The Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics is now accepting applications from graduate students for its 2008-09 fellowship in ethics. Also As part of its evolving emergency communications procedures, Harvard University is making available text message alerts to students, faculty, and staff to be used only in the event of an extreme, campus-wide, life-threatening emergency.
Renowned Egyptian activist Nawal El Saadawi has been selected by the Harvard Committee on African Studies to deliver its annual Distinguished Harvard African Studies Lecture. Balkanski Professor of Physics and Applied Physics Eric Mazur and Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, 300th Anniversary University Professor, were recently named Phi Beta Kappa (PBK) Visiting Scholars for the 2007-08 academic year.
William James LeMessurier, Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD) adjunct professor of architectural technology in the Department of Architecture, died this past July 14. One of the world’s pre-eminent structural engineers, he taught at the GSD for decades. He was 81.
The date of the memorial service for Alfred D. Chandler Jr., Isidor Straus Professor of Business History Emeritus, has been changed from Sept. 28 to Oct. 19. A memorial service for Wilga M. Rivers, professor of Romance languages and literatures emerita, will be held in Appleton Chapel of the Memorial Church on Oct. 17 at 4:30 p.m.
Harvard Forest recently announced the 2007-08 Charles Bullard Fellows in Forest Research. The purpose of this fellowship program, established in 1962, is to support advanced research and study by persons who show promise of making important contributions, either as scholars or administrators, to forestry defined in its broadest sense as the human use and study of forested environments.
The Harvard women’s soccer team defended its perfect home record with a 1-0 edging of Fairfield this past Tuesday afternoon (Oct. 2). The Harvard sailing team placed third out of 14 teams in the Women’s Regis Bowl this past Sunday (Sept. 30) on the Charles River. Lehigh defensive lineman Paul Bode returned a fumble 27 yards in the final 30 seconds of regulation to break a tie and help propel the Mountain Hawks past the visiting Crimson, 20-13, on Saturday afternoon (Sept. 29).
The atmosphere was cheerful and upbeat as volunteers, young and old, from Harvard and beyond, gathered on a bright autumn morning last Saturday (Sept. 29) for what organizers and University officials hope will be the first in a long tradition of an annual University-wide Day of Service.
A major advance in distance education was initiated this fall in a specially equipped classroom at the Harvard Extension School. Classes held there give online students the ability to view on-campus lectures in real-time and actually take part in classroom discussions. The facility also serves as an experimental locus to test distance education teaching methods and technology. One of the extraordinary benefits of the $1 million in state-of-the-art equipment is that several courses can be taught at the same time.
Imagine an epidural or a shot of Novocain that doesn’t paralyze your legs or make you numb yet totally blocks your pain. This type of pain management is now within reach. As a result, childbirth, surgery, and trips to the dentist might be less traumatic in the future, thanks to researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Harvard Medical School (HMS) who have succeeded in selectively blocking pain-sensing neurons in rats without interfering with other types of neurons.
Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government has announced a new academic research program, the Initiative on Religion in International Affairs. The interdisciplinary initiative, based at the Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, will be directed by Monica Duffy Toft, associate professor of public policy, and J. Bryan Hehir, Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Religion and Public Life. The new program is supported with a $400,000 grant from the Henry Luce Foundation.
With a ceremonial blessing and a cautionary reminder of native peoples’ historic oppression, a group of American Indian leaders joined an assemblage of experienced and budding archaeologists Wednesday (Sept. 26) to begin the search for Harvard’s Indian College roots.
Thirteen Harvard University faculty members will be inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences at a ceremony on Saturday (Oct. 6). Celebrated for their scholarship, artistic triumphs, and service to society, the 227th class of fellows includes the following Harvard affiliates:
The J.P. Lemann family has made a major gift to Harvard University to endow permanently its Brazil Studies Program. The first significant commitment of Drew Faust’s presidency, it signals the importance of international priorities at Harvard.
Harvard University has received the approval from the Board of Directors of the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA), the city’s planning and economic development agency, for plans for the Harvard Allston Science Complex, the first new academic building of the University’s planned extended campus in Allston. Following completion of the zoning approval, construction can begin. Formal groundbreaking is expected to be in November.
Sept. 19, 1782 — The Harvard Corporation votes to establish the Medical School, following a detailed plan from President Joseph Willard and Professor Edward Wigglesworth. The plan calls for new books in chemistry and medicine, “a complete anatomical and surgical apparatus,” three new professorships, and organized lectures with required clinical components.
Following are some of the incidents reported to the Harvard University Police Department (HUPD) for the week ending Sept. 24. The official log is located at 1033 Massachusetts Ave., sixth floor, and is available online at http://www.hupd.harvard.edu/.
In August, the Rev. Professor Peter J. Gomes, the Plummer Professor of Christian Morals and Pusey Minister in the Memorial Church, was appointed by Queen Elizabeth II to membership in The Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem, the oldest order of chivalry in the United Kingdom, dating to the 10th century. Gomes will be invested in November.
At its second meeting of the year on Sept. 26, the Faculty Council reviewed the Ph.D. program in Information, Technology and Management, considered a proposal for open access to scholarly articles, and was joined by President Drew Faust for a start-of-term discussion.
The Weatherhead Center for International Affairs is supporting 24 doctoral candidates as Graduate Student Associates for 2007-08. The associates represent a multidisciplinary group of advanced-degree candidates from Harvard’s departments of Anthropology, Government, History, Religion, and Sociology; the Kennedy School’s Public Policy Program; and the Law School’s S.J.D. program. All of the students are working on topics related to international affairs.
The John King Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard has announced its 2007–08 class of postdoctoral fellows, visiting scholars, fellows, and associates. “We are privileged at the Fairbank Center to have so many highly trained scholars in attendance,” said Professor Martin King Whyte, acting director of the Fairbank Center. “While working on their own research, they attend our seminars and often give talks on campus. In that way, they contribute greatly to the vitality of the Fairbank Center’s intellectual community.”
As part of its evolving emergency communications procedures, Harvard University is making available text message alerts to students, faculty, and staff to be used only in the event of an extreme, campus-wide, life-threatening emergency.
The National Association of Collegiate Women Athletics Administrators (NACWAA) will honor Pat Henry, senior associate athletic director at Harvard University for 22 years, as one of its eight Administrator of the Year Award recipients at an Oct. 8 ceremony in St. Petersburg, Fla.
This year’s RiverSing at the Weeks Footbridge was, as always, a festive affair with music from a variety of lyrical sources, including the Halalisa Singers and saxophonist Stan Strickland. Chiming along were bells rung by assorted visitors. Of course, there was the usual dazzling appearance by the gargantuan puppets Oshun and Poseidon. The music, the color, the weather — all conspired to make this autumnal welcome a success.
The Boston Landmarks Orchestra and Harvard Extension School will co-present “Witness to Darfur,” a unique evening of dialogue, film, and music, in Sanders Theatre on Oct. 1 at 8 p.m. The two-hour program aims to draw attention to the tragic events in Sudan, while acknowledging the work of organizations and individuals who are committed to putting an end to the genocide.
There’s no easy answer, said Norman Davies, an Oxford-educated British historian and Poland specialist who has written widely on the 1939-1945 conflict.
Featured series 
Gallery
