The Vanderbilt Story

Looking back, I wonder whether we should have been in class that morning. It was just before lunch, and I had already missed a few that semester—classes, never lunch—as, unfortunately, my first midterm grades attested. From our residence in Dyer Hall, the path to food at Sarratt took me and… Read More

A shark attack leads to a collaboration that could transform the lives of amputees This is the last snapshot taken of Craig Hutto before a shark attack claimed his leg on June 27, 2005. Photo provided by Craig Hutto It was an overcast June morning at Cap San Blas, Fla.,… Read More

Frank Wcislo examines how we consider Russia and its leaders two decades after the Cold War           Frank Wcislo, associate professor of history (John Russell/Vanderbilt)         As Soviet Russia disintegrated in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Frank Wcislo and other… Read More

See why some of country music’s biggest stars are lending their talents to a special Vanderbilt camp. Plus, how a Vandy professor is personally tied to the Atlantis space mission, and fixing what U2 left behind! Read more about music’s healing power in Vanderbilt Medicine. [vucastblurb]… Read More

On any given day, Jenny Plume can be seen pushing her instrument-laden, two-tiered cart through the hallways of the Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt. Her arrival onto patient floors is a welcome sight to staff and parents alike. Plume’s instruments often offer a remedy for what is ailing… Read More

When the United States declared a “War on Cancer” 40 years ago, the endeavor was envisioned as a strategic battle, with doctors and researchers employing overwhelming force and lethal technology in a straightforward march to victory against a disease that claimed millions of lives. Scientists have made progress in the… Read More

You could say Earth and Environmental Sciences and Philosophy double major Grace Loy spends her days playing in a sandbox. But this undergrad is working on collaboration with one of Vanderbilt’s top researchers that could make a dramatic difference. Read More

Sometimes business mixed with compassion can help those who need help the most. See what a group of Vanderbilt engineering undergrads and Vanderbilt Owen Graduate School of Management MBA students built to help those at the bottom of the financial pyramid. Read More

Former linebacker Shelton Quarles coordinates pro scouting for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Shaiza Rizavi is a New York portfolio manager who previously worked in international aid and development. Entrepreneur Jeremy Werthan runs a granite company in his native Nashville. Ryan Pickens teaches business at a small liberal arts college in… Read More

A couple of hours south of Nashville lies a place inhabited by manned rockets and moon rocks that gives witness to America’s stellar past and beckons young and old to come and contribute to its future. It is the U.S. Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama’s No.1 tourist attraction,… Read More

The abbreviated lives of Emily, BS’03, MEd’05, and Lauren Failla, BS’07, bear witness on an all-too-personal basis that out of tragedy comes triumph. The sisters, alumnae of Peabody’s human and organizational development program, died in tragic accidents, four years and half a world apart from each other. Their lives are… Read More

Good teaching and basic science breakthroughs would not be possible without institutions such as Vanderbilt, says Patrick Abbot, associate professor of biological sciences. Professors, in turn, understand the critical need to “participate in the maintenance and improvement of these institutions.” That’s where service, such as editing journals, jurying research or… Read More

On a chilly Friday night last November, the area underneath the wide expanse of the Jefferson Street Bridge in downtown Nashville became a scene of rare opportunity for the city’s homeless. The Salvation Army Soup Wagon was there, as could be expected, but some friends had joined them. A foldout… Read More

Graduates Shannon Hoffman, Nehal Mehta and Karen White come from different backgrounds and have different interests, but each will use their significant talents and valuable lessons learned at Vanderbilt to affect change in the world. Read More

Vanderbilt Divinity School Dean James Hudnut-Beumler takes heart in the fact that when times are tough, his graduates offer comfort and guidance to an ailing world. Read More

Psychology professor Isabel Gauthier, an expert in the science of face recognition, relishes the process of discovery – and mentoring graduate students along the way. Read More

Kristen Keely-Dinger, BS’98, remembers March snow falling on the streets of New York, the sounds of babies crying and people screaming, and the stench of urine in the housing projects as she carried hot meals up flight after flight of stairs. As a Vanderbilt sophomore who had signed up for… Read More

My study-abroad experience began much like anyone else’s. I spent months preparing personal statements, making travel plans, and preparing for the cultural transition. I would be Vanderbilt’s first, and only, student participating in an Arabic-language study-abroad program at the American University in Cairo, a premier university renowned throughout the Middle… Read More

In the days before bank failures, stock-market tumbles and worldwide economic malaise, a college diploma—especially one from a top university like Vanderbilt—was a one-way ticket to financial security. These days, however, graduates are faced with less-than-certain job prospects. America’s 50 million Millennials represent the most educated generation ever, but they… Read More

For 10 years Janice Dalton worked as a renal transplant/dialysis nurse at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. In 2003, at the age of 54, she was diagnosed with renal failure, placed on dialysis and told she would need a kidney transplant. The tables had turned. Despite years taking care of patients,… Read More