The Vanderbilt Story

By day, her world is black and white—debits and credits, columns in a spreadsheet, numbers in a row. But by night Debra Jeter’s world is sepia-toned and dreamlike, as she weaves words into short stories, screenplays and novels that draw on her life as a child in rural Kentucky.  … Read More

Craig Lewis has a secret identity. Students and fellow Owen faculty know him as the Madison S. Wigginton Chair of Management and a finance professor. His colleagues at the Security Exchange Commission in Washington, D.C., know him as the SEC’s chief economist. And his family knows him as husband and… Read More

Growing up in Bogotá, Colombia, Miguel Palacios never set out to be a competitive water-skier. But Columbia’s warm, year-round climate makes water activities popular. One summer, 7-year-old Miguel went with his father to a nearby sports club and signed up for a water-skiing lesson. Before long, he was skimming across… Read More

“I have seen many wonderful changes at Peabody during my tenure, but thankfully there are key core values that have not changed,” says Kathy Hoover-Dempsey. Read More

In this week’s VUCast: See a baby’s life-changing surgery before he’s even born! A former senator and Vandy grad shares important pieces of history. See a hot weather homerun All this and more in this week’s VUCast, Vanderbilt’s online newscast. Watch now. [vucastblurb]… Read More

Frustrated with school options for her son with autism, Helen Leonard, BS’91, created a school of her own. The light-filled classrooms of The Paragon School in Orlando, Fla., provide everything that this mother ever hoped for in an academic environment for her son. That’s because she created it. Read More

Mark Schoenfield, Ph.D., chair of Vanderbilt’s Department of English, and his family were a little behind schedule a few weeks ago as they prepared to drive from their home in Hillsboro Village to the airport. Read More

The man the crowd knows as Deacon from the popular television show Nashville takes the stage at the Grand Ole Opry to screams of recognition. He starts with a sensitive ballad, and women of all ages stream past the lip of the stage and take his photo before being urged by ushers… Read More

You never know where a blind ad will lead you. It led Tim Murray from Knoxville, Tenn., to the Kingdom of Bahrain in the Middle East. Murray is CEO of Aluminium Bahrain (Alba), one of the world’s top 10 aluminium producers. He joined Alba in 2007 as general manager of finance after… Read More

See how a musical pacifier teaches preemies a life-saving skill Why this awesome “kid president” is spending so much time at Vanderbilt Hear the Vandy student wowing judges on America’s Got Talent All this and more in this week’s VUCast, Vanderbilt’s online newscast. Watch now. Read More

In this week’s VUCast: Bionic Breakthrough: See advances in this robotic hand What Vandy doctors are doing with the military to avoid amputations See a special view of Commodore baseball All this and more in this week’s VUCast, Vanderbilt’s online newscast. Watch now. [vucastblurb]… Read More

Deena Dill is probably one in a million—a busy actress and producer who’d rather work light-hearted sitcoms and game shows than become the next Meryl Streep. “Game shows are certainly not a niche most people in the industry gravitate toward, but it’s what I like,” she says. “I don’t know… Read More

During a 1997 summer internship, Vanderbilt mechanical engineering student Kofi Dadzie had a brilliant idea: Enormous opportunities awaited someone who could bring a combination of business principles and information technology to his homeland, Ghana. Read More

Thirty years ago John Elkington stood near the Mississippi River and looked east down historic Beale Street. The legendary jazz district, where blues pioneers W.C. Handy, Muddy Waters and B.B. King once played uniquely American music, resembled a war zone. The iconic area had become a wasteland of abandoned and… Read More

Lu Zeph believes people with disabilities have both a civil and a human right to develop their abilities in an inclusive community. “The disability rights movement is rooted in the Civil Rights Movement,” she states. Both faced similar opposition, she says, and both have advanced society. Read More

In December 2010, a relatively unknown Maryland assistant football coach named James Franklin arrived in Nashville to occupy a hot seat that had scorched a long list of more seasoned men—that of Vanderbilt University’s head football coach. Read More

“It is often said that Africans excel in relationships. I have discovered over the past two years that it is true. I cherish the relationships that are slowly building here in Kijabe; I feel a part of the staff now, and we have a wonderful time talking, teasing, swapping Swahili…It… Read More

Graduates laughed, cried and left as Vanderbilt alums for life. Re-live Commencement 2013. [vucastblurb]… Read More

See how a student is saving young women from violence one download at a time. Music therapy hits the big time. Hear stars sing young patients’ songs. How hard does the football… Read More

Heartfelt songs penned by a group of patients of Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt while working with their music therapist are being released May 14 worldwide on a compilation CD featuring some of Nashville’s top recording stars. Read More