A local activist known for constructing the first legally built tiny house in the county will be a keynote speaker for the 2025 Sustainability Senior Integrated Project (SIP) Symposium at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 23, at the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership.
Ben Brown will address the symposium in a lecture titled Rumors of Hope. A writer and international speaker, he will discuss his years of public engagement through social justice movements, urban farming, food sovereignty, energy sovereignty and economics.
Brown, who grew up on a family farm in Southwest Michigan, is also an expert in the affordable-housing movement and is a founding member of the Kalamazoo Electric Vehicle Association (KEVA). He continues to be involved in environmental and conservation work and is credited with helping to preserve several cultural resources.
In 2017, Brown provided WMUK Radio with a video tour around his tiny house, which measures less than 270 square feet. Kalamazoo Valley Habitat for Humanity assisted in the house’s construction.
The SIP Symposium will feature student presentations representing a variety of academic departments at K and include research on topics such as food access, marine eco-systems, sustainability transitions for public transportation in Kalamazoo, sheep grazing and soil health, carbon sequestration and more. K recently featured one of the SIPs, a project on coral reefs in the Philippines by Brooke Dolhay ’25, on its website.
Writer and international speaker Ben Brown will discuss his years of public engagement through social justice movements, urban farming, food sovereignty, energy sovereignty and economics at the 2025 Sustainability SIP Symposium at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership.
If you’ve ever played the game Spot it!, then you know it’s both disarmingly simple and endlessly replayable. Each card features eight symbols, and between any two cards in the game deck, there is always one—and only one—matching symbol. Several variations change the mechanics, but the goal always remains the same: Be the fastest player to spot and name the matches.
What is the secret to the game? How does it work? Well—it may come down to math.
On April 29, at 7 p.m. in Dewing Hall Room 103, Sarah Koch will deliver a talk titled “Spotting the Math in Spot it!,” this year’s installment of the George Kitchen Memorial Lecture at Kalamazoo College. The lectureship provides an opportunity for mathematicians to speak about their work in a way that is accessible to high school students and math educators.
“We’ll play Spot it! and explore ways to answer various questions about the game,” promises the description for the talk. “We will discover that there is a remarkable amount of mathematics underlying this game, including a tantalizing mathematical mystery.”
Koch, an Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Mathematics at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, researches complex dynamical systems, working to understand the infinitely complicated structure of beautiful fractals that emerge. She holds two Ph.D.s in mathematics, one from the Université de Provence in Marseille, and one from Cornell University. She is the director of the Math Corps at U(M), a summer camp for middle schoolers and high school mentors from Ypsilanti and Detroit, and the organizer of the Math Mondays in Ypsi Program, which has temporarily been replaced with Super Saturdays. In addition to doing math, she enjoys teaching, working with students and making kindness chains.
Stephen Oloo, associate professor of mathematics at Kalamazoo College, said Koch was suggested as a speaker by a visiting professor who had graduated from U of M.
“I did a bit of research and could see she loves doing this kind of talk,” Oloo said. “We don’t choose just any mathematician. Our speakers are always active research mathematicians, and they like to give math talks aimed at an early high school sort of student. They like outreach. They tend to have a few talks prepared that are pitched at just the right level.”
Sarah Koch, an Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Mathematics at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, researches complex dynamical systems and will deliver the 2025 Kitchen Lecture through a game with math ties titled Spot It!
Spotting the Math in Spot It!
What: The 2025 George Kitchen Memorial Lecture at Kalamazoo College, given by Sarah Koch, an Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Mathematics at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor
Oloo said the math department at K communicates the intent and audience of the lectures to the speaker, who chooses his or her own topic.
“I know this talk is going to be good,” Oloo said. “It strikes me as it will probably have a lot of combinatorics, what you can think of as advanced counting, which tends to have interesting results while being very accessible. From the nature of the game, there are all kinds of interesting questions you could ask. When you deal out a hand of Spot it! cards, how many possible different combinations are there? How big does the deck have to be? If you dealt two or three or four cards, what would they have in common and different? I’m sure she’ll have some surprising things for us. Probably she’ll talk about strategy. There are probably ways to approach the game that you could figure out by studying the math.”
The lecture’s target audience of high school students honors George Kitchen, who was a local mathematician and teacher and firmly believed that a love for mathematics and its applications could be cultivated in every student. In the 1980s, Kitchen helped start a regular gathering at K of college and high school math teachers called Calculus Connection, along with John Fink, Kalamazoo College professor emeritus of mathematics.
“George was a wonderful teacher, and he was really demanding, but he would always support his students in what he demanded of them,” Fink said.
When Kitchen died, members of Calculus Connection decided to fund an endowment to support a lecture series to honor Kitchen’s memory. The George Kitchen Memorial Lecture at Kalamazoo College was founded in 1999 and has taken place every spring since, excepting a hiatus from 2020-2023 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Obviously we think math is important, and math and science knowledge, education, literacy, are good things,” Oloo said. “This has been a good way to get students in the area excited about math, to show them that math is not just this dull thing.”
The talks also build local connections and help improve K’s visibility with area high schoolers. A whole community has developed over the years, with the audience often including not only math teachers and high school students and their parents, but also former students of George Kitchen as well as parents of long-grown children who first experienced the lectures when their children were in high school and continue to attend.
“I’ve seen how popular these can be, the surprising number of people intrigued by mathematical ideas,” Oloo said. “My hopes are good attendance, and that people would leave feeling like they’ve learned something—both that it was fun, and that they are now a little bit more knowledgeable.”
For example, the 2024 speaker brought a statistics and probability lens to, among other things, conspiracy theories such as the Lincoln–Kennedy coincidences urban legend that points out a large number of similarities between the two presidents, including the fact that their assassins were both known by three names composed of 15 letters.
“He was diving into the numbers, and things you encounter that seem almost spooky, but in this talk, you realize, ‘Oh, it’s not that weird.’ It’s just a function of doing the math, how many people we have on the planet,” Oloo said. “It was a great lecture where people in the audience who knew probability have thought about these things and know how the numbers work, while for many of us, it’s new, and you could learn something that actually alters how you view the world. I’m not a big statistics guy, and I left that talk armed with this new piece of knowledge. When I encounter people claiming, ‘Oh, this is a really spooky coincidence,’ now I can say, ‘No, it’s just the numbers. It’s not that weird.’”
An author and scholar of Islam in South Asia will deliver the 2025 Thompson Lecture, sponsored by Kalamazoo College’s religion department, at 4:15 p.m. Thursday, April 17, in the Olmsted Room.
Ayesha Irani is an associate professor of Asian studies at the University of Massachusetts-Boston. She specializes in Islam in South Asia, the literature and history of Bengal and Bangladesh, Sufism, Islamic art, translation studies and Middle Bangla codicology.
Irani’s lecture, titled “The Muhammad Avatāra: Salvation History, Translation, and the Making of Bengali Islam,” will draw from her book of the same name and examine the Nabivamsa of Saiyad Sultan, the first Bangla language biography of the Prophet Muhammad, revealing the power of vernacular transition in the Islamization of Bengal.
The Paul Lamont Thompson Lecture, named for the K president who served from 1938–49, brings in speakers who enrich the ethical understanding of the College’s position in society. The lecture was established by a gift from Thompson’s sons and daughters-in-law to recognize the crucial role he played in guiding the College through the Depression and World War II.
Author and scholar of Islam Ayesha Irani will deliver the 2025 Thompson Lecture at Kalamazoo College.
Starting today, Kalamazoo College will be one of about 100 educational institutions taking part in global efforts to spur international conversations about the climate crisis through Climate Education Week.
Many K faculty will discuss climate issues in their classes regardless of whether the environment is a regular theme in their disciplines. In addition, several events will be open to students, faculty, staff and anyone interested in climate action, no matter their fields of study. The events include:
A Climate Connection Series conversation with the Climate Action Plan (CAP) Committee at 11 a.m. Wednesday in Dewing Commons. CAP will address its learning goal, which strives to help students study issues related to climate change and strengthen K graduates’ climate literacy.
A group trip to the Lillian Anderson Arboretum. Meet at Red Square at 4 p.m. Wednesday to take a bus to the arboretum and explore the trails. Participants can explore on their own or with students who work with the Environmental Stewardship Center.
A Climate Anxiety Café at 6 p.m. Thursday in the Bissell Theatre. Discuss climate anxiety with students and become agents of meaningful change. Discover how to channel anxiety into positive action and contribute to a more sustainable future.
Kalamazoo College will observe Climate Education Week with classroom conversations and activities on campus.
Environmental Stewardship will also collect EPS foam (Styrofoam) for recycling at the beginning of each Community Reflection this term. That includes from 10:30–11:30 a.m. this Friday at Stetson Chapel. Collections will be transported to City of Kalamazoo EPS foam recycling events.
Your voice and desire for action can help inspire others to pursue climate action, too. By encouraging faculty, staff and academic departments to participate, you’re helping the College fulfill its Climate Action Plan while showing that K wants its curriculum to be climate-conscious.
Update: The in-person lecture has been canceled, but the livestream will still be available.
Scott Aalgaard, an associate professor of East Asian studies at Wesleyan University, will discuss folk and protest music through the lens of Japanese performers such as Takada Wataru and Kagawa Ryō in this year’s Kafu Lecture at Kalamazoo College.
Aalgaard will present “Folk Music Revolutionaries: Protest Music in Modern Japan” at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, April 10, in Room 103 of Dewing Hall, 1219 Academy St. A livestream will be available.
The discussion will challenge attendees to step away from thinking about American musical storytellers in the 1960s when they think of protest music to consider what it involves elsewhere. The talk will explore how Japanese folk singers performed amid Japan’s political circumstances in the turbulent 1960s and developed musical projects that challenged limited notions of what “protest” is or can be in the first place.
Aalgaard works on cultural production in modern and contemporary Japan with particular emphases on popular music and literature. His work addresses geopolitics, political economy, regional and social histories, nationalism, fascism and disparate modes of protest and critique, among other topics. His first book, titled Homesick Blues: Politics, Protest and Musical Storytelling in Modern Japan (University of Hawai’i Press, 2023), explores the interplay between music and everyday life and how music is used by artists, fans and others to imagine and re-imagine social, political and cultural life in modern Japan. It is oriented toward understanding the ways in which artists, authors and individual social actors use music to understand the world and envision different possibilities for living in it.
The Kafu Lecture was established in 1982 by an anonymous donor in honor of Nagai Kafu, an acclaimed 20th century Japanese writer. Kafu studied at Kalamazoo College during the 1904-05 academic year. The free, public event is co-sponsored by Kalamazoo College and the departments of East Asian Studies and Music at K. For more information, contact Professor of Japanese Noriko Sugimori at sugimori@kzoo.edu.
Kafu Lecture speaker Scott Aalgaard is an associate professor of East Asian studies at Wesleyan University.
A Kalamazoo College department is expanding its offerings to help the greater community build skills that are convenient for the great outdoors.
The College’s Outdoor Programs team launched the Outdoor Leadership Training Center (OLTC) in January, providing public in-person community courses, workshops and certifications for every level of expertise in outdoor education, wilderness medicine, first aid and CPR/defibrillator (AED) training.
Opportunities are expanding this spring to include new workshops:
A backpacking series continuing in April with map and compass navigation, first aid, shelter building and trip planning, ranging from $35 to $70 per class.
A climbing series that will cover climbing anchor principles (May 16), natural anchor building (May 17) and a skills test (May 18), ranging from $35 to $150 per class. Register for all three as a package for $225, a discount of $30 over signing up separately.
A mountain biking clinic available May 25 or July 5 at Maple Hill Trail for $150. Expert trainers will lead riders of all experience levels, covering fundamental techniques such as braking, cornering and shifting, along with advanced skills such as climbing, descending and line selection. Bikes and helmets can be provided when they’re needed.
“The Outdoor Leadership Training Center is here to provide the community with a fun, safe and welcoming space to learn essential outdoor skills,” OLTC Training Coordinator Hannah Wolfe said. “As a new resource in the area, we’re filling a need for accessible, hands-on training that helps people connect with nature while staying safe. Whether you’re a beginner who wants to explore the outdoors with confidence or someone looking to refine your wilderness skills, we’ve got something for you. Our courses are perfect for outdoor enthusiasts, families, educators or anyone wanting to prepare for any outdoor adventure. We love helping people of all backgrounds gain the confidence to enjoy the outdoors and discover new skills along the way.”
The Outdoor Leadership Training Center at Kalamazoo College in January provided new public in-person community courses, workshops and certifications for every level of expertise in outdoor education, wilderness medicine, first aid and CPR/defibrillator (AED) training. Additional courses for all levels of expertise will be available this spring.
As an international student from Romania, Bernice Mike ’26 knows what it’s like to face a choice between staying with one’s family and pursuing life far away. Such is the choice her lead character makes in Eurydice, the play coming to Kalamazoo College’s Festival Playhouse, 129 Thompson St., this week.
“I’ve loved Greek mythology since I was a child,” Mike said. “And being a dramatic play, Eurydice is the kind of story I gravitate toward. I read it over winter break and it hit me immediately, so I thought it would be a good role to try out for. I haven’t dealt with grief the way she has to, but I know what it’s like to make a choice between staying with loved ones and going away.”
The original Orpheus and Eurydice story is told from the perspective of Orpheus, a musician who travels to the Underworld to try to save his wife after she dies on their wedding day from a snakebite.
“Orpheus plays the most beautiful music in the world,” Mike said. “There are so many other people who are attracted to him, but because the story is Greek mythology, we don’t know much about Eurydice and why she’s the one for him. It’s a love story that shows you don’t have to put why you love someone into words, but she’s a big enigma.”
Eurydice, though, is told from the heroine’s point of view. The play—directed this week by K Professor of Theatre Arts Ren Pruis—premiered at Madison Repertory Theatre in Madison, Wisconsin, in 2003. In Mike’s words, Eurydice is an intelligent and loving character, and the play emphasizes her internal struggle as she grapples between a desire to stay with a predeceased family member in the Underworld or return to Orpheus. Audiences will see her navigate stages of life as she forgets and then relearns how to be herself.
“It’s cool to portray this character who turns out to be strong and brave through the lens of Sarah Ruhl’s play,” Mike said. “She deals with a loss from a young age, but has a lot of love to give. We see some of that in her relationship with Orpheus, but also with her father after they reunite in the Underworld. What is important is that she constantly stays true to who she is.”
Bernice Mike ’26 and Davis Henderson ’25 rehearse for “Eurydice,” which will be staged Thursday-Saturday at the Festival Playhouse. Photo by Andy Krieger/Inspired Media.
Mike said she feels the story also wants audiences to learn to follow their own hearts.
“Eurydice follows her heart and her own story,” Mike said. “It’s almost a coming-of-age story in that way. I’ve learned from playing Eurydice that it’s important to constantly seek and get to know yourself no matter the situation you’re in. There’s a lot of tragedy that goes into it. I would say the story’s message is to constantly get to know yourself and seek what your heart wants to do. At the end of the day, it is the best decision that you could make.”
Eurydice will be staged at 7:30 p.m. from Thursday, February 27–Saturday, March 1, and at 2 p.m. Sunday, March 2. Tickets are available online or by calling the Festival Playhouse at 269.337.7333.
“I think you’ll be able to go through a lot of emotions if you see it,” Mike said. “There are funny, heartwarming and gut-wrenching moments. I think for people who love theater and want to feel those emotions, we offer a great array of them. It’s an immersive experience and a different one because it’s Greek mythology told in a modern way. It’s not something that you get to see every day.”
The Learning Support Center at Kalamazoo College has a week of events scheduled that will challenge stereotypes and misconceptions about neurological differences between people on campus and beyond.
Neurodiversity Week, starting Monday, will provide the K community a chance to recognize the skills and talents of neurodivergent individuals, while creating more inclusive and equitable cultures that celebrate differences and empower every individual. Events will include:
Snacks and games in the Learning Support Room daily.
Panel pop-ups from 11 a.m.–1 p.m. Monday–Wednesday at Hicks Student Center. Students and staff will answer questions and engage students in conversations about neurodiversity across campus. There will also be giveaways, raffles and a vote for what fidget toy the Learning Support Center will 3D print next.
A sharing of Senior Integrated Projects from 7–9 p.m. Wednesday in the Learning Support Center at the library. Seniors will talk about their SIP processes and experiences as neurodiverse students.
A neurodiversity mixer from 3–5 p.m. Thursday in the Learning Commons. The event will serve as a crafting party with make-your-own brain collages, snacks and games. Students can also meet the Learning Support Center mascots: axolotls of all kinds because you need to “axolotl” questions to succeed. A grand prize raffle winner will receive a large stuffed axolotl.
A fidget-toy petting zoo from 4–5 p.m. Friday in the Learning Commons. Enjoy cake and try a variety of fidget toys.
A study group for everyone from 2–4 p.m. Sunday in the Learning Support Room.
The Learning Support Center empowers students to develop study skills, notetaking methods and time-management strategies through a variety of methods that help students engage in deeper learning.
“We are excited to share our love of brains of all kinds,” Learning Support Specialist Candace Combs said. “We encourage everyone to learn more about neurodiversity throughout the week.”
Neurodiversity Week begins Monday, February 24, at Kalamazoo College.
The Community and Global Health concentration at Kalamazoo College will host a researcher and physician who specializes in infectious diseases at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, February 19, in Dewing Hall Room 103.
Larry Lutwick is a specialist within the Mayo Clinic Health System in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, and is a former professor of medicine and biomedical sciences at Western Michigan University Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine. He will present his address, “The Pandemic Clock is Ticking. We Just Do Not Know What Time It Is. The Spread of Infections in a Connected World,” discussing how the medical field monitors and responds to epidemics in a globalized world. He received his medical degree from State University of New York Downstate Medical School and completed his residency training at Barnes Hospital through the Washington University School of Medicine. He completed an infectious diseases fellowship at Stanford University School of Medicine.
A small reception follows the lecture. For more information, contact department student advisor Sofia Fleming at sofia.fleming21@kzoo.edu.
An immersive art exhibition titled Tipping Point—created by a Kalamazoo College faculty member and developed through eight years of projects—has drawn acclaim from viewers as it approaches subjects such as climate change, fossil-fuel extraction, environmental degradation and greenhouse gas emissions.
You’re invited to hear directly from that artist, Jo-Ann and Robert Stewart Professor of Art Professor Tom Rice, in a free lecture at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, February 6. The presentation will take place in room 2008 at Western Michigan University’s Richard Center for Visual Arts.
Rice stated that “tipping point” is a term made popular by journalist and author Malcolm Gladwell in his 2000 book, Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference.
“Gladwell was talking mostly about what he calls social epidemics or trends that suddenly have great success in our culture and how that happens,” Rice said. “Climate scientists, however, use the term to focus on changes to the atmosphere, oceans, carbon sinks, air temperature and ecosystems. In an ideal world, I’d want my work to be a tipping point as Gladwell describes it—one that starts a social epidemic toward real progress in reducing our dependence on fossil fuels. There are other things that need to be done to slow the pace of global warming, but reducing our dependence on fossil fuels is critical.”
“Tipping Point” is currently in the Albertine Monroe Brown Gallery at Western Michigan University’s Richard Center. It features a 95-foot drawing of the mountain-top removal mining process, works addressing the complexities and absurdities of oil refining, and miniature silverpoint drawings portraying accidents related to fracking and crude oil transportation in North Dakota’s Bakken oil fields.
The collection, currently in the Albertine Monroe Brown Gallery at the Richard Center, features a 95-foot drawing of the mountain-top removal mining process, works addressing the complexities and absurdities of oil refining, and miniature silverpoint drawings portraying accidents related to fracking and crude oil transportation in North Dakota’s Bakken oil fields.
Rice says that his use of plastic made from natural gas is intended to raise questions in the viewer’s mind about the ubiquity of petroleum-based products in our culture.
“If people will be led to discuss the contradictions, then I’ve done my job,” he said. “While the effort to transition to renewable, upcycled and sustainable materials is gaining strength—even within industry—the truth is that complete divestment from petroleum-based design is going to require a growing awareness of how deeply petrochemical byproducts are embedded within capitalism. Everything from dyes and adhesives, the plastic in the products we use every day—such as our cell phones and computers—all the way to packaging and the synthetic fibers contained in our clothing and furniture are built on the foundation of petrochemicals.”
As a result, when presenting his work, Rice often questions whether his lecture is an artist’s talk or more of a call to action. To decide for yourself, hear the lecture or visit the exhibition, which is on display through Friday, February 7.
“Avoiding a complete climate disaster is going to mean sacrifice from all of us,” he said. “As author Naomi Klein says in her book This Changes Everything: Capitalism and the Climate, it’s going to take mass social movements to start the change we need in regards to battling global warming and environment degradation. It’s not one behavior or action that humans can take to slow the pace of climate change and environmental degradation. We really can’t predict with certainty when the tipping point will be, or what outcomes will result, but we can be sure that our climate is changing and those changes are not only making the planet warmer, but less inhabitable for humans and many other forms of life.”
