Alumni
-
Six recognized with 2025 Vanderbilt alumni awards
The Vanderbilt Alumni Association Board has announced the 2025 recipients of its annual alumni awards. The honorees will be celebrated during Reunion and Homecoming Weekend Nov. 6–9. Read MoreMay 28, 2025
-
No Limits: Together, We Achieve Even More
Excellence, the first principle set forth in the updated Code of Bylaws approved by Vanderbilt’s Board of Trust, along with our other two guiding principles—academic freedom and free expression, and growth and development—drives our core purpose: to provide transformative education and pathbreaking research. It is our foremost commitment and our steadfast promise in all that we do. Read MoreMay 22, 2025
-
A North Star: Alumni Remember Dean K.C. Potter in Their Own Words
Alumni remember K.C. Potter, emeritus dean of residential and judicial affairs, in their own words Read MoreMay 21, 2025
-
Chosen by You: Vanderbilt’s Most Instagrammable Spots
Vanderbilt's social media community tells us their favorite places on campus to snap pictures. Read MoreMay 20, 2025
-
From Anger to Advocacy: Robby Barbieri, BA’13, MSF’14
After a car accident in 2022 forever altered Robby Barbieri's life, he refused to let anyone take his future. In fact, he worked to change countless lives for the better in his adopted home state by advocating for legislation that allows thousands of Tennesseans with disabilities to maintain careers and care for families. Read MoreMay 20, 2025
-
Generations of Growth
Myria Carpenter, BS'97, president of the Association of Vanderbilt Black Alumni, takes a broad community approach to engagement. Read MoreMay 15, 2025
-
Wyatt Smith, BS’10: Solving the Skilled Workforce Shortage
As founder and CEO of UpSmith, Wyatt Smith, BS'10, uses technology to help builders and technicians be more productive, master new skills to stay in the workforce longer and help solve the skilled workforce shortage. Read MoreMay 14, 2025
-
Digging for the Truth: Jim Emison, BA’65, devotes retirement to civil rights–era cold case
Jim Emison is dedicated to seeking justice for Elbert Williams, the first known NAACP member to be racially terrorized and slain. Read MoreMay 14, 2025
-
Joanna Winston Foley, BA’65: Representation Matters
Joanna Winston Foley, BA’65, brings the lack of racial representation in public art to light through advocacy and her website Representation Matters. Read MoreMay 14, 2025
-
Cultivating Philanthropic Spirit
Ann Marie, BA’64, and Martin McNamara III, BA’58, and their family recognized their many ties with Vanderbilt by creating the Martin F. McNamara Jr. Scholarship in honor of Martin’s father, a student-athlete who graduated in 1932. The scholarship benefits College of Arts and Science undergraduates. Read MoreMay 13, 2025
-
The Gift of Connection
Sarah Catherine “SC” Perot, BS'13, has many roles, but they all work to expand and enhance alumni engagement, which benefits the entire Commodore community. Read MoreMay 13, 2025
-
A family tradition grows through open dialogue
Inspired by the spirit of civil discourse, Lise and Ed Spacapan generously support the Dialogue Vanderbilt Student Advisory Board, an intentional effort to consistently advance and more deeply imbed the university's long-held values of free expression, civil discourse and institutional neutrality across campus and beyond. Read MoreMay 12, 2025
-
Nashville Jazz Connections at Blair
Jazz has a long history in Music City. As long as Nashville has been a center for recording and education, it has drawn musicians of all types who found places to play—as well as to teach. Many have had connections to Vanderbilt Blair School of Music Read MoreMay 12, 2025
-
Rings of History
An artistic testament to the Bicentennial Oak and those who sat beneath its branches Read MoreMay 12, 2025
-
Open Space: Vanderbilt Alumni Propel a Vision for Space Travel That’s Accessible and Sustainable
Blue Origin and a handful of other private companies, like Virgin Galactic and SpaceX, are racing to develop low-cost, reusable rockets that are safe enough to regularly ferry humans—and other materials—to space and back again. At least a dozen Vanderbilt alumni are working in some capacity with David Limp, BS'88, and CEO of Blue Origin, to achieve the company’s sweeping vision. Read MoreMay 5, 2025
-
-
A New Jazz Age
Vanderbilt University is becoming known as a place to study jazz performance and delve into jazz history through the acquisition of the extensive collections of Dizzy Gillespie, Yusef Lateef and Phil Schaap. Read MoreApr 21, 2025
-
H. Rodes Hart, longtime Vanderbilt benefactor and trustee emeritus, 1932-2025
H. Rodes Hart, BA’54, who had an insatiable appetite for learning and education and contributed to Vanderbilt’s growth through his philanthropy and more than 30 years of leadership on the university’s Board of Trust, died March 30. He was 93. Read MoreApr 2, 2025
-
Blending passions: how Vanderbilt alumnus Alex Astrella merges film and therapy to advocate for the neurodiverse community
By Jenna Somers Alex Astrella At age two Alex Astrella, MEd’23, was diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder. His parents were told that he had little chance of graduating high school or becoming financially independent. Today, Astrella is the founder and CEO of Blu Star Productions, an award-winning film studio… Read MoreApr 1, 2025
-
Lauren Egan, BA’17: On the Spot News
Journalist Lauren Egan, BA'17, reports on politics in D.C. for The Bulwark and formerly for Politico. She got her start on-air from war-torn Ukraine for NBC News. Read MoreMar 17, 2025