Toward a More Perfect Union

America is in need of marriage counseling. Enter Bill Doherty, a couples therapist for some 40 years — but over the past eight, he’s taken on a new type of client.

Categories: Community Impact


Molly vs. Dyslexia

“When I was a kid, my dyslexia was something that I really did not like about myself,” says alum Krista Weltner. “ I hope that these books will help children who are going through it right now.”

Categories: Arts, Community Impact


A Save for LiveSafe

Capt. Justin Gilbert believed the new LiveSafe app offered by the UConn Police Department could be a potential lifesaver for students — if only they knew about it.

Categories: Community Impact


On the Money

Janet Yellen and Lynn Malerba ’08 MPA make history as the first female Treasury Secretary and first Indigenous U.S. Treasurer with their signatures on the currency.

Categories: Community Impact


The U.S. Treasurer

Grad student Sage Phillips ’22 (CLAS), ’24 MA in conversation with Lynn Malerba ’08 MPA on Malerba’s roles as Treasurer, Chief, and Mom.

Categories: Community Impact


Mary Estella Sprague

She was the first woman to serve as the dean of an academic department at UConn, overseeing the Division of Home Economics from 1920 to 1926.

Categories: Community Impact


For Mom

In the wake of a tragic loss, Ryan Matthews ’09 (CLAS), ’16 MPA started The Susie Foundation, a nonprofit that supports families caring for relatives with ALS.

Categories: Community Impact


Billion Dollar Bailey

Behind business supernova Trisha Bailey is a “deeply disturbing” story that shaped her into the resilient, generous individual she is today.

Categories: Community Impact


Accessible Playground

Making Good Accessible Playground Sarah Grossman (far left) during the ribbon cutting ceremony for the opening of the accessible playground. When physical therapist Sarah Grossman ’81 (CAHNR) started the school year in the Chimacum, Washington, school district six years ago, she discovered she had three preschool children on her caseload who couldn’t walk. The school’s […]

Categories: Community Impact


Hey Girl 

Listening to music from her youth — Spice Girls, anyone? — transports Maldonado to the headspace of her semi-autobiographical, young adult heroines.

Categories: Community Impact


Road Eats 

When this Ph.D. student isn’t working in a genomics lab, he’s biking — and finding some truly wild things on the side of the road. (And, often, eating them!)

Categories: Community Impact


Lubbie Harper Jr.

The third African American to serve as a Justice of the Connecticut Supreme Court, Justice Harper cast the deciding vote to legalize same-sex marriage in the state.

Categories: Community Impact


Rescue Mission

Kinesiology alum Yuri Hosokawa ’16 (CAHNR) uses methods she learned at UConn to train the Japan Coast Guard.

Categories: Community Impact


Our Librarian

Edwina Whitney (1868–1970) was the second and longest-serving head librarian at UConn, then Connecticut Agricultural College. Hired in 1900, she first worked in a cramped two-room library lit by kerosene lamps.


G-Man: Frank Figliuzzi’s FBI Story

Frank Figliuzzi ’87 JD, host of the podcast “The Bureau with Frank Figliuzzi,” MSNBC analyst, and author of “The FBI Way,” maintains a “fidelity, bravery, integrity” mission despite retirement.

Categories: Community Impact


Leo Can Handle It

From behind the wheel of a stretch, Leo Lachut ’89 (CLAS) has seen a lot of things. While abiding by the “limo code,” UConn’s director of Academic Support shares a few favorite stories.


The Stigma Buster

UConn policy practice Master of Social Work graduate, Amanda Brenner’s work on mental health policy, is an extremely personal mission — she’s hoping her lived experience can give others hope.

Categories: Community Impact


“There Was Suddenly a Fatwa on my Head”

For reporting on terrorism, extremism, and atrocities against women in her country, Marvi Sirmed found herself under the most serious of death threats. The Pakistani journalist found the freedom to live — and to work and teach — at UConn.

Categories: Community Impact


So Handsome

When LaShawnda Phillips (RHSA ’20, CAHNR ’22) first moved to her neighborhood in Hartford at age 13, she set out to do some exploring. She found horses.

Categories: Community Impact


Keep the Change

Dennis Pierce ’15 MBA never got the memo about how humans tend to be change averse. During his 34-year tenure at UConn Dining Services the recently retired Pierce created a culture of change.

Categories: Community Impact, Food


Call Cowen!

The more extraordinary the challenge, the more likely UConn Distinguished Alumnus Scott Cowen will be asked to help.

Categories: Community Impact


Love, Life, and the Miracle Movies of Oscar Guerra

Emmy Award–winning filmmaker Oscar Guerra wants to have a conversation about immigration. Not a policy debate or a campaign rally or, god forbid, a made-for-cable screaming match. But an honest and open talk about what it means to be a working-class Latinx immigrant in America in the 21st century.

Categories: Arts, Community Impact


Rise Up

A sociology graduate, Larkin-Wells honed her abilities as a breadmaker through UConn’s Sustainable Community Food Systems minor — a unique and intensive interdisciplinary program that combines theory and practice through service learning and hands-on experience with community partners.

Categories: Community Impact


3,081 Miles

After Hannah Bacon ’15 (CLAS) lost her job at an environmental nonprofit due to the pandemic, she decided to use her time off to walk across the country to raise money and awareness for climate action.

Categories: Community Impact


Say it With a T-shirt

Former Husky baller Chris Smith ’92 (BUS), far right, gathered current basketball players to help Foodshare’s Jason Jakubowski ’99 (CLAS), ’01 MPA, center.

Categories: Community Impact


TKD for ASD

Taekwondo master Daniel Andrew Chasse ’85 (SFA) teaches classes designed for kids with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD).

Categories: Community Impact


Monopoly Busters

Daniel Hanley ’12 (BUS), ’19 JD and Jackie Filson ’16 (CLAS) lead a growing anti-monopoly movement at the Open Markets Institute in D.C.

Categories: Community Impact


Si Se Puede

This extraordinary class of seniors (and near-seniors) had already weathered a number of major storms before the pandemic hit.

Categories: Community Impact


In Fashion

Ahmed Diakhate ’23 (BUS) created and donated 250 face masks to frontline health care workers.

Categories: Community Impact


Local Hero

Louis Goffinet ’17 (CLAS) offered in a Facebook post to shop for elderly neighbors. Two months later he was still shopping, and overseeing a $30,000 Neighbors Grocery Fund.

Categories: Community Impact


Our Defining Moments

These Huskies — students, staff, professors, doctors, nurses, and graduates new and old —are finding innovative ways to help us all navigate a global pandemic.

Categories: Community Impact, Health


Genetics for Justice

Anthropology professor Deborah Bolnick analyzes ancient DNA in a state-of-the-art Clean Lab in Storrs where her work is, among other things, helping to shed light on Native American histories.

Categories: Community Impact, Health


The Isis Terminator

“The intellectual rigor at UConn, in the political science program, really prepared me for everything from the Supreme Court to the White House to building up one of the largest counterterror coalitions in the world,” says Brett McGurk ’96 (CLAS).

Categories: Community Impact


100 and Counting

Still practicing law at 100 years old, Morton Katz ’39 (CLAS) ’51 JD has worked as a special public defender at Hartford Superior Court for the past 20 years.

Categories: Community Impact


The Husky Ticket Project

Despite living in New York City for the past five years, true fans Kevin Solomon ’14 (BUS), Jeremy Longobardi ’12 (BUS), and Kevin Kortsep ’12 (BUS) have made it a mission to keep supporting UConn Nation.


Chris Murphy Walks the Walk

“It’s become Forrest Gumpish, because you can find me if you follow social media, so people come and join.” says Sen. Chris Murphy ’01 JD of his summer walks across Connecticut.

Categories: Community Impact


Team Impact

This national nonprofit matches children with serious and chronic illnesses with college athletic teams. UConn has the most pairings of any Division 1 school in the country.

Categories: Community Impact


#OneUConn

On Campus #OneUConn At convocation, freshmen wore shirts with “#oneuconn” on the front and on the back this Nelson Mandela quote: No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can […]