(Reuters) – Climate activists who want Harvard University to divest fossil fuel assets from its $41 billion endowment have claimed three seats on an alumni board that helps set strategy for the school, according to results posted by the university on Friday.
The election for five open seats on the 30-member Harvard University Board of Overseers had pitted proponents of fossil fuel divestment against those who want to keep money and what they describe as special interests out of the contest.
Members of Harvard Forward, a campaign by recent graduates focused on climate change, elected to the board include professional soccer player Margaret “Midge” Purce, environmental scientist Jayson Toweh and civil rights attorney Thea Sebastian.
Usually nominees come from Harvard’s alumni association, which this year had put forward a slate of eight candidates. The HAA candidates claimed two seats.
Harvard did not provide details of how many votes each candidate received but said 43,531 ballots were cast in total.
Neither Harvard Forward nor the alumni association was immediately available for comment.
While the outcome will not directly determine investment decisions, it could send a symbolic message as many schools face calls to sell oil stocks. The Board of Overseers approves candidates to the Harvard Corporation, the body that can make divestment decisions.
Harvard’s upstart slate had prompted pushback from some alumni leaders. In an open letter they said the campaign had “copious funding” and threatened to have “special interests” control the Overseers.
“These are extraordinary times, posing extraordinary challenges, and the Board will do all we can to help Harvard navigate them as thoughtfully as possible, always with an overriding concern for the best interests of the University and how it can best serve the world,” Board of Overseers President R. Martin Chavez said in a statement on The Harvard Gazette website.
(Reporting by Nichola Groom and Ross Kerber; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)
