Issues

Never underestimate the power of a good dose of outrage. About 12 years ago Chris Barbic got angry–really angry. In 1992 Barbic had graduated from Vanderbilt and signed on through Teach for America as a sixth-grade math teacher in the Houston inner-city schools. Finding the experience rewarding, he decided… Read More

Photo by Steve Green For children ages 1 to 4, the Susan Gray School provides intimate classes where typically developing children learn, play and grow alongside children with special needs. The education and environment at SGS are acceptance-based and allow children at all levels of physical and social development… Read More

I was born in Trinidad, educated in England, and moved to Nashville in 2002 to teach history at Vanderbilt. My research focuses on African Americans in the Atlantic world of the 19th century. Wherever I live, I also try to do a bit of research into local history. My… Read More

Elyn Saks feels right at home on the University of Southern California campus. There is something about the leafy-green trees and ivy-covered walls, the slate-roofed buildings, and the perpetual warmth of the California climate that has put her at ease almost from the start. But even here in… Read More

Few people have a greater impact on Vanderbilt than the person who manages the university’s $3.5 billion endowment. Last summer Philadelphia native Matthew Wright, then just 39, left his position as director of investments at Emory University to become vice chancellor for investments at Vanderbilt, succeeding Bill Spitz, who… Read More

Illustrations by Hal Mayforth In 1959 renowned Caltech physicist Richard Feynman pondered the possibilities of just how small technology could get in his seminal lecture, “There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom.” He foresaw a world of extremely small machines manufactured at the atomic scale–from the bottom up–by direct… Read More

Call them “the disappeared.” Last year 1.2 million American students dropped out of high school without receiving their diplomas. Only they didn’t really disappear. According to “The Silent Epidemic,” a recent study by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, many of them joined the ranks of the unemployed… Read More

There was a time in the not-toodistant past when educators viewed pencils with erasers as crutches for lazy students. In the following years, other advancements like calculators and spellcheck raised similar concerns. Now a new trend has found its way from the Web into the classroom. Call it “webspeak”or… Read More

It’s easy to imagine that crossword puzzles have existed for centuries–that they were an amusing diversion for crusading knights or monks killing time between illuminating manuscripts. But they’ve been around for less than a century, having first appeared in the New York World in 1913.What started as a fad… Read More

Richard Hull, BA’92, is executive producer of the film Daddy Day Camp, starring Cuba Gooding Jr. The film was released Aug. 8. Hull’s previous films include the teen hit She’s All That. Patrick Alexander, BS’00, has won the 2007 Student Academy Award given by the Academy of Motion Picture… Read More

The 1968 Democratic National Convention was an iconic event in American history. Young Vietnam War protestors clashed with Chicago police while millions witnessed their battles on live television. Eight protestors were tried for conspiracy in a circus-like atmosphere. A new film about the event, associate produced by… Read More

Musical explorers the Kronos Quartet will take the stage at Ingram Hall on March 14, 2008, at 8 p.m. as part of Vanderbilt’s Great Performances series to perform Sun Rings, an evening-length, multimedia work in 10 movements that will feature choirs from the Blair School of Music. The piece,… Read More

During a three-hour session on the changing relationships between audiences and the arts, approximately 700 attendees of the American Symphony Orchestra League’s conference in Nashville in June were encouraged to blog–right then and there–about what they were hearing. Bill Ivey and Steven Tepper, director and associate director, respectively, of the… Read More

Visual Arts At first glance, the basement of Sylvia Hyman’s home looks much like any other clay artist’s studio. A shelf running along the wall holds jar after jar of oxides, silicates, fluxes and other materials used in the preparation of ceramic glazes. A large kiln sits in one… Read More

Their Own Receive Them Not: African American Lesbians and Gays in Black Churches(Pilgrim Press) by Horace L.Griffin, MA’93, PhD’95. “Their Own Receive Them Not cuts through the Gordian knot of homophobia in the Black Church with compelling, substantive arguments,” comments Sylvia Rhue, director of religious affairs and… Read More

In hip-hop music and videos, young black women are consistently portrayed as sexually insatiable vixens willing to debase themselves for the privilege of even the shortest ride on the music industry party train. Despite the lack of respect, young black women play an enthusiastic part in hiphop culture, as… Read More

The toddler entertainment market has exploded in recent years: Infants, toddlers and preschoolers in the United States watch an average of one to three hours of video media and television programming per day. But new research suggests parents should choose videos with high interactive content if they want their… Read More

Illegal immigration is hurting African Americans, according to research by a Vanderbilt professor of law and political science. In Debating Immigration, a book of essays that Carol Swain edited and contributed to, she says African Americans are losing more jobs to illegal immigrants than other racial or ethnic groups;… Read More

Women who undergo breast augmentation surgery are nearly three times as likely to commit suicide, according to a study published in the August issue of Annals of Plastic Surgery. This research confirms previously seen links between breast implants and a high risk of suicide, as well as deaths from alcohol… Read More

Winnter Reynolds may have within her body a clue to the legendary Hatfield- McCoy feud. The 11-year-old is a descendant of McCoys who harken from West Virginia and are, according to her grandmother, Goldie, kin to the family known for its long-running clash with the Hatfield family. Winnter… Read More