Around the Block

Deploying ‘Kenny the Robot’ to Make Remote Connections

By Leah Veldhuisen ’19

You never know when you might need a little help from a… robot? CC is known for its small class sizes and strong connections between professors and students. However, there are occasionally times when someone can’t physically make it to class. Associate Professor of History Jane Murphy called on Kenny the Robot in this exact situation when Maddie Bodell ’20 couldn’t make it to one day of Murphy’s History of Medicine class during Block 6.

Kenny is an iPad attached to a wheeled, mobile base that can be remotely controlled and maneuvered by the user. Users are also able to control Kenny’s line of sight. Kenny’s ability to be remotely controlled was particularly handy when Bodell couldn’t be in the classroom for an integral day of Murphy’s class. For this course especially, the classroom community and participation were important. Murphy says, “writing intensive classes are capped at 12 students and we exchange drafts of work throughout the block… You need to trust people to share your writing drafts with them — that participation in a process is a large part of the work we all do.”

On the day Bodell had to miss, Murphy had arranged to Skype in with Nancy Bristow, CC history alumna and professor of history at the University of Puget Sound, who authored “American Pandemic: The Lost Worlds of the 1918 Influenza Epidemic.” The discussion about Bristow’s research and the students’ research “was our final element of the course and not something I could make up later,” Murphy adds. Via Kenny, Bodell was able to engage in the discussion with Bristow and her classmates.

“Kenny enhanced my learning experience by allowing me to participate in a class discussion in a more natural way when I couldn’t physically be present. It was fun having more of a presence than just a computer screen,” Bodell explains. Additionally, the day she missed was the day of the “bomb cyclone” spring blizzard right before Spring Break, and she was able to direct Kenny to the window to see the storm. “I could move him around since he was on wheels and I could use my computer keys to control his movement. He’s actually pretty fast,” she adds.

Murphy says, “We are fortunate to do most of our teaching face-to-face, in a context in which we have gotten to know and trust one another.” She says she sees Kenny’s potential to enable further classroom participation when a student cannot be in class.

Contact the ITS Solutions Center if you have an opportunity to use Kenny in your class: (719) 389-6449.

CC Climbing Team Prepares For Nationals

By Miriam Brown ’21

Apparently, Colorado College’s climbing team has never heard of the “sophomore slump.”

In just their second year of existence, the team finished third at the regional championships in Denver, with only a quarter of the competitors brought by rivals University of Colorado Boulder and Colorado State University. Two of CC’s climbers, Claire Bresnan ’19and Rin Gentry ’19, were named regional champions in their respective categories. Of CC’s 11 competitors, seven will be headed to the National championships in Murfreesboro, Tenn., April 26-27.

Instead of having a hired coach, the team is led by three of their athletes who double as coaches: Katherine Hade ’22, William Abbey ’22, and Emily Barga ’21. Captain Zach Levy ’21credits their leadership as having been crucial to their success thus far.

“This year our team has a group of students who are extremely devoted to bettering their climbing and training to prepare themselves the best they can for this climbing season,” Levy said. “A lot of our success can be attributed to the student coaches who have stepped up this year to lead the team and guide our athletes down a successful path.”

The team holds simultaneous practices three days a week at three different climbing gyms, using workout regimens designed by Hade, Abbey, and Barga to test their strength and conditioning. They try difficult boulders and timed workouts to simulate a competition environment and to prepare themselves for anything they might face at nationals. The competition at nationals will be steep, but Levy thinks they’re prepared.

“We are very excited to be heading to Tennessee over the first weekend of Block 8 and can’t wait to see what nationals has in store for us,” he says.

It’s a Home Run: Faculty and Staff Build Connections on the Field

By Leah Veldhuisen ’19

Professor Emeritus of History Bill Hochman’s legacy continues not only in the classroom, but also on the softball field. Hochman started and coached the faculty and staff intramural softball team in 1955 and they continue to play every spring.

Heather Stapish, payroll manager, has been on the team since 1999 and is also the current captain. She was appointed by Hochman two years ago when it became more difficult for him to make it to the games. Stapish enjoys carrying on Hochman’s legacy of the team, and says “He loved this sport and he LOVED this team.”

Associate Professor of English Steven Hayward has been on the team for the entire 10 years he has worked at CC, and says “I joined on the advice of Susan Ashley, who was then dean of the college. She said I’d love it and she was right.” The team plays against student intramural teams, allowing for more connections between students, staff, and faculty outside of the classroom. “It’s great to meet your students outside of the classroom and compete; it’s a wonderful, sort of secret, campus community,” Hayward says.

Stapish adds that she enjoys being around the students, which is also what led Hochman to start the team originally. Additionally, many of the staff and faculty have been on the team for years, and Hayward explains that these friendships are the best part of being on the team. Relationships built on the faculty and staff team continue off the field, as Hayward reminisces:

“My nickname on the team is Hammer, given to me initially by Professor (Peter) Wright in the Religion Department and then adopted by Bill Hochman. One time there was a faculty meeting at which I made a particularly contentious point that Hochman agreed with. He stood up to say so. ‘Hammer’s right,’ he said. No one knew who he was talking about, but it’s in the minutes of the meeting.”

Games are played on Armstrong West Quad, Tava Quad, and Tutt Science Quad. View the schedule and find out how you can get in on the action.

Tutt Library Wins AIA/ALA Library Building Award

By: Miriam Brown ’21

After its reopening in 2017, Tutt Library became a symbol of Colorado College’s core values: intellectual curiosity, environmental sustainability, innovation, and collaboration. The library’s renovations were so transformational to its relationship with the campus that it is receiving national recognition, as one of six libraries awarded with this year’s American Institute of Architects/American Library Association Library Building Award for the best library architecture and design.

According to Library Director JoAnn Jacoby, Tutt Library was such a competitive candidate in part because it was “built for the block,” designed to maximize flexibility for students. The renovation more than doubled its seating capacity, and rooms throughout the building can transform from a classroom to a conference room to a study room to match the community’s needs. Additionally, technologically rich spaces such as the GIS Lab, DataViz Wall, and Tech Sandbox make it a hot spot for cross-disciplinary collaboration. Today, the library averages around 1,800 visits each day, and 43 percent of faculty report that they visit the library more than before the renovation because of the “open and inviting spaces.”

Tutt Library is also uniquely representative of CC’s sense of place. It reflects the college’s commitment to environmental sustainability, as the largest academic library to be a carbon-neutral, net-zero energy facility. Throughout the building, there are windows and terraces to give visitors a view of Pikes Peak, and the outside of the building is decorated to reference locally mined red sandstone.

“We now have a reimagined library that is as adaptable, nimble, and innovative as our students and that was built to sustain the academic rigor and intensity of CC’s pioneering Block Plan,” says Jacoby. “We got the award, I think, in part because of how well the transformation aligns with our mission and unique identity, so in that sense, the award calls attention not just to this particular building, but what it represents about our community.”

Celebrating Destruction: Amaury Bargioni ’19 Creates Mural on Demolition Site

By: Miriam Brown ’21

Amaury Bargioni ’19 has been painting a mural on the side of the Whitney Electric Building for the last two blocks. Soon, it will all be destroyed, and he can’t wait.

The Whitney Electric Building, located behind Wooglin’s Deli on North Tejon Street, is one of many buildings that will be knocked down to make room for the new Robson Arena. Most students don’t know the building by its name, but instead by its colorfully painted walls and long history with Colorado College artist-activists.

In 2014, the CC InterDisciplinary Experimental Arts program commissioned Pueblo artist Jaque Fragua to paint a mural on the north side of the building, as part of an exhibition entitled “Rhythm Nations: Transnational Hip Hop In the Gallery, in the Street, and on the Stage.” For his part, Fragua painted rug patterns from different Native American tribes, commenting on the inability for many to see distinctions between tribes. On the top, he painted bar codes to express frustration with feeling like “just a census number” in the United States.

In addition, murals on the east side of the building were painted by Mike 360, a street artist working in Albuquerque, as part of a collaboration with Assistant Professor of Race, Ethnicity, and Migration Studies Jamal Ratchford’s class on hip hop culture during the 2016-17 academic year. The murals stayed on the Whitney Building over the years — until now.

When Bargioni and members of the Art Department heard about plans for the building’s demolition, they saw an opportunity to turn the destruction into a celebration, all while honoring the building’s history with Fragua and his use of graffiti art for social commentary.

“People are mad about the hockey arena, and they’re mad about the buildings being taken down,” Bargioni says. “So I guess the project was born from the aim to make it not a problem that it’s being taken down, but more like it’s a good thing.”

The mural, titled the “Wall of Negativity,” will feature objects, ideas, and concepts that CC students want to see disappear from the community. Bargioni took the first turn, painting enlarged images of chains and a gun. The mural spans two walls, designed to look like one cohesive image from a distance. The walls are currently painted black, but members of the CC community will be invited to paint what they want to be rid of in white.

When the building is knocked down, Bargioni hopes to document its demolition along with the destruction of the Wall of Negativity, serving as a ritual cleansing of the CC community.

CC students, faculty, and staff can participate by painting on the mural on Sunday, April 14, from 1-5 p.m. at the Whitney Building. Supplies will be provided.

“I’d love for people to show up,” Bargioni says.

Accolades for Mary Margaret Alvarado’s “On Memory With No Devices”

By Leah Veldhuisen ’19

While CC’s Thesis Specialist Mia (as she is known) Alvarado has published much of her writing, including poetry and nonfiction, in magazines and journals including The Boston Review, The Kenyon Review, VQR, and Outside, her recent essay is particularly exciting: It has been named a finalist for “Best of the Net” honors and selected to be published in an upcoming print anthology, Omnibus!. The essay, titled “On Memory With No Devices,” was selected by president and publisher of Farrar, Straus and Giroux Jonathan Galassi to be part of this anthology.

Alvarado says the idea for this essay is “part of a long-time obsession with what is a machine, and who are we among them?” It is also part of a series of lyrical essays Alvarado has written about the digital revolution that comprise a book-length manuscript, “They Say This Thing Works.” She adds, “I also wrote it to console myself; as I often write; and to revisit that girl that I once was, and offer her some mercy.” The themes of memory and technology have been interesting to Alvarado since before “On Memory With No Devices,” as she says, “I am interested by the degree to which we are outsourcing the very act of thinking, and the many arts and practices of memory.” Additionally, she says “I am interested by how we remember, and what; how a self-mutates in time; how nations and peoples create or erase memories; and by how domestic technologies, like, say, a letter, can form a whole life.”

The inclusion of this essay in Omnibus!is exciting and humbling for Alvarado, as she loves and admires the work of Farrar, Straus and Giroux. “It is an honor for Galassi to have read and then to recommend this writing,” she explains.

Alvarado’s essay can be found on the Cagibi website: https://cagibilit.com/on-memory-with-no-devices/.

Women’s Skate Club Pushes for Inclusion in Male-Dominated Scene

ByMiriam Brown ’21

Jane Hatfield ’22 taught herself how to skateboard at age 10. Though she has been passionate about it ever since, she has never had very many female role models to look up to in the male-dominated sport.

When she came to Colorado College, she started a girls’ skateboarding club to give female students a pressure-free space to learn and connect. The club already has around 50 members, and most are just now learning how to skate.

“Skateboarding is a sport and culture dominated by males,” Hatfield says, “but we hope to make it accessible to girls as a form of expression, exercise, and a life-long hobby.”

Hatfield noticed a similar need in the greater Colorado Springs community. After receiving a mini-grant from the Collaborative for Community Engagement and William P. Dean Memorial Fund, the club formed a relationship with the YMCA’s after-school program for middle school students.

Together, the students had discussions about what it means to be a role model, citing examples of female leaders in the skating world and writing thank you letters to each of their role models. They held a class to introduce the kids to skating and used grant money to purchase skateboards and helmets for them to spray paint, decorate, and design.

In the future, Hatfield wants to expand the club’s reach even further around Colorado Springs. She hopes for the skate club to host an “All Girls’ Skate” at Monument Skatepark, to give lessons at other schools throughout District 11, and to increase their presence on CC’s campus through film showings and guest speakers.

“I think the [most rewarding] thing has just been getting to see and experience joy and a love of skateboarding with a group of rad, artistic, and motivated middle schoolers,” Hatfield says. “It’s been amazing for us all to develop close friendships grounded on the foundations of skateboarding and art, across differences in age, ability, and other identities.”

Students can join Hatfield and the skateboarding club at 7:15 p.m. on Tuesdays outside of the Tutt Science building for on-campus skate lessons; no experience or gear are necessary.

The Well Campaign is Here for You

The Well Campaign is a new initiative from the CC Wellness Resource Center that seeks to promote awareness that wellness and well-being mean something different to everyone. As CC strives to become a more equitable and inclusive campus and continues to implement the Equity in Mental Health Framework as part of the JED Campus Project, it is important to continue broadening understandings of what wellness means.

The Well Campaignpromotes holistic well-being as a process that is different foreveryone and invites members of the campus community to participate. The campaign builds on the holistic model of wellness to highlight five practices that help facilitate well-being: engage, relate, care, reflect, and rest.

WRC Paraprof Celia Palmer ’16printed posters in the Press at CC corresponding to the five terms; start looking out for those around campus. In addition to the posters, the WRC will be sharing photos in which CC community members hold one of the posters and comment on what the given term means to them. The posters also direct viewers to the WRC webpagefor mental health resources and tips for reflecting on your own well-being. The more people who participate, the more diverse and meaningful the campaign will be, so reach out to Celia (cpalmer@coloradocollege.edu) if you’re interested!

By engaging students, faculty, and staff from across the CC community and asking them to share the ways they practice and promote well-being in their own lives. Some of the terms (rest, reflect) are more personal and others are more social (engage, relate), but each involves vulnerability, self-awareness, communication, and an emphasis on growth.

CC’s Nordic Skiers Compete in Nationals

By Leah Veldhuisen ’19

This season, the CC Nordic Ski Team had a handful of students heading to the U.S. Collegiate Ski and Snowboard Association Nationals at Snow King Mountain in Jackson Hole, Wyoming for the first time ever. Ines Siepmann ’19, Maddie Strasser ’21, Oliver Jones ’20, and Benjamin Swift ’21all qualified for the event, and Laurel Sullivan ’21andSarah Packard ’21will be joining to complete a relay team. Sullivan is a co-captain of the team, and says “the Nordic season was incredibly successful and we are excited to be able to send our first group of skiers to nationals.”

Sullivan explains that participation as a member of the team is accessible to all CC students, as “we are able to provide gear for any skier on the team, allowing the team to remain open and accessible to people with little to no Nordic skiing experience.” As a club sport, they receive some funding from the school, but also rely on donations to keep the team running smoothly, and are solely student-led. Twenty-three students raced for the team this year, seven of which were first-years or transfers, and 13 were able to take advantage of the provided ski gear.

To qualify for nationals, skiers must “attend at least two races of each style (classic and skate), and at least one of these races must be fast enough to fall below a certain threshold.” Sullivan adds that “this is the first year we have been able to send any of our skiers to nationals, primarily for scheduling reasons. We are excited to take part in nationals and join some of the best Division II skiers in the country in a beautiful place.” The team has enjoyed all the snow that has fallen in Colorado Springs this winter, and they are continuing their twice-weekly dry land strength and technique practices in the lead-up to nationals. “Our main goal is to get there and enjoy the experience! We’re excited to meet more teams and compete in a new environment,” Sullivan says.

Upon returning from nationals, Sullivan says it was quite successful. “We skied in four different events, the trails were beautiful, and we got to ski with teams from all over the country,” she explains. Additionally, Swift made it to the quarter finals for the skate sprints, the women’s relay team placed ninth in the nation, and all athletes who went to Wyoming were either First- or Second-Team Scholar All-Americans. “There is a strong community within Nordic skiing and we felt very lucky to be a part of it,” Sullivan says.

Get to Know Allen Bertsche: Director of Global Education

By Ritik Shrestha ’22

In January, Allen Bertsche joined CC as director of global education, a role that aims to expand on the college’s emphasis on cultural exchange. He says he’s excited to become a part of the campus and to help give CC students the chance to expand their horizons through international travel. Here is your chance to get to know Bertsche as he shares his experiences as well as his goals.

What is the main way your position will impact students at CC?As the new director of global education, I am involved in all international exchange on campus. This means that I work to bring international students to Colorado Springs as well as send our own students on study abroad trips. A big part of my job is putting together budgets and programs so that our students have places to go on their study abroad trips as well as the financial backing to make said trips possible. I will also play a role in selecting mentors and processing applications and visas for international student orientation, and the global scholar’s program.

What is your professional and educational background before CC?
I was born in Long Island, New York, but I decided to travel halfway across the country to Indiana University for my undergraduate schooling. I majored in Spanish with a focus on Latin American Studies, and I spent my entire senior year abroad in Spain. I then went to the University of Wisconsin to get a master’s degree in Spanish literature which I then followed by going back to Spain to work as an English teacher. Finally, I came back to the University of Wisconsin to finish my schooling by getting a Ph.D. in Spanish literature. After I finished my studies I joined Augustana College in 1996 to become a Spanish professor. I taught all sorts of courses but I wanted to have a bigger role in promoting cultural exchange. In 2006, I switched roles and started to work in the college’s Office of International Programs where I did a lot of the same things I will be responsible for at CC. The problem was that it was a one-person office and having to send 350 students abroad every year got very tiring. I figured that I had maxed out what I could do there and it was time for a new challenge, which ended up being CC.

Why do you think you are a good fit for the job?
Given my own experience as a former faculty member who led study abroad programs, I feel like I have a good amount of insight into what work is needed to get the job done. I have been through a lot of these situations and I know how to tackle them. My old job at Augustana College had many responsibilities dealing with budgets and visas so I am also very used to that aspect of my job and I know how to work efficiently. Finally, I feel like I am pretty creative and I work well with solving problems on the fly such as budget issues, program vacancies, and difficulties that occur while students are abroad.

What influenced you to get into this field and profession?
My grandparents spoke Spanish and my mother was bilingual so I always had a desire to discover this other part of me. I got my first chance of doing that in 10th grade when I went to Venezuela for a month on an exchange program. This along with my other travels to Spain got me very interested in languages but more specifically the learning that comes with cultural exchange. I originally wanted to be a Spanish teacher but I wanted a way to combine cultural immersion into my job and this position was a great fit.

What do you like about CC so far?
The students here are very entrepreneurial. There are a ton of great ideas that they want to make happen and that lets me be creative to try to turn these ideas into a reality. I also feel like the staff here is very friendly and there is a strong emphasis on collaboration and support which always makes working more fun. This is also apparent in the student body as I like how inclusion and acceptance are two values that are very important among the members of this campus. Finally, I love Rastall! Compared to what my college food was like, I can tell you that this is great.

What do you like to do when you are not working?
Being new to Colorado Springs I have really gotten into hiking. This place is great for outdoor activities and I plan to take full advantage of all the great spots around the city. I’ve already been to trails on the prairie as well as the foothills and I plan to do a lot more. I’m also a big football fan so I like to catch games on Sundays and I really like soccer although my team (Everton) isn’t having the best of seasons right now. I actually got to see them play live in England and let me tell you, the atmosphere is really something else!

What is one interesting fact that people might not know about you?
When I was in college I actually managed to build quite the FBI file although it was all by coincidence. A few friends and I were in DC when we decided to go to the Andrews Air Force Base where they house the president’s plane, Air Force One. We were able to get on the runway and we were poking around the new F16 fighter jets which probably wasn’t the best idea now that I think about it. Little did we know that while we were on the tarmac, the base was conducting an anti-terrorist drill. I guess they thought we were the simulation terrorists and next thing I know a bunch of army cars and armed officials are surrounding us asking for IDs. They actually even looked us up in their database and were telling us information about ourselves that they shouldn’t have known. It was pretty scary at the moment but now it’s definitely a good story to tell.