This week, CC launched Mike on the Mic, a podcast series featuring Mike Edmonds, senior vice president, in the months leading up to his retirement after 30 years of service at CC. Edmonds hosts faculty members and local leaders for conversations about topics that matter. 

In the first episode of Mike on the Mic, Edmonds is joined by Margaret Sabin and David Steinbruner – two pillars of healthcare in Colorado Springs – for a conversation about mental health and its effects on our college community. Sabin is the past president of Children’s Hospital Colorado Springs and former president and CEO of Penrose Hospital. Steinbruner is the chief medical officer at UCHealth Memorial Hospital and an emergency room physician.

Over three decades of service to Colorado College, Edmonds changed the landscape of CC and illustrated the power of inclusive leadership. As acting co-president with Robert Moore from July 2020-June 2021, he was the first Black leader in CC history to serve as president. He was dean of students/vice president for Student Life from 1991-2020, and currently serves as senior vice president. Edmonds served and mentored countless students through his many years leading Student Life, holding especially strong relationships with varsity student-athletes and teams.

A decorated public speaker, Edmonds has been a coach and mentor with CC’s speech and debate team and used his communications expertise as a community change agent, serving on many boards of directors throughout Colorado Springs. Above all, Edmonds has demonstrated steadfast care and concern for students as his guiding principle and made an indelible impact on the CC community.

Cornel West is a social justice advocate and an elite scholar of African American studies. West’s written contributions to academia have and continue to inspire conversations about race and injustice, lighting a path for other brilliant activist scholars to follow. His passion and vocalism add value to higher education and is an example of how one voice can mobilize revolutionary change, evoke new meaning, and spark awareness about racial issues plaguing society today. 

This Black History Month, we highlight West and his contributions: reminding us that our words have power, whether written or communicated; and to take time to reflect on how we choose to use our words and how our contributions will forever impact history.

Take a look at the Black History Month event and resource page for more opportunities to learn, and for more information regarding happenings on campus and around town.

From the creator and star of “Hamilton” comes Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first Tony Award-winning musical, a love-letter to the community in upper Manhattan where he still lives. “In The Heights” tells the universal story of a vibrant community in New York’s Washington Heights neighborhood – a place where the coffee from the corner bodega is light and sweet, the windows are always open, and the breeze carries the rhythm of three generations of music. It’s a community on the brink of change, full of hopes, dreams, and pressures, where the biggest struggles can be deciding which traditions you take with you, and which ones you leave behind.

Directed by Elise Santora, who won the Henry Award for outstanding actress for her work on stage at the FAC in “Anna in the Tropics,” and choreographed by Julio Agustin, “In The Heights” boasts a production team and cast comprised of people of color. “These stories are everyone’s stories,” said Santora. “It’s parents trying to put their child through college; it’s an independent, fierce woman fighting for her business. It’s about created family, a better life, and what home really looks like. I want the audience to be soaked in that community feeling.”

Student Rush Tickets

Students can purchase tickets the day of the performance at the FAC front desk for $15 (Students receive a free rush ticket one hour before the performance). Tickets subject to availability, and must be purchased in person with a CC Gold Card.

CC Staff & Faculty

CC staff and faculty can purchase tickets the day of the performance at the FAC front desk for $25. Tickets subject to availability, and must be purchased in person with a CC Gold Card.

By Alexa Gromko

Colorado College’s 13^th annual State of the Rockies Project Conservation in the West Poll shows strong support for conservation policies among Westerners despite inflation, drought, water shortages, and overcrowding.

The poll, which surveyed the views of voters in eight Mountain West states, including Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, New Mexico, Montana, Nevada, Idaho, and Arizona, found that the majority (70 to 90 percent) support conservation goals like protecting wildlife habitats and migration routes, ensuring healthier forests, preventing light pollution that blocks out stars, and safeguarding drinking water.

The poll surveyed at least 400 registered voters in each of eight Western states for a total of 3,413-voter sample, which included an over-sample of Black and Native American voters. The survey was conducted between January 5-22, 2023, and the effective margin of error is +2.4%. The full survey and individual state surveys are available on the State of the Rockies webpage.

The Charlie Blumenstein Stewardship Assistant position allows one Colorado College student to spend a summer dedicated to water and wildlife conservation.

The selected intern will spend the summer at The Nature Conservancy’s (TNC) Carpenter Ranch in Hayden, Colorado (near Steamboat, Colorado). This experience offers the opportunity to engage with visitors, work alongside the ranch manager in maintaining the property, and gain a better understanding of how Carpenter Ranch supports researchers, Colorado water rights, and much more. 

Deadline for submission is March 17, so make sure to apply now! Posting and application details can be found in Handshake. Once posted, all applications must be completed on The Nature Conservancy’s Careers page (search “Blumenstein”). Contact the Career Center with questions.

By Grace C. Smith

Cayce Hughes, assistant professor of sociology, hosted trans filmmaker Chase Joynt and sociologist Kristen Schilt to screen their film “Framing Agnes,” at Cornerstone Arts Center on Dec. 12. The film, which had premiered at Sundance this past year, is about a woman named Agnes, who approached the UCLA Medical Center in the late 1950s seeking sex-reassignment surgery, and how this event would go on to define the medical and social scientific understanding of transgender people well into the 1990s.

For Hughes, the master class and film had powerful ties. “We focused on the social construction of deviance and the ways that power shapes this process. ‘Framing Agnes’ is a window into the ways that powerful institutions, including medicine and social science, play a role in constructing categories around transgender identity that affect trans lives in profound ways. At the same time, the film centers trans folks’ responses and resistance to these mechanisms of social control, highlighting their agency in the face of constraint. That tension and interplay between individuals and institutions is at the heart of sociological inquiry, so I think the film checks so many relevant boxes.”

As students wrapped up the class and watched the film, Hughes shared, “I hope students are inspired by the possibilities of trans-disciplinary (pun intended) collaboration. One of the most exciting things about learning in a liberal arts setting like CC is the opportunity to be exposed to different ways of approaching a topic or question, to learn different methodological and theoretical approaches, and to explore how different disciplines challenge and complement one another.”