BY BRYAN FEAREY
Candidate
UNM-LA Advisory Board

My name is Bryan Fearey. I am running for a position on the University of New Mexico–Los Alamos (UNM-LA) Advisory board. I seek your vote so that together we can strengthen UNMLA as one of our bedrock institutions. I strongly support UNM-LA’s mission of “preparation for transfer … pathways for careers … passion for lifelong learning.”

I am a long-term resident of Los Alamos County, having worked and retired from the Los Alamos National Laboratory (>32yrs) in the national security arena (Linkedin). I completed my Chemistry BS at Wichita State University and my PhD in Physical Chemistry at Iowa State University, where I taught a number of college-level chemistry courses.

Los Alamos became my true home and my community not long after my arrival in 1986 — there is no better place to live. My daughters, Brenna and Colleen, grew up here and together we saw the challenges of education here, in the United States and in the World. Colleen earned a BS in Zoology at University of New Hampshire, and Brenna earned a BS in Psychology at State University of New York–New Paltz and a MS in Neuroscience at the University of Utrecht Neuroscience in the Netherlands and her PhD in Hamburg, Germany, before returning to Boston for a Postdoctoral position at Boston University.

Education has always been an integral part of my life, whether as an undergraduate or doctoral student, a scientist, a policy expert, a mentor or as a thesis advisor for 3 PhD students and 2 Masters while working at LANL. I’ve been a Capstone Mentor for the Bush School at Texas A&M University, and an adjunct professor at several universities, including the University of New Mexico. Today, I continue to mentor several national-security early-career professionals, and support knowledge transfer throughout the nuclear security enterprise.

Together with my wife, Maureen Connolly [also a PhD physical chemist], we have been engaged in the educational-area for decades. Maureen taught at UNM-LA, at Los Alamos High School and at Little Forest Playschool. My daughters were in the LAHS marching and concert bands, we were Band Boosters, and I worked closely with Brenna’s clarinet section.

I returned to performance music in 2005, and am now playing in Los Alamos Community Winds and Los Alamos Symphony, and perform regularly in my saxophone quintet, SaxAtomix, while also teaching clarinet to LAHS students.

After I served on the Los Alamos Employees’ Scholarship Fund Advisory Committee for six years, my wife and I decided to set up a LANL Foundation Endowed Scholarship for Science and the Arts—honoring our enduring commitment to education supporting six students to date.

I believe UNM-LA is a gemstone connecting so many different parts of our community—whether with high school students in dual-credit courses, transition students before leaving Los Alamos for 4-year college experiences, students seeking certification (e.g., welding) or an associate’s degree (e.g., emergency medical services), or an advanced degree (e.g., computer science), or adult students seeking personal enrichment.

Through my strong educational experience, sound scientific foundation and a deep commitment to our community, I will work hard to ensure UNM-LA is truly a best-in-class institution.

I thank you in advance for your consideration in voting for me to join the UNM-LA Advisory Board.

Website: www.electbryanforunmla.com
Email: electbryanforunmla@gmail.com
Phone: 505-644-2246