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Merrow Receives the 2006 Alumni Council Award for Outstanding Contribution to Education

John Merrow, Ed.D'73, will receive the 2006 Alumni Council Award for Outstanding Contribution to Education on Wednesday, June 7.

"It would be difficult for me to overstate what the Ed School has meant to me, both personally and professionally," Merrow said. "My parents and my high school teachers taught me that the gift of life carries with it the obligation to try to make the world around one a better place, but it was Harvard that gave me the skills and the confidence to try."

Merrow will receive the award during HGSE's precommencement ceremony at the Gutman Conference Center at 3:30 p.m. The HGSE Alumni Council first established the Alumni Award for Outstanding Contribution to Education in 1985 in order to recognize the significance of service to education by alumni.

Beginning on National Public Radio (NPR) in 1974, Merrow has spent over 30 years creating interesting and lively radio and television broadcasts that expose the vital issues lurking below education's surface. Most known for his work on The Merrow Report, as well as The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour on PBS, in 1995 Merrow established Learning Matters, a not-for-profit corporation that produces television, radio, and Web programs.

Each year, the Alumni Relations Office solicits nominations for the award from the alumni body. Candidates must be graduates of HGSE and have made a noteworthy contribution to education during their professional careers.

"Merrow has demonstrated an unparalleled commitment to educational opportunity in his career as a journalist," said incoming HGSE Alumni Council Chair Brian Fitzgerald, Ed.M.'76, Ed.D.'90. "His objective and insightful reporting has highlighted the most serious educational challenges we face in elementary, secondary, and higher education, and has transformed the policy debate on these issues."

Merrow's work has not gone unnoticed in the fields of journalism or education. He has received the George Foster Peabody award, 11 consecutive awards from the Education Writers Association, and several Emmy nominations.

Merrow admits that he didn't always know where he was headed until he started studying at HGSE in the 1970s. "It was Harvard that put [education and societal issues] together for me and changed my life," he said.

Merrow credits HGSE for not only opening his eyes to the world through the teachings by various faculty members, but also for meeting his wife, Joan Lonergan, Ed.M.'84, when they both served as members of the Alumni Council.

"When the Ed school asks me to jump, my only question is 'how high?'" Merrow said.

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