<p>The Crimson keeps beating that horse, but I haven’t, actually, heard somebody complain about it in person even once. We do have a sense of community; I’m not sure how having a student center would affect that. Would a student center be nice? Yes. I’d probably appreciate another place to study or hang out, even if I can’t imagine myself visiting more than rarely. Do I feel there isn’t community because I have to visit my friends in their actual houses, or have them visit me in mine, rather than meeting in some central other space? No, and I don’t understand why it’s supposed to make me feel that way. I feel like I’m missing something! It’s not a desire I understand or have even seen in other students, including the writers of the articles. I know one of them very well, and even when we’re discussing Harvard’s flaws, lack of social space isn’t one she ever mentions, so seeing her byline there was kind of surprising. Our entryways would be weak if they were our only alternative, but Annenberg serves as an effective social space for the whole freshman class, and then the upperclass Houses are pretty much identically structured to Yale’s colleges. Since everybody would agree that Yale has a strong sense of community [obligatory crack about how being surrounded by New Haven would form a strong sense of community among almost any group of people], and Yalies tout their colleges as one of their main sources of community, I don’t see that we’re lacking in non-student-center institutional structures.</p>
<p>I don’t think people talk about Harvard in relation to Columbia because it’s not something that leaps to my mind to respond to. We’re certainly much better than Columbia; the concerns the author raised there seem irrelevant here. In reading that article, none of his points hit home or seemed true of my own college experience. We aren’t legendarily close-knit, like, say, Dartmouth, but it would seem odd to pop up in that thread and be like “Harvard is also better than Columbia in this way I really have nothing more to say on that topic but yes we are definitely better.” I think that’s why the silence. I agree it’s still odd, but it’s the only explanation I can think of.</p>