Mike SembosFebruary 12, 20143min
Last summer, history and government major Shannon Welch ’14 was an intern at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. She was paging documents at the Center for Legislative Archives when she stumbled across a little known and disturbing proposed constitutional amendment on the books in her home state of Maryland. “I came upon this 13th amendment that was making slavery institutionalized for the rest of time,” she said. “The federal government could never touch it. Then I found a document that Maryland had ratified it, and I was shocked. They let me keep researching, and I found out that Maryland had…

Kate CarlisleFebruary 12, 20143min
Historians will tell you that the past can often have a direct and profound effect on the present age.  Take Magda Teter, for example. A scholarly probe into post-Reformation Europe recently led the professor of history and director of Jewish Studies at Wesleyan to an event that may have changed the course of Jewish and Christian relations in Poland. “This is how scholars can sometimes play a role in getting people to talk to each other,” she said. “It didn’t start that way, but that was the good result.” Sandomierz, a sleepy Renaissance town in southeast Poland, (now known in…

Olivia DrakeFebruary 12, 20142min
Wesleyan's Patricelli Center for Social Entrepreneurship announced the finalists for its 2014 PCSE Seed Grant Competition. These $5,000 awards are intended to fund the launch or early stage growth of a Wesleyan-connected social enterprise, project, program or venture. Last year’s winners used the seed funding to launch a grant-funded community supported agriculture effort in Middletown, work with incarcerated youth in Chicago, advocate for farmers’ working conditions in Bali, and scale up the MINDS Foundation and Maji Safi Group, two Wesleyan-borne social enterprises. This year’s finalists will pitch their projects at a public event from noon to 1 p.m. Feb. 28…

Brian KattenFebruary 12, 20145min
The Wesleyan spring sports season gets off and running  March 1 when men's and women's lacrosse begin NESCAC play against Hamilton, the men on the road and the women at home. The men are coming off a 13-5, Little Three champion season with a wealth of talent returning, earning the squad the no. 16 spot in the USILA preseason Division III national poll. Women's lacrosse will be looking to stake a claim in the always tough NESCAC under interim head coach Amanda Belichick as six opponent squads are ranked among the top 15 nationally in the preseason. Also looking to…