Word: impact
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...development approach. We lobbied Harvard to allow our class to set up an alternate gift, in Harvard’s honor, which would build the institutional capacity of a university in sub-Saharan Africa with which Harvard already has academic collaborations. In view of the devastating impact of AIDS on African academics and the dilapidated state of their institutions, we felt that a class donation there could make a significant and tangible difference...
...green banners of sustainability have inspired action around campus, from rallies to individual students watching their energy consumption. Small scale efforts are a good start, but Harvard can make a greater impact by using some of its endowment to actively contribute to efforts to mitigate climate change...
...built on youthful enthusiasm and the desire for real change in the world, any plan to use Harvard’s endowment for environmental initiatives must be tempered with a dose of reality and understanding. For example, Martin L. Weitzman, a professor in the economics department, argues that the impact of Harvard’s endowment on the alternative energy field would be relatively small and limited to its symbolic significance. Instead, Dr. Weitzman favors large, sweeping public policy changes, such as a stiff tax on carbon emissions, in order to check the emission of harmful greenhouse gasses...
Admittedly, the real impact of these initiatives would be relatively small. Harvard may have billions of dollars to work with, but that sum is a drop in the bucket when one considers the size of the American economy. We should not, however, be overwhelmed simply because the task of lowering carbon emissions is so large. Investing some of the endowment in new initiatives or in establishing Harvard as a carbon-tax test scenario obviously won’t solve the problem alone. But just because these efforts have no guarantee of concrete success does not mean they are not worthy...
...Richard J. Goldstone, followed by a panel discussion yesterday evening. The event, “The Genocide Convention at 60 Years: New Challenges or the Same Ones?” analyzed legal and humanitarian effects of the post-World War II convention—“its impact, its meaning, its relevance for the next 60 years,” said panel moderator Jennifer Leaning, a Harvard Medical School and School of Public Health professor. “Genocide was appropriately called by Winston Churchill the crime of crimes,” Goldstone said. He said that, partly because...