Dear Friends,
This is my first time writing to you as the new Vice Dean for External Relations, and it’s fitting that this is the issue of Harvard Public Health where we highlight—and thank— those who so generously support the Harvard Chan School. I like to think of these gifts as investments in the future of public health. By giving to the School, you play a critical role in enabling our students and faculty to pursue world-class education and research that improve health for millions of people around the world. On behalf of everyone you have helped: thank you for supporting the School’s public health mission.
Fiscal year 2017 gave us much to celebrate. The School received a transformative gift to establish the Zhu Family Center for Global Cancer Prevention and two affiliated professorships. We also received substantial faculty support thanks to a $5.5 million gift from Campaign Co-Chairs Jonathan Lavine, MBA ’92, and Jeannie Lavine, AB ’88, MBA ’92, that established the Lavine Family Professorship in Humanitarian Studies. Another $5 million gift from Deborah Rose, SM ’75, builds on the Rose Traveling Fellowship by creating the Rose Service Learning Program, which will offer students opportunities involving service and engagement with global communities in the context of rigorous academic study. Valuable student support also came from Marilyn and Ron Walter, SM ’72, who established the Ronald A. and Marilyn R. Walter Fellowship Fund, which is funded through a planned gift known as a charitable annuity remainder trust. Lisa Schwartz and Mark Schwartz, AB ’76, MBA ’78, MPP ’79, made a $2 million gift which will provide flexible resources to support research in climate change, sustainability, and human health. And hundreds more demonstrated their belief in public health with gifts large and small.
We are deeply grateful for this outpouring of generosity, and particularly for those who made gifts to support financial aid.
Supporting students creates a virtuous cycle. You’re not just helping one student—you’re also helping all those whose lives will be touched by that student in the future. Gifts to financial aid are a uniquely powerful investment because they have such a tremendous multiplying effect. I recently looked at one scholarship fund that helped 13 students graduate from the Harvard Chan School since 1995. Today, those students are leaders in global health— CEOs of companies that are transforming health care, senior leaders at nongovernmental organizations and nonprofits that are saving lives through public health innovation, and influential researchers in a range of fields. Collectively they’ve helped tens of thousands of people. And this is just one scholarship fund.
With your support, we will continue to address many of the most profound challenges to well-being around the world. Your contributions help ensure that the Harvard Chan School will remain a powerful and impassioned voice in public health for decades to come.
With my deepest gratitude,
Michael McNally
Vice Dean for External Relations
