In the News

A new law clinic is providing free legal services for veterans in the St. Louis region. Washington University’s School of Law officially launched the Veterans Law Clinic this month. The free clinic prioritizes low- to moderate-income veterans who want to upgrade their discharge characterizations and correct military records.

Washington University in St. Louis is partnering with the St. Louis Integrated Health Network (IHN) on a five-year $3.8 million grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The grant is part of the CDC’s Racial and Ethnic Approaches to Community Health (REACH) program. The funding aims to help improve health, prevent chronic diseases and reduce health disparities in the local Black community residing in the St. Louis Promise Zone.

BioSTL, the biosciences economic development organization, has named a new leader for its investment arm. The organization said this week that Dr. James McCarter, a Washington University-trained physician and biologist, has been named a senior vice president of BioSTL and senior managing director of BioGenerator Ventures.

Dr. Katherine Weilbaecher was concerned about the trends. As an oncologist at WashU Medicine specializing in metastatic breast cancer, she noticed Black patients from North County were coming to her office with more advanced cancers. She recently created a mammography clinic targeted to the high-risk population to find those cancers earlier and ensure patients receive follow-up care.

Although Vice President Kamala Harris is the first-ever Indian American candidate to win a major party’s nomination for the U.S. presidency, it would be wrong to assume she has “the Indian American vote” among St. Louisans — or anywhere else in the country — locked in. Harris’ historic candidacy has, however, ignited conversations about Indian Americans and voting. This is especially important in St. Louis because U.S. Census data show Indians make up the fastest-growing immigrant population in the St. Louis region, and second in the nation overall. Three Indian Americans in St. Louis including Jacob Chacko, executive director of Washington University’s Center of Diversity & Inclusion, spoke with St. Louis on the Air about their lives in the Midwest and how politics have played a role.

How to retain Washington University graduates and other higher education students in the St. Louis metro area is a complex question, but WashU researchers have compiled data that offers a potential path forward.

Washington University in St. Louis is releasing a report on retaining college graduates in the city. Salary is the main determinant of whether graduates stay or leave, according to a study by WashU’s Center for Analytics and Business Insights. Social connections and career advancement opportunities are the next two most important factors.

External research funding at Washington University has nearly doubled in 10 years, from $532 million in fiscal 2014 to more than $1 billion now, the first time annual funding from federal agencies, foundations, donors and other external sources has reached into 10 digits.

Asquith S. “Sean” Armstong, dean of the School of Continuing & Professional Studies (CAPS) at Washington University St. Louis, will be honored with an Excellence in Education Award during the 2024 Salute to Excellence in Education Scholarship and Awards Gala.

In just over a year as dean of Washington University’s Olin Business School officially, Mike Mazzeo has presided over the creation of a new flexible master’s in business administration program that has seen 25% growth over the part-time programs it replaced and 20% growth in the school’s executive MBA program. The results, he said, fit into Olin’s strategic strengths: education contoured to the local business community’s needs, including the two part-time, non-traditional MBA programs.