An update on Harvard’s diversity and inclusion efforts
Last March, outgoing Harvard President Drew Faust appointed John Silvanus Wilson Jr. as senior adviser and strategist to the president, charged with overseeing implementation of the recommendations of the Presidential Task Force on Inclusion and Belonging. Faust accepted the task force report and outlined recommendations that she felt would move Harvard from being a place peopled by a diverse student body to one where students, faculty, staff, and other members of the Harvard community from various backgrounds feel truly at home, and able to work, grow, and explore opportunity while flourishing. The Gazette recently talked with Wilson, the former president of Morehouse College, former head of the White House Initiative on Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and former administrator at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Wilson, who holds three Harvard degrees and took leave from the Board of Overseers to assume this role, discussed progress in implementing the task force recommendations and...