Heyl Scholars Bound for Kalamazoo College

Eight Kalamazoo College Heyl ScholarsAt a May dinner in the Hicks Center Kalamazoo College celebrated the 2014 Kalamazoo County high school graduates who earned Heyl Scholarships for Kalamazoo College (science and math) or Western Michigan University (nursing). The scholarship covers tuition, book costs, and room charges. The 2014 Heyl scholars include (l-r): front row—Rachel Chang, Fiona Beaton, Emily Fletcher, Amber Salome; back row—Jacob Naranjo, Peter Rossi, Jager Hartman, and Abhay Goel. Beaton will attend WMU; the other seven will begin their undergraduate studies at K in September. Not pictured is Alexandria Oswalt, who also will attend K. (Photo by Anthony Dugal Photography)

Young Scientist

Mara Richman standing by her research posters
Mara Richman presented research at the North America Society for the Study of Personality Disorders.

Mara Richman ’15 has built an impressive scientific résumé in three short undergraduate years–and she has yet to reach her Senior Individualized Project (SIP) term!

During her study abroad in Budapest, Hungary the psychology major collaborated with Dr. Zsolt Unoka on research in depression and borderline personality disorder. She presented that work, titled “Mental state decoding deficit in major depression and borderline personality disorder: a meta-analysis,” at the North America Society for the Study of Personality Disorders. Think the age of David (when he confronted Goliath) or of Joan of Arc … Mara was the youngest presenter at NASSPD! And she will be one of the youngest oral presenters at the prestigious International Congress on Borderline Personality Disorder and Allied Disorders (Rome, Italy), where her paper was accepted and where she will detail the meta-analysis she completed with Unoka. Their research also has been submitted in manuscript form to Clinical Psychology Review.

To date, Mara has six manuscripts published or in review for publication on research into schizophrenia, drug courts, and borderline personality disorder. She has presented research (or had research accepted for presentation) at Stanford University, the Association for Psychological Science, the Midwestern Psychological Association, the Mid America Undergraduate Research Conference, and the Michigan Undergraduate Psychology Conference. And she will present her work at the American Psychological Association in August. Most of this BEFORE she begins in earnest her SIP work. That will happen this summer at Harvard University Medical School’s Department of Psychiatry under mentor ship of one of the world’s foremost experts on borderline personality disorder, Dr. Mary Zanarini.

Given her youth and her accomplishments so far, it may not be too surprising that Mara will graduate after her senior fall term. She hopes to work in a lab for nine months or so and then apply to graduate school. She plans to earn a Ph.D. in clinical psychology and focus her research on borderline personality disorder.

More-in-FourPeat

Kalamazoo College has won the coveted Klein Cup for the fourth consecutive year. “If we keep this up, perhaps the award should be re-named the K Kup,” said John Fink, the Rosemary K. Brown Professor in Mathematics and Computer Science. The Klein Cup honors the first place finisher in the annual Lower Michigan Mathematics Competition (LMMC). This year’s math dust-up took place a Lawrence Technological University (Southfield, Mich.) and featured 20 teams from nine schools. K sent three teams that placed first, second, and tenth. Not bad. And since half the first place team and all of the second place team are underclassmen, the prospects for next year look good. K Kup, indeed! This year’s K math hornets included: first place team–Umang Varma and Tibin John; second place team–Raoul Wadhwa, Ngoc (Van) Truong, and Raj Bhagat; tenth place team–Sajan Silwal, Mehmet Kologlu, and Alex Townsend.

Four in More Than 15,000

Three female students who presented at the 2014 Experimental Biology Meeting
K student researcher/presenters at the 2014 Experimental Biology Meeting included (l-r): Amanda Bolles, Rina Fujiwara, and Virginia Greenberger. Not pictured is Michael Korn.

Four Kalamazoo College students attended at the 2014 Experimental Biology Meeting: Amanda Bolles ’14, Chemistry; Rina Fujiwara ’15, Chemistry; Virginia Greenberger ’14, Chemistry; and Michael Korn ’14, Biology. Experimental Biology is a joint meeting of six different societies including the American Association for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB) as well as societies for physiology, nutrition, pharmacology, pathology, and anatomy. The meeting provides a great opportunity for students to present their work and attend a variety of engaging scientific talks. More than 15,000 scientists attended the event in San Diego, Calif.

Bolles and Fujiwara presented their research findings during the Undergraduate Poster Competition and during the regular scientific session for ASBMB. Their research involves recent work completed in the laboratory of Professor of Chemistry Laura Furge. That work has shown that two different (but related) compounds inactivate P450 3A4, an enzyme in the liver and intestine that metabolizes (or processes) a major pharmaceutical drug. The titles of the Bolles and Fujiwara posters were, respectively, “5-Fluoro-2-[4-[(2-phenyl-1H-imidazol-5-yl)methyl]-1 piperazinyl]pyrimidine is a mechanism based inactivator of CYP3A4” and “Mechanism-based inactivation of human CYP3A4 by a piperazine-containing compound.” The ASBMB competition includes posters of some 300 students from a variety of college and universities across the country. One grand prize award was presented to a student in each of four research categories (bioenergetics/protein structure, cell biology/developmental biology, DNA/gene regulation, and immunology/microbiology/neurobiology). Bolles won the $500 grand prize in the bioenergetics/protein structure category and was recognized the next day before an audience of hundreds of scientists, educators, and students at the award lecture for outstanding contributions to education. Bolles’s presentation derived from her Senior Individualized Project (SIP), which will be published later this year along with results from co-author Fujiwara.

Greenberger conducted her SIP research in the laboratory of Professor of Chemistry Regina Stevens-Truss. The abstract she presented at the meeting was titled “Bacterial Action of Novel Cationic Peptide Sequences.” As more antibiotic resistance is observed in patients, new sources of antibiotics are being investigated, including short peptide sequences. Greenberger’s work in the Truss lab was aimed at determining the antibiotic activity (and the precise mechanisms of action that yielded the activity) of two newly studied peptide sequences.

Dr. Furge also presented a poster in the ASBMB regular scientific session based on work started last year by Parker de Waal ’13. The work began as part of a course assignment in Furge’s “Advanced Biochemistry” course and grew into an elegant computational study of structural differences between select variants of the drug-metabolizing enzyme P450 2D6. de Waal used molecular dynamics methods to show how subtle differences in the enzyme structure can help explain differences in the metabolizing abilities of the enzymes. The study is being completed by Kyle Sunden ’16. While in San Diego, Furge spent an afternoon at the Skaggs School of Pharmacy at the University of California-San Diego discussing the implications and approach of the study with other scientists in this field.

Korn attended the American Physiological Society (APS) portion of the Experimental Biology meeting. He presented the results of his SIP work (conducted in the laboratory of Dr. Christopher Mendias at the University of Michigan) in the APS Student Poster Competition. Korn’s abstract received the David Bruce Outstanding Undergraduate Abstract Award. The title of his presentation was “Simvastatin reduces myosteatosis following chronic skeletal muscle injury.”

The future is promising for all four of these outstanding student researchers. In the fall, Bolles will enter the University of Michigan Graduate Program in Biomedical Sciences; Greenberger will matriculate to the chemistry department at Pennsylvania State University to begin work on her Ph.D; Korn will attend the University of Michigan Medical School; and Fujiwara will complete her SIP with Furge this summer. She plans to attend graduate school after her June 2015 graduation from K.

Professors Furge and Truss are both members of the ASBMB and attend the annual meeting each year. Truss also directs a National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded workshop for area high school science teachers in connection with the annual ASBMB meeting. This year’s workshop attracted more than a dozen local teachers who learned science and teaching strategies to use in their classrooms. Attendees at the workshop are also eligible for mini-grants to support further development of their teaching after the workshop. A recent article describes the impact of this workshop (which is in its fourth year).

In other meeting news, the Ruth Kirschstein Diversity in Science Award was given jointly to President Freeman Hrabowski III and Professor Michael Summers of University of Maryland-Baltimore County. Professor Summers was the SIP mentor to Erran Briggs ’14 and has worked closely with Professor Truss on the Professional Development and Minority Affairs Committees of ASBMB. Professor Summers also visited K’s campus in 2010 as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Guest Scholar Lecturer. Given the connections, and important work of Summers and Hrabowski, Professor Truss arranged for Bolles, Fujiwara, and Greenberger to interview Summers for Kalamazoo College’s Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership’s Praxis Center. Following the interview, Summers treated the students and Truss to lunch overlooking the San Diego Harbor marina! Notes from the interview will be posted on the Praxis website.

Travel to ASBMB for Bolles, Fujiwara, and Greenberger was supported by grants from the Provost Office, the Heyl Foundation (Greenberger), and the ACSJL. Korn’s travel to the meeting was sponsored by grant funds from his SIP advisor and the University of Michigan. Furge and Truss were supported by the Hutchcroft Endowment as well as their NIH and NSF grants, respectively. Next year’s Experimental Biology Meeting will occur in Boston, Mass.

Abigail Miner ’14 receives “Young Democrat of the Year” award from the Michigan Democratic Party

Abigail Miner with President Clinton and other award recipients at the Democratic Party dinner
Abigail Miner ’14 is pictured at far left with President Clinton and other award recipients at the April 26 Democratic Party dinner in Detroit.

Abigail Miner ’14 received the “Young Democrat of the Year” award on April 26 from the Michigan Democratic Party at its annual Jefferson-Jackson fundraising and awards dinner at Cobo Center in Detroit. In addition to meeting “some of my heroes” currently serving or running for state and federal office, Abigail said she dined with U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow and had her photo taken with former President Bill Clinton. Abigail recently completed a year-long term as membership director for the Michigan Federation of College Democrats. During her term in office, the number of chapters on Michigan campuses doubled from seven to 14. She’s also served as an officer in the College Democrats chapter at K. Abigail is a political science major from Elmhurst, Ill., and the daughter of Ed Miner ’76 and Colleen Sherburne ’77. Her K-Plan includes study abroad in Rome, an internship at the American-Turkish Council in Washington, D.C., four years performing with the Kalamazoo College Singers, and four years working in the K Admission office as a tour guide and intern.

Kalamazoo College Senior Performances Feature MISS LONG BEACH and THE CHAIRS

Members of the cast of "How Miss Long Beach Became Miss long Beach"
Members of the cast of HOW MISS LONG BEACH BECAME MISS LONG BEACH include (at left) Natalie Vazquez ’17 (seated) and Belinda McCauley ’16, and, at right (l-r): Wendy Rubio ’16, Mireya Guzman-Ortiz ’17, and Marta Gonzalez Infante ’17.

The Senior Performance Series of Festival Playhouse of Kalamazoo College presents two one-act plays: the world premiere of How Miss Long Beach Became Miss Long Beach, (written by Alejandra Castillo ’15 and directed by Amy Jimenez ’14) and a new staging of The Chairs (written by Eugene Ionesco and directed by Grace Gilmore ’15).

Performances occur Thursday, May 1, through Sunday, May 4, in the Light Fine Arts Building’s Dungeon Theatre.

Playwright Alejandra Castillo says her play poses important questions: What does it mean to be a girl? What does it mean to be a woman? What does it mean to be a Latina?

Miss Long Beach is a play that explores femininity and womanhood in Latino culture,” she adds. “Sixteen-year-old Angie must decide whether to compete in a beauty pageant to please her glamorous mother or continue with her tomboy ways. The play touches upon issues of gender, sexuality and cultural assimilation, and the importance of mother-daughter relationships.” Director Amy Jimenez says, “Although this play speaks to the Latina experience to some extent, it is definitely relevant to all female experiences because it deals with issues of identity, sexuality, family, and the ideology of beauty.”

In Eugene Ionesco’s landmark Absurdist play, The Chairs, the Old Man and the Old Woman prepare their guests for the arrival of the mysterious Orator, whose speech will not only be the couple’s farewell to life, but also will contain a great message for humanity. The Chairs is a comedy of language,” director Grace Gilmore explains, “that forces us to imagine a world where the meaning of life is undefinable, where loneliness is in the eye of the beholder, and where what we say is not always what we mean. When we look closer we realize this world is not so different from our own.”

Katie Anderson ’15 designed the sets for the two performances, and Michael Wecht ’14 serves as the lighting engineer.

The Senior Performance Series showcases the best and brightest of Kalamazoo College students creating their own theatre. Show times for the two plays are Thursday, May 1, at 7:30pm, Friday and Saturday, May 2 and 3, at 8pm, and Sunday, May 4, at 2pm.. After Thursday’s performance the audience is invited to converse with the director and actors for The Chairs, and, after Friday’s performance, with the cast, director, and playwright of Miss Long Beach. All tickets at the door are $5, with the exception of Thursday’s performance, which is pay what you can.

Four Share Research on Japanese Culture

Four students sharing their research on Japanese cultureFour Kalamazoo College students presented their research at the annual Michigan Japanese Heritage and Culture Conference. The conference was sponsored by Grand Valley State University’s Japanese Cultural Association, and attendees–some 50 students and teachers–shared their studies in Japanese culture, including Japanese relations within Michigan and contemporary issues affecting Japan and the United States. Several presenters were members of the Japanese community, including employees of government agencies, colleges and universities, and university organizations. The K presentations focused on food, fabric dyeing, cinema, and nontraditional romantic relationships. The four K students were classmates in Assistant Professor of Japanese Noriko Sugimori’s winter term class, “Intermediate Japanese II,” when most of their research was done. The students (and the titles of their research presentations) are (l-r): Anh Lam ’17 (“Mochi: Where Cultures Meet”), Jamie Heywood ’16 (“Shibori: Re-visitation, Reinvention, and Revival”), Penelope Owen ’16 (“Alternative Love”), and Edwin Salvatierra ’16 (“Kitano’s Gokudou: Reinventing the Yakuza Film Genre”). The three sophomores will study abroad in Japan during their entire junior year–Heywood and Owen in Kyoto, Salvatierra in Hikone.

Dean’s List Winter 2014

Congratulations to the following Kalamazoo College students, who achieved a grade point average of 3.5 or better for a full-time course load of at least three units, without failing or withdrawing from any course, during the Winter 2014 academic term. Kudos to the entire group of some 300 students, and good luck in Spring term, 2014.

Winter 2014

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

A

Ayaka Abe
Sara Adelman
Utsav Adhikari
Isabela Agosa
Avery Allman
Dana Allswede
Suma Alzouhayli
Steven Andrews
Giancarlo Anemone
Jill Antonishen
Alex Arnold

B

Shreya Bahl
Benjamin Baker
Kimberly Balk
Katherine Ballew
Abraham Bayha
Nicholas Beam
Zoe Beaudry
Marie Beckrich
Andrea Beitel
Matthew Belanger
Kate Belew
Cleome Bernick-Roehr
Anup Bhullar
Paul Bistolarides
Alexis Blakley
Reid Blanchett
Maribel Blas-Rangel
Benjamin Blomme
Nicolas Bolig
Sean Bolourchi
Kira Boneff
Nathalie Botezatu
Olivia Bouchard
Riley Boyd
Scott Brent
Erran Briggs II
Maxine Brown
Joel Bryson
Matthew Burczyk
Janice Burnett
Shanice Buys

C

Francisco Cabrera
William Cagney
Robert Calco
Ellie Cannon
Olivia Cares
Fiona Carey
Raymond Carpenter
Sheila Carter
Marissa Cash
Alejandra Castillo
Nicholas Caywood
Xiangzhi Cheng
Amelia Chronis
Shahzaib Chughtai
Isabelle Ciaramitaro
Josefina Cibelli
Nicholas Cockroft
Annaliese Collier
Quinton Colwell
Monica Cooper
Hannah Cooperrider
Holly Cooperrider
Colleen Corrigan
Dylan Cramm Horn
Wilson Cross
Laura Crouch
Katherine Curley
Suzanne Curtiss

D

Paula Dallacqua
Rachel Dandar
Justin Danzy
Sabrina Dass
Natalie Davenport
Matthew Davidson
Corrin Davis
Megan Davis
Marissa Dawson
Francesca DeAnda
Jeric Derama
Samir Deshpande
Scott Devine
Dana DeVito
Claire De Witt
Eric De Witt
Melany Diaz
Claire Diekman
Calee Dieleman
Alexis Diller
Ryan D’Mello
Miranda Doepker
Rachel Dranoff
Querubin Dubois
Julia Duncan
Trisha Dunham
Alivia DuQuet
Trenton Dykstra
Kayla Dziadzio

E

Jamie Eathorne
Andres ElAmin-Martinez
Rachel Ellis
Rachel Epstein
Karl Erikson
Sophia Ernstrom
Andrew Ertle
Michelle Escobar
Fiona Evans

F

Rachel Fadler
Mario Ferrini
Alexis Fiebernitz
Claire Fielder
Olivia Finkelstein
Marie Fiori
Tyler Fisher
Joshua Foley
Angela Fong
Caroline Foura
John Fowler
Hannah Frame
Christopher Francis
Valentin Frank
Anthony Frattarelli
Annah Freudenburg
Gabriel Frishman
Rina Fujiwara

G

Andrew Galimberti
Bridget Gallagher
Jacob Gallimore
Keith Garber
Joana Garcia
Brett Garwood
Dominic Gattuso
Lauren Gaunt
Kathleen George
Carl Ghafari
Mark Ghafari
Mousa Ghannam
Sarah Ghans
Danielle Gin
Sarah Glass
Alexa Glau
De’Angelo Glaze
Daniella Glymin
Ellie Goldman
Marlon Gonzalez
Kaitlin Gotcher
Alexandra Gothard
Emma Gougeon
Curtis Gough
David Graham
Ryan Gregory
James Grenda
William Gribbin
Alexandra Groffsky
Guilherme Guedes
Alyse Guenther
Maria Isabel Guevara Duque
Yicong Guo
Rebecca Guralnick

H

Kayan Hales
Genevieve Hall
Robert Hammond
Nora Harris
Hadley Harrison
Taylor Hartley
Rachel Hartman
Shannon Haupt
Veronica Hayden
Alina Hechler
Frances Heldt
Ashley Henne
Jordan Henning
Kyle Hernandez
Michelle Hernandez
Yessica Hernandez
Daniel Herrick
Mason Higby
Jakob Hillenberg
Kelsey Hill
Gabrielle Holme-Miller
Kaitlyn Horton
Allia Howard
Pornkamol Huang
Yuxi Huang
Audra Hudson
Robert Hudson
Julia Hulbert
Madeline Hume
Siwook Hwang

I

Pinar Inanli
Yohana Iyob

J

Dana Jacobson
Jon Jerow
Amy Jimenez
Amanda Johnson
Evan Johnson
Katherine Johnston
Tibin John
Dylan Jolliffe
Brittany Jones
Stann-Omar Jones

K

Kamalaldin Kamalaldin
Andrew Kaylor
Jack Kemper
Spencer Kennedy
Kelsey Kerbawy
Anthony Ketner
Komal Khan
Alexandra Kim
Andrew Kim
Hannah Kim
Na Young Kim
Elizabeth Kinney
Siga Kisielius
Lucille Klein
Younsuk Koh
Mehmet Kologlu
Ruiqi Kou
Holly Kramer
Matthew Kuntzman
Lucas Penn Hardy Kushner

L

Rebecca La Croix
Cameron Lafayette
Anh Lam
David Landskroener
Samuel (Jake) Larioza
Colin Lauderdale
Roxann Lawrence
Cindy Lee
Gunyeop Lee
Jacob Lenning
Colin Lennox
Madeline LeVasseur
Sarah Levett
Clara Lewis
Daria Lewis
Jordan Lewis
Samuel Lichtman-Mikol
Rachel Lifton
Michael Lindley Jr.
Alex Lindsay
Emily Lindsay
Gordon Liu
Chenxi Lu
Riley Lundquist
Liam Lundy

M

Madeleine MacWilliams
Miranda Madias
Morgan Mahdavi
Lucy Mailing
Megan Malish
Hannah Maness
Sarah Manski
Scott Manski
Maria Luisa Garnica Marroquin
Natalie Martell
Alexis Martin-Browne
Elizabeth Martin
Mary Mathyer
Takumi Matsuzawa
Claire McCarthy
Belinda McCauley
Mallory McClure
Quinn McCormick
Adam McDowell
Tyler McFarland
Ivy McKee
Molly Meddock
Thomas Mehall
Jordan Meiller
Brianna Melgar
Alan-Michael Mencer
Kylie Meyer
Shannon Milan
Joshua Miller
Abby Miner
Jamie Misevich
Mallika Mitra
Katharine Moffit
Daniel Moore
Aliera Morasch
Brittany Morton
Hagop Mouradian
Chloe Mpinga
Tendai Mudyiwa
Dorothy Mugubu

N

Victoria Najacht
Alissa Neff
Audrey Negro
Gisella Newbery
Shelby Newsom
Hang Nguyen
Ly Nguyen
Anne Nielsen
Yuta Nishigaki
Danielle Nobbe
John Nocita
Mackenzie Norman
Fernando Nunez

O

Agust Olafsson
Rachel Olson
Devin Opp
Michael Oravetz
Morgan Overstreet
Jessie Owens

P

Dana Page
Anthony Palleschi
Kari Paine
Fayang Pan
Yunpeng Pang
Grace Parikh Walter
Harrison Parkes
Veeral Patel
Jessica Paul
Bronte Payne
Gabriel Pedelty Ovsiew
Darren Peel
Elizabeth Penix
Marlisa Pennington
Madison Perian
Adam Peters
Caroline Peterson
Thanh Thanh Phan
Katherine Pielemeier
Henry Pointon
Duncan Polot
Ayesha Popper
Emily Powers
Nicole Prentice
Beau Prey
Danielle Purkey

Q

 

R

Brian Raetz
Christopher Ralstrom
Malavika Rao
Katelyn Ray
James Reuter
Jenna Riehl
Megan Rigney
Megan Riley
Sophie Roberts
William Roberts
Erika Robles Araya
Jakob Rodseth
Werner Roennecke II
Lyla Rothschild
Peter Rothstein
Stefanie Roudebush
Elinor Rubin-McGregor
Connor Rzeznik

S

Katharine Scheck
Jennie Scheerer
Natalie Schmitt
Sarah Schmitt
Grady Schneider
Aaron Schoenfeldt
Aaron Schwark
Allison Seiwert
Lauren Seroka
Anthony Shaheen
Rebecca Shapiro
Sanjay Sharma
Dylan Shearer
Cameron Shegos
Ke Sheng
Sonam Shrestha
Brandon Siedlaczek
Sajan Silwal
Petar Simic
Eren Sipahi
Emily Sklar
Griffin Smalley
Alexandra Smith
Caitlyn Smith
Emily Smith
Grace Smith
Sarah Smith
Wyatt Smith
Cassandra Solis
Joshua Sowers
Honora Stagner
Jordan Stainforth
Charlotte Steele
Collin Steen
Kaitlyn Steffenhagen
Alexandra Stephens
Petra Stoppel
Marian Strauss
Lydia Strini
Hailey Stutz
Thomas Stuut
Michelle Sugimoto
Sarah Sullivan
Kyle Sunden
Mengxi Sun
Muyang Sun
Shang Sun
Mira Swearer

T

Tyler Tabenske
Thomas Tabor
Emerson Talanda-Fisher
Kiyoto Tanemura
Salwa Tareen
William Tauke
Abigail Taylor
Edward Taylor
Sophia Taylor-Havens
Elisabet Teagan
Kaitlyn Thiry
Cassie Thompson
Laurel Thompson
Spencer Thompson
Eric Thornburg
Karen Timm
Sharel Tomlinson
Nadia Torres
Alexander Townsend
Madeleine Tracey
Brooke Travis
Ngoc Truong
Hsu Tun
Shelby Tuthill

U

Kelly Usakoski

V

Trevor Vader
Caleb VanDyke
Erica Vanneste
Kaela Van Til
Umang Varma
Natalie Vazquez
Madeline Vermeulen
Julia Villarreal
Samantha Voss

W

Raoul Wadhwa
Reid Wagner
Alexis Walker
Sarah Wallace
Sidney Wall
Emily Walsh
William Warpinski
Cameron Wasko
Brennan Watch
Samantha Weaver
Jared Weeks
Perri Weiderman
Natalie Weingartz
Paris Weisman
Madeline Weisner
Clayton Weissenborn
Kenneth Weiss
John Wenger
Cameron Werner
Sarah Werner
Scott Wharam
Connor Wheaton
Caitlyn Whitcomb
Elijah Wickline
Arshia Will
Rachel Williams
Emily Witte
Camille Wood
Dayon Woodford
Lisa Woolcock Majlof
Lindsay Worthington
Joseph Wyzgoski

X

Anja Xheka
Jincheng Xu

Y

Suyeon Yang
Brent Yelton
Samantha Young

Z

Lauren Zehnder
Rachel Zemmol
Cheryl Zhang
Jingcan Zhu
Agron Ziberi
Marc Zughaib
Kevin Zuker

Outstanding Community Advocates

Roxann Lawrence helps a student with schoolwork
Roxann Lawrence (right) and a CAPS student

Seniors Roxann Lawrence and Raven Fisher have integrated community service into their undergraduate academic learning in ways that are unmatched by most college students in the state of Michigan. And it hasn’t gone unnoticed. Roxann and Raven are co-recipients of the Outstanding Community Impact Award, given annually by the Michigan Campus Compact (MiCC). Only six such awards are given in the state (and some 600 students were nominated). In addition to honoring Roxann and Raven (both of whom will address the 18th Annual Outstanding Student Service Awards Celebration on April 12 in East Lansing, Michigan), MiCC will also bestow its Heart and Soul Award to 14 other Kalamazoo College students. They are Dana Allswede, Zoe Beaudry, Ebony Brown, Jordan Earnest, Amy Jimenez, Sherin John, Komal Khan, Colin Lauderdale, Katherine Mattison, Ayesha Popper, Chelsey Shannon, Eren Sipahi, Sarah Sullivan, and Madeline Vermeulen. The Heart and Soul Award recognizes students for their time, effort, and personal commitment to communities through service.

Roxann and Raven have been involved with Community Advocates for Parents and Students (CAPS), an advocacy and tutoring initiative founded in 2005 in response to the Kalamazoo Promise, which provides college tuition for Kalamazoo public schools graduates to any Michigan public university, college, or junior college. CAPS believes that all children, despite their economic circumstances, can learn and successfully take advantage of the Kalamazoo Promise College Scholarship Program. The program has made a difference for some 400 socioeconomically disadvantaged children.

Raven Fisher helps a student with schoolwork
Raven Fisher (left) and a CAPS student

Roxann and Raven were CAPS tutors during their first year at K. As sophomores they took a leadership role as Civic Engagement Scholars (CES) in the CAPS program. The CES program is part of the College’s Center for Civic Engagement. They are serving as co-directors of all K tutors in the program during their senior year. Both women are active in other campus organizations. Raven is president of K’s Black Student Organization; Roxann is president of the Caribbean Society. Roxann’s Senior Individualized Project focused on LGBT issues in her native Jamaica. Raven’s SIP involved working with Kalamazoo Public Schools on a program to introduce and measure the effect of a culturally relevant math curriculum for middle school students.

Michigan Campus Compact is a coalition of college and university presidents who are committed to fulfilling the public purpose of higher education. MiCC promotes the education and commitment of Michigan college students to be engaged citizens. Roxann and Raven were nominated for the Outstanding Community Impact Award by Teresa Denton, associate director of K’s Center for Civic Engagement.