Bouchet Conference highlights innovative strategies for future scholars

On April 10-11, more than 200 attendees took part in the Graduate School’s annual Bouchet Conference on Graduate Education, now in its 22nd year. The theme of this year’s conference was “Historic Milestones and Future Directions: Innovative Strategies to Empower the Next Generation of Scholars.” 

The conference is named for New Haven native Edward Alexander Bouchet, who graduated from Yale College in 1874 and became the first self-identified African American to earn a doctorate at an American university when he received his PhD in physics from Yale in 1876.  

Participants included undergraduate and graduate students, faculty, and administrators from Yale and 28 institutions across the country. During the conference, 142 scholars were inducted into the Bouchet Graduate Honor Society, which recognizes outstanding scholarly achievement and promotes excellence in doctoral education and the professoriate.  

The conference also included 37 poster presentations, 42 oral research presentations, and guest lectures by C. Brandon Ogbunu, associate professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Yale; Gahodery K. Rodriguez Cambry, a lawyer, motivational speaker, and host of the “Labor for Life” podcast; Dr. Damani Piggott, associate vice provost for graduate diversity and partnerships at Johns Hopkins University; and Dwight A. McBride, Gerald Early Distinguished Professor of African & African American Studies, professor of English, and senior advisor to the chancellor at Washington University in St. Louis. Ogbunu was a 2008 inductee into the Bouchet Graduate Honor Society, and Rodriguez Cambry and Piggott were part of the 2006 inaugural cohort. 

In his keynote address, McBride underscored the importance of the Bouchet Society, which “makes space for scholars whose work challenges disciplinary conventions,” he said.

A first-generation college student, McBride experienced first-hand the transformative power of higher education, he told attendees.

“We need to build strong and inclusive doctoral communities. This is central to the mission of research universities,” he said.

McBride was awarded the 2026 Bouchet Leadership Medal in recognition of his academic achievements and his innovative, interdisciplinary approach to university leadership. A leading scholar of race and literary studies, McBride has written numerous books and edited volumes exploring race, Black studies, sexuality and identity politics. He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2022.

In her remarks, Graduate School Dean Lynn Cooley called McBride an “extraordinary scholar and leader whose work models both intellectual depth and public consequence.”

Cooley also reflected on the conference theme of innovative strategies for future leaders.

“Excellence in graduate education is not accidental. It's intentional and it's supported by mentorship, funding structures, advising cultures, inclusive pedagogy, and institutions willing to change,” she said.

According to Cooley, those strategies include leading with intellectual courage and humility; investing in coalitions; strengthening the infrastructure of trust; and cultivating public scholarship and translation. 

“We in higher education have not done a good enough job letting our country know why what we do is so important. And that's behind the reason that the public trust in higher education has declined. We need to tell people what we do in language they can understand and convey our excitement about the impact of our work,” she said.

Cooley also recognized Michelle Nearon, senior associate dean at the Graduate School who has led the conference for 17 years and will retire from Yale in June.

“Michelle, your stewardship has been steady, expansive, and profoundly human. You have helped build an intellectual home where emerging scholars are not only celebrated but supported; where milestones are honored, and future directions are made real through careful, value-driven work,” Cooley said. “Thank you and congratulations on a remarkable legacy,” she said.

In closing, Nearon exhorted attendees to carry on the work of Bouchet. “Your enthusiasm, excitement, sense of responsibility, and pure talent are extraordinary. As current and future leaders, you reflect the hope and radiate the inspiration that Dr. Bouchet would be proud of.”

See more photos from the conference in the slideshow below: