Campus & Community

More than 80 Harvard College seniors have been named Thomas T. Hoopes Prize winners for outstanding scholarly work or research. The prize is funded by the estate of Thomas T. Hoopes ’19. The recipients, including their research and advisers, are as follows:

The Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study has named Harvard senior and sociology and economics joint-concentrator Eric Kouskalis winner of its 2008 Captain Jonathan Fay Prize. Kouskalis was chosen for the quality and impact of his senior thesis, which featured a compelling argument against the current methods for introducing and deploying computers into South African and Namibian school systems.

The Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study has announced that Donna E. Shalala, president of the University of Miami and former U.S. secretary of Health and Human Services, will be awarded the 2008 Radcliffe Institute Medal at the annual Radcliffe Day luncheon on Friday (June 6) at 12:45 p.m. Barbara J. Grosz, dean of the Radcliffe Institute, will make opening remarks and present the medal. Shalala will deliver the keynote address.

Late this morning (June 3), Adam Goldenberg ’08 — in a fashionable bow tie and flowing academic robes — joined a long line of gowned seniors in the shade of trees outside Harvard Hall. A few months before, the Vancouver, B.C., social studies concentrator had dressed a little differently (in pink tights and a yellow Bo Peep dress) to entertain Hasty Pudding’s Man of the Year Christopher Walken.

The Harvard Alumni Association (HAA) has announced the recipients of the 2008 Harvard Medal: Susan L. Graham A.B. ’64, Richard M. Hunt Ph.D. ’60, and Stephen B. Kay A.B. ’56, M.B.A. ’58.

Harvard University today (June 5) conferred honorary doctoral degrees on 10 individuals in recognition of their outstanding achievements in a broad range of fields. The degrees were awarded at this morning’s 357th Commencement Exercises. In addition, the University announced its intention to confer an honorary degree on Sen. Edward M. Kennedy on an appropriate future occasion. Kennedy had planned to attend today’s Commencement ceremony but is now recovering from surgery earlier this week.

In September 1958, Harvard College senior Alfred Hurd moved to 3 Sacramento St., an old Victorian mansion the University had bought less than a year before. The rambling three-story house — with its interior of arched doorways, stained-glass windows, and tiled fireplaces — was the locus of an experiment: Harvard’s first cooperative housing dormitory.

‘The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination’

In the future, Harvard will go beyond traditional ivy and red brick to create campuses with more energy-efficient buildings that minimize water usage and produce low air emissions.

June 1766 — Designed by colonial governor Sir Francis Bernard, the new Harvard Hall (still standing, with several later modifications) opens to replace its predecessor, destroyed by fire in 1764.

Following are some of the incidents reported to the Harvard University Police Department (HUPD) for the week ending June 2. The official log is located at 1033 Massachusetts Ave., sixth floor, and is available online at http://www.hupd.harvard.edu/.

As Commencement closes another chapter of the Harvard story, here is a brief backward glance at some highlights of the year that was.

Jesús Terrones exudes a calm that commands attention. His voice has a quiet resonance. His eyes are a brown that border on black, at once intense and kind.

Call it magic, but the rain held off while Harry Potter creator J.K. Rowling delivered the keynote address this afternoon (June 5) at Harvard University’s annual meeting of the Harvard Alumni Association.

Harvard LGBT reunion event set for September; Modern Greek Studies Program offering Ph.D. fellowship

Holdren honored as guest professor of Tsinghua University; Locke given innovation award; HBS’s Thomas McCraw receives Hagley book prize; Zhang awarded prestigious Merck Award

Andrew J. Hession, an HVAC technician for Harvard Medical School (HMS) for seven years, died on May 26 of complications from heart surgery.

As vice chairs of the Harvard College Fund’s Recent Graduates Committee, Eryn Ament Bingle ’95 and Thomas M. Reardon Jr. ’96, M.B.A. ’05 couldn’t help focusing on a nagging fundraising statistic: 60 to 70 percent of Harvard seniors give to a Senior Gift fund before graduation, but fewer than 20 percent of those same students make any gift to their college one year later.

The notion of “the right attitude” is so played out in the world of sports — in pep talks and SportCenter sound bites, for instance — that one might question whether it carries any weight. In the case of Harvard swimmer Elizabeth Kolbe ’08, who is one of America’s premier Paralympic athletes, the answer is a resounding yes.

Why do people suffer from the sins of others? Elizabeth J.A. Siwo-Okundi has long pondered this question as she has studied some of the most ambiguous and troubling passages in the Bible. A master’s of theology student at Harvard Divinity School, Siwo-Okundi has never shied away from difficult issues. Even while studying Old Testament stories of rape, human sacrifice, and war, Siwo-Okundi has found inspiration and even comfort; she has turned her discoveries into eloquent sermons that have won her national attention.

Today the University awarded a total of 6,966 degrees and 104 certificates. A breakdown of the degrees by schools and programs follows. Harvard College granted a total of 1,564 degrees.

Employment Services, collaborating with a University-wide organizing committee, is hosting its 10th annual career forum on June 10. The event will be held at the Graduate School of Design’s Gund Hall, 48 Quincy St. It will be open to the public from 4 to 6:30 p.m. The career forum will open one hour earlier (at 3 p.m.) to internal candidates presenting a valid Harvard ID. Employees and recently laid-off employees will be able to receive individual attention from hiring representatives at this time.

In celebration of the city of Cambridge and of the country’s oldest university — and of our earlier history when bells of varying tones summoned us from sleep to prayer, work, or study — this ancient yet new sound will fill Harvard Square and the surrounding area with music when a number of neighboring churches and institutions ring their bells at the conclusion of Harvard’s 357th Commencement Exercises, for the 20th consecutive year.

Continuing its tradition of promoting and funding student research on Europe, the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies (CES) has announced its selection of nearly 50 undergraduates for thesis research grants and internships in Europe this summer.

In 1926, William Lawrence published his autobiography, “Memories of a Happy Life.” In 1967, his daughter, Marian Lawrence Peabody, then in her 90s, published “To Be Young Was Very Heaven.” These reminiscences show that although some things change, much stays the same, including certain rituals — and worries — around Commencement.

A biologist who has led groundbreaking research efforts on proteins, an art expert who leads one of the country’s foremost museums, an astrophysicist whose theories guide the study of galaxies and planets, and a social sciences professor who has shaped the course of East Asian studies received the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) Centennial Medal on Wednesday (June 4) at the Harvard Faculty Club.

This morning’s orations bring together a young literature scholar on the eve of public service, a classics concentrator on her way to medical school (after a year of studying archaeology), and a U.S. Army officer who served in Iraq. In their own ways, the three orators represent Harvard’s diversity as it is measured by the immeasurable — the ineffability of experience. They represent the wide array of backgrounds that students bring to the University and the wide array of horizons that awaits them beyond Cambridge.

The Committee of the Howard T. Fisher Prize in Geographical Information Science has named four students winners of the award for the 2007-08 academic year.

The Harvard Extension School has announced the following student prize and faculty award winners for 2008.

The David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (DRCLAS) is sponsoring more than 130 students traveling to Latin America for research and internships this summer.