Brian Elliott (’20 Ph.D.), who earned his doctorate this spring, never allows his visual impairment to slow him down. Elliott didn’t expect to finish his time at UNT defending his doctoral dissertation in a Zoom meeting, but he says it ended up not being a big deal. It’s not surprising he took it in stride. After all, he earned three UNT degrees in history while living with Stargardt’s disease, a visual impairment he was diagnosed with as a teen. Elliott, selected as a special projects research assistant for UNT’s Portal to Texas History, has published book reviews and has manuscripts under consideration by several journals. He was named the history department’s 2019 Outstanding Teaching Fellow and teaches history in the diploma program at Westlake Academy in Westlake.