CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Feb. 16 (UPI) -- Harvard President Lawrence Summers is facing an uprising from the Massachusetts' university faculty that could lead to a vote of no confidence.
Summers was the target of pointed criticism Tuesday at a faculty meeting, the upshot of which was to set another meeting for next week to discuss "the widening crisis of confidence" in the Summers' leadership, Professor of Comparative Religions and Indian Studies Diana Eck told the Harvard Crimson.
The Crimson said Summers sat subdued throughout Tuesday's 90-minute session before more than 250 members of the faculty. "This has been a searing afternoon for me," Summers said at the end of the meeting.
This week's session stemmed from Jan. 14 comments by Summers in which he suggested "innate difference" was a possible explanation for the lack of female scientists at top universities, the Crimson reported. Summers apologized for the comments again Tuesday.
But faculty members cited other instances in which Summers' leadership was called into question.
The faculty could cast a vote of no confidence in Summers, but only the seven-member governing board can remove his from his position.
