Olivia DrakeSeveral Wesleyan students enjoyed lunch outdoors for the first time this spring on April 3. Temperatures reached 56 degrees. (Photos by Olivia Drake) (more…)
Lauren RubensteinIn this issue of The Wesleyan Connection, we speak with Mike Robinson, assistant professor of psychology, assistant professor of neuroscience and behavior, who joined the faculty in January. Q: Welcome to Wesleyan, Professor Robinson! Please fill us in on your life up to now. A: I was born and grew up in France, in the west suburbs of Paris, but my parents are both British, so that makes me bi-national and bilingual. I went to high school in France and decided to go to university to study neuroscience at the University of Sussex in the U.K. Then I went to…
In this issue of The Wesleyan Connection, we speak with Joaquin Benares ’15, who recently was awarded a Patricelli Center for Social Entrepreneurship Seed Grant for his project, Boundless Updated Knowledge Offline (BUKO). BUKO uses an electronic bookshelf (Raspberry Pi powered server) to bring video lectures, e-textbooks and other educational tools to Philippine public schools to supplement their (sometimes nonexistent) libraries, teaching aids and contact time with teachers. Q: Where did you grow up and how did you end up coming to Wesleyan? A: I was born and raised in Manila, the capital of the Philippines. I attended high school…
The Office of Human Resources reported the following new hires, advancements and transitions, and departures for March 2014. Newly hired Courtney Becher joined the Corporate Foundation and Government Grants Office as an assistant director on March 17. Edwin Flynn joined Physical Plant as a boiler tender in the Central Power Plant on March 10. Advancements and transitions Lisa Sacks became assistant director of curricular initiatives on March 1. Departures Rosanna Carabelas, administrative assistant of the Wesleyan Fund. Jonathan Connary, area coordinator in Residential Life.
Kate CarlisleIn recognition of Wesleyan’s commitment to equity and inclusion, A Better Chance Foundation will present President Michael Roth with its 2014 Benjamin E. Mays Award. Named for the famed civil rights pioneer, the Mays award is presented annually to a leader in education who individually and with their institution demonstrate a clear commitment to diversifying higher education. "I'm deeply honored to be recognized by A Better Chance,” Roth said. “The Wesleyan community has been enriched by the students who come to us through the foundation.” The foundation’s mission is to increase substantially the number of well-educated young people of color…
Kari Weil, University Professor of Letters, delivered a keynote address on “Animal Studies: The Ends of Empathy and Beginnings of Reading” at a "Why do Animal Studies?" conference April 3-4 at the University of Chicago. During the conference, scholars discussed "What is it that draws a multiplicity of voices into this conversation, and how can they productively engage with one another? Why has this field of inquiry gained such traction in recent decades? How is Animal Studies taking shape as a field that overlaps multiple discourses and disciplines, and what opportunities or difficulties arise as a result? How do different methodologies clarify or substantiate one another, fill knowledge…
Four staff from Information Technology Services and one student spoke at the NorthEast Regional Computing Program (NERCOMP) Annual Conference held in Providence, R.I. on March 26. Karen Warren, director of user and technical services for Information Technology Services, led a poster session on "The Best thing to Ever Happen at Wesleyan: Justifying and Sustaining LyndaCampus." Warren explained the successes of Wesleyan's LyndaCampus implementation backed by usage data statistics, cost comparisons, and a description of the cross-departmental approach used to garner support campus-wide. The poster featured quotes and anecdotes from Wesleyan student users underscoring the benefits of the campus (versus a limited)…
Professor of Economics Richard Grossman gave a public lecture about his book, WRONG: Nine Economic Policy Disasters and What We Can Learn From Them, at the Center for Economic Studies/Institute for Economic Research at Munich University on April 7. He delivered the talk in German. More information about the Munich Seminars is here. The book was published in November 2013 by Oxford University Press. A video of the lecture is available here.
Michael Roberts, professor and chair of the Classical Studies Department, presented a paper titled, “Venantius Fortunatus on Poetry and Song,” at the annual meeting of the International Society for Late Antique Literary Studies at Brown University, Oct. 31-Nov. 2, 2013. He also spoke at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign on March 21 on “Pompatic Poetics: Claudian’s Epithalamium for Honorius and Maria and Some Features of Late Latin Poetry.” Roberts also is the Robert Rich Professor of Latin and professor of medieval studies.
Professor of Religion Peter Gottschalk is the author of an op-ed published April 17 in The Los Angeles Times on the history of religious intolerance in the U.S. Responding to recent shootings near Jewish community centers in Kansas, in which three people were killed, Gottschalk writes that though the incident "seems at first glance like a disparaged past flaring briefly into the present," in fact religiously motivated violence is alive and well in the U.S. Gottschalk walks readers through a history of religious intolerance from the country's earliest days, and traces the various forms the KKK has taken over the years. He…
David LowSue Guiney ’77 has published her second novel, Out of the Ruins (Ward Wood Publishing). At the beginning of the book, a Cambodian doctor is frustrated that the poor women in his country are dying needlessly. He reaches out to friends to help him create a new clinic for the local villages around Siem Reap’s world famous temples, and they answer his call. An Irishman, Dr Diarmuid, arrives with his English assistant, Dr. Gemma, and a Canadian administrator Mr. Fred. Together they establish a place where poor women of Cambodia can find the basic care that so much of the…
Natalie Robichaud ’14Avery Esdaile ’00 started his new job as athletic director for Boston Public Schools on Monday, April 14. Before his recent transition, Esdaile spent 12 years in the Wellesley College Athletic Department. Ken Still, the former athletic director for Boston Public Schools, retired in October, leaving the schools without an AD for much of the fall and the entire winter season. Esdaile, with a degree in sociology from Wesleyan and a master’s of science in management of sports industries from the University of New Haven, says he is looking forward to being “in a position to hopefully down the line develop…