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Each spring, the Harvard Club of Long Island (HCLI) honors distinguished middle and high school teachers from across Long Island at a luncheon and awards ceremony. Current Harvard undergraduates are asked to nominate the teachers who most inspired or influenced them on their path to Harvard, and an HCLI committee selects approximately ten teachers annually to receive the Distinguished Teacher Awards.
The program was created in 2005 to support education on Long Island by visibly and publicly appreciating our best 6th-12th-grade teachers while offering a meaningful event for HCLI members. We strongly believe that great teachers deserve more recognition for changing lives; that the “Harvard Experience” benefits teachers, their colleagues, and future students; and that encouraging Harvard undergraduates to nominate former teachers enriches the students and fosters a lifelong practice of honoring mentors.
The Distinguished Teacher Awards provide three levels of honor. Every teacher nominated by an undergraduate receives a letter of recognition as a distinguished teacher. About ten teachers are invited to a luncheon, awards ceremony, and keynote lecture by an eminent Harvard professor, with the speaker and topic chosen to engage a diverse audience. One Distinguished Teacher attendee is further honored as an HCLI Fellow and awarded a stipend to spend 2-3 days at Harvard: attending classes, visiting libraries and museums, engaging with students and faculty. This "Harvard Experience" is funded by donations from HCLI members and others. Many HCLI members consider this annual celebration a "must-see, signature" event.
HCLI schedules the event midday on a weekend before or after Harvard's spring break so the undergraduates who nominated attending teachers can join. The audience typically consists of distinguished teachers (from all academic disciplines, from across Long Island) and their family members, some school administrators, undergraduate nominators, past honorees, as well as HCLI members and the Harvard professor.
General schedule for the Distinguished Teachers Awards Ceremony & University Relations Lecture:
11am-11:30am: Registration; Meet & Greet Honored Guests
11:30am-12:15pm: Buffet Luncheon
12:15pm-1:00pm: Distinguished Teacher Award Ceremony
1:00pm-2:15pm: University Relations Lecture and Q&A
Over the past 20 years, HCLI has sent almost one thousand letters recognizing great teachers, honored over 250 teachers with awards, and named 40 teachers as HCLI Fellows while providing the opportunity of a Harvard Experience. See here for a list of honorees and Fellows, their schools, and their academic discipline(s).
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