Effort estimated to save $20 million per year, rollout to begin this month
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Edgerley Family Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Hopi Hoekstra used the first Meeting of the Faculty of the 2026–27 academic year to reflect on the Workforce Planning effort and to discuss the rollout of the new administrative structure it yielded.
As she did in her Oct. 5 message to the FAS community, Hoekstra cast her vision of the FAS’ path to long-term stability through her evolutionary biologist lens, saying there has long been debate in her field about whether populations can evolve to become better able to adapt to future environmental change. While evolution happens without foresight, she said, institutions can — and should — anticipate change.
“Can institutions — even those like ours, long known for its stability — become nimble and agile enough to thrive in the present and excel into the future?” Hoekstra said. “This answer matters enormously, not only for universities but for what we give to the nation, to chart a better future through discovery, to sustain our global competitiveness, and to strengthen our democracy.”
She noted the dramatic changes that have shaken the foundation of higher education during the last two decades, and the last few years especially — the global financial crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, the upheaval around federal funding, and the rapid rise of AI. Just this week, the Trump administration returned to court seeking to overturn the judicial ruling that restored federal research funding, and the Justice Department signaled a renewed effort to bar international students from entering the United States to study at Harvard.
“The landscape has shifted and continues to shift dramatically,” Hoekstra said.
Though Workforce Planning was launched for multiple reasons — including addressing a structural deficit and making the FAS better able to respond to the volatility in federal funding — Hoekstra said the new administrative model is, most of all, about creating a more effective structure and governance for FAS staffing.
“Strong feedback mechanisms and clear measures of performance will allow us to identify problems earlier, simplify cumbersome processes, and reduce unnecessary bureaucracy,” she said, acknowledging that it will take time for these changes to become evident, as the model gets implemented this fall. “We will keep working at it until we get it right, responding to feedback to continually improve, quickly and effectively.”
The model dominated discussion during the faculty question period and re-emerged during the docketed portion of the meeting, when Hoekstra and Dean of Administration and Finance Warren Petrofsky shared more details on navigating the mid-October launch of the new model, including setting up new governance structures and feedback mechanisms.
Faculty asked tough questions about what they perceived to be the rushed speed of the rollout and raised concerns about the loss of institutional memory among staff who were laid off or moved into redefined roles, the cost of working with external consultants who advised on restructuring, and the state of morale in the administrative ranks.
Hoekstra estimated that the new structure would reduce annual personnel costs by about $20 million per year, though administrators will have more complete figures available during the November Meeting of the Faculty when they will discuss FAS finances. Hoekstra and Petrofsky said the higher-ed specialists provided valuable data and insight on what has and has not worked at peer institutions.
“We wanted a model that was sustainable over time,” she said. “We wanted a model that broke down silos.”
Also on the docket, Jill Hooley, John Lindsley Professor of Psychology in Memory of William James, was unanimously confirmed as parliamentarian for the 2026–27 academic year. Professor Naomi A. Weiss from the Department of the Classics brought a motion from the department to change the name to the Department of Classics, noting amid laughter that she was happy to leaven the charged discussion of the administrative model with some “light relief.”
“It must seem comical, even ludicrous, to remove the definite article from our department’s name,” said Weiss, noting that the department has been called the Department of Classical Philology, the Department of Classics, and the Department of the Classics, with the last as the official title since 1900. The definite article is an “elitist archaism” framing the works of Greco-Roman antiquity as more important than those of other cultures and histories around the globe, Weiss said.
“Our department has long been ridiculed for keeping the the,” she said. Faculty will vote on the motion at the November meeting.
Earlier in the meeting, Hoekstra addressed the sexual assault situation at Cornell University that has sparked widespread outrage and discussion. “What has been described is horrific and really difficult to comprehend,” Hoekstra said. “It has also brought renewed attention to something I know from experience: In an academic community, feeling safe is essential to being able to participate fully in the academic mission.”
She said faculty have a responsibility to foster a culture of dignity and respect. “This work is urgent, and it’s never done,” Hoekstra said. “But the situation unfolding now is a tragic reminder of the responsibility that we all share — to keep working every day to make this the institution that our community deserves.”
During the Memorial Minutes, Professor William Mills Todd III, Harvard College Professor and Harry Tuchman Levin Professor of Literature and Professor of Comparative Literature Emeritus, presented on the life service of John E. Malmstad, Samuel Hazzard Cross Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures Emeritus, who died in February, and Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., Alphonse Fletcher University Professor, presented on the life and service of Marcyliena H. Morgan, Ernest E. Monrad Professor of the Social Sciences Emerita, who died in September 2025.
Le Xie, Gordon McKay Professor of Electrical Engineering, ended the meeting with a Research Minute presentation (“The Electric Grid: Enabling Climate Action and AI Growth”) on how artificial intelligence can be used to help manage the power grid even while taxing it.
In her introduction of Xie’s work, Hoesktra noted that it “sits at the intersection of energy systems, data science, and artificial intelligence, with a particular focus on how we build a power grid that is cleaner, more resilient, and capable of meeting growing demands for electricity. Increasingly, that includes a fascinating two-way question: How can AI help us manage the power grid — and what will the growing use of AI demand from the grid?”
When Hoon Lee ’94 received the script for the role of Lee in Zoe Kazan’s Netflix adaptation of “East of Eden,” he was prepared to be skeptical. Decades in the industry had left the Massachusetts-born actor wary of roles that perpetuate Asian stereotypes.
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