Senior Integrated Project

K Student Builds Notable Voice in Sustainability

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City businesses and officials are taking note of a Kalamazoo College student’s Senior Integrated Project (SIP), which quickly has made her a recognizable local voice in sustainability.

Since 2021, Lauren Crossman ’23, a political science major, has worked at Bee Joyful Shop, a store on Kalamazoo’s downtown walking mall that features locally made, zero-waste products for homes, kitchens, baths and beauty routines. She got the job after interviewing women who opened businesses during the pandemic for a journalism class, including the owners of Mason Jar Plant Shop, Colors and Cocktails, Kalamazoo Fashion House and Bee Joyful.

Through Bee Joyful, Crossman developed a passion for sustainability; however, by the time she realized that interest exceeded her love of political science, it seemed too late to change her major or add an environmental studies concentration. That’s when Jeanne Hess—a Bee Joyful customer and city commissioner who retired in 2019 from K as a physical education professor and volleyball coach—planted an interesting idea. She suggested that Crossman create her own internship based on sustainability at Bee Joyful, an idea that also provided a formative plan for Crossman’s SIP.

Bee Joyful owner Jessica Thompson provided enthusiastic approvals and a few ideas on how that internship would work.

“Jessica said she had actually been thinking about creating a week of sustainability events, or I could go talk to other businesses on the mall and see if we can get them to be more on board with different ways to reduce waste and make them all greener,” Crossman said.

Crossman started the internship by researching environmentally friendly business practices involving ideas from cocktail straws to packaging materials. All of it had the potential to help businesses reduce waste and save money. Yet then came the tough part: Crossman began to cold call and visit 22 small businesses in Kalamazoo to discuss their environmental practices, present an environmental report card, and help them create sustainability-related goals.

“It was something that was way outside of my comfort zone,” Crossman said. “I remember talking to my family and friends and saying, ‘I don’t know how I’m going to do this.’ I had this feeling that no one was going to take me seriously because they didn’t know me. I was this random student from K College who wanted to talk about the environment.”

Regardless, Crossman pursued the work and said the conversations generally went well.

“A lot of those businesses at first said, ‘I’m just trying to keep the lights on and pay the bills,’ so there were uncomfortable points,” she said. “Others thought it was a nice conversation to have, but it might not make a difference. But I was surprised at how many of the business owners appreciated just starting the conversation.”

As those conversations developed, business owners began to see that even small gestures could make big differences as Crossman provided resource guides, viewable through the Instagram profile link @sustainable.kzoo.businesses, that were specific to retail stores, restaurants, salons, brick-and-mortar locations and online businesses.

“I was trying to highlight that there are so many ways businesses can be sustainable, in big ways or small ways, down to the type of tape they use to ship out boxes,” Crossman said. “It all can make a difference. I brought all those guides with me to each of the businesses and shared that information, and we worked through the eco report cards that had around 20 business practices. I got down to fine details like having LED lights or asking vendors to ship products without plastic, so they could see a wide variety of what they could do.

“The eco report cards were helpful because businesses could use them as a starting point to say, ‘we’re doing a lot of really good things, and there are ways we can improve,’” she added. “I feel putting that information together grounded me so I could go in and talk to the business owners.”

With happy business owners starting to save money and be more sustainable, Crossman presented her work at the Kalamazoo State Theatre in March during Green Drinks Kalamazoo, a monthly networking event of city businesses and friends that addresses sustainability. At the event, Professor of History Charlene Boyer Lewis, serving as Crossman’s SIP advisor, spoke up to let Crossman and the crowd know that Crossman had earned honors on her SIP. And next, Crossman plans to offer her report to Hess, who regularly attends the city’s environmental concerns committee, to ask for her opinions.

“We have opportunities in Kalamazoo that aren’t being seized and I think there’s so much potential for impact and people are already willing to make changes,” Crossman said. “But nobody’s holding them accountable. I think that was the biggest part of the critique. I think it’s important information for somebody to see, because the businesses are willing to make changes, but what’s the city’s role now and what are they doing, too?”

In the meantime, Crossman can provide a sustainability leader’s view of Earth Day, celebrated every April 22, the anniversary of the birth of the modern environmental movement in 1970.

“I feel like there’s a lot of good that can be done on Earth Day, but we can’t forget about the rest of the days of the year,” Crossman said. “I don’t want people to think that if they say no to a straw one day of the year that they’re doing enough. Helping the environment needs to be a lifestyle change. We can’t just talk about climate change one day of the year. It must be a pressing conversation all the time, because it’s a pressing problem all the time.”

Sustainability SIP writer Lauren Crossman at Bee Joyful Shop
Lauren Crossman ’23 works at Bee Joyful Shop, a store on Kalamazoo’s downtown walking mall that features locally made, zero-waste products for homes, kitchens, baths and beauty routines.
Lauren Crossman presents her sustainability SIP at Green Drinks Kalamazoo
Crossman presented her work at the Kalamazoo State Theatre during Green Drinks Kalamazoo, a monthly networking event of city businesses and friends that addresses sustainability.
Lauren Crossman and Bee Joyful Shop owner Jessica Thompson
Bee Joyful owner Jessica Thompson enthusiastically approved of Crossman’s ideas for an internship based on sustainability at her shop.

Walking Alone, Gathering Together: Solitude and Community on the Camino de Santiago

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Two women at a marker along the Camino de Santiago
Struggling with sore feet and blisters, Fiona O’Rielly ’23 rented a bike to reach the Camino Finisterre. 
One female student looking at the ocean at the Camino Finisterre along the Camino de Santiago trail
O’Rielly ’23 arrives at the Camino Finisterre
O'Rielly walks during her first day at the Pyrenees mountain range along the Camino de Santiago
O’Rielly walks during her first day at the Pyrenees mountain range along the Camino de Santiago.

July 2022 was the hottest calendar month in Spain since records were first kept in 1961. It was also the month that Fiona O’Rielly ’23 set out on a 500-mile hike across Spain. O’Rielly’s sweltering passage along the ancient pilgrimage route Camino de Santiago, and the interviews she conducted with other walkers along the way, formed the basis for her Spanish Senior Integrated Project (SIP), Caminando el Camino: Una experiencia de comunidad. 

The SIP process helped O’Rielly reflect and gain perspective on community, solitude and relationships during her last year on the Kalamazoo College campus—which was also her first full year on campus, due to a college experience upended by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

O’Rielly wrote her SIP in Spanish and in four parts, focusing on the historical context of the Camino de Santiago, the shift toward more secular pilgrimages and increase in use, the impact of the pandemic on the Camino and on tourism in Spain, and O’Rielly’s interview findings and personal reflections. 

The Camino de Santiago, or the Way of St. James, is a network of pilgrimage routes leading to the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain, where tradition holds that the remains of the Biblical apostle St. James the Great are buried. It began in the ninth century and became a major pilgrimage route of medieval Christianity by the 10th century. 

Since the 1990s, the Camino de Santiago has regained the popularity it had in the Middle Ages, with hundreds of thousands walking the route each year. Although some of those walkers continue to be religious pilgrims, many now walk for a variety of more secular reasons. 

O'Rielly walks along the final stage of the Camino de Santiago through Galicia, Spain
O’Rielly walks along the final stage of the Camino de Santiago through Galicia, Spain.
O'Rielly stops at one of the albergues, or hostels, along the route to stay the night along the Camino de Santiago
O’Rielly stops at one of the albergues, or hostels, along the route to stay the night.
O'Rielly began her journey at the St. Jean-Pied-du-Port in France
O’Rielly began her journey at the St. Jean-Pied-du-Port in France.

O’Rielly walked the Camino Francés, the most popular route, which stretches about 500 miles, or 800 kilometers, from St. Jean-Pied-du-Port in France to the cathedral in Santiago, in the heat of summer. That July, the average daily high was 85˚F, with the hottest day reaching 106˚F. August wasn’t much better, with an average daily high of 81˚F and a peak of 100˚F.  

“It was pretty unbearable some days,” O’Rielly said. “A lot of the time, the sun was very intense and there wasn’t a lot of shade.” 

She battled heat rash, sunburn, dehydration and blisters, often rising by 4 a.m. to get the day’s miles walked before the heat of the day. She carried a backpack with a change of clothes, a sleeping bag liner, a guidebook and lots of water. 

During the day, O’Rielly did a lot of solo walking, often starting off with two friends who joined her on the Camino before each settled into their own pace and thoughts. Some days she listened to the sounds of nature; other days, the rhythm of traffic; at times, she plugged into music on her phone, especially a folk band from Ohio called Caamp, which released a new album while she was walking. 

The path varies in style and surroundings, ranging from mountainous dirt trail to flat gravel path to narrow road shoulder. Well-marked with yellow arrows, the Camino passes through a range of landscapes as well as many small towns where pilgrims stop at cafes to eat or at albergues (hostels along the route) to stay the night. 

In the evenings, O’Rielly would reconnect with her friends and other pilgrims in the towns and albergues along the route. She would also conduct interviews for her SIP.  

“I wanted those conversations to happen more organically, and I did talk to people that way, but those conversations specifically for my SIP happened mainly in the albergues, which is the main community aspect of the Camino,” O’Rielly said. “A lot of people will walk the whole day alone, and then come together, gather, share a meal, play cards, and get to know other walkers in these hostels.” 

O'Rielly organizes documents from her interviews at an albergue along her route on the Camino de Santiago
O’Rielly organizes documents from her interviews at an albergue along her route.
O'Rielly stops at a cathedral in Santiago, Spain
O’Rielly stops at a cathedral in Santiago, Spain.
O'Rielly plans her journey along the Camino de Santiago
O’Rielly plans her journey along the Camino de Santiago.

Most pilgrims were open and friendly, willing to be interviewed and to share their stories. O’Rielly ended up interviewing 15 hikers from all over the world, including Spain, the U.S., New Zealand, Ireland and Argentina. She conducted about half the interviews in Spanish, and wrote her SIP in Spanish, which was challenging and important in her Spanish learning progression.  

“I wanted to hear a lot of people’s stories and I think most people were open with that and happy to talk,” she said. “They were also understanding of me as someone who’s learning Spanish. When I was having these interviews in Spanish, there were definitely grammatical errors on my part, and people were patient and also excited to share their experiences. Maybe some people saw this as a way for them to take the time and reflect and talk it out as they were having this experience. Everyone was really welcoming.” 

In her interviews, O’Rielly met pilgrims who chose to walk for religious or spiritual reasons, as part of their struggles with addiction, because they were facing a transition in life, as part of their grieving process and to spread a loved one’s ashes, because they felt lost and unsure of their direction, because they wanted to see the country in all its variety, and more. 

One big theme that emerged from O’Rielly’s interviews was the need for both solitude and community. 

“Most people I talked to started the Camino alone,” she said. “I remember one in particular who started alone, then met this group on the first day. They would hike alone, then they would all gather and pick the same hostel and cook a meal at the end of the day. Having the time to really be alone with your thoughts and then being able to come together and have that community and those friendships is really special.” 

Another big theme that resonated personally for O’Rielly was acceptance of relationships that are anchored to a particular time or place. 

A series of stamps depicting stops along the Camino de Santiago
The Pilgrim Passport or Credencial is an official accreditation that identifies people who walk across the Camino de Santiago.

“I’ve had a lot of experiences in my life recently of intense times of bonding with people for a short period of time, and then having to walk away from that relationship,” O’Rielly said. “It’s been hard for me to realize that I can’t keep in touch with everyone.” 

For example, O’Rielly came to Kalamazoo College in fall 2019, where the Ann Arbor native participated in LandSea, joined the swim team, took Spanish classes and built community on the close-knit campus. Then came March 2020, with the COVID-19 pandemic closing the state down and sending O’Rielly and the rest of the campus home. Along with so many others, O’Rielly found herself abruptly removed from the community she had started to establish at K. 

Her second year at K, O’Rielly lived in a Kalamazoo apartment with friends, attending classes virtually and rarely venturing outside her COVID bubble. 

Then O’Rielly left that community to spend her entire third year of college abroad in Cáceres, Spain. In Cáceres, she first lived with a host family and took classes through the Universidad de Extremadura with about a dozen other K students from September to February. At that point, the other K students returned to Kalamazoo, while O’Rielly stayed behind in Cáceres until June, moving into an apartment with two international students from Italy and taking Universidad classes on her own.  

On the Camino, O’Rielly found herself in a similar situation yet again, meeting people in a context of openness and self-discovery, bonding quickly and intensely, then separating, possibly forever. She also found the time and space to reflect on those relationships. 

“I remember having this conversation with my friend, and she said something like, ‘The relationships I made on the Camino are meant to be left on the Camino. They’re not mine to take,’” O’Rielly said. “That was a powerful moment for me, personally, to realize that I’ve had these beautiful moments and shared these connections with people, and it’s temporary, and that’s OK. Maybe they’ll come back again, and I can be content with these relationships as they are.” 

Walking the Camino alone gave O’Rielly time to think about the interviews she had conducted, brainstorm the format for her SIP, reflect on her own experiences and what they meant to her, and let her mind wander wherever it happened to go. 

“It’s really beautiful to have an experience like the Camino and be able to take time to sit with it and reflect on what I gained,” O’Rielly said. “In a lot of my experiences, I’ve just had to move on because I’m back in school or on to the next thing. Having that time benefitted me a lot.” 

The home stretch of the Camino can bring a bit of culture shock after all that solitude and small community. Church groups and large organizations often walk the last 100 or 200 kilometers, so the quiet Camino becomes a river of people by the time a pilgrim passes through the town of Sarria, especially during the summer peak season. 

“How far to walk each day and where to stay each night was very spontaneous until about the last two weeks,” O’Rielly said. “In Sarria, you’re reaching the last 100 kilometers of the Camino, and that’s when the crowds come in. Then I was booking hostels in advance and on more of a schedule.” 

Between the increasing number of pilgrims, and the bigger size of Santiago de Compostela, the end of the Camino can be jarring for pilgrims who walk the whole route. 

“I felt a bit overwhelmed,” O’Rielly said.  

O'Rielly walks through Garcia, Spain, along the Camino de Santiago
O’Rielly walks through Garcia, Spain, along the Camino de Santiago.

After two nights in Santiago, she struck out again, on a sort of alternate ending to the Camino—about an additional 90 kilometers to Fisterra, or Finisterra, “the end of the world.”  

Struggling with sore feet and blisters, O’Rielly rented a bike for the Camino Finisterre. 

“I thought a bike would be so much easier,” O’Rielly said. “I rented panniers to put my stuff in, though, and every time I would go up a hill, the bike would just tip. It ended up being really difficult, and I think walking would have been easier.” 

Fisterra, however, was worth the extra work, and her three nights there were a satisfying end to her pilgrimage. 

“It’s this beautiful route along the coast, and you end at the ocean,” she said. “It was amazing to swim in the ocean and relax, and I felt a lot more of the community there. I reunited with some people I had met early on the Camino and it was a really special ending point for me.” 

Now O’Rielly is deep in her last and first full year on the Kalamazoo College campus, done writing her SIP, finishing a major in Spanish with a minor in English following the journalism course sequence. She is grateful for the experiences she has had and the professors, the Hough Foundation SIP Grant and funding from the Center for International Programs that made those opportunities possible.  

After graduation, she hopes to return to Spain, possibly through the North American Language and Culture Assistants Program. 

“That would be a good way for me to continue speaking Spanish and take some time to reflect on what I would like to study next,” O’Rielly said. “There’s a lot of different things I’m interested in. I would love to go to graduate school in a Spanish-speaking country, but figuring that out could take some time and I’m not rushed at all for that.” 

Just like she did on the Camino de Santiago, Fiona O’Rielly will take things one step at a time. 

O’Rielly walked the Camino Francés route of the Camino de Santiago, which stretches about 500 miles, from St. Jean-Pied-du-Port in France to the cathedral in Santiago, Spain.

Future Physician Targets Tropical Diseases in Ghana

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Kramer in the Centre for Research in Applied Biology
Rachel Kramer ’23 in the Centre for Research in Applied Biology (CeRAB) at UENR with Ankrah, Babae, Kramer and Rabi Baidoo from left to right.
Rachel Kramer in a classroom full of children
Kramer collecting samples from schoolchildren.
Rachel Kramer with four friends
Kramer and friends sharing a home-cooked meal by Ankrah during the “going-away party” they all threw for her at the end of the summer.

With the International Day of Women and Girls in Science on February 11, Kalamazoo College commonly celebrates the accomplishments of scientists such as Rachel Kramer ’23.

The day, first marked by the United Nations in 2015, encourages women scientists, and targets equal access to and participation in science for women and girls. Such a day is desired because U.N. statistics show that fewer than 30 percent of scientific researchers in the world are women and only about 30 percent of all female students select fields in science, technology, engineering or math (STEM) to pursue in their higher education. Only about 22 percent of the professionals in cutting edge fields such as artificial intelligence are women, and representation among women is especially low professionally in fields such as information and communication technology, natural science, mathematics, statistics and engineering.

Rachel Kramer comforting a child providing a blood sample
Kramer often found herself comforting community members like this child as they gave their blood samples for tropical disease research.
Rachel Kramer with NeTroDis Research team at the University of Energy and Natural Resources
Rachel Kramer ’23 stands with a NeTroDis Research team at the University of Energy and Natural Resources (UENR). From left to right in the bottom row are Dr. Kenneth Bentum Otabil, Kramer, Ms. Blessing Ankrah, and Theophilus Nti Babae. From left to right in the top row are Charles Addai and Emmanual Bart-Plange.
Kramer enjoying fresh Ghanaian coconut
Kramer enjoying fresh Ghanaian coconut after Sunday service.

However, Kramer—a biochemistry major with a concentration in community and global health and a minor in Spanish—is bucking that trend. She will attend the Western Michigan University Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine in July 2023. Plus, she completed 10 weeks of research last summer investigating health inequities in Ghana, Africa, while collecting data and researching Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTD’s) for her Senior Integrated Project (SIP).

The lead up to her SIP opportunity began two summers ago when she decided to get into volunteer work abroad through International Volunteer Head Quarters (IVHQ). At that time, she spent two weeks in Ghana, where she performed health care outreach by providing wound care to people in remote areas under the supervision of local health professionals.

Rachel Kramer stands with four other people
Kramer, the NeTroDis Team and their study clinician, Dr. Vera Darko (far right), on the far left meet the president of the regional hospital (middle) to inform him of their research.
Ankrah and Otabil introduce Kramer to UENR’s Dean of Science at UENR, Professor SF Gyasi
Ankrah and Otabil introduce Kramer to UENR’s Dean of Science at UENR, Professor SF Gyasi.
Rachel Kramer hugging Blessing Ankrah
Kramer and her host mother, Blessing Ankrah.

While she was there, she saw people with parasitic diseases which she later found out were considered to be NTD’s. Such diseases are of special interest to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and World Health Organization (WHO). In fact, the two organizations have a roadmap for eradicating NTD’s by 2030, which involves working with local researchers in endemic regions to collect data to inform policy to better protect and serve the people affected by NTD’s.  

“I saw children 5 years old and younger with these ulcers half an inch deep in their ankles and feet,” Kramer said. “It struck me and I knew that these things shouldn’t be happening.”

Even before returning to Michigan, Kramer knew she wanted to go back to Ghana and develop her SIP there as her way of helping to solve the health issues she witnessed. She just didn’t know what might provide that opportunity.

Rachel Kramer standing with her SIP
Kramer in front of Kalamazoo College’s Dow Science Center, holding her 101-page SIP just before turning it in.
Tropical disease researchers pack into a van
Kramer and UENR students and staff packed into vans like this with all their gear to travel to fieldwork destinations.
What tropical disease researchers see under a microscope
A microscopic view of a participant sample.

After several random conversations asking people, including K alumni, about anyone doing research there, Kramer reached out through Twitter to Blessing Ankrah, a researcher with the NeTroDis Research Group, a non-governmental agency at the University of Energy and Natural Resources (UENR) in Sunyani, Bono Region of Ghana.

“Two weeks later, she ended up responding and said she’d be happy to collaborate,” Kramer said. “We started talking on Zoom and WhatsApp, and she decided to have me work on a project where they were updating the prevalence rates of two neglected tropical diseases called schistosomiasis and soil-transmitted helminthiasis.”

People walking down a flooded dirt road
Terrain such as the one pictured were roads teams had to walk several miles on in order to reach some of the communities. This contributes to why diseases are considered neglected. They are difficult for researchers and health personnel to reach.
Researchers looking at books and forms to translate documents
Multilingual UENR students are seen translating the research forms from English to Twi so the community members, who speak Twi, could participate in the research.
Four at a birthday party
Kramer celebrating Doris Berkoh’s (professor of Biochemistry at UENR) birthday with other UENR Biological Science faculty and staff.

According to the CDC, schistosomiasis parasites live in some types of freshwater snails, and humans become infected when their skin touches contaminated water. Health-care professionals diagnose schistosomiasis through urine and stool samples. Within days of becoming infected, patients typically develop a rash or itchy skin. Fever, chills, cough and muscle aches can begin within a month or two of infection. If left untreated, this disease can become fatal.

Soil-transmitted helminthiasis, the CDC says, targets human intestines as parasites’ eggs are passed in feces. If an infected person defecates outside—near bushes, in a garden or on a field, for example—parasitic eggs are deposited on soil. People can ingest the parasites when they eat fruits and vegetables that have not been carefully cooked, washed or peeled. Some infections can cause a range of health problems, including abdominal pain, diarrhea, blood and protein loss, rectal prolapse, and slowed or stunted physical and cognitive growth. Similar to schistosomiasis, if untreated, this disease can become fatal.

Group photo at Mole National Park
Group photo of Kramer and the junior year biological science students on the field trip to Mole National Park
Rachel Kramer surrounded by children
Kramer celebrating Cultural Day at a local Montessori.
Rachel Kramer surrounded by community members
Kramer standing with members of a community NeTroDis researchers visited after watching them construct a hand-made xylophone with wooden planks, leaves and a hole in the ground.

Ankrah became a host mom to Kramer as both worked on the project to update and investigate the relevance, intensity and risk factors of schistosomiasis and soil-transmitted helminthiasis in selected rural and hard-to-reach communities in the Bono and Bono East regions of Ghana. The opportunity was funded by the Hough SIP Grant and the Collins Fellowship through Student Projects Abroad (SPA) funding, both of which were through Kalamazoo College. .

“This summer was an experience where I was not only a researcher, but I was also a student and a family member,” Kramer said. “Blessing was able to show me what the food was like, what the people were like, what the culture was like and it was just an amazing life experience.”

Students at Mole National Park
Kramer with UENR students in the savanna on the field trip to Mole National Park.
Rachel Kramer looking through a microscope
Kramer in the Centre for Research in Applied Biology (CeRAB) at UENR microscopically analyzing samples.
Picking out clothes from a pile
Bringing clothes for community members during fieldwork visits.

Yet research definitely remained the purpose of her visit. For the first three weeks, it was necessary for the researchers to perform paperwork during business hours to ensure the ethical approval of the project by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) committees at UENR. During the evening hours, Ankrah introduced Kramer to her family and friends including host brother Lord Owusu Ansah; the university’s president, vice president and dean of science; and regional hospital leaders.

When the five-week field work began, Kramer and her fellow researchers traveled to eight isolated communities that had as few as five and as many as 200 residents to collect socio demographic and qualitative data along with urine and stool samples.

Four researchers walking down a dirt road
NeTroDis team walking on the dirt road to get to the communities. From left to right Theophilus Nti Babae, Otabil, Divine and Kramer.
Rachel Kramer in front of a tree with large roots
Kramer at one of the community sites for field work.
Rachel Kramer hugging Blessing Ankrah
Kramer with Ankrah for their daily “pre-work selfie.”

“We would get up at 4:30 a.m. and ride in a packed van for about three hours,” Kramer said. “When we arrived to the communities, many times we would have to walk a distance with all of our gear. Some of these communities were only a few households and are located so far from public roads, and that’s why these diseases are considered neglected. It took us two hours to walk to one of the communities on foot and there was no way to get there with a car. Since there are so few people living in these remote places, there’s no way the government would fund roads to these communities.”

After traveling back to the UENR campus from the field, the researchers stored their samples in freezers before resting for a few hours and then returning to the lab around 7 p.m. in the evening when they analyzed up to hundreds of samples. The immediacy was imperative despite their long days because the urine and stool samples would go bad within 24 to 48 hours.

Rachel Kramer with Kenneth Bentum Otabil
Kramer standing with her head researcher, Dr. Kenneth Bentum Otabil.
Rachel Kramer and the vice chancellor of UENR
Rachel Kramer exchanging a gift with the vice chancellor of UENR after introducing NeTroDis’s summer research project to him.
Rachel Kramer surrounded by children
Kramer with children at local market.

After the field work, Kramer’s biggest roles were inputting data, helping with the preparation of samples, and microscopic analysis of the specimens.

“Once we got our data from all eight communities, we compiled all of it and I worked with a data analyst at the university who helped me compile it to get our overall prevalence rates and associate the risk factors to the positive cases,” Kramer said.

This work became the basis for her SIP.

Short woman pats Kramer on her head
“This was the first time I met someone in Ghana who was older than me yet shorter and we had so much fun dancing together when I visited this community,” Kramer said.
Ghanian woman wearing colorful clothes provides a blood sample
A research participant dressed in beautiful Ghanaian clothing gives her blood sample for research.
Rachel Kramer hugging Blessing Ankrah
Kramer with Ankrah for their daily “pre-work selfie.”

“Now that my written SIP has been submitted, all that’s left to do is present my SIP at the annual Chemistry and Biochemistry SIP Symposium during the spring trimester and then wait to find out whether I attain honors from the faculty for my work,” Kramer said. “So many people questioned why I decided to do something so big for my SIP since I have already been accepted to medical school. But just because I have been accepted doesn’t mean I need to take a step back, so I decided to pursue a passion instead. I did this because I have seen these diseases firsthand and how disproportionately they affect people of low socio-economic status in tropical regions. I was emotionally driven to take part in the global movement to end the neglect. Additionally, I knew that this opportunity would enhance my cultural competence which can help me be a better physician to people in the future. Eventually, I’d like to be a study clinician in similar studies and even create the policies that can protect and serve people. With this foundational-level research under my belt, I am motivated to continue my research focus on NTD’s in medical school.”

And this might not be the last of her research outside of medical school.

“I’m still in contact with my host mom,” Kramer said. “I have a number of people in Ghana I text every week just to talk about various things like the projects they’re working on. Currently, they have two new projects that are going to be funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation regarding an NTD called Onchocerciasis, which is transmitted through biting black flies. I asked Blessing if it is possible for me to work remotely while I’m in medical school on those projects, and she said I probably could, but it is also possible that I could go back to Ghana during this upcoming summer to join their new projects in projects in person. Overall, I loved being abroad and how it opened up my eyes to the world and cross-cultural differences. Being a future physician, I was introduced to the atrocities of Neglected Tropical Diseases and I saw just how invaluable being a part of the team that is working to end the neglect really is.”

Kalamazoo Gardeners Beware: Student Unearths Jumping Worms

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Katie Rock smiles and holds a jumping worm
Katie Rock ’23 is cataloging the earthworms inhabiting Lillian Anderson Arboretum and has unearthed jumping worms, which have never been officially documented in Kalamazoo.
Katie Rock holds a common earthworm and a jumping worm to compare
Katie Rock ’23 compares a common earthworm (left) to a jumping worm. Jumping worms are officially being documented in Kalamazoo through Rock’s research for the first time.

Worms crawl in and worms crawl out, but biology major Katie Rock ’23 has found a problematic variety that jumps right here in Kalamazoo.

Rock’s Senior Integrated Project (SIP), cataloging the earthworms inhabiting Lillian Anderson Arboretum, has unearthed an invasive species never before officially documented within our city, the jumping worm (scientific name Amynthas). Rock said all worms in Michigan are invasive species given that glaciers killed the native varieties during the Ice Age. The crawlers we have now mostly came from Europe.

“Most of the earthworms are good for agriculture and gardening,” Rock said. “In the forests, they’re not as beneficial, but they have benefits in producing and giving nutrients.”

Katie Rock picks up a worm that has risen to the soil's surface
Katie Rock ’23 collects worms after mustard water forces them to the soil’s surface at Lillian Anderson Arboretum.
Katie Rock pours mustard water into a sampling water
Katie Rock ’23 pours one gallon of mustard water into a sampling area, forcing worms to the soil’s surface.

Jumping worms, though, which come from places such as Korea and Japan, present their own problems. They have no natural predators, individual specimens can reproduce by themselves, and they go through a lifecycle in one season, so they’re faster to mature, Rock said.

“They originally came from Asia through tiny cocoons,” she said. “They get into potted plants and then people plant them, so they spread all over. There have been attempts to stop their spread, but there hasn’t been any solution.”

Jumping worms inhabit leaf litter and the top few inches of soil on the ground. Their movements, processes and quick metabolism change the soil’s texture, so it looks like coffee grounds, Rock said, stripping the soil of its nutrients, and potentially killing plants. They’ve been found in other Great Lakes region states such as Wisconsin and Minnesota. In Michigan, they were found for the first time in the Detroit area around 2008 and more recently in Grand Rapids.

Plus, with the crawlers in the arboretum, local residents are likely to find the jumping worms in local yards.

Katie Rock demonstrates a geographic information system map
Katie Rock ’23 shows a geographic information system (GIS) map she will use in her research to map where jumping worms are found.
Katie Rock points to a map showing where jumping worms have been found at the Lillian Anderson Arboretum
Katie Rock ’23 is designing a map that shows jumping worms at Lillian Anderson Arboretum have so far been confined to spaces near Batts Pavilion.

“If you see any, do not transfer any of your plants over to anyone else,” Rock said. “It’s actually recommended that we kill them because of their detrimental effects on ecosystems.”

Rock and her SIP advisor, Professor of Biology Ann Fraser, have found mostly juvenile jumping worms with a few adults in the arboretum, as expected because they start each year as eggs and take time to grow to adults. The species is identifiable thanks to their extreme movements that can be provoked by human touch, a glossy gray color that leaves them nearly translucent in their gastrointestinal regions, a flat ring-like structure called a clitellum that circles their body and serves as a reproductive organ, and small hairs, or bristles, that can be seen under a microscope.

“I’m going to do a GIS (geographic information system) map in my research, comparing where earthworms are found to where invasive species of plants are found,” Rock said. “We think there might be a correlation. It’s also possible that deer might be spreading them. For right now, the only place we’ve found them is close to Batts Pavilion. We have not found any yet on the other side of the power lines. We’re wondering if that’s because there’s an intersection where they haven’t crossed yet.”

Testing for jumping worms can be a heavy lift for Rock, requiring assistance from a golf cart as she hauls her equipment, including one gallon of mustard water for every test she intends to conduct during a stay at the arboretum.

The mustard water is just that: a mix of mustard powder and water that Rock pours on the ground within a given quadrant or sampling area. The mustard irritates the worms and forces them to the surface, where Rock collects them. She also records what she sees in the trees; collects a soil sample; clears away any vegetation and debris; measures the soil’s temperature, pH balance and moisture; and notes other bugs she finds.

“Sometimes I find a lot of worms and sometimes I find just a few,” Rock said. “After I collect my worms, I’ll measure them and put them in ethanol. I then look at them under the microscope, ID them and separate them in jars by type.”

If Rock finds more adults when she resamples as her work concludes this month, she can confirm a larger infestation. Long term, it might be impossible to get rid of all of the jumping worms, although figuring out how to isolate their locations within the arboretum would provide Rock with the type of experience she wants to have in preparing for a career.

“I want to go into environmental science and ecology, and I think this is a good start, especially with the experience in an invasive species,” Rock said. “The process of finding it, cutting it off and finding ways of preserving other areas from it is important. I hope to bring in that knowledge in grad school or in a job with some ideas for tackling a new problem, even if it’s not worms.”

Mentors Help Chemistry Major En Route to Scholarship, Research Abroad

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Crystal Mendoza outside Hoben Hall
Crystal Mendoza ’23 stands in front of Hoben Hall during her first Michigan snowfall in fall 2019.
Crystal Mendoza in Vienna
Crystal Mendoza ’23 took a solo trip to Vienna, Austria, during her summer 2022 research internship at Karslruhe Institute for Technology in Germany.
Crystal Mendoza and Julia Ghazal in biochemistry class
Crystal Mendoza ’23 (left) builds polypeptide bonds to see the bond structure with Julia Ghazal ’22 in a biochemistry class during fall term 2021.

For the second year in a row, a Kalamazoo College chemistry student has been awarded the prestigious Priscilla Carney Jones Scholarship.

Crystal Mendoza ’23 is the 2022 recipient of the scholarship through the American Chemical Society. The scholarship provides a minimum of $1,500 funding toward tuition, books and lab fees for a female undergraduate student majoring in chemistry or a related discipline and beginning her junior or senior year.

Mendoza and the 2021 recipient of the scholarship, Ola Bartolik ’22, have both worked in the lab of Blakely Tresca, the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

When Mendoza received the scholarship announcement, her reaction was, “Wow, oh my goodness, I actually got it,” she said, “because I really didn’t think I would get it. It was a little bit later than when they announced it the previous year, and in the back of my mind, I didn’t think they would give it back-to-back to someone from the same college.”

Once the news sank in, she called her mom to celebrate and sent Tresca a message.

“I was really surprised two students from the same school got the scholarship back-to-back, especially since they only award one each year,” Tresca said. “I’m not surprised, though, that Crystal earned it. She has worked really hard in research and at school, while at the same time doing so much for the department and the community at K helping mentor the next generation of chemists.”

The scholarship has both practical and intangible benefits for Mendoza. Not only does it cover Mendoza’s out-of-pocket costs for tuition, books and fees for her last year at K, it also provides a feeling of belonging.

“It was rewarding that the Women Chemists Committee posted the announcement on Twitter, Facebook, all their socials,” Mendoza said. “Seeing my face and the significance of the scholarship and what it means to the community of women chemists made me feel like I’m actually a part of this community. I feel like I can continue in the field of chemistry with support and inclusion.”

Crystal Mendoza and Isabel Morillo attend a softball game
Crystal Mendoza ’23 (right) and Isabel Morillo ’23 attending a K softball game to support their roommate Lucy Hart ’23.
Chemistry mentors helped Crystal Mendoza achieve opportunities in places such as Cologne, Germany
Crystal Mendoza ’23, pictured on a trip to Cologne, Germany, is currently working on a research internship at Karlsruhe Institute for Technology in Karlsruhe, Germany.

Finding her community and niche has been a journey for Mendoza. Arriving on campus in fall 2019, she intended to declare a biology major and follow the pre-med track. Her first term, however, she found herself not taking any biology courses and struggling through Chemistry 110. Her STEM journey could have ended there had it not been for Jeff Bartz, professor of chemistry and chair of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

Bartz invited Mendoza to come to his office hours and introduced her to Alex Cruz ’21, a chemistry major and fellow Los Angeles native. Cruz agreed to tutor Mendoza—the start of a mentoring relationship that continues to this day.

Crystal Mendoza holding a bucket and a cell phone in an elevator
Chemistry student Crystal Mendoza ’23 snaps a selfie in the elevator at the Karlsruhe Institute for Technology in Germany, where she is completing a summer research internship. Mendoza was on her way to buy propionic acid from the stockroom.
Crystal Mendoza
Chemistry student Crystal Mendoza ’23 has been awarded the prestigious Priscilla Carney Jones Scholarship.

“She wanted to succeed,” Bartz said. “She was willing to ask for help and that’s sometimes the hardest thing for all of us to do, especially as a beginning college student among your peers where you want to look like you have it all together. I had enough of a relationship with her, because of the kind of place K is, to have a sense of what help she needed and who in our program could provide that help to her.”

Cruz introduced Mendoza to Sukuma Dow, a peer-led organization for underrepresented students in STEM, her first year at K. She has been an active participant ever since, serving last year and this coming year as a group leader.

“I did feel discouraged at some points my first year,” Mendoza said. “After taking some biology courses, I didn’t think STEM was for me. I doubted myself and it wasn’t until I got into the support group and talked more with Alex, Dr. Bartz and Dr. Tresca that I got myself out there and found what I truly enjoy. It has been a journey. I found what I like, I like being in a lab, and it took a lot of conversations, tough love and discipline to see that.”

Bartz, Cruz and Tresca all encouraged Mendoza to apply to Research Experiences for Undergraduates summer programs through the National Science Foundation. She ended up performing research on electrocatalysts for carbon dioxide reduction at the University of Southern California, where she scrapped any lingering thoughts of med school and committed wholeheartedly to a chemistry major and future goal of a doctorate in chemistry.

“I came back from that summer and immediately started looking for opportunities for this summer,” Mendoza said. She prioritized research abroad, as the COVID-19 shutdown had pushed her to delay courses she wanted to take in person until her junior year, taking study abroad off the table for her.

As a result, in mid-June, Mendoza arrived in Karlsruhe, Germany, to take part in a Research Internship in Science and Engineering (RISE) through the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD), or German Academic Exchange Service. RISE offers undergraduate students the opportunity to complete a summer internship at a top German research institution. Students are matched with a host university or institute according to their area of interest—Karlsruhe Institute for Technology for Mendoza—and DAAD provides students a monthly stipend to help cover living expenses.

German professor Kathryn Sederberg helped Mendoza arrange housing, and the DAAD funding is supplemented by the Nahrain Kamber and Ralph Griffith Endowed Student Research Fellowship benefiting female science students at K. Together, the two funding sources fully cover Mendoza’s living expenses and provide her with a small stipend as well.

Mendoza will remain in Karlsruhe until early September, conducting 12 weeks of research into photocatalysts for carbon dioxide reduction for her Senior Integrated Project.

“I’m learning even more than I thought, because I thought there would be some repetition from last summer, but it’s totally different,” Mendoza said. “I’m doing more synthesis, learning to read scientific literature for myself, and it’s more hands on.”

Catalysts are substances that increase the rate of a chemical reaction without undergoing any permanent chemical change. Electrocatalysts speed up electrochemical reactions, while photocatalysts absorb light to create energy that accelerates chemical reactions. Mendoza’s research involves attempts to artificially re-create photosynthesis, the process by which plants convert carbon dioxide into oxygen and carbohydrates.

“We take what’s happening in nature and try to find the optimal way to do it in solution in the lab,” Mendoza said. Currently, she is building three major components of the process—a photosensitizer, an electron donor and a catalyst—in different ways. Once she has built the library of different catalyst and photosensitizers, Mendoza will test the different components to see which perform the best for carbon dioxide reduction and turnover numbers.

At Karlsruhe, Mendoza has two Ph.D. student mentors, whom she describes as “helpful” and “very sweet” and who have given her independence to conduct her own project in the lab.

“At first, it was a little intimidating, but once I got the hang of it, it’s the best lab experience,” Mendoza said. “I’m just in awe at every reaction that I do, whether it’s successful or not, because I did it myself.”

Research into catalytic reduction of carbon dioxide could eventually have implications for reducing environmental pollution in the world, a topic of interest for Mendoza. Regardless, her time in Germany is proving enlightening.

“I had a really different perspective on what I thought the lab would be,” she said. “I thought it was going to be down to business, only doing experiments, let’s only talk about chemistry. My mentors have shown me otherwise. You can have fun, you can sing, you can dance, or you can enjoy a bottle of soda outside the lab.”

In addition to research and classes, Mendoza has worked as a chemistry teaching assistant.

“I really enjoy that,” she said. “It gives me more time in the lab and a chance to connect with people who want to do STEM and say, ‘Hey, you’re good at this, have you considered this major?’”

In 2021, K started a PRIME (Promoting Research, Inclusivity, Mentoring and Experience) Scholars program, funded by a National Science Foundation grant, and Bartz asked Mendoza to be a peer mentor for the 10 incoming first-year PRIME students.

“It’s been amazing seeing their progress from when they first came to campus and I met them during orientation,” Mendoza said. “It’s always rewarding after every meeting, one-on-one or in a group, to think that I was once in their place, not knowing what I wanted to do, and now being so accomplished in my discipline and helping them get there, too. I’m grateful that Dr. Bartz thought I was the right person for that.”

From mentee to mentor, doubt to confidence, Mendoza is thriving at K with guidance from strong mentors, support from peers, and opportunities for exploration and growth. With one year left at K, she’s looking ahead to her own future while extending a hand back to those coming behind her.

“We talk about certain students as having figured it out,” Bartz said. “What got them here is not what will get them through here. Early on, Crystal recognized that she didn’t have it figured out and was willing to ask for help. Now she’s one who figured it out and is willing to share that with others.”

SIP of Water Grows Crops in Tanzania

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Sam Meyer and Father Evarist Thadei Mngulu in Tanzania for water irrigation project
Sam Meyer ’21 visited Tanzania last summer to help
Father Evarist Thadei Mngulu and his mission
build a sustainable irrigation system.

When you need inspiration for celebrating Earth Day, a Kalamazoo College student will often provide it. Take Sam Meyer ’21, a physics major. His Senior Integrated Project (SIP) applied gravity and physics theories not only to designing, but building—through in-person, international volunteerism—a sustainable irrigation system in Pawaga, Tanzania, that conserves the region’s scarce water resources.

Both on location and off, Meyer surveyed Tanzania’s Consolata Missionaries site, researched and studied fluid mechanics, aided the system’s design and installation, and secured project funding through K’s Collins Fellowship—which helps fund student projects abroad—and through donors from GoFundMe.

The project was still ongoing as Meyer returned home from Tanzania last summer after spending about seven weeks there. In that time, he said, Pawaga didn’t receive even a drop of rain. However, the system he created now sustainably irrigates about 3 acres of soil and has yielded a successful season of crops. In fact, his work might hold solutions for areas around the world that have trouble with implementing their own agriculture. Meyer’s system fills elevated reservoir tanks during the day through solar power, thereby powering an electric water pump, and uses gravity to irrigate the fields in the evening when the sun is low and the land is cooler, mitigating evaporation.

“Not only has the system limited the labor involved in the agriculture, it’s maximized itself to a point that the mission can grow crops regularly and have excess crops to share with a nearby elementary and primary school,” Meyer said. “Those students come to the compound every day, so the system promotes their education and combats malnourishment, which I think is just amazing.”

Tanzania is one of several African countries that lies along the East African Rift Valley (EARV), which features an arid and rocky ecosystem, causing frequent droughts, despite water’s general availability through lakes and rivers. Tanzania is one of the most developed countries in East Africa, but outside of its capital and urban centers, the villages and vast wilderness leave some populations isolated outside of schools and religious groups that offer some support. Scarcity causes national authorities to impose taxes to control water with some irrigation practices limited to restrictive or wasteful practices such as flooding fields or bucketing water by hand.

Sam Meyer with Children Who Benefit from Water Irrigation Project
Children from a nearby elementary and primary school are among the people who benefit from an
irrigation system Sam Meyer ’21 installed last summer in Pawaga, Tanzania.

Challenges from climate change to wildlife necessitate improving the nation’s sustainable approaches to agriculture. Volunteer organizations such as the World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms (WWOOF) nurture agricultural practices to tackle these challenges in Tanzania. The organization’s worldwide movement links visitors, also known as WWOOFers, with organic farmers, promoting a cultural and educational exchange, and building a global community conscious of ecological farming and sustainability practices.

WWOOF has one chapter assisting Father Evarist Thadei Mngulu, whose Tanzania mission had failed in previous attempts to integrate an irrigation system and couldn’t afford an engineer’s estimate of $16,000 to install one. That lead Father Evarist to seek help from WWOOF, and WWOOF to finding Meyer while he was searching for SIP ideas.

Between the Collins Fellowship and GoFundMe, Meyer raised about $3,200, which funded his entire project. Even with a language barrier and Father Evarist being the only fluent English speaker among the Tanzanians who generally speak Swahili, the project was successful.

“Father Evarist wants to use the system as a way of educating other farmers in the area in irrigation practices because their practices now are to flood a field, which can produce a lot of runoff and waste, or bucketing water there,” Meyer said. “Through the system, he helps to strengthen the community through this new technology, which is a new aspect of the mission. That makes me very happy.”

Sam Meyer with assistant and water pipes
Sam Meyer ’21 helped install the irrigation system
he designed for a mission in Tanzania.

As Meyer reflects on the irrigation system’s implementation, he has an offer on the table from an engineering firm in Austin, Texas. Mears Group Inc.—an infrastructure-solutions provider that offers engineering, construction and maintenance services to the oil and natural gas, electric transmission and distribution, telecommunications and wastewater industries—took notice of Meyer’s SIP, the work he performed in Tanzania and his interest in environmental engineering. Now, Meyer will begin life after K in a role that promises more opportunities to improve communities, while he continues to eye the progress he began in Tanzania.

“I promoted this project during my application process, and I believe it was a big part of me gaining the position,” Meyer said. “I mentioned the sustainability aspect of it and my potential interest in being an environmental engineer, and they were excited to hear about it. I think it was a huge piece in me getting that position.”

Beyond the practical and professional experience gained through the project, Meyer appreciates the relationships formed along the way. “The people of Tanzania are so welcoming and friendly that I had a great time. I still have some connections with friends I made there, including Father Evarist, and I’m still working on aiding him with anything else that comes up.”

Donations Accepted

Sam Meyer ’21 is continuing to collect donations through GoFundMe that will go toward supporting agricultural efforts including growing crops and teaching other communities about building their own sustainable irrigation systems. Visit his fundraiser to donate.

Student-Athlete Researches Exercise Response in Fruit Flies

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Marco Savone Holds Research Report on Fruit Flies
Marco Savone ’22 completed his Senior Integrated
Project (SIP) as part of a research study on exercising
fruit flies at Wayne State Medical School.

While many student-athletes at Kalamazoo College are interested in health and wellness, there might only be one who has applied that interest not only to sports, classes, externships and travel, but also to fruit flies. 

Marco Savone ’22 is a chemistry major and Spanish minor on the pre-med track who played football at K for four years. His first year at K, he completed an externship refining nutrition plans for a local health company. COVID-19 scrapped his study abroad plans, but he was able to make a medical volunteering trip to Costa Rica.  

In summer 2021, Savone completed his Senior Integrated Project (SIP) by participating in a three-month research study at Wayne State Medical School with exercising fruit flies. 

“It sounds bizarre at first,” Savone said. “They’re one of the very few labs in the country that does this. They want to apply the fruit fly model to human models because fruit flies have about 60 percent of their genome similar to humans and share many genes that are related to those in the human exercise response. Their goal is to be able to apply what they find with fruit flies to mice and rodents, and eventually human studies with exercise physiology.” 

Fruit flies also make good test subjects because they are cheap and have short lifespans. Within 60 days, researchers can see the effects of exercise over a full lifespan. 

“Humans live a long time so it’s hard to look at a human model in regards to how exercise affects the health span,” Savone said. “Ideally you would need a longitudinal study.” 

Marco-Savone-in-Scrubs
Walker Chung ’22 (left) and Marco Savone ’22 were
part of a medical volunteer trip to Costa Rica.

Savone took part in a study exploring the relationship between exercise and two gene-encoded proteins, myostatin and follistatin, that are involved in muscle mass development. Through a process called RNAi, or gene silencing, one group of fruit flies had myostatin basically eliminated in their systems, while a second group underwent the same process with follistatin. 

Within each group, Savone exercised one sub-group and did not exercise another. 

“We had lots of vials and they were all labeled with stickers,” Savone said. “We had this machine that would move the vials up and then they would drop down, and when the flies would feel the impact, they would fall to the bottom of their vial and then they would start climbing up to the top. This process would be repeated to act like a treadmill for the flies.”  

The team would measure the speed and endurance of the fruit flies over time. 

“One overarching thing that I did find was that we did see exercise responses with the two groups of flies,” Savone said. “We tested them for how long they would basically run, how fast they would fatigue. Then we also looked at their climbing speed to see how fast they would climb up their vial and we did see that exercise improved climbing speed and endurance.” 

While Savone experienced some success, he also learned from setbacks in the research. The RT-PCR test to verify how much of each gene was expressed in the fruit flies did not work, and Savone had to pivot to another type of testing. 

Marco-Savone-with-football-team
Marco Savone ’22 (right) values his experience as a
student-athlete for the lessons he learned
in teamwork, leadership and time management.

“I was really bummed that it didn’t work out,” he said. “But I was told by my mentor that it’s a hard thing to get used to and you need a lot of practice. I didn’t feel as bad when he told me that. 

“Research is so unpredictable. You have to learn how to troubleshoot when something goes wrong, and there are so many outcomes that can happen. There may be one singular thing you want to find, but you may find different things you didn’t even expect to see. That was really eye opening for me.” 

Savone sees immense benefit in gaining hands-on research experience outside of K to bring back and apply to classwork. He also benefitted from mentorship and collaboration with the lab staff, mainly Ph.D. students, and from a presentation he gave at Wayne State that boosted his confidence when presenting his SIP at the chemistry symposium. 

His experiences at Wayne State also came into play in January, when Savone started a short-term contracted position with Kalamazoo lab Genemarkers, LLC, which had pivoted during the pandemic from skincare-product testing to COVID-19 testing. 

His job involved separating test tube vials and preparing them for RT-PCR testing, the same type of testing he had attempted on the fruit flies at Wayne State. Savone also helped chart data for the tests.  

“They were just starting to train me on other things, but unfortunately, since I was a contract employee, they had to let me go when the COVID numbers went down significantly,” Savone said. “It was interesting to see how that whole process works behind the scenes of the COVID testing and it was a rewarding experience.” 

After graduating this June, Savone plans to study for the MCAT in the summer and take at least two gap years to work in clinical research before attending medical school, perhaps back at Wayne State. 

Looking back on the past four years, Savone sees how far he’s come. He credits his growth to the academics at K, his hands-on experiences at Wayne State and Genemarkers, and the lessons in teamwork and time management he learned as a student-athlete. 

“My experiences wouldn’t have been possible without going to K,” Savone said. “If I had to redo the whole thing again, I would do it the same.” 

Women in Science: Student’s Research Signals Trouble With Climate Change for Fish

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Grace Hancock ’22 and her senior integrated project (SIP) are proving that something fishy is going on with the rising water temperatures caused by climate change.

Hancock, a biology major and Spanish minor from Portland, Oregon, recently conducted her SIP in the fish ecology lab at K with guidance from Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Assistant Professor of Biology Santiago Salinas. Through it, she administered an analysis of Atlantic silverside fish, foragers that grow to be no longer than 6 inches in length, which exhibit temperature-dependent sex determination.

“When the temperature is generally colder, the fish produce more females,” Hancock said. “When it’s warmer, they produce more males because the females need to reach a bigger size before they hit sexual maturity.”

Portrait of Grace Hancock
Grace Hancock ’22
Grace Hancock Analyzing Fish
Through the Fish Ecology Lab at Kalamazoo College, Grace Hancock ’22 analyzed Atlantic silverside fish and how climate change is threatening their reproductive patterns.
Grace Hancock Measures a Fish with a Ruler
Grace Hancock ’22 measures a fish during her survey work as an intern at Sarett Nature Center.

Such a process is nature’s way of ensuring optimal numbers of males and females along with ideal conditions for breeding. However, that only works if their water temperatures follow seasonal patterns that are unaffected by climate change. As a result, climate change can cause problems for not only a variety of temperature-dependent sex determination-exhibiting fish, but humans as well.

“Skewed sex ratios in populations are crazy to monitor because they mean there aren’t as many viable mates for them and it’s dangerous for the species,” Hancock said. “I can see how these fish are going to need our help and how climate change needs to slow down if we want to continue to explore and work with these resources that we have in our oceans. If some fish are struggling and some are not, it will create an imbalance.”

Grace Hancock taking notes in the fish lab
Grace Hancock conducted her senior integrated project in the fish ecology lab at K.
Grace Hancock works at a computer in the fish ecology lab - women in science
Grace Hancock ’22 examined Atlantic silverside fish in her senior integrated project.
Atlantic silverfish in a petri dish
Atlantic silverfish
Grace Hancock analyzing Atlantic silverfish women in science
Grace Hancock ’22 determined through her senior integrated project that climate change could skew fish populations.

Thanks to her research and her passion for science, Hancock is a great example of someone the United Nations is celebrating today, February 11, on the International Day of Women and Girls in Science. The day, first marked in 2015, encourages women scientists and targets equal access to and participation in science for women and girls.

Such a day is desired because U.N. statistics show that fewer than 30 percent of scientific researchers in the world are women and only about 30 percent of all female students select fields in science, technology, engineering or math (STEM) to pursue in their higher education. Only about 22 percent of the professionals in cutting edge fields such as artificial intelligence are women. Plus, representation among women is especially low professionally in fields such as information and communication technology at 3 percent; natural science, mathematics and statistics at 5 percent; and engineering at 8 percent.

“This happens in high school, college, middle school and as far back as I can remember,” Hancock said. “Women in science classes have to fight for their place. I feel like we’re getting better, but even in college, I feel talked over. I feel like I don’t have as much of a voice or authority in those communities. There are extra roadblocks for women to stick around in STEM, and it can be taxing emotionally and mentally to experience those environments.”

Group picture of the Kalamazoo College Birding Club with binoculars - women in science
Grace Hancock ’22 had student support systems such as the Kalamazoo Birding Club throughout her years at K.

Hancock is among the many women in science at K working to reverse such trends. In addition to her marine biology work, she has enjoyed taking classes involving ecology and animal behavior, while encouraging students new to K to stick with the sciences and seek support systems. Hancock had her own support systems even outside the classroom through the Kalamazoo Birding Club and the women’s swimming and diving team.

“There’s so much research and so much to be said about staying healthy physically, and how that helps you mentally,” Hancock said of her athletics experience. “Even if I’m having a hard trimester, taking classes like organic chemistry or calculus, if I’m working out regularly or I have a team of women supporting me in the water, then my classroom work is going to be better. I would say almost half of the women on the swimming and diving team were STEM majors or taking STEM classes and we consistently had one of the highest GPAs among the athletics programs at K. It was an academically-driven community and I loved being a student-athlete.”

In targeting life after K, Hancock obtained class credit by working for a trimester in an internship at Sarett Nature Center in Benton Harbor, Michigan.

“That was a really great experience, because I got to visit every week and see how the naturalists worked,” Hancock said. “We used GIS equipment to survey and record the locations of different plants and demographic data on the fish living in streams. It was observational data, which was great exposure for me as someone who is more research focused.”

Grace Hancock works with two others at the birding station at Sarett Nature Center
Grace Hancock works at the birding station at Sarett Nature Center.
Blue Jay at Sarett Nature Center
Grace Hancock ’22 observed birds like this one working as an intern at Sarett Nature Center.
Women in Science Grace Hancock Holding and Owl
Grace Hancock ’22 holds an owl while working as an intern.
Women in Science Grace Hancock with an owl
Grace Hancock ’22 holds an owl at the Sarett Nature Center.

After graduation, Hancock hopes to obtain a short-term marine biology job that might involve working in a lab or on a boat to monitor marine mammals. After that, she would like to obtain a Fulbright scholarship in a country in South America to work on her Spanish skills and later find a graduate program that suits her. In the meantime, she will continue mentoring younger students, while following in the footsteps of students who started at K before her.

“Mentorship from our professors is important, but there’s a lot to be said for women looking after women in the classroom,” she said. “I have a few students who have graduated as my role models and I hope to emulate them for younger students. I’m a TA for Form and Function and some other entry-level biology classes. Through that I’m able to work with first-year students. I’m continuing that legacy that the older students gave to me.”

“Acting Shakespeare” an Ideal Intro to the Bard

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Matthew Swarthout rehearses for Acting Shakespeare
Matthew Swarthout ’22 will present “Acting Shakespeare,” his own play
adapted from Sir Ian McKellen’s production of the same name, this
Thursday–Sunday at the Dungeon Theatre, 139 Thompson St.

If you desire an appreciation for the works of William Shakespeare yet find his plays challenging, you’ll want to attend a show coming this week to Kalamazoo College. Matthew Swarthout ’22 will present his self-written senior integrated project (SIP), a play titled Acting Shakespeare, adapted from Sir Ian McKellen’s production of the same name, this Thursday–Sunday at the Dungeon Theatre, 139 Thompson St.

The original production featured McKellen alone on stage with no props or scenery, performing monologues from Shakespeare’s work, and discussing some of his plays. McKellen first performed it in 1980, and a 1984 Broadway engagement earned him the Drama Desk Award for an Outstanding One-Person Show and a Tony Award nomination.

This version will encompass both Swarthout’s and McKellen’s insight into Shakespeare’s plays, featuring monologues and scenes from plays such as Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hamlet, Macbeth, Henry the Fourth Part One and Henry the Fifth.

“This is the kind of Shakespeare show for people who don’t know Shakespeare,” Swarthout said. “I can talk in my 2022 language, which everyone can understand, and then I can shift into Shakespearean language and say, ‘This is what Shakespeare meant by this.’ It’s like a sampler of plays. You’ve got a comedy, a tragedy, a history and you can decide for yourself if you enjoy Shakespeare enough to see more of his plays.”

Matthew Swarthout rehearsing for Acting Shakespeare
Matthew Swarthout ’22 offers his insights into William Shakespeare’s plays
in “Acting Shakespeare,” coming this week to the Dungeon Theatre at
Kalamazoo College.

Swarthout first developed his appreciation for Shakespeare as a young child when he saw As You Like It at the Stratford Festival in Canada. He later was drawn to K as he found the liberal arts could empower him to double major in biology and theatre. Since, Swarthout has performed in several Festival Playhouse shows with roles including the comical character Sir Andrew in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, and Buzz Windrip, a politician who unexpectedly wins the U.S. presidency in It Can’t Happen Here, a play based on Sinclair Lewis’ 1935 satire of what could happen if Fascism spreads to the United States.

“I’ve had a lot of freedom at K with directors who really like to see some big, expressive characters, and that’s the kind of role I’m often cast into,” Swarthout said. “Even for Acting Shakespeare, I change things around one day and try something completely different the next day to see what works. It’s nice to see what goes wrong in order to see what’s going to go right.”

Acting Shakespeare production poster
“Acting Shakespeare” will encompass plays such as “Romeo
and Juliet,” “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” “Hamlet,”
“Macbeth,” “Henry the Fourth Part One” and “Henry the Fifth.”

That freedom takes on more complexity in preparing for Acting Shakespeare as Swarthout serves as both actor and director. He listens to recordings of himself reciting the play while snowboarding for memorization purposes in addition to maintaining regular rehearsals.

“There’s a challenge in looking at yourself with such a critical eye,” he said. “Usually as an actor, you’re doing your best and then it’s up to the director to say, ‘You could improve upon this.’ But since I’m directing myself, I’ve had rehearsals where I go over about three lines in 45 minutes. It’s hard to separate the director from the actor.”

In additional theatre pursuits, Swarthout participated in the New York Arts Program, a study away opportunity that places students from Great Lakes College Association (GLCA) affiliated schools in Broadway and off-Broadway theatre organizations, opera houses, dance companies, publishing houses, literary agencies and music performance venues. Swarthout worked at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute, finishing just before the COVID-19 pandemic hit the city. An adviser told him not to expect an opportunity to act on stage while there, as most of the acting opportunities go to New York University students. However, his talents enabled him to accept the role of Underling in a production of The Drowsy Chaperone, a parody of American musical comedies of the 1920s.

“That was probably the best experience I had in New York just because I felt like I was living there as a working actor,” Swarthout said. “I had my classes, I had my job and then I had the gig, which was really fantastic.”

Swarthout is sending out audition tapes to adapt to theatre’s current virtual landscape in the hopes of one day returning to the East Coast and eventually New York after graduation. In the meantime, he’s excited to think of how his audiences could develop an interest in Shakespeare as a result of his performances. Tickets for Acting Shakespeare, which is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Thursday–Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday, are available online. Kalamazoo College students, faculty and staff are admitted free. Tickets for the general public are $5. Please note that proof of vaccination and masks are required for admittance to the theatre.

“People should enjoy Shakespeare and keep Shakespeare alive, not for the history of it, but what we can do with it,” Swarthout said. “We can change its meaning and interpret it in so many ways to get a point across. If you’re trying to have a theatre season that’s focused on anti-racism or has some themes around homophobia, for example, you can use a Shakespeare show to bridge gaps of understanding. Shakespeare becomes a powerful tool.”

Toads Shape Student’s Conservation Research

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Molly Ratliff with boreal toads at night
Molly Ratliff ’22 shows one of the boreal toads she’s researching this summer in Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado.

Molly Ratliff ’22 hopes to work in an environmental-studies field after she graduates from Kalamazoo College, making her senior integrated project (SIP) this summer an ideal experience. She is researching boreal toads at their known breeding grounds in Rocky Mountain National Park in Estes Park, Colorado, as a way to engage with conservation.

“Amphibians, such as boreal toads, are really great indicators of overall ecosystem health,” Ratliff said. “Their skin is highly permeable, making them vulnerable to environmental changes and toxins. Since amphibians are typically the first species to be impacted by changes in the environment such as climate change, they can show general trends of how other species may react.”

To be specific, in her research Ratliff is investigating how a skin disease that affects amphibians around the world—Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis or Bd—might be affecting the sizes of the toads at various locations and how this might relate to survivability. She performs surveys at dusk around lake shores, captures toads to mark them with pit tags, takes body measurements, and swabs them to test for the disease. The toads are then released and can be identified as they’re recaptured by their unique pit tags.

“If amphibian populations are not doing well in an ecosystem, it can be an indicator that there are stressors, toxins, imbalances, etc. within the entire system,” she said. “Amphibians also typically exist as both predators and prey, making them a crucial part of the food chain within an ecosystem.”

Ratliff’s work is an excellent example of the independent scholarship critical to the K-Plan, Kalamazoo College’s integrated approach to academics in the liberal arts and sciences. As a culmination of learning at K, all students explore a subject of their own choosing, resulting in an in-depth, graduate-level research thesis, performance or creative work. Learn more about how these projects fit into the K-Plan at kzoo.edu/k-plan.