2020 GSAS Centennial Medalists

The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences’ honorands

Pictured are Stephen Cook, Albert Fishlow, Helen Vendler, and Margaret Kivelson

Clockwise from top left: Stephen Cook, Albert Fishlow, Helen Vendler, and Margaret Kivelson. 
Photographs courtesy of Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences

The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Centennial Medal, first awarded in 1989 on the occasion of the school’s hundredth anniversary, honors alumni who have made contributions to society that emerged from their graduate studies. It is the highest honor GSAS bestows, and awardees include some of Harvard’s most accomplished alumni. The 2020 recipients, announced on May 27, are: Stephen Cook, Ph.D. ’66, a computational theorist and mathematician; Albert Fishlow, Ph.D. ’63, a development economist and historian; Margaret Kivelson ’50, Ph.D. ’57, RI ’66, a space and planetary physicist; and Helen Vendler, Ph.D. ’60, Porter University Professor emerita, beloved Harvard teacher and poetry critic. For more about the honorands, see harvardmag.com/centennial-20.

You might also like

The Harvard-Radcliffe Collegium Musicum reunites for a 50th anniversary tour around France.

He was Harvard’s quintessential people person.

The former economics concentrator brings his talent for crunching numbers to netminding.

Most popular

In her memoir All That's Unseen, Emilee Hackney explores religion, friendship, and home.

College staff whose jobs will be changed or eliminated were notified this week.

Harvard scientists identify hundreds of genes under selective pressure.

Explore More From Current Issue

Two figures stand before a large, colorful pixelated face against a yellow background.

Harvard scientists identify hundreds of genes under selective pressure.

A woman with long, silver hair rests her chin on her hand, wearing a black top.

Author and Harvard Divinity School writer-in-residence Terry Tempest Williams finds beauty in the world around us.

Star-filled night sky with the Milky Way arching over a rocky silhouette.

There’s a growing movement to curb light pollution. It starts on your front porch.