Home » About Ryan Bagwell

About Ryan Bagwell

Ryan Bagwell is the founder of the Penn State Sunshine Fund, a grassroots effort supported by hundreds of dedicated alumni that aims to improve transparency at Penn State. In 2012, he restored our right to obtain public records from some university trustees. Now he wants to continue the fight for transparency as a member of the board.

A software developer and former newspaper reporter who sits on the board of the Madison chapter of the Penn State Alumni Association, Ryan wants the administration to release documents related to Louis J. Freeh’s investigation. He also supports a plan to aggressively reduce the price of a Penn State degree.

After graduating in 2002 with degrees in music and journalism, Ryan worked as an investigative newspaper reporter in Pennsylvania and Maryland before creating his own news Web site devoted to holding public officials accountable. Today he’s a Web developer with an advertising and marketing agency near Washington, D.C.

Ryan knows how boards work. As a journalist, he spent hundreds of hours writing about public bodies and exposing back-room politics. He’s also an experienced budget analyst, having reviewed countless spending plans and writing about their impact in a way people can understand.

He’s a proud lifetime member of the Penn State Alumni Association, a football season ticket holder and an active alumni association volunteer.

  • Jon Beard

    Ryan: Having just discovered your site, I’m pleased to subscribe. My daughter, Jessie, graduated from PSU in May with a BA in English. As you know, it is a fine school, but presently needs help from folks like you to “clean out the stables”, and I’m not talkin’ ’bout the Dairy Barn. Cheers, Jon

    • ryanbagwell

      Thanks for reading Jon. Keep the faith.

  • Lenny Pepperidge

    Ryan; Are you aware of exactly how much damage that you and the other Paterno Cultists are doing to Penn State? Penn State’s Presidential search is literally in the garbage, and serious candidates want no part of the job. The university was forced to offer the job to the dean of a third tier school medical college, and he only pulled out because of serious ethical questions that arose at the last minute.

    It’s not Rodney Ericsen or the older members of the Board of Trustees who are driving away A-list candidates. It is the Paterno Cultists and Paterno Truthers. It’s the cesspool of consipracy theorists. It’s Crazy Joe Lubrano demanding that a disgraced, dead football coach be reinstated so that he can “retire” with dignity. It’s Franco toting his cardboard cutout of that dead, disgraced football coach around and barging into the offices of university Presidents around the country. It’s Penn Staters for Responsible Stewardship and Rallies 4 Resignation.

    In your quest to redeem your God figure and secure his precious 409 wins, you are ruining Penn State. What top tier University President is ever going to consider leaving his job to step into this mess.

    http://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/collegian.psu.edu/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/f/e1/fe1fd9e4-23f2-11e3-9aa5-001a4bcf6878/523fa05c5112b.image.jpg

    • Chris Morris

      Are you nuts Lenny? The way you drive that backward narrative, I wonder what you are trying to hide?

    • ryanbagwell

      Hi Lenny, I’m not sure what you mean by “Paterno cultist.” I’ve been seeking public records from the Pa. Dept. of Education and other state agencies. These are public records that should be released to the taxpayers who own them. If standing up for the public’s right to obtain public records makes me a “Paterno cultist,” that’s ok with me.

  • Chris Morris

    Keep up the good work Ryan! You have our support.

  • 149113

    Ryan- Where was all this discussion of transparency all those years when Graham Spanier and the school were lobbying the Commonwealth of PA to limit reporting of financial data as well as other activities at PSU to the state and federal government? What did they have to hide? Why the secrecy? I think we all now know why PSU was so secretive all those years. Where was your outrage then? Where was your outrage when the Clery Act was patently ignored for years by the same administration that covered up for a known pedophile? Seems to me that the only reason you have taken this stance on “transparency” is to resurrect the image of your dead football coach. But the rest of the country isn’t buying it. Your school has adopted 119/120 recommendations in the Freeh report. Seems to me and the rest of the country that they understand how deficient PSU was/is. Erickson and your BOT are doing a commendable job on trying to get PSU back on track after the damage done by Spanier, Schultz, Curley and Paterno. Maybe it’s time you do the same.

  • klahrace

    Ryan, you have the support and gratitude of thousands. Good luck in the trustee election – you’ve got my vote.