biology

Local Grants Help the Arboretum Bloom 

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Binney Girdler’s unpopular opinion is that she prefers the Not-So-Magnificent Pines to the Magnificent Pines. 

And if you know what that means, then you—like Girdler, a professor of biology and the director of the environmental studies program at Kalamazoo College—are probably already a fan of “the Arb.” 

The Lillian Anderson Arboretum, located about five miles west of campus at 7787 W. Main St., encompasses 140 acres of forest, fields and wetlands, with five miles of walking trails. K faculty and students have long treasured the Arboretum as a living learning laboratory for courses as diverse as biology, German and art. 

Over the past few years, the Arboretum has increasingly taken its place as a valuable community resource as well. During the pandemic, when families and individuals sought outdoor recreation at unprecedented levels, nearby residents discovered the beauty of the Arb like never before—and as COVID-19 restrictions eased, they continued to take advantage of the free access to a variety of natural settings. 

While the Arb is a private facility, K welcomes its use by members of the public—and yet, increased use means accelerated wear and tear. Hikers track in invasive species. More cars and trail users cause faster degradation of the parking area and pedestrian surfaces. 

Sara Stockwood, director of the College’s Larry J. Bell ’80 Environmental Stewardship Center and the Lillian Anderson Arboretum, therefore appreciates community support that helps keep community access possible. Local foundations have contributed more than $100,000 in grant support for projects and physical improvements at the Arb over the past two years. 

Collaboration and partnership with the Consumers Energy Foundation, ENNA Foundation, Irving S. Gilmore Foundation, Kalamazoo Rotary Club and Seminary Hill Sustainability Internship as well as Stryker and Zoetis through the Kalamazoo Nature Center have enabled entrance trail upgrades, a new welcome sign, installation of a new well, replacement of the Batts Pond bridge, continuation of pollinator habitat research, a three-year sheep-grazing research project, and development of a land-management plan. 

“The Arb is part of the College’s operating budget,” Stockwood said. “That helps with our maintenance costs and keeping things safe. The local foundation grants really allow it to flourish, improving the experience for both college students and community visitors. The grant funds allow us to dream about what we could do and help give some momentum to making progress toward our goals.” 

Physical improvements 

Grant-supported physical improvements over the past couple of years have included replacing and upgrading some aging features.  

Erosion from rain and snow melt off the parking lot, in addition to regular use, necessitated regrading the entrance trail and adding another layer of crushed asphalt millings.  

The hand-pumped well went offline several years ago after a failed water-quality test, and a new well had to be drilled to provide visitors with fresh drinking water.  

Two additional photo monitoring sites, where visitors are encouraged to take and submit pictures to help the College track how the landscape changes over time, were installed—one on the Power Line Trail and one on Old Field.  

The bridge over Batts Pond desperately needed a replacement. The original bridge was more than 20 years old, and every few years, high water levels have submerged it under as much as a foot of water. 

“We’d been trying to figure out how to manage a bridge where the water levels change so much,” Stockwood said. “You have to be able to get across there. It’s a spot where classes do research and it’s one of our big access points, close to Oshtemo Township Park. We were spending so much time trying to make extension bridges, and then they would float away, and we would go get them and bring them back.” 

The new bridge, supported by grant funds, is fixed on either end, with a floating dock in the middle, made from the same material as the Arb’s wetland boardwalk. That will allow the bridge to rise and fall with the pond’s changing water level, keeping it accessible year-round and minimizing ongoing maintenance. 

“These projects are all big, and anything that has infrastructure related to it has maintenance and upkeep,” Stockwood said. “The local grants have allowed us to make that a focus, so that as our numbers are increasing, as people are spending more time out there, we’re able to accommodate and focus on the trails feeling accessible and safe and welcoming.” 

Four students gaze up at the trees during a class at the Lillian Anderson Arboretum
Binney Girdler, a professor of biology and the director of the environmental studies program at Kalamazoo College, conducts some classes at the Lillian Anderson Arboretum.
A family, surrounded by tall trees, walks on one of the trails at Lillian Anderson Arboretum
During the pandemic, when families and individuals sought outdoor recreation, nearby residents discovered the beauty of the Arboretum like never before.
A butterfly perches on a sign that says Lillian Anderson Arboretum
The Arboretum is a tremendous asset for both the College and the community. 

Arboretum Projects 

Grant funding also supports new and continuing projects at the Arboretum, notably pollinator research, a grazing study and development of a land-management plan. 

One long-term project involves pollinator research along the power line. For many years, Arb staff and students have managed a stretch of the power line, working to remove invasive species, plant a native prairie ecosystem, and survey pollinator activity. Many students have completed internships and Senior Integrated Projects while taking part in the ongoing research. 

New over the past couple of years is a research project, also along the power line, to compare a hands-off land-management approach to traditional mowing and to sheep grazing. Girdler, Stockwood and Ann Fraser, emerita professor of biology, have worked with Lauren Burns, owner of local contract grazing company Tending Tilth, to coordinate the project with student involvement. 

Planned to run for a minimum of three years, the project consists of data collection from vegetation surveys, soil sampling, pH monitoring, evaluation of carbon sequestering, and growth rates on plots of land that are mowed, grazed by Burns’ sheep, or left alone. 

“It pushes students to use what they’re learning in class in a tangible way,” Burns said. “They’ve had hands-on experience in what it’s like to design a study and perfect it over a couple years and what it looks like when a student adopts a project started by another student, what to focus on, how to avoid losing data. I hope to inspire young people to pursue careers in agriculture and science, and I think this really supports that.” 

The benefits go far beyond those directly experienced by Burns and K students. 

“It’s a benefit to Lauren because it has the potential to prove that her business model is good for the planet,” Girdler said. “It’s great for students to be exposed to this approach. For me, intellectually, it’s very cool to work with a farmer and businessperson who’s willing to take this approach. That’s a personal benefit. It’s a benefit to the Arboretum, because it’s helping us understand better ways to manage the Arboretum. That can have knock-on effects, especially if we are able to publish our results for other land managers and for scientists generally, for the field of vegetation management and trying to do things without as much fossil fuels, in the face of climate change and the face of invasive species, a lot of the wicked problems we’re going to need to tackle in this adaptive way.” 

The College is working with the Kalamazoo Nature Center to develop a five-year land-management plan for the Arb that should be complete this spring. The plan follows the Open Standards for the Practice of Conservation, a widely adopted set of principles and practices. 

“We’ve been identifying goals and targets and figuring out how that all matches with our values,” Stockwood said. “That will give us some targeted areas of the Arb that we want to focus on, especially with invasive species removal, and it’ll continue some things that we’ve been doing.” 

The plan also includes some new types of monitoring, including deer and avian health. 

“Having a land-management plan gives us direction, versus just tackling things as they come up,” Stockwood said. 

Of course, some things will still come up. Trees will fall across trails and need to be dealt with in the moment. A management plan, however, will aid in more proactive scheduling of maintenance and improvement work. 

“It also ties in our values and gives us reasoning for why we’re doing what we’re doing,” Stockwood said. “That could help us make a case for other projects and grants. I’m hoping that we can tie in more classes, too; if we have specific monitoring goals, we can ask a class to help us with that. It doesn’t just have to be the student trail crew or a staff member, we can bring in different parts of our community to help us reach the management goals if it’s clear what we’re doing and why we’re doing it.” 

Common ground 

The Arb is a tremendous asset for both the College and the Kalamazoo-area community.  

“Since I got here in 2001, almost every class I have taught has used the ecosystems out there as a laboratory,” Girdler said. “I’m an ecologist, so of course it offers a lot for my classes, but also, a lot of first-year seminars go out there. Art classes use it. We just had a German class go do some forest bathing, which is a particularly German idea of connecting with nature. Student groups meet and hike there. Students work on the Arb Crew. It’s part of campus, and once they know it’s there and it’s theirs, students will often pile in a car and just go to be away from the world a little bit, which is what I do when I go out there.” 

Along the trails of the Arb, town and gown can coexist peacefully and even support each other. 

“I think it’s a really important community asset that folks can visit, dawn to dusk, anytime of the year,” Stockwood said. “It’s a place for recreation and relaxation, that’s part of campus, but not on campus; part of the College, but away from the rigor of daily campus life. A free outdoor space that is maintained for walking, outdoor recreation, and is used very heavily by the community. 

“With the amount of people that we see coming through, there’s maintenance that has to happen to keep up, and the grants really, really help support the community. I hope that visitors learn something while they’re out there, either through some of our interpretive signage, or by meeting a student or staff member, or just seeing something and being curious and exploring it.” 

Perhaps they’ll climb Gathje Hill or encounter grazing sheep along the power line. Maybe they’ll stop to snap and submit photos at the monitoring sites. Most likely, they’ll pause to admire one or both stands of pines, where they can form their own opinions. 

“I don’t know why people think they’re not so magnificent,” Girdler said with a shrug. “It’s a matter of taste, I guess.” 

Alumna Finds Where Birds of a Feather Flock Together

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Update: Rockwell’s presentation now is available online.
Click the link and use the password v1R$ErPy to watch it.

A Kalamazoo College alumna will deliver a public virtual presentation through the Redwood Region Audubon Society (RRAS), highlighting the incredible journeys of two varieties of migratory birds including one that was found through her research to fly from Oregon to Brazil and back.

Dr. Sarah Rockwell ’02 works for Klamath Bird Observatory (KBO), a scientific nonprofit research organization in Ashland, Oregon, that focuses on achieving bird and habitat conservation through science, education and partnerships. Rockwell’s program, “To Southern California, Brazil, and Back: First GPS Tracking of Oregon Vesper Sparrow and Western Purple Martin Migration,” will be available through Zoom at 10:30 p.m. Eastern time Thursday, January 16, at rras.org.

Rockwell joined collaborators from the U.S. Forest Service, the U.S. Geological Survey and Cape Arago Audubon to work after dusk with purple martin bird colonies along the Oregon coast and at Fern Ridge Reservoir. Equipped with headlamps, they captured adult birds roosting in their nest boxes between about 9 p.m. and 1 a.m. and tagged them with a small GPS device. The next morning, after sleeping in tents, Rockwell and her collaborators observed the tagged birds to ensure their normal behavior, including flying and feeding their nestlings.

Separately, Rockwell worked with KBO Director of Conservation Jaime Stephens to study Oregon vesper sparrows. Together, they set up a mist net near a perching spot in a male’s territory and placed a speaker playing a vesper sparrow song under it. The birds perceived the song as a rival male, often causing them to fly into the net while trying to chase away the false intruder, allowing Rockwell and Stephens to band them.

With both species, Rockwell and her collaborators made harnesses so the birds could comfortably wear the GPS tags like a backpack with loops going around their legs. Rockwell then waited almost a year for the birds to complete their round-trip migrations so they could be collected for data retrieval as GPS tags for birds this small are too lightweight to transmit data, only store it.

Their efforts have proven successful.

“Before this study, we did not know where purple martins from Oregon went during migration and winter,” Rockwell said. “The unique subspecies of the western purple martin is estimated at just 3,500 pairs in the Pacific Northwest states, and it is considered to be of conservation concern. We had the same questions for the Oregon vesper sparrow, another subspecies unique to the Pacific Northwest that is currently under review for listing as threatened or endangered due to its small population size and declining trend. These are the first studies of their kind with these subspecies, tracking them with GPS tags year-round.”

As a student at K, Rockwell participated in the ecology and environment study abroad program in Ecuador. Through that program, she participated in field trips with an ornithologist that helped her and other students spot and identify birds. At the Tiputini Biodiversity Station in the Amazon, she also participated in a three-week bird survey, spending time in canopy towers counting birds and adding to the inventory at the station.

Two scientists wear headlamps while working with birds at night
KBO Senior Research Biologist Sarah Rockwell ’02 (left) works with birds alongside Field Technician Sam Webb on a boat at the Fern Ridge Reservoir. Photo by Daniel Farrar.
Scientist stands in water while retrieving birds in their nesting boxes with a pole
Rockwell retrieves purple martin nest boxes at Fern Ridge Reservoir. Photo by Sam Webb.
An Oregon vesper sparrow perches with a GPS antenna attached to it. Photo by Frank Lospalluto.

“It is hard not to fall in love with tropical rainforest birds like parrots, toucans, tanagers and hummingbirds,” Rockwell said. “When I returned, I took a vertebrate biology class with Dr. Paul Sotherland, which had a substantial bird component. When I found that I also loved learning the birds of Michigan, I took that as a good sign. My first field jobs after college were working with sea turtles and then endemic forest birds on the big island of Hawai’i at Volcanoes National Park. This is where I learned how to mist-net and capture birds. The first time I held a wild bird in my hands, I was hooked.”

Rockwell earned a job with KBO after completing her Ph.D. at the University of Maryland and Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center. Fast forward 12 years and she’s now working there as a senior research biologist. In her position, she hires and supervises field crews and conducts field work from April-July. That means getting up early and spending a lot of time hiking and studying birds outdoors. The rest of the year, she pursues data management and data analysis using statistical software, writes reports and peer-reviewed publications, seeks grant writing opportunities, and plans for the next field season.

In her upcoming presentation, Rockwell said attendees can expect to see photos and maps from her research, and peek into where western purple martins and Oregon vesper sparrows go during the annual voyages they undertake.

“These first few birds have returned with fascinating information, revealing new discoveries about their incredible journeys, including unexpected lengthy fall stopovers, and for purple martins, winters on the beach in southeastern Brazil,” she said. “Determining the factors that limit population size in a migratory bird species can be challenging. It requires understanding what threats they may face in different parts of the year, and thus, the first step is knowing where they are throughout their annual cycles. A better understanding of overwintering locations and migratory stopover sites used by Oregon vesper sparrows and western purple martins, and potential threats originating during the non-breeding season, are key information gaps needed to target conservation actions.”

K Welcomes New Faculty for 2024

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Kalamazoo College is pleased to welcome the following faculty members to campus this fall:

Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Kelsey Aldrich

Aldrich arrives at K from Duquesne University, where she earned a Ph.D. and served as a graduate teaching assistant in biochemistry. Her educational background also includes a Bachelor of Science in chemistry with American Chemical Society (ACS) certification from Grove City College, where she was an undergraduate teaching assistant in organic, analytical and general chemistry.

Aldrich will teach a Shared Passages Seminar course this fall titled Cultured: The History and Science of Fermented Foods. In winter spring terms, she will teach classes in general chemistry and biochemistry. Her professional affiliations include membership in the ACS and the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB).

New Faculty Member Kelsey Aldrich
Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Kelsey Aldrich

Visiting Assistant Professor of English Erika Carbonara

Carbonara recently earned her Ph.D. in English from Wayne State University. She additionally holds a master’s degree from Oakland University and a bachelor’s degree with university honors from Wayne State.

She specializes in early modern literature with an emphasis on gender, sexuality, and kink studies. In her previous teaching positions, she has taught a wide range of courses from introductory composition to literature classes focused on Renaissance literature, children’s literature, and women’s literature. This term she will lead a course on social justice from a literary perspective with a focus on issues, events, movements and historical moments while emphasizing areas of power difference such as race and ethnicity, disabilities, class, gender and sexuality. 

New faculty member Erika Carbonara
Visiting Assistant Professor of English Erika Carbonara

Visiting Assistant Professor of Mathematics Rachel Chaiser

Chaiser’s educational background includes a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Colorado Boulder, and a bachelor’s degree with honors in mathematics from the University of Puget Sound.

In Boulder, she served as a part-time graduate instructor in linear algebra for non-math majors and calculus courses, a graduate teaching assistant in precalculus and an advanced undergraduate research mentor. At K this fall, she will teach calculus with lessons in algebra, precalculus and analytic geometry.

New faculty member Rachel Chaiser
Visiting Assistant Professor of Mathematics Rachel Chaiser

Visiting Assistant Professor of Psychology Sharon Colvin

Colvin has teaching experience with the University of Pittsburgh School of Education as an instructor, leading students with research methods and applied research; and the University of Maryland First-Year Innovation and Research Experience (FIRE) as an assistant clinical professor. Before getting her PhD., she was a youth services librarian for 10 years. At K, Colvin will teach educational psychology in fall, which applies the principles of psychology to the practice of teaching.

Colvin holds a Ph.D. in learning sciences and policy from the University of Pittsburgh School of Education, Health and Human Development; a master’s degree in library science from the Simmons University Graduate School of Library and Information Science; a master’s degree in mind, brain and education from the Harvard University Graduate School of Education; and a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Wellesley College.

New faculty member Sharon Colvin
Visiting Assistant Professor of Psychology Sharon Colvin

Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Caitlin Coplan

Coplan arrives at K from Northwestern University, where they recently earned a Ph.D. in physical chemistry. They also hold a bachelor’s degree with honors in physical and educational chemistry from the University of Utah.

Coplan has prior professional and teaching experience as an instructor as a part of the Arch program for incoming first-year students, and a teaching assistant for general chemistry and nanomaterials courses at Northwestern. They have also served as an interim undergraduate chemistry advisor, College of Science student ambassador, and teaching assistant in general chemistry at the University of Utah. At K, they will teach analytical chemistry this fall.

New faculty member Caitlin Coplan
Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Caitlin Coplan

Visiting Assistant Professor of Biology Mahar Fatima

For the past seven years, Fatima has served the University of Michigan, first as a postdoctoral researcher and then as a research laboratory specialist. Her research interests include studies of the sensory neural circuits under physiological or pathological conditions, the molecular mechanisms required to interpret sensory information, and how relations between neural and non-neuronal systems contribute to chronic pain, chronic itch, and pulmonary disorders. This fall, Fatima will teach neurobiology at K, addressing the structure and function of the nervous system with topics including the cell biology of neurons, electrophysiology, sensory and motor systems, brain development, and nervous system dysfunction.

Fatima earned a Ph.D. from the National Brain Research Centre in India along with master’s and bachelor’s degrees in biochemistry and life sciences respectively from the University of Allahabad.

New faculty member Mahar Fatima
Visiting Assistant Professor of Biology Mahar Fatima

Visiting Assistant Professor of Religion Shelby King

King holds a master’s degree and Ph.D. in religious studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) along with a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Texas State University, San Marcos.

Her teaching areas include the history of religion in America, religion and popular culture, religion and American politics, theories and methods in religion, and theories of genders and sexualities. Her professional memberships include the American Academy of Religion, and the UCSB Center for Cold War Studies and International History.

New faculty member Shelby King
Visiting Assistant Professor of Religion Shelby King

Visiting Assistant Professor of Mathematics Cemile Kurkoglu

Kurkoglu comes to K from Denison University, where she had been a visiting assistant professor, teaching undergraduate mathematics and statistics courses since 2021. 

Kurkoglu holds a Ph.D. in mathematics from Indiana University Bloomington, where she served as an associate instructor for algebra, calculus and finite mathematics courses and she assisted for graduate mathematics courses. She also has a master’s degree from Bilkent University and a bachelor’s degree from Hacettepe University. Her graduate-level coursework included abstract and commutative algebra, number and representation theory, and ordinary and partial differential equations, real and complex analysis, and topology.

New faculty member Cemile Kurkoglu
Visiting Assistant Professor of Mathematics Cemile Kurkoglu

Visiting Assistant Professor of History Josh Morris

Morris is arriving at K from Wayne State University, where he has been a visiting assistant professor at Grand Valley State University since 2021. Elsewhere, he has served St. Clair County Community College, the University of Toledo and Wayne State University as an adjunct faculty member; a graduate teaching assistant at Wayne State and Cal State University Pomona; and a lecturer for the Los Angeles Workers’ Center and the University of California, Irvine.

Morris holds a Ph.D. from Wayne State, a master’s degree from CSU Pomona, and a bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Santa Barbara, all in history. His professional memberships include the American Historical Association, the Organization of American Historians, the Historical Materialism Society for Critical Research in Marxism, the Labor and Working-Class Historical Association and the Historians of American Communism.

New faculty member Joshua Morris
Visiting Assistant Professor of History Joshua Morris

Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Sociology Koffi Nomedji

Nomedji holds a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from Duke University, a master’s degree in economics from Oklahoma State University, and bachelor’s degrees in sociology and economics from the University of Lomé, Togo, West Africa. At Duke, Nomedji taught courses in introductory cultural anthropology, the digital revolution, the anthropology of money, and development and Africa.

New faculty member Koffi Nomedji
Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Sociology Koffi Nomedji

Visiting Assistant Professor of Computer Science Nick Polanco

While recently earning a Ph.D. in computer science at Michigan State University, Polanco conducted research in automotive cybersecurity specific to autonomous vehicles. He also was a teaching assistant in artificial intelligence, computer organization and architecture, software engineering, computer systems, discrete structures, mobile applications and development, and database systems.

At K, Polanco will teach courses in introductory computing and programming basics for JavaScript and web development this fall.

Nick Polanco
Visiting Assistant Professor of Computer Science Nick Polanco

Director of African Studies and Assistant Professor of Anthropology Dominique Somda

Somda has arrived at K from the Institute for Humanities in Africa (HUMA) at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, where she was a research fellow. She also has past appointments as traveling faculty with the International Honors Program (IHP) at study abroad and world learning sites in the U.S., Spain, Jordan, India, Nepal, Senegal, South Africa, Brazil, Argentina and Chile; as a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology at Reed College and the Department of Anthropology and Center for Africana Studies at the University of Pennsylvania; as a visiting scholar in anthropology at the London School of Economics; as a postdoctoral fellow at the Université Paris Nanterre in France; and as a teaching and research fellow at the University of Paris Nanterre.

Somda has a Ph.D. and two master’s degrees in ethnology and comparative sociology from the University of Paris Nanterre, and a master’s and bachelor’s in philosophy from the University Clermont Auvergne.

Somda will lead a course this fall at K titled On Being Human in Africa. The course will examine the experiences of Africans through racialized and gendered existences, their affective relations, their ways of relating to and caring for each other and the land; and explore what it means to think and write about Africa with representations and discourses including fiction, academic writing and social media.

Dominique Somda
Director of African Studies and Assistant Professor of Anthropology Dominique Somda

Assistant Professor of Biology Clara Stuligross

Stuligross was a postdoctoral scholar at the University of California, Riverside prior to K. She holds Ph.D. in ecology from the University of California, Davis, and a bachelor’s degree in environmental studies from Earlham College.

Stuligross studies the impacts of environmental stressors on native bee ecology and recently received a federal grant to study the effects of climate change on bees. She also has professional experience as a museum educator at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, where she taught science outreach programs and developed hands-on climate change education lessons. At K this fall, she will teach Biology Explorations.

Clara Stuligross
Assistant Professor of Biology Clara Stuligross

Visiting Instructor of Chinese Ruyuan Yang

Yang has a master’s degree in teaching Chinese to non-native speakers from the Beijing Language and Culture University, and a bachelor’s degree in teaching Chinese as a second language from Yunnan Normal University in Kunming, China.

Yang previously has taught college-level courses in beginning, intermediate and advanced Chinese at K; basic and intermediate Chinese, and Chinese dance and culture at Western Michigan University; and integrated Chinese and Chinese listening and speaking courses at Beijing Language and Culture University. Yang’s courses this fall include beginning and intermediate Chinese.

Visiting Instructor of Chinese Ruyuan Yang
Visiting Instructor of Chinese Ruyuan Yang

Six Faculty Earn Endowed Chair Honors

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Kalamazoo College has appointed six faculty members as endowed chairs, recognizing their achievements as professors. Endowed chairs are positions funded through the annual earnings from an endowed gift or gifts to the College. The honor reflects the value donors attribute to the excellent teaching and mentorship that occurs at K and how much donors want to see that excellence continue.

The honorees are:

  • Espelencia Baptiste, the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership Senior Faculty Chair
  • Anne Marie Butler, the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership Junior Faculty Chair
  • E. Binney Girdler, the Dow Distinguished Professor in Natural Sciences
  • Sohini Pillai, the Marlene Crandell Francis Endowed Chair in the Humanities
  • Dwight Williams, the Kurt D. Kaufman Endowed Chair
  • Daniela Arias-Rotondo, the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Endowed Chair in Natural Science

Espelencia Baptiste, Anthropology-Sociology

Baptiste is currently on sabbatical in Benin where she is working on a book project focused on different ways Africans and Haitians claim each other across time and space. Her research focus centers on the relationship between Africa and its diasporas. She has been active and engaged within the College since her arrival; most recently, she received the College’s Outstanding Advisor Award in 2023 and served as Posse mentor from 2019-2022.

Her courses include Lest We Forget: Memory and Identity in the African Diaspora, You Are What You Eat: Food and Identity In a Global Perspective, Communities and Schools, and Missionaries to Pilgrims: Diasporic Returns to Africa. Within her teaching, she is invested in challenging students to imagine the production of power, particularly as it relates to belonging, as a continuous phenomenon.

Baptiste has a bachelor’s degree from Colgate University, and a master’s degree and Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University.

Endowed Chair Espelencia Baptiste receives a plaque from Kalamazoo College President Jorge G. Gonzalez
Espelencia Baptiste, the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership senior chair, received the College’s Outstanding Advisor Award in 2023 as presented by President Jorge G. Gonzalez

Anne Marie Butler, Art and Art History; Women, Gender and Sexuality (WGS)

Butler has a joint appointment in Art History and Women, Gender, and Sexuality. Her research focuses on contemporary Tunisian art within frameworks of global contemporary art, contemporary global surrealism studies, Southwest Asia North Africa studies, gender and sexuality studies, and queer theory. At K, she teaches at the intersection of visual culture and gender studies, instructing courses such as Art, Power and Society; Queer Aesthetics; Performance Art; and core WGS classes, and this is her fourth season as volunteer assistant coach for the swimming and diving team at K.

Butler is co-editor for the volume Queer Contemporary Art of Southwest Asia and North Africa, which will be available in October (Intellect Press). She has been published in ASAP/Journal, Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies, Liminalities: A Journal of Performance Studies, and The London Review of Education. She is also an editor for the volume Surrealism and Ecology, expected in 2026.

Butler has a bachelor’s degree from Scripps College, a master’s degree from New York University and a Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Portrait of Endowed Chair Anne Marie Butler
Anne Marie Butler is the the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership junior chair.

E. Binney Girdler, Biology

Girdler is the director of K’s environmental studies program and a biology department faculty member. She focuses on plant ecology and conservation biology with her research involving studies of the structure and dynamics of terrestrial plant communities.

Girdler previously had an endowed chair as the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Endowed Chair in Natural Science. She develops relationships with area natural-resource agencies and non-profit conservation groups to match her expertise with their research needs and the access needs of students. In 2022, she and K Associate Professor of Biology Santiago Salinas contributed to a global research project that proves humans are affecting evolution through urbanization and climate change. The study served as a cover story for the journal Science.

Girdler commonly teaches courses titled Environmental Science, Ecology and Conservation, and Population and Community Ecology along with an environmental studies senior seminar. She earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Virginia, a master’s degree from Yale University and a Ph.D. from Princeton University.

Dow Distinguished Professor in Natural Sciences E. Binney Girdler
Dow Distinguished Professor in Natural Sciences E. Binney Girdler at Batts Pavilion.

Sohini Pillai, Religion

Pillai is the director of film and media studies at K and a faculty member in the religion department. She is a comparatist of South Asian religious literature, and her area of specialization is the Mahabharata and Ramayana epic traditions.

Pillai is the author of Krishna’s Mahabharatas: Devotional Retellings of an Epic Narrative (Oxford University Press, 2024), a comprehensive study of premodern retellings of the Mahabharata epic in regional South Asian languages. She is also the co-editor of Many Mahabharatas (State University of New York Press, 2021) with Nell Shapiro Hawley and the co-author of Women in Hindu Traditions (New York University Press, under contract) with Emilia Bachrach and Jennifer Ortegren. Her courses have included Religion in South Asia; Hindu Traditions; Islam in South Asia; Dance, Drama, and Devotion in South Asia; Religion, Bollywood, and Beyond; Jedi, Sith, and Mandalorians: Religion and Star Wars; and Princesses, Demonesses, and Warriors: The Women of the South Asian Epics.

Pillai has a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley; a master’s degree from Columbia University; and a bachelor’s degree from Wellesley College.

Sohini Pillai standing in her office with some Star Wars memorabilia
Marlene Crandell Francis Endowed Chair in the Humanities Sohini Pillai displays some of her personal Star Wars memorabilia including a painting of Grogu gifted to her by a student.

Dwight Williams, Chemistry and Biochemistry

Williams previously was an endowed chair at K, having served as the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Assistant Professor of Chemistry from 2018–2020. He teaches courses including Organic Chemistry I and II, Advanced Organic Chemistry and Introductory Chemistry. His research interests include synthetic organic chemistry, medicinal chemistry and pharmacology.

Williams spent a year as a lecturer at Longwood University before becoming an assistant professor at Lynchburg College. At Lynchburg, he found a passion for the synthesis and structural characterization of natural products as potential neuroprotectants.

Williams learned more about those subjects after accepting a National Institutes of Health postdoctoral research fellowship at the Virginia Commonwealth University Medical College of Virginia Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology. During that fellowship, he worked in medicinal chemistry and pharmacology, where his work was published in six peer-reviewed journals.

In 2019, Williams was awarded a Fellowship for Excellence in Teaching grant from the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation and Course Hero. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Coastal Carolina University and a Ph.D. from Virginia Commonwealth.

Endowed Chair Dwight Williams
Kurt D. Kaufman Endowed Chair Dwight Williams holding a molecular model in his office.

Daniela Arias-Rotondo, Chemistry and Biochemistry

Arias-Rotondo earned a grant valued at $250,000 last year from the National Science Foundation through its Early-Career Academic Pathways in the Mathematical and Physical Sciences (LEAPS-MPS). The LEAPS-MPS grant emphasizes helping pre-tenure faculty at institutions that do not traditionally receive significant amounts of NSF-MPS funding, including predominantly undergraduate institutions, as well as achieving excellence through diversity. She uses the funding primarily to pay her student researchers, typically eight to 10 per term, and bring more research experiences into the classroom.   

This year, Arias-Rotondo earned an American Chemical Society (ACS) Petroleum Research Fund grant, which will provide $50,000 to her work while backing her lab’s upcoming research regarding petroleum byproducts. Her lab traditionally develops molecules that absorb energy from light while transforming that energy into electricity. The grant will allow her and her students to take molecules they have designed to act as catalysts and unlock chemical transformations through a process called photoredox catalysis. In this case, those transformations involve petroleum byproducts and how they might be used. 

Arias-Rotondo teaches Introductory Chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry, and Molecular Structure and Reactivity, and commonly takes students to ACS conferences. She holds a bachelor’s degree from the Universidad de Buenos Aires in Argentina and a Ph.D. from Michigan State University. 

Portrait of Endowed Chair Daniela Arias-Rotondo
Daniela Arias-Rotondo has been named the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Endowed Chair in Natural Science.

Thailand Lessons Influence Student, Kalamazoo’s First Read Along

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Emerson Wesselhoff working at a table with a city of Kalamazoo table cloth, ready to lead city's first read along
Emerson Wesselhoff ’25 is working in an internship with the city of Kalamazoo, where she is leading the city’s first Kalamazoo Reads effort through the book “Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design” by journalist Charles Montgomery about urban design and happiness.
Emerson Wesselhoff with a host family and a fellow student in Thailand
Wesselhoff (left) sits with one of her host families and a fellow student in the Maetha agricultural co-op village. The younger Thai woman is Pi Pui, the expert seed saver for the village. The older Thai woman is her mom, Mae Sawn.
Wesselhoff works with elementary school students she led in a read along
Wesselhoff works with elementary school students during her internship in Thailand with Kiaow Suay Hom, which translates to Green, Beautiful and Fragrant in English.

A study-abroad experience, a passion for sustainability and a love for her city have helped a Kalamazoo College Heyl scholar leave her mark on Imagine Kalamazoo 2035, the city’s newly launched master plan.

Emerson Wesselhoff ’25 is an outreach and engagement intern working with City Planner Christina Anderson ’98. She was among the officials at an open house September 19 when the city shared some of its successes from the previous master plan and discussed with residents what they can expect over the next year with the new plan.

Now, as a part of Imagine Kalamazoo 2035, Wesselhoff will lead the city’s first Kalamazoo Reads effort, a community read along and discussion with clubs, community groups and residents. Together, they will have meaningful conversations about Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design, a book by award-winning journalist Charles Montgomery beginning Monday, September 30. The book combines urban design and an emerging science of happiness that will help participants analyze some of the world’s most dynamic cities, while brainstorming what residents want in Kalamazoo.

“I first read the book at K through a class I took sophomore year,” Wesselhoff said, speaking of a seminar led by Anderson, City of Kalamazoo Chief Operating Officer Laura Lam ’99 and then-Mary Jane Underwood Stryker Center for Civic Engagement Director Alison Geist. “We want Individual citizens, book clubs, organizations, boards, shops and institutions to read it, and every month we will host a community-led discussion of the book. I’ve put together a big toolkit that provides summaries, links to the author’s TED talk, and discussion questions to guide thoughts and processes. We want to get people thinking about how the city makes us happy and what happiness means in our lives.”

Wesselhoff’s opportunity is a relatable follow-up to a reading-focused experience she led when she studied abroad in Thailand last year. She concluded her time overseas with a six-week climate engagement internship through a non-government organization called Kiaow Suay Hom, which translates to Green, Beautiful and Fragrant in English. There, she studied the benefits of green spaces in fighting pollution and particulate matter (PM 2.5) as smoke and smog cause health risks such as heart attacks, cancer and respiratory issues in Thailand. The organization had created a children’s book about PM 2.5 that was central to the outreach Wessselhoff performed as part of her internship.

How to Participate
in the Read Along

  • Let Wesselhoff know if you or a group will join the read along and whether you would like resources by emailing her at wesselhoffe@kalamazoocity.org.
  • Happy City is available at a discount at Bookbug and This is a Bookstore (3019 Oakland Drive), in person and online. Use the discount code KALAMAZOO if you buy the book online. You may also read an online version of the book or get it from the Kalamazoo Public Library as an eBook or audio book via Hoopla.
  • Public read along discussions start Monday, September 30, with a gathering at Bookbug and This is a Bookstore. A second discussion will take place Wednesday, October 23, at Jerico, 1501 Fulford St. Free reservations are available online for the September 30 event and the October 23 event.
  • A Happy City toolkit is available online to guide independent reads and discussions.
  • Share your read along results by completing a brief online form, sending an email to hello@kalamazoocity.org with your responses typed, or attaching a scan of any written notes to an email. Return a paper copy by mail or in person to Community Planning and Economic Development, 245 N. Rose St. in Kalamazoo, during business hours.
Emerson Wesselhoff with other students in Thailand
During her internship in Thailand, Wesselhoff volunteered at a local farm with her fellow NGO interns to help the farmers prepare for a big harvesting event.
Emerson Wesselhoff discusses sustainability with elementary school students she led in a read along
Wesselhoff told elementary school students about what they can be do with green space and pollution-filtering plants to fight health risks that are common in Thailand.
Wesselhoff makes a presentation to a group of NGO's in Thailand
At the end of her Thailand internship, Wesselhoff presented information on her work to Chiang Mai’s Breath Council, a larger council of NGOs dedicated to helping fight PM 2.5 pollution.

“Having more green space, carbon-sequestering and pollution-filtering plants is a great way to combat PM 2.5,” Wesselhoff said. “Creating those green spaces starts with awareness and I learned the importance of youth education. A huge component of my internship was going around to local elementary schools in In the Mae Hia subdistrict of Chiang Mai, Thailand, and showing how sustainability connects to local culture, children’s lives, and how to keep them and their friends and family safe. I learned how to engage with kids and break down a heavily scientific and scary topic, while connecting it to their culture and their lives at home. It made them feel empowered to make choices that are healthier for their community.”

She hopes Happy City read along conversations will have similar success and spark some ideas regarding potential local sustainability efforts.

“I’m trying to help bring awareness to how the city impacts our sense of happiness and our sense of self in where we live,” she said. “That’s a big piece of environmental engagement work—knowing where you live, knowing its shortcomings, and advocating for the things that make it great, and sustainability planning is a huge part of that. I look at my study abroad experience, which was so centered on putting my assumptions on the back burner and learning from local people through their lived experiences. I’m trying to bring that same practice back here. I think we often turn to academics, politicians or big systems to figure out how to make progress. What I learned from local communities in Thailand is to focus instead on making space for our relationship to land, first and foremost. Community awareness and respect will follow close behind.”

Wesselhoff was abroad for a total of six months, spending her time first with the International Sustainable Development Studies Institute—a hands-on, fieldwork learning center based in Chiang Mai, Thailand, focused on sustainability.

With ISDSI, Wesselhoff and 13 other students from around the world, including two other K students, took one monthlong class at a time with courses including culture, ecology and community; sustainable food systems; political ecology and ocean ecology. The first week of each class consisted of lectures before the students stayed three weeks with host families, mostly in indigenous communities, and performed field or volunteer work in the community.

In the sustainable food systems course, Wesselhoff and her peers spent two weeks living in an organic co-op village called Maetha, staying with a seed saver and learning about organic agriculture. The third week she lived on an organic coffee farm called Nine One Coffee near a jungle and learned about the organic bean-to-cup process.

With the forestry course, Wesselhoff traveled to Mae Hong Son, the northernmost province in Thailand, near the Myanmar border, and backpacked between six villages, starting at low elevation and proceeding higher with each stop. Along the way, she lived with six indigenous host families who graciously taught the students about livelihoods and land rights in their highland communities.

During the ocean ecology course, Wesselhoff and her group went south to learn about mudflats and mangroves while living on a coastal farm, before spending about a week and a half in the Adang archipelago near the Malaysian border to kayak through more trading routes and learn about coral reef ecosystems. When the classes ended, students from other colleges returned home and the K students began working internships. Wesselhoff’s experience now feeds her desire to improve life in Kalamazoo.

Wesselhoff with a baby elephant
Wesselhoff greeted a baby elephant during an excursion with the International Sustainable Development Studies Institute.
Emerson Wesselhoff in Thailand
Wesselhoff participated in a field expedition to Wiang Khum Kam, an ancient archeological site south of Chiang Mai.

At home, the Loy Norrix High School graduate is a biology major with a concentration in environmental studies and minors in English and anthropology-sociology. She also serves K as a Climate Action Plan Committee student representative and intern, advocating for the College’s efforts in being carbon neutral by 2050. The committee maintains the College’s Climate Action Plan in association with the President’s Climate Leadership Commitment, which K joined in 2010, while establishing goals, monitoring progress, conducting annual reporting and providing guidance on projects and initiatives to support the plan. Plus, Wesselhoff writes blog post updates addressing news on climate efforts at K, and all her work excites her to extend her work into the city.

“The more time I spend in Kalamazoo, the more I realize just how much people care about this place,” Wesselhoff said. “I think I’m lucky because I’m not just here as a four-year college student. I have roots here and that gives me a distinct advantage. I’m in a college environment most of the time with the connections I build in the K community, but I also work with folks in the city, getting to talk to stakeholders and community members, going to places like the farmers market or events downtown like Art Hop and Lunchtime Live. Even if people have a complaint to voice, it’s because they care about where they live. The city of Kalamazoo is headed in a unique direction, with bountiful opportunities to make the city a more connected, livable, and sustainable place. I feel very fortunate to be here in a time of my life where I can learn all about those things.”

Hungary Program Amplifies Student’s Passion for Neuroscience

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Vivian Schmidt ’25 might one day advance the fight against neurological disorders such as ALS, Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease—and her recent study abroad experience is one reason why. 

Schmidt, a biology and psychology double major with a concentration in neuroscience at Kalamazoo College, worked for 10 weeks last summer in the University of Michigan’s Summer Intensive Research Experience in Neuroscience (SIREN) program, then followed that with an academically rigorous global challenge in fall at Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE) in Budapest, Hungary. 

Schmidt chose the ELTE program, called the Budapest Semester in Cognitive Science (BSCS) program at K, for its wide breadth of subjects including biology, psychology, philosophy and computer science, each of which covered topics in neuroscience through a K partner program that included faculty from Slovakia and Hungary. She now feels ready to return to Ann Arbor this summer for additional hands-on research. 

“I was able to meet many researchers during my time in Hungary as they were our professors, so I got to learn a lot about the groundbreaking research happening outside of the States,” Schmidt said. “Before going abroad, my main goal was to get out of my comfort zone. I wanted to try new things, eat new foods, meet new people, experience new things, learn a new language and more. I wanted to make it the experience of a lifetime. Now that I am back in the States, I would say that I did just that.”

As a first-generation student, Schmidt said studying abroad seemed absolutely out of reach for her family. Therefore, the experience was special to her, especially with it supported by the James G. Stemler Study Abroad Scholarship through Alpha Lambda Delta, a national honor society that recognizes academic excellence in their first year of college. The K chapter is advised by Jessica Fowle, K’s director of grants, fellowships and research. The scholarship gives 20 students from around the country between $1,000 and $2,000 apiece every year. Recipients are ranked in the top 20% of the class at the end of their first year with a GPA of at least 3.5.

 “Without this scholarship, I wouldn’t have had a chance to study abroad, I wouldn’t have gained all the incredible experiences, and I wouldn’t have met the amazing people I did,” she said. “Because of this scholarship, I was able to grow as a person, excel as a student and make connections that will last a lifetime.”

Equally beneficial was the opportunity to discover a place completely unknown to her.

“Growing up, I did not learn much about Eastern Europe,” Schmidt said. “Given the opportunity to study abroad, I wanted to learn about a culture in which I had no preconceptions or experience with. I wanted to see a whole new part of the world, one that I probably would never have seen without my study abroad experience. Those three months were the most memorable of my life thus far and they will continue to hold a special place in my heart for years to come. The relationships that I made while abroad are some of the strongest in my life.”

Vivian Schmidt in Hungary
Vivian Schmidt ’25 (left) earned a scholarship to study abroad last fall in Budapest, Hungary.
Vivian Schmidt in Hungary
Alpha Lambda Delta distributes $30,000 in study abroad scholarships each year to students like Schmidt who finish in the top 20% of their class at the end of their first year in college with a GPA of at least 3.5.

Heeding the Call of the Wildlife

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World Wildlife Day, observed annually on March 3, underscores the critical role of wildlife veterinarians in global conservation efforts as professionals like Maddie Chilcote ’17 work to ensure the health and survival of wild species, supporting both biodiversity and ecosystem preservation.

Many people think of household pets like cats and dogs when they think of veterinary medicine, yet it’s a whole other animal for Kalamazoo College alumna Maddie Chilcote ’17.

Chilcote is a wildlife and conservation medicine intern at the Clinic for the Rehabilitation of Wildlife (CROW), a nonprofit teaching hospital and visitor education center in Sanibel, Florida, dedicated to saving wildlife through veterinary care, research, education and conservation medicine.

Wildlife and conservation medicine intern Maddie Chilcote at a lake
Kalamazoo College alumna Maddie Chilcote ’17 is a wildlife and conservation medicine intern at the Clinic for the Rehabilitation of Wildlife (CROW) cares for more than 6,000 sick, injured and orphaned wildlife patients from more than 200 species a year.
Wildlife doctor Maddie Chilcote performing surgery
Chilcote performs surgery to remove dead tissue on a mottled duck.
Wildlife doctor's photo shows healing on a treated mottled duck
The mottled duck Chilcote treated at CROW began growing new feathers and healthy tissue three weeks after surgery.

Each year, CROW cares for more than 6,000 sick, injured and orphaned wildlife patients from more than 200 species—varying from tortoises to bald eagles—while offering educational fellowships and externship programs for undergraduate students and visiting veterinary students, and internship programs for veterinarian graduates like Chilcote, a Michigan State University College of Veterinary Medicine graduate. In addition to clinical duties, CROW interns work closely with staff from all departments in the hospital to gain a better understanding of the rehabilitation process, participate in research and conservation projects, and help teach students, staff and volunteers.

“Anthropogenic threats are the primary reason patients present to the hospital—whether they have been hit by a car, stuck in a glue trap, suffering from toxins such as rodenticides or harmful algal blooms, or reaping the consequences of habitat destruction.” Chilcote said. “If students want to be a part of the organizations that are the One Health and climate change first responders, I would encourage them to get involved in wildlife rehabilitation and medicine.”

Chilcote began to realize her potential career path in fourth grade in her hometown of Rochester Hills, Michigan, when she gave a speech in school about her dream of becoming a veterinarian.

“I don’t know what inspired me at that age, probably just love for my pet cat, hearing about the conservation work my uncle was involved in, seeing animals on TV and going to the zoo,” she said.

That dream shifted slightly when she job shadowed in high school and the appeal of clinical care lost some of its luster. Chilcote said she considered pursuing research over clinical work when she began taking classes such as animal behavior, animal development, vertebrate biology and symbiosis from influential faculty members such as Biology Lab Director Anne Engh and Associate Professor of Biology Amanda Wollenberg at K, where she also minored in German and played women’s soccer.

Her Senior Integrated Project (SIP) at Binder Park Zoo focused on the stereotypic pacing behaviors of three American black bear siblings while introducing food-based and environmental enrichment, sealing her career interest in wildlife. Soon after, she found an internship at the Center for Wildlife in Cape Neddick, Maine, where she began embracing the idea of attending Michigan State to study veterinary medicine.

At Michigan State, Chilcote used elective opportunities to spend time at the Santa Barbara Wildlife Care Network in California, the Wildlife Center of Virginia, the California Wildlife Center, The Georgia Aquarium, and the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife before fulfilling an internship—similar to a residency for students of human medicine—at VCA South Shore Animal Hospital near Boston.

The mottled duck was brought back to health after surgery.
The mottled duck patient was released at Gator Lake at Six Mile Cypress Slough Preserve in Fort Myers, Florida.

At VCA, Chilcote helped pets on an emergency room floor while also rotating through specialties such as neurology, dermatology, internal medicine and surgery. But because she still hoped for experience in wildlife medicine, she re-entered the internship match program and ended up at CROW, where one of her most satisfying experiences involved saving a mottled duck over one Thanksgiving weekend.

“A lot of my colleagues were out of town visiting family and this patient presented with a scabbed and necrotic wound that extended the length of its neck and further down its right side,” Chilcote said. “Although this is not a wound we regularly see, and it may look like an immediate euthanasia given the extent of the wound, I felt inspired to try to treat this patient. After a couple of days of supportive care that included intravenous fluids, antibiotics, pain medications, and an appropriate refeeding plan, this patient was ready for an anesthetized procedure for debridement and wound care.”

After a successful surgery, daily bandage changes, wound dressings and nurturing healthy tissue at CROW, a partnering facility finished the duck’s rehabilitation with outdoor care and conditioning.

“They collaborated with us again a couple weeks later and we released him together,” Chilcote said. “It was remarkable. He flew just above the water along the length of a small lake at a nature preserve. It was a good full-circle moment to see what saying yes and trying something new can lead to. Knowing that I had primary responsibility of that case and could see it all the way through was a big milestone for me.”

With her CROW internship winding down, Chilcote is hoping to intern again to further her veterinary skills—perhaps in Nebraska, California or Minnesota—when Match Day comes around again next week. She has applied to sites in each of those states, eyeing additional internship opportunities, perhaps at a wildlife center near you.

“I’m especially looking to further my orthopedic experience,” Chilcote said. “We’ve pinned a handful of fractures in birds this year, but our caseload and therefore surgical case load has been down since Hurricane Ian. I want to feel a little bit further along in those skills before trying to find a staff position where I may be the only veterinarian there and have to make decisions and do procedures like that primarily on my own.Because Michigan is so near and dear to me, my 20-, 30- or 40-year plan is to eventually get back to Michigan, partner with local businesses, and design and build a wildlife teaching hospital of my own.”

Students Stand up for the ‘Little Guys’ by Researching Land Snails

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Student examines snails through a microscope
Emily Haigh ’24 examines land snails under a microscope at Dow Science Center.
Student goes through leaf litter samples to look for land snails
Georgios Gkolois ’24 said some people might think land snails are insignificant, which only inspires him to learn more about them.
Snails under a microscope
Haigh and Gkolois sifted through leaf litter samples to find snails like these.

The next time you visit Kalamazoo College’s Lillian Anderson Arboretum or the Armintrout-Milbocker Nature Preserve in Allegan, Michigan, think about what you might be stepping in—but not for the reasons you might think.

There are land snails in the area, as small as 2 mm in diameter, which are endangered thanks to deforestation and pollution. Fortunately, Georgios Gkolois ’24 and Emily Haigh ’24 teamed up this summer to collect and examine some of them as a part of their Senior Integrated Projects (SIPs) while researching what can be done to help the species in decline.

To the naked eye, the snails can appear to be the tiniest specs of dirt. Yet the snails are important to the ecosystem, aiding decomposition processes by eating fallen logs and leaves. They also glean calcium from their food, concentrate it in their shells, and pass it up the food chain as they are consumed by predators. Haigh warns that if the snails decline further, the impact eventually would affect humans, because as the environment suffers, so do we.

“I’m planning to go to med school one day, but I have always been passionate about the environment,” Haigh said. “I’ve always wanted to be outside, and I thought this would be a cool way to explore environmental biology before I put my life into medicine. I’ve learned a lot about the importance of even the smallest, tiniest, most microscopic creatures because the little guys can still have a big impact on everything.”

Leaf litter samples
Haigh and Gkolois examined leaf litter samples like this one to find land snails.
Magnified land snail in moss
Haigh and Gkolois said land snails could often be found in mossy areas.
Student collecting samples in forest area
Haigh collected leaf litter samples at the Lillian Anderson Arboretum and the Armintrout-Milbocker Nature Preserve to find land snails.

Gkolois was relegated to a lab role this summer after breaking his ankle a matter of days before their fieldwork was scheduled to start. However, the misfortune provided a clear method for the partners to share their workload with Haigh in the field and Gkolois in the lab. First, Haigh collected samples through leaf litter in the natural areas, especially near fallen trees, under living trees and near moss. Later, in the lab, the samples’ moisture was removed through heat before Gkolois sorted the snails by examining them through microscopes.

“It seems amazing that a piece of log could be such a diverse community where we could find microhabitats,” Gkolois said. “While we were sorting, we saw snails that were as small as a grain of sand. A lot of people would think they’re insignificant and ask why we care about them. That just got me thinking that I wanted to know more about them.”

Professor of Biology Binney Girdley, serving as their SIP adviser, and zoologist Ashley Cole-Wick, a Michigan Natural Features Inventory conservation associate, worked with the students to shape the project as Gkolois and Haigh developed their SIPs.

“I’m looking into relationships between the volume of decomposing wood and the state of decomposition to the amount of land snail abundance and diversity,” Gkolois said. “Basically, I’m looking at categories of freshly fallen wood and live trees, intermediately decomposed logs and completely decomposed mulch. I want to find out what the snails like most.”

Leaf litter samples in paper bags
Haigh and Gkolois cooked leaf litter samples before examining them under microscopes to look for land snails.
Hand holding vial containing a land snail
Haigh and Gkolois collected land snails including some that were no bigger than a grain of sand.
Haigh and Gkolois commonly found land snails in leaf litter samples taken from mossy areas.

Haigh’s project differs slightly. During her field work, she wasn’t looking for levels of decomposition as much as she was for similar plots of land on a slope within about 25 meters of the Kalamazoo River to compare natural communities and find the areas where snails are most likely to be.

“I’ve learned a lot about conservation as a whole, especially animal conservation,” Haigh said. “I’ve learned about the importance of even the tiniest, most-microscopic creatures because these tiny guys can still have a big impact on everything. It taught me a lot about the environment and the impact we have on it.”

Because of their research, Gkolois and Haigh have calls to action for people who want to learn more.

“A lot of times people will remove pieces of logs from land without realizing they’re habitats for a lot of organisms, and not just land snails, but other micro-invertebrates.” Gkolois said. “My advice, as a result, would be to maintain awareness of such situations when managing land.”

“On the topic of conservation, we’ve been writing literature reviews for our SIPs,” Haigh said. “In that, I’ve found a lot of information on the habitats and variables that impact the snails. I think understanding what goes into the land snail communities and their ability to survive is an important factor in better conserving them. We want to make sure these little guys are here to stay.”

Biology Department Incorporates New Microscope into Research, Teaching

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A microscope acquired in spring 2023 using grant funds is opening new opportunities for research and teaching in the Kalamazoo College biology department. 

The fluorescence dissecting microscope boasts several advantages over other microscopes in the department, said Michael Wollenberg, associate professor of biology and department chair, and Amanda Wollenberg, associate professor of biology. Its features include optics that allow clear views of individual cells, fluorescence to help differentiate between types of cells, space to manipulate a sample while viewing it, and a dedicated camera and software program. 

“We want to be able to look at single bacterial cells, and they’re one-millionth of a meter large, so they’re not visible to the naked eye,” Michael said. “What’s really important is that we have a microscope that has extremely good optics, and those optics resolve the sample very well—they magnify it to the point where we can see individual bacterial cells. Bacterial cells are clear and transparent, and having a set of fluorescent molecules inside the cell allows us to tag them with a glowing marker so we can say, ‘OK, that transparent cell that’s really tiny—that’s actually the bacterial cell we’re interested in, as opposed to schmutz or a eukaryotic cell or some other bacterial cell, and it’s located in X, Y or Z place, which gives us a three-dimensional resolution of the relationship that we’re looking at.’” 

While many microscopes use white light to illuminate samples, a fluorescence microscope can do more. 

“Bacteria might be too small to actually see just using white light,” Amanda said. “If you genetically manipulate those bacteria so that they glow fluorescent—and that’s a very common technique; people do it all the time, Michael can do it in his lab—if you have a microscope that can detect fluorescence, you can track those bacteria. You can see where they are because they’re glowing green.” 

The microscope also has a camera and software program that allows the user to take and analyze photos through the microscope as well as project to a computer screen—two key advantages in research and in teaching that are new to the biology department in terms of dissecting microscopes. 

“The camera and software are really important when it comes to trying to share the results of what we see with other scientists by publishing,” Amanda said. “You can’t just say, ‘Oh, trust us, we saw it.’ You must have a picture, and it’s got to be a high-quality picture. Ideally, you also try to quantify some of the information in that picture. That means you don’t just show a picture. You say, ‘We took 100 pictures, and we did this analysis of the intensity of the color, using the software program, and in 70 percent of the pictures, the intensity was higher than a certain threshold.’” 

The computer projection makes the microscope an excellent teaching tool. 

“A microscope has two eyepieces,” Michael said. “You look in the eyepieces, and you’re the only person who can see what you’re seeing. This camera is a great way to project what the microscope sees to a larger group of people, be it a small research laboratory, like our summer research with undergraduates, or a small class.” 

Biology major Allison Sokacz ’24 has worked in Michael Wollenberg’s lab for three summers. She recently started using the microscope in the summer research that will form the basis for her Senior Integrated Project. 

“The intensity that lets you see the entire fluorescence from this microscope, versus some of the other scopes we have, is really helpful,” Sokacz said. “It’s a lot easier to see what you have.” 

The camera is essential to her project, as she is working with two different forms of a bacteria and will be able to compare their locations using saved images. She also appreciates the benefits of the screen projection. 

“Microscopy is hard, because only one person can see,” Sokacz said. “I just took microbiology with Dr. [Michael] Wollenberg this spring, and I really struggled with microscopy, because it’s different for everyone. My lab partner might say, put the zoom to this, but then I might not be able to see it. With this microscope, I can say what I see, and they can also see it, instead of, ‘Well, I saw this but then it moved off the screen,’ or, ‘I can’t get it in focus.’ Being able to show a whole room what you’re seeing is definitely helpful.” 

In addition, the microscope has a wheel that allows for different filters that can detect different colors of fluorescence, which expands the future possibilities for use. 

“You could label one type of bacteria with green and one with red, and now you can look at the dynamics,” Amanda said. “Are the green ones in one place, are the red ones in another place? Another thing researchers will do sometimes is to stain the host with one color and the bacteria with a different color, and that can help resolve some of the questions of what you are seeing.”

Student looks through microscope that projects image on to a computer screen
Garrick Hohm ’25 looks into the fluorescence dissecting microscope purchased for the biology department in spring 2023 using National Science Foundation grant funds.
Student points to an image projected onto a computer screen
Biology major Allison Sokacz ’24 demonstrates how the biology department’s new, grant-purchased microscope can be connected to a computer monitor for research and teaching. 
New Biology Microscope 5
Garrick Hohm ’25 looks into the fluorescence dissecting microscope
Student looking into a microscope
Allison Sokacz ’24 checks for the presence and location of bacteria in nematodes using a grant-purchased microscope that is opening up new research and teaching opportunities in the biology department.

The microscope was purchased using funds from a $400,000 National Science Foundation grant, awarded to the Wollenbergs in June 2018 to study mechanisms of specificity and tolerance in a nematode-bacterial symbiosis. About 9 percent of that budget was for the microscope, which cost about $35,000. The rest of the total includes about 12.5 percent for other materials and small equipment, 5 percent for travel, 26 percent for indirect costs like building infrastructure, and slightly less than half for student pay, summer salary and benefits. 

“Science uses very condensed writing, where each word means so much,” Amanda said. “In the title of our research, ‘mechanisms’ tell you that we’re looking at the molecular side of things: not just that this happens, but how does it happen? ‘Specificity’ is getting at this idea that when two organisms are trying to have a relationship with each other, it’s not like just any bacteria can come in and live with any animal. ‘Tolerance’ is, even once they’ve found each other and formed that partnership, they have to keep getting along with each other. From the animal perspective, it can’t start killing off that bacteria like it does to other, more pathogenic bacteria. The specific relationship we’re looking at is a nematode-bacterial symbiosis. This is telling us that the animal is the nematode–that’s a roundworm that lives in the soil–and the partner it has is bacteria. Symbiosis is saying they’re in partnership, they both benefit each other. We’re trying to understand how they find each other and get along with each other within that system.” 

The duo is well-suited to the research, with Michael bringing a microbiology perspective while Amanda has an immunology focus.  

“The big picture is that we live in a microbial world where there’s lots and lots of microorganisms that are in and on our bodies and all animal bodies,” Michael said. “Basically, they facilitate everything that animals do; we can’t survive without them. Understanding how animals tolerate beneficial microorganisms is a big open scientific question. How do we train our immune systems, or how are our immune systems calibrated, so that the friendly bacteria get into association with organisms and maintain those associations that are beneficial?” 

That’s not very well understood, Michael notes, “especially not in really complicated organisms like humans, where there are myriad different species of microorganisms that are associated with us. If you think about our gut, it’s like its own ecosystem. We do research with simple models to try to understand detailed answers to bigger biology questions, in the hopes that other scientists can apply that research to things that are more relevant for human health or other animals that have more complicated associations in their health.” 

The new microscope is an invaluable tool in the Wollenbergs’ research, and they also look forward to the whole biology department finding ways to use it in the classroom. 

“That was part of the reason we wanted to get this piece of equipment as well, is to integrate it with teaching and use it as a teaching tool,” Michael said. “As we’re coming online with the things we’ve wanted to do with the grant, it’s giving us ideas of how we can translate this into the classroom.” 

Student’s Neuroscience Research Fights ALS

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When progress is made in the fight against neurological afflictions such as ALS, Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease, students such as Vivian Schmidt ’25 often are on the frontlines of research.

Schmidt, a biology and psychology double major with a concentration in neuroscience at Kalamazoo College, is having a cutting-edge experience this summer at the University of Michigan. She is working for 10 weeks in the institution’s Summer Intensive Research Experience in Neuroscience (SIREN) program, a highly desirable opportunity that accepts only about 20 applicants each year out of hundreds. As a bonus, she’s directly working with Michigan faculty such as K alumna Elizabeth Tank ’03, an assistant research scientist in neurology.

The initiative is funded by the National Science Foundation’s Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program, which also provides Schmidt with a stipend and on-campus housing.

“It’s surreal to think that everything I did in high school and my first two years at K led to this opportunity,” Schmidt said. “I’ve met a lot of incredibly witty, smart and established professionals in their field, who have done phenomenal things. It definitely has solidified my desire to come here for graduate school, as well. It’s been amazing to get to know the faculty members and the culture of the program here.”

SIREN research this summer involves a range of topics within neuroscience. Schmidt’s specific project is investigating what goes wrong with a protein that has ties to ALS and dementia to understand the underlying causes of the conditions. The hope is that the science will one day reveal therapeutic options that assist treatment.

“Even the failures are exciting now because I’ve realized they tell me this one thing didn’t work,” Schmidt said. “I ask, ‘Why didn’t this work?’ as opposed to getting down on myself. The daily successes have involved my mental attitude and keeping up my enthusiasm, especially in such a long program, and ultimately, the overall goal is presenting my research.”

In a way, such an opportunity for Schmidt could have been predicted. She’s been interested in studying how people think since high school, and her biology and chemistry classes helped her develop a passion for biological-based research rather than clinical approaches to psychology.

“I wanted to be the one getting my hands dirty in the lab,” she said. “I wanted to be the one who tries to figure out why something failed and then try it again. I’ve known since my first year in high school that I wanted a Ph.D. in neuroscience, and it’s something I’ve been gunning for since.”

Schmidt has received a lot of encouragement from K faculty and staff such as Professor of Biology Blaine Moore, Director of Biology Labs Anne Engh and Assistant Professor of Chemistry Daniela Arias-Rotondo. Moore, however, was the one Schmidt conversed with even before she arrived at K. He, Arias-Rotondo, and Engh have written countless letters of recommendation on her behalf.

Vivian Schmidt presenting her neuroscience research poster to five people at the University of Michigan
Vivian Schmidt ’25, a biology and psychology double major with a concentration in neuroscience, presents her summer research at the University of Michigan.
Vivian Schmidt 2_showcase

“I did my apprenticeship with Dr. Moore in the spring after he was phenomenally supportive throughout my first year, so I made him my official academic advisor,” she said. “He’s been great at guiding me with which classes to take and pushing me to do what he knows I’m capable of. I might not 100% believe in myself all the time, but I know he believes in me. Kalamazoo College is better for him being there.”

Study abroad opportunities and a wide range of subjects within her reach were big reasons why she chose K.

“The fact that I could do a double major and still have room to take classes that had absolutely nothing to do with neuroscience was a huge draw,” she said. “My first year I took jazz explorations and Hindu traditions and they were some of my favorites. I don’t think I would have been able to do that at another school.”

Thanks to a well-rounded K-Plan, Schmidt also plays on the women’s lacrosse team, participates in an astrophotography- and astronomy-focused student organization she co-founded called Konstellation, and plans programming for first-generation students like herself through the Intercultural Center. But research will always be her focus at K, throughout graduate school, and hopefully, in her professional life.

“I’ve been tossing around a few ideas, because with a Ph.D., I could go an industrial route or go into teaching, or I could work somewhere like the Van Andel Institute, where I could just be a research scientist,” she said. “I’ve always had a bit of an interest in teaching, mentorship and explaining things to people, too. At this moment, I’m thinking I would love to be a professor at an institution where I can teach and do research. That would be ideal, but no matter what, as long as research is involved, I’m going to be happy.”