Cathy Connolly (born September 15, 1956) is an American professor and

politician A politician is a person who participates in Public policy, policy-making processes, usually holding an elective position in government. Politicians represent the people, make decisions, and influence the formulation of public policy. The roles ...

from

Wyoming Wyoming ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States, Western United States. It borders Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho t ...

. A

Democrat Democrat, Democrats, or Democratic may refer to: Politics *A proponent of democracy, or democratic government; a form of government involving rule by the people. *A member of a Democratic Party: **Democratic Party (Cyprus) (DCY) **Democratic Part ...

, she is a former member of the

Wyoming House of Representatives The Wyoming House of Representatives is the lower house of the Wyoming Legislature, Wyoming State Legislature. There are 62 Representatives in the House, representing an equal number of single-member constituent districts across the Wyoming, st ...

who represented the 13th district in Albany County. She is also a tenured professor at the

University of Wyoming The University of Wyoming (UW) is a Public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Laramie, Wyoming, United States. It was founded in March 1886, four years before the territory was admitted as the 44th state, ...

in Laramie.

Early life and education

A native of

Troy, New York Troy is a city in and the county seat of Rensselaer County, New York, United States. It is located on the western edge of the county, on the eastern bank of the Hudson River just northeast of the capital city of Albany, New York, Albany. At the ...

, Connolly earned her B.S. from

Buffalo State College The State University of New York Buffalo State University (colloquially referred to as Buffalo State University, SUNY Buffalo State, Buffalo State, or simply Buff State) is a public college, public university in Buffalo, New York. It is part of ...

. She then received three postgraduate degrees from the

State University of New York at Buffalo The State University of New York at Buffalo (commonly referred to as UB, University at Buffalo, and sometimes SUNY Buffalo) is a public research university in Buffalo and Amherst, New York, United States. The university was founded in 1846 a ...

: a

Master of Arts A Master of Arts ( or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA or AM) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Those admitted to the degree have ...

(1989), a

Juris Doctor A Juris Doctor, Doctor of Jurisprudence, or Doctor of Law (JD) is a graduate-entry professional degree that primarily prepares individuals to practice law. In the United States and the Philippines, it is the only qualifying law degree. Other j ...

(1991) and a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

(1992). In 2009, Connolly complete
Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government
program for Senior Executives in State and Local Government as
David BohnettLGBTQ Victory Institute
Leadership Fellow. She moved to Laramie, Wyoming in 1992 when she accepted a faculty position at the University of Wyoming. Until 2000, she served as an adjunct professor in the Women's Studies Program in the College of Arts and Sciences. In 2000, she became director of the program, a post she held until 2006. Since 2006, she has been a professor, following six years as an associate professor in the sociology department. A

lesbian A lesbian is a homosexual woman or girl. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with female homosexu ...

, she has a son, Lucas. She is the first ever openly gay member of the Wyoming State Legislature. She has authored a number of articles on sexuality including ''Out in the cowboy state: a look at lesbian and gay lives in Wyoming'', published in the Journal of Gay and Lesbian Social Services in 2007. Connolly represents Laramie, the city in which

Matthew Shepard Matthew Wayne Shepard (December 1, 1976 – October 12, 1998) was an American student at the University of Wyoming who was beaten, tortured, and left to die near Laramie on October 6, 1998. He was transported by rescuers to Poudre Valle ...

was murdered in 1998 in what was believed to be an anti-gay hate crime. She is featured as a character in the play based on those events, ''

The Laramie Project ''The Laramie Project'' is a 2000 American play by Moisés Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theater Project (specifically, Leigh Fondakowski, writer-director; Stephen Belber, Greg Pierotti, Barbara Pitts, Stephen Wangh, Amanda Gronich, Sar ...

''.

Political career

The district Connolly represented is the 13th district
map
, which fell entirely within the city of Laramie and contained a central portion of the city. Connolly was first elected to the legislature in 2008, winning the primary election unopposed. A Republican, Ember Oakley, filed to run against her in the general election but withdrew on August 29. She was therefore elected without opposition. She succeeded Democrat Jane Warren and took office in January 2009. In the 2009 legislature, she was appointed to the House Education Committee, to the House Travel, Recreation, Wildlife and Cultural Resources Committee and to the Select Committee on Legislative Facilities. She faced no opposition in 2010 and ran unopposed for re-election in 2012 and 2014. Prior to becoming the representative from district 13, Connolly volunteered with the Wyoming Council for the Humanities. Connolly also served on the board of directors of Albany County SAFE Project and United Gays and Lesbians of Wyoming (now Wyoming Equality). She spent several years as a grant reviewer for the State Division of Victim Services and currently serves as a member of the State Department of Workforce Services' wage gap policy group. She is also a former chair of the parent board at Laramie's Whiting High School.

Electoral record

References

External links

Legislative homepageCampaign websiteHomepage at the University of Wyoming
{{DEFAULTSORT:Connolly, Cathy 1956 births 21st-century American women politicians 21st-century American LGBTQ people 21st-century members of the Wyoming Legislature Democratic Party members of the Wyoming House of Representatives American lesbian politicians Lesbian academics LGBTQ state legislators in Wyoming Living people Politicians from Troy, New York Women state legislators in Wyoming University at Buffalo alumni