All News – Page 26

Each year at Commencement, Wesleyan University recognizes three outstanding faculty members with the awarding of the Binswanger Prizes for Excellence in Teaching. The University announces that this year’s recipients are Matthew Garrett, associate professor of English; A. Meredith Hughes, associate professor of astronomy; and Tushar Irani, associate professor of philosophy and Letters. Underscoring Wesleyan’s commitment to its scholar-teachers, these annual prizes are made possible by gifts from the family of the late Frank G. Binswanger Sr., Hon’85. Recipients are chosen each spring by a committee composed of faculty and members of the Alumni Association Executive Committee based upon strong recommendations…

President Michael S. Roth ’78 spoke about “Safe Enough Spaces” and their place in the debate around free speech at a symposium on Speech and Expression on College Campuses at Skidmore College on April 15. President Roth wrote a book review of “The Age of Guilt: The Super Ego in the Online World” by Mark Edmundson for The Washington Post. The book examines online judgementalism through a Freudian lens, Roth writes. He called Edmundson’s writing “engaging” with a “friendly yet incisive” tone. The Chronicle of Higher Education’s The Review newsletter quoted a tweet from Roth in a piece about scholars…

Students from the “Dance as Activism” course this spring will perform a new movement piece based on excerpts from Shapiro-Silverberg Distinguished Writer in Residence Mahogany L. Browne‘s poetry collection “Chrome Valley” at Lincoln Center in New York on September 9. Their performance, called “Movement Through The Valley,” received its first showing in the Bessie Schönberg Dance Studio April 14. The “Dance as Activism” course is taught by Assistant Professor of the Practice in Dance and African American Studies Joya Powell. On May 8, the class will share individual projects—solos and duets, and a workshop—in conversation with social issues of their…

Art, like many areas of creative expression, does not always get the full attention it deserves. On average, visitors only spend 15 to 30 seconds looking at an artwork before moving on, according to studies done by several notable art museums. Peter Ketels Fulweiler ’23 said hearing this statistic fascinated him and made him want to create art that kept people’s attention. He exhibited his senior thesis piece “Terms and Conditions,” an interactive sculpture, at the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery on March 28 to April 2. And yet, 15 to 30 seconds would seem long for many to view…

By Maia Bronfman '24 Seven students at different stages in their startups delivered pitches to potential partners and funders on Friday, April 14, at Beckham Hall during the Patricelli Center’s New Venture Awards Finalist Showcase hosted by Interim Director Ahmed Badr. “The public showcase of the New Venture Awards is a key priority of the Patricelli Center, as it presents an opportunity for students to introduce their work to the larger campus community, as well as alumni working across sectors. The gathering kicks off a series of engagements between students and alumni, and is always followed by new friendships, mentorships,…

By amplifying the personal experience of women in Jamaica who are living with HIV/AIDS, Nilukshi Chen ’23 hopes to explore the rampant fear and stigma surround the disease in the island nation. Chen interviewed four women for her senior thesis on the stigma surrounding HIV and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) in Jamaica. Her thesis, titled “Sounding Subaltern Voices: Conversations with Jamaican Women Living with HIV/AIDS,” considers Spivak’s “Can the Subaltern Speak” to grapple with what it means give a voice to individuals who have been historically voiceless. The term “subaltern” refers to an individual or group who is excluded from…

A team of Wesleyan students won "Best Data Story" at the 6th Annual Wesleyan DataFest hosted by the Quantitative Analysis Center April 21 through April 23. The Wesleyan team, called “Team Into the Tidyverse,” consisted of Ethan Brill-Cass ‘23, Aaron Foote ‘24, Calvin Gao ‘23, Edvin Tran Hoac ‘24, and Emma Tuhabonye ‘23. In addition to the Wesleyan squad, teams from Yale University, Connnecticut College, Trinity College, University of Connecticut, and Bentley University, encompassing 55 students, participated in the event. In addition to Wesleyan’s honor, Connecticut College was given honorable mention, University of Connecticut was recognized for best statistical insight, and Bentley…

A collection of Wesleyan's seniors gathered on the steps of Olin Memorial Library on April 19 to celebrate the submission of their senior theses with a champagne shower. Smiling faces, hugs between friends, and cries of joy and relief fluttered through the air alongside the popped corks and bubbly.

Michael Greenberg ’76, P’14 is one of three winners of the Lundbeck Foundation’s The Brain Prize 2023—the largest personal award for neuroscience research—for his contributions to the field. Greenberg, the Nathan Marsh Pusey Professor of Neurobiology at Harvard Medical School, said it was “very gratifying” for his life’s work to be recognized by neuroscientists at the highest level. He has spent more than four decades researching the brain, specifically neuroplasticity—the ability of the brain to change in response to learning, experience, or following injury. “It's also been gratifying to see the work come to fruition in ways that we think…

Keleki Logoh ’23 lived in Togo, located in West Africa, until she was seven years old. In 2021, she went back home for the first time since she was a little girl. “I was shocked by the state of the country,” Logoh said. Food scarcity was an issue since over 60 percent of the citizens experienced moderate to severe food insecurity. Imported vegetables were expensive. People had trouble balancing financial burdens with feeding their families. Just a few months later, Logoh was back at Wesleyan going down an internet rabbit hole of videos of different kinds of farming techniques. When…

For Eugene Gato Nsengamungu ’23, his homeland of Rwanda is everything. Guided by the example of his late father, a soldier who fiercely loved his country, it’s only natural that when Nsengamungu thinks of a problem to be solved, he thinks of how he can do so back home. “This is a spirit I got from my dad,” he said. Nsengamungu, a Government and Physics major, was recently awarded a Davis Project for Peace grant from the Patricelli Center for Social Entrepreneurship to create the Rwanda Youth Tech Informants (RYTI) project, a program that will equip high school students in…

In this continuing series, we review alumni books and offer a selection for those in search of knowledge, insight, and inspiration. The volumes, sent to us by alumni, are forwarded to Olin Library as donations to the University’s collection and made available to the Wesleyan community. In honor of Poetry Month, this edition of YJHTRT features chapbooks and collections in verse that investigate grief, language, and the human condition. Ian Boyden ’95, A Forest of Names: 108 Meditations (Wesleyan University Press, 2020) When an 8.0 magnitude earthquake leveled China’s western Sichuan province in May 2008, tens of thousands of people…

2023 Binswanger Prizes for Excellence in Teaching Announced

Wesleyan in the News: May 2023

‘Dance as Activism’ Students Create Movements to Poems from Browne’s ‘Chrome Valley’

Senior Thesis: Peter Ketels Fulweiler ’23 Comments on AI and Surveillance with Sculpture

Three Students Win Patricelli Center New Venture Awards

Senior Thesis: Chen ’23 Studies HIV/AIDS and STD Stigma in Jamaica

Wesleyan Team Wins ‘Best Data Story’ at 6th Annual DataFest

Gallery: Wesleyan Seniors Celebrate Thesis Submissions

Michael Greenberg ’76, P’14 Wins The Brain Prize 2023 for Neuroscience Research

Logoh ’23 to Start Up Aquaponics Farm in Togo

2023 Davis Project for Peace to Improve Technology Access in Rwanda

“You Just Have to Read This…” Books by Wesleyan Authors Boyden ’95, Schafer ’85, and Yankelevich ’95