August 11, 2020

Various departmental Diversity and Inclusion subcommittees have met and are already generating great ideas for how our community can promote diversity, equity, and inclusion. As we explore outreach initiatives, it’s useful to also take stock of existing outreach programs within the Harvard ecosystem. Some of these programs are outlined below. While not a comprehensive summary, this list will hopefully be a useful resource to members of our community and help us build upon ongoing outreach efforts.

Office for Diversity, Inclusion, and Community Partnership (DICP) at HMS
DICP hosts a number of outreach programs spanning middle school through college and also provides professional development opportunities for medical/graduate students, postdocs, and faculty. Outreach programs focus on local students, especially those belonging to underrepresented or disadvantaged groups. These include the AP Biology Hinton Scholars Program, Project Success, and the Health Professions Recruitment and Exposure Program (HPREP).

Harvard Life Sciences Outreach Program (LSO)
The LSO provides professional development to New England high school teachers and hands-on laboratory experience to high school students. There are opportunities for graduate students, postdocs, and faculty to get involved.

Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS)
GSAS offers a post-baccalaureate program (the Research Scholar Initiative) and administers the Summer Research Opportunities at Harvard program (SROH) for undergraduates to help students interested in applying to PhD programs. The GSAS outreach website also lists a large number of other summer undergraduates research programs across Harvard, including the Summer Honors Undergraduate Research Program (SHURP), an HMS-based summer program for students belonging to groups traditionally underrepresented in the biomedical sciences.

Ed Furshpan and David Potter Native American High School Program (NAHSP)
Originally founded by two members of the Department of Neurobiology, the NAHSP is a three-week residential program at HMS for high school students from the Hopi and Fort Peck reservations. Each year the program solicits graduate student volunteers to lecture in the program and to serve as student mentors.

Journal of Emerging Investigators (JEI)
Founded by Harvard graduate students, JEI is an open-access journal that publishes research articles written by middle and high school students from all over the world. Multiple members of the JEI executive leadership team are members of our very own Department!

Action items for our community

  • Explore some of Harvard’s outreach programs to identify opportunities to get involved and outreach gaps that our Department could fill
  • Are you involved with or do you know of outreach programs at Harvard not captured here? Email Tari Tan (taralyn_tan@hms.harvard.edu), so we can add them to our list!