Vanderbilt Magazine

Sarah Vaillancourt (Photo by Kevin Richtik/Caroline Photography) Sarah Vaillancourt’s mission—to help women get the care they need—far predated her nursing degree. “I knew I wanted to work in women’s health before I knew exactly what I wanted to do or how I wanted to do it,” says Vaillancourt, who earned… Read More

Dr. W. Bedford Waters (Photo by John Russell) Dr. W. Bedford Waters, president of the Vanderbilt Medical Alumni Association and the second African American to graduate from Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, died May 25. He was 71. Waters completed his internship and one-year residency in general surgery at the… Read More

Ben Schulman (photo courtesy of Scripps MD Anderson) The vision and thoughtful generosity of Benjamin D. Schulman, who died June 2, helped Vanderbilt become a more nurturing and diverse community. Schulman, of Carlsbad, California, was 102 at the time of his death. He had returned to campus in January 2017… Read More

As Provost Susan R. Wente assumes the role of Vanderbilt’s interim chancellor, she looks to further the university’s commitment to learning, discovery and creative expression with the same drive and optimism she’s cultivated as an academic leader, scholar and mentor. Read More

The Technology Fallacy: How People Are the Real Key to Digital Transformation (2019, MIT Press) by Gerald C. Kane, Anh Nguyen Phillips, Jonathan R. Copulsky and Garth R. Andrus, EdD’88 Digital technologies are disrupting organizations of every size and shape, leaving managers scrambling to find a technology fix that… Read More

It has been an honor to serve you during these past 11 years, and to devote more than three decades of my life to an institution so capable of driving enormous change. Read More

Following the news that Chancellor Nicholas S. Zeppos plans to step down in August, many Vanderbilt alumni, parents, and supporters of the university reached out with letters of gratitude and well wishes. Below are just a few of the numerous messages received in the weeks since the announcement was made. Read More

Bernie Ellis, BA’71, heard the helicopters before he saw them. Within minutes they converged, whirring, over his blueberry farm south of Nashville, as 10 federal agents drove up in four-wheelers. The moment he had always feared had arrived: He was being raided. Read More

David Williams II was remembered as a courageous vice chancellor, outstanding athletics director, brilliant law professor, and devoted husband and father during a celebration of life service Feb. 15. Read More

Gary H. Cheek, a retired U.S. Army lieutenant general, joined Vanderbilt in April to direct the newly created Bass Military Scholars Program, established in 2018 with a $25 million gift from the Lee and Ramona Bass Foundation. Read More

When I come out to my students and colleagues as from the working class, I want to expand the idea of who or what a professor is, and I especially hope to give upwardly mobile students—those incarnations of my younger self—the example and language to find one another. Read More

President George W. Bush spent the day at Vanderbilt on March 11, surprising a history class and visiting a student veterans club before speaking to a capacity crowd at Langford Auditorium that evening. Read More

Dr. Constance Mobley is among only 14 female African American physicians in the U.S. who are abdominal transplant surgeons. She directs the surgical and liver intensive care unit for Houston Methodist Hospital. Photo by Tommy Lavergne As a molecular physiology and biophysics doctoral student at Vanderbilt, Dr. Constance Mobley… Read More

Blair’s Deanna Walker, left, welcomes to her songwriting class Claude Kelly, middle, and Chuck Harmony of the duo Louis York. Photo by Steve Green Deanna Walker was initiated into the world of hit Nashville songwriting in the usual way. She suffered a broken heart. In the 1990s,… Read More

Melissa Scrivner Love. Photo by Becca Murray Like many children who grew up in the 1980s, Melissa Scrivner Love, BA’02, was raised on James Bond films. That cinematic introduction to the KGB led her to double major in Russian and theater, and to consider two possible career paths: working… Read More

Just in time for the debut of a new television series this year on NBC exploring the Gilded Age, Cecelia Tichi, the Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor of English, has published her latest book, What Would Mrs. Astor Do? (2018, NYU Press). Read More

Chancellor Nicholas S. Zeppos has announced that he will step down as the university’s eighth chancellor Aug. 15 after more than a decade in the role. Read More

Whether vying for gold at the Olympic Games alongside the world’s best slalom kayakers or helping lead the Clinton Climate Initiative to create a global consortium of cities focused on sustainability, Muller can trace the trajectory of his life’s work and passions back to formative experiences at the David Williams II Student Recreation and Wellness Center. Read More

Toren Stafford, a 20-year-old sophomore studying voice at Blair School of Music, staged a “Tiny Dorm Concert” in Vanderbilt’s Morgan House in March. Read More

Horrocks found a home with Vanderbilt women’s basketball, but it was her academic journey at the university that sparked a potential career path in LGBTQ+ advocacy. Read More