Vice Provost for Special Projects
Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery Initiative
Addressing systemic inequities by developing and advancing visible, lasting, and effective action grounded in Harvard’s educational mission and guided by the recommendations and findings of the Presidential Committee on Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery.
We know this work will be complex, challenging, and full of tough decisions, but it could not be more important.
Supporting descendant communities through excellence in education
Creating, expanding, and disseminating world-class learning opportunities to historically marginalized children via a K-12 program that teaches about slavery and its legacies.
Honor through memorialization
Working to build a physical memorial to mark the University’s involvement with slavery.
Partnering with HBCUs
Expanding existing collaborations through the HBCU Library Alliance, and the announcement of Ruth Simmons as Senior Advisor to the President on HBCUs.
Honoring direct descendants
Richard Cellini has launched the Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery Remembrance Project.
Engaging with Native communities
Local tribes are coming together at Harvard for a conference in November 2023, funded by Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery.
Financial support for reparative efforts
A $100 million allocation by President Bacow and the Harvard Corporation will fund the initiative in perpetuity.
Ensuring institutional accountability
Sara Bleich and her team are building the infrastructure to manage implementation activities University-wide.
Stories
Legacies of Slavery: From the Institutional to the Personal
Tasked with uncovering entanglements with slavery at their respective institutions, two leaders reckon with the past and explore ideas for future projects.
Saying their names
Scholars involved in Legacy of Slavery Initiative discuss findings, remind that each of enslaved was ‘real person …with dreams, with pain’
Giving Voice to Slavery’s Voiceless
Former U.S. Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith, alongside Harvard students Stacey Fabo, Ogechukwu Ogbogu, and Suleyman Wellings-Longmore, reaches back into the emotions of the past to understand the emotions of the present.
COVID and Campus Closures: The Legacies of Slavery Persist in Higher Ed
With his recent research, Anthony Abraham Jack paints a bigger picture of the doubly disadvantaged—students who are low income and from schools in underserved communities.
Report on Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery
On April 26, 2022, Harvard President Larry Bacow released the Report of the Committee on Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery, which documented the University’s ties to slavery—direct, financial, and intellectual—and offered seven recommendations that will guide the work of reckoning and repair
The H&LS Newsletter
Get monthly updates on the Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery initiative.