Originally published at The Crimson
To the editors:
Faculty of Arts and Sciences Dean Michael D. Smith has asked what qualities are necessary and desirable in the next Dean of Harvard College. I would encourage him to relax the constraint that the Dean be a tenured faculty member. For most of the modern era, the longest-serving and most effective deans were not tenured faculty: John U. Monro, Fred L. Glimp, Charles P. Whitlock, John B. Fox, Jr., L. Fred Jewett. When Harry R. Lewis ’68 was made dean in 1995, he was only the second tenured professor since 1947 to hold the post.