Jackie McLean Fellow for 2013-14 is Announced

The Office of the Provost is pleased to announce that Cesar Rodriguez will join the faculty at the University of Hartford for the 2013-14 academic year as the Jackie McLean Fellow. As a promising young scholar, Rodriguez will add breadth and depth to the University through his teaching and scholarly/creative work.

Rodriguez, a PhD candidate in sociology at the University of California at Santa Barbara, will join the Department of Sociology in the College of Arts and Sciences. Rodriguez holds a master's in sociology from the University of California at Santa Barbara. His doctoral research is on the “school to prison pipeline” (STPP), which examines the connections between struggling inter-city schools and the incarceration of students of color.

The fellowship is named for Jackie McLean, a world-renowned alto saxophonist, educator, composer and community activist who served on the faculty at the University of Hartford for 36 years. In 1968, he established the African-American music department and later the jazz studies degree program at The Hartt School. In 1970, he and his wife Dollie McLean founded the Artists Collective, a nationally recognized nonprofit, interdisciplinary cultural arts institution serving at-risk youth and the Greater Hartford community through the preservation and perpetuation of the art and culture of the African Diaspora.

The Office of the Provost would like to thank the members of the search committee who worked so hard in the selection process: Katherine Black, Karen Case, Woody Doane, Deborah Kidder, Bilal Sekou, Laurel Clark Shire, and Karen Tejada. We would also like to thank the faculty and staff of the College of Arts and Sciences for all their efforts to make our new colleague feel welcome.

Please join the Office of the Provost in welcoming Cesar Rodriguez as the University of Hartford’s newest Jackie McLean Fellow.