‘Notable Alumni’ website offers fresh look at breadth of UC’s impact

The University of Cincinnati Alumni Association has introduced a feature on its website that highlights well over 100 UC alumni for their extraordinary and, in many cases, historic accomplishments and contributions.

The new Notable Alumni microsite lists these remarkable Bearcats in five categories — Champions, Creators, Entertainers, Innovators and Leaders — to reflect the various ways that a UC education has served as outstanding preparation and a tremendous launching pad for achievement as alumni (and sometimes even as students).

“The value of a university can be evaluated in many ways, but the surest and most timeless measure is the impact of its alumni,” said Jennifer Heisey, UC’s chief alumni officer and the UC Foundation’s vice president for alumni and donor relations. “After all, for more than two centuries, UC’s primary function has been to prepare students to leverage their collegiate training to make the world a better place through their own unique contributions as alumni.”

Heisey said that during the development of the microsite, she and her staff were delighted to rediscover some of the great alumni who have passed through the university and the lasting impact they have made.

“Many of us know that UC produced the only person to have been U.S. president and chief justice, and arguably the world’s greatest basketball player, and the man who built the Golden Gate Bridge,” Heisey said. “But we were reminded that Bearcats were largely responsible for developing the Pentium processor, Apple’s first computer mouse, the world’s first fully automated computerized stock exchange, and the balloon catheter that revolutionized the treatment of blood clots.

“Our alumni include the first female administrator of OSHA and America’s first female rabbi. A Bearcat was a member of the first American team to scale Mt. Everest. We invented Benedryl, Aspercreme, the electric guitar, the Cozy Coupe toy car, the Easy-Bake Oven, and the Snugli hands-free baby carrier. It was even a UC alumna who was the model for the original Columbia Pictures Statue of Liberty logo. The list goes on and on. And its diversity demonstrates the breadth of our impact.”

The Notable Alumni list will continue to grow and be shaped by the ongoing achievements of the UC alumni family, with a semiannual review by the UC Foundation board’s Alumni Engagement Committee determining periodic updates. UC alumni and others are welcome to submit candidates for consideration by emailing alumni.association@uc.edu.