Natural Leader Shegufta Huma Is KU’S 27Th Rhodes Scholar
No 1, 2017 n $5
Natural Leader Shegufta Huma is KU’s 27th Rhodes Scholar
n EXTRAORDINARY MARINES
n A SON’S TRIBUTE
Contents | Issue 1, 2017
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20 26 32 Champion for Change The Few, The Proud Honor the Father For KU’s newest Rhodes e U.S. Marine Corps has no For his rst project as both Scholar, growing up Muslim in higher honor than the Le wich writer and director, a budding Kansas has been a source of Trophy. In the past ve years lmmaker turns to a personal strength and struggle. Both this select group of leaders has story of faith and family. have fueled her ght for welcomed two Jayhawks to marginalized communities its ranks. By Steven Hill around the world. By Chris Lazzarino By Heather Biele
Cover photograph by Steve Puppe
Established in 1902 as e Graduate Magazine Volume 115, No. 1, 2017 ISSUE 1, 2017 | 1 Lift the Chorus color—has seen KU through Mclendon’s “Literature of the the storm. Holocaust.” I think of it o en, I loved the picture of BGL on and reference the impact the eight years of leadership. We page 10 of Kansas Alumni. I course had on me to my own should all be proud of the will miss seeing her gracious students and advisees. many achievements as we look smile as KU’s ship steers into It was an amazing, thought- back on her years at the helm. the waters of 2017-2018. But I provoking and in uential class, While Hilltopics cites many am immensely proud to say taught by a gi ed instructor. I of those accomplishments— that my University—our am saddened that future KU in dollars and cents raised, in University—had a black students will not bene t from new programs begun or in woman at the helm in very Dr. Mclendon’s instruction. construction undertaken— troubled times. My condolences to her certainly, I believe, Gray-Little Timothy Rake, c’73 family and University will leave a far more enduring Forest Grove, Oregon colleagues. legacy to KU. Jennifer Dennis, PhD’09 In an era that began with Associate professor of biology America’s deepest economic Teaching legacy Missouri Southern State Jayhawk pride University crisis since the Great Depres- Joplin, Missouri I both a deep sion, that saw the governor A I through sense of admiration and literally implode the state’s my Kansas Alumni magazine Editor’s Note: Maryjane bittersweet feelings of loss that budget for higher education this evening, I happened to Mclendon, PhD’91, was an I discovered in Hilltopics that with short-sighted tax policies, look at the In Memory section assistant professor of American Bernadette Gray-Little would and that gave voice to a new and noted the passing of Dr. literature and a literature of the leave the University of Kansas age of politics in the form of Maryjane “MJ” Mclendon. Holocaust scholar at KU. She died next June [“Eight fateful years,” bigots, misogynists and racists, e most in uential course I Aug. 12 in Lawrence. issue No. 6]. I couldn’t be more the serene face and calming completed as an undergrad proud of my University for her hand of a woman—a woman of was, without question, Dr.
2 | KANSAS ALUMNI January 2017
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Publisher Heath Peterson, d’04, g’09 2 Lift the Chorus Editor Jennifer Jackson Sanner, j’81 Letters from our readers Creative Director Susan Younger, f’91 Associate Editors Chris Lazzarino, j’86 5 First Word Steven Hill e editor’s turn Photographers Steve Puppe, j’98 Dan Storey 6 On the Boulevard Graphic Designer Valerie Spicher, j’94 KU & Alumni Association events Sta Writer Heather Biele 8 Jayhawk Walk Advertising Sales Representative LPD LOL, noodle nosh, Pluto goes postal Teri Harris and more Editorial and Advertising Oce KU Alumni Association 1266 Oread Avenue 10 Hilltopics Lawrence, KS 66045-3169 News and notes: Stable funding tops higher-ed’s 785-864-4760 state agenda; gi creates Melville professorship. 800-584-2957 www.kualumni.org [email protected] 16 Sports Josh Jackson leads men’s defense of Big 12 crown; KANSAS ALUMNI MAGAZINE (ISSN 0745-3345) is published by the volleyball clinches rst conference title. KU Alumni Association six times a year in January, March, May, July, September and November. $55 annual subscription includes member- ship in the Alumni Association. O¡ce of Publication: 1266 Oread Avenue, Lawrence, KS 66045-3169. Periodicals postage paid at 38 Association News Lawrence, KS. Jayhawks to tee o with golf-themed Rock Chalk Ball in April. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Kansas Alumni Magazine, 1266 Oread Avenue, Lawrence, KS 66045-3169 © 2017 by Kansas Alumni Magazine. Non-member issue price: $7 44 Class Notes Pro les of an inspirational artist, a children’s advo- cate, an education-conscious coach and more
60 In Memory Letters to the Editor: Deaths in the KU family Kansas Alumni welcomes letters to the editor. Our 64 Rock Chalk Review address is Kansas Alumni magazine, 1266 Oread Avenue, Freshmen team with faculty mentors; books on Lawrence, KS 66045-3169. Email responses may be sent to Radiohead, college, corporate slackers and more. the Alumni Association, [email protected]. Letters appearing in the magazine may be edited for space and clarity. For letters published, we’ll send a free gift of KU 68 Glorious to View Campus Playing Cards, a $5 value. Scene on campus
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 3
by Jennifer Jackson Sanner First Word
ro les of KU’s Rhodes Scholars are among military academies, earned the trophy makes Pour favorite cover stories. Since 1993, Kansas “No matter what their stories even more remarkable. Alumni has featured six Jayhawks whose intellec- Another Jayhawk is just beginning his tual repower, passion and commitment earned our life’s work, we journey in the military as an Army ROTC them one of academe’s most coveted accolades: draw nourishment cadet. Wilfredo Figueroa-Rivera, a Leaven- Pam McElwee, c’93; Munro Richardson, c’93; worth sophomore, was among the students Robert Chamberlain, c’02; Ruth Anne French- from the examples who took the Oath of Enlistment Nov. 12 in Hodson, c’05; Kelsey Murrell, c’12; and this year, of Jayhawks who Memorial Stadium. Lazzarino was there to Shegu a Huma, who will graduate in May with cover the football game, but he also came her political science degree, then begin her clearly see a away with the story of Figueroa-Rivera, who master’s studies at Oxford University in England. purpose and work so impressed Lazzarino in their conversation Sta writer Heather Biele shares the story of following the game that he found it dicult to Huma, whose scholarly talent and bravery as an ceaselessly to share only a portion in our Jayhawk Walk advocate and mediator earned her distinction as fulfill it.” section. We expect to chronicle the young one of 32 U.S. Rhodes Scholars. Jayhawk’s achievements in years to come. Courage and conviction—and the will to One of Mount Oread’s most treasured and pursue a calling—add luster to several stories throughout this honored professors, Elizabeth Schultz, taught English for 34 years issue. In our second feature, Associate Editor Steven Hill and for several years chaired the humanities and comparative describes the determination of lmmaker Paul Shoulberg, c’04, to literature programs. Schultz devoted her scholarly life to Herman bring his parents’ poignant story of love and faith to the screen. Melville’s Moby-Dick. For generations of students, she illuminated Don, PhD’75, and Gini Shoulberg, g’72, met when he was a priest the ways in which the classic novel explores the essence of and she was a nun.“ e Good Catholic” follows the couple as they humanity and the questions we all struggle to answer. In our make the dicult choice to follow their hearts and heed the call Hilltopics section, Steve Hill reports on Schultz’s gi to fund a KU to marry and start a family while remaining faithful Catholics. professorship and ensure that the study of Melville and other e lm is their son’s memorial to Don, who died in 2013. guiding lights of literature will continue to ourish at the Honor and valor gleam in the stories of two Marine Corps University. ocers, Ryan Sparks, c’97, and omas Morrow, c’06, whose No matter what our life’s work, we draw nourishment from the leadership of their infantry companies proved worthy of the examples of Jayhawks who clearly see a purpose and work Marines’ most revered award, the Le wich Trophy. As Associate ceaselessly to ful ll it. eir stories feed our hearts, our souls and Editor Chris Lazzarino, j’86, explains in our third feature, the fact our minds. As Kansas Alumni begins Volume 115 of its long KU that two alumni from a public university, rather than one of the chronicle, we feel privileged to share them.
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 5 On the Boulevard CHRIS LAZZARINO
Exhibitions 4 KU Wind Ensemble and MARCH Students, faculty and Jazz I 2-4 Rock Chalk Revue sta got a sneak peek of “Temporal Turn: Art and 5 Prairie Winds and 5 An Evening with Julia winter in early December, Speculation in Contemporary Sun ower Strings Concert Alvarez Asia,” Spencer Museum of Art, when a light snowfall 9 SUA Tunes at Night 6 An Evening with Kristin through March 12 brought a quiet serenity 10 Rebirth Brass Band Chenoweth Celebrating the Art of Elegance to the University’s Lied Center events 12 Jon Nakamatsu, piano 7 SUA Tunes at Night bustling campus. 15 e Acting Company: JANUARY “Julius Caesar” 8 KU Wind Ensemble 22 Ovation! USD 497 Talent 16 e Acting Company: 14 KU Symphony Orchestra Show Marcus Gardley’s “X” 15 Imani Winds 27 e Paludan Sisters 18 Scholarship concert 28 KU Jazz Ensemble I with present “ e Music of the featuring Carmina Burana Mind” special guest Kneebody 20 KU Symphonic Band and 28 29 SUA Tunes at Night Chinese New Year Gala University Band
29 31 American Brass Quintet SPICHER VALERIE Russian National Ballet 23 Adam Devine eatre: “Swan Lake” 25 Erik Kaiel/Arch 8 FEBRUARY 26 Mr. Ho’s Orchestrotica 2 “Pippin” Quintet
6 | KANSAS ALUMNI University Theatre STEVEN HILL STEVEN FEBRUARY 9-12 “Seminar,” by eresa Rebeck, William Inge Memorial eatre
MARCH 31, April 1-2, 4-6 “Anon(ymous),” by Naomi Iizuka, William Inge Memorial eatre
Lectures
FEBRUARY 23 “Nature’s God: e Heretical Origins of the American Republic,” Matthew Stewart, Lied Center Pavilion 28 KU vs. Kentucky watch 24 Humanities Lecture parties
Series Conversation: STOREY DAN Matthew Stewart, Hall Center conference hall FEBRUARY 1 Great Bend: Kansas MARCH Honors Program 28 “Pursuing Elusive Equity 1 KU vs. Baylor watch in Higher Education,” parties Jennifer Hammer, e 4 KU vs. Iowa State watch Commons parties 6 KU vs. Kansas State watch Academic Calendar parties
JANUARY 6 Pittsburg: Kansas Honors Program 17 First day of spring classes 11 KU vs. Texas Tech watch 18 KU vs. Baylor watch 25 KU vs. Texas watch parties parties MARCH parties 13 22 Atchison: Kansas Honors 27 KU vs. Oklahoma watch 20-26 Spring break Beloit: Kansas Honors Program Program parties 13 Iola: Kansas Honors 22 Holton: Kansas Honors Alumni Events MARCH Program Program 4 KU vs. Oklahoma State 13 KU vs. West Virginia 22 KU vs. TCU watch JANUARY watch parties watch parties parties 24 KU vs. West Virginia 11 KU Night with the 15 KU Night with the 23 Axtell: Kansas Honors watch parties Portland Trailblazers, Denver Nuggets, Denver Program 28 KU vs. Kentucky Portland, Oregon 15 Paola: Kansas Honors 25 KU vs. Texas pregame pregame party, Lexington, 29 Chanute: Kansas Honors Program party, Austin, Texas Kentucky Program
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 7 Jayhawk Walk Blast of nostalgia
ad enough of laughing cats, baby Hrap, cursing British butlers, foul- mouthed South Park kids, heavy metal and bubblegum pop? Then it’s high time you Rock Chalk your ringtone with an authentic five-second blast from KU’s original “Big Tooter” steam whistle. Launched in October to announce the debut of Steam Whistle Creative, a student-run advertising agency within the William Allen White School of Journalism and Mass Communications, the ringtone signals your crimson-and- blue allegiance with the coolest call announcer this side of Mount Oread. The Alumni Association’s free KU Alumni App (kualumni.org/app) includes a tile that leads to the iTunes Store or Google Play, where you can search for “Steam Whistle Creative” to download the $1.29 ringtone. With the tone on your phone, navigate through “settings” to “sound,” select the steam whistle as your ringtone, and forever fuel your nostalgia for running late to class. There’s no word yet on hacks to make
LARRY LEROY PEARSON LEROY LARRY the whistle sound at 10 till every hour.
LPD, #hilarious “I felt the same frustration and despair that everybody else did about KU losing A the Lawrence Police that game,” Fennelly says. “So I was PUPPE STEVE Department’s Twitter page Dec. 31, 2015, thinking, how can I express to everyone with the usual dry reminders for revelers else how I feel and relate it to the police to designate sober drivers, O cer Drew department?” Fennelly yearned to “ nd the voice for the He’d found the voice he’d been searching Twitter account.” for, and his ensuing parade of comedy gold His creativity burst forth three months gained an even wider audience—hello, later, as Fennelly, ’09, hunched over his Jimmy Kimmel—Sept. 29: “We realize laptop, bemoaning the men’s basketball politics can make emotions run high, but team’s shattering loss in the NCAA being mad at a presidential candidate in a Tournament. “Sorry, we can’t investigate debate is NOT a reason to call 911.” Villanova ripping your heart out of your Fennelly says he scrutinizes every post chest,” Fennelly wrote. “ e crime for any possible hint of controversy or Fennelly occurred outside our jurisdiction. #RCJH” disrespect, but he otherwise lets the laughs e post was noticed by the Kansas City loose almost daily, including an election- citizens not to tempt thieves with unat- Star’s sports editor, who shared it with his day reminder that “Electioneering is not a tended porch packages, and, best of all, the 10,000 followers, and suddenly @Law- major at KU,” K9 o cers posed for cute occasional Saturday-night #LKPDTweetal- renceKS_PD zoomed to online fame. dog pics, Bad Luck Brian reminding ong, during which he rides with a fellow
8 | KANSAS ALUMNI “I want people to feel like they can come to ocer and tweets the action from a citizen’s point of view. this fun, open-minded place and it’s super- STEVE PUPPE STEVE “Humor really is one of the best coping aordable to have this incredibly awesome, mechanisms for dealing with what we see hot, nutritious meal,” says organizer Shantel on a regular basis,” says Fennelly, an ocer Grace (far right) of Ikigai Noodle, a free student- since 2009. “I think you would be hard- oriented DIY supper at KU’s Westwood House. pressed to nd a police ocer without a pretty good sense of humor.” From dry to wry, all in a day’s work. cheering for the football ’Hawks. “It was surreal,” Figueroa-Rivera says. “For the rst few minutes, it was all A recipe for good muscle memory, instinct, because I was thinking about my life ahead of me and N J concept Trendy ramen, nutritious ingredients all of the things I’m about to do with my meaning “reason for being,” Ikigai and thoughtful presentation create a life in the military.” Noodle—a meal hosted ursday nights caring vibe, says Sean Norris, campus A er dinner with his Spirit Squad from August to May at Westwood House, pastor at Westwood. “She makes every- teammates, Figueroa-Rivera enjoyed a home of KU’s Lutheran Campus Minis- thing look really nice. Centerpiece. long phone conversation with his parents. try—is all about destigmatizing the soup Candles. She’s like Mary Poppins when she His father is an Army major at Fort kitchen. walks in here. ings just fall into place.” Leavenworth, so both Diners build their own ramen bowls parents o ered sage using ingredients supplied by Shantel advice from Ringler Grace, ’02, who with her husband, End-zone enlistment lifetimes of Tim, owns the downtown Lawrence experience. restaurant Ramen Bowls. Participants W F -R was “ ere’s just serve themselves and donate $2 if they already in uniform when he raised his a feeling of ... like—or nothing at all. right hand and took his oath of enlistment What was the By upending the traditional soup in the U.S. Army. But it wasn’t an Army feeling? It was kitchen structure—“volunteers in T-shirts uniform he wore the a ernoon of Nov. 12. almost like a behind a counter serving people”—Grace at’s because the sophomore cheer- feeling of welcom- hopes to create a festive, welcoming leader was three-quarters of the way ing, like you’re now atmosphere where people feel good about through KU’s “Salute to Service” game part of something that’s a Figueroa-Rivera accepting a little help when they need it. against Iowa State when he trotted away lot bigger than yourself and “Some people don’t take advantage of from the west sideline to join his ROTC you have expectations to live up to. It was resources because there’s a shame factor,” comrades in the south end zone and ful ll nice to see my family encouraging me to she says. “Our idea is, if you want to put a the Army’s Oath of Enlistment. live up to those expectations and make couple bucks in the donation box, that’s As applause for the cadets lled Memo- everybody proud. great. But there’s nobody sitting here rial Stadium, Figueroa-Rivera quickly “Prouder than they already are.” taking money. Just help yourself.” rejoined the Spirit Squad and resumed Truly worth cheering.
Clyde Tombaugh, c’36, g’39— color enhancements expanse that NASA scientists We Pluto can’t play with the big boys, highlighting surface texture, the dubbed the Tombaugh Region. why not a stamp sheet of its image clearly reveals Pluto’s “Dad put a heart on Pluto!” he planetary postage event own? now-famous heart-shaped exclaimed Tombaugh’s Tof the year, “Views of Our And, voila!, the four-stamp feature, a 1,000-mile-wide daughter, Annette Tombaugh Planets,” sadly put the U.S. “Pluto—Explored!” features Sitze, at the time of the Postal Service’s stamp of images of both the New mysterious geologic feature’s approval on Pluto’s 2006 Horizons spacecraft—which unexpected discovery. downgrade to “minor planet” carries the 1991 “Pluto: Not Yet Go ahead and gloat, Mercury, status: The 16-stamp sheet Explored” stamp as well as Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, presents eight images, not nine. Tombaugh’s ashes—and a Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. So if beleaguered little striking image New Horizons We know the littlest planet of Pluto—discovered in 1930 by made of Pluto in 2015. With them all has the biggest heart.
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 9 Hilltopics by Steven Hill
fund the 50 scholarships for the $15,000 bachelor’s degree. STEVE PUPPE STEVE But the proposal did not address the $10.7 million hit the University took last May. “On Jan. 11, the governor released his budget recommendations for the next scal year,” said Tim Caboni, vice chancel- lor for public a airs. “While he does not recommend additional cuts to the University of Kansas, his recommenda- tions include the $10.7 million allotment cut he made to the KU budget last May—essentially making that a permanent annual cut. “ e sudden loss of $10.7 million has signi cantly impacted KU and its students and forced the university to make di cult decisions. With that in mind, KU is asking Budget-challenged revenue measures” such as tax increases to legislators to consider the following two address projected de cits, while also priorities this session: restoration of the Governor's budget proposal signaling that higher education is among 2016 cuts to KU and stable funding for KU the few areas where he hopes to generate moving forward.” oers higher-ed initiatives, some new spending in the coming year. Last year’s reduction in the state but fails to restore cuts to KU He called for starting a School of Dentistry appropriation for KU was part of a $97 at KU Medical Center to address a million spending cut that Brownback s the Kansas Legislature convened in shortage of dentists in 87 of the state’s 105 ordered statewide to bring the budget AJanuary, leaders at KU and the Kansas counties; proposed a new scholarship passed by the Legislature in balance with Board of Regents had but a short wish list program to aid Kansas college students expected revenues. ose cuts resulted in a for lawmakers: Restore the mid-year cuts who want to teach and urged expansion of 4 percent reduction for most state agen- made to KU’s budget last May and an existing scholarship program for cies, including the universities governed establish stable funding in the two-year college students; and challenged the state’s by the Board of Regents. However, KU and budget covering the 2018 and 2019 colleges and universities to provide Kansas State sustained proportionally scal years. students a chance to earn a four-year higher cuts—5.1 percent of the state’s But even those modest requests looked degree for a total cost of $15,000, promis- appropriation for KU—because lawmakers to be a tough sell, as lawmakers started the ing to fund 50 student scholarships for the stipulated that higher education cuts be session with a familiar challenge: Tax rst institution to achieve that goal. based on universities’ “all-funds operating revenues are well short of projections, In a detailed budget proposal presented budgets” instead of only their state general resulting in a budget shortfall of nearly to the House and Senate budget commit- fund allocations. In a joint letter to $350 million that will require more work tees Jan. 11 by Shawn Sullivan, the state Jayhawks for Higher Education and their to balance the budget between now and budget director, Brownback pledged Wildcat counterparts last May, Chancellor the end of the 2017 scal year in June. e $800,000 to pay for the initial planning Bernadette Gray-Little and Gen. Richard outlook for scal 2018 is even more dire, costs of the dental school, which would be Myers, then interim president at K-State, with a budget shortfall currently projected the rst in Kansas. His proposed budget pointed out the aw in this formula while to top $550 million. also includes $3 million next year and $6 encouraging advocates to persuade Gov. In his State of the State address Jan. 10, million in scal 2019 to fund scholarships Brownback to line-item veto that Gov. Sam Brownback, l’82, promised a at Kansas universities for future teachers provision. balanced budget that addresses both who agree to work in rural areas, and $1 “ is formula penalizes Kansas State expenditures and “modest, targeted million a year, starting in scal 2018, to University and the University of Kansas,
10 | KANSAS ALUMNI whose all-funds budgets are higher e governor’s wry delivery of that line Jayhawks for Higher Education commu- because of our large research portfolios,” seemed to suggest that he expects the battle nicate the importance of the University Gray-Little and Myers explained in their may be particularly pitched this year. and Higher Education to the Kansas letter. “In essence, this formula punishes A signi cantly reshaped Legislature—59 Legislature. Alumni who live in Kansas and K-State and KU for conducting research new lawmakers were sworn in at the start want to get involved in the group, which and successfully securing federal research of the session, many of them moderate now numbers more than 1,600, can get grants that bring new dollars to Kansas. In Republicans and Democrats who ran on a more information at kualumni.org/ addition to harming the two universities platform of repealing the governor’s tax jayhawksforhighereducation. and the state we serve, this type of funding cuts—is likely to resist many of Brown- decision sends a terrible message to the back’s budget proposals, which rely heavily nation that Kansas does not value earning on one-time funding sources such as research grant funding and that our state raiding the state highway fund, delaying Save the whale actively penalizes our research universities payments to public schools, freezing when they succeed.” contributions to the KPERS retirement Gift to lure Melville expert to KU, When adjusted for in ation, state fund for state employees, and selling o restore Moby-Dick to curriculum support per student at KU has declined 44 future tobacco settlement money. percent over the past 17 years. In 2016, the e proposal also doubles tobacco and o dedicated is retired English profes- state appropriation of $236 million for KU liquor taxes and cancels a planned Ssor Elizabeth Schultz to Herman remained below pre-recession levels. at decrease in the state’s lowest tax bracket, Melville’s famed 19th-century novel continuing decline makes stable funding but it leaves largely untouched the 2012 Moby-Dick, she recently enticed a friend crucial for KU, administrators say. ey tax exemption for businesses that many to read the book by o ering to conduct a hope to persuade lawmakers that the blame for several consecutive years of kind of one-woman master class. University cannot absorb additional cuts budget shortfalls. Rep. Tom Phillips, a “I’ll talk you through it,” Schultz says without negatively impacting the students, Manhattan Republican, wasted no time in she told her friend. “Call me. I will.” citizens, communities and companies KU introducing a bill that would repeal the Schultz, who began teaching at KU in serves. so-called LLC loophole for 330,000 1967 and retired in 2001, is one of the In his speech, Brownback noted that the businesses that currently pay no state world’s foremost Melville scholars, and she annual State of the State address “was once income taxes, and both Democrats and taught his classic novel every one of her 34 described to me as a beautiful ritual, Republicans on the House tax committee years on the Hill. But with the retirement pageantry, conducted just before the real have indicated support for a repeal, which of Schultz and her English department battle begins. Perhaps it is.” would raise about $250 million. colleague Haskell Springer, in 2003, the
UPDATE
olombia's Congress on rebels to end the war. The story in Kansas Alumni in CNov. 30 approved a two sides held a celebra- 2011, he embraced social CARLOS VILLALON CARLOS peace accord engineered by tory signing, but voters and academic life on the President Juan Manuel defied expectations and Hill, joining Delta Upsilon Santos, b'73, finally polls by narrowly rejecting fraternity and completing a concluding a dicult the agreement in October. degree in seven semesters. process that led to a Nobel Days later, the Nobel Com- At a ceremony marking Peace Prize for Santos mittee urged both sides to completion of a new ac- ["Peace Prized," issue No. continue talks, saying they cord meant to address the 6] but struggled to bring an hoped the prize for Santos concerns of voters, Santos end to the half-century-long would "give him strength to urged unity. civil war that left more than succeed in this demanding "On signing this agree- 200,000 people dead. task." ment, as president of all In August the Santos Santos followed his Colombians, I want to invite administration announced brother, Luis Fernando San- all, with an open mind and that, after years of talks, tos, j'70, to Mount Oread in open heart, to give peace a it had reached a deal with 1969. As detailed in a cover chance."
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 11 Hilltopics
condition,” Schultz says. “ at is to say, they were on a ship of state that was Winter grads: More than 1,300 Jay- d o om e d .” e story of an authority gure so hawks earned their KU diplomas at the blinded by his obsessive need for ven- end of the fall semester in December. geance that he’s willing to endanger STEVE PUPPE STEVE himself and those he leads resonated with Degrees are ocially conferred in Janu- students then and still resonates now, ary, but winter graduates (who represent Schultz believes. She wants to restore the novel to popular readership, yes, but she 57 Kansas counties, 40 states and 28 coun- also sees it as a linchpin in the life of the tries) are invited to participate in the annual walk down University. “I do think that the humanities are the Hill at Commencement on Sunday, May 14. being challenged these days, and I would hope that having a distinguished person teaching central American works in the English department would inspire not only other humanists but the whole says. “He’s fundamen- University campus,” she says. “I would tally asking large hope this would have a trickle out e ect, STEVE PUPPE STEVE questions that have to not just a trickle down e ect, that the do with the way we ongoing presence of this professorship on live our lives as campus would really emphasize the individuals and as a University’s commitment to the humani- community of people. ties and the arts and culture in general, To me the most and that what courses in history and the important question we classics and languages and philosophy are can ask is, ‘What is a all about is good and clear thinking. We good life, and how can need it more than ever.” we live it?’ I think we have in Moby-Dick a cast of characters that model a variety of Radical lit Schultz kinds of behavior, and in the course of seeing Student’s Sacco and Vanzetti tale of Captain Ahab’s obsessive pursuit of how people act toward one another in that collection wins national prize a fabled white whale fell o reading lists. novel, the reader is asked to evaluate how With a $1.5 million gi commitment, he or she could do better.” inety years a er Nicola Sacco and announced last fall, Schultz hopes to Schultz rst encountered Captain Ahab’s NBartolomeo Vanzetti were executed correct that omission by establishing the vengeful quest as an undergraduate at for murdering two men during an armed Herman Melville Distinguished Professor- Wellesley College. “I knew it was some- robbery in Braintree, Massachusetts, ship to bring to KU someone to teach one thing amazing,” she says, “something the people still disagree about the Italian or more of the great American writers of likes of which I had never read before, and immigrant anarchists’ guilt or innocence. the mid-19th century, a grand roster that I was totally engaged.” But she ended up But the historical parlor game (did they includes Melville, Emily Dickinson, writing her PhD dissertation on a very or didn’t they?) isn’t what interests Megan Nathaniel Hawthorne, Harriet Beecher di erent kind of writer, Henry James. Jones, a graduate student in English who Stowe, Henry David oreau, Frederick At KU she rst realized the novel’s full has built a collection of books about the Douglass, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Walt power. two gures. Her collection won KU’s Whitman. “I found my rst year of teaching at KU, Snyder Book Collecting Contest in April But Schultz is particularly keen to in the fall of 1967, it was Melville who and placed second in the National restore to syllabi a book she considers the spoke to my students. I had many who Collegiate Book Collecting Contest Great American Novel. were distressed about the Vietnam War, (NCBCC) in October. “In Moby-Dick I think there is not a some of them guys about to be dra ed, “I’m really more interested in what it is perspective he doesn’t touch on,” Schultz and they found that Melville spoke to their about these two men that has captivated
12 | KANSAS ALUMNI red her imagination, Milestones, money but also provided material for scholar- and other matters STEVE PUPPE STEVE ship. She sought out collections of Sacco and Vanzetti’s letters to see what had been published on the subject, and was surprised to nd major discrepancies between the published versions and the originals. e n Jones edited letters make the David Dillon, b'73, retired chairman two men appear less and CEO of Kroger Company, heads the the imagination of so many people, and militant, Jones says. And less individual. search committee chosen in November why we’re so interested in not only “ eir personalities have both been a by the Kansas Board of Regents to find preserving their legacy, but why we look little bit erased in favor of making them the University's next chancellor. Alumni back at them as this big question,” Jones martyrs for the general le ist anarchist representatives on the committee in- says. eir arrest came at the height of the communist radical workers’ cause,” Jones clude Greg Ek, b'76, Wichita, and Dave Palmer Raids, mass arrests and deporta- says. “We don’t see as much of their Roland, e'80, Excelsior, Minnesota, tions that occurred during the post-World individual personalities, and I think that who serve on the Alumni Association's War I Red scare, she notes. “ ey weren’t may be why they’re so popular. ey’re national Board of Directors, and Debbie the only radicals arrested or accused of very di erent people, but they’ve been Foltz Nordling, d'79, Hugoton, a former crimes or deported or executed during this linked and glori ed in a way that’s Association Board member. Regents time. Why are they the ones we talk about, interesting.” also voted to hire R. William Funk and who still captivate the imagination of so e discovery led to her undergraduate Associates as search consultant. The many even now? at’s a more interesting thesis and fueled her collecting. She now committee will undertake a closed question to me than who did it.” has about three dozen books—more than nationwide search to recruit a successor Jones bought the rst book in her she had before she won the $600 Snyder to Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little, collection in 2012. While an undergradu- prize and $1,000 NCBCC prize. who will step down June 30. ate at Indiana University, she took a class “I thought I should spend at least some at e Lilly Library, the school’s repository of the money on getting more books, n Charlie Rose, anchor and execu- for rare books, manuscripts and special right?” tive editor of the PBS television news collections. Looking for an archive to But the crown jewel of the collection program "Charlie Rose," will receive the explore for her class project, she stumbled came to Jones absolutely free: It is a 2017 William Allen White Foundation across Sacco and Vanzetti and remem- pristine copy of the 1927 John Dos Passos National Citation. Rose will receive the bered a brief encounter with them in a pamphlet, Facing the Chair: Story of the citation on campus on William Allen high school history class. Americanization of Two Foreignborn White Day, April 20. “I saw their picture in the corner of my Workmen, from the book collection of the textbook and I asked my U.S. history late Melvin Landsberg, the professor n Robert Sorem, e'86, g'88, PhD'91, teacher who they were, because there was emeritus of English at KU who died in associate professor of mechanical only a tiny short blurb about them,” Jones March. Jones had contacted the estate to engineering, was presented the 2016 recalls. “And he was like, ‘Oh, don’t worry; see if the work might be in Landsberg’s H.O.P.E. Award by the senior class at they’re not that important.’” collection, since he was a Dos Passos the KU-Texas game Nov. 19. Sorem She started reading, nding handwritten scholar and biographer. has advised the Jayhawk Motorsports letters in the Lilly archives that the It’s one of the few Sacco and Vanzetti Formula SAE racing team for 22 years, anarchists had sent to friends, and quickly works she actively tracked down. Most she winning the Carroll Smith Mentor's Cup became intrigued. discovers by happy accident. in 2009. The H.O.P.E. (Honor for an “You get a lot more of a person’s “Part of the fun of my collection is I Outstanding Progressive Educator) was personality by reading their handwriting don’t really know what all is out there,” established by the senior class in 1959 in letters they wrote 90 years ago,” Jones Jones says. “I’m always nding new things and remains the only honor the class says. “I think that’s what did it for me.” that somehow relate. It’s the surprise of it gives a faculty member. Seeing these historical artifacts not only all.”
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 13 Hilltopics
Nudo received the Dolph Simons Award in Biomedical Sciences. Christer Aakeröy, University Distin- guished Professor of chemistry at Kansas State University. His research on aspects of COURTESY KU MARCOMM (4) MARCOMM KU COURTESY intermolecular interactions and materials science has attracted major grants from the National Science Foundation, the Department of Defense, National Insti- Carta Nudo Aakeröy Nel tutes of Health and the Petroleum Research Fund. Aakeröy received the Olin Petesh Award in Basic Sciences. RESEARCH Judith Carta, professor of special Philip Nel, University Distinguished education, senior scientist at the Schiefel- Professor of English at Kansas State, Higuchi Awards recognize busch Institute for Life Span Studies and co-founded and directs the Program in faculty research gains director of early childhood research at Children’s Literature, and his literary KU’s Juniper Gardens Children’s Project in research focuses on the understanding of T KU and two Kansas City. She has led an externally literature written for children. Nel received from Kansas State received the most funded research program at KU for 31 the Balfour Je rey Award in Humanities prestigious award for scholarly excellence years, in uencing changes in social policy and Social Sciences. that Kansas o ers: the Higuchi-KU and improving the quality of services for Endowment Research Achievement children and families across the nation. CAMPUS Awards. Carta received the Irvin Youngberg Award Named for Takeru Higuchi, the late KU for Applied Sciences. Conservation upgrades help cut distinguished professor considered “the Randolph Nudo, Marion Merrell Dow KU's energy consumption father of physical chemistry,” the awards, Distinguished Professor in Aging and announced in December, recognize professor and vice chair of research in the exceptional long-term research achieve- department of rehabilitative medicine at G E O and ments of faculty members at Kansas Board KU Medical Center. Nudo’s research the Center for Sustainability at KU to of Regents universities. e 2016 awardees focuses on neural repair and neurologic reduce campus energy usage are paying o are: recovery and rehabilitation a er stroke. with not only cost savings, but also a
VISITOR CREDIT CREDIT Creative control BACKGROUND: Smith is the works. "My first exercises in critically acclaimed author of writing when I was a kid were Zadie Smith, an English novelist several novels, including the literal plagiarism," she recalled. and professor in the creative award-winning White Teeth, The "I would just type out stories, writing program at New York Autograph Man, On Beauty, NW, word for word, and then read University, delivered her lecture and her most recent book, them out loud to myself or COURTESY HALL CENTER FOR THE HUMANITIES HALL CENTER FOR COURTESY "Why Write?" as part of the Swing Time. She was 21 when record myself reading them. I Humanities Lecture Series. she submitted 80 pages of her think it’s a very good practice, Smith first novel, White Teeth, to an that kind of absolute copying. If involve something more than WHEN: Dec. 1 agent, and it was published in you do it for long enough, you finding the perfect audience for full a few years later. learn that way; it’s a kind of the perfect product." WHERE: Kansas Union rehearsal." "I do want them less attuned Ballroom ANECDOTE: When asked to the chatter of publishing PR how she developed her writing QUOTE: In a time when a departments and more in touch SPONSORS: Hall Center for style, Smith explained that she writer's ultimate goal is to be with the workings of their own the Humanities and Kansas was always a voracious reader published, Smith reminds her minds.” Public Radio and influenced by other literary students that creativity "might —Heather Biele
14 | KANSAS ALUMNI 4,500 LED bulbs alone Milestones, money has saved an estimated $61,000, according to and other matters the energy report, EARL RICHARDSON which also details n Shane McCreery leads ongoing e orts to the Oce of Institu- identify problem tional Opportunity and buildings that need Access. The oce works further attention. to strengthen diversity MARCOMM KU COURTESY Read the full report at and inclusion at KU, and energy.ku.edu/campus- McCreery investigates discrimi- energy-useage. nation and harassment complaints. McCreery previously directed the Oce of Equal Opportunity, Ethics and Access reduced carbon footprint. CAMPUS at Illinois State University. He started at Heating, cooling and lighting the more KU on Sept. 1. than 130 buildings on campus takes a toll Mount Oread to be on the University’s budget and the tobacco-free by 2018 n Sandra Billinger, interim associ- environment. KU spends more than $15 ate dean for research and associate million annually on utilities such as T L is still on track professor in the department of physical natural gas, electricity and water, using to join the ranks of the nearly 1,500 U.S. therapy and rehabilitation sciences, and about 925 million BTUs of energy, which colleges that are completely Belinda Sturm, associate professor of produces more than 160,000 metric tons tobacco free, but implementa- civil, environmental and architectural of carbon emissions each year. tion of the new policy has engineering, are the 2016 Edward and In scal 2016, electricity usage dropped been pushed back to 2018. Thelma Wohlgemuth Faculty Scholars. by 1.9 million kilowatts and gas consump- As previously reported in The fund seeks to help KU retain prom- tion dropped by 46 million BTUs, thanks Kansas Alumni [“Smoke Out?” ising faculty by recognizing their early to conservation e orts that seek to bring Hilltopics, issue No. 2, 2015], Tobacco Free career accomplishments and potential energy costs for campus buildings to 100 KU, a coalition that includes the human for future scholarly contributions. It kBTUs per square foot. Energy consump- resources department, Watkins Health was established by Dorothy Wohlge- tion was reduced from 106 kBTUs in 2015 Services, Recreation Services and the muth Lynch, d'59, in 2000 to honor her to 98 in 2016, exceeding that goal. e student group BEAK (Breathe Easy at parents. reductions are enough to power 156 KU), is working to replace the University’s homes and o set greenhouse gas emis- existing policy, which bans smoking inside n Bozenna Pasik-Duncan, professor of sions from 520 cars for a year. buildings but allows outdoor smoking and mathematics and courtesy professor in e e orts use a combination of permits student housing residents to use the departments of electrical engineer- equipment upgrades (like replacing smokeless tobacco in their rooms. e ing & computer science and aerospace burned out halogen, compact uorescent new policy, originally set to begin this fall, engineering, is the 2017 Global Chair and incandescent bulbs with LEDs) and will ban all tobacco products and e-ciga- of the Women in Engineering Commit- behavioral changes (such as the successful rettes across campus. tee for the Institute of Engineering and Shut the Sash campaign that reminds users An ocial announcement on the new Electronics Engineers. She oversees the to close fume hoods in campus labs to save policy is expected in fall 2017, with world's largest professional organiza- energy and improve safety). Installation of implementation scheduled for fall 2018. tion supporting women in science and engineering.
n Rex Buchanan, ’92, in October received the Geological Society of “Why write? To express the reality of human America's Public Service Award for his capacities. You really don’t need to be a unique decades of accomplishments as a leader and communicator on issues related to creative genius to do this; you only need to have the geology and natural resources. Buchan- language under your control.” —Zadie Smith an retired recently as interim director of {} the Kansas Geological Survey, which he joined in 1978.
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 15 Sports by Chris Lazzarino
Detroit steel double-doubles against TCU and Kansas bettering Ted Owens on the all-time eld State, earning a Big 12 Player of the Week house list. Jackson a ‘special freshman’ honor of his own. But, short of a national championship, who dazzles with rare talent Program and individual milestones are 2017 will likely be remembered as the also garnering well-deserved attention. season Josh Jackson was a Jayhawk. ow to upstage Josh Jackson: Score Self, in his 24th season as a head coach, As Self has noted, it’s impossible to Hthe last-second, game-winning won the 600th game of his career with become the best ever at a school where basket against rival Kansas State, and do so KU’s Dec. 6 victory over UMKC, his 400th Wilt Chamberlain, ’59, and Danny by brazenly bolting three, maybe four, at KU with the win at Oklahoma (a victory Manning, c’92, played. And in the era of strides without dribbling. Safe to say that likely to elevate the Jayhawks to No. 1 a er single seasons for freshman elites, Jackson nothing about the Jan. 3 home Big 12 Baylor’s loss at West Virginia) and on won’t leave with any career records. opener will be long remembered other Dec. 21 Self was announced as a rst-time But his talents seem to surpass even than junior guard Svi Mykhailiuk Walk nominee for the Naismith Memorial those of another recent top-ranked recruit, Chalking straight down the lane and Basketball Hall of Fame. Andrew Wiggins, ’17, and game-by-game laying the ball in for KU’s 90-88 victory. e victory over Texas Tech, the displays of athleticism, court vision, And yet it was Jackson, a No. 1 overall Jayhawks’ 48th-consecutive in Allen Field shooting, passing, rebounding and recruit and all-but-certain one-and-done House, made KU the second team in acrobatic and powerful dunks are earning superstar, who led all scorers with 22 NCAA Div. I history to reach 2,200 wins, the 6-8 guard from Detroit, in Self’s points, his third 20-point-plus perfor- and the Nov. 18 victory over Sienna was estimation, “a chance to be one of the mance in the rst 15 games of his college the 207th for Self in Allen Field House, special freshmen the program’s probably career, and added nine rebounds ever known.” and six assists. A er following that Says Self, “I think his vision is performance with 17 points and 10 probably the best thing. He’s rebounds Jan. 7 against Texas Tech, inside a zone. I haven’t seen him Jackson was named Big 12 New- be inside a zone before he got comer of the Week for the third here, and man, he’s good in there.” time, to go along with the Big 12 Jackson, who sports a winning Player of the Week honor won a er smile and easygoing manner, says scoring 21 at UNLV Dec. 22. he’s inspired by Oklahoma City “I think the potential,” coach Bill under All-Star guard Russell Self says of Jackson, “is o the Westbrook—“I’ve heard [West- charts.” As KU prepared to face Okla- homa Jan. 10 in Norman, the
Jayhawks, 14-1 overall and 4-0 in PUPPE (2) STEVE the Big 12, were ranked No. 2 in the country, and senior guard Frank Mason III, national Player of the Year candidate and two-time Big 12 Player of the Week, was leading the Jayhawks in scoring at 19.9 points a game, including 26 against Texas Josh Jackson (11), a likely lottery pick Tech. in the June NBA draft, and Frank Junior guard Devonte’ Graham Mason III (0), a contender for led KU with 35 3-pointers, followed closely by Mykhailiuk’s 33, and National Player of the Year, combined senior center Landen Lucas for 37 points in KU’s 90-88 victory rebounded from a lackluster early over Kansas State Jan. 3 in Allen season to post back-to-back Field House.
16 | KANSAS ALUMNI brook] say, ‘I dunk the ball so hard so nobody challenges me when I go to the basket,’ so that’s what I’m trying to do”— “His vision is probably the best thing. He’s inside a and he’s eager to use his time here wisely. zone. I haven’t seen him be inside a zone before he “[Self] knows that I’m kind of a special player, and he still never takes it easy on got here, and man, he’s good in there.” me, doesn’t kiss my butt,” Jackson told the —coach Bill Self on freshman guard Josh Jackson Kansas City Star. “He’s really hard on me {} sometimes. I think I need that.” Self agrees. He says Jackson’s coachabil- ity is similar to what he saw in Wiggins and Joel Embiid, ’17. victories, with an 8-0
“He wants somebody to correct him,” record in ve-set matches, MIKE GUNNOE Self says. “Now, I’m not saying he wants to including a Sept. 8 victory be jumped, but I’m saying he’d like at Creighton. somebody to coach him and correct him In their NCAA match, and be constructive and at the same time KU won the opening set push him and try to get the most out of 25-21. Creighton him. He likes that. He didn’t come in here responded with 25-20 and thinking that he was where he needed to 25-17 victories in the be. He came in here thinking, ‘I’m picking second and third sets. this place because I’m not where I need to Down 2-1, KU played its be.’ I think sometimes that gets lost. best volleyball of the night “Josh is one of those guys who is—even in the fourth set, winning though he’s really, really bright—he knows the rst four points and Senior Cassie Wait (5)—with (l-r) junior Addison Barry and he doesn’t know. It’s amazing to me, when cruising 25-16 to force the senior Maggie Anderson—was named Big 12 Volleyball we do a scouting report, he hangs on every deciding set. Scholar-Athlete of the Year. A three-year starter, the Big 12 word. I ask Josh a lot of questions to see if Junior right-side hitter Libero of the Year completed her final season while enrolled in he’d know the answer, and half the time he Kelsie Payne, named the School of Law. does and half the time he doesn’t, and he’s rst-team All-American totally intrigued on why he doesn’t.” for the second consecutive season, scored seven kills in the nal set All-American, Big 12 Libero of the Year, (and 26 for the match), and KU led 10-9, Big 12 Volleyball Scholar-Athlete of the but it was not enough, as the Bluejays had Year and rst-year KU law student—said To the bitter end their rst match point at 14-12. KU rallied of the growth of KU volleyball since her to fend o six match points, but the arrival. “We’re in control of the play every After winning first Big 12 title, Jayhawks couldn’t stop No. 7: Although single time. If we do our jobs every time volleyball drops NCAA thriller h sets are played to 15, this one was we step out on that court, we have the decided at 20-18. power to win every match.” he sweet memory of their thrilling “It was a special atmosphere in there, a Along with Wait’s honors, others for KU T ve-set victory last season over special e ort from both teams,” said coach included Big 12 Player of the Year for powerhouse USC, a match that launched Ray Bechard. “I’m as proud as I can be for Payne; junior Ainise Havili becoming the KU volleyball to its rst Final Four in the our group, but pretty devastated that we rst back-to-back winner of Big 12 Setter NCAA Tournament, is preserved for the couldn’t ip the score.” of the Year; Bechard as conference Coach ages with a huge photograph displayed in A er beating Big 12 powerhouse Texas of the Year for the second-consecutive a Horejsi Family Athletics Center hallway. Oct. 29 to secure a tie for the conference season and the fourth time in ve years; at match’s magic could not be repeated, lead, the Jayhawks took sole possession of and junior outside hitter Madison Rigdon though, as the Jayhawks, winners of their the Big 12 lead with a 3-1 victory Nov. 5, joining Payne, Havili and Wait on the rst Big 12 title, were ousted by Creighton on a night that Texas was idle, at Okla- All-Big 12 First Team. in this season’s second round. homa. A ve-set victory over Iowa State Wait, senior Maggie Anderson, junior e fourth-ranked Jayhawks (27-3) Nov. 19 in Horejsi secured the Jayhawks’ Kayla Cheadle, redshirt freshman Patricia entered the Dec. 2 showdown with rst Big 12 title. Montero and senior Tayler Soucie were Creighton (28-6), one of the hottest teams “We are the aggressors now,” senior also named to the Academic All-Big 12 in the country with 15-consecutive libero Cassie Wait—an honorable mention rst team.
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 17 Sports
individual medley a day earlier in a Pool hustlers double-dual at UCLA, took second in the JEFF JACOBSEN 200 IM. Energetic swimmers cruise Senior Pia Pavlic out-touched San at four-team meet in San Diego Diego’s Dani Taylor by one-hundredth of a second in the 50-yard butter y, senior wimming powered into its 2017 Yulduz Kuchkarova won the 50-yard Snonconference season with a memo- backstroke, sophomore Haley Bishop rable West Coast trip, including a domi- placed second in the 50-yard breaststroke nating victory in the Jan. 7 USD Shootout. and 50-yard freestyle, and the Jayhawks With four event victories and 53 points, closed out the busy trip with a victory in the Jayhawks topped runner-up North the 400-yard freestyle relay. Texas by 25 points. “ e whole team is doing so good right KU started the four-team meet with a now, not only at meets, but what’s even second-place swim in the 400-yard medley more important, at practices,” Pavlic said. relay. at was followed by a victory in the “We are less than 50 days away from our 1,000-yard freestyle by sophomore Libby conference meet [Feb. 22 at Texas] and we Sophomore Libby Walker won the 1,000-yard Walker, with freshman Jenny Nusbaum all carry a lot of energy in each practice, freestyle at the Jan. 7 USD Shootout, and a day close behind in second. which is really what matters the most. is earlier placed a close second to junior Nusbaum then won the 200-yard team has an unlimited amount of poten- teammate Madison Straight in the 400-yard freestyle, and junior Madison Straight, tial, so with time and a little bit of rest, IM at a double-dual hosted by UCLA. coming o a victory in the 400-yard we’ll light it up at Austin.”
UPDATES
Sophomore Anastasia Dorance Armstrong Jr. was a
Rychagova, ranked No. 65 unanimous selection as JACOBSEN LAURA nationally in women’s tennis, first-team All-Big 12. Senior won her singles match and both safety Fish Smithson was also doubles matches on Jan. 7, the named first-team All-Big 12, final day of the Maui and sophomore defensive Invitational. The Jayhawks were lineman Daniel Wise was 21-6 in three days of recognized by ESPN. ... competition against Hawaii and Big 12 cross-country Washington State. The Jayhawk champion Sharon Lokedi, Big 12 Lokedi Tennis Center at Rock Chalk Women’s Runner of the Year, Park opens Jan. 20 with a ran fifth at the Nov. 19 NCAA junior Lois Heuchan, o a Rush, who now plays for the match against Saint Louis. ... Championships in Terre Haute, pinpoint pass by sophomore Minnesota Timberwolves Football’s incoming recruits Indiana, the best NCAA finish Grace Hagan. The Jayhawks alongside former KU teammate include a former starting by any KU cross-country runner were eliminated five days later Cole Aldrich, c’13, and Andrew quarterback for Washington since John Lawson, j’92, won by NCAA semifinalist North Wiggins, ’17. ... State, junior Peyton Bender. the men’s title in 1965. ... After Carolina. ... Sophomore McKenzie Coach David Beaty, who placing second in the Big 12’s Brandon Rush, named to the Calvert was named Co-Big 12 received a contract extension regular season, its best Final Four All-Tournament Team Player of the Week Dec. 27 through 2021, indicated that the conference performance since after KU’s championship run in after scoring 30 points in QB job would likely be decided 2004, the soccer team opened 2008, will have his No. 25 women’s basketball’s 90-84 between Bender and the NCAA Tournament with a jersey retired during the Feb. 22 victory over UC Riverside. sophomore Carter Stanley, 1-0, double-overtime victory men’s basketball game against Junior guard Jessica who led KU to a 24-21 victory over Missouri Nov. 13 at Rock TCU. “This is a big, big deal to Washington scored 16 in KU’s over Texas Nov. 19. ... Chalk Park. The game-winner have your number retired in the 75-51 rout of Arizona Dec. 17. Sophomore defensive end was a close-range strike by rafters of the field house,” said
18 | KANSAS ALUMNI Sports Photographs by Steve Puppe
New Stanford coach and former KU great Jerod Haase, b’97, g’01, returned to Allen Field House (above) Dec. 3. “He’ll be the most-loved head coach in the building,” coach Bill Self (far left) said before KU’s 89-74 victory. “He deserves that.” Other action for the Jayhawks included tipo of the Sunflower Showdown Jan. 3 against Kansas State (top), Landen Lucas (33) and Svi Mykhailiuk (10) hustling for a rebound (above left) Jan. 7 against Texas Tech, and Devonte’ Graham, Carlton Bragg Jr. and Lagerald Vick (left) celebrating a 30-point victory Nov. 29 over Long Beach State.
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 19 20 | KANSAS ALUMNI hampion f o Cr Change
n late November, as campus Rhodes Scholar cements her role as an advocate slowed its pace and students departed for anksgiving for marginalized communities break, Shegu a Huma made the familiar, two-and-a-half-hour drive from Lawrence to her Wichita area with her father, mother and by Heather Biele hometown of Bel Aire, a small suburb older sister just a month shy of her second Inortheast of Wichita. birthday. ey joined Huma’s aunt, her Photographs by Steve Puppe “It was the rst time I went back all mother’s younger sister, who lived nearby semester,” she admits. “I just haven’t had with her husband and family. the time.” “Growing up in Wichita was pretty While most parents would disapprove interesting,” Huma recalls. “Coming of uma proudly asserts that she of their youngest child’s extended absence age in the post-9/11 political climate, in inherited her ghting spirit from home, Huma’s family likely was a place like Kansas, really forced me to H from her parents. Her mother understanding. e political science confront a lot of realities not only about and father grew up in Bangla- major, who also graduates this spring with myself, but also about other people from desh during a particularly tumultuous a minor in Spanish, had just been named marginalized communities.” time in their country’s history, when the University’s 27th Rhodes Scholar a er Huma had just turned 7 when the Sept. genocide, deportations and other atrocities a whirlwind weekend in Chicago. 11 attacks occurred. at tragic sequence led to the Liberation War of 1971. “I was kind of in a daze,” she says, of events—and the anti-Muslim response “My parents came of age during a time describing the moment she won the that unfolded in its wake—helped shape of bloody revolution,” Huma says. “My prestigious award. “I just texted my sister, her desire to become a vocal advocate for dad, in his college days, was a political who was with my parents, and said, ‘GOT immigrants and other marginalized activist and very much involved with IT’ in all caps.” communities. Now, 15 years a er that resistance e orts in Bangladesh.” Of course, a phone call to her fateful day, Huma is poised to take a major Following in her father’s footsteps, parents soon followed, and Huma heard step toward accomplishing that goal as Huma established herself as a leader at a rsthand the joy and excitement in she joins 31 U.S. Rhodes Scholars next young age, serving as president of the their voices. year at Oxford University in England, Muslim Club at Wichita East High School Family has always played a signi cant where she will pursue two years of and vice president of Model United role in the young scholar’s life. Born in graduate studies in public policy, social Nations, an academic simulation program Bangladesh in 1994, Huma moved to the justice and human rights. for high school students who want to learn
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 21 about global issues and policymaking. She “She’s someone who makes you think about things in ways you hadn’t thought of before,” says did all this while excelling in the school’s Anne Wallen, who works closely with Huma in the University Honors Program. “And she does it in International Baccalaureate program, a a way that is disarming and surprising and just really delightful.” grueling academic endeavor for even the highest-achieving students. “Educators in my life have been very at also requires a high degree of bravery e University Honors Program in uential in terms of making me care and and courage. And she’s up to the task.” provided the close-knit community Huma dedicate myself to my academics,” Huma Bolstered by the support she received hoped for. From her rst moments on says. “Even as far back as elementary from her high-school teachers, Huma campus, even before she was fully school, I had educators—some of whom I carefully researched her options—and entrenched in the program, she under- still keep in touch with—who saw some- considered her close ties with her family— stood its value. “It allowed me to continue thing in me that I didn’t really see in before selecting KU to further her studies. having the type of supportive communities myself at that time. ey not only cel- “It was close enough to home that my that I was accustomed to,” she says. “It ebrated that, but they also helped me in parents felt secure with the decision and allowed me to have that in college, which whatever way they could to further my that they would still have access to see me,” was not something that I was expecting. I prospects in terms of school and a career.” she explains. “But it was also far enough was able to take honors courses that were One of those instructors is Jennifer Fry, away from home that I felt like I would be o entimes very small; some classes were who taught English at Wichita East High able to have the college experience and even smaller than classes I took in high School. “When you combine her personal gain some more independence. I also school. I felt that I was really able to life story with her scholarly passion, that’s decided to come here because I was connect to a lot of my professors in very what especially sets her apart,” says Fry. accepted into the Honors Program. I knew personal and meaningful ways.” “Life was not easy as a rst-generation the Honors Program was a community Anne Wallen, assistant director for Muslim female student, and it continues to that I would want to be a part of if I was national fellowships and scholarships and be challenging. She’s very, very committed going to go to a huge research institution director of the University Honors Pro- and passionate about making a dierence. like KU.” gram, describes the program as a liberal
22 | KANSAS ALUMNI arts college experience within a large research university. “Our students come in more likely to want to really hit the ground Life was not easy as a first-generation Muslim running, doing research and being very female student, and it continues to be challenging. involved in student government and “ She’s very, very committed and passionate organizations,” says Wallen, c’03, who has worked closely with Huma for the past two about making a dierence. That also requires years. “Our students are more likely to a high degree of bravery and courage. study abroad. Our job is to provide —Jennifer Fry resources to help them make all of those And she’s up to the task. things happen.” Huma took advantage of many opportu- nities the University Honors Program Huma used her powerful voice to speak personally confronted with the bigotry. provided. She immersed herself in student out against several other injustices on at really” catalyzed my desire to want to government and several other organiza- campus that year. While the Imagine dedicate everything to ghting towards tions, serving as president of the Muslim Coalition campaign was underway, social justice for the communities that I’m Student Association and a student senator anti-Muslim social media posts created by a part of and working in coalition with for the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences four KU fraternity members and other other marginalized communities across and eventually being elected as vice students surfaced online. As president of the world.” president of University Senate. She also the Muslim Student Association at the was one of 20 sophomores selected for the time, Huma worked to educate the University Scholars Program. During the University community about the harmful espite the di culties Huma has spring semester of her sophomore year, e ects of these actions and to prevent endured, she hasn’t let up in her she helped found the Imagine Coalition, similar events in the future. D commitment to the causes she recognizing a need for change in the way “She immediately responded to and believes in. Last year, she became Student Senate served the University. mediated—I think in a very respectful the University Honors Program’s rst “We decided to create our own coali- manner—a conversation between Greek peer outreach advisor to ensure that all tion, because student government as it life and the interim provost on how best to KU students are aware of the multitude existed was not serving the needs of respond and resolve that event,” says of fellowships and scholarships available marginalized students,” says Huma, who Porras. “It was resolved in a manner which to them. helped manage the coalition’s campaign most students would not have the maturity “As someone who has been a bene ciary that ran on a platform of diversity, equity to approach. She’s consistently committed of the system,” Huma says, “I felt it was and inclusion. to giving voice to the voiceless with such really important to pay it forward and But Huma’s newfound role as a leader grace and maturity.” really spread the word to other people who on campus didn’t come without chal- Although Huma had grown accustomed could bene t from the fellowship and lenges. “I de nitely faced a lot of backlash to anti-Muslim incidents on campus and scholarship process at KU.” from people, both within and outside of in her everyday life, nothing could have Huma also accepted a position last fall this institution, for daring to criticize prepared her for the kind of harassment as a peer educator for the O ce of anything that is wrong in the status she received the following spring. While Multicultural A airs, conducting training quo—for daring to want to change the ills serving as an intern at the Leadership and workshops on social justice education that are plaguing this institution,” she says. Conference on Civil and Human Rights in and cultural competency for her peers and “My colleagues and I dealt with a lot of Washington, D.C., during the 2016 U.S. student organizations on campus. backlash, because our platforms were presidential campaign, she publicly Working closely with the University based on social justice and equity.” criticized pro-Trump and anti-Muslim Honors Program and the O ce of Precious Porras, director of KU’s O ce comments that were written in chalk on Multicultural A airs was a natural t for of Multicultural A airs, witnessed the the sidewalks of KU’s campus. Huma, who says both organizations tremendous impact Huma made during “Aer that I probably received the most provided an immense amount of support the election. “She was a key driving force backlash I’ve gotten in my life,” Huma during her struggles at KU. in organizing a lot of that campaign and recalls. “I wasn’t even on campus, and I “ e University Honors Program has pushing forward,” Porras says. “While they was receiving hundreds and hundreds of been very supportive of me not only in my ultimately lost, I think she really branded hateful messages online from people academic life and academic triumphs, but herself as a leader on campus, especially in wanting me raped, dead or deported, also in a lot of the hardships that I faced at terms of being a voice for marginalized things like that. KU,” says Huma. “Whenever it felt like I students.” “It just changed everything. I was very haven’t had institutional support for causes
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 23 that I’ve advocated for, the support system a rare form of leadership emerge from her the door for me to be able to work with the that I have in the University Honors student. United Nations High Commissioner for Program has never failed to help li me up “She’s one of the strongest leaders and Refugees,” says Huma. “ at would be and carry me through whatever issues I agents for change I have encountered,” amazing. Maybe someday work in the U.S. was struggling through.” Britton says. “She stands up for things she Department of State Bureau of Population, ose who know Huma well know that believes in, even at great personal cost to Refugees, & Migration.” much of her strength comes from within. herself.” As evidenced by her unshakable “She’s just extremely determined and Britton has no doubt Huma will leadership and advocacy for marginalized dedicated,” says Wallen, who guided Huma continue to persevere with great strength communities on campus, Huma has through the application processes for the and purpose as she advocates for systemic already laid the foundation to make those Rhodes and Truman scholarships, both of change across the globe. goals attainable. She will walk away from which she was a nalist for. “She’s been “She has a very strong vision for what KU knowing that she never gave up, that through a lot, especially in the past year. she thinks the world should look like,” she provided a voice for those who may She’s just sort of reached this point where Britton continues. “And unlike a lot of not have had the courage to speak for she has accepted that she’s going to have students, she also has very clear plans. She themselves. challenges, but the things she cares about says more than just, ‘I want to make a “I hope that future Jayhawks can see that are important enough that she’s willing to di erence.’ She really will make a if you really stay true to the values that you ght through it. And that’s what she’s di erence.” hold dear and ght for the causes that you going to do: She’s going to keep ghting.” believe in, it will be worth it and things Hannah Britton, associate professor of will work out for you,” says Huma. political science and director of the Center ith most of her political science “Sometimes when it feels like you are for the Study of Injustice at the Institute of coursework behind her, Huma facing hurdle a er hurdle, setback a er Policy & Social Research at KU, has also will dedicate her remaining setback, for advocating for the causes that witnessed Huma’s strength in the face of Wtime at KU to planning her you believe in, it can be really easy to be adversity. As one of Huma’s instructors in studies at Oxford University, where she’ll dogged down and to give up,” she contin- fall 2015, during a time when the Univer- pursue a master’s degree in refugee and ues. “But as I have experienced with this sity was rocked by protests and reports of forced migration studies during her rst entire process of winning the Rhodes racism and discrimination following the year, followed by a year earning her Scholarship, I really do think that Nov. 11 town hall forum on race, respect, master’s degree in public policy. eventually the universe will reward you responsibility and free speech, Britton saw “I’m really hoping that Oxford can open for your e orts.”
24 | KANSAS ALUMNI Nominate a worthy Jayhawk!
ince 1975 the Fred Ellsworth Medallion has Shonored individuals “who have provided unique and signi cant service to KU.”
Fred Ellsworth Medallion recipients are honored by the Association in the fall and introduced during a home football game.
Past winners have been leaders in Kansas higher education, members of University boards and committees, consultants for KU projects and donors to the University.
If someone you know has continually shared time, talents and resources to bene t KU, submit a nomination today!
To submit a nomination, contact the KU Alumni Association by March 31 at 800-584-5397 or kualumni.org ach element of the U.S. military Jayhawk ocers bestows within its ranks awards and honors unique to the branch. For the U.S. Marine singled out for the Corps,E none has higher status than the Le wich Trophy, which once a year honors the infantry captain “who best exempli es Leftwich Trophy, outstanding leadership within the Ground Combat Arms community.” “Marines doing the right thing,” the Marine Corps’ A point of pride for the few and the Denning says. “ at’s what the Le wich proud is that every Marine is infantry. Trophy is recognizing, those captains in While true in spirit, not all Marines command who are making decisions and highest honor for become infantrymen; those who serve in taking action, demonstrating the leader- di erent areas of expertise are not eligible ship that has strategic consequences for for the Le wich Trophy. our nation.” infantry leadership “In the Marine Corps there’s one trophy As thrilled as Denning and his fellow that matters. One. And that’s the Le wich veterans on Mount Oread were to learn Trophy,” says Martin Minnich, c’06, a about Sparks’ honor, the next piece of retired Marine ocer now studying news almost stopped them cold: Five years by Chris Lazzarino mathematics in San Luis Obispo, Califor- later, in May 2016, Capt. omas Morrow, nia. “It is the pinnacle. If you’re a Marine c’06, was also awarded the Le wich ocer and you’re awarded the Le wich Trophy, for leadership of a training Trophy, you are in a long legacy of great, deployment that saw his Marines dis- and I mean absolutely great, U.S. Marines.” persed across eastern Asia and the Paci c. Mike Denning, c’83, director of KU’s “ e fact that KU, over the period of the Oce of Graduate Military Programs, last ve years, had two of these guys … president of the Alumni Association’s KU well, you would expect for that to be Naval Veterans Alumni Network and a former Academy,” Denning says. “Two Jayhawks Marine Corps aviator who retired as a with the Le wich Trophy? at’s why this colonel a er 27 years of service, was is really a great story.” thrilled when he learned that Ryan Sparks, c’97, a now-retired Marine captain, had eb. 12, 2010: Capt. Ryan Sparks stands been awarded the 2011 Le wich Trophy— Fbefore the men of Bravo Company, and a Silver Star—for his actions at the 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment. 2010 Battle of Marjah. Tomorrow begins the largest assault of the
26 | KANSAS ALUMNI night to see what was going to happen.” At Camp Dwyer, in southern Helmand Province, long war in Afghanistan, against Taliban battle planners produced a map ghters, narcotra ckers and other of the region and drew a circle assorted ru ans burrowed into Marjah, in around Marjah. Various Marine the large southern province of Helmand. companies would assemble at Two and a half months earlier, on Dec. staging areas around the perim- 1, 2009, President Barack Obama eter and attack the city from the announced that 30,000 additional troops outside. One company of would head for Afghanistan; less than six Marines would be ordered to hours aer the president’s West Point go in the opposite direction. speech, Bravo Company’s advance team “Who’s doing that?” had already departed Camp Lejeune, Sparks recalls asking the North Carolina. e rest soon followed. o cers in charge of “We were the rst,” Sparks says. “Packed, staging the ght to come. ready to go, and we were gone.” “ ey’re like, ‘Well, Sparks suspected that they were headed that’s you. You’re going to Marjah—a command and control hub to y in with your 200 for opium traders and terrorist networks, a Marines and 100 safe haven for foreign ghters ooding the Afghan soldiers, in area—and he was right. the middle of the night. Bravo Company was ready to join the We’re going to plan to not ght. be able to resupply you for “I had been building this company, 200 two days and you’re going to Marines, for a year,” Sparks says, explain- ght your way out.’” ing that at various times he guessed Under a brilliant desert sky, the men incorrectly that they’d be deployed to Iraq of Bravo Company listen intently as or Japan. “We’re watching CNN every Sparks, a recruiting-poster Marine, his
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 27 captain’s bars glistening in the sun, clicks o a few highlights of the company’s preparation, much of which had been more cerebral than physical, including Kantian and utilitarian ethics, theories and philosophies on life and death, explora- tions of Judeo-Christian and Muslim values. ASSOCIATION MARINE CORPS COURTESY “Trust me,” Sparks says, as captured by freelance videographer Ben Johnson, who later turned months of footage into “ e Battle for Marjah,” an HBO documentary, “this is going to be chaotic.” As these men had learned at the outset of their assembly as Bravo Company, their leader—one of the rst Marines sent to Afghanistan in fall 2001, as an enlisted member of Marine Force Recon—was more than a man of action. He also brimmed with intelligence and reection. At Fallujah in 2004, the 3rd Battalion of the 1st Marine Regiment, Sparks’ unit at
Ryan Sparks (left and above) received the Leftwich Trophy May 5, 2011, from Gen. Joseph STEVE PUPPE STEVE F. Dunford Jr., then assistant commandant of the Marine Corps. The trophy (detail, p. 27) was created by Felix de Weldon, designer of the revered U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial, which depicts Marines raising the flag on Iwo Jima.
ey were, unfortunately, correct. A detachment of Marines from neighboring Kilo Company, which had undergone a leadership turnover before heading to Haditha, killed two dozen unarmed men, women and children, allegedly in retribu- tion for an attack on a Marine convoy. “In Fallujah, not that killing civilians the time, endured ve months of daily a western Iraqi city called Haditha. was OK, but there just weren’t any there,” gun ghts, “but it wasn’t like a full-on e commander of Lima Company and Sparks says. “And so the conditioned attack.” en came two months of all-out his o cers, including Sparks, used the responses were di erent and the threat urban combat, during which Sparks’ short stateside turnaround to begin was a lot di erent. So we went back and battalion was “the main e ort,” or primary combat training anew, consciously kind of reset everybody. Our guys were war ghters given the critical missions pushing their Fallujah experience aside in very successful there. We didn’t lose a upon which the success of other aspects of favor of picture-perfect training-manual single Marine on that deployment.” the battle would hinge. “A very intense techniques. Fallujah, they predicted, had When nally given command of his own deployment,” Sparks summarizes dryly. been too much of an outlier, and Marine company, Sparks knew that the rst test of Six months aer returning to San Diego, units that replicated the unique intensity his leadership would be in the training, all 3rd Battalion deployed again, this time to of that battle would likely make mistakes. of which came to a head as his company
28 | KANSAS ALUMNI assembled for the nal time before boarding assault helicopters and ying “In the Marine Corps there’s one trophy straight into the heart of a ght around that matters. One. And that’s the Leftwich Trophy. which the others circled. Sparks reminds his men about their It is the pinnacle. If you’re a Marine ocer lessons in “the gi of aggression.” When and you’re awarded the Leftwich Trophy, you are the enemy chooses to engage U.S. Marines, he is choosing to die. “Destroy him,” in a long legacy of great, and I mean absolutely great, Sparks says atly. “Immediately.” e —Martin Minnich captain also cautions, “I guarantee you we U.S. Marines.” will lose Marines. I guarantee you that we will. Don’t let emotions control you.” He is not ranting, frothing, st pound- ing or foot stomping. He is crisp and cool. “What happens over the next ve days,” Sparks says, “will be a cornerstone of your memory for the rest of your life.” who was killed while leading an extraction because it’s never just me. It’s the team that mission during his second combat tour in provided this. I hope they really under- In the early morning hours, Company B Vietnam. stand it’s about their e orts, and not conducted a low-light heliborne assault to “ ere’s so many lessons out of that necessarily mine. I’m just the face, and not seize the Taliban stronghold in the Koru award for me,” Sparks says of the Lewich a good one at that.” Chareh village. ... Undaunted by [enemy Trophy. “ ere’s no way to earn or aim for e 2015 deployment for which Morrow re], Captain Sparks moved from position the greatest things you’re going to achieve. was singled out saw Weapons Company to position, covering hundreds of meters of at’s number one. Two, that’s a leadership strewn across its Asia-Paci c area of open terrain in order to e ectively direct his award speci cally, but there’s also no way operations. While the bulk of the battalion platoons. With complete disregard for his to do it on your own. My team won that trained with their South Korean counter- own safety, Captain Sparks led his company award. parts, Morrow’s company sent a mortar from the front, refusing to lose momentum “You focus on other people. As a team to Okinawa and a scout sniper and and cede the initiative to the enemy. company commander, probably more than mortar detachment joined a three-month —Citation for the Silver Star, awarded any other time in my life, I spent all my exercise with troops from Indonesia, Sept. 28, 2011 energy and all of my time and all of my Malaysia and ailand. Morrow’s Marines passion toward making my Marines better, were also dispatched to mainland Japan For his “calm demeanor, con dence enabling them, spending time with them, and the Philippines. under re, and exceptional tactical mentoring them, coaching them, making Morrow, according to commanding prowess,” as well as “bold leadership, the team better. And then when we were o cer Lt. Col. Ryan Hoyle, as quoted in determination, and complete dedication to in combat, making it a real thing, being the Marine Corps Times, “built the best duty,” Sparks was awarded the Silver Star, with the people there.” infantry company I’ve observed while the U.S. military’s third-highest decoration serving in ve di erent infantry battalions for valor in combat. Only four were over 20 years.” awarded from the Battle of Marjah, and homas Morrow, a captain when he e son of a retired Marine infantry Sparks was the lone o cer so honored. Treceived the Lewich last spring and o cer, Tom Morrow came to KU from “ at was probably the worst day of my now a major, was in the middle of a Libertyville, Illinois, north of Chicago. He life; you rely on great leaders like Capt. two-week training exercise with the had hoped to land a Navy ROTC scholar- Sparks to help you get through the day,” Marines of Weapons Company, 2nd ship, but instead won only a stipend that Sta Sgt. Kevin Irons told a Marine Corps Battalion, 3rd Marines, at Marine Corps helped with expenses but did not cover reporter at Sparks’ Silver Star ceremony. Base Hawaii when he received a call from tuition. He carried on, and quickly “He’s an incredible leader and de nitely another battalion captain, informing him embraced the infantry, not to follow his deserves this award. Every day he inspired that he had won the Lewich Trophy. father’s lead but in pursuit of what he us all to get the job done and worked hard “I didn’t believe it. I thought he was judged to be his strengths and passions. to get us all home safely.” joking at rst,” Major Morrow says from “ e things that associate themselves And then came an honor not loier, but his o ce at Marine Corps Base Hawaii, with being an infantryman are the things I still more rare: the Lewich Trophy, given where he is now the 2/3’s battalion ended up liking,” Morrow says. “ e once a year since 1979, in honor of Navy operations o cer. “I didn’t think that I physical aspect of it, the challenge of the Cross winner Lt. Col. William G. Lewich, individually deserve this, and I still don’t, austerity, just you and your Marines
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 29 solving problems and tackling challenges. at met my personality.” Martin Minnich, then a 28-year-old freshman, had already spent 10 years as an enlisted Marine, and attended KU as part of the Marines’ Enlisted Commissioning Education program. Despite the age gap, he developed unexpectedly close comrade- ship with a few fellow Navy ROTC DILLON CPL. NATALIE BY PHOTO MARINE CORPS freshmen, including Morrow. “Right from the beginning of the program, Tom Morrow was mature, he had a goal before him and he never wavered from that goal,” Minnich says. “You’ll nd that the majority of candidates KU sends [to O cer Candidate School] are going to be in the top 10 percent of that program. It’s not just that they’re out there winning the Le wich Trophy, but they’re out there at every event that they’re participating in and making a solid reputation for the school. KU has a very, were provided to me by KU. Why are they very good reputation for putting out doing this? What are they looking to quality Marines.” provide? And not to themselves or their As a second lieutenant, Morrow in families, but to their country. October 2007 was in charge of a joint “We’re all trying to provide a good life, security station, partnered with Iraqi to either Americans or the people we’re police, in northern Ramadi. As a rst defending abroad, so in a kind of round-
lieutenant, he commanded a combined about way, I reach back to that: What is ASSOCIATION MARINE CORPS COURTESY anti-armor platoon that patrolled a wide the good life?” range of Afghanistan’s Helmand Province. Along the way, he was careful to absorb lessons from o cers he respected as well xceptional leaders of ghting men as those he viewed as less than ideal. Eand women extend their leadership “Strangely enough,” Morrow says, “one beyond the battle eld. Of particular recent of the things that shaped who I am as a interest to Sparks is Tribe, a slim, thought- leader are the bad examples I’ve had, both ful book by author and war correspondent Tom Morrow at Marine Corps Base Hawaii in and outside of the Marine Corps, people Sebastian Junger. (top), during the world’s largest international you look at and you say, ‘I do not want to “Today’s veterans o en come home to maritime exercise, Rim of the Pacific 2016, and replicate whatever he was or did.’ So you nd that, although they’re willing to die receiving the Leftwich Trophy (above) from see what’s wrong to be able to do what’s for their country, they’re not sure how to Gen. Robert B. Neller, commandant of the right.” live for it,” writes Junger, who contends Marine Corps, on May 5, 2016. Like Sparks, Morrow drew upon his KU that loss of tribal identity is as much a liberal arts education in training young cause of psychological collapse as are vivid Marines under his command, most combat memories. “It’s hard to know how notably the “What is the good life?” to live for a country that regularly tears citizenship, their fellow Americans attend explorations he encountered in Western itself apart along every possible ethnic and and give those voices the respect they Civ I and II. demographic boundary. ... It’s complete deserve. e notion intrigues Sparks, who “I have since related ‘What is the good madness, and the veterans know this.” remains in regular contact with his former life?’ to what we o en think of as provid- Among Junger’s suggestions is that we Marines to encourage them in their ing ‘the why’ behind our actions,” Morrow devote Veterans Day to community civilian lives. says. “I have subordinate leaders who are forums where veterans are invited to stand Despite his best intentions, his leader- smarter than I ever was or will be, but I and say whatever is on their minds, to ship is sometimes no longer enough to see can challenge them with those things that nally be heard, and that as a price of his Marines through to safety.
30 | KANSAS ALUMNI “I’ve lost guys to suicide, and continue he found himself seeking a fresh challenge, did not in ict a single civilian casualty in to,” he says. “Eventually I’ll lose more guys he joined the elite Marine Force Recon. its seven-month deployment. to suicide than I have enemy re, I’m sure.” On Sept. 11, 2001, his Force Recon unit Sparks, who now leads a technology Sparks’ dedication to enlisted Marines is was already deployed in Australia, and implementation team for Chase Com- so intense that it drove him to become an they were the rst American forces sent merce Solutions in New York City, ocer in the rst place. into the ght, securing an air eld in returned in November to KU, where he Splitting his time between his parents’ Pakistan to prepare for the arrival of Air met with the KU Veterans Alumni homes in Overland Park and San Diego, Force combat search and rescue teams that Network, attended Marine Corps birthday Sparks grew up a sun-bleached surfer. His would precede Army Rangers and Green celebrations at the Dole Institute of Politics wheels at KU were the VW van he drove Berets headed to Afghanistan. and Salute to Service ceremonies during here from the beaches of Southern Sparks returned from Afghanistan in the football game against Iowa State, and California. “I was,” he says with a smile, March 2002 and le the Marines three visited the Center for Business, Industry “the only member of the KU surf team.” months later. He returned home to Kansas and National Security at the School of But a serious streak lurked within. City, but, rather than applying to law Business, a edgling program led by Sparks’ grandfather, Vincent Smiley, a school, Sparks found himself back in a lecturer Tom Jindra, g’01. torpedo bomber pilot in World War II, Marine Corps recruiting oce. Among other activities linking military was awarded the Navy Cross for extraordi- “I’m one of the 1,000 combat vets in the and civilians, Jindra’s KU program brings nary heroism in the July 28, 1945, attack entire U.S. military. I think I should go,” he together midcareer soldiers with execu- on the Japanese eet at the heavily forti ed told the recruiter. “You have war on the tives from business, industry, the federal anchorage near Honshu. horizon. I think I should come back.’” government and academia. e goal is to “With a grandfather like that,” Sparks He was accepted for pilot training, but, develop leadership skills by sharing says, “I always had an inclination to serve.” aer completing Ocer Candidate School, insights and expertise while also gaining He applied for the Marine Corps’ Sparks wrote to the commandant of the appreciation for colleagues from di erent Platoon Leaders ocer commissioning Marine Corps, asking to be let out of his career elds. program while at KU, with the hope of ight contract. “When they work together on common becoming a Marine aviator, but was “I’m a Force Recon combat vet. I should issues,” Jindra says, “they begin to under- denied. e ocial reason was, incredibly, be leading infantrymen,” Sparks says. “I stand one another. It’s a way to connect, for dandru ; in reality, it was the height of know that people will die who shouldn’t and those connections are awfully the mid-1990s drawdown, and the Marine die if I don’t do this.” important.” Corps was not inclined to grant waivers to is time Sparks got his waiver, and by Says Sparks, “Tom Jindra’s program is its strict entrance regulations. November 2004 he was in Fallujah as a fantastic. ere needs to be more things So Sparks embraced his KU experience, second lieutenant in charge of a huge like that.” including a Study Abroad year at the combined anti-armor platoon of more And more leaders like Sparks and University of Exeter, and aer graduation than 90 Marines. By the time he reached Morrow, a mission KU accepts gladly. he spent a year “just trying to gure it out.” his fourth combat deployment, at the He took a series of odd jobs—Sparks put Battle of Marjah, Sparks had years of himself through school by working experience in preparing Marines for summer construction—and when he combat, so when Bravo Company assem- nally tired of Lake Tahoe, where he was a bled before dropping into the center of snowboard instructor, Sparks returned to Marjah, Sparks relied on no notes. Lawrence, walked into the Marine Corps “It’s kind of how you know you’re in the recruiting oce at 23rd and Louisiana right place, right? You reach a level of More online streets and enlisted. “A very rare path,” he mastery where you don’t have to cra “The Battle for Marjah,” an says of a college graduate joining the anything. at’s all free ow.” award-winning documentary Marines’ enlisted ranks. His pre-combat speech was about more featuring Capt. Ryan Sparks He intended to get the military out of than the battle his men would soon face. It and the Marines of Bravo his system by serving for a few years was also about how his Marines should before returning to KU for law school and conduct themselves in a manner that Company, can be seen in its an eventual career in politics. First, would allow them to return with honor. As entirety at youtube.com/ though, he had to see his enlistment seen in the documentary, a neighboring watch?v=b9Pq5JZ2Fd8. through, and Sparks realized that the best company dropped explosives on a house way to loosen the grip of strict regulations harboring three families, injuring 11 and was to be the best. He was No. 1 in boot killing four children; Sparks’ Bravo team, camp, No. 1 at infantry school, and, when trained in “a culture of ethical response,”
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 31 In his first feature film : “And when I started to write they were , like, ‘Well, why aren’t you writing that?’” as writer and director, It took time—and the death of his E father—but Shoulberg eventually saw the Paul Shoulberg . dramatic possibilities of a love story whose A E . V plot twists include a special dispensation creates a monument . R . from the pope. “ e Good Catholic,” his rst feature as both writer and director, is to family and faith Many families have their own creation loosely based on the courtship of his story, the tale of how Mom and Dad met. parents, Don, PhD’75, and Gini Shoulberg, Growing up, Paul Shoulberg believed that g’72, who married in 1971. Rather than a his family’s was nothing special. true-to-life retelling of their relationship, “I always knew that my dad had been a the lm, set in the present day and shot in by Steven Hill priest and my mom was a nun and they Bloomington, Indiana, is instead a loving met and fell in love and quit doing that homage to Don, who died in March 2013, Portrait by James Brosher and had a family,” says Shoulberg, c’04. “I just as production was beginning on thought it was pretty normal. But as far “Walter,” Paul Shoulberg’s rst script to be back as I can remember, people would be made into a feature-length movie. like, ‘Oh, my God, that’s a hell of a story. “His death led directly to this lm,” says at’s a crazy story.’ Shoulberg of his father, who worked at
32 | KANSAS ALUMNI ISSUE 1, 2017 | 33 “There’s a heart to this story that just grabs you deal with the in uence exerted by his fellow priests, a strict, by-the-book father immediately. It tackles these very large issues of love played by Glover and a more irreverent, and faith and family in a way that only Paul’s writing can— worldly priest played by McGinley. “I’ve read everything Paul has ever which is to hit you as incredibly funny one moment written, and something just shone out of this story that wasn’t there before,” says and the next moment, when you least expect it, bring you down Spicer, who co-founded a production to this very contemplative place.” —Zachary Spicer company, Pigasus Pictures, to produce the movie. “ ere’s a heart to this story that just grabs you immediately. It tackles these very large issues of love and faith and KU’s Student Health Services and taught made me think, ‘You’re not here forever, family in a way that only Paul’s writing in the School of Social Welfare before and if you’re going to create something, it can—which is to hit you as incredibly going into private practice as a marriage has to be a story you’ll always be glad you funny one moment and the next moment, and family therapist. ough he was told.’” when you least expect it, bring you down thrilled to watch his “Walter” script Starring veteran actors Danny Glover to this very contemplative place. brought to the screen by another director, and John C. McGinley alongside relative “ at heart and that connection with his the process also made Paul realize that he newcomers Zachary Spicer and father made us know we had to take a wanted to not only write, but also direct. If Wrenn Schmidt, “ e Good Catholic” chance and make this movie.” he was going to commit the time and crackles with sharp dialogue, sexual e central question of the lm is energy needed to pull that o, he decided, tension and intense emotion as Daniel, a not what makes one a good Catholic, it had to be a story that meant a lot to him. young Catholic priest played by Spicer, Shoulberg says. “ e question is what “I couldn’t think of anything more grapples with his commitment to God and makes you a good human, and by good I important than delving into something the church a er encountering Jane, a don’t mean virtuous. What makes you based on my dad, to deal with all the stu free-spirited singer, during a late-night useful to the world? What makes you you have to deal with when you lose a confession. As their relationship deepens, somebody that can be good to other parent,” Shoulberg says. “His death really Daniel must confront his own doubts and people? e thought is, you’re not really COURTESY PIGASUS PICTURES (3) COURTESY
Paul Shoulberg with actor and Pigasus Pictures co-founder Zachary Spicer on the set of “The Good Catholic.” “Paul took a huge chance on me as an actor,” Spicer says, “and I guess we took a chance on him as a director. But the quality of his storytelling is such that it just didn’t seem that big a chance to me.”
34 | KANSAS ALUMNI serving anyone if you’re not being true to yourself. Can you really see God if you’re not following your heart?”
an a person serve God without Cfollowing their heart? at was among the questions faced by Don, a Roman Catholic priest and master’s student at Duke Divinity School, and Gini Hartigan, a Dominican nun and teacher, who met in Durham, North Carolina, in 1967. ey were introduced by a priest on the church steps before Mass. A erward, Don joined Gini and the other sisters at the convent for break- fast. “He stayed several hours, just talking to everybody, and we had a wonderful discussion,” Gini Shoulberg recalls. “When he le —they teased me about it later—I said, ‘I could talk to him forever.’” Over the next two years they grew close. “He became a soul mate,” Gini says. “He and I were on the same wavelength spiritually. I just thought, ‘ is is good.’ We were just very close friends.” In May 1969, Gini was asked to leave her job teaching junior high school and join an experimental community her order was starting. Don won an internship in Houston to study marriage and family counseling. She loved her job, loved the Gini and Don Shoulberg after their parish, loved Durham. When she sought move to Lawrence in the early his advice, he confessed that he had strong 1970s. Don and Paul at Paul’s feelings for her that were troubling him. wedding in 2005. “I went on about how feelings are just feelings, you don’t have to act on them,” she says. “And that’s how it ended. But that night, it just exploded.” She’d decided to Gini recalls. “I said, ‘I can’t let you do it.’ Vatican council that modernized many of become a nun at age 12, she explains, and And he said, ‘You don’t have a choice what the Roman Catholic Church’s teachings. feelings repressed through high school and I do; you gotta make your own decision.’” But for those raised in the church and college now burst forth. It took her a couple of months longer to educated in Catholic schools, some of the “It panicked me. I thought, ‘I’m nd her answer. e turning point came old teachings died hard. supposed to be a nun; I can’t be feeling when she spoke to a Presbyterian minister, “I said, ‘I want to be married, but if I do like this.’” a former Duke classmate of Don’s. God won’t love me,’” Gini recalls. “And Don le for Houston, Gini stayed in “ e rst question he asked me, he said, those words freed me completely, because Durham, and over the course of the next ‘Leave the church aside, leave Don aside, I knew that was ridiculous. I was earning year apart they wrestled with what to do. leave everything aside: What do you want God’s love, because that’s how we were Don decided rst. “He said, ‘I’m leaving to do?’” brought up: You have to earn it because the priesthood. I want to be married,”’ ese were the days a er Vatican II, the you’re really a bad person.”
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 35 on the brink of giving up when someone— he thinks it might have been Don—sug- gested that he talk to Kevin Willmott, professor of theatre and lm. “I remember standing in line outside his COURTESY PIGASUS PICTURES COURTESY door,” Shoulberg recalls. “ ere was always a line. I stood in line, not being a theatre student, never having met him, and I waited through his entire o ce hours and couldn’t get in because there were too many people. I went back and nally got in, and he was really nice.” Willmott read one of Shoulberg’s scripts, and he liked what he saw. “He was just one of those students that you know right away is special,” Willmott says. “He had the thing it takes to get there. He was just a great writer: smart and funny and sophisticated. And he had a voice, even at KU. I knew that it was just a Zachary Spicer, Paul Shoulberg and David Anspaugh. Enlisting the director of Indiana’s two most matter of time for him.” well-known films, “Hoosiers” and “Rudy,” as executive director for “The Good Catholic” was a key “He said, ‘You’ve got something. You’re step forward for the Bloomington-based production. good at this. Here’s some thoughts. Work on it and come back,’” Shoulberg says of that rst script. “He kept telling me to Gini nished the school year, resigned Heady. Intellectual. A ceaseless reader come back, and I did that for three years. I her job and le her vows. Don announced who loved big ideas and dirty jokes, don’t think I ever took a class with him, his intention to leave the priesthood, philosophical discussions and salty because I was meeting with him a couple which required permission from the pope. language. A man with endless patience, a of times a month in his o ce and getting She ew to Houston to meet him, and sunny outlook and a nearly Olympic talent the best education I could get. I owe so together they drove to Lawrence, where for listening—along with a wicked much to him, because I was about to give he’d landed a job at KU, to begin their life mischievous streak. at was Don up and he repeatedly told me, ‘You have together. Shoulberg. the ability to do this.’” Don worked at Watkins Memorial “When the children were little, and they rough playwriting classes with Paul Hospital and taught in the School of Social would start acting out at dinner, he’d laugh Lim, c’70, g’74, founder of KU’s English Welfare until 1982, when he joined the so hard,” Gini says. “I’d take my plate and Alternative eatre, Shoulberg discovered Menninger Clinic in Kansas City. He come in here, close that door. I didn’t want the allure of writing for the stage. “What I moved to private practice in 1990. Gini them to see me laughing, because I felt like loved was that for no money you could taught, rst at Pinckney Elementary somebody had to maintain some control. nd ve actors and have a production,” he School and later at St. John Catholic But Don was one of them.” says. “It was so much easier than making a School, where she retired in 2013 a er 50 lm.” at led to graduate school at years of teaching. Indiana University, where he completed an Together they raised three children: hile earning his bachelor’s in MFA in playwriting. His work won several Jennifer, b’94; Erin; and Paul. Wtheatre and lm, Paul Shoulberg honors, including the Kennedy Center’s “We le our vows, but we never le the made enough short lms to satisfy 2007 Mark Twain Playwriting Award for church,” Gini says. As a priest, Don had requirements for his major, but his real Comedy. But critiques from his fellow been known for his counseling in the love was screenwriting. Even when he students and teachers led to a realization. confessional. “He continued the work he dropped out for a while, a er changing “ e response I was getting to my plays was doing as a priest, and I continued the majors several times, he kept writing was, ‘ ese are like movies on stage.’ And I work I’d been doing as a teacher. at screenplays, posting his work to a website was like, ‘Yeah, because movies are better.’ didn’t change. I’d loved living in commu- that oered peer reviews. When he came And they were like, ‘ en why are you nity, and he became my community. When back to KU, he pressed his scripts on writing plays?’ So I kinda came back to he died, that was one of my losses. I theatre actors, hoping to interest them in a lm.” missed that faith community.” reading. No one returned his calls. He was A er nishing “ e Good Catholic”
36 | KANSAS ALUMNI script, Shoulberg again sought out “He was just one of those students that you know right Willmott. He was determined to make the lm, even if he had to fund it with away is special. He had the thing it takes to get there. He was Kickstarter and do it with volunteers on a bare-bones budget. Willmott, who has just a great writer: smart and funny and sophisticated. directed nearly a dozen of his own lms, including “CSA: e Confederate States of And he had a voice, even at KU. I knew that it was just America” and “Jayhawkers,” helped show him how it could be done. a matter of time for him.” —Kevin Willmott “We talked about how hard it is to get something smart through the Hollywood system,” Willmott says. “How, if it comes down to that—if it comes down to raising But that was far from the only stroke of that somewhere, and it’s the sort of money and making the lm on your good fortune, Spicer notes. creation story that rings true to him, a own—you should do that. And I think he “David Anspaugh said that when he man who le the church at 16 but who was prepared to do that when he got directed ‘Rudy,’ everything looked like it nevertheless grew to understand and lu c k y.” was going to fail but at the last moment appreciate the role that faith played in his Luck, fortune, kismet: ese are not something always saved the situation. at father’s life. prominent gods in Paul Shoulberg’s happened throughout the process of “I’ve never been particularly religious, pantheon. “He may quite possibly be the making this entire movie. So many things and I’m still not, but as my father was most cynical person I know,” says Zachary could have gone terribly wrong for us and dying, I really learned a lot about what Spicer. “He worries about the worst turned the movie into a disaster, but at the religion has o ered him, and I developed a possible scenario of everything all the end every single time something always real respect for how he embraced it and time. Up to the point that Danny Glover swooped in and saved the movie.” used it to be a better person,” he told the got on the set, Paul still didn’t believe the Landing Glover and McGinley. Securing Lawrence Journal-World in a March movie was going to happen.” help from the City of Bloomington in interview. “To see how a really smart, Yet, Willmott explains, every indepen- lming certain key scenes. Convincing progressive, loving guy can nd meaning dent lmmaker needs a bit of luck. investors to open their checkbooks at in religion did give me respect for it. And “Luck in the sense that there’s a lot of critical moments. e speci cs of their that was something I hadn’t really learned really great writers out there—and Paul is deliverance from disaster varied, but one yet.” de nitely one of them—but the thing thing was constant, Spicer says. With “ e Good Catholic,” Shoulberg you’re always looking for is you’ve got to “If it weren’t for the personal aspect of also learned to trust his own instincts as a get it to the right person. If you’re lucky this story—that we’re making it for Paul’s screenwriter. enough to do that, then something can dad—the lm wouldn’t have gotten made. “When I was writing, I just felt I needed happen.” at got people on board. Because they to be honest with these characters. And as For Shoulberg and his creative partners understood, there’s no determination like a result it’s the most gentle script I’ve ever at Pigasus Pictures, a big break came when the determination of a child who wants to written.” e lm is more of a “slow burn” David Anspaugh, director of “Hoosiers” honor their parents.” than his previous work, Shoulberg says. and “Rudy,” signed on as executive e natural state of an independent lm “I usually don’t have that much disci- producer. is to not exist. Paul Shoulberg says he read pline. I like to come at you right away, the typical lm thing where you really want to get everyone’s attention right out of the gate and really push and push.” Screen Shot Although the lm wrestles with big philosophical ideas like love and faith and “The Good Catholic” will premiere the nature of true calling, there is a human in February at the Santa Barbara scale to the plot and a genuineness to the International Film Festival in California, characters that rmly grounds the movie’s with additional festival screenings spiritual questions in everyday life. planned. For more information on the Paul likes that, and he thinks his father film, visit thegoodcatholicmovie.com would have liked it too. or follow “The Good Catholic” on “I didn’t want it to turn into something Facebook, Twitter and Instagram not real,” he says. “I had to honor my @tgcmovie. father’s story.”
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 37 Association A NOTE FROM HEATH School of Engineering merits KU pride throughout the region
ne of the Alumni Association’s most Ocritical roles is to inform, engage and mobilize the KU community to strengthen
LISA SCHELLER/KU ENDOWMENT SCHELLER/KU LISA the University. As graduates, donors and members of the KU Alumni Association, you can attest to the power of a KU education. As “shareholders” of the University, you also understand that your support and service help increase the value of the KU degree. Therefore, I want to highlight our world-class School of Engineering and enlist your help to educate your peers Masters of tradition and recruit the next generation of 2017 Rock Chalk Ball to highlight a timeless golf classic Jayhawk engineers! To be an eective Peterson advocate, all you he Master’s Tournament provides and volunteers, serve alumni and KU, need is the ability to articulate the facts, Tplenty of golf’s richest traditions: and unite all Jayhawks. along with a little Jayhawk enthusiasm: distinctive green jackets, an honorary Alumni are encouraged to perfect their • The KU School of Engineering has opening tee shot and uniquely costumed swings and gear up in golf attire for this produced true giants in business, caddies. is year, Kansas City-area year’s celebration, which will feature silent including Alan Mulally, e’68, g’69, former alumni will celebrate a twist on a classic and live auctions and the music of the CEO at Boeing Commercial Airplanes and Jayhawk tradition, as the 22nd-annual Karen Davis Project. Brian Hanni, j’02, Ford Motor Company, who was widely Rock Chalk Ball brings a taste of the the play-by-play voice of the Jayhawks, credited for his innovative leadership legendary golf tournament to the Over- will serve as emcee. helping Ford thrive after the devastating land Park Convention Center April 29. Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little and losses during the Great Recession and is “We are working to create an event that Shade Little are honorary chairs of this now on the board of directors for highlights those who have impacted the year’s event, a tting tribute as Gray-Little Google’s parent company, Alphabet; and KU community over the years and are true announced in September that she will step Brian McClendon, e’86, vice president of ‘Masters of Tradition,’” says Kelsey Hill, down June 30 a er serving the KU advanced technologies for Uber and c’12, assistant director of Kansas City and community for the past eight years. formerly one of Google’s most influential Wichita programs. “We hope this is a Sasha Flores Boulware, c’98, g’00, and engineering executives, who developed theme with which attendees can really get Jason Booker, b’99, will lend their services the digital mapping software that became creative and have fun.” to the ball as network co-chairs. Boulware known as Google Earth. They are only Hosted by the Alumni Association and is a Presidents Club member and a two of countless engineering alumni the Greater Kansas City Network, the longtime ball participant. She has served around the world who have led their annual event unites Jayhawks in the on the Greater Kansas City board since industries. nation’s largest KU community and raises 2000. Booker is a Life Member and a funds for Association programs to Presidents Club member and has partici- • The KU School of Engineering is the advocate for KU, communicate to alumni pated in the ball since 2008. He is entering top-ranked program in the state of and friends in all media, recruit students his second year on the board. —Continued on p.40
38 | KANSAS ALUMNI
Association
Sweepstake wins A NOTE FROM HEATH —continued from p.38
hanks to everyone who entered the Kansas, and KU is the only AAU university of the newest and most advanced facilities TAlumni Association’s Membership in the state. in the nation. Mania Sweepstakes. e following winners • In Kansas, KU Engineering students You should be proud that the KU School renewed or upgraded their memberships, have the highest ACT/SAT averages and of Engineering provides the “total package” purchased a gi membership or made a the highest graduation rates. for future engineers, not to mention all the year-end contribution to the Association other benefits associated with being a • KU Engineering students benefit from to enter the drawing: Jayhawk! Thank you, as always, for your the best student-to-faculty ratios in the support of our proud University, and for state. n Grand Prize: $1,000 Visa® gi card, strengthening our alma mater by helping 2016-’17 KU men’s team autographed • In addition to tutelage from outstanding us recruit students! basketball and four tickets to the faculty, KU Engineering students also take Rock Chalk! KU vs. West Virginia basketball game classes and conduct research in some —Heath Peterson, d’04, g’09 Carole Haggard, g’94, Olathe KU Alumni Association President n Second Prize: 60-inch Samsung® at screen television j’03, director of legacy relations, and Brad Finals Dinner Wendy Rohleder-Sook, c’98, l’01 Eland, b’09, g’11, vice president of alumni Hays programs. • Gold, Diversity Programs, KU Black n ird Prize: Yeti® Jayhawk cooler and Alumni Network Leaders and Innovators.
two tumblers Jacey Krehbiel, d’12, g’16, assistant (3) YOUNGER SUSAN Jason Scheiderer, Kansas City director of alumni programs, and Eland worked with network volunteers. n Fourth Prize: Bose® Bluetooth speaker • Silver, Editorial Design, “Lifeline,” Karen Pershall-Wilder, PharmD’08 Kansas Alumni, issue No. 3, 2016. Susan Olathe Younger, f’91, creative director, provided the illustration. n Fi h Prize: $100 Visa® Gi Card • Gold, Best Articles of the Year, William Nye, c’70 “Mission: Relief,” Kansas Alumni, issue No. Falls Church, Virginia 2, 2016. e cover story, by Associate Editor Steven Hill, pro led William McNulty, c’01, founder of Team Rubicon, a disaster relief organization led by military Top honors veterans and emergency rst responders. It now advances to compete in the Best Kansas Alumni, programs Articles of the Year category of CASE’s recognized with regional awards international competition this spring. • Gold, Periodical Sta Writing, Kansas lumni Association programs and Alumni writers and editors. Contributors AKansas Alumni magazine earned ve include Jennifer Jackson Sanner, j’81, awards in the eight-state District VI 2016 editor; Chris Lazzarino, j’86, associate competition of the Council for Advance- editor; Hill; and Heather Biele, sta ment and Support of Education (CASE). writer. e fall competition preceded the district’s annual conference in January. e Therapy dogs, massage and a dinner buet following list describes the awards, are excellent antidotes for stress. Finals categories, projects and sta members who dinner, hosted by the Student Alumni contributed. • Silver, Alumni Programs for Special Association, is designed to give students a Constituencies, Home for the Holidays. break from the stress of studying and e project included Joy Maxwell, c’03, upcoming exams.
40 | KANSAS ALUMNI Life Members e Association thanks these Jayhawks, who began their Life memberships Nov. 1 through Dec. 31. For information, visit kualumni.org or call 800-584-2957. The KU Black Alumni Network Andrew L. Allen Gerald T. Elliott Robert H. & Marcia Eubank Tyler J. Emerson Altomare Brian L. Filinger Nathan F. Anderson Peggy M. Flood Mike and Joyce Shinn Michael L. Aurbach Timothy B. & Jennifer Carter Alexa R. Backman Fortin Maurice W. & Diana K. Baker Jannene Foust-Welchons Leaders John D. Blankenship Melissa Thomas Furman Gregory L. Blaske Andrew K. Gaddis Spencer L. Brackman Susan Glatter Gallagher and Austin P. Brane Michael B. George Thomas A. Brigham James N. Gilbert Innovators C. Gilberto & Prudence Hearst William L. Goodell Brito Michael W. Goodwin LuAnn Ellis Butterfield Deborah S. Grimes Award Gregory J. Cameron Lauren Pollmiller Harms David M. Charles Jennifer S. Harrington David A. Christ William & Kirsten Oschwald he KU Black Alumni Network is proud to Scott D. & Paige Ruby Conklin Hastings honor African-American alumni who have Drew T. Darrah Stephen T. Hetro Tdistinguished themselves and made a Susan Saner Davenport Seanna L. Higley di erence through demonstrated leadership Justin T. & Jennie Lei Sichter Patrick A. Hildebrandt and/or innovation to the University, their Davis Don A. Hill profession or society at large. The project Shannon I. Daze Gordon R. Ho man acknowledges the contributions of individuals Gary W. & Amy M. Decker Rodney J. & Barbara Nelson who have made their mark in varied ways and Lucas J. Steinbeck & Davina F. Ho man highlights in photographs and text the accom- Dell-Steinbeck Sarah A. Hutton plishments of our honorees. Grayson D. & Kaylin Carter Le M. Huynh Dillon Molly E. Iler Recipients are selected from nominations Merilyn K. Douglass Renee E. Jones submitted to the KU Black Alumni Network Whitlee A. Douthitt Zachary C. Jones Mike and Joyce Shinn Leaders and Innovators Courtney Driscoll Emily Enright Johnson Award Committee. Brian S. Duerksen Amanda Kerley Dulaney —Continued on p.42 The committee will accept nominations for the 2017 awards through Feb. 17, 2017. DAN STOREY DAN
To nominate an individual, please complete the nomination form online at kualumni.org/kublackalumni.
Presidents Club members enjoyed the pregame tailgate reception Dec. 3 in the Adams Alumni Center before the KU vs. Stanford game.
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 41 Association
Mark A. & Susan Dickey n Life Members Board of Directors DIRECTORS TO 2021 Putman Ryan Colaianni, c’07, j’07, Arlington, n CHAIR Barbara Long Quirk-Rizzo Virginia —Continued from p.41 Scott R. Seyfarth, b’83, Hinsdale, Erik A. & Kathleen Moore Illinois Jay Kerutis, c’82, Mesa, Arizona Eric Johnson Radowski Janet Lusk Murfin, d’75, Wichita n CHAIR-ELECT Joshua L. & Emily T. Johnson Alexander R. Raines Portia Kibble Smith, c’78, Kevin E. Carroll, assoc., Atlanta, Brian M. Johnston Adam B. & Jessica Kalender Overland Park Georgia Barbara Kaatman Kalist Rich Sean Kelly Kyle N. Roberts n EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE John W. Ballard III, b’73, Overland Park Senior Sta Members John H. Killen Randall W. Rock Kevin E. Carroll, assoc., Atlanta, n PRESIDENT Cindy Lewis Kindsvater Weston B. Rockers Georgia Heath Peterson, d’04, g’09 Victoria B. Kirk Aaron R. Rogers Michael P. Koehler Dennis R. & Merrill Harris Marci K. Deuth, e’05, Washington, D.C. n ADMINISTRATION Peter R. Laudon Schapker Cory L. Lagerstrom, c’94, g’98, l’98, Heather Hawkins, j’06, Executive Karen J. Lenzen Nicholas R. Schulte Prairie Village Assistant & Coordinator, Donor Jill Simpson Miller, d’01, Webb City, Relations Kristen Dawson Lewis Mark O. & Cynthia E. Scott Missouri Janet M. Lipke Judith Ryan Sears Richard E. Putnam, c’77, l’80, n ALUMNI & STUDENT Mitchell A. & Marcialete A. Laura A. Serrano Omaha, Nebraska MEMBERSHIP PROGRAMS Love Eric & Rebecca Shultz Scott R. Seyfarth, b’83, Hinsdale, Brad Eland, b’09, g’11, Vice Cathrine Moore MacFarlane Michael T. & Alicia Oswald President, Alumni & Student Illinois Kimberly S. Manche Simon Programs n DIRECTORS TO 2017 Thomas J. Manning Preeti Singh Donald R. Brada, c’61, m’65, Lawrence n COMMUNICATIONS Teresa A. Markowitz Nancy L. Smith Luke B. Bobo, e’82, Shawnee Jennifer Sanner, j’81, Senior Vice Deanna Marks Neha Sood Kevin E. Carroll, assoc., Atlanta, President, Strategic Communica- Thomas A. Matches Stephen T. Southern Georgia Marci K. Deuth, e’05, Chicago, tions & Advocacy; Secretary Nathaniel R. Mayhew Timothy R. Sparks Illinois n DEVELOPMENT Scott E. & Barbie Hyatt Molly E. Maxwell & Ryan M. Gregory E. Ek, b’76, Wichita Calvin McConnell, j’11, McAfee Sprott n DIRECTORS TO 2018 Associate Development Director Lynda K. McGinnis Hugh Stanfield John W. Ballard III, b’73, Overland n DONOR RELATIONS Nicole McGrew Craig D. Stewart Park Aaron R. Brinkman, j’98, Dallas, Angela Storey, b’04, g’07, Yusshy R. Mendoza William H. Stiles Texas Debi Dennis Duckworth, d’80, Vice President Craig A. Merrick Richard A. Stones Houston, Marla K. Michaels Julie A. Stover n Texas FINANCE Dwight Parman, Senior Vice David H. Michener John R. Swift Jill Simpson Miller, d’01, Webb City, President, Finance and Human Nicolas S. & Stephanie Rebecca Streeter Tast Missouri Resources; Treasurer Greer Miller Matthew R. & Jennifer Jerry D. Skillett, b’81, New York, New Frederick N. & Jeanne M. Poecker Thompson York n HOSPITALITY SERVICES Mills Rachel P. Tindall Bryan Greve, Senior Vice President, n DIRECTORS TO 2019 Morgan J. Minnis Kevin S. Tuttle Hospitality Carrie W. Coulson, b’02, l’05, New John B. Mitchell Bruce C. Underwood York, New York n MARKETING & DIGITAL Megan E. Murray Duane W. & Brenda J. Vann Cory L. Lagerstrom, c’94, g’98, l’98, MEDIA Michael F. Neilson Jessica Spohn Wade Prairie Village David Johnston, j’94, g’06, Vice Brett K. Nickisch Mayo C. Walcott Cindy Emig Penzler, c’81, m’85, President, Marketing & Digital Jan M. Nosinger Patrick M. & Camey Beaupre Lawrence Media Brandon F. Numrich Walker Timothy T. Trump, b’80, l’83, Tulsa, n MEMBERSHIP PROGRAMS Nolan P. & Ragen L. Numrich Stephanie L. White-Neuhold Oklahoma Teri Harris, Vice President, Daniel P. & Nikki R. Ogle Camden L. Wittenauer Albert I. Shank Jr., b’77, Liberal Membership & Business Matthew J. Ostergaard Sarah E. Wittenauer n DIRECTORS TO 2020 Development Tari J. Parmely Cayla J. Witty Missy Hodge McCarthy, c’86, s’88, n RECORDS Scott M. & Sarah Hedberg Steve P. Wright Rancho Mirage, California Bill Green, Senior Vice President, Penny Cliord B. Young Ellen O. Remsing, c’00, Manhattan, Information Services Thomas W. Wilder & Karen K. Greg D. Younger Kansas Stefanie Shackelford, Vice President, Pershall-Wilder Kyle J. Zerr Dave B. Roland, e’80, Excelsior, Alumni Records Kathy Kilo Peterson Taylor J. Zimmerman Minnesota
42 | KANSAS ALUMNI Nominate an Association member to serve on the board
We need your assistance in nominating future members of the KU Alumni Association’s National Board of Directors.
To nominate a fellow Jayhawk, please complete the form at kualumni.org/board or call 800-584-2957 and materials will be mailed or faxed to you. All nominations should be sent to the Association by March 1.
With your help, the Association will continue to recruit directors who represent the diversity of the KU family and the dedicaton that has been a hallmark of KU alumni service through the years.
For any additional questions, contact the Association at 800-584-2957 or visit kualumni.org Class Notes by Heather Biele Carrizozo, New Mexico, with his wife, Deborah. Tom Geraghty, c’68, m’72, a recently retired plastic surgeon, is president of the Stan Hamilton, j’55, an author Jan van Sant, g’58, PhD’63, is on the KU Medical Alumni Association board. 55 and retired journalist who lives in 58 board of directors of Senior Quality He is also chairman emeritus of Medical Lawrence, contributed an essay titled Lifestyles Corporation in Houston. He is Aid for Children of Latin America and a “Wanderlust Satis ed (Temporarily)” to retired from a 34-year career in the oil city councilman in Mission, where he lives the book Drive-In Movies and General industry. with his wife, Judy. Stores: Tales from the Good Old Days in Richard Shrout, c’68, is a founding Northeastern Kansas, which was published Nancy Topham Chadwick, c’61, is partner at Potomac Indexing in Gaithers- by Hometown Memories of Hickory, 61 trustee emeritus at Palomar College burg, Maryland, where he lives. North Carolina. in San Marcos, California. She is retired from the University of California and Kenneth Lee Washington, j’70, Carl Blair, f’56, an artist and former resides in Oceanside. 70 wrote Joe’s Tap: e Story of 56 instructor at Bob Jones University David Edgell, b’61, received a faculty Maurine and Tales of the Other Cape May, in Greenville, South Carolina, will be book award from East Carolina University which was published in August by honored this spring by 55 artists at an in Greenville, North Carolina, for publish- iUniverse. exhibition at the Metropolitan Arts ing Managing Sustainable Tourism: A Council, where he also will showcase his Legacy for the Future. He’s a professor of Dee Wallace Stone, d’71, stars in own work. tourism, trade and economic development 71 “Just Add Magic,” a new series on at the school. Amazon. She is an author and actress in Clark Stewart, b’61, g’63, is president of Woodland Hills, California. School Codes Letters that follow names indicate the school from which alumni earned Butler National Corporation in Olathe, degrees. Numbers show their class years. where he makes his home with Sue Cliord Otto, b’72, is CEO of Saddle Antenen Stewart, d’64. 72 Creek Logistics Services and serves a School of Architecture, on the board of trustees of Florida Design and Planning Luther Fry, c’63, m’67, owns Fry Eye Polytechnic University in Lakeland, b School of Business Associates in Garden City. He has Florida, where he makes his home. c College of Liberal Arts 63 and Sciences performed more than 42,000 cataract d School of Education surgeries during his 40-year career as an Everett “Kit” Moulton III, c’73, m’80, e School of Engineering ophthalmologist. 73 an ophthalmologist in Fort Smith, f School of Fine Arts Douglas Neckers, PhD’63, won the 2016 Arkansas, wrote Annabella, which was g Master’s Degree eodor Förster Lecture Prize. He is published in January 2016. h School of Health Professions McMaster Distinguished Research Krishna Sreedhar, ’73, lives in Kerala, j School of Journalism Professor Emeritus of photochemical India, where he’s a retired psychotherapist. l School of Law sciences at Bowling Green State University m School of Medicine and CEO of Spectra Group. Mary Anne Modrcin, n’74, is dean of n School of Nursing 74 nursing and vice president for p School of Pharmacy Janice Wheaton, c’64, lives in extended learning sites at Lincoln Memo- PharmD School of Pharmacy s School of Social Welfare 64 Madison, Wisconsin, where she rial University in Harrogate, Tennessee. u School of Music retired as assistant dean of students at AUD Doctor of Audiology University of Wisconsin-Madison. Lewis Armstrong, g’75, is retired DE Doctor of Engineering 75 and lives in Fayetteville, Georgia. He DMA Doctor of Musical Arts Daniel Leonard, d’67, owns Wallowa is working on a cookbook and an autobi- DNP Doctor of Nursing Practice 67 Lake Lodge in Joseph, Oregon, and ography and continues to be involved in DPT Doctor of Physical Therapy is facilities chairman of the board of local veterans’ programs. EdD Doctor of Education managers for the property. He and his Barry Rose, c’75, m’79, wrote e OTD Doctor of Occupational wife, Joyce, were recently honored by Cutting Edge of Compassion: How Physi- Therapy AARP as nalists for the Washington State cians, Health Professionals, and Patients PhD Doctor of Philosophy Volunteers of the Year Award. Can Build Healing Relationships Based on SJD Doctor of Juridical Science (no letter) Former student Trust, which was published in September. assoc Associate member of the Rick Geary, f’68, g’70, is a cartoon- He’s chief of orthopedic surgery and Alumni Association 68 ist and illustrator who lives in surgical division head at Palo Alto
44 | KANSAS ALUMNI Foundation Medical Groups in San Francisco.
U.S. Sen. Jerry Moran, c’76, l’82, in 76 November was elected to another six-year term in the U.S. Senate. He and his wife, Robba, live in Manhattan. Ridley Pearson, ’76, an author who lives in St. Louis, wrote Lock and Key: e Initiation, which was published in Septem- ber by HarperCollins. It’s his rst book in the Lock and Key trilogy for young adults. Paul White, b’76, g’79, is vice president of real estate at Kiewit Corporation in Omaha, Nebraska. He and Kristine Howard White, b’76, live in Papillion.
Steve Bump, c’77, manages corpo- 77 rate health and safety at NV5 in Richland, Washington, where he resides.
Mark Huber, c’78, lives in Baton 78 Rouge, Louisiana, where he coordi- nates safety at Pennoni Associates Inc. Richard Kramer, d’78, g’87, directs student activities and athletics for the Shawnee Mission school district. He makes his home in Lenexa. Craig Sherwood, f’78, lives in Kirkland, Rolfe Mandel, g’80, PhD’91, a distin- Julene Tedlock Miller, c’82, l’85, is Washington, where he’s president of Craig guished professor of anthropology at KU, general counsel for the Kansas Board of Sherwood and Associates. has been named interim director of the Regents in Topeka. She commutes from Kansas Geological Survey. He’s also a Lawrence. Lee Green, b’79, l’86, is an attorney senior scientist and executive director of David Schoech, p’82, a pharmacist at 79 and semi-retired professor of the Odyssey Geoarcheology Research Mercy Hospital Columbus, received the business and economics at Baker Program at KGS. Bowl of Hygeia Award from the Kansas University. Pharmacists Association for his commit- Diane Bergquist Lindeman, d’79, g’83, Monte Vines, l’81, is an attorney ment to community service. He lives in g’06, directs student nancial aid for the 81 at Adams Jones Law Firm in Columbus. Kansas Board of Regents in Topeka. Wichita, where he lives with Kimberly Desmond Williams, g’82, PhD’83, James McCarten, b’79, was named Gee Vines, l’83. directs programs in pharmaceutical Atlanta’s 2017 Lawyer of the Year in Lynette Woodard, c’81, a former KU science at the University of South Austra- litigation and controversy-tax by Best All-American and Olympic gold medalist, lia in Adelaide, South Australia. Lawyers of America. He’s a partner at Burr is assistant coach of women’s basketball at & Forman. Winthrop University in Rock Hill, South Craig Adams, e’83, g’88, PhD’91, is Carolina. She recently received a scholar- 83 Oliver L. Parks Chair and professor Mark Burlingame, ’80, is a manager ship from the National Basketball Retired in the department of civil engineering at 80 at Just Energy. He makes his home Players Association and plans to pursue a Saint Louis University in St. Louis. in Houston. master’s degree in business administration Deepak Ahuja, c’83, m’87, is regional Linda Zarda Cook, e’80, joined the at Kaplan University. medical director at UnityPoint Health- board of directors of Bank of New York Trinity. He lives in Rock Island, Illinois. Mellon. She’s a managing director and Steven Koppes, g’82, lives in Christopher Peters, c’83, m’89, member of the executive committee at 82 Lincoln, Nebraska, where he directs owns Corridor Surgery and Vein Center EIG Global Energy Partners and CEO of research communications at the University in Coralville, Iowa, where he makes Harbour Energy. of Nebraska-Lincoln. his home.
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 45
David Robinett, c’83, is chief marketing and Quail Forever. He’s an attorney at entertainment at Caruso A liated in Los o cer at #250. He and Pilar Jacobson, ’93, Wise & Reber in McPherson. Angeles. He lives in Pasadena. a clinical psychologist, live in Overland Robin Rusconi, b’85, l’88, is executive Park with their daughter, Carly. eir son, Fritz Edmunds Jr., j’85, l’95, is director of Midwest Biomedical Research Luc, is a junior at KU. 85 executive managing director at Foundation in Kansas City, where she Frontier Investment Banking in Leawood. makes her home. Ronald Ragan, p’84, g’97, PhD’98, He resides in Overland Park. James Thornton, p’85, is a contract 84 makes his home in High Point, Kathy Greenlee, b’85, l’88, is vice pharmacist for the Department of Veter- North Carolina, where he’s dean and president of aging and health policy at the ans A airs Consolidated Mail Outpatient professor at the School of Pharmacy at Center for Practical Bioethics in Kansas Pharmacy in Leavenworth. He lives in High Point University. City. She makes her home in Lenexa. Shawnee. Brett Reber, c’84, is on the national Steven Martin, c’85, is senior vice James Traylor, c’85, m’86, manages board of directors of Pheasants Forever president of strategic alliances and radiology IT and quality at the University
PROFILE by Heather Biele STEVE PUPPE STEVE Artists in Philly thrive need are small funds to keep with boost from alumna their projects going.” Her proposal was accepted, rica Hawthorne-Manon’s 2006 album, and in 2012 she received E“Spoke Inward,” almost didn’t happen. $60,000 to launch Small but e spoken word artist, who goes by the Mighty Arts, a volunteer-run stage name RhapsodE, had spent hours in nonpro t that awards micro- a Philadelphia studio perfecting her grants from $50 to $1,000 to creative debut—a soulful blend of poetry local artists to help them with hip-hop and jazz beats—only to nd nance their projects and she would need an additional $1,000 to reach their creative goals. complete the project. Since receiving the Knight “I had to put the release on hold and Foundation grant, Small but In 2015, Erica Hawthorne-Manon received the KU Black make some more money,” she recalls. Mighty Arts has evolved to Alumni Network’s African-American Leaders and Innovators Hawthorne-Manon, j’02, was able to provide more than just award for her contributions to Philadelphia’s art community. gather the funds she needed, but the monetary solutions for experience le her wondering how many struggling artists. e of her creative peers struggled nancially. nonpro t works with other For the next three years, Hawthorne- community organizations to create new group to help revitalize the 52nd Street Manon managed her career as a perfor- programs and resources, including commercial corridor in West Philadelphia. mance artist while juggling a full-time gig networking events and other professional “ ey wanted to paint meters that couldn’t as a college prep counselor at Swarthmore opportunities. be replaced,” she explains. “So we identi- College. Heeding a friend’s suggestion, she “We do every program with a commu- ed artists to paint and design those applied for a challenge grant through the nity partner, which is really important,” meters. e artists talked to community Knight Foundation, an organization that Hawthorne-Manon says. “We match them members and got their ideas. ey turned o ers funds to artists, entrepreneurs, with artists they want to work with. Many out beautifully.” educators and other innovators who strive artists who participate are then tapped to Showing no signs of slowing down, to bring positive change to their do other projects.” Small but Mighty Arts distributed 11 communities. Also important, she says, is that these micro-grants to artists this year and added “My idea was really simple,” Hawthorne- community partners provide artists with a seven new community partners. “I want to Manon says. “ ey give me money and I’ll fair wage for their work. continue to grow,” Hawthorne-Manon give it out in smaller increments. Huge Small but Mighty Arts recently part- says. “ e more partners we have, the grants are great, but what artists really nered with a community development more artist connections we’re making.
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 47 Class Notes of Kansas Hospital. He and his wife, Tina, Plummer Associates in Fort Worth, Texas. Donna Hines Rayson, a’88, is an live in Kansas City. Timothy Summers, l’87, is president of architect at Schwerdt Design Group in Aegis Specialty Insurance Services in Topeka. She and her husband, Paul, live in Karen Mayberry, l’86, is an appel- Sunnyvale, California. He resides in Ottawa and have four children. 86 late military judge for the U.S. Air Redwood City. Matthew Tidwell, j’88, directs the Force Court of Criminal Appeals in Martin Upchurch, e’87, is an industrial integrated marketing communications Maryland. She resides in Alexandria, hygienist at S-E-A in St. Louis. He lives in master’s program at KU’s Edwards Virginia. Maryland Heights, Missouri. Campus in Overland Park. Frank “Wes” Naylor III, ’86, lives in Winter Park, Florida, where he’s president Bryan Becker, m’88, is vice presi- Daniel Crossman, ’89, is special and managing partner at Coe & Naylor 88 dent of integrated care at DaVita 89 teams coordinator for the Bu alo Group. He’s a retired captain in the Kidney Care in Vernon Hills, Illinois. He Bills football team in Orchard Park, New U.S. Navy. lives in Hinsdale. York. Sally Stre Buzbee, j’88, is senior vice Mark Heinrich, g’89, manages strategic Gary Amble, c’87, is a meteorologist president and executive editor of the sourcing and supply chain at Microso in 87 at KCTV5 in Fairway. He and his Associated Press. She rst joined the news Redmond, Washington. He makes his wife, Lori, assoc., live in Shawnee. network in 1988 as a reporter and later home in Bellevue. Robert Fee, c’87, is president and became vice president and chief of bureau Neil LaBute, g’89, is a playwright and chief operating o cer at Fee Insurance in Washington, D.C., positions she held lm director. His latest play, “Fat Pig,” Group in Hutchinson. He also serves on for the past six years. was featured at the Center for Performing the board of directors for the Kansas Ervin Cash, e’88, is president and CEO Arts in University Park, Illinois, in Association of Insurance Agents. Bob and of SloanLED in Ventura, California. He October. Annie Burger Fee, b’89, have four children lives in Santa Barbara. Craig Likhite, ’89, is on the board of and live in Hutchinson. Kurt Caywood, c’88, is vice president of directors of Foundation 65, an educational Danielle Morlock Fournier, c’87, is a audience at Morris Publishing Group in foundation for the Evanston-Skokie school human resources generalist at Alan Augusta, Georgia. district in Illinois. He’s vice president and
48 | KANSAS ALUMNI
Class Notes
creative manager/recruiter at Cramer Joel Ze, j’90, is a public speaker and Wendy Bantam, f’92, is a traveling Krasselt in Chicago. improvisational comedian in Coppell, 92 artist and created the Outlook Molly Brooks Seitz, f’89, is on the Texas. He recently performed with the Program, which connects artists to local sales and marketing team at nuyu in Almost Legendary Improv Jam in nonpro t organizations. She lives in New York City. McKinney. Lincoln, Nebraska. Johna Priest Cabrera, h’92, is an Stewart Bailey, j’90, in October was Lorien Foote, c’91, wrote e Yankee occupational therapist in Loveland, 90 inducted in the Topeka High 91 Plague: Escaped Union Prisoners Colorado, where she makes her home with School Graduate Hall of Fame. He lives in and the Collapse of the Confederacy, Anthony, e’90, m’94. Valley Village, California, where he’s an which was published in November by Steven Hattamer, m’92, is chief of executive producer for the NBC show the University of North Carolina Press. anesthesia at North American Partners in “Last Call with Carson Daly.” She’s a professor of history at Texas A&M Anesthesia in Nashua, New Hampshire. Gregory Rockers, p’90, ’94, is president University. of JCB Laboratories in Wichita. He lives Jean Redeker, j’91, PhD’08, is vice Kimberly Hays, l’93, lives in Tulsa, in Augusta. president of academic a airs for the 93 Oklahoma, where she’s an attorney Eric Stasen, j’90, manages industrial Kansas Board of Regents in Topeka. She and practices family law. sales at BlueInGreen in Fayetteville, commutes from Lawrence. Elizabeth Miller, b’93, l’97, g’97, is an Arkansas. Andrew Strayer, PharmD’91, makes his attorney at Spencer Fane in Overland Jon Trevisani, m’90, is a plastic surgeon home in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, Park. She’s part of the employee bene ts and founder and medical director of the where he’s vice president of clinical practice group. Aesthetic Surgery Centre in Maitland, programs at Cempra Inc. Florida. Tiany Torgler Wingo, c’91, g’95, l’95, is Jerey Johnson, c’94, received Marti West, ’90, lives in Minburn, Iowa, an attorney at Berger Estate and Elder Law 94 the 2016 Outstanding Publication where she’s a business systems consultant in Leawood, where she makes her home of the Year Award by the Journal of at Wells Fargo. with Douglas, l’94. Organic Chemistry. He’s a chemistry
50 | KANSAS ALUMNI professor at the University of North 100 St. Louis-area educators to receive the Carolina in Chapel Hill. Emerson Excellence in Teaching Award in James Persinger, g’94, PhD’00, profes- October. She teaches in the Parkway sor and chair of the department of school district in St. Louis. psychology at Emporia State University, Arthel McDaniel III, c’95, was named received the Lifetime Achievement Award one of 2016’s Most In uential Minority Mitch Germann, c’96, leads global in October from the Kansas Association of Lawyers by the Los Angeles Business 96 communications for Nike’s Jordan School Psychologists. Journal. He’s a business attorney and brand in Beaverton, Oregon. principal at Polsinelli in Los Angeles. Jacqueline Osland, m’96, is a general Mario Gomez, c’95, g’98, is co- Patricia Heyka Wooster, c’95, ’97, surgeon at Je erson Healthcare Surgical 95 founder, chief technology o cer wrote Ignite Your Spark: Discovering Associates in Port Townsend, Washington, and president of product at Quoine in Who You Are from the Inside Out, pub- where she makes her home. Singapore. lished by Simon Pulse/Beyond Words. Blake Vande Garde, c’96, l’01, ’04, Angela Peirce Lolley, d’95, was one of She lives in Wesley Chapel, Florida. is a patent attorney at Erickson Kernell
PROFILE by Steven Hill
Children’s champion earns $124 million, distributed by the First ings First board—which Basha chairs— lifetime advocacy award to early childhood programs statewide. e ballot initiative passed, she believes, BASHA NADINE MATHIS COURTESY n the early 1980s, when Nadine Mathis because the campaign focused on fairness. IBasha began working to bolster child “We like to think life is like a Monopoly care regulations in Arizona, one of the board and all kids get to start at Go with state’s giants in the eld was Martha K. $200 in their pocket,” Basha says. “But the Rothman. Smart, well-prepared and reality is there are many children who are tireless, Rothman was both inspirational never on the board and never have $200 to and intimidating. see what they can accomplish. My goal is “She was always so together and so on fairness and opportunity for all children. point, and I was such a novice,” recalls at’s where I get my energy.” Basha, d’71, of the crusader who became Basha has served on many state and her colleague and friend. “If you want to local boards and started a business, be an advocate for kids, you just can’t ever Summa Associates, a consulting and give up—and she never did.” management rm that helps employers Frustration with her state legislature’s ree decades into her own “journey promote work-life balance with child care infrequent attention to the needs of children of endless advocacy,” Basha in December and other family-friendly employee pushed Basha into advocacy. “I really believed received the Martha K. Rothman Lifetime programs. Arizonans felt dierently about children and Achievement Award, one of the Champion Overlapping her career and volunteer children’s issues.” for Children & Families honors given by work is a passion for education. Child & Family Resources of Tucson. It “At Nadine’s core, I think, is this real recognizes Basha’s career helping children, genuine belief that as a society we will be ence Matters Changemaker Award earlier from early successes such as the 1988 judged over the span of history on how we in 2016. Both cite her prescient focus on founding of Children’s Action Alliance (an support our most vulnerable in our early childhood programs before research advocacy group that works as a “power children,” says Sam Leyvas, CEO of First proved the link between a child’s early broker for children”) to leading the charge ings First. “When you come to this years and long-term success. on Proposition 203, a 2006 Arizona ballot work with that core belief, I don’t think “In my own journey, the more I learned, initiative that created a cigarette sales tax you have a choice. I think this is a calling the more I knew how important a child’s to fund quality childhood development for Nadine.” early years are,” she says. “Every child and health programs for kids from birth to e Rothman honor is one of many deserves the opportunity to start school age 5. In scal 2016, the tax generated Basha has received, including the Experi- ready to succeed.”
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 51 Class Notes
in Leawood. He and Nicole Copple Vande Kathleen Gunja Nelson, c’98, b’98, performance for the Toronto Blue Jays Garde, n’96, live in Overland Park. 98 l’01, is assistant general counsel at baseball team. American Century Investments in Kansas David Roumanie, g’99, is a plant MARRIED City. She lives in Leawood. controller at Federal-Mogul in Saint-Jean- Kevin Olson, c’96, to Rebecca Fromer, Bret Rhodus, b’98, is managing de-la-Ruelle, France. Oct. 30 in Washington, D.C. He’s a senior partner at CCP Strategies in Overland Michael Stevenson, m’99, resides in attorney at IBM in Somers, New York. Park. He resides in Lenexa. Oklahoma City, where he’s associate ey live in New York City. Kristin R.B. White, c’98, was named one medical director at the Oklahoma Blood of 2016-’17 Who’s Who in Energy by the Institute. BORN TO: Denver Business Journal. She’s an attorney U.S. Rep Kevin Yoder, c’99, l’02, in Alayna Miller Hoenig, b’96, ’97, and her and manager of Jackson Kelly in Denver. November was elected to another term in husband, John, son, Landon, July 14 in Kansas’ 3rd Congressional District. He Plano, Texas. Erika Nutt Donner, s’99, s’03, l’03, is and Brooke Robinson Yoder, l’05, live in 99 an associate attorney at M. Sue Overland Park with their two daughters. David Eagan, b’97, is global director Wilson Law O ce in Minneapolis. She 97 of customer success and service lives in Champlin, Minnesota. Sridevi Donepudi, m’00, is assistant delivery at Gresham Computing in Douglas Holtzman, b’99, is CEO of 00 chief medical information o cer at London. ONtrac Sports & Entertainment in Christiana Care Health System. She lives Jerod Haase, b’97, g’01, is head coach of Norcross, Georgia. He makes his home in in West Chester, Pennsylvania. men’s basketball at Stanford University in Brookhaven with his wife, Christina, and Stanford, California, where he lives with their two daughters. BORN TO: Mindy Meidinger Haase, Angus Mugford, g’99, PhD’05, is Brad Westerbeck, d’00, and his wife, c’97, ’98. Jerod played president of the Association for Applied Mandy, daughter, Quinn, June 24 in basketball at KU from Sport Psychology. He lives in Bradenton, Folkston, Georgia, where she joins a 1994 to ’97. Florida, where he’s director of high brother, Greyson, 6.
52 | KANSAS ALUMNI FEBRUARY IS
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Andrew Saeger, f’01, is a designer and senior associate at Smith Moore Leather- illustrator in Seattle. wood in Raleigh, North Carolina, where David Tappan, g’01, is principal of he makes his home. Shawnee Mission North High School in Benjamin Gripka, b’01, ’09, makes Mission. Lucas Bell, c’03, is executive vice 01 his home in Lenexa, where he’s 03 president of Illinois Realtors in president and founding so ware engineer Jack Brooks, c’02, l’05, is a captain Spring eld, Illinois. at Sigma Sourcing. 02 in the U.S. Air Force. He lives in James McLaughlin, c’03, l’06, is senior Rodney Hanley, PhD’01, is provost and Surprise, Arizona. vice president and senior counsel at vice president of academic a airs at Fisk Breeze Luetke-Stahlman Richardson, Envestnet Asset Management in Chicago, University in Nashville, Tennessee. c’02, directs communications for the where he resides. Samuel MacRoberts, c’01, l’06, lives in Kansas Board of Regents in Topeka. She Adam Murray, c’03, manages sales at Kansas City with his son, Ralph, 2, and his resides in Lawrence. Taylor Forge Engineered Systems in Paola. daughter, Eleanor, who was born Oct. 24. Eric Snider, c’02, is an attorney and He lives in Overland Park.
PROFILE by Chris Lazzarino
Doctoral degree arms academic opportunities available to athletes at NCAA Div. II schools. COURTESY DBU ATHLETICS COURTESY coach’s education values Flickner says his research indicates that while most coaches think they allas Baptist University’s men’s are living up to their profession’s Dbasketball team last season led the ideals, they might not be as Heartland Conference in points (87.5), successful as they, their schools or three-point eld goals (9.9) and assists per the NCAA claim. game (17.3), and the Patriots quali ed for “ ere’s a lot of data that shows the NCAA Div. II Tournament for the it’s not as much about education as second time in program history. And yet a it should be, or at least the players statistic more meaningful for 12th-year aren’t bene tting from the educa- coach Blake Flickner is his program’s tional side of it as much as they graduation rate: 100 percent for players should be,” he says. “ e NCAA who complete their eligibility at DBU. puts out statistics that show student Dallas Baptist basketball coach Blake Flickner advises Impressive, but players are not Dallas athletes have higher graduation his players, “Don’t be fooled into thinking a bachelor’s is Baptist’s only academic achievers: Flickner, rates than their peers, but if you dig enough. Let’s start thinking bigger than that.“ b’98, in December earned a doctorate in a little deeper, there’s a lot of education degree in an accelerated questions about that. program o ered by the southwestern “We didn’t solve the world’s problems, Navy, Flickner jumped at the opportunity Dallas school. but we started to ask some of the questions to help DBU relaunch a men’s basketball “ e way it was almost entirely online, it that I think are good to be asked.” program. t well,” he says. “I was able to do it from Flickner played two seasons at Mes- “It’s just ideal for me,” Flickner says. “I hotel rooms while I was out recruiting or quite’s East eld College for his father, Bob, knew early on that as much as I admired on the road with our team. I got a lot of g’74 [Pro le, issue No. 6], who spent two the coaches I had been around, it was not reading done on the bus and I was doing years as a graduate assistant for coach Ted for me to spend the next 20 or 30 years homework right alongside our players at Owens. When it came time to complete trying to be a high-major head coach. study hall. It worked out great.” his undergraduate degree, Blake came to “I wanted to nd a smaller school where In keeping with his university’s mission KU and spent two seasons as a team I can pour into guys who love this game, of encouraging “servant leadership,” or the manager, then returned to East eld as a help them grow spiritually, help them concept of leaders putting the well-being volunteer assistant coach while earning grow as a basketball team, and then this of others ahead of themselves, Flickner a master’s degree in Christian education. opened up, and it’s amazing. I feel like I’m used his dissertation research to examine A er stints at Colorado State and living a dream. I feel very blessed.”
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 55 Class Notes
Ministries in Lawrence. Bob Fuladi, PharmD’06, is vice president and chief operating o cer at Mission Health Care Pharmacy Corporation in Oxnard, California. He lives in Montecito. Jennifer Thomas Gomez, g’06, is assistant director of development services for the City of Missouri City in Texas. Allison Johnson, a’06, is a project architect at HOK in St. Louis. She lives in Wildwood, Missouri. Quinton McElhaney, l’06, is a project manager at Advanced Discovery in Lenexa. Andrew Rebar IV, c’06, is a line shi leader at Procter & Gamble in Kansas City. He and his wife, Amber, live in Shawnee with their two sons. Erinn Roos-Brown, c’06, lives in Kansas City, where she is a humanities curator at Mid-America Arts Alliance. David Rowe, l’06, is a program manager of Smart Cities at ECCO Select in Kansas City, where he resides. Emily Hu hines Webster, j’06, and Mark, c’06, live in Leawood with their two children, Caroline, 3, and Andrew, who’s nearly 1. Mark is an attorney at Lathrop & BORN TO: Center in Flagsta , Arizona. He was Gage, and Emily is a brand manager at William Salyers, m’03, g’09, and his recently named 2016 Nathan Avery Sullivan Higdon & Sink. wife, Vanessa, daughter, Harlow, Sept. 6 in Physician of the Year. Wichita, where she joins a brother, Jacobi, Jennifer Gunby, b’04, e’04, was named BORN TO: 7, and two sisters, Camden, 5, and Emory, one of “40 Under 40” by Midwest Energy Laura Wolowicz Crook, d’06, g’08, and 2. William is an assistant professor at KU’s News. She’s the senior city adviser and Jeret, d’06, son, Henry, Sept. 26 in Dallas, School of Medicine in Wichita. community energy program manager for where he joins a sister, Caroline, who’s the Institute for Market Transformation in nearly 2. Kyle Binns, b’04, l’07, is an attorney Kansas City. 04 and member at Lewis Rice in Steven Adkins, c’07, is a Kansas City. He makes his home in Michael Allen, l’05, is senior deputy 07 provisioning manager at Overland Park. 05 district attorney for the 4th Judicial TollFreeForwarding.com in Los Angeles. Clay Britton, c’04, l’09, is assistant U.S. District in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He lives in Culver City, California, attorney for the Department of Justice in He and his wife, Heidi, live in Monument. with his wife, Amy. Kansas City. Dereck Totten, c’05, m’13, g’16, is a Kimberly Karfonta Carnley, j’07, is Holly Cranston, m’04, received the 2016 physician at Citizens Medical Center in assistant city attorney in Stillwater, Dr. Kenneth K. Bateman Outstanding Colby, where he resides with Kysha Oklahoma. Alumni Award during Pittsburg State Nichols Totten, m’13. Chris Jameson, b’07, makes his home in University’s homecoming celebrations in Atlanta, where he’s regional vice president October. She’s a physician in Weir. MARRIED at SmartTrust. Kristin Keeney Forbes, c’04, j’04, is a Sarah Moon, j’05, to Richard Powers, James Lowery, ’07, is a winemaker and graphic designer and owns Kristin Forbes Oct. 1 in Overland Park, where they make owns KC Wineworks in downtown Kansas Creative in Oceanside, California, where their home. City. she lives with Je erson, c’05, g’10. Lauren Marino, c’07, l’10, is an attorney Adam Gra , m’04, is a psychiatrist and Jesse Brinson, c’06, is a youth at Ogletree Deakins in Washington, D.C. department chair at Flagsta Medical 06 minister at Call to Greatness She lives in Arlington, Virginia.
56 | KANSAS ALUMNI Jason Oropeza, l’07, is assistant chief BORN TO: Bradley Montgomery-Anderson, g’09, counsel at the O ce of the Principal Legal Jessa Kuhlman Wilkens, c’08, n’10, and PhD’09, received the 2017 Leonard Advisor for the U.S. Department of her husband, Ben, son, Jack, Sept. 23 in Bloom eld Book Award in January. He Homeland Security Immigration and Dighton, where he joins two brothers, wrote Cherokee Reference Grammar, which Customs Enforcement in Kansas City. He Luke, 4, and Evan, who’s nearly 2. was published in March 2016 by Univer- resides in Overland Park. sity of Oklahoma Press. Brad is an Karl Rubis, g’07, ’12, is the historian for Aislinn Addington, g’09, PhD’16, associate professor at Northeastern State the U.S. Army Ordnance Corps and 09 directs Abby’s House, a center for University in Tahlequah, Okahoma. School in Fort Lee, Virginia. women and families at Western Oregon Nick Oldfather, d’09, g’12, lives in Joseph Spellman, ’07, is a project University in Monmouth, Oregon. Chicago, where he’s a senior manager at manager at Americo Financial Life & Bassem Chahine, ’09, lives in Lawrence, Genesco Sports Enterprises. Annuity in Kansas City. He makes his where he owns the Lawrence Hookah Arturo Ramos, e’09, is lead solution home in Eudora with his wife, Kristy, and House and Euphoria Hookah Lounge. He architect at OpenLink Financial in their two daughters. also owns hookah houses in Topeka and Houston. He resides in League City, Texas. Robert Williams, b’07, l’14, lives in Emporia. Phoenix, where he’s an attorney at Gust Joel Grillot, g’09, is an interrelated Damian Green, g’10, is a G-4 sta Rosenfeld. resource teacher for Lawrence public 10 o cer in the U.S. Army. schools. He makes his home in Lawrence. Ashlynn Haynes, a’10, is creative MARRIED Jena Gunter, c’09, lives in Lawrence director of design and owner of Paper Benjamin Ryan, d’07, g’12, to Samantha with her son, Hayden, 5, and her daughter, Laundry in Denver. Wolf, Oct. 22 in New York City, where Storey, who turns 1 in April. Kingsley Okonkwo, m’10, is a pediatri- they make their home. Ben teaches Brandon Hidaka, c’09, PhD’15, was one cian at Driscoll Children’s Hospital in English at Success Academy charter school of ve medical students nationwide to Corpus Christi, Texas, where he lives. in East Harlem. receive the 2016 Pisacano Scholarship. He Kevin Osborn, PhD’10, is chief informa- will receive his doctorate in 2017 and tion o cer and associate provost for BORN TO: plans to specialize in family medicine. information systems at Fuller eological Brian McTaggart, c’07, and his wife, Kari, son, James Hudson, Sept. 20 in Chicago, where Brian is a surety account executive at Aon. It’s almost this easy. Elizabeth Austin, c’08, manages 08 digital marketing at StorAmerica ! Management in Irvine, California. She and her husband, Dylan, make their home in Laguna Niguel. Lizzie Greco, f’08, owns Crabelly Paper & Pattern in Denver, where she lives. Kyle Kitson, c’08, l’13, is an attorney at Littler Mendelson in Kansas City. He resides in Mission. Jane Rozelle, c’08, lives in Dallas, where she’s social editor at PaperCity Magazine.
MARRIED Richard Nathan Rytting, g’08, to Tuyen Kim i Vo, Oct. 15 in Kansas City. He’s a Jayhawk License Plate purchases and renewals speech-language pathologist at Flint Hills are now easier with one payment to your Special Education Cooperative in county treasurer. A $50 annual tax-deductible Emporia. contribution to the KU Alumni Association is Leah Spare, d’08, ’09, to Joel Burzinski, still part of the cost, but now you can pay it June 24 in Lawrence. She teaches science along with your normal state tag fees and For additional information, and answers to some at Turner Middle School in Kansas City, vehicle taxes. By mail, online or in person, it’s often asked questions, visit kualumni.org or call 800-584-2957. where they make their home. as easy as Rock Chalk!
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 57 Class Notes
Seminary in Pasadena, California. He and daughter, Katerina, who’s nearly 2. accountant in Kansas City, where they live. his wife, Michelle, make their home in Stephanie Waugh, j’11, and Philip Valencia. Bennett, g’13, Sept. 17 in Kansas City, Sean Tapia, a’14, j’14, g’16, makes his Rachelle Pauly, d’10, g’13, works for where they make their home. 14 home in Chicago, where he’s an Kansas Athletics, where she is assisant associate planner at Houseal Lavigne coach of rowing. She was a member of the Paige Blevins, c’12, l’15, is a law clerk Associates. team as a student from 2007 to ’11. 12 for Chief Justice Lawton Nuss at the Victoria Whitehead, l’14, is a public Dagoberto Rodriguez, l’10, is an Kansas Supreme Court. She lives in defender for the 10th Judicial District in attorney at Rodriguez & Sanabria in Topeka. Johnson County. She lives in Lawrence. Manassas, Virginia. Joseph Boothe, c’12, is a writer and Robert Stracener, c’10, e’16, is an producer. His short lm, “ e Morning MARRIED engineer at Hyde Engineering & Consult- A er,” is part of a group project shot this Lauren Brown, d’14, and Zachary Korte, ing. He lives in San Diego. winter in Texas. c’14, June 4 in Lawrence. She teaches rst Jarred Harrington, c’12, lives in Wash- grade at Heatherstone Elementary School BORN TO: ington, D.C., where he’s an economist in in Olathe, and he works for Aero Trans- Elizabeth Robb Lang, d’10, g’12, and her international pricing at the U.S. Depart- portation Products in Independence, husband, Isaah, son, Cameron, Nov. 6 in ment of Labor. Missouri. Wichita, where Elizabeth teaches sixth- Andy Kriegh, c’12, g’14, is operations grade mathematics. lead at Brio Partners. He lives in Lawrence. Amanda Angell, l’15, lives in Omaha, Jacqueline Mocnik-Boyd, c’12, is an 15 Nebraska, where she’s an associate Katherine Courtney, e’11, is a so ware executive administrative assistant at the attorney at Koley Jessen. 11 engineer at IBM in Littleton, American College of Clinical Pharmacy in Jiwon Choi, DMA’15, is a sta accompa- Massachusetts. Lenexa. She commutes from Lawrence, nist at Northwest Missouri State Univer- Kevin Neslage, c’11, is an associate where she lives with her husband, Ryan. sity in Maryville. attorney at Hinshaw & Culbertson in Kassie Altergott Murphy, c’12, manages Austin Lear, b’15, g’16, is an assurance Coral Gables, Florida, where he resides. property for Newmark Grubb Zimmer in associate at RSM US in San Francisco. He Grace Peterson, c’11, coordinates visual Kansas City. She and her husband, Brice, makes his home in Walnut Creek, arts for Salina Arts and Humanities. Her live in Overland Park. California. exhibition “Material Communion” was Colby Soden, e’15, lives in Englewood, displayed last fall at Kansas Wesleyan MARRIED Colorado, where he’s a so ware engineer University in Salina. Garrett Lent, j’12, to Sarah Doyle, Sept. at S&P Global. Sonia Schwartz Rubens, g’11, PhD’15, is 24 in York, Pennsylvania. He’s an attorney Samuel Storrs, l’15, is counsel at Unite assistant professor of psychology and at Post & Schell in Harrisburg. ey make Private Networks in Kansas City. He director of the Child and Adolescent their home in Manchester. resides in Mission. Resilience Lab at the University of New Orleans. Ashley Haden-Peaches, s’13, is lead MARRIED Austin Smith, b’11, is an associate 13 community health worker at Rodgers Haley Burgess, h’15, and Robert Strube, attorney at Kilpatrick Townsend & Health in Kansas City, where she and Lacy ’15, Oct. 1 in Scott City, where they live. Stockton in Dallas. He’s part of the rm’s Haden-Peaches, assoc., live. Lauren Pipkin, PharmD’15, to Nathan complex commercial litigation team. Lauren Gaylor Hughes, c’13, l’16, lives in Dick, Oct. 15 in Lawrence, where they Kristie Stremel, c’11, is a singer and McPherson, where she’s an associate make their home. songwriter. She has released more than 75 attorney at Wise & Reber. songs and tours regularly throughout the Amy McAfee, d’13, is a physical Stephen Duerst, l’16, is a lobbyist United States. therapist at Mid-America Orthopedics. 16 and attorney at Federico Consulting Matthew Thiessen, j’11, is a videogra- She resides in Council Grove. in Topeka. pher, editor and producer at Kroenke Andrew Tate, PharmD’13, is project Matthew Fieser, e’16, is an aerospace Sports & Entertainment in Denver. He and manager of eld operations at ScriptPro in systems engineer at Vencore Inc. in Kelsey Smith Thiessen, c’11, make their Mission. He and Sarah Luby, PharmD’13, Chantilly, Virginia. He lives in Reston. home in Castle Rock, Colorado. a clinical pharmacist at the University of Ashlyn Hazard, b’16, lives in Kansas Kansas Hospital, live in Prairie Village. City, where she’s a marketing analyst at MARRIED Quest Diagnostics. Tyler Metzger, d’11, g’13, and Tatyana MARRIED Ashlie Koehn, c’16, was named a Fastovski, c’15, Nov. 5 in Kansas City. Dana Wilensky, b’13, to Ryan Katz, Nov. Schwarzman Scholar and will receive a ey live in Overland Park with their 5 in Minneapolis. She is a certi ed public year of graduate study in China. She is an
58 | KANSAS ALUMNI economist at the Bureau of Labor Droste Milledge III, b’16, lives in Micah Roman Schloegel, PhD’16, is a Statistics. Dallas, where he’s a nancial analyst reading specialist in the Shawnee Mission Nathaniel Lohmann, c’16, teaches at BDO. school district. science in the Douglas County school Sage Morander, b’16, is an account district in Colorado. He lives in Parker. executive for the Spring eld underbirds MARRIED Kinsey McKenrick, l’16, is an associate hockey club in Spring eld, Massachusetts. Haley Bainbridge, PharmD’16, and attorney at Richards, Layton & Finger Autrin Naderi, j’16, coordinates Colton Christensen, PharmD’16, June 12 in Wilmington, Delaware. She resides accounts at MMGY Global in Kansas in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. ey in Bear. City, where she makes her home. make their home in Bloomington, Illinois.
PROFILE by Heather Biele STEVE PUPPE STEVE
Artist finds creative calling Months later, as Lamb was still reeling through friend’s illness from the shock of losing her job, one of her longtime friends, Cheryl Wonnell, uring a particularly rough time in her assoc., was diagnosed with acute myeloid Dchildhood, when bullying had gotten leukemia. Determined to get out of her the best of her, Stacey Leslie Lamb told her funk, Lamb o ered to drive her friend to mother she wasn’t going to school any- her doctor’s appointments. When Won- more. She retreated to her bedroom, where nell’s treatment plan called for a bone her collection of Charlie Brown comic marrow transplant and 100 days in a books awaited, and she began sketching germ-free environment, Lamb knew she her favorite character, Snoopy. had to do something special. “I don’t know what happened, because I She illustrated 100 index cards with had never really been that interested in inspirational messages for each day of drawing,” Lamb, f’82, recalls. “I always say Wonnell’s treatment and gave them to her something magical happened.” with clothesline and several clothespins to “These cards were meant to cheer up Cheryl, When she returned to school with her display the cards. “I gave her the cards as a and they cheered me up, too,” Stacey Lamb Snoopy sketches in hand, the young boy gi to decorate her room,” Lamb explains. says. “They totally changed me and helped me who had ridiculed her took notice and “But as her clothesline became fuller and move forward.” praised her drawings. “From then on I was fuller, it became apparent that she was no longer Stacey the fat kid,” Lamb says. “I going to go home soon. So it became this was Stacey the artist.” countdown.” also made a deck with 25 “do good, feel Lamb continued drawing and eventually e upli ing creations cheered Wonnell good” cards for the holidays. “I made 120 landed her dream job as an artist and and also caught the attention of boxes, and I sold out in four days,” she designer at Hallmark in her doctor, whose research says. “I thought, ‘OK, we’re on to Kansas City. She worked supported the something.’” for the greeting card power of positivity Today, Lamb’s cards can be found in company for 31 years on patient recovery. seven hospitals across the country and in before an unexpected He encouraged the hands of those counting the days to a layo three years ago Lamb to market wedding, birth, retirement, vacation or shook her to the core. her cards. graduation. She also sells decks with jokes “It was bad,” Lamb Lamb immediately and tips for healthy living. All of her cards says. “I’m a pretty went to work and sold can be purchased at happycountdown- upbeat person, and for her rst batch of Happy cards.com, the website her husband, Brent, the rst time in my life Countdown Cards to c’84, created. I felt a lot of really Wonnell’s doctor, who “We’re spreading happy,” Lamb says. weird emotions that I placed them on his “It started out as a gi from one friend to had never felt, like patients’ beds when they another. Now it’s just blossomed, and betrayal.” started treatment. She people are loving it.”
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 59 In Memory retired civil engineer. His wife, Carol, a daughter, a stepdaughter, a stepson and a sister survive.
Dorothy Caldwell Varnum, c’38, d’49; two grandchildren; and two Richard Beach, a’50, 92, Oct. 17 30s 99, Oct. 15 in Collingswood, New great-grandchildren. 50s in Georgetown, Texas. He had a Jersey. She taught English and journalism. Roy Harmon, c’43, g’48, 95, Nov. 5 in longtime career in architecture and Surviving are a son, Robert, m’69; six Wichita, where he taught at Wichita North construction management. Surviving are grandchildren; and 12 great- High School for 30 years. Surviving are two sons, Christopher, c’71, and Douglas, grandchildren. three daughters, Mary Harmon Richards, c’72; a daughter; 10 grandchildren; and d’70, Jeannie Harmon Miller, d’71, g’76, nine great-grandchildren. Glady Blue Bayles, f’47, 92, Sept. and Carol Harmon Winters, c’80; a sister; David Burgett, b’56, 81, May 25 in 40s10 in Leawood, where she was an a brother; and seven grandchildren. Medford, Oregon. He retired a er 38 years artist and community volunteer. She is Kenneth Lewis, c’41, 97, Nov. 7 in Des as a CPA and partner at Coopers & survived by a daughter, Martha Bayles Moines, Iowa, where he managed Master Lybrand. Survivors include his wife, Betsy, Bacon, ’73; three sons, one of whom is Builders of Iowa. He is survived by two and two sons. Robert, ’02; 12 grandchildren; and 11 sons, one of whom is Peter, ’74; and three Robert Cebula, c’51, 87, Oct. 2 in West great-grandchildren. grandchildren. Brook eld, Massachusetts. He was a William Beeson, c’48, l’50, 89, Sept. 27 Alberta Cornwell Mahoney, c’47, c’49, funeral director and later became an in Overland Park. He had a 44-year career 90, Oct. 22 in Kansas City. She was a insurance agent. His wife, Eleanor, three with Lawrence-Leiter & Company. homemaker. Surviving are four daughters, sons, a daughter, a stepdaughter, a sister, a Survivors include two sons, John, b’72, and Anne, g’75, Colleen Mahoney Martin, l’79, granddaughter, two step-grandchildren Michael, d’75; two daughters, Sally Beeson Maureen, l’84, and Molly, ’85; a son, Bill, and two step-great-grandchildren survive. Hoag, c’80, and Margaret Elaine Beeson l’89; a brother, Charles, d’65; and 10 Warren Chinn, e’58, 79, Sept. 12 in Palo Blaise, b’82; 10 grandchildren; and 14 grandchildren. Alto, California, where he had a 34-year great-grandchildren. James Mitchell, b’40, 98, Oct. 18 in career at Booz Allen Hamilton as a Earl Clark, c’42, m’45, 95, April 11 in Overland Park, where he was a retired management consultant. His wife, Carol, a Wichita, where he was a pediatrician. colonel in the U.S. Army Reserves. He also son, two daughters and six grandchildren Surviving are two sons, one of whom is raised cattle on his family’s ranch. Survi- survive. Howard, c’75, d’79; a daughter, Ann Clark vors include a stepson, John Lester, m’70; a Ervin Colton, g’52, 89, Oct. 30 in Patton, c’79; 10 grandchildren; and 15 stepdaughter; a brother, Wiley, b’43, g’47; Milwaukee, where he owned Cerac Inc. He great-grandchildren. ve grandchildren; and eight is survived by two sons, Michael, b’78, and Winifred Hill Gallup, f’41, 95, Sept. 19 in great-grandchildren. Mitchell, c’80; two daughters; three Lawrence, where she was an organist and Anita Stewart Roland, n’41, 96, Oct. 13 stepsons; a stepdaughter; two brothers; 19 member of the Lawrence Civic Choir. in Rapid City, Michigan, where she was a grandchildren; and 10 great- A memorial has been established with homemaker. She is survived by three sons, grandchildren. KU Endowment. She is survived by two David, c’65, Stewart, c’68, and Scott, c’71, Gary Davis, c’54, l’57, 85, Sept. 27 in daughters, Nancy Gallup Penland, c’67, g’74; a daughter, Anita Martin Uden, s’72; Oklahoma City. He had a longtime career m’79, and Cynthia Gallup Pine, ’71; six seven grandchildren; and 11 as an attorney in the oil and gas industry. grandchildren; and four great- great-grandchildren. Survivors include his wife, Sara “Sally” grandchildren. Robert Stoer, m’48, 90, Oct. 16 in Bunger Davis, ’54; a son, Gary Jr., c’77; two James Good, c’42, m’62, 95, Sept. 4 in Topeka. He was a physician. Survivors daughters; a sister; and eight Republic, Missouri. He was a retired include a son, Robert Jr., m’75; a daughter; grandchildren. pathologist. Surviving are four sons, three a sister; eight grandchildren; and nine James De Coursey Jr., l’59, 84, Oct. 17 of whom are James Jr., c’68, m’72, Michael, great-grandchildren. in Topeka, where he served as lieutenant ’70, and Stephen, ’73; a daughter; four Lucy Hunter Thomas, c’46, 91, Oct. 3 in governor of Kansas in 1968. He later had a grandchildren; and three great- Los Alamos, New Mexico, where she career in banking. He is survived by his grandchildren. taught business at Los Alamos High wife, Joyce, assoc.; three sons, one of Muriel Stember Hannig, c’46, 91, Sept. School. She is survived by two sons, one of whom is Timothy, ’83; a daughter; and 17 in Sedona, Arizona. She was a whom is Jerry, c’69, g’70; three daughters; eight grandchildren. researcher at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, 10 grandchildren; and seven great- Judd Durner, b’58, 80, Oct. 31 in Minnesota, and also volunteered in her grandchildren. Wichita. He was president of the State community. Survivors include two David Whyte, e’45, 91, Oct. 12 in Bank of Burrton and also served as mayor daughters; a sister, Beverly Stember West, Roseville, California, where he was a of the City of Burrton. Survivors include
60 | KANSAS ALUMNI his wife, Rosie; a son, Josh, ’98; a sister, seven grandchildren. the Boeing Company. A memorial has Gay, d’65; and a grandson. Irving Ringdahl, m’57, 92, Oct. 24 in been established with KU Endowment. Thomas Emery, c’57, 80, Nov. 7 in Loveland, Colorado. He was a child Cameron, Missouri. He had a 45-year psychiatrist and founded the child Royce Angell, a’67, 80, Oct. 13 in career as a dentist. Surviving are his wife, psychiatry residency program and 60sLiberal, where he was an archi- Deborah; three sons, one of whom is inpatient child psychiatry department at tect. He is survived by his wife, Judith Derek, c’06; two daughters; a brother, the University of Arkansas Medical Black Angell, d’67; a son, Kevin, ’96; a Dennis, ’61; several grandchildren; and a Center. Surviving are his wife, Almina, daughter; a brother, Wayne, g’53, PhD’57; great-grandson. two sons, two daughters, two brothers, a sister, Lynda Angell Williams, c’62; four Gretchen Anderson Ferrell, c’52, 86, three sisters, 11 grandchildren and seven grandchildren; and four great- Sept. 12 in Topeka, where she owned an great-grandchildren. grandchildren. antique store. Two sons, ve grandchildren Evan “Dave” Ritchie, b’50, 90, Oct. 27 Ronald Boyd, ’64, 75, Oct. 19 in and two great-grandchildren survive. in Wichita, where he worked in construc- Merriam. He managed sales at IBM and Walter Scott Hayden, e’56, 82, Oct. 2 in tion and real estate with Ritchie Corpora- owned Boyd and Associates. North Hollywood, California. He was a tion and Ritchie Development. He is Gary Burnidge, ’61, 76, Oct. 27 in Grove, business management analyst at Lockheed survived by his wife, Marilyn ompson Oklahoma. He was an oral surgeon. Martin. A daughter, a son and three Ritchie, ’52; two daughters, Julie Ritchie Surviving are his wife, Joy; four daughters, grandchildren survive. Gladden, j’77, and Jan Ritchie Dorian, ’79; three of whom are Kirsten, c’88, Keri, ’92, Marian Rippeteau Klise, c’50, 87, Oct. two sons, one of whom is Jack, b’81; 11 and Briana, ’13; two stepsons; a step- 21 in Salt Lake City, where she owned grandchildren; and three daughter; a brother; two sisters; and 10 Rock Tools Inc. She is survived by her great-grandchildren. grandchildren. husband, Kenneth, a son, a daughter, two Rev. Margaret Foster Ruth, f’52, 88, Mathew Cabot Jr., b’63, 78, Oct. 13 in stepdaughters and 10 grandchildren. Oct. 3 in Kansas City, where she was an Los Altos Hills, California, where he was Robert Kraus, c’58, 81, July 19 in Bella Episcopal deacon. Surviving are two an information technology consultant at Vista, Arkansas. He played football at KU daughters, Rebecca Ruth Hart, ’78, and Allin Consulting and also designed sets for and was co-captain of the team for three Alice Ruth Alvarez, ’85; a son; 11 grand- children’s theatre. He is survived by his years. Surviving are his wife, Conneye; two children; and two great-grandchildren. wife, Christine, assoc.; two daughters; sons, Korbin, j’81, and Paul, ’87; a daugh- Lila Hyten Stites, d’50, 88, Sept. 22 in three sons; two sisters; and 14 ter, Stephanie Kraus Wuthrich, f’90; a Manhattan, where she was a homemaker grandchildren. stepson; two stepdaughters; 12 grandchil- and also co-owned Creative Travel. She is Sondra Youle Cole, d’61, 77, April 30 in dren; and two great-grandchildren. survived by her husband, John, b’50, l’56; Arlington, Texas. She was a psychothera- Donald Lumpkin, b’57, 81, April 21 in two sons, Tim, ’80, and Jerry, ’94; and pist. Survivors include a son, a daughter, Phillipsburg, where he was a grocer and three grandchildren. two sisters and two grandsons. ran his family’s business, Lumpkin’s IGA. Jay Warner, b’55, 83, Oct. 5 in Kansas Brian Conner, c’68, m’72, 70, Oct. 27 in He is survived by his wife, Brenda, a son, a City, where he was a retired insurance Salina, where he was an ophthalmologist. daughter, ve grandchildren and four broker. He is survived by a daughter, Ann He is survived by his wife, Elizabeth great-grandchildren. Warner Alexander, f’86; four sons, two of Cushing Conner, d’68, g’72; and a son, Jack Moore, b’55, 84, Aug. 16 in whom are Syd, c’92, and Peter, j’93; and David, e’01, ’02. Lawrence, where he owned General eight grandchildren. Robert Davis, b’66, 72, Sept. 29 in Appliance and later worked at a bank. Carol Helmers Winslow, c’50, 88, Sept. Overland Park, where he was associate Surviving are his wife, Mary Jane Conklin 24 in Mission. She was a nancial admin- chief of appeals at the Internal Revenue Moore, ’57; two daughters, Julia Moore istrator at Grace and Holy Trinity Cathe- Service. Surviving are his wife, Margaret McDonald, c’79, and Joanne Moore dral in Kansas City. Survivors include Bybee Davis, c’66, ’98; a daughter, Kim- Renfro, f’82; a son; a brother, Sam, b’52; three sons, Je , c’77, Jay, ’77, and John, ’82; berly Davis Ho man, s’90, s’96; a brother; and six grandchildren. seven grandchildren; and four and two grandchildren. Paul Pfortmiller, b’51, 90, Nov. 1 in Bel great-grandchildren. Bruce Eggert, b’68, 70, Oct. 16 in Aire. He managed a medical o ce. A son, Mary Lu Valk Winters, d’55, 83, Oct. 27 Hinsdale, Illinois. He was regional director two daughters and four grandchildren in Kansas City. She worked at Hallmark of customer service at Unisys Corporation survive. for several years and also was a home- for more than 35 years. Survivors include Ronald Rentz, e’59, 84, Sept. 30 in maker. Surviving are her husband, Joe, his wife, Barbara Stein Eggert, c’70; a Garland, Texas. He served in the U.S. Air a’56; a son; a daughter; two granddaugh- daughter; a son; a sister; two brothers; and Force and was a retired programmer. ters; and a great-grandson. a grandchild. Surviving are his wife, Dorothy Nitcher Ray Wyatt, f’58, 80, Oct. 6 in Wichita, David Folkerts, b’61, g’63, 78, Oct. 12 in Rentz, ’59; three daughters; a son; and where he was a service group manager at Great Bend, where he was an accountant
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 61 In Memory and partner at Maneth and Folkerts. A 21 in Branford, Connecticut, where she in Kansas City, where she was an elemen- memorial has been established with KU retired a er a long career in teaching. She tary school teacher. A daughter and Endowment. He is survived by his wife, is survived by two sons; a brother, Bill, granddaughter survive. Cecile Samson Folkerts, ’62; a son, Bryan, c’65, l’68; and four grandchildren. Jane Barricklow Rousser, g’67, 74, Oct. c’91; two daughters; three brothers, one of Charles LaPage, b’60, 82, Aug. 20 in 28 in Riverside, California, where she whom is Larry Keenan, c’52, l’54; two Anchorage, Alaska. He was a certi ed taught elementary and middle school for sisters; 10 grandchildren; and two public accountant and also served the City 30 years. Her husband, Wesley, and a great-grandchildren. of Valdez, Alaska, as a councilman and daughter survive. Marilyn Hawkins Hall, g’66, EdD’75, 86, mayor. A daughter, a son, a brother, two Jerry Salisbury, e’64, 78, Sept. 22 in San Sept. 13 in Hays. She was a special-educa- grandchildren and two great-grandchil- Antonio, where he was a petroleum tion teacher before becoming a marital dren survive. engineer. His wife, Judy, a son and three counselor. A memorial has been estab- Gloria Mays McCord, d’63, 75, Sept. 15 grandchildren survive. lished with KU Endowment. Surviving are in Sierra Madre, California, where she was Victor Zuercher Jr., d’63, 75, April 16 in her husband, Vance; two daughters, Debra an actress, playwright and lmmaker. She Honolulu, where he was a dentist. A son, a Clark Goodman, ’78, and Julie Clark is survived by her husband, Berry, c’62, sister and three grandchildren survive. Adams, ’84; a son, Douglas Clark, c’77, m’66; two sons; two sisters, one of whom is g’85; three stepdaughters, one of whom is Kala Mays Stroup, c’59, g’64, PhD’74; and Deborah Kruskop Brodbeck, c’77, Laurel Hall Stitzhal, ’87; a sister, Fran a brother, John, c’65. 70s61, Sept. 28 in Derby, where she Hawkins Rast-Nelson, d’60; 18 grandchil- Daniel McCue, p’67, 73, Oct. 8 in Blue retired a er 30 years with the U.S. Depart- dren; and 13 great- Springs, where he was a pharmacist. ment of Veterans A airs. She is survived grandchildren. Surviving are his wife, Emily, three sons, by a son, Nicholas Menefee, e’06; two James Henry, d’69, g’70, EdD’76, 82, three daughters, a sister, a brother and sisters, one of whom is Karen Kruskop Oct. 11 in Lawrence, where he was retired several grandchildren and great- Selig, d’75; and a brother. director of placement at KU’s College of grandchildren. Edward Dosh, l’77, 67, Sept. 27 in Joplin, Liberal Arts & Sciences. He later became a Stuart Moore, c’66, 73, Sept. 12 in Missouri. He had a law oce in Parsons city commissioner and served a one-year Raytown, where he sold antiques and and also served as the city attorney of cterm as mayor of Lawrence. Survivors collectibles. He is survived by two sisters, Chetopa. Survivors include two brothers. include his wife, Kay, assoc.; two daugh- one of whom is Elaine Moore McGinn, David Gentry, b’74, g’76, 64, Oct. 7 in ters, Barbara, c’83, and Jennifer Henry n’68; and a brother. Pontiac, Michigan. He was retired from a McWilliams, ’83; two sisters; and two Donald Moreland, m’63, 80, Sept. 21 in career in accounting and nance. Surviv- grandsons. Tyler, Texas, where he was a family ing are his wife, Debra; his father, Kale, Charles Hobbs, PhD’60, 81, Sept. 11 in practitioner. A memorial has been c’56, m’60; two daughters; his stepmother; St. Louis, where he retired a er a 35-year established with KU Endowment. Survi- a stepsister; a stepbrother; and four career as an organic research chemist at vors include two daughters, two sons, a grandchildren. Monsanto. A memorial has been estab- sister, seven grandchildren and two Rev. Leslie Burtner Gregory, c’70, 67, lished with KU Endowment. Surviving are great-grandchildren. Sept. 24 in Dalhart, Texas, where she was his wife, Vi; a son, Douglas, c’83, l’86; a Darrell Nelson, b’68, 78, Sept. 16 in an Episcopal priest and served in several daughter, Deborah Hobbs Tremain, ’86; Topeka. Surviving are a daughter, Darla churches and prisons. She is survived by and three grandchildren. Nelson-Metzger, d’96; three brothers, one her husband, Alan, ’85; a daughter, Sherry Kay McCanles Holmes, c’61, 77, of whom is Larry, g’72; six sisters; and ve Alexandra Gregory Parker, u’12; and two Sept. 14 in Prairie Village. She worked at grandchildren. brothers, Dale Jr., c’64, g’66, and Charles, KU Medical Center and the National Rudolph Oberzan, g’67, 74, Oct. 4 in c’65. Institutes of Health in Washington, D.C. A Lawrence. He managed sales for several Linda Gail Johnson, j’75, 63, Oct. 31 in memorial has been established with KU prefabricated-home companies. Survivors Cottonwood, Arizona. She was an Endowment. A son and a grandson include two sons; a daughter; three advertising copywriter at Nestlé Purina survive. brothers, Joseph, ’65, John, j’70, and PetCare Company in St. Louis. Surviving Daryl Hughes, e’68, 71, Oct. 18 in omas, s’73, s’75; a sister, Ann Oberzan are her mother; two sisters, Jean Johnson Brevard, North Carolina. He was a senior Look, ’78; and two grandchildren. Rose, a’78, and Terri, c’80; a brother, Mark, sta engineer at Shell Oil Company for Patricia Brady Raney, b’64, 74, Oct. 8 in c’82; her stepfather; a stepsister; and a more than 28 years. Surviving are his wife, Overland Park, where she was the pur- stepbrother. Elma; six brothers, three of whom are chasing administrator at Johnson County Joseph King, a’70, 68, Aug. 19 in Harold, ’80, Michael, c’84, and Daniel, ’87; Community College. A son, a daughter Lawrence, where he was an architect. He is and a sister. and ve grandchildren survive. survived by his wife, Lucille Resnik King, Nancy Chambers Jones, d’68, 70, June Betty Thoman Roberts, d’67, 94, Oct. 25 c’70, a’87; a son, Zachary, e’07; a daughter,
62 | KANSAS ALUMNI Alison, c’11; and two sisters, Sarah King and a member of a community orchestra. Aaron, c’87, and Allen, c’89; a daughter; a Couch, d’67, and Christine, c’73. Surviving are her husband, William, e’51; sister; three grandchildren; and a Becky Kunz Lovett, f’75, 63, Sept. 12 in four daughters, one of whom is Suzanne great-grandchild. Ewing, New Jersey, where she was an Sinderson Hendee, c’85; two stepdaugh- Jack Riegle, ’61, 82, Aug. 15 in Law- occupational therapist. Surviving are her ters, one of whom is Alison Richey Pearse, rence, where he had a 38-year career as a husband, Donald; a son; two daughters; d’77; and 10 grandchildren. civil engineer with KU Campus Opera- her mother, Nadine Kunz, c’42; and two tions. He later became a technical director brothers, William, b’72, g’75, and Stephen, Slade Adams, d’97, 42, Oct. 10 in and set designer for eatre Lawrence. m’74. 90sWichita, where he was a profes- Surviving are his wife, Ines; two sons, one Michael Riedel, c’77, 62, Sept. 27 in sional golfer. He played golf for KU and of whom is Steven, ’95; two brothers, one Liberal, where he was an environmental was the Big Eight champion in 1995. In of whom is Robert, a’49; two sisters; two specialist at Panhandle Eastern Pipeline 1997, he competed in the U.S. Open. granddaughters; two step-grandchildren; Company. His father and a brother Surviving are his wife, Gina, three and two step-great- survive. daughters, his parents and a brother. grandchildren. Rev. Eugene Schmidt, ’75, 87, Sept. 22 Robert Primo Sherman, m’63, 82, Aug. in Topeka. He was a Lutheran pastor and Matthew Lewellen, ’11, 27, Nov. 4 3 in Kansas City. He was an internist and served in several churches and schools. 10sin Jordan. He was a Green Beret in pulmonologist and an associate professor Surviving are a son, Stephen, ’79; two the U.S. Army and received numerous of clinical medicine at KU’s School of daughters, Sheryl Schmidt Speelman, d’80, awards for his service, including the Medicine from 1970 to ’80. Surviving are and Suzanne Schmidt Peterson, c’88; a Bronze Star Medal. Surviving are his three sons, one of whom is Paul, ’88; a brother; six grandchildren; and a parents, a brother and a sister. daughter; and ve grandchildren. great-granddaughter. George Worth, assoc., 87, Oct. 7 in Phyllis Lamb Smith, d’72, 67, Oct. 9 in UNIVERSITY COMMUNITY Lawrence, where he was an English Wichita. She is survived by two daughters, Surendra Bhana, g’68, PhD’71, 77, Sept. professor and chaired the department Dana Wilkinson Palmer, d’93, and 24 in Lawrence, where he was professor from 1964 to ’79. In 1994, he received the Stephanie Wilkinson Hargett, c’04; a son; a emeritus in the department of history. He Chancellors Club Career Teaching Award. stepson; a brother; and four is survived by his wife, Kastoor Jeena He is survived by a daughter, eresa grandchildren. Bhana, PhD’70; two daughters, Hershini, Worth Wilkinson, ’78; a son, Paul, j’80, Kirk Starks, c’78, 62, Aug. 9 in Corinth, c’92, and Palvih, j’02; a son, Hemant, ’97; g’86; four granddaughters; and ve Texas, where he worked in residential and and three grandchildren. great-grandchildren. commercial real estate. He is survived by Roy Creek, 98, Oct. 10 in Lawrence. He his wife, Judy; a son; a stepson; a step- was a retired colonel in the U.S. Army and ASSOCIATES daughter; his mother; two brothers, spent 15 years as a hospital administrator Marlene Boster, assoc., 84, Nov. 6 in Gregory, b’73, and Jon, c’80; and a at KU Medical Center. Survivors include Wichita. She is survived by her husband, granddaughter. his wife, Florine; a daughter, Cynthia D. Wayne, e’61; a daughter; a sister; and a Creek Maude, j’71; three sons, one of granddaughter. Mark Chaney, ’85, 53, Oct. 11 in whom is Condy, d’77; 11 grandchildren; Sarah “Sally” Whitcomb Lieurance, 80sLawrence. He worked in account and 16 great-grandchildren. assoc., 97, Sept. 6 in Williamsburg, sales at Sports Radio 810 WHB in Kansas Margaret Schutz Gordon, assoc., 95, Virginia. She was a registered nurse and a City. Survivors include two daughters, Oct. 3 in Kirkwood, Missouri. She was ight attendant. Surviving are two sons, Emily Chaney Elliott, ’06, and Sarah professor emerita in the School of Social Newton Jr., c’66, and John, e’70; a daugh- Chaney-Lundquist, ’06; two brothers; and Welfare, and in 1983 she was inducted in ter, Darline Lieurance Rowe, d’71; a three grandchildren. the KU Women’s Hall of Fame. ree brother; ve grandchildren; and several Kevin Koch, l’80, 61, Oct. 2 in Oro stepsons, a stepdaughter, ve grandchil- great-grandchildren. Valley, Arizona, where he was an attorney. dren and ve great-grandchildren survive. Gwendolyn White Mitchell, assoc., 93, His wife, Beth Morton Koch, c’80; two Stuart Levine, assoc., 84, Oct. 29 in Sept. 24 in Lawrence, where she was a sons; a brother; and a sister survive. Lawrence, where he was professor homemaker and community volunteer. A J. Darrell Preston, c’83, j’83, 55, Oct. 24 emeritus of American Studies and memorial has been established with KU in Dallas, where he was a business authored and edited several publications, Endowment. She is survived by her journalist at Bloomberg News. He is including the American Studies journal, husband, Wiley, b’43, g’47; two daughters, survived by a daughter and two brothers, which he founded. A memorial has been one of whom is Nancy Mitchell Moore, Glenn, c’86, g’89, and Steven, ’87. established with KU Endowment. Survi- ’70; two grandchildren; ve great-grand- Cynthia Kobett Richey, c’85, 78, Sept. vors include his wife, Susan Fleming children; and two great-great- 28 in Overland Park. She was a librarian Matthews Levine, PhD’80; two sons, grandchildren.
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 63 Rock Chalk Review
Brad Osborn studies “compositional complexities” of rock music recorded after
STEVE PUPPE STEVE about 1990. “But,” he says, “I’m starting to shift my work more toward analyzing the cultural aspect, along with the music.”
or one book. He decided immediately to devote himself to a book on Radiohead, whose music he brie y explored in his dissertation. Osborn says that the deeper he immersed himself in Radiohead’s exten- sive catalog of music during his research and writing, the more he respected artistry that hits what he views as “that sweet spot between convention and experimentation.” Radiohead, Osborn contends, does that better than any band since the late-era Beatles. “I did not go into this thinking that Radiohead was necessarily as historically signi cant as I found them to be, University of Washington, where he ultimately.” In the sweet spot completed a dissertation on experimental A er completing one last Radiohead Book explores Radiohead’s rock music a er 1990. He now teaches article, three years in the making, Osborn music theory to all freshman music plans to focus his research on a particular balance of artistic success with majors, and enlivens the dicult course, “melodic motive” that for decades has popular commercial appeal “kind of mathematical in nature,” with been used in lm music to signify melan- pop-music elements that are easily choly, longing, nostalgia or remembrance. hortly a er Oxford University Press’ relatable to 18-year-olds. e musical gure is a two-note passage SNovember publication of Everything In “My goal,” Osborn says, “is to teach that hangs on a dissonant leading tone Its Right Place: Analyzing Radiohead, Brad them how Beethoven and popular music before nally falling down. It was heard, Osborn, assistant professor of music really aren’t that dierent if you’re looking for instance, at the end of “Laura Palmer’s theory, was asked to discuss his book at a at structural principles of the music.” eme” from “Twin Peaks,” and is Kansas City advertising agency. His When he arrived at KU, Osborn learned commonly heard when a two-syllable speech, “Radiohead is my favorite brand,” that he had six years to complete one of name is included in “Happy Birthday to explored the English rock band’s blend of two tenure requirements: six major articles You .” artistic and commercial success as an Osborn says he has analyzed the inspiration for other long-running creative emotive passage in about 100 lms, from endeavors. Everything In Its Right 1930s classics to, most recently, a weekend “It was all about how Radiohead keeps viewing of “Selma.” Place: Analyzing some core principles the same but evolves “It’s a heart-wrenching movie, so of Radiohead the sound from record to record. at’s course I’m waiting for the composer to use how they remain relevant,” Osborn says. by Brad Osborn that motive,” Osborn says. “And just near “ ey keep a core Radiohead-ness, if you the end of the lm, Lyndon Johnson signs Oxford University will, but constantly try something new, the Voting Rights Act; cut to a shot of Press, $24.95 and slowly, glacially, evolve their sound.” Martin Luther King’s face and there it is, Osborn came to KU in 2013 from the the motive.
64 | KANSAS ALUMNI that year. I was quite animated.” In putting together e ABCs of “If you think you need to be something by the Enlightenment, Day was struck to discover how much his learning shaped his time you graduate, tell yourself you want to be teaching. “I learned because I was enlightened.” —Robert Day included in the learning: My best teachers {} brought me into their intellectual lives,” he writes. “It seemed natural to do the same for my students, and in so doing, like my “I know that might ruin it, when you’re something by the time you graduate,” he teachers, I joined what Borges called el waiting for something to appear, but it’s advises, “tell yourself you want to be salon de estudiantes instead of el salon de also kind of gratifying, to have this enlightened.” professores.” theory—Will it happen in this movie?— “Tales Out of School,” “ e Myth of As more than one writer notes in the and, sure enough, it does.” Good College Teaching” and “Famous introductions and a erwords salted Everything in its right place, musically Education” take a more critical look at throughout this delightful collection, Day’s and otherwise. academia, but the pointed criticism plays high esteem for his teachers has been —Chris Lazzarino well with Day’s pointed humor. Writing returned to him many times over by those about the rich undergraduate prize he taught. No wonder: Even as a professor, awarded by Washington College, where he Bob Day is a student at heart. taught for many years before retiring, Day —Steven Hill Old school recounts the media circus that ensued each spring. Memoir explores writer’s life “My college keeps the winner secret, but that year we had to tell the television The ABCs of on both sides of the classroom people, so they could point the cameras in Enlightenment: A the right direction to catch (a la ‘ e Price Memoir of Learning obert Day’s literary tributes to the Is Right’) screams, gasps, jumping up and and Teaching Rprofessors he encountered at KU down, whoopie, whatever. As it turned during the 1960s are among the most out, we did not make the evening news. By Robert Day popular pieces Kansas Alumni has e woman who won was not animated Serving House published over the past decade. A ection is enough for the camera. For my part, Books, $10 not quite adequate to describe the feeling when they pointed the camera my way, I that Day, c’64, g’66, expresses for mentors said the prize was larger than my salary like Ed Ruhe, Ed Wolfe, Carroll Edwards and Charlton Hinman in essays that artfully move between the innocence of the student and the wisdom of the elder STOREY DAN looking back on his callow youth. Appreci- ation—a deep, abiding gratefulness— marks those well-cra ed remembrances, which don’t simply extol the example these master teachers set, but suggest how their in uence rippled across his own teaching and writing career. e ABCs of Enlightenment: A Memoir of Learning and Teaching closes the circle by collecting six of these stellar essays on learning ( ve of which originally appeared in Kansas Alumni) with seven pieces on teaching. e title essay, framed as a rst-day-of-class lecture to freshmen, urges students to embrace learning for the sake of learning rather than career advancement. “If you think you need to be Robert Day
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 65 Rock Chalk Review Family ties STEVE PUPPE STEVE Legacy of corruption and control at core of author’s latest novel
n e Roanoke Girls, author Amy IVickery Engel spins a troublesome tale of family dysfunction and secrecy as told by Lane Roanoke, a young girl who uncovers the truth about her family and ees, only to return years later a er the disappearance of her cousin. Engel has published young adult novels, but this is her rst for the adult ction market. e story begins as 15-year-old Lane is sent to Osage Flats, a small, rural town in Kansas, to live with her maternal grandparents and her cousin, Allegra, a er her mother’s suicide. Although Lane knows little about her family—her mother young girl’s summer at the farm to present Students in the University’s new Emerging had broken ties as a teenager and never day, which nds Lane broken, seemingly Scholars Program work approximately seven spoke about them—she quickly adjusts beyond repair, struggling to come to grips hours a week with their research mentors. “It’s and becomes entrenched in small-town with her family’s history and her place in not overbearing,” says John Augusto. “They life, forming a sisterly bond with Allegra it. Interspersing chapters told from the can still balance it with their coursework and and developing a tumultuous relationship perspective of relatives who came before their commitments to other student with a young man named Cooper. Lane, e Roanoke Girls carefully reveals organizations.” For Lane, life on the Roanoke farm has the casualties of love and loyalty and its perks, but she soon discovers that the provides an uncomfortable glimpse into sprawling estate harbors secrets that span one family’s heartbreaking generations. She escapes before she, too, dysfunction. research,” says John Augusto, g’95, PhD’09, becomes one of its victims. —Heather Biele director of the Center for Undergraduate Eleven years later, while Lane is living in Research, “but we didn’t have a whole lot Los Angeles, she’s contacted by her of programming and a whole lot of eorts grandfather, who pleads with her to come for students who are just getting started in back to Osage Flats a er Allegra disap- First-year edge research.” pears. Overcome with guilt for having le Augusto explains that the program was her cousin behind years ago, Lane returns, New program oers students also driven by a need to include more determined to uncover the truth about early start to conduct research rst-generation and low-income students Allegra—a dicult task in a small town so in research, a challenge he sees not only at adept at keeping secrets. tudents now have the opportunity to KU, but also at other universities nation- Engel, c’93, aptly takes readers on Lane’s Sconduct research during their rst wide. “If you have to choose between journey by shi ing seamlessly between the year at the University, thanks to a new, volunteering and doing research or federally funded work-study program at working a part-time job, you have to the Center for Undergraduate Research. choose working the part-time job,” he says. e Emerging Scholars Program, which “We understand that.” The Roanoke Girls launched in August, pairs rst-year As participants, students work approxi- students with faculty mentors who need mately seven hours a week for an hourly by Amy Engel assistance on research and creative wage. In addition to duties assigned by Crown Publishing, projects. More than 100 students initially faculty mentors, students also must attend $25 applied for the program, and 50 were monthly professional development selected to participate. workshops with other Emerging Scholars “We had a lot of programs and eorts and sta from the Center for Undergradu- for students who were already doing ate Research.
66 | KANSAS ALUMNI Augusto and his team took cues from that in the admissions process. is gives he apparently wants for himself, and she is several universities that o ered similar us a way to walk our talk, which is saying glad to see heavy responsibility thrust work-study programs for students, ‘Yeah, we talk about the importance of upon his sloping shoulders. including the University of Michigan, undergraduate research and for students But the unpaying trustee gig isn’t easy, which has operated the successful Under- who want to do that, you can do that as as Bob had hoped. Investment proposals graduate Research Opportunity Program early as your rst year.’” being considered at the time of Sam for 20 years. When KU launched its —Heather Biele Bennett’s death must begin anew, and the program, an overwhelming number of coaster nds himself stuck in a ceaseless faculty members answered the call to eddy of PowerPoints and pitchmen. participate. Enter Sanitol Solutions, a freakishly “We had over 80 applications from What about Bob? good cleaning system, and toothy front- faculty,” says Augusto. “We had to turn man Tom Swanson, both seemingly too faculty away.” Novel’s dark humor overcomes good to be true. e coaster’s dormant Faculty create job descriptions for their suburbia-gone-bad conventions business instinct slowly sheds its slothish research positions and are paired with shroud, prodding Bob to look closer, and students based on their interests. ob Patterson has it all: a wonderful closer still. Industrial espionage, personal “A number of faculty have said that the Bwife, two good kids, a sprawling home betrayals, blackmail, a handy quiver of reason they are in this program is because in Kansas City’s suburban countryside, tranquilizer darts, kidnapping, murder, they got this experience when they were loads of dough. Most delightfully for Bob, another murder, gruesome gory stu and a an undergraduate,” Augusto explains. “So the one thing he doesn’t have is an urge to dash of high-tech gadgetry, all methodi- 10, 15, 20 years ago, somebody saw them upset the smooth currents of his satisfy- cally stirred in a chilled shaker of wise- as a freshman and said, ‘Hey, you’d be ingly unchallenging life. cracks and observational humor, nally good in research,’ pulled them in, got them “Even though I’m not that smart or reveal Bob Patterson to be a coaster only excited about studying chemistry or doing successful, everyone thinks I am,” Bob to his own—and his wife’s—engine and research in sociology, and that really explains in e Coaster, the debut novel by propeller. shaped their experience going forward.” Kansas Citian Erich Wurster, b’85, l’88. As is common with crime thrillers built Cecelia Menjívar, Foundation Distin- “My entire life feels like a lie. Not a big, on humor, e Coaster is more about guished Professor in the department of interesting, book-worthy lie, as if I’ve got a people than plot. Structural defects, sociology, works closely with Kansas City secret family locked in the dungeon under though, are forgiven for Wurster’s dark freshman Giselle Almodovar, who assists my house. Just a series of small, meaning- comedic talent, memorable for its deli- in creating a database of articles that less deceptions to hide my true self from cious doses of immaturity: a wise guy vs. examine immigrants and immigration others. Maybe ‘lie’ is a little strong. Let’s wiseguys. Like its namesake, there lurks laws in the media. say people only know the me I pretend to within e Coaster more than suspected, “I think it is a great opportunity to b e .” especially the unexpected reward of a involve undergraduates in research very Bob’s smarmy fraternity brother, Dave suburban crime spree story in which early in their academic careers so that they “Corny” Cornwallis, explains a few rounds husband and wife ght through to learn important research skills through into a momentous night of debauchery salvation by trusting, rather than murder- hands-on projects,” Menjívar says. “ ese that Bob is a “coaster.” CEOs who swing ing, one another. experiences complement nicely what they big deals are “the engines,” and, one level Tom Swanson never comprehended are learning in the classroom.” down, their lieutenants are the “propel- what Sarah Patterson knew all along: e In the future, Augusto would like to see lers,” Corny continues. Because those coaster is not what he pretends to be. the Emerging Scholars Program expand if alpha males need subservient buddies, —Chris Lazzarino funding allows. He also hopes to o er a pleasant and ever-helpful “coasters” like credit-only option for all students, in Bob occupy the next rung down on the addition to the work-study option for ladder. rst-year students. But Bob won’t be a coaster much longer. The Coaster “Students come to KU for great reasons,” When patriarch and civic pillar Samuel he says, “like we have their major, or they Bennett dies of a heart attack, the reading by Erich Wurster meet a professor and they get excited of his will reveals a shocking turn: Ol’ Sam Poisoned Pen about studying a particular subject matter, passed over his talented daughter Sarah, Press, $15.95 or maybe because of our great volleyball president of e Bennett Company, and team or great basketball team. instead named son-in-law Bob as trustee “I want them to come to KU because of his immense wealth. Sarah holds no they can do research. We talk a lot about grudge. She wants more for her man than
ISSUE 1, 2017 | 67 Glorious to View photograph by Valerie Spicher
The bronze likeness of legendary law dean “Uncle Jimmy” Green and a student, crafted by sculptor Daniel Chester French and dedicated to the University in 1924, weathered blustery winds and a fine dusting of December snow.
68 | KANSAS ALUMNI
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