Barnard College

Jul 26, 2024 | barnard.edu | Nicole Gates Anderson

Some people need time to figure out what they want to do. They meander and dabble until they land on something. But for Anne Cebula ’20, there was no equivocation, no trial and error. She knew her calling from the moment she watched the 2008 Beijing Olympics at just 10 years old from her home in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. “I saw fencing for the first time, and I just fell in love. This is unlike anything I’ve ever seen,” she recalls. “And I remember I saw it, and I said, ‘Well, I want to do that.

May 31, 2024 | barnard.edu | Gabriel Baumgaertner

Zinnat Ferdous ’16 was not dreaming of becoming an Olympian in early 2017. All she wanted was to get her boyfriend, Edmund, a nice gift for his birthday. She chuckled when Edmund shadowboxed at stoplights, in the bathroom, and “anytime there was a void.” Until she watched him pound a heavy bag during a visit to the gym, she had no idea she had been dating an amateur boxer for the past few months.

Mar 28, 2024 | barnard.edu | Michael B. Dougherty

“I found my place in the world hosting a radio show at one a.m. in New York City in the 1980s,” writes Brooke Wentz ’82 in the introduction to her recently published book, Transfigured New York: Interviews with Experimental Artists and Musicians, 1980-1990, adding, “I had just started school at Barnard when I showed up at Columbia’s WKCR-FM.” Wentz, who went on to an impressive and varied career in the music business, including heading up ESPN’s music department, managing A&R at Arista...

Mar 13, 2024 | barnard.edu | Kenrya Rankin

Some things just stick with you. Ebonie Smith ’07 was in high school when she first heard her honors chemistry teacher say, “Water is the universal solvent.” Perched atop a stool, feet dangling below the lab table at East High School in Memphis, Tennessee, Smith didn’t think it registered beyond one more lesson in a long day of learning. But more than two decades later, those five words continue to inform her understanding of music. “Water can pretty much dissolve anything.

Mar 4, 2024 | barnard.edu | Eric Holder

Adelson Siegel was many things in her remarkably accomplished 101 years — lawyer, activist, and beloved member of the Barnard community. From the beginning of her journey at the College as a 15-year-old student, Adelson Siegel was dedicated to fighting for social justice and housing rights.