In Brief: Spring 2026
The Fall 2025 Athletics season was one of the greatest in Wesleyan’s history. All eligible fall sports teams—field hockey, volleyball, soccer, cross country—advanced to the NCAA Tournament, and football secured a Wesleyan history-making fourth straight Little Three Championship.
The Patricelli Center for Entrepreneurship celebrated the opening of its new headquarters on the second floor of the Allbritton Center in October. With a board room, individual and collaborative workspaces, a designated office for the entrepreneur-in-residence, and more, it is designed to support evolving programming and provide a dynamic hub for the activities of student entrepreneurs. In its 14th year, the Center—established through a gift from the Robert and Margaret Patricelli Family Foundation—also has a new name. Formerly the Patricelli Center for Social Entrepreneurship, it has dropped the “social” to reflect current student interest as well as a broader approach to entrepreneurial leadership.
The 2025–26 Shasha Seminar for Human Concerns, Dialogue for Change: From Conflict to Action, brought together a wide range of diverse voices for two days of keynotes, panels, and interactive workshops on how to engage in the productive conversations that lead to community building across differences. Alumni, students, faculty, and guests learned from experts in community empowerment, constructive conversation, negotiation, and place-based democratic renewal. The seminar was one of the inaugural campus events of Renewing Democracy’s Promise, a three-year Wesleyan initiative spearheaded by Provost Nicole Stanton to strengthen democratic culture and civic engagement.
As part of its 2025 National Arts and Entertainment Journalism Awards, the Los Angeles Press Club awarded Rashida Shaw McMahon, chair and associate professor of English, first prize in the category of Commentary Analysis/Trend, Music. McMahon’s essay in Zócalo Public Square, titled “Why Beyoncé is Carving a Route Along the ‘Chitlin’ Circuit,” won out over pieces from outlets such as Variety, Rolling Stone, and Salon.
For the seventh consecutive year, Wesleyan University has been recognized for being one of the colleges and universities with the highest number of alumni selected for the Fulbright US Student Program by the US Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. Nine recent alumni received grants for the 2025–26 academic year.
Wesleyan’s Center for the Humanities hosted the first-ever research symposium about the Wangunk people of central Connecticut. Titled “Emerging from Erasure: Indigenous and Settler Colonial Histories of the Wangunk People,” the symposium featured scholarship of the Wangunk Studies Working Group and was part of the programming for an art exhibit of the ceramic works of Wangunk tribal elder Gary Red Oak O’Neil at the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery.
The Pruzan Art Center received a 2025 Design Award from the Connecticut chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA). Of 111 submissions, the Pruzan was one of only six recognized for Excellence and appears in the November 2025 issue of AIA Connecticut’s magazine, Architype.
Sadia Shepard, assistant professor of film studies and global South Asian studies, received two awards in 2025 for her video essay "Shadow Self: On Agnès Varda’s Documenteur." She won the Audiovisual Essay Award at the Marienbad Film Festival in Marienbad, Czech Republic, and Second Prize of the Adelio Ferrero Award at the Adelio Ferrero film festival in Alessandria, Italy. In addition, the British Film Institute’s Sight and Sound magazine listed it as one of the Best Video Essays of 2025.
Winslow-Kaplan Professor of Music Sumarsam garnered the Best Book Award from the International Council for Traditions of Music and Dance for his work The In-Between in Javanese Performing Arts: History and Myth, Interculturalism and Interreligiosity. The book, which provides the first comprehensive overview of Javanese performing arts, also received the Nancy Straub Publication Award from the Union Internationale de la Marionnette/American Branch.
Scout McKibben-Baier ’27, an English major with a minor in civic engagement, has become the first student from Wesleyan University to receive the Voyager Scholarship. The program was created by Barack and Michelle Obama in partnership with Brian Chesky, cofounder and CEO of Airbnb, to support undergraduate students committed to careers in public service. The scholarship, which provides funding over two years for education and travel experiences, will help McKibben-Baier pursue her career interest of increasing access to women’s and girls’ education internationally.
Wesleyan’s 33rd Annual Dwight L. Greene Symposium centered on the topic of “Shifting Narratives: Asian American and Pacific Islander Politics and Identity in an Age of Polarization.” Panelists John Yang ’80, anchor of PBS NewsHour Weekend and correspondent for the PBS NewsHour, and Daniel Martinez HoSang ’93, professor of American studies and political science at Yale University, discussed AAPI cultural representation in mainstream media and in education, the diversity of identities and experiences within the AAPI community, and the divisive political environment.
Wesleyan University and Bank Street Graduate School of Education have launched a new partnership to create accelerated master’s degree pathways for students interested in pursuing careers in education. Qualified students are eligible to transfer eight undergraduate credits toward Bank Street’s MSEd degrees in Early Childhood General Education or Childhood General Education programs.
The National Institutes of Health awarded significant new funding to two members of the faculty in 2025. Associate Professor of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry Amy MacQueen received a $598,500 grant for her research into complex proteins during meiosis, the process in which cells divide and replicate. Professor of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry and Integrative Sciences Scott Holmes received a grant for the same amount for his research into gene silencing and chromosome segregation.
