L. Fred Jewett

Note: Discussing the 1 November ROTC drill on the Harvard campus, Harvard College Dean L. Fred Jewett '57 said, "ROTC has a right to request campus space on an individual, time-to-time basis like any other activity."

This breakfast was dedicated to the honor of former Harvard College Dean L. Fred Jewett.

Note: Harvard College Dean L. Fred Jewett '57 said that ROTC did not have official extracurricular status on campus, but said that the College had made "special provisions" to allow military drills to take place periodically.

For L. Fred Jewett, A.B. '57, M.B.A. '60, dean of admissions and financial aid from 1972 to 1984 and dean of Harvard College from 1985 to 1995- From Byerly Hall to Harvard Yard, from admissions to athletics, from Massachusetts to Maine and back again, you continue to shape the journey of Harvard students from all walks of life as a wise counselor, advisor, and friend.

By the time I entered the applicant pool, the position had been renamed "dean of admissions and financial aids," and Dean L. Fred Jewett '57 was expressing concern about the low number of incoming students like me--ones from families with no college background. For my class of '88, that low number was 180--only 11 percent of the total. In his report for the academic year 1983-84 Jewett wrote, "[the] long-term downward trend...has concerned us for some time. The previous year, he had made the same observation, adding that "the number of applicants from blue collar or other low income family backgrounds continued to decline. Apparently there had been little remediation of a situation that had existed at least since 1974, when Jewett commented, "Clearly the image of Harvard as an expensive university--out of normal reach for the average or poor family--is having an effect on our applicant pool...Unless we can take corrective actions the increasing economic stratification of our applicant pool will inevitably affect over-all class quality as well as the goals of diversity."

Although L. Fred Jewett '57, Lewis' predecessor as dean, had announced the new practice of randomizing placements in the housing lottery, Lewis had strongly endorsed the proposal in a report before he became dean and drew the wrath of students who in the past had been able to apply for acceptance into Houses.
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"I think everybody here really has sad feelings about Dean Lewis," Jewett says.
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"Dean Lewis looked to be the perfect person to take the new position because he understood both ends," Jewett says of the new deanship.