Harvard Boas Scholars » News

Testimonial from Clara von Thüngen-Reichenbach

admin — Tue, 11 Jun 2019 22:59:08 +0000

Born to a Belgian diplomat and a German artist, I led a nomadic childhood in Brussels, New York, Moscow, and Rome. Along the way, I acquired proficiency in English, Flemish, German, Italian and French. After a year abroad on Erasmus at the University of Regensburg in Germany, I returned to England to complete the final year of an undergraduate law degree at the University of Cambridge.

After having studied English common law, German law and European Union law, I am eager to learn more about the U.S. legal system in order to round off a truly international legal education. It is this international upbringing that has fuelled my interest in the intra-State dimension, especially cross-border negotiation, litigation, and arbitration between States. I am very grateful to the Boas program for enabling me to pursue my graduate studies at Harvard and thereby to specialize in both Public and Private International Law, as well as to gain deeper insight into the U.S. common law.
I thoroughly enjoy oral advocacy and thus look forward to the Harvard Socratic teaching method and to getting involved in student advocacy societies, such as Human Rights advocacy groups and mooting clubs. Beyond academics, Harvard also provides the ideal environment for fostering discussions among renowned experts and enthusiastic students from across the globe. It is with great pride that I walk in the footsteps of past Boas scholars and look forward to being part of the creation of a new future.

Testimonial from Richard Steppe, LL.M. ‘18

admin — Sun, 10 Jun 2018 13:02:26 +0000

A few weeks ago, I completed an LL.M. degree (Master of Laws) at Harvard Law School. The year has passed surprisingly quickly, yet it was memorable at each step of the way. With 65 countries represented in the LL.M. class (and many other programs and schools within close reach), engaging with bright legal minds from a wide variety of backgrounds has never been easier or more exciting. HLS offers over 400 thought-provoking courses, seminars, and reading groups, with more than half of those hosting fewer than 25 enrolled students. This framework catalyzed many fascinating classroom discussions and collaborations, allowing participants to fully experience the US methods of legal analysis and teaching. In addition, the facilities on campus, as provided by, e.g., the HLS Library, Graduate Program, or Dean of Students Office, were truly impressive; and the world-renowned professors nothing short of excellent.
The courses I opted for related mostly to antitrust and intellectual property law or had a significant skills-oriented dimension, the latter in the form of collaborative seminars or courses on non-legal analytical methods. In addition, my year at HLS was filled with extracurricular activities. As the President of the Harvard European Law Association (HELA), I worked closely with faculty members, scholars, and associations at Harvard and beyond. Under the auspices of HELA, we organized a dozen lunch talks as well as the 2018 Harvard European Law Symposium, the latter exploring the topic of isolationism in the US and Europe by hosting a variety of speakers from both sides of the Atlantic, such as international academics, supreme court judges, policymakers, lobbyists, attorneys, and enforcement officers (among which various previous Fulbright scholars). Furthermore, as a Submissions Editor at the Harvard Business Law Review and a Submissions Committee Member at the Harvard Journal of Law & Technology, I helped assessing the academic quality and fitness for publication of contributions submitted to both law journals.
The above mentioned endeavors comprised an excellent opportunity to get to know and collaborate with many talented people, not only from the pool of LL.M. candidates but also from the J.D. program, different schools at Harvard, and universities in Boston and New York. Being able to befriend such a terrific ensemble of Americans and internationals, whether it be in the context of HLS (extra)curricular activities, various travels across the US, the Fulbright Gateway Orientation, or the Boston nightlife, was an incredible privilege for which I will always remain grateful.
Since graduation, I have been working as a Visiting Researcher at HLS to further develop a paper into publishable scholarship. Upon my return to Belgium, I will resume activities as a Ph.D. Fellow of the Research Foundation Flanders and Teaching Assistant at the KU Leuven, Faculty of Law. Looking back, the experience at Harvard has been life-changing on diverse personal, academic, and professional levels. In that context, it would be difficult to overestimate the tremendous support provided by the Frank Boas Scholarship for Graduate Studies in realizing this objective. In a time where international mutual understanding and cooperation are highly relevant and important, the Frank Boas Scholarship enables students from a broad spectrum of disciplines to engage in an enriching experience at Harvard and to interact with a community of talented scholars from across the globe. I am truly grateful to form part of the Boas family and will work to also help future students obtain the opportunities essential to fulfilling their aspirations, opportunities which have been provided to me so generously by the Frank Boas program.

The new Boas Scholars introduce themselves! – Tom Vos

admin — Thu, 07 Jun 2018 13:09:28 +0000

I am currently a PhD Candidate at the KU Leuven (Belgium). I also did the research master in law at the KU Leuven, where I specialized in business law and tax law. Currently, my research is in the field of corporate law, and more specifically about the protection of shareholder against dilution when corporations issue shares to investors. In my research, I compare the law in Belgium, the United Kingdom and the United States. This was also one of the main reason for enrolling in the LL.M. program at Harvard Law School, to learn more about corporate law in the United States.
Since my studies, I have also been interested in negotiation and I founded a student association about negotiation. Nowadays, I regularly teach students about negotiation and mediation. As Harvard has been described as the “birthplace of negotiation theory”, I am very enthusiastic about learning more about negotiation during my time at Harvard.
In my spare time, I like reading, traveling and playing guitar. I have always been fascinated by American music and literature, and I am very excited about discovering more about the United States during my LL.M next academic year and during my travels in this period.

The new Boas Scholars introduce themselves! – Laurens De Poorter

admin — Thu, 07 Jun 2018 13:08:24 +0000

I am part of the MBA Class of 2020 at Harvard Business School. I was born and raised close to Antwerp, Belgium. Even as a child, I was fascinated how technology had such a big positive impact in our world. After finishing my secondary education in Mathematics and Sciences at Sint-Jan Berchmanscollege in West-Malle, I commenced my engineering studies at KU Leuven. By studying to be an engineer, I wanted to make my own contribution to a better world.
In the summer after my Bachelor studies, I went to Peru to build a wind turbine to provide electricity to a local school. During this life-changing experience I realized that if you combine technology with a profitable business model, you can scale and have a much larger impact. I became a strong advocate of social entrepreneurship in which business is used to address one of society’s social challenges.
Immediately after my exchange year at Imperial College London, I founded Academics For Development (AFD) in Leuven. AFD is a student-led non-profit organization that allows students to help social entrepreneurs in developing countries start or grow their social businesses. The novel concept attracted large interest from students and academic institutions as well as social entrepreneurs and non-profits. Today, our organization has expanded to Louvain-La-Neuve (Belgium), Utrecht (Netherlands) and Stellenbosch (South-Africa). In total, more than 150 university students have worked on more than 35 projects across Africa, Asia and South-America.
After working as a management consultant for the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) for almost 4 years to hone my business skills, I will now start my MBA at Harvard Business School (HBS). In parallel to pushing the growth of AFD to the next level and expanding the organization to North-America, I would like to explore further opportunities to leverage business and technology in order to – and fully in line with HBS’s mission – become a leader who makes a difference in the world. To get there, I hope to build upon the solid academic foundation in business, as well as the entrepreneurial eco-system, resources and network of HBS and the wider Harvard community.
In my leisure time, I love sailing and kitesurfing in summer and skiing in winter. I am an avid traveler, and hope the move to Boston will enable me to explore more of the Americas – both up North as well as down South. Finally, I am a true bon vivant when it comes to food and drinks, and enjoy spending my time with friends and family.

The new Boas Scholars introduce themselves! – Friso Bostoen

admin — Thu, 07 Jun 2018 13:06:45 +0000

I feel immensely privileged to be a part of Harvard’s LL.M. class of 2019 as a Boas scholar. I obtained my initial master’s degree at KU Leuven in 2016 and started working as a Ph.D. researcher at my alma mater immediately afterwards. My research focuses on the application of antitrust law to online platforms (such as Google, Amazon, and Facebook). While my enthusiasm for law and technology will be duly reflected in my course schedule, I equally look forward to gaining broader perspectives on the U.S. legal system. During my year in Cambridge, I also hope to explore more of the fascinating country that is the United States.

The new Boas Scholars introduce themselves! – Bram Devolder

admin — Thu, 07 Jun 2018 13:05:23 +0000

After obtaining my law degree at Ghent University in 2015, I became a teaching assistant at KU Leuven (Centre for Methodology of Law) and started my doctoral research on regulatory disruption by the sharing economy under the supervision of Dean Bernard Tilleman. The focal point of my research is situated on the interface between contract law, economic regulation, law and technology, and law and economics. By pursuing an LL.M. degree at Harvard Law School, I aim to take my research to a higher level through increased knowledge of the U.S. legal system and improved skills in legal methodology. Being submerged in the profound interdisciplinarity of scholarship at Harvard will help me to become a more mature legal scholar.
Having read the testimonials of past BOAS scholars, I am convinced that spending an academic year in Cambridge is about much more than taking courses in my area of interest. Harvard is well-renowned for its social events, such as daily lunch seminars where influential scholars from around the world discuss their latest research results. I look forward to discussing preliminary ideas with renowned experts and meeting international students and scholars with similar interests in the implications of technology for law and society. It would be an honor if I could make a humble contribution to the intellectual and social life at Harvard Law School.
I am very grateful for the opportunity to pursue graduate studies at Harvard with the support of the Boas program. It is both an enormous privilege and an astounding responsibility to join the impressive family of Boas scholars. I have the ambition to make a difference in the world by giving back to society, and hope to live up to the examples set by past Boas scholars.