Word: uc
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
What’s at issue here is more than the UC’s inefficiency; the council’s funding policy is incoherent and inconsistent. The status quo leaves student leaders and UC members alike irritated and confused, and leaves events unfunded for apparently arbitrary reasons. The most basic issue has to do with the content of the UC’s non-discrimination provision itself. Article I, Section 4 of the UC Constitution reads: “The Council shall not discriminate, and shall discourage discrimination on the basis of ancestry, nationality, creed, philosophy, economic disadvantage, physical...
...basis of this restriction, the UC has occasionally denied funding to officially recognized Harvard student organizations, most notably the Asian American Christian Fellowship (AACF), which requires its officers to be Christians, and single-sex a cappella singing groups, which require their members to be of a particular sex. Even though these organizations have passed muster with University Hall’s Committee on College Life (CCL), which vets student groups for official College recognition, the UC has sometimes insisted that they not be funded because of the discrimination written into their constitutions...
This situation is untenable since the UC has not stuck to its regulations in the past. Last November, for example, the UC suspended its bylaws to fund an AACF study break. Three months later, it made the opposite decision in considering another AACF application. Why the inconsistency? I don’t have the answer, and I don’t think the UC’s leaders do, either. But while no one wants to see the status quo survive, the UC has proven itself unable to decide how to fix the problem...
...option is for the UC to obstinately redouble its opposition to funding groups that discriminate in their constitutions on any of the bases proscribed in the UC constitution. This position would have the UC eliminate the loopholes that have allowed it to fund events put on by “discriminatory” groups in the past, without regard to the nature of the events themselves...
This isn’t viable because it ignores the actual impact that UC funding has on student life. The wording of an organization’s constitution is surely secondary to the nature, audience, and impact of the events it puts on, and if the entire campus stands to benefit from an AACF event, the UC should fund it. Supporters of this option respond that money is fungible and that funding an individual event frees up an organization’s resources for other, more exclusive, and more sinister activities. Fine. But frankly, if UC support would make...