4 September 2025
Dear Provost D’Alleva, President Marić, and Members of the Board of Trustees ~
We, the undersigned, are deeply grieved by the University’s recent decision to shutter the Medieval Studies Graduate Program. We are a group of scholars and educators who earned graduate degrees from UConn’s Medieval Studies, English, and related departments and experienced firsthand the tremendous quality and benefit of what was affectionately known as “Med Stu.”
This richly interdisciplinary program has been a jewel in the University’s crown for over 50 years, attracting top graduate students with interests beyond a single department’s curriculum. Producing scholars with solid historical, literary, philosophical, and linguistic grounding, Medieval Studies bucked the tendency of many disciplines and departments to be siloed and narrow in their focus. For decades, this area of study has contributed to and helped to shape the climate of intellectual life on the Storrs campus. Program graduates have gone on to accept faculty appointments at public and private institutions across the country. The robust and lively teaching and learning of UConn’s Med Stu program has rippled out over the years and miles to scores of students at dozens of colleges and universities.
The compelling course offerings and programming significantly influenced graduate students outside of the Medieval Studies cohort as well, who benefited from coursework with the brilliant Medieval faculty; attended the many talks and lectures sponsored by Medieval Studies; undertook Medieval area qualifying exams; and broke bread at the many warm and inclusive gatherings on campus and in the homes of Medieval Studies faculty. Non-medievalists found their teaching and scholarship deepened through their exposure to Medieval texts and ideas, and by working and teaching alongside their talented and dedicated peers within the Medieval Studies graduate group.
Each fall, the Visiting Scholar program would invite a medievalist of international renown to campus to teach an intensive seminar and offer a public lecture to the University community. Medieval Studies faculty frequently gave far more than required, directing independent studies, leading extracurricular reading groups, and serving on dissertation committees—just as often for graduate students outside of Medieval Studies as for those within.
Medieval Studies always had a definite flavor and presence within CLAS that could not be overlooked. The group even adopted croquet as their official sport (I defy you to name another academic program area on campus with an officially recognized group pastime!).
And now, all of that is at an end.
While we understand the reality presented by low enrollments, we nonetheless mourn the loss of this stellar and respected program of study whose half-century of thriving shaped the intellects and career paths of an uncountable number of scholars and educators at work in higher education today. The closing of this program means that each of the participating departments of English, History, Literatures, Languages, and Cultures, Art History, and Philosophy will shine a little less brightly on their own, without the incandescence of the interdisciplinary sharing that illuminated them all collectively.
It is a sad occasion, and we register our deep disappointment at the University’s decision.
Respectfully,
Jennie-Rebecca Falcetta (Ph.D., English, 2007)
Professor of Humanities
Massachusetts College of Art + Design
Joshua Eyler (Ph.D., Medieval Studies, 2006)
Senior Director of Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning and Assistant Professor of Teacher Education
University of Mississippi
James J. Donahue (Ph.D, English, 2007)
Professor of English
State University of New York at Potsdam
Jenny Spinner (Ph.D., English 2004))
Professor of English, Writing & Journalism
Saint Joseph’s University
Katie Peel (Ph.D., English, 2008)
Professor of English
University of North Carolina Wilmington
Andrew Pfrenger (Ph.D., Medieval Studies, 2011)
Director of Interdisciplinary and Multidisciplinary Studies
University of Mississippi
Stephanie Roach (Ph.D., English, 2003)
Associate Professor of Writing, Department of Language and Communication
University of Michigan-Flint
Sarah Daniel Rasher (Ph.D. English, 2013)
Co-Director, OER Associates LLC
Brandon W. Hawk (Ph.D., Medieval Studies, 2014)
Professor of English and Director of Graduate Programs in English
Rhode Island College
John P. Sexton (Ph.D., Medieval Studies, 2007)
Professor of English
Bridgewater State University
Matthew Cella (Ph.D., English, 2007)
Professor of English
Director of Interdisciplinary Minor in Disability Studies
Shippensburg University
Rebecca Devers Mazumdar (Ph.D, English, 2010)
Associate Professor of English
New York City College of Technology at the City University of New York
Patricia R. Taylor (Ph.D., English, 2013)
Associate Professor (Teaching) of Writing
University of Southern California
Molly Ferguson (Ph.D., English, 2010)
Associate Professor of English and Assistant Chair
Ball State University
Steven Bruso (Ph.D., English, 2017)
Associate Professor of English
Endicott College
Kisha G. Tracy (Ph.D., Medieval Studies, 2010)
Professor and Chair of English Studies
Chair of General Education Program
Fitchburg State University
Frank M. Napolitano (Ph.D., English, 2009)
Professor of English
Graduate Teaching Fellows Mentoring Program Coordinator
Radford University
Chris Cottrell (MA, Medieval Studies, 2004)
Carolyn Coulson (Ph.D., Medieval Studies, 2006)
Professor of Theatre
Associate Dean for Faculty and Academic Affairs, Shenandoah Conservatory
Shenandoah University
Michael A. Torregrossa (MA, Medieval Studies)
Founder of Alliance for the Promotion of Research on the Matter of Britain
Founder of Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture
Michael Mendoza (MA, Medieval Studies, 2004)
Professor of English
Seminole State College-Oviedo, FL
Joseph F. Stephenson (Ph.D., English, 2007)
Professor of English
Abilene Christian University
Becky L. Caouette (Ph.D., English, 2009)
Professor of English
Director of Writing
Rhode Island College
Amy Mendoza (MA, Medieval Studies, 2004)
Associate Librarian, Research and Instruction
Seminole State College of Florida
Alexandra Garner (MA, Medieval Studies, 2013)
Associate Director of Accountability and Residential Living
University of Oregon
Tonya Moutray (PhD, English, 2006)
Professor of English
Russell Sage College