Harvard Extension School

The origin of Harvard Extension School can be traced back to 1835, when John Lowell Jr. founded the Lowell Institute. In his will, Lowell Jr. funded an organization that provided Boston with free public lectures on a variety of subjects. The institute quickly gained an influential presence. Oliver Wendell Holmes, a lecturer at the institute, remarked, “No nobler or more helpful institution exists in America than Boston’s Lowell Institute.”

In 1910, A. Lawrence Lowell, as Trustee of the Lowell Institute and President of Harvard University, established the academic program of University Extension at Harvard as an experiment in “popular education.” The Harvard Extension School has broadened its reach beyond the local community to a national and global audience while retaining a commitment to educational quality and affordability.

Since its inception, it is estimated that more than one-half million women and men have enrolled in Harvard Extension School courses and more than 15,000 have been awarded undergraduate and graduate degrees and graduate certificates. Every year, nearly 14,000 students of all ages, from all over the world, register for classes on campus and online. The range of resources is both broad and deep: 600 courses, of which 200 are offered online, spanning the liberal arts and professional studies; educational options include individual courses, professional certificates, and formal degrees: Associate in Arts, Bachelor of Liberal Arts, and Master of Liberal Arts in 19 fields, and Master of Liberal Arts in professional studies (biotechnology, sustainability and environmental management, information technology, journalism, management, mathematics for teaching, and museum studies).

The faculty are another exceptional resource: 60 percent are Harvard affiliates, others are from area universities and the business community. Many have taught at the Harvard Extension School for decades, while some teach the same course at the School as in Harvard College.

Each year, the Harvard Extension School, with the Lowell Institute, co-sponsors the Lowell Lecture at Harvard. Past speakers have included Carl Sagan on nuclear winter, Gore Vidal on American politics, Ken Burns on the documentary as history, and Sissela Bok on the pursuit of happiness. Timothy Johnson, MD, MPH, one of the nation’s leading communicators of medical healthcare information delivered the 2011 lecture entitled “The Truth About Getting Sick in America: The Real Problems with Healthcare and What We Can Do.”

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