Math and music scholarships for high school students
The Andrea Harvey Memorial Fund provides scholarships for college-bound high school students with financial need graduating from Cambridge Rindge and Latin School and East Boston High School.
The Andrea Harvey Memorial Scholarship rewards high-school seniors planning on pursuing a college career, often with interests in mathematics or the arts.
The Leslie and Shirley Kimbrough Memorial Scholarship rewards high-school seniors heading to college, often with a commitment to social activism.
About Andrea
Andrea Harvey was a beloved teacher, daughter, friend, vegan cook and musician.
Andrea Harvey was a twenty-eight year old who embraced every opportunity to live life to the fullest, and to improve herself and those around her. She was involved with projects that would have reorganized the school where she worked, bringing valuable lessons learned from highly successful schools abroad.
Andrea actively sought out ways to contribute to the lives of others, and did so in her community as a respected high school math teacher, a promising Masters student, an accomplished musician, artist, gourmet vegan cook, traveler, devoted daughter, loving sister, niece, granddaughter, and kind friend. She was affectionately called a Renaissance Woman by her friends, who speak of her as a person with an open and generous heart, who tolerated nearly all personal failings in others except for prejudice.
A shy toddler, she tagged after older sister Julia. In school, she found friends and the viola, which she played in church Christmas pageants and was honored to be invited to join the Greater Boston Youth Symphony. Gentle and sweet, she shocked her mother when, at her eighth grade graduation, she refused to stand and salute the flag. “She was on stage,” says Shirley. “I was horrified, which I knew she could see, but on she sat. She felt that as long as there was not liberty and justice for all she shouldn’t have to salute.” Shirley was later mollified upon discovering that Andrea had won the math award.
At Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, she excelled at math and science and toured Britain with the high school’s jazz ensemble. She began to perform regularly with various local artists, including Chances, a Cambridge reggae band. One friend describes watching a fearless Andrea drag her viola on stage during an open jazz session with professional musicians at Wally’s Club in Boston. “The musicians were all male,” said friend Lena Entin. “She looked so young and gorgeous up there, that people stopped talking to listen. After a solo marked by loud applause, Andrea grinned and hopped off the stage.”
As an undergraduate at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, Andrea majored in musical performance and minored in Spanish and Math, and began composing jazz pieces for viola, often using elements from musical traditions from around the world. After graduation she picked up a Master’s degree in Education from Simmons College and was in the process of completing her second Master’s degree in the teaching of mathematics in the Division of Continuing Education of Harvard University. She delighted her teachers there, with Professor John Boller remembering her as “terrific in class, very smart and enthusiastic.” Andrea’s mother, Shirley, recalled how Andrea loved her courses, noting, “the more challenging, the more she liked them.” In turn, saddened Harvard math preceptor Thomas Judson called her “an amazing teacher – one of the best to come through the program.”
At East Boston High School, Andrea loved seeing her students succeed. She would “do anything to help,” said 16 year old, Alma Mendoza, who had failed first term Algebra, but through Andrea’s help, earned an “A” second term. Andrea, who believed that “anything that worked for kindergarten students could also work for teens,” created lessons that combined high rigor with goofy rewards like Hello Kitty stickers, lollipops, lip balms, or especially radiant smiles. She amused her students by speaking Spanish in accents they loved to correct, and sometimes even teased them with a little Japanese.
“Andrea embraced her work with energy and passion,” said East Boston High School Headmaster Michael Rubin. “She was an outstanding teacher who cared deeply about her students.” Rubin described the school as “devastated by her death.” “I’ve been at the school twenty-seven years,” he said, “and this has been the most difficult week of my educational career.” Andrea, an active member of the school’s restructuring committee, planned and wrote grants to augment the school budget, tutored in the after-school program, and taught in summer enrichment programs. Her gifts to the school were not only academic; through weekly gatherings, festive parties, and by bringing co-workers vegan lunches, Andrea created a climate in which everyone felt welcome and colleagues became friends.
Andrea held tea parties and made sumptuous feasts for family and friends. She sent faraway friends her watercolors of guinea pigs that told zany stories about a day in her life. Her little sister Mia loved the nights Andrea shared her bed, even if it meant losing the blankets or getting tickled to the floor. After moving from home, Andrea called her mother almost daily for long chats, serious or not. She worried about sister Julia stationed in Iraq, and kept close to her through e-mail. She insisted her parents stay healthy by making them join her for long walks. She kissed her father (whom sister Julia notes she had wrapped around her little finger), teased her brothers, and entertained her friends with a sense of humor they called “quirky, silly, and profound.” Her charismatic and dazzling smile, framed by a tangle of locs, could, and did pierce hearts.
Andrea Harvey, loved and mourned by her family, is survived by her parents, Shirley and Cedric Harvey; sister Julia, a Senior Project Manager with the Army Corps of Engineers; niece, Jada Harvey; brother, Andre, a Software Engineer for Northwell Health with wife, Abigail and son, Andre, Jr. and Andrea’s sister, Mia, a Harness Design Engineer with Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab. Andrea’s older brother, Cedric Harvey, Jr.(CJ) passed away in 2014.
Memorial stone at the Garden of Peace in Boston, Massachusetts.Memorial tree and stone right next to the garden.Music room at Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School.Lecture hall at East Boston High School.Dedicated mural at East Boston High School.
About the fund
The Andrea Harvey Memorial Fund is a non-profit organization registered in the state of Massachusetts in 2005 with the mission of furthering Andrea’s lifelong work to educate and inspire others through mathematics and music.
We offer two types of scholarships for high school students in Cambridge and East Boston.
The Andrea Harvey Memorial Scholarships
Through the Andrea Harvey Memorial Scholarship Fund, we raise money to help college-bound students from two high schools achieve their dreams of furthering their education.
Eligibility Two students from East Boston High School, where Andrea taught mathematics for 5 years, will receive $1,000 towards financing their college education. The seniors must demonstrate financial need and a marked improvement in mathematics.
Two students from Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School, where Andrea attended high school, receive $1,000 towards financing their college education. The seniors must demonstrate financial need and plan on studying music.
The application is available to college-bound seniors at both East Boston High School and Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School through the scholarship office. We look forward to reading your applications!
The Leslie H. Kimbrough Memorial Scholarships
Eligibility Through the Leslie H. Kimbrough Memorial Scholarship, we raise money to help college-bound students from Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School achieve their dreams of furthering their education.
Two students from Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School, where Les was dean of students, receive $1,000 towards financing their college education. The seniors must demonstrate excellence in commitment to community and public service.
Join us in our efforts supporting students in going to college by making a donation.
Annual Walk
Andrea Harvey loved teaching, walking, food, music and people.
Each year, the Andrea Harvey Memorial Scholarship Fund organizes a 3.5-mile walk at Fresh Pond to raise funds for our scholars.
Date: April 12, 2026 Registration Opens: 7:30 AM Walk StartTime: 9:30AM Location:250 Fresh Pond Parkway, behind the Water Works Building (695 Huron Ave, Cambridge, MA). Fee: $35 (adults) Student Fee: $25 before walk, $35 day-of. Free for CRLS students under 18 who register before April 1.
If you can’t attend the walk, please consider sponsoring another walker or making a donation instead!
Donate
Help us grow the fund by donating online or by mail.
Join our effort to help college-bound students from two high schools achieve their dreams of furthering their education by making a contribution.
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Donate by mail
Donations by mail should be addressed to the Andrea Harvey Memorial Fund or to the Leslie H. Kimbrough Memorial Scholarship at:
Webster First Federal Credit Union 20 Felton St. Cambridge, MA 02138
Please include your name and address. Any notes or memories of Andrea are also welcome.
The Harvard Extension School has also established the Andrea Harvey Thesis Scholarship in her honor. That scholarship covers the cost of a master’s thesis in the Mathematics for Teaching Program.
Checks should be made out to Harvard University, in memory of Andrea Harvey.
