There was something conspicuously absent from Harvard Kennedy School’s (HKS) annual summer picnic last week (July 9): garbage. The “zero waste” event was one of the first of its kind held at Harvard and was organized by the HKS Green Team, a group of staff dedicated to the pursuit of campus sustainability.
The Harvard Allston Education Portal, a new resource center designed to be a bridge between North Allston/North Brighton residents and Harvard teaching and learning, opened its doors last week (July 14) with mentoring for area children and a science movie night for families.
Rolling thunderstorms dumped rain on Harvard Yard, but that didn’t dampen the spirits of the student leaders and campers who gathered at the Phillips Brooks House Association (PBHA) on Wednesday (July 23) for a barbeque that had one very special guest.
Jay M. Harris, a longtime member of the Harvard faculty who has also served in a variety of administrative roles at the University, has been named Harvard College’s new dean of undergraduate education. His appointment, by Harvard College Dean Evelynn M. Hammonds, was effective July 1.
Bill Purcell, the former mayor of Nashville, Tenn., has been named director of the Institute of Politics (IOP) at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS). Purcell will assume the post Sept. 1. Purcell has spent more than 30 years in public service, law, and higher education. During his eight-year tenure as mayor of Nashville (1999-2007), the city saw unprecedented economic expansion, an increase in Metro school funding of more than 50 percent, and the development of more than 26,000 affordable housing units. His accomplishments as a civic leader earned him “Public Official of the Year” honors in 2006 by Governing Magazine. Purcell was an IOP Fellow in fall 2007.
David C. Parkes, a leader in research at the nexus of computer science and economics, has been appointed Gordon McKay Professor of Computer Science in Harvard University’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), The appointment was effective July 1.
Mark D. Jordan has been appointed the first Richard Reinhold Niebuhr Professor of Divinity at Harvard Divinity School. He will take up the new post in January 2009. Jordan has been Emory University’s Asa Griggs Candler Professor since 1999.
Donald Fleming, an intellectual historian who studied the impact of science on American thought and was a member of the Harvard faculty for more than 40 years, passed away at his Cambridge home on June 16. He was 84.
Christine Heenan, former director of community and government relations at Brown University and founder and president of the Clarendon Group, a communications and government relations consulting firm, has been appointed vice president for government, community and public affairs at Harvard University, President Drew Faust announced today (July 15).
In a succession of brief ceremonies outside Lowell House this week (July 8), Harvard University officially returned to authorities of the Russian Orthodox Church the last of a set of monastery bells saved from a Stalinist-era scrap heap.
Katherine Bogdanovich Loker, a major Harvard benefactor and one of the nation’s most active and generous supporters of higher education, died June 26 in Oceanside, Calif. She had suffered a massive stroke earlier in the week.
Harvard University today (July 8) released the report of its Greenhouse Gas Task Force. The task force, appointed by President Drew Faust in February, proposes elements of a framework for much-intensified efforts to reduce the University’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, as part of a broader effort to promote environmental sustainability.
Edward C. Forst, global head of the Investment Management Division for Goldman, Sachs & Co. and a member of the firm’s Management Committee, will become Harvard University’s first executive vice president, effective September 1, Harvard President Drew Faust announced today.
Judith D. Singer, the James Bryant Conant Professor of Education and former academic dean at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE), has been named senior vice provost for Faculty Development and Diversity at Harvard University, Provost Steven E. Hyman announced today.
Lori E. Gross, director of arts initiatives and adviser to the associate provost at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), has been named associate provost for arts and culture at Harvard University, Provost Steven E. Hyman announced today.
At a Meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences on April 8, 2008, the Minute honoring the life and service of the late Richard Abel Musgrave, Harold Hitchings Burbank Professor of Political Economy, Emeritus, was placed upon the records. Musgrave was the leading public finance economist of his generation.
At a Meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences on May 20, 2008, the Minute honoring the life and service of the late Ernst Mayr, Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology, Emeritus, was placed upon the records. Mayr helped lay the foundations of contemporary evolutionary biology.
At a Meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences on May 6, 2008, the Minute honoring the life and service of the late Herbert Bloch, Pope Professor of the Latin Language and Literature, Emeritus, was place upon the records. Bloch did pioneering work on Greek and Roman historians.
The Ash Institute for Democratic Governance and Innovation at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) recently announced the 15 finalists for the 2008 Innovations in American Government Awards competition. These programs are models of government excellence, representing innovative programming from the local, county, city, tribal, state, and federal levels. The finalists were selected from an initial pool of nearly 1,000 applicants. Winners of the 2008 Innovations Award will be announced in September with each of the six winners receiving $100,000 toward the replication and dissemination of its innovation.
The Ash Institute for Democratic Governance and Innovation at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) recently announced its faculty and student summer grant recipients for the 2008 academic year. The institute will fund four summer 2008 independent student research grants, two student Ash Summer Fellowships in Innovation, and five faculty research grants. Such grants are part of the institute’s efforts to enhance its studies of democracy and innovation by harnessing the talent and experience of the HKS community.
At a Meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences on May 20, 2008, the Minute honoring the life and service of the late David Roy Shackleton Bailey, Pope Professor of Latin Language and Literature, Emeritus, was placed upon the records. Shackleton Bailey was one of the greatest twentieth-century scholars of Latin textual criticism.
The Institute of Politics (IOP), located at Harvard Kennedy School, Monday (June 9) announced the selection of 42 undergraduate students, chosen from a pool of 275 candidates, for paid summer political internships.
The Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business & Government (M-RCBG) at the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) has named Michael Sperling ’08 the winner of the 2008 John T. Dunlop Prize in Business and Government.
A dozen talented graduate students from Boston University, Harvard, MIT, Northeastern, Suffolk, and Tufts have been awarded a prestigious fellowship that will allow them to spend the summer helping area public officials address a variety of key issues. The students, who were selected from nearly 100 applicants, will be working as Rappaport Public Policy Fellows in such venues as the office of Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, the Boston Redevelopment Authority, the state’s Department of Housing and Community Development, MassHousing, Somerville’s Office of Strategic Planning and Community Development, and the U.S. EPA’s Region I office in Boston.
Departments at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) are changing their names to reflect the increasingly international aspect of public health in the 21st century.
Five exceptional advisers are the winners of this year’s John Marquand Award, which recognizes excellence and dedication in the mentoring and guidance of Harvard undergraduates.
Educational testing is a fundamental part of the educational system in the United States, but many argue that far too much emphasis is placed on it. One influential voice in the lively, often contentious, testing debate belongs to Daniel Koretz, professor of education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE), whose research focuses on educational assessment as it relates to educational policy, with an emphasis on the effects of high-stakes testing. His new book, titled “Measuring Up: What Educational Testing Really Tells Us” (Harvard University Press, 2008), is a detailed exploration of the pros and cons and complexities of testing.
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