Series of differences

Key controversies during the tenure of Harvard president Lawrence H. Summers, who was appointed in 2001.

2002

April 12 Princeton University announces that Harvard University professor Cornel West will leave Harvard for Princeton. Later, West said he left because of a disagreement with Summers, who wanted to review the professor's scholarly work every few months.

Sept. 17 Summers tells an audience that recent calls for Harvard, Tufts, Princeton, and other schools to divest from Israel are anti-Semitic.

2005

Jan. 14 Summers sparks an uproar when he gives a speech suggesting that innate differences may account for the lack of women in science and engineering at top universities and research institutions.

March 15 The Faculty of Arts and Sciences passes a vote of no confidence in Summers, 218 to 185.

July 14 Conrad K. Harper, one of the seven members of Harvard University's governing Corporation, resigns, saying that he objects to the Corporation's decision to give Summers a pay raise without setting performance goals.

Nov. 15 Seventeen department chairmen and seven former department chairmen send a letter to the university's governing board, complaining about Summers's leadership.

2006

Jan. 27 William C. Kirby, dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, announces that he is stepping down at the end of the academic year, and faculty members accuse Summers of pushing him out.

Feb. 7 Roughly a dozen professors, partly upset about Kirby's resignation, confront Summers at a faculty meeting, and several suggest that he step down or be fired.

Yesterday Summers announces he will resign from the presidency, effective June 30.

SOURCES: Boston Globe archives, news reports
Kathleen Hennrikus/Globe Staff