The Harvard Crimson and The Boston Globe are reporting this morning that Drew Gilpin Faust will be named this weekend as the next president of the university. Both newspapers, citing anonymous sources, said the university’s Board of Overseers had scheduled a special meeting for Sunday, when Ms. Faust’s appointment will be formalized. Ms. Faust, who is dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, became the front-runner last week, when Thomas R. Cech, another leading candidate, withdrew.

Ms. Faust, 59, is a historian of the Civil War era and of the South, and she taught at the University of Pennsylvania for 25 years before moving to Harvard. She is a popular internal candidate, regarded as someone who values and can build consensus, although the Radcliffe Institute is the largest academic unit she has ever led. She would succeed Lawrence H. Summers, who resigned nearly a year ago after an epic battle with the Harvard faculty. Derek C. Bok, a long-serving former president, has served as interim president ever since.