Speaking in his office down the hall from Pfister’s, Dean of Student Life Stephen Lassonde says that he recalls a tense atmosphere among College staff when he arrived on campus last spring to begin his position as head of the Office of Student Life.
“Everyone was in reaction mode all the time, being constantly bombarded by one controversy after another,” Lassonde says. “That’s a difficult environment to operate in. You don’t feel like you can ever make progress and address student needs and think about and anticipate what those should be.”
But Lassonde says that Pfister was largely successful in maintaining the stability of the College staff coming off a year when administrative cohesion was hard to find. In particular, he says that the “really necessary trust” between the resident deans, who were at the center of the email search scandal, and central College administrators has been restored over the course of Pfister’s tenure, with increased dialogue between the groups and the completion of an FAS review of the resident dean position that reaffirmed the resident deanship’s role in the College.
Pfister says that one of the priorities he set for his year-long tenure was to “build, help, and enhance the College staff,” a task he believes was accomplished by making sure his “door was open” to colleagues and ensuring that they felt their voice was heard in the office.
Russ Porter, the College’s interim dean for administration, praised in an email statement Pfister’s efforts to “strengthen the entire community.”
“Much has been written already this year about his special charm and way with the students, but I want to add that he has that very same impact on the staff here at the College,” Porter wrote.
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Adams House resident dean Sharon L. Howell, who was a vocal critic of the handling of the email search scandal, praises the connections she sees Pfister having made among students and administrators.
“It’s been clear that he values resident deans,” Howell says. “This is a moment and has been a moment of transition in a lot of ways, and [Pfister] has been an ideal person to have at the helm in a transitional moment like this because he is calm, and careful, and listens to all of the constituencies.”
Though Pfister says that he did not make specific efforts to reach out to faculty members during his time as dean, members of the Harvard community say that Pfister’s presence itself was restorative for the group.
Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations professor Ali S. Asani ’77 explains that the real rift between faculty members and administrators existed with the FAS Dean’s Office, not that of the College Dean.
“Because he is a respected faculty member who has been at Harvard for a long time, and people know him and he’s been a House master, appointing someone like him actually was seen as a good sign. Okay, here’s somebody that we can trust,” Asani says.
‘PAR FOR THE COURSE’
Despite Pfister’s strides to improve perceptions toward the dean of the College position, students, faculty, and administrators say that they recognize that Pfister’s tenure was a year of pause in policy, one where initiating long-term projects and reforms took a backseat to providing a smooth transitional administration while Smith searched for the next dean of the College.
Pfister facilitated the decision to expand gender neutral housing and saw through the conclusion of the resident dean review, but, when he departs University Hall this summer, he will leave his successor complicated and unsolved questions regarding academic integrity and vacancies among the College staff.
