MERRIMACK FALL 2018 MERRIMACK SEIZES ITS MOMENT PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE MERRIMACK A Magazine for Our Alumni, Parents, and Friends Fall 2018 Dear Alumni, Parents, and Friends, President Merrimack College is 71 years old this Christopher E. Hopey, Ph.D. fall, and I don’t know if our community Editor has had a more momentous year than the Bethany LoMonaco one we are living in right now. Writers We announced the College’s move into Patty Bovie NCAA Division I athletics, months after Ginny Caggiano watching our men’s lacrosse team earn the Kaitlyn Manighalam Division II National Championship at Jack Minch, MPA’17 Gillette Stadium. We learned that we have Kelli Readey ’16 become a top-50 school in our U.S. News John Veneziano category, and we are also one of the “most Design innovative” schools in the northern United PBD States. And Money magazine honored us as one of the 10 “most transformative” Photographers institutions in the country. David Barron Webb Chappell We achieved our $50M fundraising goal of our Together for Good capital Heratch Ekmekjian campaign, thanks to the support of alumni and friends, and in September we Bob Keene opened the Dr. Alfred L. Arcidi Center, honoring one of our earliest alumni Kevin Salemme ’95 and a family that represents three generations of Merrimack education. Marvin Sandavol Mary Schwalm When we broke ground for Crowe Hall in 2016, I noted that Merrimack was Jim Stankiewicz replacing the promise of “we will be” with the reality of “we are,” transforming Editorial Offices years of potential into a present of achievement and a future Merrimack Magazine of accomplishment. Box A-8, Merrimack College This fall’s amazing milestones are not the reason for our success. They are the 315 Turnpike Street North Andover, MA 01845 results of our vision, our purpose, our mission, and the hard work of so many in our community who saw what Merrimack College could be. merrimack.edu facebook.com/merrimackcollege Best, twitter.com/merrimack @merrimackcollege Every effort has been made to contact copyright Christopher E. Hopey, Ph.D. holders of any material reprinted in this magazine. President Any omissions will be righted in subsequent issues if notice is given to the editor. CONTENTS 4 8 12 In this edition: 4 Merrimack Accepts 14 Together for Good “We have grown our reputation Division I Bid Updates from the Campaign academically and athletically — 8 Three Generations of a rare feat.” Merrimack Warriors Alumni News 34 DR. CHRISTOPHER E. HOPEY, PRESIDENT 12 Boosting the Student Experience On the cover: Top left to right: Cody Demers ’19, Football; Jessica Palmer ’20, Field Hockey; Nicole Nanof ’19, Softball; Juvaris Hayes ’20, Basketball; Front and center: Karlee Alves ’19, Basketball MERRIMACK.EDU 1 QUESTIONS FOR MICHAEL STROUD, PH.D., APPLE DISTINGUISHED EDUCATOR Recently joining the ranks of Apple Being recognized for combining my rather than a syllabus. If I want to get Distinguished Educators (ADEs) two passions of technology and the students’ input on something during across the globe, Dr. Michael Stroud education is wonderful. Plus, it serves class, I create a quick poll. They simply is an associate professor of psychology as assurance that what I’ve been doing use their iPad to visit the website and at Merrimack College; a co-director is forward-thinking — really, the tap on it to give me their opinion, and of the Merrimack Context, Attention, education of the future. I throw the results up on the screen. Memory, and Perception Lab; and a lifelong tech enthusiast. When the Q: What opportunities come with Q: In your opinion, what is the best Mobile Merrimack Initiative was being recognized as an ADE? tech invention in recent history? announced in 2015, Dr. Stroud said the It’s exciting to be part of a large The game changer for me is touch opportunity to combine teaching with community of people who are thinking interface. Styluses have been around his interest in technology was a “dream about technology and education in new a long time, but to be able to interact come true,” ultimately leading him to and exciting ways. If I need inspiration with the technology, to be so intuitive, pursue and attain ADE status. or have a technical question, I can post to be able to touch it with your finger — in the ADE social network and receive that’s a whole other level. Q: How did you become interested four or five responses within a minute. in the ADE program? Q: What do you think teaching in the When Merrimack introduced the idea Q: How do you think technology changes classroom will look like in 20 years? and enhances the way students learn? of providing iPads for every student, an That’s a long time in the tech world! ADE from another college gave a talk We’ve all had to do presentations in How about five years? In the classroom, on campus, which inspired my curiosity class, where you just throw a bunch of the projector and computer will be to look a little further and eventually text up on the screen and read it. With gone, as you won’t need the central focal set it as a personal goal. iPads, students can share video clips point. Instead, it will be a collaborative and images to make it more interactive environment in which everything will be Q: What was the process of becoming and create work that they’re proud of. delivered to personal devices. I’ll be able an ADE like? I show my colleagues the projects that walk around anywhere I want because Applications are only accepted every my freshmen create in introductory everyone will see everything. two years and require a two-minute courses, and they’re amazed. — Kaitlyn Manighalam video showcasing your use of technology in the classroom. Mine focused on three Q: Do you find that students are more themes: transformation, reaching new engaged with technology-driven lessons? heights, and community collaboration. Absolutely. They see the content, After being selected as an ADE, I they experience it firsthand, and then attended a three-day intensive training they discover how it connects to their academy, which introduced the program studies. It’s great when they get that fundamentals. From 6 a.m. to 9 p.m., it lightbulb moment — “Oh, yeah, this was constant workshops and networking. makes sense!” I was just blown away. Q: How has the use of technology Q: What does it mean to you to changed the way you teach? have earned this status? Technology allows me to utilize more From the original Nintendo to Apple’s innovative and engaging teaching first-generation iPod, I’ve always been techniques. This year, for example, an early adopter of new technology. I created a fully interactive website Photos by Webb Chappell MERRIMACK.EDU 3 DIVISION I UP TO THE CHALLENGE Merrimack seizes its moment by joining Division I athletics Article by John Veneziano | Photos by Jim Stankiewicz History will remember September 13, 2018, as the day Merrimack College athletics made its boldest move. For that’s when the school announced it had accepted an invitation to join the Northeast Conference, marking the Warriors’ entrance into the world of NCAA Division I athletics. Good-bye, New Haven. Hello, Notre Dame! Yet such monumental decisions aren’t made on a whim. Merrimack began charting this course in 2011 when Christopher E. Hopey, Ph.D. was inaugurated as the college’s eighth president and expressed his intention to raise Merrimack’s athletic profile. Soon after, that plan was put into Merrimack’s president, Dr. Christopher E. Hopey, action as part of the Agenda for Distinction, Merrimack’s 10-year Northeast Conference (NEC) commissioner, strategic initiative to shape its future. Noreen Morris, and Merrimack athletic director, Jeremy Gibson celebrate Merrimack’s acceptance The true inspiration for the move, however, was born well before either into the NEC. of those events. It came from Dr. Hopey’s lifelong love of sports — he excelled in ice hockey, football, and track in high school and remains an avid outdoorsman — and through his years as a student and an administrator in higher education, where he personally witnessed the impact a vibrant athletic program can have on a campus community and a school’s identity. “I was an undergraduate at Northeastern University in the 1980s when coach Jim Calhoun and Reggie Lewis brought national attention to the men’s basketball program there,” Hopey said. “And I spent more than a decade in Philadelphia, where I saw the excitement that surrounded not just pro sports, but events like the Penn Relays and college basketball games at The Palestra.” When Hopey arrived at Merrimack and announced his plans — “We’re going to be a Division I program,” he bluntly stated — support was quick to build. Campus leaders and donors embraced the idea that a major investment in athletics, wrapped within the school’s guiding principles, would expand the college’s visibility and help it reach its potential. 4 MERRIMACK • FALL 2018 MERRIMACK.EDU 5 1947 Merrimack College is Early-to-Mid 1970s founded. A number of women’s programs begin organized competition, A group of students 1947–48 including basketball, softball, form an informal hockey club tennis and volleyball. known as the “Blue Blades,” which eventually becomes the Merrimack 1984–85 Merrimack men’s ice hockey program. College joins what was then the Northeast-8 Conference, replacing The men’s basketball 1949–50 the University of Hartford. That team becomes the first varsity same year, the men’s ice hockey athletics program on campus, team reclassifies as a Division I finishing 7–2 in its first year of independent program.