But the unofficial right to use it can cost thousands more in tuition. Which is why the rear windshield of many a car is fodder for sociological speculation. Few, it seems, are bashful about advertising. Naeemah White-Peppers, who graduated from Harvard in 1999, now works in its alumni office. She's confident that all of her college friends who have cars sport a sticker.
Current students seem more hesitant to don insignia.
Harvard sophomore Youming Zou was recently wearing a T-shirt with the famous maroon seal. It was a freebie from his involvement in an intramural league, he said, and not likely to be worn off campus. Then again, that's when he may well be driving around in his parents' decal-embossed car. If anything, students prefer clothing from other schools, says Allen Powell of Harvard's bookstore, The Coop. At Harvard, at least, they're tourists.