Stories

Sports & Recreation

Mad Rollin’ Dolls Gallery

At least 21 of the 139 skaters in the Mad Rollin’ Dolls, Madison’s flat-track roller derby league, are UW-Madison graduates, students, faculty, or staff. The Madison league is a leader in national roller derby culture, helping to refine the rules of the sport to make it more welcoming to…

International

Our Man in Berlin

As a foreign correspondent in Germany, Louis Lochner 1909 chronicled the rise of the Third Reich and helped Americans understand how Adolf Hitler amassed power.

International

A Refuge for Hope

At the peak of the refugee crisis in Greece, Amed Khan ’91 found a way to bring humanity to an inhumane situation.

Science & Technology

Power Walking

Spencer Walts

The next renewable energy source could be right underfoot. A group of UW–Madison engineers has developed an inexpensive method to convert footsteps into electricity using wood pulp and nanofibers incorporated into flooring. It marks the latest advance in “roadside energy harvesting” — green…

Destinations

Muir Knoll

Muir Knoll is a small, knobby extension of a drumlin — in this case, Bascom Hill — formed by the retreat of the last glaciers that remade Wisconsin’s landscape.

In 1919, one year after the knoll was dedicated to naturalist John Muir…

International

Russia in Focus

The new Wisconsin Russia Project aims to help the U.S. be more prepared to manage a calculating Kremlin with yet-to-be-determined ambitions.

The Arts

Daniel Brenner ’92

Photo: Ronen Tivony

It took Rabbi Daniel Brenner ’92 until now to realize that he just wants to dance.

Brenner has spent two decades finding innovative ways to connect young Jewish people with their faith. Newsweek named him one of America’s most influential…

Teaching & Learning

Deborah Derman MA’76

Regina Miller, Origin Photo

Breath. Purpose. Compassion.

For many people who have lost a loved one or are experiencing other profound challenges in life, simple words such as these are helping them heal — one page at a time.

Inspired by her personal recovery,…

The Arts

Mark Zimmer ’82, JD’85

Andy Manis

By day, Mark Zimmer ’82, JD’85 is a Madison lawyer. But by night, he’s a classical-music detective, hunting for clues in archives around the world to identify lesser-known works by Ludwig van Beethoven.

Together with Netherlands-based composer A. Willem Holsbergen, Zimmer…

Book

Where There’s a Will …

Patricia Bean McConnell ’81, MS’84, PhD’88 of Black Earth, Wisconsin, is an internationally renowned zoologist and certified applied animal behaviorist who specializes in canine aggression. For 25 years, she was also a beloved UW–Madison adjunct associate professor who taught The Biology and Philosophy of Human–Animal Relationships.…