Carroll Bogert (RSEA AM'86) awarded Harvard GSAS Centennial Medal

June 5, 2019
Carroll Bogert photo by Harvard Gazette

At a GSAS ceremony on May 29, RSEA Alumna Carroll Bogert (AM '86) was presented with a Centennial Medal in recognition of her courageous work in journalism and advocacy for human rights.

The Centennial Medal is the highest award bestowed by the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. Established in 1989 on the occasion of the school's 100th anniversary, the Centennial Medal honors distinguished alumni who have made lasting contributions to society that emerged from their graduate study at Harvard.

Carroll Bogert is President of the Marshall Project, a Pulitzer-Prize-winning nonprofit media organization that reports on the US criminal justice system. From 1998-2016 she was deputy executive director at Human Rights Watch and led an award-winning multimedia division with global reach. Before joining Human Rights Watch she spent twelve years as a foreign correspondent for Newsweek in China, Southeast Asia, and the Soviet Union, a distinguised career that began with an interest in China she developed while at Harvard.

As a graduate student in RSEA, Bogert studied modern Chinese politics with the late Prof. Roderick MacFarquahar. After receiving her AM in 1986, Bogert headed to China and began her journalism career as a stringer in Beijing.

At the invitation of RSEA Chair Prof. Xiaofei Tian, Carroll Bogert returned to Harvard RSEA to share her experiences and career advice with current students at the RSEA Distinguished Alumni Panel event in October 2018.

Applauded by GSAS as a "a first-rate international journalist and human rights advocate," Bogert was presented with the Centennial Medal for her "courageous lifelong commitment to fact-finding and truth-telling ... which sheds light on injustice both at home and abroad". Read more of Caroll Bogert's 2019 Centennial Medal Citation.

Bogert is one of five GSAS alumni honored with a 2019 Centennial Medal award. Read more in The Harvard Gazette and Harvard Magazine.