Gabrielle Holme-Miller ’17 (Carrie White) and members of the cast (background) in CARRIE the musical. Photo by Emily Salswedel ’16.
The outside gaze that condemns is the subject of Festival Playhouse of Kalamazoo College’s spring term production of CARRIE the musical.
“Almost the very first lyrics concern the horror of going to high school every day and the pain of trying to fit in–‘Every Day, I Just Pray Every Move I Make is Right,’” said Ed Menta, the James A. B. Stone College Professor of Theatre Arts, and the director of CARRIE the Musical. “Through song, choreography, social media, light scenery, and costumes, we hope to make this musical a fun and interactive experience for our audience that also explores one of the major social issues of our time: bullying,” he added.
Gabrielle Holme-Miller ’17, who plays the lead role of Carrie, emphasizes the need for the focus on aggression: “Almost everyone in their adolescence will find themselves a victim, aggressor, or witness to bullying in some form. Carrie’s suffering and torment is symbolic of the unacknowledged bullying many young people face.”
Festival Playhouse and the Kalamazoo College Department of Music will collaborate on the May production. The play opens Thursday, May 14, at 7:30 p.m., and continues Friday and Saturday, May 15 and 16, at 8 p.m., and on Sunday, May 17, with a matinee at 2 p.m. Additional performances occur Thursday, May 21, at 7:30 p.m. and Friday, May 22 at 8 p.m. Tickets are $5 for students, $10 for seniors, and $15 for other adults. For reservations call 269.337.7333. For more information visit the Festival Playhouse website.
The performance features Professor of Music James Turner, vocal director; Jack Brooks, conductor; Kate Yancho, choreographer; Lanford J. Potts, scenic designer; Katie Anderson ’15, lighting designer; and Lindsay Worthington ’15, sound designer. CARRIE the musical is based on the novel, Carrie, by Stephen King and the book by Lawrence D. Cohen. Michael Gore scored the music; Dean Pitchford wrote the lyrics.
Three Kalamazoo College chemistry majors presented at the 2015 Experimental Biology meeting, a joint meeting of six different societies including the American Association for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB) as well as societies for physiology, nutrition, pharmacology, pathology, and anatomy. More than 15,000 scientists attended the meeting in Boston, Massachusetts.
Rina Fujiwara ’15, Sarah Glass ’17, and Victoria Osorio ’16 shared results of the research they did in collaboration with Professor of Chemistry Laura Furge. Their presentations were part of both the Undergraduate Poster Competition and as part of the regular scientific session for ASBMB. Some 300 undergraduate posters composed the ASBMB competition from students across the country and from a variety of college and universities.
Fujiwara’s work, part of her Senior Individualized Project (SIP), showed how the work of two human liver enzymes vital to the body’s processing of medicines is halted by two small molecule inhibitors. The research took place in the Furge lab at Kalamazoo College and was published in Drug Metabolism and Disposition (Fall 2014). Other co-authors included Furge, Amanda Bolles ’14, and Erran Briggs ’14.
Victoria Osorio
Glass and Osorio presented a poster that centered on recent work in the Furge lab with variants of an enzyme responsible for metabolism (or processing in the body) of about 15 percent of all medicines. The presence of these enzyme variants in different individuals can lead to vastly different responses to some pharmaceutical drugs, including cough syrup, the breast cancer drug tamoxifen, and many more. Though not present at the meeting, Mike Glista ’06) and Parker de Waal ’13) were co-authors on the posters.
This summer Fujiwara will enter the University of Pennsylvania Graduate Program in Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics. Osorio and Glass will continue research with Furge this summer. Both plan to attend graduate school after graduating from Kalamazoo College.
Sarah Glass
At the Boston meeting Professor of Chemistry Regina Stevens-Truss once again directed her highly acclaimed HOPES project, connecting science teachers with practicing scientists to enhance the quality and hands-on authenticity of primary and secondary classroom science instruction.
Professors Furge and Stevens-Truss are members of the ASBMB and attend the meeting every year. Travel to ASBMB for students Fujiwara, Glass, and Osorio was supported by grants from the Richard J. Cook Research Fellowship Fund (Fujiwara), an award from the ASBMB Student Affiliate (Fujiwara), the Provost Office (Glass, Osorio), and a grant to Furge through the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Travel for Furge and Truss was supported by the Hutchcroft Endowment as well as NIH and grants from ASBMB.
Several of the 2015 Michigan Campus Compact Award winners are flanked by their Center for Civic Engagement mentors and collaborators Teresa Denton (far left) and Alison Geist (far right). The students are (l-r) Jasmine An, Hannah Bogard, Mele Makalo, and Rose Tobin.
Eight Kalamazoo College seniors–each of them Civic Engagement Scholars in K’s Center for Civic Engagement–will receive Michigan Campus Compact (MiCC) Awards for their dedication to community service. Kacey Cook and Mele Makalo earned the MiCC Commitment to Service Award, recognizes up to two students per member campus in the state of Michigan for either the breadth or depth of their community involvement or service experiences. Only 31 students in the state will receive this award.
Jasmine An, Hannah Bogard, Alejandra Castillo, Katherine Rapin, Andrea Satchwell, and Rose Tobin will receive the Heart and Soul Award, “given to students to recognize their time, effort, and personal commitment to their communities through service. “We are thrilled that our remarkable students are receiving these awards,” said Alison Geist, director of the Center for Civic Engagement. “We are even more thrilled that we have had the honor to work closely with them.” The eight will be feted at an awards brunch in East Lansing on April 18. MiCC promotes the education and commitment of Michigan college students to be civically engaged citizens, through creating and expanding academic, co-curricular and campus-wide opportunities for community service, service-learning and civic engagement.
Vageesha Liyana-Gunawardana ’15 won the Special Prize in the annual Michigan Japanese Speech Contest, held at the Japanese Consulate in Detroit. Vageesha’s speech was titled “The Policeman I Met That Day Does Not Know My Name.” According to his Japanese language teacher, Assistant Professor of Japanese Noriko Sugimori, the speech is based on his study abroad experience in Tokyo, during which Vageesha was questioned by the police on thirteen different occasions. Inspired by Nobel Peace Prize winner Lester Pearson, Vageesha’s reflection upon these seemingly negative experiences reaffirmed the importance of meeting people and making an effort to understand each individual at deeper levels in order to work toward world peace. His talk, of course, was delivered in Japanese. Vageesha is a chemistry major at Kalamazoo College. He is a United World College alumnus (he attended high school at Pearson UWC in Victoria, British Columbia) and a Davis Scholar. At K he also works in the Center for International Programs.
Psychology majors who joined Professor Brittany Liu (far right) at this year’s MUPRC included (l-r)–Perri Nicholson, Jessica Varana, Elizabeth Hanley, Grace Barry, and Rachel LePage. Not pictured is Professor Robert Batsell.
Five senior psychology majors presented their Senior Individualized Projects at the 28th annual Michigan Undergraduate Psychology Research Conference [MUPRC] held on the campus of Albion College. Grace Barry presented the talk “The association of narrative structure and psychological well-being in emerging adulthood.” Elizabeth Hanley presented the talk “Reflexive attention to configural and local motion cues in a biological motion display.” Rachel LePage presented the poster “Variation in reward-sensitivity and negative affect in high-risk youth brain-reward function.” Perri Nicholson presented the talk “Saccharin consumption does not result in increased weight gain in rats.” Jessica Varana presented the talk “Moral decision making: Empathy as an indicator for utilitarian or deontological moral judgments.” The students were accompanied by Kalamazoo College psychology faculty members Brittany Liu and Robert Batsell.
K presenters as MSS (l-r): Aaron Schoenfeldt, Mariah Hennen, Krystal Wilson, and Callie Daniels-Howell
Four senior anthropology and sociology majors presented their Senior Individualized research at the annual conference of the Midwest Sociological Society (MSS) in Kansas City. Aaron Schoenfeldt, Mariah Hennen, Krystal Wilson, and Callie Daniels-Howell shared their work on sports and identity, re-conceptualizing study abroad, the culture of natural birth, and child hospice care and compassion, respectively. All four participated in regular paper and panel sessions along with sociology faculty, graduate students, and professionals from the Midwest and other parts of the country. “The conference was a very rewarding experience.” said Wilson. “I had the opportunity to present my work with individuals who were just as interested and dedicated in their sociological projects as I was. I also really enjoyed networking and connecting with graduate students discussing the various topics of our research and how we can take it to the public.”
Designed by world renowned architect and MacArthur Fellow Jeanne Gang, the architecture that houses Kalamazoo College’s Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership has inspired rave reviews by many. Perhaps no work better explicates the iconography of the space than the video that was commissioned by Studio Gang Architects and produced by Dave Burk. The piece features many persons from Kalamazoo College, including President Eileen B. Wilson Oyelaran and Trustee Jon Stryker ’82, whose gift made the building possible. Convening on behalf of social justice often has taken place in small and out-of-the-way spaces designed for other purposes. The Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership at Kalamazoo College brings these discussions up from the basement, so to speak, and squarely into public consciousness.
The Arcus Center works to develop emerging leaders and sustain existing leaders in the fields of human rights and social justice. As a learning environment and meeting space, it brings together students, faculty, visiting scholars, social justice leaders, and members of the public for conversation and activities aimed at creating a more just world. We invite you to take the seven minutes to view this short film. Together, the space and the people who experience animate, and the film shows how.
Congratulations to the following Kalamazoo College students, who achieved a grade point average of 3.5 or better for a full-time course load of at least three units, without failing or withdrawing from any course, during the Winter 2015 academic term. Kudos to the entire group of some 300 students, and good luck in Spring Term, 2015.
Ayaka Abe
Benjamin Abreu
Melissa Acosta
Lucian Aitkins
Mojtaba Akhavan-Tafti
Omid Akhavan-Tafti
Rachel Alworth
Rasseil Alzouhayli
Suma Alzouhayli
Abby Anderson
Katelyn Anderson
Steven Andrews
Jasmine An
Jill Antonishen
Carlos Arellano
Taylor Arney
B
Sara Babcock
Gordon Backer
Sarah Baehr
Shreya Bahl
Katherine Ballew
Caroline Barnett
Grace Barry
Julia Bartlett
William Bartz
Abraham Bayha
Blake Beauchamp
Rebecca Beery
Andrea Beitel
Kate Belew
William Bell
Hayley Beltz
Erin Bensinger
Hannah Berger
Anup Bhullar
Benjamin Blomme
Allison Bloomfield
Vanessa Boddy
Hannah Bogard
Sean Bogue
Serena Bonarski
Georgetta Booker
Madeline Booth
Olivia Bouchard
Kennedy Boulton
Grace Bowe
Jonathan Bowman
Zoe Bowman
Riley Boyd
Nakeya Boyles
Sarah Bragg
Andrew Bremer
Allie Brodsky
Drew Brown
Emerson Brown
Erin Brown
Maxine Brown
Taylor Brown
Thomas Bryant
Joel Bryson
Andrew Buchholtz
Elisse Buhmann
Camille Burke
Mary Burnett
Michelle Bustamante
Erin Butler
Shanice Buys
C
Nicole Caddow
William Cagney
Sonia Camarena
Angel Caranna
Dorothy Carpenter
Raymond Carpenter
Sheila Carter
Haley Cartwright
Marissa Cash
Alejandra Castillo
James Castleberry
Rachel Chang
Kristina Chetcuti
Siu Kwan Katherine Cheung
Chido Chigwedere
Madeleine Chilcote
Emiline Chipman
Jae Hyun Choe
Elina Choi
Jennifer Cho
Youngjoon Cho
Amelia Chronis
Joshua Claassens
Tyler Clack
Taylor Clements
Elizabeth Clevenger
Cody Colvin
Quinton Colwell
Riley Cook
Hannah Cooperrider
Dejah Crystal
D
Susmitha Daggubati
Anna Dairaghi
Christina Dandar
Joshua Daniel
Roger Darling
Natalie Davenport
Charles Davis
Cecilia DeBoeck
David Demarest
Jeremy DePree
David DeSimone
Scott Devine
Dana DeVito
Eric De Witt
Seth Dexter
Green Dickenson
Cecilia DiFranco
Alexis Diller
Margaret Doele
Miranda Doepker
Guillermo Dominguez Garcia
Kelsey Donk
Ana Paula Dos Santos Dantas
Tuan Do
Lauren Drew
Querubin Dubois
Benjamin Dunham
Lotte Dunnell
E
Daniel Eberhart
Maya Edery
Adam Eisenstein
Ian Engstrom
Melissa Erikson
Samuel Ettwein
Andriana Evangelista
Angelia Evangelista
Samuel Evans-Golden
Kevin Ewing
F
Rachel Fadler
Jessie Fales
Abram Farley
Mario Ferrini
Alexis Fiebernitz
Jory Finkelberg
Tyler Fisher
Emily Fletcher
Joshua Foley
Samantha Foran
Delaney Fordell
Steven Fotieo
John Fowler
Maria Franco
Valentin Frank
Emma Franzel
Abigail Fraser
Annah Freudenburg
Maria Fujii
Lydia Fyie
G
Bridget Gallagher
Jacob Gallimore
Mauro Galus
Owen Galvin
Keith Garber
Joana Garcia
Brett Garwood
Katherine Gatz
Charlotte Gavin
Kathleen George
Mousa Ghannam
Camille Giacobone
Kelan Gill
Danielle Gin
Sarah Glass
Samantha Gleason
Daniella Glymin
Abhay Goel
Carter Goetz
Ellie Goldman
Emily Good
Anna Gough
Prachi Goyal
Janelle Grant
Claudia Greening
Lydia Green
Jackson Greenstone
Nya Greenstone
Kaitlyn Greiner
Ethan Grier
Adreanna Grillier
Jared Grimmer
Alexandra Groffsky
Brenden Groggel
Ellie Grossman
Daniel Grost
Guilherme Guedes
In Hye Gu
Yicong Guo
Rebecca Guralnick
H
Simon Haile
Marie Hallinen
Robert Hammond
Daniel Handley
Elizabeth Hanley
Jessica Hansen
Zihan Han
Hadley Harrison
Cheyenne Harvey
Andrew Haubert
Shannon Haupt
Evan Hayden
Veronica Hayden
Bonita Hazel
Stephanie Heard
Frances Heldt
Ashley Henne
Mariah Hennen
Jordan Henning
Kyle Hernandez
Mason Higby
Cassidy Hillis
Kelsey Hill
Louis Hochster
Megan Hoinville
Gabrielle Holme-Miller
Jenna Holmes
Daniel Holtzman
Se-Jung Hong
Drew Hopper
Elise Houcek
Allia Howard
Claire Howland
Jane Huffman
Jason Hugan
Siwook Hwang
I
Pinar Inanli
J
Jordan Jabara
Thomas Jackson
Dana Jacobson
Clare Jensen
Jon Jerow
YanYan Jiang
Lara Job
Amanda Johnson
Andrea Johnson
Katherine Johnson
Kourtney Johnson
Samantha Johnson
Tibin John
Samantha Jolly
Brittany Jones
Alexander Juarez
K
Kamalaldin Kamalaldin
Elyse Kaplan
Abigail Keizer
Gwendolen Keller
Jack Kemper
Samuel Kepes
Kelsey Kerbawy
Rachel Keshishian
Anthony Ketner
Benjamin Kileen
Hannah Kim
Na Young Kim
Savannah Kinchen
William Kirchen
Sai Klein
Hannah Kline
Gabriel Klotz
Julia Koreman
Bharath Kotha
Emily Kotz
Emily Kozal
McKenna Kring
Matthew Kuntzman
L
Ariah Lacey
Lauren Landman
Jeremy Lantis
Bryan Lara
Tessa Lathrop
John Lawless IV
Hannah Lehker
Rachel Leider
Elizabeth Lenning
Jacob Lenning
Rebecca Lennington
Omar Leon
Phuong Le
Arianna Letherer
Sarah Levett
Emily Levy
Samuel Lichtman-Mikol
Rachel Lifton
Emily Lindsay
Bret Linvill
Xiang Lin
Kate Liska
Gordon Liu
Giovanni LoGrasso
Trenton Loos
Bailee Lotus
Chenxi Lu
Liam Lundy
M
Spencer MacDonald
Sydney Madden
Jessica Magana
Lucy Mailing
Hannah Maness
Grace Manger
Sarah Manski
Helena Marnauzs
Nicholas Marsh
Elizabeth Martin
Takumi Matsuzawa
Kelsey Matthews
Madison McBarnes
Karly McCall
Miles McDowall
Adam McDowell
Angus McIntosh
Sara McKinney
Thomas McLravy
Molly Meddock
Jordan Meiller
Roxanna Menchaca
Franklin Meyer
Samuel Meyers
Emily Mickus
Sangtawun Miller
Suzanne Miller
Zach Miller
Ethel Mogilevsky
Gabrielle Montesanti
Daniel Moore
Tessa Moore
Madison Moote
Asia Liza Morales
Vanesa Morales
Alexandra Morris
Cody Mosblech
Chloe Mpinga
Tenley Mustonen
N
Victoria Najacht
Harsha Nand
Jacob Naranjo
Laetitia Ndiaye
Alissa Neff
Annie Nelson
Annie Nelson
Hallie Nerge
Mumo Nganu
Hang Nguyen
Hung Nguyen
Phuong Nguyen
Thi Phuong Lan Nguyen
Viet Nguyen
Perri Nicholson
Anne Nielsen
Nicholas Nizzardini
Rosemarie Nocita
Jonathan Nord
Skyler Norgaard
Mackenzie Norman
O
Bryan Olert
Stephen Oliphant
Hannah Olsen
Michael Oravetz
Eli Orenstein
Colleen Orwin
Alexandria Oswalt
Ty Owens
Justin Rabidoux
Yajaera Ramirez
Samantha Ramsay
Malavika Rao
Katherine Rapin
Anna Rayas
Shelby Retherford
Maria Rich
Melinda Rietkerk
Philip Ritchie
Annika Roberts
Madeleine Roberts
William Roberts
Camryn Romph
Samuel Rood
Jeremy Roth
Lyla Rothschild
Elinor Rubin-McGregor
Keigan Ryckman
Matthew Ryder
Connor Rzeznik
S
Minato Sakamoto
Amber Salome
Sharayu Salvi
Kira Sandiford
Andrea Satchwell
Gabriel Schat
Anselm Scheck
Maison Scheuer
Ashley Schmidt
Natalie Schmitt
Sarah Schmitt
Cameron Schneberger
Maxwell Schneberger
Kaitlyn Schneider
Aaron Schoenfeldt
Colleen Schuldeis
Robert Schultz
Lisa Sczechowski
Eli Seitz
Rachel Selina
Lauren Seroka
Jenna Sexton
Anthony Shaheen
Hannah Shaughnessy-Mogill
Dylan Shearer
William Sheehan
Ke Sheng
Tianqi Shen
Geon-Ah Shin
Louise Silverman
Petar Simic
Kaylah Simmons
Kylah Simmons
Kriti Singh
Kathryn Skinner
Emily Sklar
Claire Slaughter
Griffin Smalley
Colin Smith
David Smith
Grace Smith
Hayley Smith
Logan Smith
Sarah Smith
Maggie Sneideman
Cassandra Solis
Austin Sroczynski
Honora Stagner
Vethania Stavropoulos
Ernest Stech
Collin Steen
Marian Strauss
Savannah Stuart
Amanda Stutzman
Thomas Stuut
Michelle Sugimoto
Xin Sui
Caroline Sulich
Shang Sun
T
Emerson Talanda-Fisher
Kiyoto Tanemura
Aidan Tank
Emma Tardiff
Lauren Tartalone
Lilian Taylor
Karen Timm
Mary Tobin
Carolyn Topper
Alexander Townsend
Madeleine Tracey
Brooke Travis
Camila Trefftz
Dakota Trinka
Sydney Troost
Hassan Turk
U
Amanda Ullrick
Elizabeth Uribe
V
Asha Vadlamudi
David Vanderkloot
Caleb VanDyke
Kaela Van Til
Jessica Varana
Jordan Veillette
Elisia Venegas
Kierra Verdun
Rolf Verhagen Metman
Thomas Verville
James Villar
Anh-Tu Vu
W
Raoul Wadhwa
Jacob Waier
Alyssa Walker
Brigid Walkowski
Marley Walter
Ning Wang
Jacob Wasko
Connor Webb
Kenneth Weiss
John Wenger
Haley Wentz
Alexander Werder
Cameron Werner
Joseph Westerfield
Scott Wharam
Caitlyn Whitcomb
Elijah Wickline
Raphael Wieland
Abigail Wilcox
Carolyn Williams
Rachel Williams
Jordan Wiskur
Natalia Wohletz
Graham Wojtas
Camille Wood
Madeline Woods
Erika Worley
Lindsay Worthington
Kate Wynne
X
Anja Xheka
Cindy Xiao
Jie Xu
Jincheng Xu
Mingyue Xu
Some chemical reactions are simply impressive—the vibrant flash of light when magnesium is ignited or the blast and subsequent grains of salt that appear after mixing sodium metal and chlorine gas.
Equally impressive is the reaction to the chemistry major at Kalamazoo College in recent years.
Sixty-eight students—41 males and 27 females—declared chemistry as their major at Declaration of Major Day. The annual event, held the fifth week of winter quarter, requires sophomores to declare their majors, minors, and concentrations.
“Fifteen percent of the sophomore class [the class of 2017] chose chemistry,” says Laura Lowe Furge, the Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Professor of Chemistry and current chair of the department. “On a per capita basis, it probably makes K the largest chemistry program in the country.”
To accommodate the growth of chemistry majors, a new faculty member will join the department this fall, and additional classes and lab times have been added to the schedule, Furge explains.
“It’s a good problem for us to have,” she says.
Space, she admits, is an issue as labs and lecture halls in the 23-year-old Dow Science Center were built to house a much smaller student population. In 1998, for example, only six students at K graduated with a chemistry degree.
“We’ve had to make some allowances,” she says. “The hope is to eventually expand the building to provide additional lab space, classrooms, and faculty offices.”
While the number of recently declared majors is impressive, it is part of a growing trend. The class of 2016 includes 55 chemistry majors and this year’s senior class will graduate 30 students with degrees in chemistry.
According to Greg Slough, professor of chemistry, the faculty has worked to change the perception of difficulty associated with a chemistry major.
“We’re making chemistry doable for students,” Slough explains. “There is a real student focus among every faculty member. The students know that we’re here for them, we’re approachable, and we’re here to help when the work gets tough.”
Professor of Chemistry Jeffrey Bartz adds that the department’s deep commitment to evidence-based education has helped it evolve.
“Every class changes, every single year,” Bartz explains. “We’re not teaching students the same thing, the same way, year after year.”
One of those students is Bryan Lara, a sophomore from California, who selected chemistry on Declaration of Major Day.
“Every chemistry professor knows my name,” Lara says. “I’m not just a number. There is a real sense of community among the faculty and students.”
He adds that extracurricular chemistry activities such as the Dow Open, a miniature golf event held inside the Dow Science Center, the October 23 Mole Day celebration, and the annual Dow-B-Q help keep students engaged and excited about the major.
And if recent years are any indication, this excitement won’t be waning anytime soon. (Text by Erin Dominianni ’95)
Good ideas will be spread across (and via) Kalamazoo College this spring when a descendant of the popular TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) Talks series comes to campus as TEDxKalamazooCollege.
First-year student Tanush Jagdish, of Bangalore, India, is the main organizer of the inaugural event, to be held May 16, and thereafter (hopefully) to occur annually. Jagdish says he came up with the idea after being impressed with the cooperation and collaboration he saw between students and faculty at the College, in everything from research to planning campus events.
Concentrating on biology and chemistry, he is already working on high-level research in the lab of Dr. Michael Wollenberg, assistant professor of biology.
“Even as a first-year, I am already learning fantastic things,” Jagdish says. “I have been so impressed with the College. I figured, why not showcase K? Holding an event like this that is known worldwide will help to build the image of the school. A TED event is a great way to go about doing that.”
There are still some small details to be worked out, but the tentative theme for the talk is “Breaking Borders,” Jagdish says. The talk is to have nine speakers: two students, one alumnus, and six K faculty. Shannon Haupt ’16 will speak on “Fossil fuel divestment campaign as a model for a multi-issue, dynamic, and collective force for change.” The title of senior Tibin John’s talk is “Implications of computational simulation and dynamical systems theory for biomedical research.” Liberal arts polymath and ArtPrize finalistLadislav Hanka ’75 is “can’t miss” with “Collaborating with bees to produce works of art that explore and reflect the sublime quality of nature.”
Faculty presenters include:
• Tim Kailing (Biology)—Biological Principles and philosophies of instruction and education
• Jeanne Hess (Physical Education)—Sportuality: the transcendental power of blending sport, spirit, and education
• Jan Tobochnik (Physics)—Using computational models to display and predict wealth distribution
• Carol Anderson (Religion)—Exploring the relationship between religion, gender, and sexuality
• Jim Langeland (Biology)—Constructing advanced modelling techniques for understanding aspects of genetics, including chromosomal recombination
• Bob Batsell (Psychology)—Application of learning theories in helping cancer patients undergo chemotherapy
Jagdish saw that the College encouraged the cross-pollination of ideas between diverse academic disciplines, and he wanted to highlight this unique take on learning, he says. At K, he says, ideas are allowed to swirl and be discussed openly.
“The talk will focus on breaking the boundaries between the liberal arts and sciences,” he says. Speakers will discuss the environment, sustainability, the liberal arts, and other topics.
TEDx was created in the spirit of the mission of the popular TED Talk series, which is to promulgate ideas worth spreading.” TEDx supports independent organizers who want to create a TED-like event in their own community. Those interested in hosting a TEDx event must wade through a rigorous application process and climb a mountain of application material.
Jagdish submitted the application in December, and heard back in January with the go-ahead. It’s very rare for an institution of higher education to receive permission from the organization to host an event, he says.
“It usually takes long time to be granted a license to host a TEDx event. But I think they liked the idea of a small liberal arts college hosting a talk. It’s a very prestigious thing to be granted a license.”
Adding to Jagdish’s enthusiasm for the TEDx event is that the push to host it has been almost entirely student led. That autonomy, he says, highlights the faith and freedom College officials place in K students and is a testament to the culture of self-led learning that the College is so well-known for.
“It’s amazing, really,” he says. “I think it shows how the College is focused on building leadership skills in its students. I have already seen leadership develop among those students involved in organizing this event. Now, hopefully, the world can see what K is all about, too.” Text by Chris Killian
