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In the Winter 1999 edition of the Harvard-Radcliffe Parents Newsletter, Dean Harry Lewis addressed parents on the issue of choosing a concentration. Lewis's piece, "A Message from the Dean: On Concentrations," appears on the front cover of the newsletter with an inset photograph of the dean. Lewis, apparently with a concentration problem of his own, submitted the academic blunder which read as follows:

Going to college is about making choices, and at Harvard students have to make some hard ones...

Some students form joint concentrations between related fields, such as Computer Science and Mathematics. (This is a combination particularly appropriate for students interested, as I happen to be, in foundational or theoretical issues in computer science.) But joint concentrations are not meant as an escape hatch for students simply unable to make up their minds between unrelated alternatives. There are no joint concentrators in Astrology and Music, though there are Astrology concentrators who pursue their musical interests, both curricularly and extracurricularly, at a very high level.

...A decision to concentrate in Music rather than Astrology, when a student loves both subjects, is not a commitment to be a professional, nor a declaration of personal musicianship to the exclusion of other personalities.

astrology, n. 1. the study that assumes and attempts to interpret the influence of heavenly bodies on human affairs.

astronomy, n. 1. the science that deals with the material universe beyond the earth's atmosphere.