Faculty Representative

Dr. Kathy Cooke

Kathy Cooke is professor of history and founding director of the University Honors Program at Quinnipiac University.  In the 6 years of the program she has worked with faculty, students, and staff to develop and implement a vision as well as a specific plan for the new University-wide honors program.  The program has grown from a forty member “pilot” group of students to its current size of two hundred and sixty. The University Honors Program emphasizes community, and the many academic, social, and service events organized by the directors and students at Quinnipiac have built a strong connection among students as well as a confident presence in the larger University.  Kathy and her students are currently developing a mentoring program for honors students to engage high school students in the larger urban environments of New Haven and Hamden, Connecticut, to increase scientific and technological literacy while providing opportunities to learn about how to apply to and succeed in college.  Kathy also has an active scholarly agenda.   Her body of research focuses on the interaction between biology and reform in nineteenth and twentieth century America, and she has been fortunate to receive substantial support, including a scholar’s grant from the National Science Foundation, to support her work. She brings her interdisciplinary interests, as well as a focus on the importance of research and different ways of thinking not only in the academic, but also in social and service, to the honors community.