Commencement 2008

Madeleine Albright Gives Commencement Address
Former United States Secretary of State Madeleine Albright delivered the 163rd Commencement address on June 7 to 259 graduates, urging students to have "the courage to confront the axis of evil -- arrogance, ignorance, and hate." Watch, listen to, or read Albright's speech.

Knox awarded honorary doctorates to Albright; Alan I. Leshner, chief executive officer of the American Association for the Advancement of Science; and Barry Bearak '71, Pulitzer Prize winning reporter for The New York Times. Read the transcripts of the honorary degree presentations.

"Knox may still be a small liberal arts school in Galesburg, Illinois, but it has always been so much more than that," said Matthew David Cessna '08, Senior Class speaker. "Knox is the mentor who never has time but always makes it. Knox is the student leader who even in the face of great adversity sticks with his or her own convictions. Knox is all the students who not only pour their heart out on the field or the courts or the theatre, but engage in thoughtful, intellectual discussions in and out of the classroom. The truth is, this list is never ending. Every one of us, along with those that came before us, has given of ourselves in one way or another to this great college." Watch, listen to, or read Cessna's speech.

Read more about Commencement 2008.

Photo courtesty of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Knox Brings Graduation to Student in St. Louis
Jessica Platt '08 underwent brain surgery last month after suffering seizures and a stroke during her last spring term at Knox. Platt will recover and was released from the hospital last Thursday, but was not yet well enough to make the trip to Galesburg for Commencement -- so Knox president Roger Taylor '63 decided to bring Commencement to her. Taylor was joined by faculty and staff members Donna Jurich, Carol St. Amant, Anne Taylor, and Anne Giffey, who made the trip to St. Louis and performed the ceremony with Platt and her family and friends last Monday. Read the story in the St. Louis Post Dispatch.

Three Students Awarded Fulbright Fellowships

Three graduating seniors at Knox College were awarded Fulbright Fellowships -- the nation's most prestigious awards for international postgraduate study.

Rebecca Ganster '08, who majored in integrated international studies and Spanish, was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to teach in Vietnam. Bethany Vittetoe '08, economics, will use her Fellowship to teach in South Korea. Myra Thompson '08, a creative writing and Russian major who also won first prize in this year's Nick Adams Short Story Competition, will combine fiction writing with study of contemporary Russia. Read more.

Athletics Wraps Up Stellar Season

It was quite a spring for the Prairie Fire. The baseball and men's golf teams won Midwest Conference championships and advanced to NCAA Division III Championship tournaments. David Marquardt won the MWC individual title and earned Second Team All-American honors with his 14th-place finish at the NCAA Men's Golf Championships. Knox had the MWC South Division Player of the Year in both baseball and softball with Paul Bennett and Katie Dura, respectively, bringing home the honors. Bennett was coached by South Division Coach of the Year Jami Isaacson. Read more.


A Note from the Editors

Meet Today's Knox Students
Didn't make it back to Homecoming this year? Missed your student phonathon call? Don't know any current Knox students but wonder what they're like? Well, now's your chance to find out! Take a few minutes to meet four current Knox students in this special online presentation.

And don't forget -- Knox ends its fundraising year at midnight on June 30. If you haven't given to Knox yet this year, please give today! Today's students appreciate your support.

Collegues, Friends, Family Remember Professor Brady
A memorial service for Professor Emeritus of English William E. Brady, who died March 9 at his home in Galesburg, was held in Kresge Auditorium on Sunday, June 8. More than 100 Knox faculty, staff, alumni, and friends, as well as members of Professor Brady's family, attended the moving service. Beginning with a slide show of photos set to poetry readings by Professor Brady, the service featured tributes from Brady's colleagues in the English department and concluded with memories from friends and family in the audience. It was a true celebration of one of Knox's most beloved professors. Read more about Professor Brady and listen to audio from the memorial service.

The English department, Knox alumni, and the family and friends of Professor Brady recently established the William E. Brady Fund in English Literature, which will honor each year the senior literature major with the best performance in senior seminar. Donate to the Brady fund.

 
Campus News 

Forbes and Kiplinger Ratings
A new college ranking published by Forbes magazine to "evaluate colleges on results" places Knox College 16th in the nation among more than 200 liberal arts colleges. The ranking is based on graduation rates, career success by graduates, and what students think of their professors. Read more about the Forbes Ranking.

Knox also recently earned recognition in Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine as one of the "100 Best Values in Private Colleges." Knox was ranked 47th among liberal arts colleges. Read more about the Kinplinger's Ranking.

College For Kids Comes to Campus
"Everything You Wanted to Know About Chocolate," "Egyptology and Egyptian Archaeology," and "School Never Tasted So Great" are just a few of the classes to be offered this year on the Knox College Campus through College for Kids, an enrichment program for gifted, high achieving, and talented students from Galesburg and the surrounding communities in third through eighth grades. A junior program for first and second graders is also being offered for the first time this year. 

Knox College for Kids is administered by Knox's educational studies department. Classes are taught by Knox College faculty or master teachers from local schools, with 10 Knox College students serving as teaching assistants. All classes have a well-defined focus, quality teaching, and will motivate students to strive for peak performance. Read more.

Photo of the current renovations to the Knox Bowl by John Heyer '68.

Knosher Bowl, Memorial Gym Construction Update
Renovations to the Knosher Bowl and Memorial Gym are continuing. The Memorial Gym floor has been completed, the bleachers are in, and wiring is currently being installed for the state-of-the-art sound system. See photos of the Memorial Gym renovation. In the Knosher Bowl, the north berm has been lowered, drainage work is complete, and bleachers are being installed for the home and visiting teams. See photos of the Knosher Bowl renovation.

More campus news and features.



Student News

Munoz '08 Makes Headway in Stroke Research
In the basement of the Sharvy G. Umbeck Science-Mathematics Center, with a researcher's logic and the perfectionism of a soon-to-be med student, Mark Munoz '08 is making waves in neuroscience -- and perhaps putting his research and Knox College on the scientific map. Munoz is using menthol to mimic hypothermia in reducing the brain damage caused by asystemic strokes. Read more.

Knox Students Mentor at Local Elementary Schools Through After-School Programs
Knox students worked with students at Galesburg's Cooke and Nielson Elementary Schools this year through the Reading Buddies and Adopt-a-Classroom programs. "Most of what they liked is just the individual interaction that they got from us," said Angela Zinn '10, a psychology major from Lawrence, Kansas. "We're not really grown-ups; we're young still. They just liked hanging out with us." The program culminated with a tour of campus. Read more about the tour of campus and the Cooke Elementary School mentoring program.

Robin Metz and members of his Hemingway class tour the press room of the Kansas City Star.

Hemingway Class Spurs Student Activities
During winter term, Robin Metz, director of Knox's program in creative writing, led his Hemingway class on a field trip to Kansas City, Misssouri. With the assistance of Steve Paul, visiting instructor in journalism, the group toured the new World War I Museum, The Kansas City Star, several art museums, various additional Hemingway haunts, and numerous jazz venues. Students from Metz's class, with the assistance of Kathleen Ridlon of the Center for Community Service, subsequently presented Hemingway papers to Galesburg audiences and led Hemingway book discussions with groups of Galesburg residents, especially senior citizens. They also interned for the "Big Read" project, an initiative of the National Endowment of the Arts to restore reading to the center of American culture, via the Galesburg Public Library. Class activities were supported by the Fellowes Fund.

Students Travel to Guatemala to Document Exploitation
First-year students Rosie Worthen and Vicky Daza traveled to Guatemala during spring term as part of Rights Action, a non-governmental human rights and emergency relief organization. The pair spent two days in Guatemala City before visiting four indigenous communities in western Guatemala that have fallen prey to exploitation by the Guatemalan government and foreign companies. Read more in The Knox Student.

More coverage of Knox students is available on the Knox news page.


Alumni News

Homecoming 2008 is Around the Corner!
Alumni and friends are invited to come home to Knox October 30 through November 2 for Homecoming 2008.
Don't miss your chance to attend classes with current Knox students, mingle at the "Taste of Galesburg" All-Class Reception, and cheer on the Prairie Fire football team.  View the schedule

Hotel rooms in Galesburg are moving fast -- be sure to make your reservations today. Find Homecoming accommodations.

Alumni Participate in Career Development Forum
Five Knox alumni participated in the John D. Carlin Career Development Forum on the Knox campus in May. The purpose of the forum was to introduce Knox students to possible career paths and to show how they can use their Knox education to reach their goals. Alumni who participated in the forum included Jean O. Anderson '87, founder and managing partner of Unconventional Wisdom, an organizational consulting firm in Chicago; Shavonna Kelley '99, product cost analyst for Apple iPod Business Team; James Lynch '97, director of major gifts at Knox; Presita May '97, assistant Cook County public defender; and Nalini Prakash Hart '03, transfer pricing senior associate for KPMG LLP Economic and Valuation Services.

Knox Education Leads to Jungles of Peru, Notre Dame Law School, and U.S. Department of Justice
When Brian Skaret '98 graduated from high school, he was sure he wanted to be a doctor. The Knox-Rush Early Admission Program seemed like the perfect fit. But once on campus, Knox opened doors that Skaret had never considered -- doors that led to the jungles of Peru, Notre Dame Law School, and -- eventually -- to the U.S. Department of Justice. Read more.

Read more alumni profiles.

New Knox Club to Meet During Homecoming
The Knox College Alumni Council approved the LGBTQ Knox Club as an official alumni club in June. The group plans to meet Homecoming weekend, Saturday, November 1, at 3 p.m. in the Human Rights Center. Alumni interested in joining the Club are encouraged to attend or contact alumni relations.

Alumni Notes

Thomas Kurtz '50 was featured in Wired.com as one of two Dartmouth professors who developed the BASIC computer language in 1964. Read more.

Franklin Gustine '60 was the grand marshal for the Memorial Day parade in Galesburg, Illinois. Read more.

Mike Lawrence '64, a longtime Statehouse reporter and later press secretary to Jim Edgar in the offices of secretary of state and governor, will retire as director of the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University on November 1. Read more.

Ed Novak '69 is the new head of the Arizona Bar.

Scott Boyden '72 was promoted to senior vice president, retail banking manager at F&M Bank in Galesburg, Illinois. He previously held the position of vice president, retail banking manager.

The film adaptation of Diminished Capacity, based on a  novel by Sherwood Kiraly '72, will be released in July. Kiraly also wrote the movie's screenplay. Read more.

Barbara Baird '73 has been named a fellow of the American Academy of  Arts and Science.

Carol Vreeland '77 has been named associate director of William Rand Kenan, Jr. Library of Veterinary Medicine. Read more.

Kent Streed '80 is working as a costume designer at the Pendragon Theatre in Saranac, New York. Read more.

Cynthia A. Babington '81 was named vice president for student services at DePauw University. Babington, who joined the DePauw administration in 1993, remains dean of students at the University. Read more.

Anna Leahy '88, currently on the English faculty at North Central College, has taken a position at Chapman University in California teaching in their undergrad and MFA programs.

Kymberly Harris '90 is in two films recently screened at the Alliance Francaise. Read more.

The essay "Late-Night Chitlins with Mama" by Audrey Petty '90 was printed in Saveur magazine and was chosen for inclusion in Best Food Writing 2006. Read more.

Craig S. Owens '91 has been appointed the new city manager for Clayton, Missouri. Read more.

Tom Rethman '92 was named the new head coach of the Briar Cliff University football program. His previous position was offensive co-coordinator at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh. Read more.

An autobiographical exhibit by Anissa Lewis '96 was displayed at UC Clermont in Florence, Kentucky, in April.  The exhibit depicts Lewis' life experiences through printmaking and painting. Read more.

Ginger Pennington Das Gupta '97 co-authored research that was recently covered by an ABC News article about last minute Valentine's Day shopper's propensity to spend more. Read more.

Kate Tummelson '97 performed in InFusion Theatre Company's production of Intrigue with Faye at The Royal George Theatre in Chicago. Read more.

The Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation has announced the selection of 29 Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellows for 2008.  Among them is Bonnie Laughlin-Schultz '98, a Ph.D. candidate in history at Indiana University.

Gwendolyn Prellwitz '99 has been appointed director of The American Library Association Office for Diversity. Read more.

Mark Halx '01, a Ph.D. student in Educational Policy and Planning at the University of Texas, Austin, was recently published in The Journal of College Student Development and Radical Pedagogy.

Katie Rich '02 was recently named one of the "Top 10 Women Under 30 To Watch" by the Chicago Sun-Times for her work with The Second City and in television and film. She continues to tour all over the country with The Second City and recently finished a tour around the world performing Second City's reviews in places like Portugal, Turkey, and Egypt.

Sylvie Davidson '06 performed in Book-It Repertory Theatre's current production, The Highest Tide.  Read more.

Mary Kiolbasa '06 received the Jacob K. Javits Fellowship from the U.S. Department of Education for graduate school.

Read and post Class Notes in the Knox Online Community.



Faculty & Staff News

Knox Honors Whitlatch at Retirement
Knox faculty, staff, students, and alumni honored Seeley Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Theatre Robert Whitlatch at a reception in his honor last month on the stage of Harbach Theatre, where he has directed more than 50 plays in his four decades at Knox. In addition to courses in acting, directing, and theatre history, Whitlatch taught for many years in Knox's interdisciplinary First-Year Preceptorial Program. "Preceptorial prompted a lot of cross-disciplinary conversations among faculty," Whitlatch says. "Psychology, biology, economics, anthropology -- we were finding commonalities in our points of view." Read more.

St. Amant Awarded Lifetime Achievement Award
Carol St. Amant, lecturer of anthropology and sociology, was recently awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award by the NASW (National Association of Social Workers) Peoria District, at a special luncheon held in her honor at Bradley University. The Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes individuals who have achieved stellar success in their social work careers and whose work has "enhanced the profession, supported clients, upheld social work values and advocated for  the betterment of all people." Read more in The Knox Student.

A Passage to India Receives Rave Reviews
In addition to a national preview article in American Theatre magazine, Vitalist Theatre's A Passage to India has received extensive coverage from Chicago's print and broadcast media and a JEFF Award recommendation, Chicago's preeminent theatre tribute.  Knox's link to Vitalist's 10-year history in Chicago -- via Knox faculty, alumni, and students -- was noted in the Chicago Sun–Times and on the "Chicago Tonight" broadcast of WTTW, Channel 11. Knox faculty and alumni who have received specific mention in reviews include Professor of Theatre Elizabeth Carlin-Metz, director; Associate Professor of Theatre Craig Choma '93, set design; Rachel Sypniewski '01, costume design; and Philip Sidney Post Professor of English Robin Metz, designer the 2D-3D art installation "Ganga Passes." 

Jim Lynch '97 Joins Advancement Office
Jim Lynch '97 has been named director of major gifts at Knox College. Before coming to Knox, Lynch worked in development for Evanston Northwestern Healthcare Foundation and Children's Memorial Foundation. He was also director of alumni relations and annual giving at St. Ignatius College Prep in Chicago.

Knox Wins "Healthiest Company" Award
Knox has been named one of the 48 "Healthiest Companies in America" out of more than 1,000 companies evaluated by the College's health management program. Interactive Health Solutions (IHS) of Arlington Heights selected Knox and the other winners on the basis of data gathered in 2006 and 2007 from more than one-million participating employees and their spouses. Knox's award came in the "Most Improved" category, which recognizes companies whose participating employees made the greatest overall improvement in their scores from 2006 to 2007.

Faculty & Staff Notes

Associate Professor of Theatre Neil Blackadder's translation from German of Rebekka Kricheldorf's The Ballad of the Pine Tree Killer was published in The Mercurian, a new electronic journal devoted to drama translation. Neil also published a performance review in Theatre Journal of two productions at London's National Theatre directed by Katie Mitchell.

Several papers by David Bunde, assistant professor of computer science, recently appeared at conferences and in journals around the country. His paper "Average Rate Speed Scaling," written in collaboration with researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and IBM Research, was presented at the 8th Latin American Theoretical Informatics Symposium. Bunde also gave a talk on this topic at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon, in March. He also had two papers appear in the mathematics journals Congressus Numerantium and the Journal of Graph Theory. Both were produced jointly with researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Andy Civettini, assistant professor of political science and international relations, presented a paper, "The Role of Affect in Structuring Political Information Search," at the April 2008 meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association in Chicago, Illinois.

Rodney Davis and Douglas Wilson, co-directors of the Lincoln Studies Center, participated in a panel on the Lincoln-Douglas debates at the annual symposium of the Abraham Lincoln Institute in Washington, DC.

Sarah Day-O'Connell, assistant professor of music, presented her paper "Femininity and the Heart of a Frog: Fragmented Bodies in Haydn's English Songs" at the 2008 meeting of the American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies in Portland, Oregon.

Athletic Director Chad Eisele '93 was appointed to the NCAA Division III Football Committee. During his four-year term of service, he will oversee the conduct of the NCAA football championship and oversee playing rules within the conference.

Nancy Eberhardt, professor of anthropology, presented a paper, "Stepping in the Same River Twice? Re-Studies of a Shan Community in Northern Thailand" as part of a specially sponsored panel on longitudinal research at the annual meeting of the Association for Asian Studies.

Gregory Gilbert, associate professor of art, delivered the paper "Televisual Experience and Montage in the Early Art of Robert Rauschenberg" at the 35th annual Midwest Art History Society conference. He also delivered a lecture "Andy Warhol in Context: Pop Art and American Culture" at the Figge Art Museum in Davenport, Iowa, where he serves on the art history advisory panel.

A biography of Robert Hellenga, George Appleton Lawrence Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of English, has been published in the March issue of Current Biography. Hellenga will be a visiting professor at the University of Verona for six weeks in spring 2009.

L. Sue Hulett, professor of political science, presented a paper, "Elections, Evangelicals, and Culture Wars" to the 2008 meeting of the Western Political Science Association in San Diego.

Tim Kasser, associate professor of psychology, recently presented at two workshops and gave one talk at the 2008 Campaign for a Commercial-free Childhood Summit held in Brookline, Massachussetts. One workshop was conducted with Tim Rairdon '08, among others.  The article "Adult attachment and psychological well-being in cancer caregivers: The mediational role of spouses' motives for caregiving," co-authored by Kasser and other researchers, was published in the journal Health Psychology. Kasser also gave talks on his research at  the first conference for the Society for the Study of Motivation in Chicago; the 2008 Early Child Care Mini-conference at Clinton Community College in Clinton, Iowa; and the new economics foundation's conference "Do Good Lives Have to Cost the Earth?" in Pocantico Hills, New York.

"The Raccoon in the Wall," a short story by Cynthia Lewis Kitchen '00, lecturer in creative writing, appears in the current issue of Minnetonka Review.  

Frank McAndrew, Cornelia H. Dudley Professor of Psychology, gave a talk on the evolutionary psychology of gossip at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida. In addition, an article coauthored by McAndrew, Tim Kasser, and Jennifer Klinesmith '05 has been included as a chapter in Readings in Social Psychology: General, Classic, and Contemporary Selections (7th Ed.). The original article appeared in the journal Psychological Science in 2006.

Robin Metz, direcctor of Knox's program in creative writing, completed the 2D-3D art installation 'Ganga Passes' for Vitalist Theatre's critically acclaimed Chicago production of A Passage to India. The installation, Metz's fourth for Vitalist, included some 150 of his photographs from India and Nepal, where he was American Poet in Residence last summer. Metz recently recorded his poetry for E-Poetry Network International, Chicago, and for the David Ray Poetry Archives, University of Chicago. He was an invited 'feature poet' at the Green Mill Jazz Club in Chicago and at the Poetry Connection in River Forest, the latter sponsored by the Chicago literary journals After Hours and Fifth Wednesday. He wrote the introduction for the memoir/travel book Are You Famous?: Touring America with Alaska's Fiddling Poet by American troubadour poet Ken Waldman. Metz's poem "Syndrome, continued from page 1," winner of the 2007 Literal Latte International Poetry Prize, was selected for the anthology Fifteen Years of Literal Latte.

Two articles by Charles Schulz, professor of physics, and his collaborators at the University of Notre Dame were recently published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society and in Inorganic Chemistry.

Peter Schwartzman, associate professor of environmental studies, recently gave a presentation at the Preparing Students for Responsible Citizenship Workshop held at Beloit College.

"Especially Roosevelt," a story by Chad Simpson, assistant professor of English, appeared in the April 2008 issue of The Sun Magazine. Simpson's essay "Home of the Poor and Unknown" appeared in a recent issue of Barrelhouse; his short story "Summer of Skin," appears in the May/June 2008 issue of The Rambler; and his flash fiction "Rail City" appeared in the March 2008 issue of 5_Trope, an online literary magazine.

Alex Varakin, assistant professor of psychology, had a paper published in the most recent issue of The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology. The paper was co-authored with  Daniel T. Levin of Vanderbilt University. 

Douglas Wilson, co-director of the Lincoln Studies Center, had an essay on Abraham Lincoln's law practice published in the current issue of Humanities magazine. He was also recently honored by North Central College as the 2007-08 Park National Bank Leadership Fellow. And in May, Wilson and Joseph Ellis, professor of history at Mount Holyoke College, talked on Minnesota Public Radio about how understanding of the The Declaration of Independence has evolved over time. Listen to the program.



Contact Us
Submissions to The Gizmogram should be made to the editors at gizmogram@knox.edu. Submissions may be edited for space.

Editors
Megan Scott '96  & Cheri Siebken

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