Fifty alumni and guests gathered at One15 Marina in Sentosa Cove for an evening that ranged freely across Southeast Asia, climate, economics, and the state of the American university.
Michael Puett, Director of the Harvard Asia Center, opened with the case for Harvard’s new Southeast Asia Initiative—an ambitious effort to build serious academic infrastructure around a region that deserves it. His message was unambiguous: this work needs alumni who care about Southeast Asia to stand behind it.
Jay Rosengard, Adjunct Lecturer in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, examined current American economic policy and what it means for Singapore and its neighbours. The discussion that followed was lively. One alumnus raised a question that resonated around the room: had universities lost something important when students could no longer walk into a classroom uncertain of their professor’s politics?
James Stock picked up that thread. Speaking about Harvard’s climate and sustainability research, Stock acknowledged the concern directly, referencing Harvard’s own work on open inquiry and its commitment to classrooms where students of every persuasion feel genuinely free to think and speak. His call to support Harvard’s research was inseparable from that conviction—that Harvard’s value lies in remaining a place where difficult questions get examined on their merits.