor, summer editor, or guest editor. A bit pretentious Ivygate?? aren’t you guys all just bloggers anyway?
August 24th, 2007 at 2:05 am
hey man, you should’ve seen the first draft of this post!
August 24th, 2007 at 5:03 am
good point, a blog staffed by a few people and a newspaper with 800 editors are totally comparable
August 24th, 2007 at 8:32 am
Another classic case of Harvard inflation.
August 24th, 2007 at 8:38 am
If you pull back the curtain on Harvard College, you will notice a few other examples of “status inflation”:
1) Grade inflation (ok, no surprise). In any event, the hardest part about Harvard is getting in.
2) The “thesis”. This is a complete joke. One can exploit this process by simply completing some busy work to get their rubber stamp.
3) Graduation with honors. During the 90s, the percentage of students graduating with some type of “honors” reached 50%. (Maybe more now.)
My sources are experience and observation.
August 24th, 2007 at 4:53 pm
Re Piling on #3:
Harvard honors degrees were capped beginning in 2005. Summa
August 24th, 2007 at 4:57 pm
Trying again: the “less than” sign is not allowed. Haxors, take note.
Harvard honors degrees were capped beginning in 2005. No more than 5% of the class could receive summa. Less than 20% could receive summa or magna. Less than 50% summa, magna, or cum.
August 24th, 2007 at 5:03 pm
I think Dartmouth’s cap for those is the top third or maybe 35%. Is that right, guys?
August 25th, 2007 at 2:50 am
The thesis is a complete joke? What the hell are you talking about? Do you actually go to Harvard, and if so, are you serious?
August 25th, 2007 at 8:09 am
At Dartmouth, summa is top 5%, magna is top 15%, and regular cum laude is top 35%. It’s entirely related to your GPA. “The lowest averages for these three groups of graduates in the three academic years 2003-2004 through 2005-2006 were, in descending order, 3.86, 3.74, and 3.56.” http://www.dartmouth.edu/~reg/regulations/undergrad/honors.html
August 25th, 2007 at 11:12 am
Putting Dartmouth GPAs aside, which this entry wasn’t about and, more generally, no one cares about, I think the Crimson editor population is a pretty good thing to fuss about. It’s pretty outrageous that the Crimson would allow 800 people to put Crimson Editor on their resumes. Whatever the history, it doesn’t fit the modern, socially understood meaning of the word and is at this point totally disingenuous. Readers are being mislead, and employers don’t know or understand the tradition. Furthermore, even having 40 “executive” editors is way, way over the top. The Crimson might be a daily paper, but I challenge anyone to find a daily paper with a circulation of around 20,000 that has even 20 top editors, let alone 40.