K Professor of History Charlene Boyer Lewis ′87 is the author of the 2012 biography, Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte: An American Aristocrat in the Early Republic. Boyer Lewis is quoted in a recent Baltimore Sun article about a new historical exhibit in Baltimore on its famous 19-year-old citizen who married Napoleon Bonaparte′s younger brother. Read more about Elizabeth′s long, colorful, and controversial life and view photos and a video about the new exhibit at http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/arts/bs-ae-betsy-bonaparte-20130608,0,1051008.story#ixzz2VqTTxKXU.
alumni
DOGL Gets More Gracious
Kalamazoo College students typically celebrate the Day of Gracious Living (DOGL) at the beach. This year, many young alumni commemorated gracious living with gracious giving.
On Wednesday, May 15, alumni from the Classes of 2002 through 2012 contributed through the Kalamazoo College Fund as part of the first DOGL Challenge, a one-day giving opportunity just for K’s young alumni. Linda Jackson ’82 challenged K’s young alumni to make a gift on DOGL by pledging to match all gifts dollar-for-dollar, up to $2,500. The goal: raise $5,000 for K in a single day.
Then, something unexpected happened on the morning of DOGL: young alumni gave at a surprising rate. Before noon they had exceeded the $2,500 match. Jackson was so pleased with the response that she increased her challenge to $5,000.
By the end of the day, 178 young alumni had made a gift through the DOGL Challenge, contributing a total of $8,124. With Jackson’s $5,000 match, the DOGL Challenge generated more $13,000 for K in 24 hours.
Now that’s a day of gracious giving!
K Alumna Describes Her Whale Science in Video Submission
Ellen Chenoweth ’08, a doctoral student and MESAS Fellow at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, has entered a video contest (National Science Foundation IGERT Video and Poster Competition).
Her entry explains her scientific work with humpback whales and salmon in Alaska and includes wonderful footage of both. It also features some humorous footage and metaphors to make the science accessible to lay audiences.
Humpback whales compete with the Alaska fishing industry for hatchery salmon. Chenoweth seeks to understand the energy expended by humpbacks to secure their other food sources. This information may eventually assist salmon hatchery release procedures in order to make food sources other than salmon more efficient for the whales, thus reducing whale-human competition for salmon fishing, which is vital to the economy of coastal Alaska.
Says Chenoweth: “Anyone can vote in the public choice category and you can vote for as many different videos as you want.”
If her submission wins the contest, she’ll use the prize to attend Marine Mammal Conference in December.
Kalamazoo College alumna Elizabeth Garlow ′07 honored by Crain′s Detroit Business
Elizabeth Garlow ′07 has received a shout-out by Crain′s Detroit Business as one of the newspaper′s annual ″Twenty in their 20s″ honorees that “honors success at a young age, from up-and-comer entrepreneurs to young professionals who make an impact in large organizations” in the Detroit area.
Elizabeth is executive director of Michigan Corps, a Detroit-based organization that launches and leads social change efforts aimed at bringing Michiganders together in imaginative ways.
Elizabeth,who attended Detroit Mercy High School and earned a B.A. in Spanish at K, launched Michigan Corps′ Pure Michigan Social Entrepreneurship Challenge, with funds from the Michigan Economic Development Corp., to fund the best social-minded business ideas. Congrats, Elizabeth!
K Alum Returns to Campus to Screen his Oscar-Nominated Documentary
David France ’81, co-writer and director of the Oscar-nominated documentary How to Survive a Plague, will screen the film on campus Sunday, May 5, at 7 PM in Dalton Theatre (Light Fine Arts Building). France will participate in a discussion with the audience at the conclusion of the film. Everyone is invited, and the event is free. INDEX news editor Elaine Ezekiel posted an interview with France. ABC Studios has purchased the rights to France’s film with the idea of making it into a dramatic miniseries. France will prepare the adaptation, which will go broader and deeper into the subject of the documentary.
Special Day Marks Transition from Tuition to Donations
On Wednesday, April 10, more than 200 signs will dot Kalamazoo College’s pathways as part of the second annual Tuition Freedom Day.
Tuition Freedom Day marks the point in the school year when tuition stops paying for the cost of a K education and support from donors takes over. Students are encouraged to visit the Hicks Student Center between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. to sign thank-you cards.
Tuition Freedom Day is about showing appreciation for the alumni, parents, faculty, staff, and friends who make a K education possible. Generous gifts through the Kalamazoo College Fund support scholarships, faculty excellence, and K’s greatest needs.
Alumni and others can also take part in Tuition Freedom Day. Let everyone know why you support K by donating your Facebook status on Wednesday, April 10. You can also make the Tuition Freedom Day Hornet (above) your profile picture for the day.
Kalamazoo College Will Soon Have First Female Board Chair
Charlotte Hall ′66 is slated to become the first woman to lead the Kalamazoo College Board of Trustees in the 180-year history of the College.
A K trustee since 1999, Hall will take over from current Board Chair Don Parfet, at the June board meeting. Parfet has been chair since 1999 and will remain on the board. He served a prior term as chair between 1988 and 1993.
Hall is a retired journalist who spent 40 years at newspapers in New Jersey, Boston, and Washington before landing at the award-winning Newsday in New York, where she served for 22 years. In 2004, she moved to the Orlando Sentinel in Florida, from which she retired in 2010 as editor and senior vice president.
Thank you, Don. Congrats, Charlotte.
Read more in the Spring 2013 issue of LuxEsto, the K magazine.
Kalamazoo College Raises Curtain on 50th Anniversary of Festival Playhouse
Kalamazoo College lifts the curtain early for the 50th anniversary season of its celebrated Festival Playhouse theatre arts program. Although the anniversary takes place during the 2013-14 academic year, the celebration begins May 16-19 with the staging of Into the Woods, the groundbreaking musical by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine, produced in collaboration with the K Department of Music.
“Our history is so rich and our celebration events so numerous, we had to start this spring in order to do it justice,” said longtime Professor of Theatre Arts and Festival Playhouse Director Ed Menta, who will stage the show. “And we are thrilled to start the celebration with Sondheim’s masterpiece.”
Into the Woods will be performed in the Nelda K. Balch Playhouse on Thursday May 16 at 7:30 p.m., Friday May 17 and Saturday May 18 at 8:00 p.m., and Sunday May 19 at 2:00 p.m. Tickets are $15/Adults, $10/seniors and $5/students.
Professors of Music Tom Evans and James Turner will serve as musical and vocal directors, respectively.
This Tony, Drama Critics Circle, and Drama Desk Award winning show “helped change the ‘American Musical,’” Evans said. “Sondheim shows are special. They combine in the most masterful way, music, lyrics, and plot. Perhaps what I like most about his work is his ability to create multilevel meanings simultaneously.”
Into the Woods features memorable songs such as “Giants in the Sky,” “Agony,” and “Children Will Listen” sung by iconic characters such as Jack (of Beanstalk fame), Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel, and Cinderella.
“And it puts a contemporary twist on the timeworn fairy tale ending,” Menta said, “What happens the day after they all lived happily ever after?”
Kalamazoo College Professor of Theatre Arts Nelda K. Balch established the first season of Festival Playhouse—with generous support from the Dorothy U. Dalton Foundation—in 1963-64, with a schedule of groundbreaking modern dramas such as Max Frisch’s The Firebugs, Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night, and a revival of Balch’s own 1958 production of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot (the first time a college in the United States had produced this landmark Absurdist play).
Beginning this spring and running through the 2013-14 season, the College will celebrate and renew the original goals and spirit of Festival Playhouse with events that include: the grand re-opening of the Nelda K. Balch Playhouse; the return of internationally known performance artist and K alumna Holly Hughes ’77; “An Evening of Kalamazoo College Theatre Alumni Scenes;” a season of three classics of Modern Drama, including Strindberg, Ibsen, and a restaging of a rarely produced early Absurdist comedy from the original Festival Playhouse season staged by professional director and K alumna Nora Hauk ’04; a special “Talkback” series led by K theatre alumni; and much more.
“From the beginning, Festival Playhouse sought to produce provocative and thoughtful theatre by combining the talents of K students, members of the greater Kalamazoo community, and professional artists,” said Ed Menta.
“The 50th anniversary season will live up to that standard.”
Dates, locations, and more details about the 50th anniversary season of Festival Playhouse at Kalamazoo College can be found by visiting www.kzoo.edu/theatre.
Kalamazoo College (www.kzoo.edu), founded in Kalamazoo, Mich., in 1833, is a nationally recognized liberal arts college and the creator of the K-Plan that emphasizes rigorous scholarship, experiential learning, leadership development, and international and intercultural engagement. Kalamazoo College does more in four years so students can do more in a lifetime.
Carpet Diem
David Landskroener ’14 is a self-described “movie junkie.” So when he won two coveted tickets to sit on bleachers alongside the famed red carpet at this year’s Oscar extravaganza in Los Angeles…well, it was a Hollywood ending.
“It was cool to see Anne Hathaway and George Clooney in person,” said David, a double major in Theatre Arts and English who also has a concentration in Media Studies where he’s learning about film.
Even cooler, he said, was when the interviewer in front of him pulled up K alumnus David France ’81 to talk about ‘How to Survive a Plague,’ his Oscar-nominated documentary.”
“He gave an insightful interview and seemed really at ease. It was so awesome to have that K connection on the red carpet, with me, a current student, only thirty feet away. K people are everywhere!”
David made the trip to LA from his home near Minneapolis where he’s been since returning from study abroad in Aberdeen, Scotland. K friend Marianne Stine ’12 joined him in a long security check-in process and a seven-hour wait in the bleachers before the stars came out.
“Luckily we had food and drink provided the entire day, and we got to watch the actual awards ceremonies from the nearby El Capitan Theatre. We both held an actual Oscar, and are those things heavy!”
Prior to his view from the bleachers, David’s most meaningful glimpse into a possible future career came during summer 2012 when he served an externship through the College’s Center for Career and Professional Development at The Playwrights’ Center in Minneapolis, a nonprofit institute that develops new plays and nurtures playwrights. He stayed with Bethany (Kestner) Whitehead ’98 who works at The Playwrights’ Center.
“It was a great opportunity for me to see that a career in that field is possible and how to work towards it. Staying with Bethany and learning about her career was just as rewarding and instructive as working at the Center itself.”
Although he looks forward to being back on campus this spring to continue his classroom and extracurricular studies, David said he also looks forward to returning to the Oscars one day, not for a seat in the bleachers, but for the full red carpet treatment.
“Studying English, theatre, and film myself, I dream of someday walking down that same carpet.”
Alumna Speaks in Mumbai on the Value of the Liberal Arts
The Great Lakes Colleges Association (GLCA) invited Hema Shroff Patel ’86 to speak at a college fair in Mumbai, India. The Indian students attending the fair were potentially interested in attending colleges in the GLCA, including Kalamazoo College. Patel spoke to them about her liberal arts education experience and how it led her to a life in Mumbai as a businesswoman. She had special praise for Kalamazoo College.
Patel had planned on attending the University of Michigan to earn a degree in economics, but she began her freshman year after the semester’s start at U of M. Her solution was to begin her studies at K, with its later start date due to the quarter system, and then transfer. Patel hadn’t counted on falling in love with K.
“I ended up spending the four best years of my life at K,” Patel told GLCA members and students. At K, she learned how to be flexible and adaptable, she said. Patel studied economics, political science, psychology, anthropology, and sociology. She learned how to view opportunities from many different perspectives, how to find innovative solutions, and how to work with people from varied cultural backgrounds.
Her skills and education came together into a textile and weaving business called Amba that Patel began in Mumbai in 1999. Born in the United States, she moved to India 22 years ago to join her family and establish her business of traditional forms of weaving, block printing, and eco-friendly natural dyeing. Amba is a social entrepreneurship that supports craft heritage in rural India.
“I marvel at how much I have used my liberal arts education in textile revival,” Patel said. “I use my communication skills with people of many different backgrounds. I interact with weavers who speak no English. I apply political science when I apply for grants, and economics and finance in running my business. A liberal arts education opens doors to the global village our world has become.”