Writer

Kenneth Best

Ken Best served as editor of UCONN Magazine for 10 years. He is a co-host of the UConn 360 Podcast. He previously covered news and sports in Connecticut for The New York Times, edited the Weekend section for the Stamford Advocate and Greenwich Time, wrote arts and culture stories syndicated by the Los Angeles Times-Washington Post News Service and was the media coordinator for Yale-New Haven Hospital. During the summer of 2015 he hosted “Walking a Blues Road,” a weekly program on WHUS in Storrs based on the holdings of the Samuel and Ann Charters Archives of Blues and Vernacular African-American Musical Culture at UConn’s Thomas J. Dodd Research Center. He is the author of Eight Days a Week: An Illustrated Record of Rock ‘n’ Roll (Pomegranate Books).


Author Archive

A 3-D re-creation of a Roman ship found on the floor of the Black Sea. (Black Sea MAP)

2,000-year-old Ship Found Intact by UConn Expert, Colleagues

Avery Point-based Kroum Batchvarov is co-director of the Black Sea Maritime Archaeology Project, which has discovered more than 60 shipwrecks so far.

Money bag against a U.S. flag as background. Concept of the Super PACs' influence on the Presidential elections in the United States. (Getty Images)

Super PACs ‘Based on Ideology Rather than Business’

Super PACs created to influence presidential and congressional election campaigns are primarily associated with ideological and issue-based causes rather than businesses, say UConn researchers.

This illustration from 1879 depicts the reaction of a group of indigenous people in South America when the lunar eclipse Christopher Columbus predicted actually happened on Feb. 29, 1504. (Camille Flammarion (Astronomie Populaire 1879) via Wikimedia Commons)

Eclipse as Omen: The Human Response

A UConn philosophy professor who has studied early astronomy across cultures discusses how humans have interpreted eclipses in history.

President Ronald Reagan makes a stump speech in front of a large American flag. (Photo by Wally McNamee/CORBIS via Getty Images)

If Father Knows Best, Is He Right?

Political scientist Jeffrey Dudas discusses the concept of fatherhood in the mid-20th century conservative movement through the personal histories of three iconic figures who continue to influence today’s politics.

A participant in the River House Baseball Reminiscence Program and her son cheer on the Mets at Citi Field. (Kenneth Best/UConn Photo)

Talking Baseball Assists Aging Adults with Dementia

A UConn researcher has found that using baseball as the focus of reminiscence therapy for elderly adults with dementia can spark memories and prompt an emotional response.

Close-up of the Declaration of Independence. (Getty Images)

America’s Ongoing Struggle for Equal Rights

'Our contradictions are built into our political DNA,' says UConn historian Richard D. Brown.

Connecticut Writing Project participants at a National Writing Project Spring Meeting in Washington, D.C. From left: Danielle Pieratti, English teacher at South Windsor High School and Writing Program Leader for the CWP; Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, professor of English Education and director of the Boise State Writing Project; and Elizabeth Simison, English teacher at Bacon Academy in Colchester and adjunct in English at UConn.

Improving the Teaching of Writing

More than 525 Connecticut teachers have attended a Connecticut Writing Project Summer Institute since it began 35 years ago.

An artist's rendering of outdoor space outside the renovated UConn Bookstore on Hillside Road. (Rendering by Barnes & Noble College)

Campus Bookstore Renovations Aim to Create ‘Social Hub’

With students increasingly ordering textbooks online or in digital format, the floor space can be used for public gatherings and other student needs, such as school supplies and residence hall accessories.

Terrence Mann, artistic director of the Connecticut Repertory Theater nutmeg summer series, leads a rehearsal of "1776" at the Drama-Music Building on May 23, 2017. (Peter Morenus/UConn Photo)

Nutmeg Summer Series Opens with Broadway Veteran as Director

The series opens at Harriet Jorgensen Theatre June 1 with '1776,' the musical version of events leading up to the American Revolution.

The Dangerous Brew of Politics and Water

Often political decisions, not scientific reasoning, determines the fate of natural resources, the environment or other key resources., Veronica Herrera says.