Year: 2015

This past week, the announcement was made that Professors Lori Huth, Dr. John Rowley, and Dr. Jamie Potter would be receiving tenure. Tenure provides job security for the faculty member, who has typically served six years, subject to the guidelines of Houghton’s Statement of Community Responsibility and Doctrinal Statement. Specifically for Houghton, tenured faculty members need to have an earned degree in a field related to their teaching and show strength in integration of faith with learning and practice, teaching, scholarship and service to the college.

Despite popular belief, tenure is not job security for life no matter what the faculty member does, but a guarantee of full due process in evaluations of performance and behavior.

The process to attain tenure is a lengthy one. Over the course of the six years served, multiple people and committees review the faculty members’ applications, teachings, scholarship and service. Everyone from faculty peers to President Mullen is involved in the process.

Relief that the strenuous and rigorous process is over is the general consensus of the three professors. “The application process itself is a lot of work,” says Huth. She said achieving tenure “requires many years of working hard on all components of being a good faculty member.” Linda Mills Woolsey, Dean of the College, praised the creative writing professor stating  “Ms. Huth brings high standards to writing teaching and some of her students have been winning national awards.”

Rowley, Professor of Chemistry, feels receiving tenure validates his vocation, which is to “teach students to be excellent scientists in a Christian context.” Woolsey said Rowley has “provided leadership for Science Honors and strong service to the Chemistry program.” Although he feels now he does not need to worry about proving himself, Rowley wants to debunk the popular myth that professors become lazy after receiving tenure. “I think tenure results in greater responsibility on the part of faculty,” said Rowley.

For Potter, she doesn’t want her position to make her complacent. “There are a lot of things I want to achieve in the department,” stated the biology professor. She feels having tenure will give her more confidence to “take the advancements” that she wants to take. Along with Rowley, Potter has made contributions to Science Honors and “has done a great deal to build and support Pre-Health Professions,” says Woolsey.

Both the Rank and Tenure Committee and the Academic Affairs Committee of the Boards were “Impressed by the achievements of these faculty,” according to Woolsey. Huth, Rowley, and Potter “Have shown a strong commitment to teaching and to serving students.”

There are no plays planned for this semester at Houghton. The school’s theater clubs have experienced a dearth of interest from the student body. This loss of momentum is a result of several factors, yet there is movement on the part of the faculty to breathe life into Houghton theater.

Wynn Horton, ’15, has been deeply involved with theater in his time at Houghton. He expressed his concern, “2014-2015 is the first of several years at Houghton in which there has been no theatre. We have had a plethora of plays and musicals over the last 4 years and now hit a drought.”

There are two active theater groups on campus: Encore and Houghton Musical Theater Players. Formerly, the Shakespeare Players put on works by their namesake before being subsumed into Encore. These groups have faced an economic challenge over the past few years as the cost of copyright has become greater than net revenue from the production.

With the reduction of the student body, there are fewer students participating in productions though the overall percentage of students interested in the performing arts may not have changed. Encore president Sarah Wright views the problem as a, “vicious circle.” As a result of fewer students participating in productions, other students know less about the productions because they don’t permeate as much of the campus population, thus even fewer students participate in later productions. This cycle runs parallel to another. The lack of funding for the plays means that they cannot have as high a quality as they would otherwise. This results in a lack of attendance, and therefore a lack of funding for further performance ventures. The solution might be to change ticket prices, however, if they are raised, the audience will shrink. If they are lowered, the overall revenue might shrink as well.

It is difficult to find a clear answer to breaking this cycle. It may not be able to raise itself up from its current status without outside help. Encore has made several efforts to increase its appeal to students. They have held an activity themed workshop on stage make-up that they had hoped would be joined by other theater-centric workshops. The low attendance of the first workshop cancelled any further plans of this kind. They have also looked into performing smaller plays, such as one-acts. Professor Wardwell suggested they participate in a 72-hour “Theater Blitz” wherein a play is written, cast, and performed in 3 days. The size of these productions make them a better fit for the present interest and funding. Their short term involvement means students aren’t required to commit as much time to them.

These efforts have been matched by further challenges. Theater groups have had trouble renting spaces to practice and even perform plays, relegating them to classrooms until opening night. The Encore Theater Group recently had to relocate their props and equipment from the building now occupied by Addie’s Ice Cream. The group understands the need for the move, but found the replacement location provided by the college meant having to throw away half of their props due to size constraints.

There is a chance that the dry spell of theater interest could be part of a larger cycle. Horton thinks that it parallels other Houghton activities, “It makes sense that one group of students had the momentum to pull off large theatre productions while others don’t. In the same way, other student organizations or campus events go through similar ebb and flow patterns. For example, the student government’s presence and interest in it comes and goes, SPOT and its talent/entertainment value comes and goes, and clubs like the Pro-life Club or Math Clubs come and go depending on whether or not there are students to lead them.” Horton said, “Theatre clubs are the same, if no one steps up or there’s no interest, then there’s no theatre. The only difference is, when musicals and plays have become almost habitual – people notice when they’re missing. I’d love to see someone make theatre happen again.”

Professor Susan Lipscomb wants to encourage a rekindled interest in Houghton productions through faculty intervention. She, along with professors Gaerte and Wardwell are working towards bringing a director as resident on campus for the upcoming three years. The director would come and spend four weeks working solely on producing a play alongside Houghton students. The cost of this residency would be paid for by an application of the Van Gorden Fund, which is dedicated to nurturing English, theater, and the arts. The three-year pilot will be vetted for a continuation of the program in subsequent years.

Professor Wardwell sees theater as an important component to life on a college campus. In his view, theater serves a human, not just educational, benefit. Horton agrees, “The stage is a medium that can truly be used as a platform or arena for conversations of all kinds and of all temperatures – perhaps even some of the edgy conversations Houghton has been avoiding over the last few years? Acting also encourages those on stage to truly put themselves in the shoes of others, and sometimes even legitimize estranged people groups or taboo topics. Regardless of theatre’s social value, it is entertaining, and we all know Houghton can never have enough of that during the cold winter months.”

This semester, Houghton became the first liberal arts college in the country to offer an undergraduate class in data science. It is also the first Christian liberal arts college to offer any class in data science according to Carmen McKell, cofounder of BaseMetrics.

“Data Science is the art of turning data into actions,” says The Field Guide for Data Science.

Seminar in Data Science hosted guest speaker Paul Yacci, data scientist at Booz Allen Hamilton and co-author of The Field Guide for Data Science, on Jan. 21, marking the first official class of the semester. Yacci said, “It will certainly will be interesting to see what comes out of liberal arts background towards data science.” He said he was “excited to kick of the series” and is the first of many guest speakers to be part of the weekly seminar.

According to course coordinator and technology librarian, Glen Avery, the course has weekly guest speakers from the field of data science lined up. McKell, also course coordinator and Houghton alumna is connecting with data scientists to speak at the seminar.

Stefan Heeke, executive director of SumAll.org, was the second speaker, via Skype, last Wednesday. Some other future speakers include Amanda Stent, principal research scientist at Yahoo Labs; Michael Lyons, director of analytics for the Buffalo Bills; and Philip Martin, SumAll.org data scientist. Avery is also trying to get in contact with a digital historian in Australia.

As part of the seminar, McKell said students will, “have a great opportunity to connect with some of the top Data Scientists in many areas including sports analytics, healthcare, business etc.” Grace Baleno, senior and class participant, said “it is good exposure to the field [data science] and making good connections.”

In addition to connections, Martin will become a mentor for students, according to Avery. Martin will advise students on their final project of data evaluation, analysis, and visualization. “Students will get a chance to work with real datasets as part of this course to tell their stories with data,” said McKell. The semester will end with students giving a presentation on their project.

Sarah Slater, senior and class participant, said the class has already “been really interesting because the teachers are people who are in the industry. I think this is an opportunity you don’t have in a lot of classes.”

“Glen Avery and I are very impressed with the diversity of students in the class,” said McKell. “They come from a variety of backgrounds, including psychology, computer science, business, biology, math, accounting, communications, and international development.”

Concerning students of the class and discussion during his presentation, Yacci said, “Bringing all those people together really fostered an interesting discussion surrounding some of the topics. One of the things I find is working with someone from a different field field often makes you have to force yourself to really think outside the box a little bit.”

McKell said, “At the end of the course it is our hope that these students will have a better understanding of the basics behind data science, and see how it fits in with their future careers.”

“I think the area of using data science for social good is a lot more interesting and intriguing to me,” said Baleno. Yacci said, “I think Houghton has a real interesting opportunity here to do a lot of good in the social good arena. I think there is still a lot that could be done as far as social good problems. I think the liberal arts perspective really would bring a lot from their end.”