Harvard Undergraduate Council


The Harvard Undergraduate Council, Inc., colloquially known as "the UC," is the representative student government of Harvard College. The Council was established in 1982 by a vote of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences and student referendum. The Council is responsible for the administration of student services, campus-wide events, and student advocacy at Harvard. There are 51 undergraduate students at any given time serving on the Council: a president, vice president, 3 from each of the 12 residential houses and 4 freshman districts. Students from the Dudley Cooperative also have a representative on the Council. The UC also collaborates with the Harvard Graduate Council, the representative student government for the twelve graduate and professional schools of Harvard University.

History

In the year 1980, the Dean of Harvard College John B. Fox initiated a committee that was to be called the Committee to Review College Governance, chaired by John Dowling, who was a professor of biology at the College. This committee was tasked with the duty of determining the :wikt:strength|strengths and the of the present system of governance at the College and of considering any needed reforms that might improve the quality of college life at Harvard.
This committee's deliberations eventually led to the passage of legislation from the faculty, a bill which is created the Harvard-Radcliffe Undergraduate Council in 1982. The constitution of the Council was ratified by a student body referendum in the same year. The first Council had roughly 80 members, and these members would elect a chair and a vice-chair to oversee the Council. The Undergraduate Council funded undergraduate organizations with the proceeds of an opt-out fee collected from the tuition bill of each registered student, planned social events and services, and sent representatives to student-faculty committees. The Council today still carries out these duties and largely gets its revenue from the same original source of student tuition.
In 1995, the Undergraduate Council passed a number of internal reforms, the most notable of which was the creation of the roles President and Vice President, more closely modeling an actual government. In the year of 2002, in a symbolic gesture to honor the advancement of gender relations on campus since the integration of Harvard and Radcliffe Colleges, the Council voted to strike "Radcliffe" from its name to simply become the "Harvard Undergraduate Council".
In 2019, the Undergraduate Council passed a package of reforms that modified the structure of standing committees. The Council retains the roles of President and Vice President; in addition, there are Chairs and Vice Chairs of the expanded sub-committees, through which most of the work on the Council is done. The Council's standing committees include: the Academic Life Committee; the Finance Committee; the First-Year Class Committee; the Health, Safety, and Wellness Committee; the Social and Residential Life Committee; and the Rules Committee.
In Spring 2020, the Undergraduate Council underwent a drastic rebranding to reimagine its role at Harvard College. The refreshed brand utilizes elements from the Harvard College shield to represent its integration into the student body and uses the RGB color as reference to the year of Harvard College’s founding: 1636. This new visual and corporate identity is integral to the Council’s communications plan to interact and engage more with the student body.

Operations

Founded with the purpose of representing undergraduates at Harvard to the administration, faculty, and wider community, the Undergraduate Council is chiefly responsible for advocacy on behalf of students and funding student activities on campus. The Council operates with a budget that is primarily dispensed to student organizations, but it also funds social events and student initiatives. The vast majority of the UC's funding comes from the composite of opt-out fees collected from the tuition bill of each student. As the sole representative student government, the UC provides student services like most student unions and also performs advocacy on behalf of the student body.
Since administrators at the College typically see the Undergraduate Council as the representative of the student body, these administrators often consult with the Council for all student issues, and UC leaders have advocated for increased student input on higher-level administrative decisions. Student-faculty committees have been founded on a number of campus issues with the joint cooperation of the administration and the Undergraduate Council. The Undergraduate Council fields applications from the student body for places in these committees and makes its decisions based on relevant experiences and perceived passion for respective roles. Chairs and vice chairs of certain UC committees sometimes sit on the relevant student-faculty committees to engage with faculty, administrators, and other students. Current student-faculty committees and committees with student representatives include:
Education
Student Life and Student Advisement
Other
All of these committees meet during the school term only.
The UC also interfaces with its graduate counterpart, the Harvard Graduate Council.