News

June 16, 2025 Commencement is an exciting time and a feast for all the senses — it’s understandable if one’s attention sometimes flickered away from the oratory onstage. So, we present another chance to take in the students’ words. Here is Valedictorian Joseph Newswander’s speech, or poem; Graduate Student Speaker Kaarthika Thakker’s speech, and also […]

June 16, 2025 “Capstone” is a word often heard in the halls of SLU — yet most of us never learn about the content of these important student projects. With the help of professors and students, and support of department chairs, we’re changing that today. What follows is simply an overview, but it’s plenty intriguing […]

June 16, 2025 Leading up to Commencement, Anna Tresvalles knew that when she crossed the stage to receive her bachelor’s degree in Urban Studies, she wanted her 9-month-old baby daughter Tala to be with her. Anna had felt that her growing baby was her companion, after all, when she finished most of her courses in […]

May 16, 2025 In life and work, you never know when you’ll need a good lawyer. So you may want to remember the name Kaarthika Thakker. Kaarthika is receiving her master’s degree in labor studies from SLU this spring and will soon be heading west to UC Berkeley Law School.Based on how quickly and thoroughly […]

May 15, 2025 Labor Studies B.A. student Joseph Newswander is this year’s Valedictorian and will speak at Commencement on May 28. Joseph has not only excelled academically, but also served on the Student Union steering committee and as vice chair for senior college affairs in the University Student Senate — SLU’s first participant in the […]

Apr. 10, 2025 Associate Professor of Urban Studies Kafui Attoh is the longest-serving professor in his department. In 2013 he joined the Joseph S. Murphy Institute (which became SLU in 2018) after receiving his Ph.D. in geography at Syracuse. Before that, he double-majored in geography and Spanish as an undergraduate at Macalester College in Minnesota. […]

Apr. 10, 2025 When Elee Ballinger decided to leave her small town amid the redwood forests of northern California for college, she opted for a true urban experience: attending Hunter College, living in Brooklyn, and working for the New York Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG). Being a part of SLU’s Community Semester program this spring, […]

Mar. 13, 2025 For Dani Lopez, a social entrepreneur and student in the Urban Studies Master’s program, the challenges of her youth plus lessons learned from working as a financial aid administrator led her to co-found a company to improve social services delivery. Launched in September 2024, Lulo is a free app designed to enable […]

Mar. 13, 2025 Prof. Rebecca Lurie shared this photo of a 1961 telegram from Eleanor Roosevelt inviting her activist mother (with a typo in her last name) to a gathering at Roosevelt’s townhouse in Manhattan. Eleanor’s husband, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, died in 1945. More below. Women make up half the world’s population. How does […]

Feb. 13, 2025 Every weekday at 7 a.m., Joana Oliveras punches in for her shift at Baruch College. Over the next seven hours, she will clean all the bathrooms on two floors, empty the trash, and more. Joana, a Bronx native, works at the college as a custodial assistant. No one would have predicted it, […]