Brandon A. Thompson, the man accused of physically and sexually assaulting a University of Wisconsin-Madison college student in Sept. 2023, has been sentenced to 30 years in prison, according to court records.
UW-Madison history professor Sasha Maria Suarez describes programs by tribal nations, K-12 schools and higher education institutions to teach Wisconsin’s Indigenous languages to learners of all ages.
Written by Hanns Kuttner, a guest essayist to Madison Magazine.
University of Wisconsin-Platteville coach Jeff Gard got the sad news while in Greece with his basketball team during a nine-day exhibition tour to Thessaloniki and Athens.
His older brother, Greg Gard, the University of Wisconsin men’s basketball coach, called and informed him that Jerry Petitgoue had passed away last Saturday. Petitgoue was 84.
Evers said in a statement that he had agreed to support Republicans’ half of the deal including their top tax priorities, while Republicans could not reach consensus within their caucuses to back the governor’s proposals, including funding increases for K-12 education, child care and the University of Wisconsin System.
An Evers spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the June 12 vote.
Allan “Bud” Selig, Sheldon Lubar and Stephen Marcus each received the Herb Kohl Service Award from the Milwaukee Jewish Federation on June 11. Roughly 550 people from the Jewish community, and the greater Milwaukee community, attended the Pfister Hotel event.
Each award winner knew Kohl personally from their childhood, or from attending the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
A Dane County judge sentenced a man who brutally attacked a University of Wisconsin-Madison student to 30 years in prison, calling him an “extreme risk” to the public.
Poker puts into focus the same gender dynamics that can create anxiety for women in a patriarchal society, says Jessica Calarco, a sociologist, professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and author of ”Holding It Together: How Women Became America’s Safety Net.” “You’re expected to read the room, stay composed, and manage risk — much like women do every day in a world that asks them to carry everything without appearing to struggle,” she tells me.
You will find good information online from the Pacific Bulb Society and, of all places, Extension Horticulture of the University of Wisconsin.
UW-Madison researchers, who study Wisconsin’s lakes, are grappling with uncertainty as cuts to the National Science Foundation (NSF) could threaten decades of freshwater research.
Professors Emily Stanley and Hilary Dugan from the UW-Madison Lab for Limnology have dedicated their careers to studying freshwater systems, with Lake Mendota serving as a key research site.
Many falls can be prevented, said Dr. Gerald Pankratz, a geriatrician at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. That makes him “optimistic about this issue,” he said.
In his practice, Dr. Pankratz said, it is not unusual for people assessed as having a 50 percent chance of falling over the next year to cut their risk in half by taking action to avoid slips and trips.
In an interview with WPR’s “Wisconsin Today,” Hickey, a University of Wisconsin-Madison alum, said it wasn’t easy writing about the nuances of tribal politics, especially because it was inspired by his own tribal community. He was worried about how the book would be received — whether he was going to get called out for getting something “completely wrong.” Instead, people embraced the story.
University of Wisconsin-Madison professor Annette Zimmermann is a political philosopher of AI and co-lead of the school’s Uncertainty and AI research group.
“Much like many other experts working in this area, I’ve been deeply concerned about imposing such a heavy handed blanket ban on any sort of state-based efforts to effectively regulate this space,” Zimmermann said. “Right now, unfortunately, we’re in a regulatory landscape where we are heavily relying on individual states to think very hard about how to protect ordinary citizens and consumers from these kinds of harmful outputs.”
UW Health and SSM Health said removing and changing DEI language on parts of their websites doesn’t change their commitment to care — but advocates for marginalized communities say it’s cause for concern.
Jennifer Mnookin stands to earn an extra $150,000 if she stays in her role at the helm of the University of Wisconsin-Madison through the end of the month.
The Board of Regents, which oversees UW-Madison and the state’s 12 other public universities, approved the “retention incentive” for Mnookin last summer. The goal was to create “continuity at our flagship university where total compensation is not competitive with its peers,” UW system spokesperson Mark Pitsch said at the time.
Major college athletic departments can now pay their student-athletes directly but also must comply with more stringent rules for NIL deals and adhere to uniform guidelines for roster sizes.
At Wisconsin the job will be to adjust to those changes while managing an athletic program that features 11 men’s and 12 women’s teams and attempting to maintain the standards of an athletic program that has been pretty competitive across the board.
While the daycare dilemma is large and complex, colleges have a unique role. Student parents (and faculty and staff) can be supported with resources by the university. Tuition paid by students should cover the costs of child care, if provided on campus.
According to an analysis by the American Council on Education, nearly one in every five undergraduate college students, about 18%, are parents, typically to preschool-aged or younger. In Wisconsin alone, 22% of all undergrads are single moms.
Noted historian Gerda Lerner, who practiced and helped build the field of women’s history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, just yards from the doors of the Wisconsin Historical Society, asserted that historical knowledge was power. Only by reclaiming their history could women empower themselves.
Dr. Ajay Sethi, a professor of population health sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told the Journal Sentinel in May he worries changes in federal guidance may encourage adults who were already on the fence about the COVID-19 booster to skip it.
Summerfest also said that rapper, frequent visitor and University of Wisconsin-Madison alum Yung Gravy has been added to the lineup, headlining the Miller Lite Oasis at 10 p.m. June 21.
“ACIP has been, across the entire world, the paragon of good, solid, well-thought-out, evidence-based vaccine policy. I hate to say this. We are heading in the direction of U.S. vaccine policy becoming the laughingstock of the globe,” said Dr. Jonathan Temte, former chair of the ACIP and a professor at the University of Wisconsin.
In some states, public universities have a history of being mandated by their state government to buy prison made furniture. According to the 2020, Inside Higher Ed report, University of Wisconsin campuses have in the past been required to purchase from Badger State Industries, Wisconsin’s prison labor enterprise.
James Li is the A. A. Alexander Associate Professor of Psychology and an investigator at the Waisman Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He told WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” that Kennedy’s statements on the harms of medications like Adderall aren’t based in science.
“The evidence is quite clear that the medications that are currently FDA-approved and prescribed to treat ADHD in particular are fairly well tolerated. They don’t lead to early mortality … and they are generally very beneficial when used properly under doctor’s orders,” Li said.
Facing an uncertain financial future, the University of Wisconsin-Parkside is merging its four academic colleges into a single college led by one leadership team.
Charles Isbell Jr. will leave the University of Wisconsin-Madison after serving for less than two years as provost.
Isbell was named Thursday as the new chancellor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and vice president of the University of Illinois System. He is set to start July 16.
University of Wisconsin-Madison Provost Charles Isbell Jr. has been named the 11th chancellor of the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign and vice president of the University of Illinois System.
UW-Madison Provost Charles Isbell Jr. is leaving to become the next chancellor of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, the university announced Thursday, ending a near two-year tenure that saw a torrent of federal and state attacks on UW-Madison’s diversity programs, research apparatus and the university’s academic mission.
A person was arrested for allegedly driving a vehicle while drunk after hitting a bicyclist near the UW-Madison campus on Wednesday, the Madison Police Department reported on Thursday.
UW-Madison Provost Charles Isbell, Jr. is moving south and getting a big promotion. He’ll be the next chancellor of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
Isbell, who has been a provost at UW since 2023, will also serve as the vice president of the University of Illinois System. He starts work on July 16.
Dr. Eric Sandgren, a professor emeritus at the UW-Madison who headed the university’s animal research operations for a decade, ending in 2016, calls these directives “nothing new.” Researchers, he says, have for some time been moving away from the use of animals as other models have become viable. “This just formalizes something that’s happening already.”
Federal vaccine recommendations matter not just because the public pays attention to them, but because it can affect which vaccines insurers decide to cover, said Patrick Remington, emeritus professor at UW-Madison’s School of Medicine and Public Health.
International students, a particular target of the Trump administration in recent months, could also be affected by the travel ban. Iranians made up the fourth-largest international student contingent at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in fall 2024, according to university data, with 61 students. At UW-Madison, there were 57 Iranian students last semester.
Dr Jae-Hyuk Yu, a professor of bacteriology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, recommends using a bleach solution (one tablespoon of bleach per gallon of water), an Environmental Protection Agency-registered kitchen disinfectant, or an alcohol-based spray for sanitizing hard surfaces, especially after preparing raw meat. And when handling cleaning chemicals, use gloves and ventilate well. He recommends cleaning fridge shelves monthly and ensuring your fridge is consistently under 40F (4C) to prevent bacteria from lurking around.
Breakouts of Fusarium graminearum infections already naturally occur in dozens of U.S. states — basically any state that produces wheat and barley — and has been established in the U.S. for at least 125 years, Caitlyn Allen, a professor emeritus of plant pathology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told ABC News. In addition, the U.S. Department of Agriculture keeps a list of potential agroterrorism agents, and Fusarium graminearum is not on that list, Allen said.
“We’re not talking about something that just got imported from China,” Allen said. “People should not be freaking out.”
“Ticks have been active for quite a while now,” said P.J. Liesch, the director of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Insect Diagnostic Lab. “It’s something that can often catch folks off-guard. We might not be thinking about ticks in those winter months — January, February, March — but once temperatures get above freezing consistently and we maybe hit 40-degrees with no snow on the ground, ticks can be active.”
Bats, birds, turtles, coyotes and more are the subject of study and conservation efforts, especially in the spring when they can be readily seen. We talk again to David Drake and Jamie Nack, wildlife specialists with UW-Extension, about these and other Wisconsin critters.
LGBTQ+ students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are preparing to acknowledge and celebrate June’s pride month, despite looming political threats from the Trump administration and cuts to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) funding.
All that most students see of the University of Wisconsin Zoological Museum (UWZM), located in the Noland Zoology Building, is the fourth floor staircase’s sign prohibiting entrance from all other than museum staff.
Behind the locked doors, however, the museum’s extensive collections of animal skins and skeletons serve as a powerful resource for research and learning.
The Associated Students of Madison (ASM) passed legislation advocating for Wiscards to become valid forms of Wisconsin voter ID on April 16, bolstering the Student Voters Unions (SVU) campaign to reduce voting barriers for University of Wisconsin-Madison students.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison lost at least $12 million in federal research grants since the start of the Trump administration, forcing faculty and researchers to shut down projects, lay off staff and scale back scientific progress.
Dr. Ellen Selkie, an assistant professor at UW-Madison and principal investigator on a now-defunded National Institute of Health-funded study, said her team enrolled more than 325 adolescents from across Wisconsin and collected comprehensive data to explore a question they believed to be at the center of national concern: How does social media affect youth mental health?
University of Wisconsin-Madison agriculture and economics professor Chuck Nicholson explained why the Trump administration’s recent tariffs will lower the price of milk while slashing incomes for American dairy farms, harshly impacting Wisconsin’s dairy industry.
During the school year, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s campus is filled with the neverending buzz of over 52,000 students. When summer comes, many students leave for home, but for the thousands that decide to stay, the summer months are about staying busy and making campus a home-away-from-home.
The Board of Regents, which oversees UW-Madison and the state’s 12 other public universities, is set to hear a proposal Thursday that would increase UW-Madison’s undergraduate application fee from $70 to $80 starting in August.
President Donald Trump’s administration has issued a dizzying number of executive orders on colleges and universities since taking office, including threats to federal research and limitations on student visas, impacting universities around the country.
Rodriguez Morris earned her Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin – Madison in environmental and civil engineering with a specialty in sustainability.
“As an engineer you love to tinker, fix things, and try to learn,” she said, adding that from a sustainability perspective she wants to extend the usable life of items.
The Trump administration’s plans to pause new international student visas, revoke the visas of Chinese students and ban travel from a dozen countries could wreak havoc on higher education in Wisconsin.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison stands to lose the most, with about 15% of its student body coming from overseas. UW-Milwaukee and Concordia University each enroll more than a thousand international students and would also be affected.
Lake Huron is about 183 miles wide and 206 miles long, the University of Wisconsin Sea Grant says.
‘Badger Meet-Ups’ are returning this summer starting Friday.
These events offer alumni, friends and fans of the University of Wisconsin-Madison to enjoy spend time along the shore of Lake Mendota.
Rising housing costs have been forcing some Wisconsinites to delay medical care, which can lead to negative health outcomes for residents and communities.
That’s according to a new report from the University of Wisconsin-Extension as part of a project examining livability in rural communities led by Tessa Conroy, associate professor of agricultural and applied economics at UW-Madison.
When a Thai princess was looking to reinvigorate her country’s dairy industry, she quickly turned to the University of Wisconsin-Madison for help. The UW-College of Agricultural and Life Sciences answered her invitation with experts from the departments of animal and dairy sciences, and biological systems engineering. They, with financial support from Thailand, recently put their boots on the ground to start an exchange of ideas that will benefit both nations.
Taylor received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1990. She then attended the University of Wisconsin Law School, graduating in 1995.
Written by Alfred McCoy, the J.R.W. Smail Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Book review written by Porter Shreve, director of the creative writing program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
According to Nasia Safdar, an infectious disease professor at the University of Wisconsin in the US, this concept has attracted interest from the pet food industry. The idea would be to develop products marketed as promoting the growth of beneficial bacteria in cats and dogs, which might then be transferred to their owners, she says.
“That angle has been an attractive one for people to fund, because for most of us, it’s the human condition that we’re interested in,” says Safdar. “So what role can the animal play in that?” she asks.
While many kids will reach for screens, Dr. Shilagh Mirgain, a distinguished psychologist with UW Health, said this doesn’t have to be the default.
She suggests going to the library with your kids and having them check out books.
She also recommended parents take their kids to a local or state park, even going as far as planning a picnic. “Think about bringing your food outside to eat. Kids outside thrive,” she said.
Written by James Pikul, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at UW-Madison.
Dr. Dominique Brossard, chair of the Department of Life Sciences Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said social scientists are worried the federal policy changes could instill more distrust in science more broadly.
“My concern is that if you start with (existing distrust in science) and giving doubt about these specific vaccines … does that instill a doubt about all the vaccines? So, is it opening the door or building that hesitancy?” Brossard said. “The whole context is definitely breeding ground for doubt and that we need to closely watch.”
Chuck Nicholson is an associate professor of agriculture and economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He said 20% of the milk produced ends up outside the U.S.
Nicholson said he doesn’t expect the dairy export market with China to be significantly impacted for the time being and that’s a good thing for Wisconsin.
“Cheese is definitely important as an export product, and it’s obviously quite important in Wisconsin. The other part about that is that with cheese typically comes whey, and we’re also a major exporter — from the State of Wisconsin — of whey products, and China is also a major market for our whey products as well,” Nicholson said.
A University of Wisconsin-Madison survey found that a quarter of providers might shut down without some form of direct aid from the state and a third would close at least some classrooms.
On June 7, University of Wisconsin–Madison PhD student Taylan Stulting and two teammates will start a 2,800-mile ocean race, rowing from Monterey, California, to the island of Kauai.
