Character Sketch
Matthew O’Brien '00 has spent twenty years providing security for dignitaries around the world.
Campus Digest: Fall 2024
News and happenings from around Boston College.
Photo: AP Photo/Alex Brandon
Fr. Gregory Boyle STM'84 Receives Major Award
Gregory Boyle, SJ, STM’84 was recently awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor. President Biden presented the medal to Boyle in recognition of his work with Homeboy Industries, the Los Angeles gang intervention program he launched in his church’s basement in 1988 that today helps more than ten thousand people each year through services such as substance-abuse assistance, mental health support, and tattoo removal. Boyle’s example, Biden said, “reminds us of the power of redemption, rehabilitation, and our obligation to those that have been condemned or counted out. Thank you, Fr. Greg, for your amazing grace.”
—Elizabeth Clemente
Campus News
David Goodman has been named dean of the Woods College of Advancing Studies. Goodman, who started in August, was formerly the associate dean for strategic initiatives and external relations at the Lynch School of Education and Human Development. He previously served as Woods College interim dean from 2018 until 2019.
BC research funding is expected to total $83 million this year, the most in University history. Faculty and administrators attribute the achievement to years of strategic initiatives and investment, with funding from government agencies, private foundations, and other external sources rising from $57 million in 2020 to $73 million last year.
Personal finance magazine Money gave Boston College a five-star rating, placing the school in the highest tier of the magazine’s “Best Colleges in America” list. BC earned its spot alongside fifty-four other schools thanks to exceptionally high scores for its graduation rates, cost of attendance, financial aid, and alumni salaries.
The Law School’s Initiative on Land, Housing & Property Rights has received a $2 million grant from JPMorganChase. The initiative, founded and led by Drinan Professor of Law Thomas W. Mitchell, works to address housing and property issues for disadvantaged communities by issuing policy recommendations, performing community outreach, and training law students.
Nutrition Navigators, a Boston College Dining Services program that helps new students manage food allergies and other medical nutrition needs, won the grand prize at the National Association of College and University Food Service Nutrition Awards. The program pairs first-year and transfer students with older Eagles with similar food challenges who can offer guidance in the dining halls.
CSOM Department Named for Marc Seidner
Thanks to the largest gift in the history of the Carroll School of Management, the Finance Department will be renamed the Seidner Department of Finance.
The gift, from University Trustee Marc Seidner ’88, will provide support for continued scholarship, research, and teaching in the department, and will endow the Seidner University Professorship, currently held by Nobel laureate Paul M. Romer. The Seidner Department of Finance becomes the University’s first named academic department, and one of the few endowed departments in American higher education. Seidner, a managing director at PIMCO, said he made the gift in recognition of the transformative education both he and his daughter Alexis ’24 received at BC, and to further strengthen the highly ranked Finance Department.
Illustration: Joel Kimmel
Professor Ann Burgess Takes Center Stage in New Hulu Docuseries
Connell School of Nursing Professor Ann Wolbert Burgess is in the Hollywood spotlight once again. Burgess spent two decades using her skills as a psychiatric nurse to profile serial killers for the FBI, and her career has served as inspiration for several television and film projects, including the hit Netflix series Mindhunter. But it’s Burgess’s own life that is the focus of a new Hulu docuseries that premiered over the summer. Mastermind: To Think Like a Killer takes viewers through fifty years of Burgess’s career, including her role in establishing the field of forensic nursing, which exists at the crossroads of health care and the criminal justice system. The docuseries, produced by the actress sisters Dakota and Elle Fanning, delves into the grisly murder cases Burgess and her FBI colleagues investigated, and the sexism she faced in the field.
The show, which was shot over eighteen months, includes a number of scenes featuring the BC campus. It provides a rare glimpse into Burgess’s personal life, including interviews with her, her husband and children, and her colleagues. Burgess said she disliked being followed with a camera but hopes the show will raise awareness about her field. “I really did it for nursing,” she said. “I think a lot of people don’t know what a forensic nurse is, so hopefully we’re educating people that nurses have a lot to do with the interface between medical procedures and the law. And they make excellent expert witnesses.”
—Elizabeth Clemente
All three contestants on an episode of Jeopardy! last summer were stumped by this “answer,” for which any Eagle could have come up with the correct “question.”
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