Alumna Truth Hunter Earns Full Ride From UConn

UConn alumna Truth Hunter was awarded a four-year doctoral scholarship from the University of Connecticut’s Neag School of Education. Hunter is a promising new Ph.D. candidate who arrived on the UConn Storrs campus knowing she will have four years of fully funded support.

Launched in 2014, the Dean’s Doctoral Scholars Program provides full tuition for four years plus a stipend to promising Ph.D. candidates. Dean’s Doctoral Scholars have the opportunity to conduct interdisciplinary research with leading experts in the field of education while earning a doctoral degree from UConn in curriculum and instruction, educational leadership, or educational psychology.

In addition to earning a doctoral degree from UConn, Hunter will have the opportunity to present at nationwide conferences, publish research in highly regarded journals, and work alongside faculty across the Neag School’s department of educational leadership.

After receiving a master’s degree in the Neag School’s Higher Education and Student Affairs (HESA) program in 2014, Hunter is returning to the Neag School to pursue a doctoral degree in the Learning, Leadership, and Educational Policy Program (LLEP). Her research will center on equitable classroom practices with an emphasis on supporting faculty.

The research Hunter conducted during her time in HESA set the foundation for the practitioner-based work she would go on to lead at Bard College in Annadale-on-Hudson, N.Y. as the assistant director of Bard’s Higher Education Opportunity Program. After gaining insights into the experience of first-generation students at Bard, Hunter went on to serve as director of Race and Ethnicity Programs at Connecticut College in New London. In this role, Hunter expanded the college’s first-generation mentorship program for students of color by creating a one-credit course for students to discuss college success strategies and enhance their social network.

An African American woman who grew up in Oakland, Calif., in a low-income household, Hunter held hopes of being the first person in her family to attend and graduate from college. Raised in a working-class environment, she first experienced what it was like to be shaped by class when she began college at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts, an all-women’s, predominantly white school.

“I want to take the information my students trusted me with and give it a voice, give it a platform, allow it to start new conversations, and new ways of thinking,” Hunter says. “That is how I hope to use my experience as a Dean’s Doctoral