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Editorial StaffNovember 5, 202411min
By: Phuc Ngo ’27 As Election Day neared, the Wesleyan Media Project’s reports on political advertising and their expert commentary were frequently cited in national media. Erika Franklin Fowler, professor of government and co-director of the Wesleyan Media Project, spoke with CBS Morning News about the impact of television ads. “Negative ads tend to be more policy-based, more issue-focused,” said Fowler, “and those details actually are very important for citizens who don't otherwise pay a lot of attention to politics.” A Washington Post piece on the presidential race in Virginia cited Wesleyan Media Project data on the relatively low number…

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Mike MavredakisOctober 8, 202419min
Lin-Manuel Miranda ’05, actor, librettist, and creator of the 2015 musical Hamilton, appeared on comedian Mike Birbiglia’s podcast “Working it Out.” Miranda and Birbiglia discussed the release of Miranda’s new album “Warriors” and the creative process that informed it. The Washington Post mentioned the work of college students from the northeast canvassing in Pennsylvania for political campaigns. Several of the students received Political Engagement Grants from the Allbritton Center for the Study of Public Life. Erika Franklin Fowler, professor of government and co-director of the Wesleyan Media Project, joined ABC News’ “FiveThirtyEight Politics” podcast to break down the political ads flooding…

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Mike MavredakisSeptember 10, 202418min
President Michael S. Roth ’78 joined WAMC’s “The Roundtable” on Sept. 13 to discuss his book “The Student: A Short History,” which maps out the way learning has changed over time. The Wesleyan Media Project (WMP) reported estimated that former President Donald Trump’s campaign has spent nearly nothing on ads that promote him in a positive light in research released on Sept. 12. New York Times Opinion contributor Kristen Soltis Anderson cited the Wesleyan Media Project’s research in a piece for The Times on Sept. 24.  The Washington Post mentioned the Wesleyan Media Project’s research into the tone of the…

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Mike MavredakisAugust 27, 202410min
The Wall Street Journal published a piece on the pressure faced by college administrators for the upcoming academic year after widespread student protests last year. President Michael S. Roth ’78 said the situation poses an opportunity for students to be actively engaged in politics. Wesleyan offers students political engagement grants through the Jewett Center for Community Partnerships to make it easier for them to be involved in political campaigns and other civic engagement opportunities.  “The real issue is, how are we going to govern ourselves in the next four years? And students can play a big role in that,” Roth…

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Mike MavredakisAugust 7, 20248min
Tony Award-winning playwright and composer Lin-Manuel Miranda ’02, Hon. ’15 collaborated with playwright and actress Eisa Davis to release a concept album inspired by the cult-hero movie “The Warriors,” according to the Los Angeles Times. The 26-song album, executive produced by the rapper Nas, will be released on Oct. 18 by Atlantic Records. “We’ve spent the past three years musicalizing the Warriors’ journey home, from the South Bronx to Coney Island,” Miranda and Davis said in a joint statement, according to the Los Angeles Times. “Along the way we’ve gotten to work with a lot of our favorite artists, and…

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Mike MavredakisJuly 10, 202413min
President Michael S. Roth ’78 was one of 503 authors, critics, and book lovers who contributed to The New York Times Book Review’s “The 100 Best Books of the 21st Century” list. Roth selected his 10 top books and wrote a passage on Jon Fosse’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Septology,” which placed 78th on the list. “The repetitive patterns of Fosse’s prose made its emotional waves, when they came, so much more powerful,” Roth wrote.  Roth discussed the history of the student, politicization of U.S. universities, the relationship between university administrators and students, and what “safe enough spaces” could look like in…

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Mike MavredakisMay 15, 202419min
New York Times reporter Hannah Dreier ’08 was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Investigative Reporting for her work on a series of stories revealing the widespread reach of migrant child labor across the United States. Dreier also previously won a Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing in 2019 for a ProPublica series that followed Salvadoran immigrants on Long Island whose lives were affected by federal investigations in the MS-13 criminal gang.  “This reporting was possible only because of the bravery of migrant children who took huge risks to share their experiences,” Dreier said after receiving the prize on May 6. “There are hundreds of…

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Mike MavredakisApril 17, 202418min
President Michael S. Roth ’78 urged for the defense of academic freedom and democracy in a piece for TIME: “If we are to strengthen our democracy and the educational institutions that depend on it, we must learn to practice freedom, better. We must learn to be better students. Our future depends on it.”  As many colleges across the country have seen protesting on their campuses, Roth appeared on CNN’s “The Assignment with Audie Cornish” to talk about free speech and the campus climate at Wesleyan. “It’s so much better that [Wesleyan students] are worried about Gaza, than just getting an A on…

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Mike MavredakisMarch 13, 202412min
President Michael S. Roth ’78 wrote an op-ed for Inside Higher Ed on his recent letters to state representatives calling for them to redouble their efforts to bring peace in the Middle East and to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza. “Silence at a time of humanitarian catastrophe isn’t neutrality; it’s either cowardice or collaboration. We don’t need institution-speak, but we do need leaders of academic and cultural institutions to call on our government and our fellow citizens to address this crisis.” Roth joined the Yale University Press Podcast to talk about his book the history of the student, current crises…

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Mike MavredakisFebruary 14, 202413min
Elizabeth Bobrick, visiting scholar in classical studies, wrote a piece for Salon on the parallels between Athenian playwright Sophocles’ “Antigone” and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s initial refusal to let the country’s public mourn the death of political enemy Alexei Navalny or his family hold a public funeral. “Navalny’s mother and widow join Antigone in prodding us to remember that the treatment of the dead has consequences for the living—not for Putin, necessarily, but for everyone who gets in his way,” Bobrick wrote.  Wesleyan President Michael S. Roth ’78 appeared on WNPR’s “Disrupted” on Feb. 7 to talk about his role…

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Mike MavredakisJanuary 17, 202414min
On the Freakonomics Radio Hour, Jan. 24, Stephen J. Dubner spoke with President Michael S. Roth ’78 about  the difficulty of being a college president in a moment of political pressure on higher education. “I realize that you can’t please everyone, but I don’t think that that’s an excuse for trying to say nothing,” Roth said. “And the fact that you can’t speak about everything doesn’t mean you should stay silent all the time.”  Roth was quoted in a Boston Globe story on the challenges university president’s face in the modern political climate that has some colleges facing frequent public attacks,…

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Editorial StaffDecember 20, 20236min
The New York Times recently highlighted research reporting that five people with moderate to severe brain injuries scored higher on cognitive tests following a brain implant that stimulated their brains. Joseph Fins ’82, Hon. ’22, medical ethicist at Weill Cornell Medicine, was mentioned with the piece after he published a series of interviews with the subjects and their families in a separate paper for Cambridge University Press.  Author and LGBTQIA+ rights activist Jennifer Finney Boylan ’80, Hon.’23 was elected President of PEN America, a key organization in the defense of free speech in the United States, on Dec. 11, according…