Newsmakers

Van Valkenburgh wins design award

Charles Eliot Professor in Practice of Landscape Architecture Michael Van Valkenburgh was named a finalist in the environment design category at the National Design Awards earlier this month in New York City. The awards, bestowed by the Smithsonian Institution’s Copper-Hewitt National Design Museum, are given to individuals or firms for an exceptional body of work in landscape architecture, interior design, or set design.

Lenger has his day

Earlier this month, Mayor Thomas M. Menino declared Oct. 17 John Lenger Day in the city of Boston. The assistant director for publications at Harvard’s Office of News and Public Affairs, and a journalism instructor at the Extension School, Lenger was acknowledged for “his dedication and commitment to the personal growth of young people of the city of Boston.”

During the summer of 2003, Lenger volunteered his expertise and time to teach a group from Youth Opportunity Boston about how to produce a newspaper. That publication, the YO Journal, encourages area youth to improve their lives through capitalizing on employment opportunities.

Belfer Center program to meet in Africa

The Belfer Center’s Program on Intrastate Conflict and Conflict Resolution will be in Africa this weekend, running an innovative analysis of African leadership challenges and opportunities with present and former leaders of the continent. The group, which includes former presidents of Botswana and Nigeria, Cabinet ministers from Kenya, Sierra Leone, Malawi, and Zimbabwe, and the speaker of the East African Parliament, among others, first met in May at the Kennedy School. This weekend’s meeting is being held in Gaborone, Botswana, and will be opened by President Festus Mogae of Botswana.

The leadership group, facilitated and chaired by Robert I. Rotberg, director of the Program on Intrastate Conflict, intends to write a “Code of African Leadership” and devise a training program for future African leaders.

– Compiled by Andrew Brooks