Summers to step down as Harvard President
(AP)
Updated: 2006-02-22 09:17

Lawrence H. Summers ended his tumultuous stint as Harvard University president Tuesday, choosing to resign June 30 rather than fight with a faculty angered by his management style and comments that innate ability may explain why few women reach top science posts.

Harvard University President Lawrence Summers pauses before answering questions at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in this Jan. 25, 2006, file photo. Summers has announced that he will resign as president of Harvard University at the end of the 2005-06 academic year, the school announced on its Web site Tuesday. [AP]

"I have reluctantly concluded that the rifts between me and segments of the Arts and Sciences faculty make it infeasible for me to advance the agenda of renewal that I see as crucial to Harvard's future," Summers wrote in a letter posted on the school's Web site.

"This is a day of mixed emotions for me," he added in a conference call with reporters.

Effective at the end of the academic year, Summers' move brings to a close the briefest tenure of any Harvard president since 1862, when Cornelius Felton died after two years in office. Summers has led America's wealthiest university, with an endowment of more than $25 billion, since 2001.

He became embroiled in several controversies early in his tenure, among them the departure of prominent black studies professors such as Cornel West — who left after a falling out with the university president.

Last year's comments to an academic conference on women in science grew into a broader debate of Summers' management style, which some considered brusque and even bullying. He also was also criticized by some for his handling of plans to expand Harvard's campus across the Charles River in Boston.

The discontent prompted a 218-185 no confidence vote from Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences last March — the only known instance of such an action in the 370-year history of the university. Faculty votes are symbolic because the seven-member Harvard Corporation has sole authority to fire the university's president.

Another no confidence vote was scheduled for next Tuesday. It was called following the resignation of Faculty of Arts and Sciences Dean William Kirby: Some faculty believe he was pushed out by Summers, though Kirby has said the decision was mutual.

On Tuesday, Kirby issued a statement saying Summers had accomplished a great deal during his tenure, and "he has set in motion important initiatives for the university's future."

Derek Bok, Harvard's president from 1971 to 1991, will serve as interim president of the University from July 1 until the conclusion of the search for a new president.

Board members said in a letter posted online that the past year has been difficult and "sometimes wrenching," but they look back on Summers' tenure with appreciation.

"Larry Summers has served Harvard with extraordinary vision and vitality," the members said.

Summers, a former U.S. Treasury secretary in the Clinton Administration, was a prominent economist when he became Harvard's 27th president after Neil L. Rudenstine announced his resignation in May 2001 after nearly a decade in office.

A former professor of economics at Harvard, Summers said he'll return to teaching at the school after a year sabbatical.

"These last years have not been without their strains and moments of rancor," the 51-year-old Summers acknowledged in his letter on the school Web site.

Judith Ryan, the professor of German and comparative literature who introduced the latest no-confidence resolution, said Summers' resignation was appropriate under the circumstances.

"I'm certainly glad we're not going to have to have that faculty meeting on Feb. 28th, which would have been agonizing for both sides," she said.

On campus Tuesday, about 80 students gathered outside Summers' office intermittently chanting, "Stay, Summers, Stay" and "Five more years."

"I don't think it's the worst tragedy to happen to Harvard, but it's a shame," said Jonathan Blazek, 21. "He's done a lot for this university."

Summers eventually emerged from his office to address the students.

"This is a bittersweet day," he said.