I was always going to attend Harvard College, or at least so I imagined.
Sitting in the back of my father’s 1993 Ford Explorer, I was four when I asked him, “What is college?” I had learned the word that day at my daycare in a conversation I overheard.
My dad responded, “It’s where you go to school after you finish high school.”
“What’s the best college?” I asked.
“Harvard.”
“I want to go to Harvard.”
And 13 years later, I was accepted.
Despite attributing my future success to my eventual attendance at Harvard, I knew next to nothing about the school. I envisioned an expanse of land peppered by ancient buildings. I fantasized about multi-disciplinary intellectualism in and outside of the classroom. My dad read me stories about famous friendships forged in Annenberg Hall, as well as stranger fictions about underground organizations and exclusive communities. As time inched toward my freshman year, I was thrilled at the prospect of experiencing Harvard, regardless of how it would turn out to be.
My father had been the first in his family to attend college, and although my mother had not, both my parents were intellectually gifted and fostered curiosity, creativity, and competition in our home. In many ways, I grew up richer in experiences than most people I know today.
But I had very little money—less than $100 to start my college career. Growing up, my family had not been wealthy. I remember using food stamps occasionally, saving up for the annual purchase of new clothes for the school year, and being a fortunate recipient of free prosthetic legs from the Shriners Hospital, but I never felt disadvantaged.
So when I heard about Dorm Crew, one of five pre-orientation program for incoming freshmen, it just made sense to do a program that allowed me to arrive on campus early and paid me for my labor. I would later find out that my reason for participating in Dorm Crew’s Fall Clean-Up was one among many. Some who joined Dorm Crew did so on the suggestion of other students who had done it; some already saw their time as their money; and some were inspired by the idea of becoming intimately familiar with the dorms. We all signed up to work 40 hours over five days, during which, together, we scrubbed toilets, dusted moldings, explored Harvard’s campus and Harvard Square, and developed a deep sense of solidarity with our 10-to-12-person person crews and captains. Thus, my introduction to Harvard was through the only student-run fee-for-service porter program in the nation.
Walking through the gates of Harvard Yard to sign in for Dorm Crew was my literal lifelong dream come true. That first week was one of acclimation and excitement. It introduced me to the people who would become my best friends throughout my Harvard career, connected me with upperclassmen who inspired us pre-frosh with advice about the academic and social scenes at Harvard—never expect to finish all the readings, take advantage of study breaks—and taught me an unprecedented lesson about the value of teamwork.
But while I rode the high of an exhilarating pre-orientation week—we finished cleaning Dunster with only minutes to spare—the first few days, and then weeks, and then months, and then years, of my time at Harvard were quite different than I expected.
I cannot recall when I first realized that I felt like I was on the periphery of the Harvard community, but it came swiftly. I could not afford to buy a laptop for college. I purchased only the books that I could not check out from the library. I did not have the same depth of knowledge or academic experience as many of my peers. I was not familiar with a lot of the foods served at study breaks or even in the dining hall. (Initially, I strongly preferred Marshmallow Mateys, the delicious but slightly less aesthetically pleasing Lucky Charms alternative, to the less familiar foods.) I wore my socioeconomic status on my sleeve, quite literally.
Outside the context of Harvard, these details seem for the most part meaningless. But within the context of the incredible institution and opportunity that is Harvard, I felt isolated, resentful, and entirely ill-equipped to navigate my education. These internal realizations were often exacerbated by my peers who, with no malicious intent, mocked my food preferences, my inability to understand social nuances with professors and advisers, my clothing, and even my speech. For most of my first two years, I was unable to participate in class or hold a conversation with faculty members because I felt wholly unqualified: I did not know how to “sound smart.” I became self-conscious about everything I identified with and preemptively feared the ways in which they might be used to label me. In an environment where I felt that I had won the figurative lottery, I simultaneously felt I had already lost it.
Yet in Dorm Crew I found solace.
After pre-orientation, my enthusiastic and encouraging Dorm Crew captain convinced me to clean bathrooms term-time, along with several of my crewmates. By the beginning of my second semester of freshman year, I had a nearly perfect work-hour average and a growing dedication to the organization. I found myself on track to apply for a captainship. The months of training and then the month-long trial period at the end of the school year, during which Dorm Crew cleans the dorms and prepares for the reunions and summer school, felt like the most directly important and impactful work of my first year at Harvard. I was given a great amount of responsibility and worked for myself, my fellow captains, and the thousands of people who would benefit from the work I did with my crews. The thrill of the trial period, and the pride I experienced in becoming a captain, solidified the meaningful part the organization would play throughout my time at Harvard.
Through Dorm Crew, I found a sense of solidarity and understanding, not because everyone came from the same walk of life—they most certainly did not—but because it was an organization and a group of people committed to hard work, excellence, and camaraderie. I never had a passion for cleaning, and I really hated dusting as a child, but Dorm Crew offered a level playing field for everyone who participated in it.
I had the pleasure of working with the most diverse group of students on campus during my roles with Dorm Crew: students who were on full financial aid, students who were not; students who had traveled the world, students who had never left their state; students who were great leaders, great academics, and even greater friends. Nowhere else on campus did I feel like I belonged in the way I felt when I was working with Dorm Crew. It was this sense of belonging in a diverse community that gave me the opportunity to embrace the variety of lived experiences of Harvard students, including my own.
On the surface, it is easy to assume this organization is for the disadvantaged, and a cursory glance at students cleaning other students’ dorms may encourage that misconception. But this is a narrow view of the work Dorm Crew does. It offers a unique community at Harvard, where everyone starts from scratch—you do not know how to truly clean a toilet until you learn from a Dorm Crew captain—and works for the benefit of the community at large. While it is best known for cleaning bathrooms during the term, it is also an essential component of the graduations, reunions, and move-in experiences of Harvard students. In some way or another, either as an employee or as a beneficiary, everyone on campus has benefited from Dorm Crew’s service. I am proud to have provided that service to my peers, and I am appreciative of having received it myself: only a Dorm Crew worker knows the effort required to clean the intricate moldings of centuries-old dorms, and to assemble the bizarre Commencement chair configurations. Over time, this aspect of Dorm Crew led to a sense of ownership of my Harvard experience and allowed me to contribute positively to that of others, which in turn made me feel like an integral part of the Harvard community.
In Dorm Crew, I found a sense of fellowship devoid of academic competition or unclear social conventions, because that was simply not part of the ethos. Yet it exposed me to a rich diversity of interests that inspired me to study abroad, change concentrations (twice), take time off from school, and move beyond my comfort zone. I was able to develop as a person because I felt comfortable being vulnerable, uncertain, and ignorant in this community—there was always room to grow within it. Dorm Crew challenged me to confront my discomforts at Harvard and look beyond my insecurities. I found a consistent sense of satisfaction and achievement that was not independent of academics, but complemented it, providing a sense of security and comfort in my identity that was crucial for academic and personal growth.
Now, as I near the two-year anniversary of graduation, I look back fondly on my tenure at Harvard. I can make even the oldest, grimiest toilet shine and can clean cracked, warped wood floors so well you could lick them. I can also write an award-winning thesis and speak several languages. I attribute all of these skills, in some way or another, to my experiences with Dorm Crew.
Dorm Crew made Harvard, and its astonishingly foreign culture not only palpable, but also approachable. It provided, from the first moment I arrived at Fall Clean-Up, a community that accepted me regardless of my background. Dorm Crew exists beyond the common identity markers, such as nationality and class. It transcends all that because the only thing that fundamentally matters is teamwork.
Ever-confident as a child, I had been certain I would be a future freshman of the College. Despite 13 years of near-constant anticipation, the overwhelming sense of possibility I felt when Harvard accepted me was world-altering. (So much so, actually, that I ran so fast down the stairs to tell someone that I shattered my prosthetic leg.) While my time at Harvard was occasionally challenging, Dorm Crew and its community made me comfortable with my socioeconomic identity—not because it is for people of a particular identity, but because through Dorm Crew I regained confidence in my social, leadership, and organizational skills, which then led to the confidence I needed to be comfortable with who I was. My deep pride and profound gratitude for Harvard and my experiences there are rooted in the person Dorm Crew helped me realize—a person with self-confidence, who is receptive to criticism, collaborative, and appreciative of a well-cleaned bathroom.
