Lux Esto Award Winner Don Mack (right) stands with Kalamazoo College President Jorge G. Gonzalez at the Founders Day Community Reflection.
Don Mack, Kalamazoo College director of technical and media services, is this year’s recipient of the Lux Esto Award of Excellence. The award, given Friday at the annual Founders Day Community Reflection marking the College’s 186th year, recognizes an employee who has served the institution for at least 26 years and has a record of stewardship and innovation.
The winner–chosen by a committee with student, faculty and staff representatives–is an employee who exemplifies the spirit of Kalamazoo College through excellent leadership, selfless dedication and goodwill.
Gonzalez credited Mack for his work, ensuring that the College’s facilities have the appropriate networking and audio-visual components to fulfill their purposes. Gonzalez added, “Through careful listening, institutional memory and insight, and just the right amount of dry humor, (Mack) promotes goodwill on campus.”
Mathematics Professor Eric Barth stands with Kalamazoo College President Jorge G. Gonzalez after receiving the Outstanding Advisor Award at the Founders Day Community Reflection.Associate Professor of English Amelia Katanski ’92 stands with Kalamazoo College President Jorge G. Gonzalez after receiving the Outstanding First-Year Student Advocate Award.
“Advisers are mentors who work very closely with our students, monitoring academic progress, and helping students identify and fulfill their goals while working to complete their degrees at the College,” Gonzalez said of Barth’s award. Barth “completes all this with grace and skill.”
First-year advocates are “educators who make significant contributions to the academic achievement and personal development of students in the students’ first year at the College,” Gonzalez said about Katanski’s honor. Katanski “has gone above and beyond to make a difference in the lives of first-year students and has helped them find their place at K while developing a foundation for advocacy and community responsibility.”
Each year, up to $100 billion worth of harvested food is lost worldwide to pests and microbes. A Kalamazoo College student’s research could hold part of the solution.
Marco Ponce ’19 examines insects through a microscope at Dow Science Center. He will attend Kansas State University with an NSF Graduate Fellowship beginning this fall.
Marco Ponce ’19, a biology major from San Diego, conducted his Senior Individualized Project (SIP) last summer under Rob Morrison, Ph.D., ’06, a research entomologist working for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Center for Grain and Animal Health Science in Manhattan, Kansas. Their work targeted alternative methods for managing red flour and lesser grain beetles, which primarily attack stored grains.
“Prior research has found that these beetles release some pheromones that make them come together in groups, and others that trigger them to spread out,” Ponce said. As a result, “we wondered how their density affects their behavior when they look for food. We’ve found the beetles responded less to otherwise attractive food cues when they’re grouped in higher densities, so we’re trying to synthesize the signal that turns off their food-finding behavior and use it as a repellent. Our goal is to figure out how to use their biology against them.”
Marco Ponce ’19 (third from right) stands with Rob Morrison, Ph.D., ’06, (third from left) outside the Insect Zoo at Kansas State University. Ponce will attend Kansas State through an NSF Graduate Fellowship this fall.
Ponce learned last week that he earned a National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowship to attend Kansas State University as a graduate student this fall, meaning he and Morrison will conduct more research beginning in July. The two will study how stored-product beetles and microbes interact to ruin harvested grains.
“Every year after harvest, we lose anywhere from 10 to 30 percent of our food commodities,” Morrison said. In addition to the U.S., “if you look at some developing countries, this means about $100 billion in commodities are lost every year. Marco’s project has global ramifications. If he can find some of the attractants useful for (pest) management, that will go a long way toward ensuring less pest damage and making agriculture more sustainable.”
“When he was selected, he was up against some students who already are in their graduate programs,” said Biology Professor Ann Fraser, Ponce’s academic adviser. “It’s always gratifying to see students take an interest in science, even if they just make a hobby out of it. But it’s especially rewarding for me to see students go into entomology. There are so many opportunities to get involved in entomology because insects affect our lives in so many ways.”
Marco Ponce ’19 will attend Kansas State University through an NSF Graduate Fellowship beginning this fall.
Ponce and Fraser got to know each other when Ponce was reconsidering his pre-med path. His classes helped him realize he could seek other opportunities in science, and he found the best opportunity in Fraser’s entomology lab.
“That was the transition for me,” Ponce said, admitting his first year at K was difficult, especially as English was his second language, having grown up primarily in Tijuana, Mexico. “I considered changing majors until I saw the email from Dr. Fraser inviting me into her lab. I was surprised because I wasn’t the best academically at the time. It’s one of the reasons why I’m still here: I found my passion.”
Ponce first performed research in Fraser’s lab with painted lady butterflies, a species common in all climates throughout the world. His work analyzed how their antennae responded to different odors produced by flowers compared to those produced by potential predators such as ants, and Fraser was thrilled with his work.
A college track, though, wasn’t always in Ponce’s view. At one point, Ponce expected to join the work force immediately after high school when Pablo Roncoroni, his high school teacher, took him under his wing and helped him navigate the college application process. As a result, not only did Ponce find K, but so did five other students from that high school who since have followed in his footsteps.
The support of teachers and mentors has led Ponce to a place where his research and passion can benefit others around the world including in his backyard. As co-founder of the College’s Entomology Club, he’ll soon start working with that group to inspire students at Kalamazoo’s El Sol Elementary, with a goal of introducing students to science in a different, more hands-on way.
“Marco is very creative,” Fraser said. “I invited him into my lab because he is such an original thinker and he has a great science mind. He is a real ambassador of science.”
A distinguished group of Kalamazoo College alumni will provide students with two days of practical workforce preparation April 12 and 13 during Career Summit 2019. All students are welcome and encouraged to attend this special event targeting positive employment outcomes through the Center for Career and Professional Development.
Shelby Hopper ’18 introduces ClozeLoop Managing Director Hilmon Sorey (from left), Loparex Global Vice President for Research and Development Ed Hortelano ’83, retired Google Superintendent of Well-Being Bill Duane ’94 and Depot Global Inc. Co-Founder and Executive Vice President Lindsey Haswell during Career Summit 2018. Career Summit 2019 is scheduled for April 12 and 13 at the Hicks Student Center.
Through interactive break-out sessions, themed panel discussions and networking opportunities, students of all majors will gain priceless information about the global job market. All Career Summit events will be at the Hicks Student Center on campus to ensure as many students as possible may participate.
The scheduled speakers for Career Summit 2019 are:
Students may register for Career Summit 2019 through Handshake. Contact Kristy Carlson at kristy.carlson@kzoo.edu or 269.337.7183 for more information or assistance in registering.
A respected law professor called “one of the stars of his generation” by Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, and one of the “most influential people of the 21st century” by Esquire magazine will deliver the Donald C. Flesche Visiting Scholar Lecture at Kalamazoo College.
Noah R. Feldman, the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and a senior fellow of the Society of Fellows at Harvard, will speak at 8 p.m. Tuesday, April 9, 2019, in the Olmsted Room, Mandelle Hall. The lecture is free and open to the public.
Harvard Law Professor Noah Feldman will deliver the Flesche Lecture at 8 p.m. April 9.
Feldman specializes in constitutional studies with an emphasis on the relationship between law and religion, constitutional design and the history of legal theory. He is also the director of the Julis-Rabinowitz Program on Jewish and Israeli Law.
“We have outstanding faculty who provide students with opportunities to think and learn. Experts in these fields are an important complement to that,” Interim Provost Laura Furge said. “This gives our students an opportunity to bring questions to the table, apply what they’re learning and bring it into a conversation.”
Feldman received his bachelor’s degree in near-Eastern languages and civilizations from Harvard University in 1992. He was selected as a Rhodes Scholar and earned his Ph.D. in Oriental studies from Oxford University in 1994. He received his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1997 and served as a law clerk to Justice David H. Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court. He served as a senior constitutional adviser during the drafting of Iraq’s interim constitution in 2003. In 2011, Feldman appeared in all three episodes of Ken Burns’ PBS series Prohibition as a legal commentator, and he is a regular contributor to Bloomberg Opinion. He has written seven books since 2003 including, What We Owe Iraq: War and the Ethics of Nation Building (2004), Divided By God: America’s Church-State Problem—and What We Should Do About It (2005) and The Three Lives of James Madison (2017).
The lecture series is named after Donald Flesche, a professor emeritus of political science and the longtime “Voice of the Hornets” at countless K athletics events. Flesche taught at Kalamazoo College from 1962-1998; in 2001, he was honored with the Weimer K. Hicks Award, recognizing a current or retired employee of the College who has provided support for programs or activities beyond the call of duty. The lectureship endowment was started by Flesche’s former students to honor his inspirational teaching and ensure that the conversations on campus include some of the world’s best scholars.
Events such as the Flesche Lecture and the Weber Lecture, which brought leading Black Lives Matter Voice DeRay Mckesson to campus in October, provide K with “an opportunity to bring in an opinion maker who sees excellence in our academic programs and invite them to be a part of our fellowship of learning,” Furge said.
UPDATE:The venue for the chemistry symposium has been changed to Dewing Hall, Room 103.
Kalamazoo College department symposiums typically kick off student presentations of senior individualized projects. This year’s chemistry symposium has added significance, serving as the official sendoff for Dorothy H. Heyl Professor of Chemistry Tom Smith, who is retiring after 40 years at the College.
This year’s chemistry symposium has added significance, serving as the official sendoff for Dorothy H. Heyl Professor of Chemistry Tom Smith, who is retiring after 40 years at the College.
The chemistry symposium will start at 4:10 p.m. Thursday, April 18, 2019, in Dewing Hall, Room 103. Kalamazoo College President Jorge G. Gonzalez will welcome attendees before Interim Provost and Chemistry Professor Laura Furge introduces alumni Chris Bodurow and Bob Weinstein, both ’79. Bodurow and Weinstein were students in the first class Smith taught in the 1978-79 school year.
After the opening remarks, Smith will offer a lecture titled “Reflections on Teaching and Research in Inorganic Chemistry: From Small Molecules to Crystals to Metalloproteins.” A reception will follow at Dow Science Center.
“We have invited alumni to attend and send notes that we will present” to Smith, Furge said. “Alumni will continue to see how strong the Chemistry department is. All faculty are research active as campus is abuzz in summer with research students, and their grants and publishing show how deeply invested our faculty are in teaching pedagogies.”
Bodurow and Weinstein were a part of the fundraising effort that endowed a research fellowship in Smith’s honor. The Thomas J. Smith Student Research Fellowship in Chemistry honors Smith by supporting an initiative close to his heart: independent summer research.
“The endowment to fund student research positions is a very fitting tribute to the work [Smith] has done,” Furge said. “He has faithfully taken on at least two students each summer, committing himself to mentoring and influencing generations of students.”
Testifying to the devotion Smith has inspired, he was designated an Alpha Lambda Delta National Honorary Society Favorite Teacher by first-year students 13 times. In addition, he directed the senior individualized projects of 70 students, was named a Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation Scholar and was awarded the Florence J. Lucasse Fellowship for Excellence in Scholarship or Creative Work and the Dr. Winthrop S. and Lois A. Hudson Award for Outstanding Contributions in Research at Kalamazoo College.
Samuel Nalangira will perform Tuesday, March 5, with Kalamazoo College’s International Percussion Ensemble in Dalton Theater.
Samuel Nalangira, a world-touring musician famous for his performances on instruments such as the adungu from northern Uganda and the akogo from eastern Uganda, will perform with the Kalamazoo College International Percussion Ensemble in one of four winter concerts coming soon through K’s Music Department.
The International Percussion Ensemble will perform at 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 5, in the Dalton Theater at Light Fine Arts. The ensemble unites individuals with varied musical backgrounds from K, nearby institutions and the general community in West African and Japanese Taiko drumming. The West African group is led by Percussion Instructor Nathaniel Waller. Instructor Esther Vandecar leads the Taiko drummers. Tickets are $5 for adults, $2 for children and free for K students, faculty and staff who present a College ID.
The College Singers is a choral ensemble featuring music majors and non-majors alike that offers mixed soprano, alto, tenor and bass voices. The group, led by Assistant Music Professor Chris Ludwa, will perform with Western Michigan University Adjunct Professor of Voice Rhea Olivacce and the Kalamazoo Bach Festival Chorus at 7 p.m. Wednesday, March 6, at First Congregational Church in downtown Kalamazoo. Tickets for the concert, themed “Love Is Love Is (Volume 2),” are available at KalamazooBachFestival.org or by phone at 269.337.7407.
Kalamazoo College’s Jazz Band, led by Music Professor Tom Evans, will perform a free concert, themed “Vortex,” at 8 p.m. Friday, March 8, in the Dalton Theater. The Jazz Band plays contemporary and classic jazz arrangements to provide enjoyable musical experiences to the students performing as well as to delighted audiences.
The Bayati Ensemble, uniting K students and community members, will perform a free concert at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 12, in Recital Hall at Light Fine Arts with the Kalamazoo College Chinese Chamber Ensemble. This group, led by Assistant Professor of Music Beau Bothwell, explores and performs the music of the broader Middle East, including music from the Arabic, Turkish, Kurdish and Persian traditions.
For more information on these concerts, call the Music Department at 269.337.7070 or email Susan.Lawrence@kzoo.edu.
Kalamazoo College will host a panel discussion to examine the impact of mass incarceration on communities from 4:15 to 7 p.m. Thursday, March 7.
Kalamazoo College will host a panel discussion to examine the impact of mass incarceration on communities, explore how to reduce incarceration rates and increase successful re-entry through a collaborative call to action. This event is free and open to the public.
WHO: Sponsored by the community and global health concentration at K, this event aims to foster dialogue among people directly and indirectly affected by mass incarceration, including community members, non-profit and youth-serving organizations, the faith-based community, law enforcement, mental health professionals, K-12 educators, and college and university faculty and students.
WHAT: The event will examine the link between student disciplinary history and future incarceration, and how access to mentorships, counseling and other services can be more effective than traditional methods of discipline in fostering student success. It will include a presentation of the documentary Pathways to Prison and thoughtful discussion with panel participants, including the documentary’s producer. Participants will consider how to support youth, schools and local law enforcement in the building of safe communities that affirm the dignity of every individual.
Panelists include:
Dr. Charles Bell (Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice Sciences, Illinois State University)
Bill Kubota, (Producer, Pathways to Prison)
Cindy Green (Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning Services, Kalamazoo Public Schools)
Reuquiyah Saunders (Director of Special Education, Kalamazoo Public Schools)
Fortune tellers, wanderers, hobbits and mermaids … meet them all through music when Kalamazoo College presents two public winter concerts this Friday and Saturday in Dalton Theater at Light Fine Arts.
Music Professor Thomas Evans will lead the Academy Street Winds in one of two winter concerts scheduled for this weekend.
The Academy Street Winds will perform at 8 p.m. Friday, March 1, featuring a theme of “Rogues and Vagabonds.”
The Academy Street Winds is a wind ensemble providing a performance outlet for woodwind, brass and percussion students. Community musicians joined the ensemble in winter 2016 to expand the group’s sound and capabilities. Conducted by Music Professor Thomas Evans, the group performs one concert each term, playing exciting arrays of challenging band music. The ensemble is a favorite of audiences as the programs are coordinated around diverse themes, which allow for performances of much-loved pieces, both classic and contemporary. Admission is free.
The Kalamazoo Philharmonia, directed by Kalamazoo College Associate Professor of Music Andrew Koehler, will perform at 8 p.m. Saturday, March 2. Tickets to this concert are $5 each for the public, $2 for students and free for Kalamazoo College students who present their College IDs.
This orchestra unites professional and amateur musicians, including Kalamazoo College students and faculty, along with many from the community. The concert is titled “A Tale of Two Cities” and will compare works from Johannes Brahms’ “Symphony No. 1” and Alexander Zemlinsky’s “The Mermaid.” Both composers had ties to Vienna, Austria.
The Kalamazoo Philharmonia won the 2014 American Prize Vytautas Marijosius Memorial Award for Orchestral Programming and has produced several CDs. It also has appeared on CBS Sunday Morning, and collaborated with the Bach Festival Chorus, as well as many renowned soloists. Listen to some of its recorded concerts at our website.
For questions about either of the winter concerts, call 269.337.7070 or email susan.lawrence@kzoo.edu.
The Kalamazoo College Festival Playhouse’s 55th season, featuring the theme of Assumption and Confusion, continues this week with the powerful play Student Body.
Kalamazoo College students rehearse for Student Body, which runs Thursday, Feb. 21-Sunday, Feb. 24, at the Nelda K. Balch Festival Playhouse.
Written by Frank Winters and directed by Visiting Theatre Arts Assistant Professor Bianca Washington, the play approaches complicated ethical questions when a college student wakes up after a party in her parents’ house and finds a video on her camera of a sexual encounter. The woman in the video might or might not be unconscious as others watch, leading the 10 characters, consisting of seven women and three men, to debate whether a sexual assault has occurred and who they should tell about it.
“The setting is written to be a university in the middle of nowhere, but the director made a bold decision to place it at K,” said Ynika Yuag ’21, who noted that some of the characters will wear Kalamazoo College apparel.
In her role as a dramaturg, Yuag is responsible for working with the director on background research and how current events and perspectives might inform or shape the production. “K isn’t exactly the middle of nowhere,” she said, “but the campus is small enough that we all get to know each other, which really makes [the production] personal. The more I work on it, the more I realize how it fits the theme of Assumption and Confusion.”
The performances are scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 21 through Saturday, Feb. 23, with a 2 p.m. showing on Sunday, Feb. 24. Yuag said a lobby display with interactive elements will allow audience members to engage with ideas related to the play through proxy stations before and after the show. Plus, there will be talkback sessions featuring facilitators and cast members after each show. The scheduled facilitators include:
Thursday: Ellen Lassiter Collier, K’s Title IX coordinator and director of gender equity
Friday: Dramaturg Ynika Yuag and Assistant Director Karishma Singh ’19; American College Theatre Festival adjudicator Derik McNish of Michigan State University will also provide a critique of the show after the talkback
Be advised, there is strong language and a graphic discussion of sexual violence in the show.
Tickets for all four shows at the Nelda K. Balch Playhouse are available by visiting festivalplayhouse.ludus.com or by calling 269.337.7333. Adults are $15, seniors are $10 and students are $5 with an ID. Kalamazoo College students, faculty and staff are admitted free with their College IDs.
Declaration of Major Day is a festive gathering where sophomores designate their majors, minors and concentrations at Kalamazoo College.
There are two camps of students who come to college: those who know exactly what they want to study — or are pretty sure they know — and those who don’t. Kalamazoo College takes a different approach to helping students decide their major. Through the K-Plan, students explore and discover academic fields for a year and a half before choosing a major. Best of all, the curriculum is designed to give students this freedom while keeping them on track to graduate in four years. This past Wednesday’s Declaration of Major Day, the midpoint of their sophomore year, was a festive gathering where students formally designated their majors, minors and concentrations.
The banquet hall at Hicks Student Center was packed as each department set up a booth. Students went from table to table, committing to their fields of study and getting stickers declaring their choices. They celebrated the big moment with one another and the rest of campus with a piece of cake baked for the event by Dining Services.
“Declaration of Major Day is a 15-year tradition at Kalamazoo College,” Associate Dean of Students Dana Jansma said. “College students everywhere are required to declare a major, but here at K we make it a special event and celebration.”
Jansma also said it’s a way to celebrate students finding their academic home.
“It is a real rite-of-passage for sophomores,” she said.
K senior Emma Eisenbeis, a political science and German double major, recalled the excitement of her Declaration of Major Day. “This event gives you the opportunity to situate yourself in your academic community with your fellow peers and faculty. It really hits you that this is the start of your career path,” Eisenbeis said.
This event typically merges the two camps of students into one, where they all have a sense of where their paths are headed. And if something changes, no worries. Thanks to the flexibility of the K-Plan, the College will work with students to make a switch of major or majors as seamless as possible.
