Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging (EDIB) at BPH

The BPH program recognizes diversity is an essential requisite to achieving excellence in research and education. Diversity in terms of race, ethnicity, national origin, gender, age, sexual orientation, ability, religious beliefs in our community of students, administrators, and faculty enriches and strengthens our program community. By fostering diversity and actively creating opportunities for inclusion and belonging, we believe that curiosity, creativity and innovation can thrive towards the betterment of human health.

We actively reject any form of discrimination and prejudice and strive to maintain an environment where we nurture a sense of safety, inclusion and belonging among our community members. We aspire to continue overturning professional barriers that have historically marginalized colleagues from underrepresented backgrounds in the scientific community. We work to craft an environment where all members of our program feel supported in their identities and comfortable to learn, teach, explore, dialogue, and support each other as a community of colleagues and friends.

Striving to enhance the compositional diversity among life science faculty throughout academia and research leaders in industry, we focus on the training and career development of a generation of scientists from all backgrounds who will keep inclusivity and equality at the forefront. We participate in conferences and fairs to build a PhD Program community comprised of qualified individuals from various backgrounds. We pledge to maintain the administrative structure and funding to enhance the pipeline of underrepresented students seeking graduate level training through our Summer Internship Program (SIP), which offers opportunities to undergraduates interested in laboratory-based biological research. SIP then allows us to strengthen the pipeline of doctoral students to help develop faculty and industry leaders whose experiences reflect the breadth of experiences of our student body.

Recruitment and retention are only one area of focus to help us build a community of individuals whose experiences enrich graduate research at all levels. We actively seek out opportunities for learning and development to ensure our BPH students, faculty, and administrators are engaged in unit-, school- and university-level activities intended to nurture a community where everyone can flourish, while embracing their own cultures and identities. At all levels of participation in social and scientific activities, training events and specific committees, we encourage our students’ active involvement and input. To see a sampling of how our community of learners works together to foster equity, diversity, inclusion, and belonging (EDIB) across other affiliated departments, we invite you to visit the EDIB webpages for the Department of Molecular Metabolism, Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, and Department of Environmental Health.

New Student Resources

Summer Institute

The Summer Institute is an optional program offered to students from underrepresented groups across Harvard. Activities include panel discussions by senior graduate students about topics such as transition to graduate school, navigating Harvard, being a 1st generation student, managing familial pressures, being the outsider in your home community, and the imposter syndrome. Participating students engage in a paper reading boot camp that exposes them to the type of discussion classes they will see in their first year. Additional workshops cover topics such as mentoring up, choosing rotations, and experimental design. The Summer Institute also leverages existing programs such as the MATLAB boot camp to bring students from multiple programs together to help them learn statistics and programming.

Culture and Community Workshop

All first year students participate in a 2.5 hour Culture and Community Workshop during the Orientation period. The goal of the Culture and Community Workshop – organized by the Harvard Griffin GSAS Diversity and Inclusion Fellows and facilitated by graduate students – is to equip incoming students with the tools to establish and sustain an inclusive culture and community across their program through dynamic and in-depth discussions and activities.

Bias Reporting Resources at Harvard Chan School

HSPH has made available information and resources for students on how to report incidents of bias as well as additional information available to all community members on our bias response process. By visiting our Bias Reporting and Harvard Chan Resources page, students will have access to information on ways to report incidents of bias, our Community Guide for Addressing Bias, a set of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ), and contact information for the Bias Response Team at Harvard Chan School.

Other Resources


Additional Student Groups are listed on the GSAS Diversity Student Groups page.