Olivia DrakeQ&As with outstanding students is an occasional feature of The Wesleyan Connection. This issue we speak with Konnie Dominguez from the Class of 2015. Q: Konnie, what are you planning on majoring in and why? A: I'm planning on majoring in biology. With a bachelors in biology, I can continue to pursue a career in biological anthropology, specifically in paleoanthropology, the study of human fossils. I've had at least one class in science ever since the sixth grade and this year, I had three - biology, chemistry and neuroscience! Q: Are you involved in any extracurricular activities? A: Most of my free time, when…
Wesleyan's Center for the Arts announces the creation of the Madhu Reddy Endowed Fund for Indian Music and Dance at Wesleyan University. Reddy, a real estate agent with William Raveis based in Glastonbury, Conn., established the fund with a pledge of $100,000. During a ceremony on Dec. 14, Reddy presented an initial check for $50,000 to Pamela Tatge, director of the Center for the Arts, and David Nelson, artist in residence. “For more than 50 years, Wesleyan’s Music and Dance Departments and the Center for the Arts have been presenting the music and dance of India to the campus and…
Four Physical Plant-Facilities staff received a Cardinal Achievement Award in December. They are: Mike Conte, assistant director of mechanical trades; Dean Canalia, plumbing shop foreperson; Sean Kane, utility mechanic; and Philip Cotharin, temperature controls mechanic and EMS specialist. The staff members were honored for demonstrating extraordinary initiative or providing outstanding service with regard to specific tasks in their department. This special honor comes with a $150 award and reflects the university’s gratitude for those extra efforts. The award recipients are nominated by department chairs and supervisors. Nominations can be made anytime throughout the year. For more information or to nominate…
This spring, the Wesleyan Institute for Lifelong Learning (WILL) will host courses on opinion writing, Shakespeare's history plays under Elizabeth I, the basics of personal finance, experiencing eldership, exploring the Housatonic Valley and Middletown's architectural heritage. Now in its fifth semester, WILL's objective is to use the talents of current and retired faculty and qualified community members to present a set of short, intellectually stimulating and lively courses to the Wesleyan community and area residents. These courses are offered at minimal cost, are not part of a degree-granting program, and are designed to offer topics of particular interest to members of the…
Wesleyan alumni helped their communities by participating in the WEServe Week of Service, Jan. 20-26. Alumni all over the country worked side-by-side with fellow alumni, students, families and friends on special projects. WEServe follows the National Day of Service on Jan. 19, and honors Martin Luther King, Jr. Day on Jan. 21. "The concept was uniquely translatable to geographic areas of all sizes; unlike some of our events which require a critical mass to be successful, these community service projects could engage alumni, parents, and students in cities or towns with as few as one or two people from Wesleyan,"…
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Bill FisherOn Dec. 28, 2012 Wesleyan's Physical Plant-Facilities staff scheduled a power-generation test at Wesleyan's Central Power Plant. The team forced a campus-wide power outage to test and refine an "island mode" process to power critical loads on campus by running the natural gas-fired co-generation equipment without any synchronization with the local electrical utility. Wesleyan performed this test under controlled circumstances with a team of technicians, engineers and electricians on site to develop procedures that will be implemented during an emergency with a much smaller staff of campus operations personnel. (more…)
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Brian KattenThree Wesleyan women's soccer players, two of whom are graduates of Newtown (Conn.) High School, took part in Soccer Night in Newtown Jan. 7 as Newtown continued to heal from the tragic incident at Sandy Hook Elementary School Dec. 14. Team quad-captain Jen Brewer '13 of Sandy Hook, Conn. and Madeline Keane '16 of Newtown, Conn. were joined by Kaylin Berger '13 of Farmington, Conn., at the Newtown Youth Academy Sports and Fitness Center for the festivities. Nearly 50 major professional soccer players, including Major League Soccer (MLS) stars Landon Donovan and Kenny Cooper, women's national team standouts Kristine Lilly,…
Krishna Winston, the Marcus L. Taft Professor of German Language and Literature, will attend a translators working meeting with Günter Grass Feb. 10-14 in Lübeck, Germany. Grass, 85, is novelist, poet, playwright, artist and sculptor. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1999. Winston has translated several of Grass's works, including his 1990 diary, From Germany to Germany, which was published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in November 2012. This will be Winston's fourth meeting with Grass and fellow translators. The group will focus the discussion on Grass's poetry, autobiographical writings and artwork. "It's a pretty special thing when translators can sit down with the author for several…
Lauren RubensteinThe New York Times on Jan. 25 published an op-ed by Andrew Curran, dean of the arts and humanities and professor of romance languages and literature, on the legacy of Enlightenment era philosopher and novelist Denis Diderot. Curran writes of Diderot: "His message was of intellectual emancipation from received authorities — be they religious, political or societal — and always in the interest of the common good. More so than the deists Voltaire and Rousseau, Diderot embodied the most progressive wing of Enlightenment thought, a position that stemmed from his belief that skepticism in all matters was 'the first step toward truth.'…