Rebecca Blank, an economist who served as chancellor of the University of Wisconsin at Madison and was acting commerce secretary under President Barack Obama, died Feb. 17. She was 67.
In her near-decade of tenure at UW-Madison, she accelerated the university’s research programs, achieved record-high graduation rates and developed scholarship programs catering to low-income students within the state. Her work also expanded the number of faculty and students, as well as put the campus’ finances back on track after the pandemic brought losses in revenue.
Rebecca Blank, who was chancellor of the University of Wisconsin at Madison for nine years, died of cancer Friday. She was 67.
Video: The University of Wisconsin announced on Saturday that former Chancellor Rebecca Blank died at 67. Her legacy and life leave a profound impact.
Former UW-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank, who helped put a university education in reach for low-income students through the Bucky’s Tuition Promise, steered the university through the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and brought billions in gifts and donations to expand research enterprise, died Friday of cancer. She was 67.
One of the longest-serving chancellors in recent UW-Madison history, Blank is credited with gaining the ability to enroll more out-of-state students, launching a full-tuition scholarship program for low-income Wisconsin students, and leading a $4 billion fundraising campaign. She’s remembered for smaller gestures, too, like bringing commencement back to Camp Randall Stadium.
Blank passed away Friday evening after a seven month battle with cancer, according to an email sent by current Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin to the campus community.
Students on the UW campus said most of their peers knew of the former chancellor’s cancer diagnosis announced in July, but her death shocked many.
Tributes to former UW-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank have been pouring in from around the world since news of her tragic death came out Saturday. Now, the person who knows her best is also sharing a tribute.
Dr. Eva Vivian was a teenager when her mother, not yet 40, learned she had a breast tumor.Vivian’s memories aren’t pleasant.
“The only option was a mastectomy. They were mean to women back then. It was a male-dominated profession,” said Vivian, a professor in the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s School of Pharmacy. “There wasn’t a lot of empathy toward women who developed breast cancer.”
Evers’ state budget, announced Wednesday night, would increase the University of Wisconsin System’s budget by $305.9 million over the biennium. But even as the state finds itself in an unprecedented financial position, with a projected $7.1 billion surplus, the number is nearly $130 million less than the UW System’s request of $435.6 million, according to figures from the Legislative Fiscal Bureau.
The long-term prospect of a tuition promise program for low-income University of Wisconsin System students is in jeopardy after a top lawmaker said the Republican-controlled Legislature is unlikely to fund it.
Wisconsin’s state universities would see a significant funding boost under Gov. Tony Evers’ state budget proposal, with a portion of the money helping pay for a tuition waiver program aimed at students from lower income households. But if past budget battles with the Republican-controlled state Legislature are any guide, the final number for the system is unlikely to match the governor’s wishes.
Gov. Tony Evers’ budget leaves the University of Wisconsin System about $130 million short of what regents say they need to run their campuses over the next two years, raising questions about whether they may raise tuition to make up the shortfall.
UW-Madison botany professor Katherine McCulloh sees former Chancellor Rebecca Blank as one of her heroes.
A longtime UW-Madison music professor and composer has received one of the nation’s premier music awards for her opera about a 17th-century female painter.
The 5th Annual Black History Education Conference took place virtually, hosted by the Professional Learning and Community Education (PLACE) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Video: The first step in addressing mental health seems simple: to talk about it. But for some, that’s easier said than done.
The four founders — Kevin Phouisangiem, Aayush Bharadwaj, Pranav Poddutoori, Adilur Istekov — said they came up with the idea to create a dorm review website in the university’s Software Development Club, where they had to come up with a project and wanted to create a platform beneficial for students.
The University of Wisconsin’s size, urban campus and lakeside position make parking cars difficult for students, Assistant Vice Chancellor of UW Transportation Services Patrick Kass said in an email statement to The Badger Herald.
UW-Madison and the UW-Madison Police Department said they are aware of defaced transgender pride stickers found on campus, according to a statement shared with 27 News.
“The idea is that the cost to build a new apartment is the same whether its intended for market rate occupancy or affordable occupancy,” said Kurt Paulsen, UW-Madison professor of urban planning. “If you want developers to build affordable units, you need to provide a capital subsidy.”
Though you may not have heard of it, shared revenue is a financial lifeline for local governments in Wisconsin — and it’s entered the spotlight as communities scramble to fund essential services.
Residents were evacuated from a University of Wisconsin-Madison dorm early Friday morning after a battery pack caught fire in a student’s backpack, according to the Madison Fire Department.
“Obviously, her love for the university stood out,” McIntosh said in an exclusive interview with BadgerExtra on Saturday. “Her support of our program. But even closer to home, her support of our student-athletes. She understood the impact of athletics here and what it can do for the people that come through our program. She was there every step of the way to help support us.”
A Jan. 26 Cap Times article (“UW-Madison launches new center to confront its history of exclusion”) spotlighted the UW-Madison’s announcement that a planned new Rebecca M. Blank Center for Campus History intends to expand on sifting, winnowing and reckoning by confronting the university’s “long culture of exclusion, racism and religious bigotry.”
Last May, Rebecca Blank was discussing what she regarded as the major unresolved issues she would leave behind at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
“This seat is crucial to the balance of the court, and the court is crucial to the balance of the state,” said Barry Burden, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and director of its Elections Research Center.
Grudges exist on a spectrum, says Robert Enright, a professor in the department of educational psychology at the University of Wisconsin Madison and a founding board member of the International Forgiveness Institute. Some grievances don’t impact your daily life, but you remember them nonetheless. These surface-level grudges are easier to relinquish, Enright says. Others take root in the soul and can grow into hatred.
Gregory Nemet, a co-author of the “State of Carbon Dioxide Removal” report and a public policy professor at University of Wisconsin at Madison, told me that pretty much all successful CO2 removal to date has come from natural climate solutions like protecting forests, planting trees and better managing soils. So I asked him, “Why not invest heavily in that?” To my mind, supporting and expanding the extraordinary potential of natural ecosystems to perform carbon removal is what investors and policymakers should be focusing on — not fantastical machines.
Daniel worked for 26 years doing research at the Physical Sciences Laboratory as an Electronics Technician for the University of Wisconsin.
During his three-decade career at UW-Madison, Fred’s research focused on school curriculum and reforms that foster critical thinking, civic engagement and more equitable student achievement. He directed the National Center on Effective Secondary Schools and the Center on Organization and Restructuring of Schools, authoring dozens of research papers, articles and books.
After graduating from James Monroe High School in the Bronx, he earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin in 1953. He served in the Navy in Japan during the Korean War and was discharged as a lieutenant.
“It was a reflection of the Vietnam era and earlier history,” Waclaw Szybalski, then a professor and geneticist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, told Science News in 1985. “Physicists were guilty of the atomic bomb, and chemists were guilty of napalm. Biologists were trying very hard to be guilty of something.”
Rebecca M. Blank, an economist and educator who served in high-level U.S. government and academic positions and, for nine years, as chancellor of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, died of cancer on Feb. 17 near Madison, Wisconsin. She was 67.
Rebecca Blank, an economist who served as chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, has died, less than a year after announcing that she had an aggressive form of cancer. She was 67.
Danny Szydlowski, who is now working on a Ph.D. in freshwater and marine science at UW-Madison’s Center for Limnology, said that the declines could be caused by a fungal disease and by crayfish destroying their own habitat. The result has allowed native plants, snails and bluegill to recover, helping restore the ecosystems in several lakes.
The former chancellor had a profound impact on Wisconsin, including Badgers’ athletics. Here is a look at her career at UW in photos.
I became a nuclear engineering PhD student at the University of Wisconsin. And the rest is history. I became a postdoc at Berkeley, a professor at the University of Illinois. I had no aspirations for a career in government, but someone put my name in the hat, and here I am in this administration, as a political appointee.
Video: federal and state leaders pay tribute via social media.
After a seven month-long battle with an aggressive form of cancer, Blank passed away peacefully with her family by her side, according to Mnookin’s message. Blank was 67 years old.
UW-Madison announced Blank’s passing on Saturday. She served as the school’s chancellor from 2013 to 2022, before leaving to become president of Northwestern University. She announced last year that she would not be taking the position after being diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer.
A former University of Wisconsin-Madison chancellor died of cancer on Feb. 17, the UW System said on Saturday.
Blank served as chancellor in Madison from 2013 up until last year when she announced plans to move to Northwestern University. Blank withdrew from that role after her cancer diagnosis.
Evers presented 20-year-old Grace Stanke with a certificate of recognition Saturday for her time as Miss Wisconsin, as a Nuclear Engineering student at UW-Madison and her accomplishment of winning Miss America.
She was preparing to join Northwestern after that, but in July 2022, she announced that she had been diagnosed with cancer and would step down from her role as president-elect in order to focus on her health and her family.
