X-Nico

19 unusual facts about Brandeis University


2011 Waltham triple murder

Teken had majored in history at predominantly Jewish Brandeis University; he was buried in Israel.

Adult bar and bat mitzvah

Rabbi Albert Axelrad of Brandeis University officiated the first adult bar mitzvahs in the early 1970s.

Daniel Lentz

Lentz achieved notability as a musician while a student at Brandeis University, when he was awarded a fellowship in composition at Tanglewood in the summer of 1966.

David Mena

He is also a graduate of criminology and international relations studies at Bar-Ilan University and of scoial services' management at Brandeis University.

David Trick

Trick holds an Honours Bachelor of Arts from York University, a Master of Arts from Brandeis University, a Master of Public Administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, and a Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science from the University of Toronto.

David Vaughn, Jr.

As a sophomore at ORU in 1973, Vaughn scored 34 points and grabbed 34 rebounds in a game against Brandeis University, setting a still-standing school record for most rebounds in a game.

Hans Corell

He currently sits on the advisory board of The International Center for Ethics, Justice and Public Life at Brandeis University and on the board of the Human Rights Institute of the International Bar Association.

John Challifour

He taught in Boston (Brandeis) and at Princeton University before moving to Bloomington with his wife, who works in the linguistics department at Indiana University.

John Unsworth

He is the University Librarian, Vice-Provost for Library and Technology Services, and Chief Information Officer at Brandeis University, a title he has held since 2012.

Kurt Thoroughman

After completion of his PhD, Thoroughman was a postdoctoral fellow with Eve Marder at Brandeis University.

Lisa Kubiske

Kubiske graduated from Brandeis University with a BA in anthropology and psychology, and from Georgetown University with a Masters of Science in Foreign Service (MSFS).

Maja Matarić

She joined the faculty at Brandeis University as an Assistant Professor of Computer Science in January 1995, then moved to the University of Southern California in 1997 as an Assistant Professor of Computer Science with a courtesy appointment in the Neuroscience Program.

Melissa Ludtke

She then served as the Executive Director of the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism at Brandeis University from 2011 to 2013.

Mordechai Liebling

He holds a Bachelor of Arts in government from Cornell University and Master of Arts in the history of American civilization, specializing in American progressive movements, from Brandeis University.

Nelson Figueroa

Figueroa attended Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts where he pitched for three years and earned a bachelors degree in American Studies.

Pete Varney

In 2012, Varney entered his 31st season as head coach of the Brandeis University varsity baseball team.

Split My Taxi

Also working with the company now is David Schwartz, a student at Brandeis University.

Stanley Diamond

On his return to the United States, he taught at Brandeis University, where anthropologist Paul Radin, a former student of Boas, was forced to retire, and in response to which Diamond resigned.

The Brandeis Hoot

The Brandeis Hoot is the community newspaper on the Brandeis campus.


Alan David Lourie

He has been described as having a "pro-patent outlook" in the book Innovation and its Discontents by Harvard Business School professor Josh Lerner and by Brandeis economics professor Adam B. Jaffe.

American Folk Art Museum

Lebanon, N.H.: University Press of New England/Brandeis University Press in association American Folk Art Museum, 2007.

Bancroft School

Myra Kraft (née Hiatt), (1942–2011), Bancroft Class of 1960: Philanthropist with the New England Patriots Charitable Foundation; Robert K. and Myra H. Kraft Foundation; American Repertory Theatre; Brandeis University; United Way of Massachusetts Bay; Boys and Girls Clubs of Boston; Kraft Stadium for American football in Jerusalem.

Benjamin Zander

In 1965 he won a Harkness International Fellowship and traveled to the United States for graduate work at Brandeis University, Harvard University and with Leonard Shure and Ernst Oster in New York.

Carolivia Herron

Herron has taught literature at many institutions, including Harvard University, Mount Holyoke College, Brandeis University, and Marien N'Guabi University in Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo.

David Aberle

Aberle also took on several teaching positions at universities, including Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Michigan, Brandeis, Oregon, and beginning in 1967 until his retirement in 1983, the University of British Columbia.

Everett Fox

Everett Fox is a scholar and translator of the Hebrew Bible, a graduate of Brandeis University.

Hebrew High School of New England

Virtually all students go on to four-year colleges after graduation, and HHNE students have been accepted to top schools such as Cooper Union, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Barnard College, Brandeis University, Boston University, New York University (NYU), Columbia University, Sarah Lawrence College, and Yeshiva University.

Howard Nemerov

Nemerov then began teaching, first at Hamilton College and later at Bennington College, Brandeis University, and finally Washington University in St. Louis, where he was Edward Mallinckrodt Distinguished University Professor of English and Distinguished Poet in Residence from 1969 until his death in 1991.

Izchak Miller

Miller was a coordinator of the Cognitive Science Research Group at the University of Pennsylvania from 1985 to 1986; he later on joined the faculty of Yeshiva University in 1993, and also taught at Stanford University, Brandeis University and the MIT.

Kfar Darom bus attack

Alisa Flatow (1975–1995), the American Jewish student from West Orange, New Jersey killed in the attack, attended Brandeis University.

Michael J. Sandel

A high achiever, he was the President of his senior class at Palisades High School (1971), graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Brandeis University with a Bachelor's degree in politics (1975), and received his doctorate from Balliol College, Oxford, as a Rhodes Scholar, where he studied under philosopher Charles Taylor.

Michael Stonebraker

In the C-Store project, started in 2005, Stonebraker, along with colleagues from Brandeis University, Brown University, MIT, and University of Massachusetts Boston, developed a parallel, shared-nothing column-oriented DBMS for data warehousing.

Myra Kraft

She served on the boards of directors of the American Repertory Theatre, the United Way of Massachusetts Bay, Northeastern University, the Boys and Girls Clubs of Boston, and Brandeis University.

National Museum of American Jewish History

Professor Jonathan Sarna of Brandeis University led the development of the core exhibit for the museum.

Nene Humphrey

She served as faculty at Parsons School of Art and Design from 1992 to 1998, at New York University in 2005, and at the Vermont Studio Center from 2004 to 2009, and was a visiting artist at Brandeis University in 1999 and 2001.

NGO Monitor

In an op-ed published in 2005 by The Forward, Leonard Fein, a former professor of politics and Klutznick Professor of Contemporary Jewish Studies at Brandeis University, takes issue with NGO Monitor's statement that Human Rights Watch (HRW) places "extreme emphasis on critical assessments of Israel" and has issued more reports about HRW than on any other of the 75 NGOs it concerns itself with.

Paul E. Beaudoin

Dr. Beaudoin received his education from the University of Miami in Coral Gables, FL (BM, 1983); the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, MA (MM with Academic Distinction, 1987) and a Ph.D. in Music Composition and Theory from Brandeis University in 2002.

Peter C. Goldmark, Jr.

He has been a visiting professor at noted schools, including the JFK School of Government of Harvard University, Yale University, Brandeis University and the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University.

Posen Foundation

An academic advisory board reviews grant applications, which have included universities such as Harvard University, Brown University, Brandeis University, and The New School.

Six Days or Forever?

Ginger, later a Professor of History at Brandeis, Wayne State University, and the University of Calgary and at the time a New York trade book editor, had written about Eugene Debs and the city of Chicago in the time of John Peter Altgeld before tackling the Scopes trial.

Steve J. Rosen

Prior to coming to AIPAC in 1982, Rosen taught political science and international relations from 1968 to 1978 at the University of Pittsburgh, Brandeis University, and the Australian National University.

The Double Yellow

After a brief stint touring region-wide visiting locations like the Paradise Rock Club, 242 Main, The Savant Project, Boston University, the University of New Hampshire, the University of Vermont, Brandeis University, and New Hampshire’s Rockin’ Ribfest Festival, the Double Yellow took a leave of absence from performance to finish writing and begin recording their debut album, Everything & Nothing, with noted producer Brian Coombes (Godsmack, Another Animal, Supertramp).

Tim Dean

Originally a British civil servant, Dean was educated at the University of East Anglia (BA in American Studies), Brandeis University, and Johns Hopkins University (MA and PhD).

William Leiss

He began his university education in New Jersey, at Fairleigh Dickinson University, graduating in 1956 with a B.A. summa cum laude (major in history and minor in accounting); then in Massachusetts, with a M.A. in the History of Ideas Program at Brandeis University (1963); and finally in La Jolla, California, with a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of California, San Diego (1969).

Xiaofeng Zhou

He holds a BS in biochemistry and microbiology from Hangzhou University in China; a PhD in biochemistry and a postdoctorate training in human genetics from Boston University; and an MS in software engineering from Brandeis University.