Earlier this month, Baylor University asked on Facebook and LinkedIn: “Which Baylor professor changed the way you thought about your future?”
Nearly 2,000 (!!) comments later, the impact Baylor faculty have on students is evident in both the quantity and quality of the responses.
Baylor’s rise as a nationally recognized Christian research university continues to attract exceptional scholars, teachers and innovators from across the country and around the world. This fall, a new cohort of faculty — think of them as the Class of ’26 — joined the Baylor Family, bringing expertise that ranges from quantum materials and artificial intelligence to bioethics and sports nutrition.
It’s impossible to spotlight everyone, but meet four of these new faculty members who offer a glimpse into the people choosing Baylor to begin, continue or grow their careers:
Baylor has always been about family — so it was a joy to welcome thousands of BU parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings and more to campus this past weekend for Family Weekend 2026.
From the new “Wake Up!” coffee crawl, “Meet the Faculty” Welcome Hour, Taste of Waco, After Dark, and Old Dominion concert on Friday, and on through the Family Tailgate and Baylor Football’s win Saturday, the weekend was a joyful celebration of our Bears and their biggest fans.
While cheering on the sidelines at Baylor’s first home football game this fall, Baylor Spirit Squad member Brooke Walker couldn’t help but feel a cascading swirl of emotions. A little over three years ago, the Baylor junior and competitive cheerleader didn’t know if she would ever be able to cheer or tumble again.
During her junior year at Rockwall-Heath High School near Dallas, Walker experienced a persistent pain in her left leg, which turned out to be an arterial blood clot above her ankle. Surgeons tried to save her foot, but complications arose, and doctors had to amputate her left leg below the knee.
For 75 years, Baylor’s Armstrong Browning Library (ABL) has been a leading destination for Browning scholars from all over the world as a research library devoted to the study of the lives and works of Victorian poets Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
The library is noted for both its breathtaking beauty and for holding the world’s largest collection of books, letters, manuscripts, and memorabilia pertaining to the Brownings, as well as a substantial collection of primary and secondary materials related to 19th-century literature and culture.
Earlier this year, a group of Baylor football student-athletes visited some of the pediatric patients at McLane Children’s Medical Center in nearby Temple, Texas. During the visit, the players and kids colored their own versions of the Baylor bear head logo — and this Saturday, one of those designs will adorn the Bears’ helmets when they take the field.
The artwork was created by 6-year-old ILaria Ramirez of Cameron, Texas (about an hour south of Waco). Ramirez, who was diagnosed with leukemia last year, titled her design “Helmet of Hope.” Her art also features the words “faith,” “victory,” and “strength.”
Twenty-five years after watching the Twin Towers fall, Dr. Marilyn Rhames, a Hankamer School of Business professor, traces how God’s calling led her out of a New York City reporting career and into teaching in Chicago public schools, a faith-based teaching movement, two White House visits — and now to a Baylor podium teaching storytelling.
College is about education, of course — but it’s just as much about the experience.
Thankfully, Baylor excels in both areas — and that’s the message behind the University’s new 30-second television spot, which debuted last weekend on social media and national television: