In the Community

Harvard is launching a lecture and program series in the Boston and Cambridge public libraries. President Drew Faust will give the inaugural address of the new John Harvard Book Celebration on Jan. 10.

Twenty-five affordable apartments in Harvard Square’s Craigie Arms Apartments will remain affordable for at least 50 additional years after the city of Cambridge, Harvard University, and the nonprofit Homeowners Rehab Inc. (HRI) put together a creative plan to preserve the affordability of these units through HRI’s purchase of the 50-unit Craigie Arms building.

Harvard University is encouraging staff, faculty, and students to “shop local” this holiday season and support locally owned, small businesses near work and in their home communities.

The work of 100 Allston-Brighton children was on display during the eighth installment of the Harvard Allston Education Portal’s Student Showcase and Open House.

Harvard has joined forces with the Brighton-based nonprofit Cradles to Crayons (C2C) to collect coats and winter gear for distribution to local children in need this winter.

The 2011 campaign for Harvard Community Gifts is under way, with a blend of Harvard traditions and new opportunities.

A new art show at the Student Organization Center at Hilles (SOCH) Penthouse Gallery not only explores concepts of house and home, but homelessness as well.

Beginning Dec. 1 Phillips Brooks House will launch Harvard’s annual holiday gift drive — an effort to collect more than 1,500 gifts for children in Boston and Cambridge.

Harvard undergraduates from many faiths will gather at the Student Organization Center at Hilles on Nov. 20 to package meals for hungry Boston-area children. The interfaith community service event is part of the Values in Action program launched this fall by Harvard’s Humanist Chaplaincy.

In the Year Up program, high school graduates and GED recipients are provided with six months of training in professional skills and education, followed by six-month internships at their corporate partners, including Harvard.

Harvard-supported Library Park in Allston was renamed Raymond V. Mellone Park at a Nov. 5 event hosted by Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino.

A food packaging service project sponsored by the Harvard Interfaith Collaborative will be held on Nov. 20, from noon to 4 p.m. at the Student Organization Center at Hilles.

The Harvard Allston Education Portal’s Halloween “Treat and Greet” melded education with costumed fun.

The Boston Public Schools’ Greenwood Academy has shown major improvement in two years, aided by the HASI program and Step UP, the five-university initiative that provides resources for 10 underperforming Boston public schools.

Harvard Athletics issued almost 1,000 tickets to Allston and Cambridge residents for this year’s annual event on Saturday. Community Football Day gives local residents a chance to watch a game and enjoy a free lunch. Participants could also enter a raffle for gear, tickets, and gift certificates.

Dorothy Stoneman ’63 accepted the 2011 Robert Coles “Call of Service” award from the Phillips Brooks House Association Oct. 15 at the Memorial Church. The award recognized Stoneman’s achievements as the founder and chief executive officer of YouthBuild USA.

As the Boston Public Schools launched a new year of learning at back-to-school nights, the Harvard Achievement Support Initiative (HASI) helped by providing 11 local schools with 3,000 bags filled with homework enrichment materials.

The 8th annual Brian Honan 5K Run/Walk took place Sept. 25, complete with Harvard cheerleaders to boost the runners along.

Harvard’s Phillips Brooks House Association, which helps to run 11 free summer camps in Boston and Cambridge, received the National Summer Learning Association’s 2011 Excellence in Summer Learning Award.

Students from the Boston Collegiate Charter School reinterpreted the classic song “Summertime” from George Gershwin’s opera “Porgy and Bess” as part of a two-day workshop conducted by the A.R.T./MXAT Institute.

Cambridge-Harvard Summer Academy encourages students to design an offbeat, futuristic high school, applying geometry lessons in the process.

Boston’s new bike-sharing program, Hubway, launches today (July 28), and University officials, in collaboration with the city of Cambridge, are planning to bring the program to Harvard’s main campus, possibly as early as this fall.

Harvard and the city of Boston open Library Park, a 1.74-acre green space in Allston.

Harvard University and Boston’s Allston-Brighton Resource Center host a job fair to connect local residents with Stone Hearth Pizza’s hiring managers.

Undergraduates who are mentors at the Harvard Allston Ed Portal say that in the end they learned as much as the young students they helped.

The development of quality homes for the residents of the 40-year-old, 213-unit Charlesview Apartment complex at Barry’s Corner took a big step forward when city, state, and Harvard officials broke ground on a new building at Brighton Mills on May 16.

Four hundred eighth-grade students from the Cambridge public schools visited campus to discuss their science experiments with the Harvard community.

Eighty from Harvard lend helping hands to the Allston-Brighton community during Boston Shines, the citywide cleanup effort.

Jazz great Wynton Marsalis played with young musicians from Harvard and Cambridge Rindge & Latin School in a master class.

The Harvard Foundation recently sent more than 1,000 new wool blankets and other relief items to the victims of the catastrophic March earthquake and tsunami in Japan.