The awards honor faculty members who show a strong commitment to mentoring graduate students, and recognize efforts that often go unrecognized -- but not unappreciated by the students they mentor, says Adam Fagen, chair of the Awards Committee.

The reception will include remarks from students and University officials, including President Neil L. Rudenstine. The reception will be held from 5 to 6 p.m. in the Graduate Student Lounge on the mezzanine level of Dudley House.

The Graduate Student Council, of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, established the annual awards earlier this academic year to publicly recognize those faculty members who "go out of their way" to mentor GSAS students by supporting, encouraging, and promoting students' research, education, professional and personal development, and career plans, Fagen says.

The GSC received more than 200 nominations from current GSAS students in almost all graduate programs as well as from other Harvard students and recent alumni, supporting more than 80 individual faculty members.

The Awards Committee of five students selected the following nine faculty members as winners of the mentoring awards:

David M. Cutler, John L. Loeb Professor of Social Sciences and professor of economics

Charles Hallisey, John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Humanities

Joseph D. Harris, professor of mathematics

Eric J. Heller, professor of chemistry and physics

Lawrence Katz, professor of economics

Thomas A. McMahon, Gordon McKay Professor of Applied Mechanics and professor of biology (awarded posthumously)

James R. Rice, Gordon McKay Professor of Engineering Sciences and Geophysics

William Mills Todd III, Curt Hugo Reisinger Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures, professor of comparative literature, and Dean for Undergraduate Education

Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, James Duncan Phillips Professor of Early American History and director of the Charles Warren Center for Studies in American History.