The Harvard University Native American Program in conjunction with the Peabody Museum of Archeology and Ethnology will host a visit and public talk by Kevin Gover (Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma), director of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian. Gover is a former professor of law at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of…

The Harvard University Department of Music is delighted to announce that the Parker Quartet will become part of the Music Department teaching faculty at Harvard University beginning in the fall of 2014. “Thanks to the Blodgett Artists-in-Residence Program, we have been fortunate to have had a Quartet-in-Residence for four weeks a year since 1985,” said…

According to the World Economic Forum’s first Human Capital Report, the U.S. ranked 43rd among 112 countries in the Health and Wellness category, which measured a country’s ability to develop and deploy a healthy workforce. It received particularly low scores in obesity, the impact on business of noncommunicable diseases, and stress. The report was co-authored by David Bloom, Clarence…

Financial reporting is crucial to a fair and functioning democracy, said Laurie Hays, senior executive editor for Beat Reporting at Bloomberg News. The challenge that financial reporters face, she said, is presenting complex economic issues in a way that large audiences can understand. Yet it is important because “the bottom line is…the bottom line,” she said,…

E-cigarettes may help reduce smokers’ exposure to toxins, but they also may cause harm, according to Vaughan Rees, deputy director of the Center for Global Tobacco Control at Harvard School of Public Health. Interviewed on KUOW (Puget Sound Public Radio) on October 2, 2013, Rees said that while e-cigarettes do contain some toxic compounds, they have far less…

From the calming and relaxing properties of lavender, to the antiviral offerings of lemon balm the Harvard Countway Community Garden offers a wealth of medicinal herbs in the heart of Boston’s urban medical area. On September 27, a bright and crisp fall day, Stephanie Zabel led a community talk on medicinal herbs as part of…

Regardless of the political wranglings around the Affordable Care Act (ACA), funding public health prevention efforts must continue, said HSPH Dean Julio Frenk in an op-ed in the Boston Globe on Oct. 2, 2013. He notes that spending on prevention within the ACA has already been reduced from a $15 billion commitment to $10 billion. “Prevention may seem expensive,…

Harvard School of Public Health Dean Julio Frenk has received the Abraham Horwitz Award for Excellence for Leadership in Inter-American Public Health from the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the Pan American Health and Education Foundation (PAHEF). He is one of five individuals from the Western Hemisphere to be honored by PAHO/PAHEF for major contributions to…

Jukka-Pekka “JP” Onnela, assistant professor of biostatistics at Harvard School of Public Health, has won a prestigious Director’s New Innovator Award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for a proposal to collect and analyze cell phone communication and sensor data to monitor social and behavioral functioning of individuals with mood disorders. One of 41 scientists around…

On September 20, the Harvard Law School Library hosted its ninth “Love Your Library Fest,” in which law students were introduced to the library by visiting various stations, including Historical & Special Collections, legal vendors and the reference desk—which offered a no-brainer “quiz” about commonly used library services. “We hold our orientation later so that…

A celebration of Harvard School of Public Health’s postdocs—as well as their mentors—was held on September 20, 2013, coinciding with National Postdoc Appreciation Week. The festive event in Kresge cafeteria featured awards, prizes, raffles, and kudos for the work and accomplishments of the approximately 300 postdoctoral research fellows who work at the School. Postdocs were…

With the launch of the new state health insurance exchanges on Oct. 1, HSPH professor Atul Gawande writes in a New Yorker editorial about three forms of obstructionism taking place to hinder the rollout: some states not accepting federal funds to expand their Medicaid programs, some refusing to operate state health exchanges, and some conservatives trying to…

The Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies (CES) is thrilled to announce the launch of a three-year pilot exchange program with the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE), a political party in the European Parliament. The goal of this new agreement is to provide meaningful internships for Harvard College students, research opportunities…

The Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies (CES) is pleased to announce that Nicolas Berggruen, founder of the Berggruen Institute On Governance and co-author of Intelligent Governance for the 21st Century, has been appointed as the center’s first senior fellow. “This appointment recognizes Mr. Berggruen’s efforts to stimulate forward-thinking research, discussion and action on Europe’s most pressing…

Imagine an automobile coating that changes its structure to adapt to a humid environment or a salt-covered road, better protecting the car from corrosion. Or consider a soldier’s uniform that could alter its own camouflage or more effectively protect against poison gas or shrapnel upon contact. A trio of university researchers from Harvard School of…

For Philips Loh, the suffering of tuberculosis patients — and the frightening ease with which the disease spreads — was a wake-up call. After working as an intern at a hospital in his native Indonesia, Loh decided to abandon his plans to become a physician and turn his focus to infectious disease prevention. Now the…

A few hours after President Obama’s speech to the UN General Assembly, the Shorenstein Center welcomed David Rohde, investigative journalist for Thomson Reuters, to speak about his observations in traveling with Secretary of State John Kerry and how U.S. policy is changing in the Middle East. Rohde has traveled with Kerry for the past few months, beginning…

Education policy has been one of the major themes in the 2013 Boston mayoral race. The two winners of Tuesday’s primary – State Rep. Martin J. Walsh and Boston City Councilor John R. Connolly — were among the candidates who spoke passionately and often about improving city schools, expanding the school day, and increasing school…

More than 110,000 people dead. Seven million individuals displaced from their homes. Three and a half million child refugees. Multiple assaults with chemical weapons. These are the grim statistics that define the Syrian conflict. What began as peaceful demonstrations on March 15, 2011 has devolved into a human tragedy of epic proportions that has stymied…

The annual “Healthy Kitchens, Healthy Lives—Caring For Our Patients and Ourselves” conference, offered by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and The Culinary Institute of America, provides doctors and other health professionals with the latest in nutrition science as well as hands-on training in how to cook healthy meals. A  video produced by conference co-sponsor the…

Jane Kelly, Historical & Special Collections assistant, and Margaret Peachy, curator of digital collections, both of the Harvard Law School Library, said they felt lucky to have the opportunity to curate an exhibition that coincides with Celebration 60, the upcoming 60th-anniversary celebration of the first women graduates of Harvard Law School (HLS). “Women at HLS:…

“You are not just a ball of cells,” says Clifford Tabin, George Jacob and Jacqueline Hazel Leder Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School (HMS). The way cells organize within the human body allows us all to function the way we do, but a couple of Harvard professors are concerned as much with that developmental…

Among the oldest surviving bonsai in America, the Larz Anderson Bonsai Collection is a beloved treasure of the Arnold Arboretum and Boston. The centennial of the collection’s 1913 arrival in America is being celebrated by a class and theme tours at the Arboretum, and a special exhibition at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Festivities begin…

Harvard School of Public Health announced today that Sir Elton John will receive the Harvard School of Public Health AIDS Initiative Leadership Award on October 15. The award is presented to individuals who have exhibited extraordinary vision, leadership, and courage in the worldwide struggle against AIDS. Past recipients include tennis legend Arthur Ashe, Diana, Princess…

The Harvard University Native American Program (HUNAP) in conjunction with the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Gutman Library and the Institute for New England Native American Studies at UMASS Boston will host a book talk on a newly published book addressing the regular practice of omitting Native American student data and statistics in national, regional,…

Harvard University has officially extended the Harvard Allston Partnership Fund (HAPF) Program by inviting nonprofits and programs serving Allston-Brighton residents to apply for $100,000 in grants this fall. Applications for the sixth round of HAPF funding are due by October 10. Over the past five years, the HAPF program has given $500,000 in grants to…

Disparities between blacks and whites in the U.S. remain pronounced—and health is no exception. A panel of experts at Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) discussed these disparities—what they are, why they persist, and what to do about them—at a September 12, 2013 event titled “Dialogue on Race, Justice, and Public Health.” The event was…

Pope Francis, who has inspired both affection and controversy with recent remarks on homosexuality and atheism, made headlines again last week. In an interview with the editor of the leading Jesuit journal in Rome, the pope criticized the Catholic Church’s focus on “abortion, gay marriage and the use of contraceptive methods.” Without a “new balance”…

More than 43 million people are injured worldwide each year due to unsafe medical care, according to a new study from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH). These injuries result in the loss of nearly 23 million years of “healthy” life. The findings represent a major new effort to calculate the global burden of unsafe…

Joan Walsh, editor-at-large of Salon.com and a political analyst for MSNBC, spoke to the Shorenstein Center about racial change and political polarization. “When politics gets almost completely racialized…and race gets thoroughly politicized,” she said, “it’s trouble for a country that was founded on E pluribus unum, and that has believed the core of American exceptionalism, in…