University of Mary Washington faculty, staff and students hit the ground running this year, sharing their academic specialties and love for what they do over the airwaves. Since the first days of January, their voices have contributed to the live broadcasts and pre-recorded podcasts that weave their way into home conversations, office discussions and the morning commute.

UMW experts transmitted their thoughts, offering insights on topics like map-making and artificial intelligence, and issuing invitations to on-campus events. Here – touting their zeal for everything from recruiting students to leading the school – are some of them:

Biz Beat Banter: UMW President Troy Paino: On Jan. 10, UMW President Troy Paino spoke with Bill Freehling, host of the Fredericksburg Advance’s Biz Beat Banter podcast. The 45-minute conversation covered highlights of Paino’s career before his 2016 arrival at Mary Washington, his duties as president and his goals for the University.

“I felt that what would give my life the most meaning is if I was doing something where I was investing in other people’s lives,” Paino said of his journey to college presidency and his George Washington Hall corner office. “Education is an opportunity to invest in other people and to be a part of an enterprise that at its core is hope. You’re dealing with young people at a stage of life where it’s all before them.”

Town Talk/UMW’s Great Lives: On Jan. 21, UMW’s Scott Harris, director of the William B. Crawley Great Lives lecture series, joined host Ted Schubel on the Town Talk radio show, aired live from WFVA’s Stafford County studio. The hour-long broadcast explored Mary Washington’s signature lecture series, which features – for free – presentations by biographers on their celebrated subjects. Speakers present on Tuesdays and Thursdays through April 3 in George Washington Hall’s Dodd Auditorium.

“When you take biography as a vehicle, it helps give you a much more grounded sense of how the past evolved, and people can relate,” Harris, who also serves as executive director of UMW Museums, said on the show. “People like hearing stories about other people.” Read more. 

A single garment, recently dyed, rattled around in the dryer. A sewing machine hummed, its needle stabbing into the waistline of a pair of pants. The University of Mary Washington’s costume shop was in full swing this week, as student workers – and a special guest alumna – prepared for a new production by the Department of Theatre and Dance.

Brooklyn-based costume designer Alicia Austin ’16, whose talent has contributed to shows like the smash Hulu hit Only Murders in the Building, came back to campus to dress cast members of UMW’s John Proctor is the Villain. Set to kick off tomorrow, with a special pay-what-you-can performance tonight, the play reinterprets the Arthur Miller classic The Crucible and features the kind of gritty, true-to-life wardrobes Austin has come to adore.

“With shows like this, it’s about breathing real life into them,” she said of John Proctor, which examines the coming-of-age thoughts of highschoolers in a small Georgia town. “Those clothes [most of which she snagged from Goodwill] have been lived in. You can tell they’ve got a story behind them.”

So does Austin, who enrolled at Mary Washington to study psychology. It came into play, she recalled, in a costume design course taught by Associate Professor of Theatre Kevin McCluskey. “I loved figuring out what kind of people the characters were and how we could use clothing as a language,” Austin said of the class that changed her college trajectory. “I was hooked.” Read more.