The vanilla-colored table tents perched atop the dining hall tables do not dispense information on the fat content or sodium intake of your food. Rather, they feature black scientists such as Jan Ernst Matzeliger, George Washington Carver and Mae Jemison--the second installment of black scientists to be featured this month on the table tents created by the Harvard Society of Black Scientists and Engineers (HSBSE) in celebration of February's Black History Month.

Matzeliger was a black inventor who invented a machine to mass-manufacture shoes in 1883; Carver invented hundreds of food products, including peanut butter; and Jemison became the first woman of color to go into space in 1992.

According to HSBSE President Charrise M. Barron '98, the organization's goal is to increase awareness in the Harvard community of the achievements black people have made in the fields of science and engineering throughout history.

HSBSE printed up more than 1,000 table tents for the eight undergraduate houses that would accept them. Barron said Eliot, Kirkland, Quincy, Lowell and Annenberg did not accept bulletins of any sort on their dining hall tables.

New table tents are created weekly so three new scientists can be profiled each week. Last week, when the table tents first went up, they featured Madame C. J. Walker, a hair-care product inventor who became a self-made millionaire; Edward A. Bouchet, the first African-American to receive a doctorate from an American university with his physics Ph.D. from Yale; and Granvile T. Woods, who invented the steam boiler furnace and an automatic air brake used to stop trains.

"The month of February is a perfect time to illustrate some of the successes of black people in the sciences," Barron said. "We wanted to set up table tents in order to educate the Harvard community concerning themajor accomplishments that black people have madein the sciences, as well as [to educate] otherblack people who might not realize that we havemade such positive impacts on modern society."

The number of black science concentrators atHarvard is a fraction of the black student body,which itself makes up only 8 percent of the totalundergraduate population.

Despite the relatively small black sciencepopulation, however, HSBSE has assisted inincreasing the visibility of black scienceconcentrators on campus.

Barron says HSBSE serves as an organization inwhich black science and engineering concentratorscan be visible and active. "The purpose of HSBSEis to help black students in the sciences atHarvard to succeed academically andprofessionally," she says. "The organizationallows students with similar interests to meeteach other, lend advice about classes and jobs andto serve as an influence to younger blackstudents."

The membership of HSBSE includes concentratorsin various science fields, ranging fromneurobiology to electrical engineering. Many ofthe students said that black role models in thesciences greatly influenced their decisions toconcentrate in a scientific field at college.

"In high school, I did a summer program at NASAand worked with a black female electricalengineer," says Chaundra C. King '99, the onlyblack female electrical engineering concentratorin her year. "It looked like a good career forme."

"I saw her as a role model," King says. "Shewas the only black person in her group, and I wasable to relate to her."

Jaime A. Williams '01 agrees that it isimportant to have role models with whom one canidentify. Williams, a mechanical engineeringconcentrator, says he considers the time he spentwith his best friend's father, an electricalengineer who is black, to have made "the biggestimpact" on his decision to study engineering atHarvard.

"I was around my best friend's father a lot,"Williams says. "I became interested in computers,and I've always liked science. Now I am very eagerto jump into my engineering classes."

LaTanya N. James '99, a cognitive neuroscienceconcentrator, said she has been interested inscience for as long as she can remember. "Sciencehas always been an area of interest to me, andI've wanted to continue studying it," she says.

Although James says he is passionate aboutscience, she is not a member of HSBSE. HSBSE VicePresident Oni J. Blackstock '99 said that althoughHSBSE is open to all black science concentrators,the majority of black students in the sciences donot belong to the organization.