The Wesleyan Connection

Wesleyan played Williams during the Homecoming football game Nov. 7 in Corwin Stadium.

More than 5,000 parents, alumni and friends came to campus Nov. 6-8 to celebrate Homecoming/Family Weekend. This year’s theme was “Come Home!” Event photos are posted on the HCFW website.

“Every year, I hear from alumni, parents and students that Homecoming/Family Weekend gets better and better,” says Gemma Fontanella Ebstein, associate vice president for external relations. “We had a terrific turnout this year and the energy was palpable across campus – in the WESeminars, athletic contests, department anniversary celebrations and other special gatherings throughout the weekend. This has become one of the highlights of the year for the Wesleyan community.”

The weekend began Friday, Nov. 6 with tours of campus, sessions for parents, department open houses, the Athletics Hall of Fame ceremony and dinner, an all-campus dinner, a concert by Eilen Jewell and the Sacred Shakers, a fall senior thesis dance concert and several WESeminars. Interactive and inspiring, WESeminars provide opportunities to revisit the classroom and attend presentations by scholars, pundits, and other experts in their fields.

The College of Letters and the College of Social Studies both held their 50th Anniversary celebrations.

Prometheus, Wesleyan's student fire-dancing group, performed on Foss Hill Nov. 6 during Homecoming/Family Weekend.

On Saturday, Nov. 7, campus guests attended the annual Where on Earth are We Going? Symposium, rowing instructions with Wesleyan’s crew team, a family swim, WESeminars on dance, study abroad projects, the history of Wesleyan, and international journalism.

Deana Hutson, director of events, estimates that 5,000 fans showed up for tailgating, the homecoming football game and the NESCAC men’s soccer semi-finals. The day wrapped up with several other athletic events, a community bike ride, the Dwight L. Greene Symposium, the Reed Labyrinth Opening and a concert with Amy Crawford ‘95.

A Fall Harvest Bruch and the Alumni Association Executive Committee meeting kicked off events on Sunday, Nov. 8. The day also included a legacy gathering and photo of current students posting with parents or grandparents that are Wesleyan alumni, a celebration of Western Art Music and a student A Capella Concert.

Alumni who are parents and grandparents of current first-year students gathered on Denison Terrace for a legacy photograph Nov. 8.

Gabriela De Golia ‘13 spent the event-filled weekend with her parents, Jim De Golia and Terri Hanagan of San Francisco; her uncle, Jose Hanagan of Reno, Nevada; and her brother, Nicolas, who goes to high school in France. Together, the family saw the Wesleyan screening of Matt Tyrnauer ‘91 Valentino: The Last Emperor, attended the Labyrinth opening in honor of Joe and Kit Reed, the Amy Crawford concert on Saturday night,  a panel discussion on how parents can help students achieve academic success, a lecture on the role of public opinion in foreign policy, the Homecoming football, soccer and ice hockey games and swimming meet. In addition, Hanagan P’13 worked as a parent volunteer at Usdan University Center.

“It was a wonderful opportunity to meet many other parents, a great many of them new (as I am) to Wesleyan,” Hanagan says. “I also met many of Gabriela’s new friends and colleagues, which was especially important to me. It gave me a great sense of comfort to see that she has so many kind, fun and intelligent new friends.”

Homecoming/Family Weekend was Nov. 6-8.

President Michael Roth also led a Sunday morning address to parents. He laid out his near and long term views for enhancing the overall student and academic experience at Wesleyan, making a strong case for the benefits of the entire Wesleyan experience and the need to provide increased financial aid to those strong candidates for admission whose ability to become members the student body would be prevented due to lack of financial means.

“As a person who has seen firsthand the benefits that my children have gained from being routine exposure to diversity on virtually all levels and all types, I found particularly attractive his passion for increasing the geographic and other diversity of the student body and for more effectively removing financial barriers to attending Wes,” De Golia P’ 13 says.

Lauren Valentino '10 taught French to rising 9th graders as part of the Breakthrough Collaborative in Denver, Colo.

For 12 weeks last summer, Lauren Valentino ’10 taught underprivileged rising 9th graders how to speak French and read Hamlet – all while most of her students were still learning English as a second language.

Valentino was in Denver, Colo, working with residents who had recently moved to the U.S. from Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Eritrea, Kenya, Mexico and Columbia, to name a few.

“One student was a refugee from the Ivory Coast and had no formal schooling until three years ago,” says Valentino, a sociology and French major. “He was one of my brightest kids.”

Valentino keeps in touch with Teo, pictured, through e-mail. Teo, a student from Mexico, wants to study sports medicine.

As a student-teacher working at the Breakthrough Collaborative location in Denver, Valentino, who is from Charlotte, N.C., had the opportunity to work with high-potential, low-income middle school students. More than 80 percent of Breakthrough student alumni are accepted to college preparatory programs.

Valentino applied for the highly selective student-teaching internship while studying abroad in France during the spring 2009 semester. From May 31 through mid-August, she worked 11-hour days, excluding time devoted to lesson planning.

The teachers also shared lunch and playtime with their students.

“Most of the students will be the first person in their family to go to college,” says Valentino, who also mentors a student through the North End Action Team. “They value education. They have perspectives about education that most public school children don’t have.”

Christine Capeless, executive director of Breakthrough Denver, says more than 135 applicants applied teaching spots last fall. Of those, 65 were interviewed. Valentino was one of only 15 students to be selected as a Breakthrough teacher.

Valentino taught Omar, who is from Kenya and wants to return there after his education to be a nurse.

“Our competition is highly competitive,” Capeless says. “The ideal teacher at Breakthrough comes from an academically rigorous high school or college, is passionate and dedicated to education has an understanding of urban youth and education and would like to pursue a career in education. We really evaluate the entire applicant as match to our program, students and community. ”

In addition to teaching the rigorous summer sessions, Valentino and fellow teachers were expected act as liaisons between the school and students. They made weekly calls to parents to inform them about their child’s progress.

“It was very challenging to make these calls, because many of the parents didn’t speak English,” Valentino says. “Fortunately some of the teachers spoke other languages, so I could call parents and speak French to them, and other teachers could call and speak Spanish.”

Valentino helped set-up an informational guide about the different types of colleges, and ran a seminar on college and career planning. She’d play games with the students, and hosted a “Tour de France” race for the French class. Winners were awarded yellow t-shirts adorned with puff-paint.

“My students were so fun to teach. It was effortless because they loved learning so much,” Valentino says. “Especially with French, they were like sponges. I’d walk down the hall and hear a couple students reciting the months in French. They loved learning, and we ran the program with the intention that learning is fun and it’s OK to be smart.”

Valentino taught Abdul, a student who immigrated to the U.S. from Afghanistan one year ago.

She also had the opportunity to connect with Wesleyan alumnus Dave Bryson ‘99, who is a teacher network specialist at the Breakthrough Collaborative in San Francisco. Bryson supports the National Program Team in recruiting, training, and building an alumni network of Breakthrough Teachers.

Valentino, who is writing her senior thesis on internships, is applying for a 2010-11 English Teaching Assistantship through the French and U.S. governments. Afterwards, she plans on attending graduate school and becoming a sociology professor – at Wesleyan.

“Breakthrough allowed me to have a classroom teaching experience while interacting with a population that I wouldn’t have contact with otherwise,” Valentino says. “I think about my students every day. They have changed my life and I feel lucky to have had the opportunity to hopefully change theirs.”

Wesleyan has launched its new online look with a completely redesigned homepage.

The new, image-rich homepage, http://www.wesleyan.edu/, offers rotating photographs of campus life, university factoids and departmental highlights that change when the page is reloaded. The most noticeable change to the new homepage is the open layout that emphasizes information, facilitates navigation, and refocuses content for Wesleyan’s primary target audiences, including prospective students, their parents and external users.

Under the images are recent headlines, upcoming events and title selections from a new, open access Community Blog. All members of the Wesleyan community can author a post, and anyone can comment on a post.

“Everyone at Wesleyan is invited to join in the conversation on the Community Blog,” says Web Redesign Team member Mark Bailey, director of strategic communications. “Many provided great ideas and expressed the hope that we all will use it to bring faculty, student and alumni news to the attention of homepage readers. Only your participation can make the Blog a distinctive online space that reflects Wesleyan life and achievements.”

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Ethan Kleinberg researched the origins of the Wesleyan "College Plan" in 1959 and published an article on the challenges facing interdisciplinary programs. (Photo by Cora Lautze '11)

As the College of Letters (COL) celebrates its 50^th anniversary, we asked Ethan Kleinberg, associate professor of history and letters, director of the COL, about his life in two departments, his views on interdisciplinary teaching, how this impacts his own scholarship, and the future of the COL.

Q. How did you end up with a joint appointment in the College of Letters and History Department?

EK: As an undergraduate at U.C. Berkeley I created my own curriculum combining philosophy, history and religion as a “Humanities Field Major.” In graduate school at UCLA I combined work in History and Comparative Literature and served as a graduate fellow at the U.C. Humanities research Institute at U.C. Irvine where I also studied with Jacques Derrida. When I received a Fulbright to conduct research in Paris it was as a “philosopher.” When I saw the job description for a joint appointment between a History department and an interdisciplinary major that combined literature, philosophy and history and I said to my wife “this job is me!!!” I was overjoyed when I got the call offering me the position. How many other Professors get to teach Frantz Fanon’s Black Skin, White Mask one day and Milton’s Paradise Lost the next?

Q. Has this given you a new perspective on the academic disciplines and interdisciplinarity?

EK: The challenges and rewards of a life in two departments forced me to think about the parameters of the historical discipline as well as to appreciate the different sorts of questions asked by philosophers, or literary scholars. Beyond this, the responsibilities of serving as Director of the College of Letters led me to research the origins of the Wesleyan “College Plan” in 1959 and then to publish an article on the challenges facing interdisciplinary programs and departments in the 21^st century. Wesleyan still stands at the fore of interdisciplinary teaching and scholarship, but we have to improve the ways that we provide our interdisciplinary programs and departments support without sacrificing the disciplines that ground them.

Q: Has your intellectual work been altered by your appointment?

EK: I feel that the support and interest of my colleagues in the History Department have allowed me to develop as an historian even as I branch out into areas such as critical theory and the philosophy of history. I have been an editor for the Wesleyan based journal History and Theory, also celebrating its 50^th year, since my arrival at Wesleyan and this has been a source of both joy and inspiration. Then of course there are the realities of teaching in the College of Letters.  In any given year I could be teaching texts of antiquity, the middle ages, the early modern, or the modern and in most cases I teach alongside a scholar from another discipline. The joy of this endeavor is that I am always learning alongside and often from the students.

Q.  What projects are you working on currently?

Alexander Nehamas, professor of humanities at Princeton University, delivered the COL 50th Anniversary Philip Hallie Memorial Lecture Nov. 6 in Memorial Chapel. His talk was titled "Because It Was He, Because It Was I: The Good of Friendship."

I have two projects on the front burner right now. The first is a book on the Talmudic Lectures that the French-Jewish philosopher Emmanuel Levinas presented in Paris between 1960 and 1990. This book explores the role and place of the author and authority in intellectual production but also the tense relation between religious belief and historical interpretation. The other project is focused on the utility of employing deconstruction for the writing of history. This project came about as a result of research into the relationship of Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida that just seemed to click while I teaching a class on Derrida for my 20^th century intellectual history class. This led me to write an article entitled “Haunting History: Deconstruction and the Spirit of Revision” for History and Theory. I am looking forward to completing this book while serving as Director of the Vassar-Wesleyan Paris Program next year.

EK: This is a tough one. A bit of speculative history I suppose.  While I can’t say with any certainty what the academic trends will look like in 50 years I do know that structure of the College of Letters is such that it will be able to move and thrive with the times. At our recent 50th anniversary celebration dinner I was amazed by the ways that the class of 1959 and the class of 2009 were able to come together around a shared experience and a shared body of texts. To be sure the interpretations differed but the COL experience of cultivating the educated imagination, the ability to think individually but discuss collectively, allowed all of our alums to immediately connect across the generations.

Cecilia Miller, associate professor of history, co-chair and tutor in the College of Social Studies; Richard Adelstein, professor of economics and tutor in the College of Social Studies; and Brian Fay, the William Griffin Professor of Philosophy, tutor in the College of Social Studies and editor of History and Theory, gather at the College of Social Studies 50th Anniversary lecture Nov. 6.

From its beginnings in 1959, Wesleyan’s College of Social Studies (CSS) has grown into a well-respected program and is celebrating its 50th year in 2009. The multidisciplinary program allows students to explore the subjects of government, history, economics and philosophy concurrently. Many attended lectures and celebrations for CSS during Homecoming/Family Weekend last weekend.

The first event of the weekend was a CSS Public Lecture by John Goldberg (CSS 1983, professor of Law, Harvard Law School) on Friday, Nov.  6. His talk was titled “John Locke on Tort Reform (Really!): A CSS Parable.”  John Goldberg was introduced by Brian Fay, the William Griffin professor of philosophy. Richard Adelstein, professor of economics, gave the response.

Peter Kilby, professor of economics, emeritus, chaired a CSS Alum Speaker Panel on CSS Entrepreneurs on Saturday, Nov. 7. The panelists included Steve Torok ‘73, Donald Zilkha ‘73, Lincoln Frank ‘79, and Jonathan Bush ‘93. A second Alum Speaker Panel, on International Affairs, was chaired by Andrew Crawford ‘97, and included panelists Bob Hunter ‘62, John Stremlau ‘66, Carl Robichaud ‘99 and Michael Brotchner ‘95.

“What impressed me the most was the way in which speaker after speaker mentioned, with specific examples, how the method of study in the CSS continued to profoundly shape the way they handled their jobs in their subsequent career, whether it be a public defender or a venture capitalist,” said Peter Rutland, Colin and Nancy Campbell Professor in Global Issues and Democratic Thought and CSS Co-Chair, who attended the event.

“Skills such as being able to write quickly and clearly; and to see many sides of a problem, and integrate them in a single analysis served CSS students well after graduation,” he recounts.

Along with Fay, Adelstein, Kilby (who retired last year), and Rutland, core professors in the CSS within the past 20 years include Cecilia Miller, associate professor of history and CSS Co-Chair; Bill Barber, Andrews Professor of Economics, Emeritus; the late David Titus, professor of government, Emeritus; David Morgan, professor of history, Emeritus; Don Moon, Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Professor in the College of Social Studies and professor of government; Nancy Schwartz, professor of government; Giulio Gallarotti, professor of government; Gil Skillman, chair and professor of economics; Joyce Jacobsen, Andrews Professor of Economics; and Erik Grimmer-Solem, associate professor of history and director of the Public Affairs Center.

According to the program description, the College of Social Studies “was created in the belief that the various social studies can best be pursed together, rather than in isolation, and that the student will better understand the subject matter and the nature of each discipline by considering it in its relation to the other disciplines, and to develop a sense of methodological criticism supported by work in philosophy.”

Former Wesleyan President Victor Butterfield crafted the plan for the CSS along with the College of Letters (also celebrating 50 years) and the College of Quantitative Studies, which disbanded in the 1960’s. Butterfield believed strongly in the importance of interdisciplinary studies.

“The curriculum stresses fundamental techniques of analysis in economics, history, and government, as well as their application in the subject matter of those fields. Precision in writing and speaking is stressed in essays and class work. A number of lectures and seminars provide a sense of community that balances the educational aspect of the College,” the program description states.

Throughout the years, CSS has produced more than 930 graduates including John Driscoll, who currently works as the University Relations Alumni Director. Driscoll graduated from Wesleyan in class of 1962 and was a member of the very first CSS class.

“In the beginning the CSS was the unstructured part of Wesleyan,” Driscoll says. “The ‘normal’ parts of Wesleyan were filled with requirements, grades, and regular tests. That may seem odd today, but then we were looked on with a mixture of curiosity, envy and resentment because while others were sweating through the regular grind, we weren’t. At least not in the same way. We were “free” of the superficial preoccupation with grades; we could focus on learning for its own sake. And for us the ability to focus on one tutorial for ten weeks along with a colloquium on epistemology each week was true liberation.”

CSS graduates have gone on to excel in a range of fields, including government service, law, business, the arts and even medicine. CSS graduates have also been well represented on the Wesleyan Board of Trustees, and in recent years the Board has included four or more CSS alumni.

Majora Carter '88 delivered the keynote address at the Dwight L. Greene Symposium Nov. 7.

Majora Carter ’88 delivered the keynote address titled “Green the Ghetto and How Much It Won’t Cost Us” during the 17th Annual Dwight L. Greene Symposium Nov. 7 in Memorial Chapel.

Carter is the founder of Sustainable South Bronx and River Heroes, host of Eco-Heroes on Sundance Channel and The Promised Land on National Public Radio.

Carter founded and led Sustainable South Bronx from 2001 to 2008, and is currently president of her own economic development consulting group.

The well-received presentation was preceded by Wesleyan President Michael Roth’s announcement of the College of the Environment.

The symposium, held in honor of Dwight L. Greene ’70, began in 1993 as a memorial to his life and work as a professor of law, mentor and friend to many.

The symposium was sponsored by the Wesleyan Black Alumni Council, the Alumni of Color  Network and the Robert Schumann Lecture Series in the Environmental Studies Program.

Bill Blakemore '65, an ABC News Correspondent, will speak on "The Many Psychologies of Global Warming," during a talk at 8 p.m. Nov. 3 in Memorial Chapel.

Four weeks before the nations meet in Copenhagen to try to avert the catastrophes that global warming may bring, ABC News Correspondent William Blakemore ’65 will identify many surprising psychological factors at play as people in all walks of life deal with the latest “hard news” on climate.

Blakemore will speak on “The Many Psychologies of Global Warming,” during a talk at 8 p.m. Nov. 3 in Memorial Chapel.

He’ll explore new definitions of sanity that may pertain, and give examples displaying different “psychologies, as well as manmade global warming’s place in “the long history of narcissistic insults to humanity itself.”

Two new time-line graphs of rapid and dangerous climate change will give fresh global context to the psychological challenges and experiences he has observed in the five years since he began focusing on global warming for ABC News.

Computer modelers trying to project the speed and severity of global warming’s advance often say that “the biggest unknown” in their equations is not data about ice or atmosphere, carbon or clouds, but “what the humans will do.” This talk probes that field and many states of mind already engaged.

The talk is sponsored by the Wasch Center for Retired Faculty, Department of Psychology, and the Robert Schumann Lecture Series in the Environmental Studies Program.

A follow-up discussion will be held at 4 p.m. Nov. 4 in the Wasch Center on Lawn Ave.

Patrick Osborne, executive director of the Whitney R. Harris World Ecology Center at the University of Missouri - St. Louis, will speak on climate change during the Where on Earth Are We Going symposium Nov. 7.

During the last 50 years, humans have degraded rivers and lakes through excessive water abstraction, pollution and by over-harvesting aquatic organisms. River flow has been impeded by dams, and floodplains have been converted for agriculture and urban areas.

The human population has doubled to nearly 7 billion and, per capita water availability has declined on all continents. During the past 50 years, global climate change has further impacted water resources.

On Nov. 7, three climate experts will speak on “Global Environmental Change And Freshwater Resources: Hope For The Best Or Change To Prepare For The Worst?” during the annual Where On Earth Are We Going? Symposium. The event is sponsored by the Robert Schumann Lecture Series in the Environmental Studies Program.

At 9 a.m., Patrick L. Osborne, executive director of the Harris World Ecology Center at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, will look at ways climate change and global warming have altered river and lake function and the water resources on which humans rely. He has 30 years experience in tropical ecology research, education and environmental consultancy and was the head of the biology department at the University of Papua New Guinea and deputy director of the Water Research Center at the University of Western Sydney in Australia.

At 10:15 a.m., Frank H. McCormick, program manager of Air, Water and Aquatic Environments at the Rocky Mountain Research Station, (more…)

Mary Alice Haddad says that the election of the Democratic Party of Japan, and more particularly the relegation of the long-dominant Liberal Democratic Party to opposition status, promises to shake up long-standing political patterns in that country. (Photo by Stefan Weinberger '10)

The candidate for issue’s “5 Questions with…” is Mary Alice Haddad, assistant professor of government, assistant professor of East Asian studies. She provides some insight into the recent, dramatic change in the Japanese government.

Q: What are your primary areas of study and research?

MAH: My primary area of research has been on civil society and democracy with a focus on Japan. I am beginning a new research project on environmental politics in East Asia. I am particularly interested in the ways that local politics around environmental issues can lead toward greater citizen participation in democratic as well as nondemocratic countries.

Q: How did you become interested in these areas?

MAH: I have been fascinated by the differences in the ways that Japanese and Americans experience democracy in different ways in their local communities and what that means for our broader understandings of democracy and democratic development.

Q: How significant are the recent changes in the Japanese government?

MAH: Extremely significant. Japanese politics has been undergoing profound transformation over the past two decades, and the election of the (more…)

Max Nussenbaum '12 was a contestant on the Oct. 7-8 episodes of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? He answered nine of the 15 questions correctly and walked away with $15,000.

Under beaming spotlights and surrounded by video cameras and an audience holding their breath in anticipation, Max Nussenbaum ’12 pondered a single question: “What is the one-word title of the 2009 book whose subtitle is “A History of the Propitious Esculent“?

A. Nitrogen, B. Penicillin, C. Potato or D. Gold.

“Obviously I have no idea … I feel like it would be something kind of funny, like a potato. That would be a clever title to a book,” said Nussenbaum during a recent episode of Who Wants to be a Millionaire?

After using two “lifelines” on the popular television quiz show, Nussenbaum, of Newtown, Mass., went with his gut: “C. Potato. Final answer.”

“He got it right! Max took a big chance, a big, big chance. He’s is the top dog right now,” shouted show host Meredith Vieira. “You’re a gambler and boy did it pay off.”

Trivia buff Nussenbaum, an undeclared major exploring degree options in English and government, received $15,000 in total prize money from answering nine of the 15 questions correctly. His show was taped on Sept. 6 and aired Oct. 7 and 8.

Nussenbaum confidently buzzed through the game’s first four questions on Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, Wacky Wafers alarm clocks, the expression “kit and caboodle,” and the Kansas City Chiefs’ Arrowhead Stadium. He won $5,000 after using the ask-the-audience lifeline, on (more…)