Education

BENAZIR BHUTTO LEADERSHIP PROGRAM

Consistent with our mission to support positive change, ClassACT has developed the Benazir Bhutto Leadership Program (BBLP) in honor of our classmate, the first female Prime Minister of Pakistan. The fellowships support scholars enrolled in the Edward S. Mason Program (MC/MPA) of the Kennedy School of Government. 

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ZOOM FORUMS

In an effort to share information and strengthen community, ClassACT has instituted a ClassACT HR73 Forum series. Forums focus on our four areas of interest: justice & civic engagement, environment and climate change, healthcare, and education. We usually present four public forums a year, drawing on the expertise of HR73 classmates and experts in their broader networks. 

The goals  of these forums are to educate people on ClassACT initiatives, bring in a broader audience, and engage people in the work.

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CHILDREN’S ORCHESTRA

The Children's Orchestra Society, founded in 1962 by Dr. H.T. Ma, is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to "teaching the language of music" to children and teens. Our mission is to cultivate and nurture children and teach them teamwork and life skills through music-learning and performing in orchestral and chamber music settings. Members of COS receive excellent training in classical music and opportunities to perform in concerts with their peers as well as with well-established musicians.

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THE FOOLPROOFME INITIATIVE

“To know the truth, you need to know both sides of the story,” said Walter Cronkite, FoolProof’s co-founder. The FoolProof Foundation’s goal: teach young people healthy skepticism and caution when making decisions impacting their money or their wellbeing.

Until now our focus has been on the financial implications of manipulation. But the explosive growth of social media platforms and the extraordinary sophistication of their manipulation poses a significant threat to children.

In 1973, kids looked at screens at four years of age. They were looking at TVs. Today kids are looking at screens at four months–and the screens are looking back.

Screen time in the first 18 months of life can lead to significant cognitive damages. Increased screen time for pre-teens and teens can contribute to obesity, sleep problems, depression and anxiety.

FoolProof’s expanded mission is to address the risks children are facing.

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EDITORIAL FREELANCERS ASSOCIATION

The Editorial Freelancers Association provides scholarships to undergraduates attending an HBCU (historically Black college or university) and HBCU alums attending graduate school.

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OLE & NU FELLAS SOCIAL AID & PLEASURE CLUB

The Club is a dynamic and very localized community support engine powered by Sue Press, the president, whose activities include, volunteering as a Court Appointed Special Advocate for Neglected and Abused Children, mentoring sessions to encourage children regarding peer pressure, family matters, social etiquette, and proper behavior and sponsoring a community activities.
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OSILIGI-HOPE FOUNDATION

The Osiligi-Hope Foundation recognizes the value of empowering females to assist their partners in addressing the challenges to their way of life and to contribute their knowledge, skill and perspective in shaping a well- balanced future which secures the best of their heritage with formal education and modern technology. The Foundation has championed female empowerment by speaking out against the practice of female circumcision and encouraging advanced education for young women.
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THE ROOTS OF MUSIC

The Roots of Music provides free year-round music education, academic tutoring, and mentorship for youths ages 9-14 in Greater New Orleans. Founded shortly after Hurricane Katrina to address the challenges facing the city’s youth and the cessation of music education in most of New Orleans’ public middle schools, the program offers children an escape and alternative to the dangerous after-school street life of New Orleans.

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SPORTS ANALYTICS CLUB PROGRAM

Robert Clayton ’73 developed the concept of a Sports Analytics Club Program (SACP) to expand STEM education opportunities to under-served high and middle school students. He had successfully implemented a pilot high school Sports Analytics Club in Baltimore, MD, and needed help developing and expanding the concept. ClassACT has helped to bring together over thirty classmates to assist in the development of SACP. Classmates have helped to facilitate business planning, organization as a not-for-profit, development of a governance structure and financial strategies, and identification of program expansion models to help as SACP has expanded to a multi-city program. The SACP board includes three HR73 classmates.
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SALIH SELF-DEVELOPMENT CENTER

The Salih Self-Development Center teaches area children vocational skills, they will be able to find jobs and learn self-sufficiency. It also provides necessities and medical supplies to the community. The Center already made progress towards a better future for Kumasi. Ibrahim Anyars Salih, the President and Founder of the Salih Self-Development Center, grew up in the Aboabo District of Kumasi and knows the challenges that face the children of Kumasi. He saw that children lacked vocational skills and education. He was fortunate to have the opportunity to come to the United States, but has never forgotten his friends who continue to face poverty in Ghana.
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UNDERSTANDING OUR DIFFERENCES

Understanding Our Differences (UOD) is a nationally recognized non-profit organization whose mission is to educate communities to value and respect people of all abilities, through school-based interactive disability-awareness programs. The goal is to foster a society that includes people with disabilities – who, at 20 percent of the US population, make up the largest minority group in the country. Since 1978, Understanding our Differences volunteers have regularly been presenting its programs to students in grades 3-5 in our home district of Newton, MA, and in other Massachusetts communities. The lessons increase students’ understanding of a range of disabilities and chronic medical conditions, with visual presentations, hands-on activities, and speakers with disabilities discussing their experiences and answering questions. Accurate information about disabilities makes the difference between discrimination and acceptance, and Understanding Our Differences teaches children – at a young age when they are open and receptive – to be allies, not bullies.
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UNITED NATIONS ASSOCIATION OF GREATER BOSTON

The United Nations Association of Greater Boston is ClassACT's newest Bridge. Sponsored by classmate Rich Golob, who most recently served as the chair of the UNAGB board of directors, the organization promotes global awareness in the Greater Boston area. Rich and their Executive Director, Caitlin Moore, have asked ClassACT to help them find topical experts to serve as speakers for their adult and student programs. We have already provided a connection to Benazir Bhutto Leadership Program Associate and international water expert, Erum Sattar.

UNAGB is developing a water curriculum so they are delighted that Erum has agreed to be the keynote speaker at their annual meeting. Classmates interested in UNAGB should reach out to Rich Golob or Caitlin Moore.In addition to finding experts for their program they are interested more generally in volunteers supporters.

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LIFE AT MIDLIFE: WHAT'S NEXT?

June 6, 2024

LIFE AT MIDLIFE: WHAT’S NEXT? was a special intergenerational program exploring change and meaning in midlife and beyond. Changes in career, family structure, gender, and priorities can seem daunting in midlife, but they can lead to a greater sense of life well-lived.

Dr. Robert Waldinger ‘73, Director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, and Alexis Redding '98, a lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, moderated by Michael Feferman ‘98, began the program by providing us with tools for informed conversation.

Drawing on questions from the 25th Reunion survey of the Class of ‘98, HR’73 classmates, Bobby Clayton, Ron Dieckmann, Anne MacKinnon, and Lindsey Straus shared personal reflections about changes they made in their lives during midlife and beyond, why they made them, and how those changes have impacted their lives.

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CLIMATE CHANGE, PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS, AND SOCIAL EQUITY: LESSONS FROM BANGLADESH

March 1, 2024

ClassACT’s Benazir Bhutto Leadership Program, along with the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs (WCFIA) and the Salata Institute, both at Harvard, hosted a daylong in person Symposium focused on mitigating climate change and its concomitant social inequities through public-private partnerships. Panelists included  Ambassador Peter Galbraith AB ’73, Senior Diplomatic Fellow, Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, Marion Dry AB ’73, Chair, ClassACT HR73, Dustin Tingley, Professor of Government, Deputy Vice Provost, Advanced Learning, Harvard University, Nazmul Haque, Fellow, Benazir Bhutto Leadership Program, HKS, Leigh Hafrey AB ’73, Senior Lecturer, Communication and Ethics, MIT Sloan School of Management, Diego Osorio MC/MPA ’09, Fellow, Weatherhead Scholars Program, Hélène Benveniste, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability, Michael Hiscox PhD ’97, Clarence Dillon Professor of International Affairs, FAS, James Engell AB ’73, PhD ’78, Gurney Professor of English Literature and Professor of Comparative Literature, Erum Sattar LLM ’10, SJD ’17, Former Program Director and Lecturer, Sustainable Water Management Program (SWM), Tufts Institute of the Environment, Kimball Chen AB ’73, MBA ’78, Chairman, The Global LPG Partnership, and Peter Tufano AB ’79, MBA ’84, PhD ’89, Baker Foundation Professor, HBS.

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CAN 21ST CENTURY CAPITALISM SOLVE SCHOOL FAILURE, CLIMATE CHANGE, AND INCOME INEQUALITY?

December 16, 2021

Moderator Leigh Hafrey ’73, Senior Lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management, and former co-Master of Mather House, led a stirring discussion about imaginative ways that impact investing and partnerships between public and private investors can help remedy poverty, failing schools and the climate crisis. The distinguished panel included Roger W. Ferguson, Jr. ’73, the former Vice Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and the former President and CEO of TIAA; Natasha Lamb, Managing Partner and Co-Founder of Arjuna Capital; and Tracy Palandjian, CEO and Co-Founder of Social Finance and former Vice-Chair of the Harvard Board of Overseers. 

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WHEN THE STAGE GOES DARK: PERFORMING ARTS IN COVID TIME

January 11, 2021

This forum explored the impact of the pandemic on the performing arts and its artists, described creative solutions the panelists have found for continuing their work and engaging audiences, and offered some innovations and hopes for the future. Moderator Marion Dry '73, Co-Chair of ClassACT, opera singer and former Director of the Wellesley College Music Performance Program will moderate our panel: Jerome Harris '73, jazz bassist and recording artist; Peter Kazaras '73, leading opera director and Director of Opera UCLA and the Inaugural Susan G. and Michel D. Covel MD Chair at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music; Emily Mann '74, former artistic director and resident playwright of the McCarter Theatre Center, Princeton University; and Charlene Jones Marchant '73, faculty member at Music Academy of North Carolina and member of the board of the Greensboro Opera.

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SCHOOLS + COVID = INEQUITY AMPLIFIED

November 17, 2020

Moderator Leigh Hafrey ’73, Senior Lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management, and former co-Master of Mather House, led a stirring discussion about imaginative ways that impact investing and partnerships between public and private investors can help remedy poverty, failing schools and the climate crisis. The distinguished panel included Roger W. Ferguson, Jr. ’73, the former Vice Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and the former President and CEO of TIAA; Natasha Lamb, Managing Partner and Co-Founder of Arjuna Capital; and Tracy Palandjian, CEO and Co-Founder of Social Finance and former Vice-Chair of the Harvard Board of Overseers. 

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GAMECHANGER: SPORTS IN THE PANDEMIC ERA

June 18, 2020

During the pandemic, everyone connected to sporting events was affected economically and personally, from the “front office” managers, to the players and team staff, and perhaps most troubling, to the vendors and many other essential workers who supported events. Can sports provide some sense of community and solace in these times? Will sports return to a pre-pandemic "normal?" Along with our moderator, former editor and writer of Sports Illustrated Dick Friedman '73, our panelists Kathy Delaney-Smith, the Friends of Harvard Women's Basketball Head Coach, Tom Volpe '73,  investment banker and venture capitalist, and Rick Wolff '73, nationally recognized expert in the field of sports psychology and sports parenting as well as the host of popular weekly sports parenting program, “The Sports Edge,” examined these impacts and questions for youth sports, collegiate sports, and minor and major league baseball.

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Below, we highlight classmates and initiatives whose work fits into the category of Education. Scroll through and see if you recognize anyone! And if you're interested in participating in any of the initiatives below, send us an email at classacthr73@gmail.com and we will connect you.