Category: Alumni

Why We Play

Posted on
"Why We Play" 2013 speakers Erran Briggs, Allison Liddane, Alex Gothard, Johanna Kupe, Allison Thomas, Brad Merrit, Jeanne Hess and Rebecca Gray
“Why We Play” 2013 speakers, left-to-right (top), Erran Briggs ’14, Allison Liddane ’13, Alex Gothard ’15, Johanna Kupe ’13, Allison Thomas ’13, Brad Merrit ’13, (bottom) Jeanne Hess, Rebecca Gray ’81.

“Why We Play” was the topic of the Winter Quarter Week Six (Feb. 15) Community Reflection in Stetson Chapel. Co-sponsored by the Kalamazoo College Department of Athletics, the annual Reflection offers a space for K student and alumni athletes to share in the collective stories and songs that capture the spirit of sport, recreation, and joy from their Division-III intercollegiate athletic experiences.

Professor of Physical Education and Head Coach of Volleyball Jeanne Hess opened the reflection before an audience of about 200 people. She read an excerpt from her book, “Sportuality: Finding Joy in the Games,” in which she explains why she thinks student athletes choose play sports. “The spiritual life is a purposeful life, and the ‘sportual’ life is a purposeful and playful life,” she said.

Student athletes Johanna Kupe ’13, Alex Gothard ’15 and Allison Thomas ’13 performed “Solider,” a song by Gavin DeGraw. Kupe said she selected the song after a teammate left the encouraging lyrics on a note in her locker before a volleyball game.

President of the Athletic Leadership Council and two-sport athlete Allison Liddane ’13 spoke about the approaching end of her collegiate athletic experience. “My list of ‘why I play’ could be never ending,” she said. Golfer Brad Merrit ’13 read an essay about the recent death of K’s Head Men’s Golf Coach Steve Tyler. Merrit, who won the MIAA Sportsmanship Award, said Tyler was his reason for playing. “We wanted to make him proud,” he said.

Football player Erran Briggs ’14 spoke about his unique love for the game and Division-III level. “When you allow yourself purely to play because you love it, not because you need it, you experience the game on a new level,” he said.

Rebecca Gray ’81 was the featured alumna speaker. A former basketball and field hockey player, Gray is K’s sole Rhodes Scholar. Speaking fondly of her time as a student athlete, shortly after the passage of Title IX that opened more intercollegiate athletic opportunities to women, Gray said sports continue to enhance her life. “For decades now, playing sports, for me, has been a completely reliable and utterly uncomplicated pleasure,” she said. She added that she looks forward to the day when she is no longer referred to as K’s only Rhodes Scholar, but simply as its first.

Community Reflections offer a unique forum for discussion, worship, performance, and community expression each Friday at 10:50 a.m. (refreshments at 10:30) in Stetson Chapel. The entire campus community and general public are invited. On Friday of Week Seven Feb. 22), the Chapel will host “40 Days of Lent: Preparing for Easter.” This reflection will focus on the traditions, history, and ways in which Christians today celebrate Easter and Lent.

Story and photo by Elaine Ezekiel ’13

Kalamazoo alumna Patricia Webb ’78 searches for Amelia Earhart

Posted on
Kalamazoo College alumna Patricia Webb
Patricia Webb ’78

Patricia Webb ’78 is part of an international effort that may have found the final resting place of famed aviator Amelia Earhart, who disappeared near the end of a historic around-the-world flying trip in 1937. Listen to Patricia talk about her experience in a recent interview with WMUK (102.1 FM) radio, the NPR station at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo.

What’s Love Got To Do With It?

Posted on
Willina Cain sings "Wake Up Everybody" while Corrine Taborn accompanies
Willina Cain ’15 sings “Wake Up Everybody” while Corrine Taborn ’13 accompanies.

“What’s Love got to do with it? Anti-Racist Activism in the Creation of Beloved Communities” was the topic of the Winter Quarter Week Four (Feb. 1) Community Reflection in Stetson Chapel, co-sponsored by the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership (ACSJL) and the Black Student Organization (BSO). The Reflection centered around love as an underlying motivator for social change and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s philosophy of “the beloved community” as an end result of non-violent social change. Members of BSO shared their own spoken word pieces, poems, stories, and facts on the subject of leaders from the African-American movement against racism.

Rob Relief III ’13, president of the Young Men of Color student organization, discussed the 87-year history and original aims of Black History Month. Willina Cain ’15 sang the R&B song “Wake Up Everybody” while Corinne Taborn ’13 accompanied her on piano and sang backup vocals. Rian Brown ’16 spoke about how her identity relates to Black History Month. “My ancestors fought for me to gain the privilege to stand before you today,” she said. “But has their work been completed? I know the answer to that question is ‘No.’” She encouraged audience members to shed their complacency and continue the fight for justice and equality.

Jeffery Washington ’15 read a poem he wrote with the refrain “I Black.” “My light friend says I can’t-be-seen-in-the-night-time black/ I’m too black to find that funny,” he read. “I guess I got a dark sense of humor.” Marquise Griffin ’15 read a reflection on his recent trip to Washington D.C. to attend the National Youth Leadership Forum, and his meditations on Christ’s love, which he discussed at the forum. “Dr. King stressed love when combating hate and racism, violence and discrimination,” he said. Bryce Pearson ’16 read a poem called “The Overlooked King,” reflecting on racism. “They didn’t know who I was/ They don’t know who I am/ And they really have no clue of who I will be,” he read. Brittany King-Pleas ’13 closed the Reflection by saying she hoped the audience left with more questions than answers.

Community Reflections offer a unique forum for discussion, worship, performance, and community expression each Friday at 10:50 a.m. in Stetson Chapel. Refreshments at 10:30. The entire campus community and general public are invited.

The Week Six (Friday Feb. 15) Community Reflection is entitled “Why We Play” and features K student athletes discussion why they love to play Division III athletics. This is an annual event always full of heartfelt passion and humor. Special guest speaker is Rebecca Gray ’81. Currently a research scholar at Duke University, Becky majored in mathematics and played basketball for the Hornets. She is also Kalamazoo College’s only Rhodes Scholar.

Story and photo by Elaine Ezekiel ’13

Alumna Selected to United Nations Commission Session

Posted on

Marlene Guerrero Chavez ’08 was selected to serve as a youth delegate for the 51st session of the United Nations Commission for Social Development. The priority theme of the 10-day conference is “Promoting empowerment of people in achieving poverty eradication, social integration, and full employment and decent work for all.” The session takes place in New York City and will feature panel discussions, more than 30 side events, five draft resolutions, and the Civil Society Forum’s recommendations on promoting people’s empowerment to achieve social development goals.

A Child’s Struggle With Autism Consumes K Alumni Family

Posted on

In 2004, Antonie Boessenkool ’99 wrote a LuxEsto article (“Homeward Bound”) that appeared in the fall issue that year about Matt ’94 and Kelli ’95 (Johnson) Stapleton. Their daughter Isabelle (Issy), at that time 5 years old, had recently been diagnosed with autism. The Stapletons currently live in Elberta, Michigan. Matt serves as principal of Frankfort–Elberta High School and coaches football and basketball. Kelli runs a podcast business, but most of her time is devoted to helping Issy and raising her two other children, McEwen and Ainsley. Issy (12) has a form of autism that manifests in occasional violent outbursts directed at family members. For the past few years, Issy has been big enough to cause serious injury to her mom and others. The Stapletons have been trying to get treatment for Issy, but their insurance program covers little to none of the costs, which are significant. Recently, Issy got into an in-patient treatment program at the Great Lakes Center for Autism (Portage, Michigan). But the insurance company would only pay for 30 days of a treatment program that requires two to three months. The Elberta community news organ (the Alert) has published the Stapletons’ story and is raising funds in hopes that Issy can complete her in-patient treatment program. All are invited to contribute.

K Grad at Work on Basketball Musical

Posted on

Ben Harpe ’09 is a cast member of “The Lockout: An NBA Musical,” written by Jason Gallagher and Ben Fort and to be produced by their company Six Hours Short. And Ben is also part of a the KickStarter project to record an album of the musical’s songs. You can see Ben (on left) belting out “I Believe,” a duet with superstar “Macon.” The play grabbed the attention of ESPN.com’s Henry Abbott, who wrote an article about it. “The Lockout” will be presented for the first time in a staged reading at Chicago’s Stage 773 on Friday August 31 and Saturday September 1.

Kalamazoo College alumna Jen Feuerstein ’93 talks about her chimps on NPR

Posted on

Jen Feuerstein ’93 is sanctuary director of Save the Chimps, the world’s biggest sanctuary, based in Florida, for chimpanzees formerly used in research experiments or the entertainment industry, or as pets. Hear Jenn in a report on National Public Radio about a National Institutes of Health plan to retire nearly all of the more than 450 chimpanzees currently housed at U.S.-based research facilities to sanctuaries where they can live outdoors in groups to climb, run, and play as they would in the wild.

Charles Holmes, MD ’93 Leads Effort to Combat Infectious Disease in Zambia

Posted on
Kalamazoo College alumnus Charles Homes speaking at a lecturn
Charles Holmes, MD ’93 has “a legacy of listening to, and using science, say long-time Washington workers in the AIDS response.”

Charles Holmes ’93 was completing his medical education when he lived and worked for three months in Malawi in 1999. The AIDS epidemic there, uncontrolled, was peaking. Desperately sick people lay three to a bed in the Lilongwe hospital where Holmes worked, and where the best medicine on hand could only alleviate their agony until they died.

“Deaths were an hourly occurrence,” he said later. “It was an important and formative experience for me to be a firsthand witness to that tragedy.”

It has shaped his work and interests ever since, he added.

This month, he packed his bags for Africa again, to lead the Centre for Infectious Disease Research in Zambia, widely considered one of the most effective in-country programs to improve health care capacities in a resource-poor country.

Read more about this Kalamazoo College graduate’s work in Science Speaks: HIV and TB News, a project of the Center for Global Health Policy.

Kalamazoo College Well Represented in the Third Annual Kalamazoo New Play Festival

Posted on

The thing’s the plays
In which we see the work of Ks!

“Ks” refers to the Kalamazoo College alumni, student, and occasional professor (and Summer Common Reading author) whose work is part of the Theatre Kalamazoo New Play Festival that will be held January 25 and 26 at the Epic Theatre in downtown Kalamazoo. Dana Robinson ’11 and Rebecca Staudenmaier ’11 are the authors of 10-minute plays that are part of the festival–Outdoors and The House of South, respectively. Outdoors will play at 4 PM on Saturday, January 26; The House of South is part of the 8 PM group of plays on the same day. Current senior Megan Rosenberg is directing the play Bringing Home the Bones by Bonnie Jo Campbell, who was the College’s Summer Common Reading author (Once Upon a River) in Fall 2012. Campbell also is an adjunct professor in the English department. Sponsoring theatres are Farmers Alley Theatre (Outdoors), Fancy Pants Theatre (The House of South), and Festival Playhouse of Kalamazoo College (Bringing Home the Bones). The Festival is free; no reservations are necessary. For more information please, and to learn the other plays featured in the Festival, please call any participating theatre or log on to the Theatre Kalamazoo website.

 

Stephanie (Harker) Schau ’90 Earns Teaching Award

Posted on

Stephanie (Harker) Schau ’90 is the 2012 recipient of the John E. Oster Award, which recognizes teaching excellence in the Sturgis (Mich.) Public School system. Stephanie was a member of Phi Beta Kappa at K and was selected for the James Bird Balch Prize for Outstanding Senior Studying American History.