Feminism without perfection
Harvard Business School (HBS) students gathered Tuesday to kick off a yearlong celebration of the 50th anniversary of the School’s first class of female M.B.A.s. After all, there was much to applaud. Women have gone from claiming just eight spots in that initial cohort to being 40 percent of the M.B.A. program. But as the evening’s keynote speaker reminded the largely female group, women at the top of the ladder still face hurdles — including their impossible demands on themselves. “We inherited a set of expectations that, at the moment, are actually dooming us to failure,” said Debora Spar, president of Barnard College, in a wide-ranging, lively talk on modern feminism. The event, sponsored by HBS’s Women’s Student Association and open to the HBS community, was the first in a yearlong speaker series that will include a talk Thursday evening by Anne-Marie Slaughter, a Princeton professor who recently wrote “Why Women Still Can’t Have...