Author: Abigail Reeth

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Opinions

Ice Cream of Our Own

It’s no secret that we, as Houghton College students, love our ice cream. In fact, we have good reason to be proud of our ice cream eating reputation. According to our dining services, Houghton College consumes roughly 3,000 gallons of ice cream per year. Moreover, Houghton students have concocted novel ways to enjoy ice cream in a broader range of contexts than just a traditional cone or dish. In the dining hall, I have marveled at the ingenuity of students as they enjoy hand-churned milkshakes, banana splits, orange soda floats, and ice cream melting over waffles fresh from the iron.

With our dedication to cultivating the art of ice cream consumption, a question naturally arises: why not create a unique Houghton ice cream flavor? After all, the dining hall serves flavors dedicated to other schools, such as ’Cuse 44 after Syracuse University and Tiger Tracks for R.I.T. If any college deserves an ice cream flavor in its honor, Houghton College does.

Obviously, the question now becomes what ice cream flavor would best represent Houghton? We could have blackberry lemon to show off our school colors. Or we might want to support athletics with some Luckey Lion Licorice. Perhaps we should embrace the wintry weather that blankets campus for most of the academic calendar with a Highlander Hot Chocolate flavored ice cream. What about SPOT ice cream (Salted Peanut Oreo Taffy)? We could pay tribute to our Scottish heritage with Banana Brownie Bagpipe Brigade. Instead, we could remember our theological roots with John Wesley’s Purified Vanilla or observe the Statement of Community Responsibilities with a grape-flavored Can’t-Believe-It’s-Not-Wine! If we are feeling especially audacious, we might even try to image a flavor called Shen Bloc Shock (or maybe we had better not. . . .)

Needless to say, there are endless possibilities for a Houghton College ice cream flavor. But who gets to decide which flavor best represents Houghton? Like any good diplomatic decision, we clearly would need to form a committee to narrow down the options to the best contenders. Of course, we would then need to hold a vote in order to give all students, faculty, staff, and alumni an equal opportunity to influence such a historic decision.

However, maybe a single ice cream flavor cannot possibly encapsulate all of the spirit and creativity of Houghton College. Maybe the best way to approach a Houghton ice cream flavor is to have a Flavor of the Year. A new flavor could be unveiled each year at homecoming. Alternatively, we could make the ice cream choosing process a senior privilege. Only students planning to graduate during that particular academic year would get to submit a flavor idea and vote for the annual winner. The flavor could be revealed at graduation and could be served during the following school year as a sort of class gift or continuing legacy of the recent graduates until the next graduation flavor is disclosed. (Or perhaps this is a foolish system as it might tempt graduates to play mischievous tricks on underclassmen by leaving them with flavors such as a medicinal Houghton Plague Antidote or Letchworth Liver and Leek.)

Regardless of the logistics for deciding on a flavor, Houghton College undoubtedly needs its own ice cream. Perhaps this pressing issue can make an appearance on the agenda for the next meeting of the Sixth Executive Council. With all the ice cream connoisseurs nurtured by this school, it is simply inconceivable that we do not have an ice cream flavor of our own.

Abigail is a senior majoring in writing and art.

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Campus Stories In Focus

Reflections from Retirees

This spring, Houghton College will bid farewell to a number of retiring professors. These retirees include Carlton Fisher of the philosophy department, art professor Gary Baxter, Ronald Oakerson from the political science faculty, Linda Mills Woolsey of the English department, Judy Congden of organ and harpsichord and writing and literature professor James Zoller. After teaching generations of students, these professors shared some reflections on their experiences at Houghton College.

Linda Mills Woolsey began teaching at Houghton in 1999 and was already familiar with the institution, since both she and her husband, Dr. Stephen Woolsey, are Houghton alumni. Houghton’s commitment to learning influenced Mills Woolsey’s career as she explained, “Teaching undergraduates challenges you to keep alive intellectually, to keep growing and changing yourself, so what you offer your students is not stale, yesterday’s thinking. And it’s a good challenge because you wouldn’t want to just get stale.”

a photo of Professor Zoller
This spring, Houghton will bid farewell to a number of retiring professors, including James Zoller, professor of writing and literature.

Not planning to grow stale in retirement, Mills Woolsey anticipates “the freedom to pursue some new projects and maybe learn some new things. I hope to pursue some hobbies like drawing and painting and maybe doing some volunteer work.” With all these new possibilities, she remarked with a smile, “I will not miss grading papers.”

However, Mills Woolsey expects that in her transition from Houghton she will miss “the interaction with the students without a doubt.” Mills Woolsey hopes “to be remembered as a challenging teacher but one who cares about students and tries to be fair to people, meeting them where they are.”

Likewise, Gary Baxter plans to be active in retirement. He looks forward to the opportunity “to visit family and explore this planet.” Beginning his Houghton career in 1979, Baxter has watched the evolution of his field of expertise in ceramics. He observed, “Critiques, which I believe are the essence of teaching art, used to be very difficult, yet now they are even harder with so much more information, unlimited processes and their new media, cutting edge art that has dulled in some cases, and the technology revolution.”

Despite these challenges, Baxter has continued to instruct countless students as well as to hone his own skills by annually creating a new work for the faculty art show. Over his years at Houghton, Baxter has especially enjoyed “watching students discovering and using their gifts.” He hopes to be remembered as “someone who gave himself to the students by making a serious art space where serious students could make serious work.”

Since arriving at Houghton in 1984, James Zoller has appreciated “that I can read what and as I want and then that I can shape that reading into courses that require me and students to figure out how to handle it, to determine what matters and how.” Also, Zoller values his interactions with students and faculty at Houghton. As he stated, “I have many friends here.”

In retirement, Zoller expressed that he is “looking forward to the absence of a rigid teaching schedule” which he hopes will enable him to travel and “to write new things and to pull together some of my unpublished stories, poems, articles, et cetera, into book form.” While he enjoys more freedom in his schedule, Zoller would like to be remembered “as a teacher who kept learning and who kept his attention on how his subjects and activities might improve us all as human beings.” He explained, “I think God is honored as much by how we handle our responsibilities and how we treat the people we have contact with as by how much we talk about Him.”

A life-long Wesleyan whose maternal grandparents met at Houghton College, Carlton Fisher joined Houghton in 1985. Contemplating his career, Fisher noted that “as I have become more and more comfortable in the classroom, teaching becomes more and more enjoyable.” His pleasure in teaching at Houghton has come in many forms, including “listening to myself talk,” “those relationships with a few students that happen and are very fulfilling,” and “lunches with Eckley and Oakerson.”

On the other hand, Fisher expects to find joy in retirement. He is especially eager for a closer “proximity to my grandsons. And just the excitement of newness. We plan to relocate, so there’s a bit of adventure about it which comes with a sort of uncertainty, too, about how much I will enjoy it. It’s kind of like a senior getting ready to graduate.”

As he “graduates” from teaching at Houghton, Fisher explains that for “students who have had me as a professor over the years, what I hope is that I will have said at least one thing that proved to be helpful.” Regardless of how he is remembered, however, Fisher can ultimately conclude that his Houghton career was “fun. It’s a great way to be able to spend your life doing something that you really enjoy doing.”

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Campus News

Hidden Faculty Talents On Display and Staff

Tomorrow night, March 24, at 8:00 p.m., Global Christian Fellowship (GCF) will host the annual Faculty and Staff Talent Show in the Center for the Arts Recital Hall. Tickets for the event cost $5 per person ($7 at the door), and baked goods homemade by community members will also be available for purchase.

The funds raised by the show will support Houghton students who are embarking on mission trips this summer. The event will showcase the impressive—and perhaps surprising—abilities of various faculty and staff from the college, including Dean Jordan, Meic Pearse, Ransom Poythress, Amanda Cox, Casey Conklin, Connie Finney, Jon Arensen, and Brandon Bate.

Professor Poythress holding a mic on stage
Biology professor Ransom Poythress will perform one of the acts in this year’s talent show.

This year, biology professor Ransom Poythress will be performing an act with the intriguing title “Using Punctuation for Communicative Clarity.” He described the talent show as “a little like a mini SPOT, just with faculty and staff participants.” As the event approaches, Poythress hopes that “attendees will be able to enjoy themselves, learn a little more about the quirkier side of some of us, and that enough money will be raised to substantially fund some Houghton students’ mission trips.”

The 2018 Faculty and Staff Talent Show will also feature history professor Meic Pearse. For this show, Pearse will be exchanging his signature parody tales for different stories, which he describes as being “at least equally silly, made famous 60 years ago by the eccentric Gerard Hoffnung.” Pearse, who considers himself “born just naturally silly,” explained that his primary hope for the event is “that I get out alive. Followed by the vague notion that it will raise lots of money towards sending some of our students as far away as possible.”

The Faculty and Staff Talent Show is brought to campus by Houghton’s GCF organization. As described by the college website, GCF is an organization designed “to meet students where they are and be a place where they can be informed about global missions and worship with others.” As Ashley Carroll ’18, one of the talent show’s organizers, explained, “GCF is important because it gives students on campus the chance to hear what’s going on around the world.” She described this opportunity to hear about missions as a blessing made possible by the “retired missionaries and…many alumni who are out and about, serving the Lord, who come back and share their experiences.” GCF provides students and community members with the chance to listen to these missionaries every Wednesday from 8-9 p.m. in the Alumni Dining Room.

In addition to GCF’s weekly meetings, the group has traditionally hosted the Faculty and Staff Talent Show. The event’s performers volunteer to showcase their remarkable abilities, and past hits have included songs from Hamilton sung by Ransom and Lisbeth Poythress, Meic Pearse’s tales about Vaigly Methodistic College in Dagnabbit’s Snowhole, and the storytelling of Beth Phifer and Benjamin Lipscomb.

With a strong lineup of faculty and staff prepared to exhibit their humorous and hidden abilities, the GCF Faculty and Staff Talent Show promises to be a thoroughly entertaining evening in support of important causes. As Ashley Carroll observed, “This event is fun because it’s getting to see our professors in a new setting and seeing what special talents and unique gifts they have. It helps you gain a new perspective of a professor on campus and feel more connected with them.” All students and community members ready to view faculty and staff in this new light are encouraged to come out tomorrow and enjoy the show because, in Carroll’s words, “It’s super fun!”

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Campus Sports Stories In Focus

Four Athletes Take the Lead

On January 26 and 27, representatives of Houghton’s athletic department attended the annual Empire 8 Summit at the Woodcliff Hotel and Spa in Fairport, NY. Each year, Houghton sends two male and two female members from the Student Athletic Advisory Committee (SAAC) to the Empire 8 Summit. This year, Houghton’s four student-athlete representatives were Bjorn Webb ‘18, Tanya Hatton ‘19, Taylor Sile ‘19, and Darcy Mitchell ‘19. Deanna Hand also attended the event as the college’s SAAC advisor and assistant to the Empire 8 Associate Commissioner.

At the Empire 8 Summit, Houghton’s representatives joined student-athletes from other schools within the Empire 8 conference (which consists of Alfred University, Sage, Elmira, Hartwick, Nazareth, St. John Fisher, Stevens Institute of Technology, and Utica) to discuss multiple issues faced by athletic teams. This year’s discussions focused on diversity and inclusion as well as Title IX and sexual assault. The importance of core values and leadership were also addressed by the Summit’s speakers.

A photo of the athletes.
On January 26th-27th, Darcy Mitchell ‘19, Taylor Sile ‘19, Tanya Hatton ‘18, and Bjorn Webb ‘18 served as representatives for Houghton College at the annual Empire 8 Summit at the Woodcliff Hotel and Spa in Fairport, NY.

The Summit encouraged these student-athlete participants from Empire 8 schools to interact and connect with one another various learning opportunities and teamwork activities. Deanna Hand viewed this collaboration as an important part of the event. She explained, “It is great to see the relationships that are built because of these opportunities. To see an opponent other than on the court or field gives [student-athletes] an opportunity to see each other as more than just student-athletes. They get to know more about each other and hold each other at a different level of respect.”

The Summit’s goal is for the ideas discussed to be dispersed with the students as they return to their respective campuses. As Houghton’s SAAC president, Bjorn Webb expressed a hope “to see a further commitment to unified teams and unified athletic departments” as a result of the Empire 8 Summit. He also thinks that the topics of diversity, inclusion, Title IX, and sexual assault are relevant beyond the realm of Houghton athletics. Webb stated, “The larger student body can help address these issues by identifying them in their own circles.  Our athletes seek to address these issues within our teams and department and hope that all other students are addressing these issues within their academic departments, clubs, [and] organizations.”

Like Webb, Tanya Hatton hopes to “bring back what we learned and talked about and find ways to implement those things on our campus,” both within and beyond the athletic department. She suggested that continuing education on topics such as sexual harassment is one significant way in which her experience at the Summit can be translated to the Houghton campus. Hatton also offered practical advice following the Summit messages on ways in which athletes and the entire college community can create a more welcoming campus environment. She explained that the Summit speakers “talked about how inclusion is an action, and I think our campus could be transformed if athletes and everyone on campus took time to actually talk to and listen to people that they wouldn’t normally talk to. There’s a difference between inviting someone to an event and actually engaging with them during that event and then following up and showing that you care and want to hear their story.”

In the future, this transformation of campus life through increased inclusivity and sensitivity will hopefully be stimulated by the Empire 8 Summit and the Houghton student-athletes who attended the conference. As Deanna Hand expressed, “I see the Summit as a leadership opportunity for SAAC reps. They are able to bring back what they have learned to campus, the department and their teams.”

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News

Critiquing Cultural Femininity

During the upcoming fall 2018 semester, Houghton College plans to offer a new art course, which promises to stimulate lively conversations and encourage students to look critically at their own values as well as those of modern culture. The course will be guided by Professor Ted Murphy and will be titled “Advanced Topics in Film: Women and Film.” This four-credit course will fulfill an IS Fine Arts requirement and may especially appeal to students who are not interested in taking a traditional art course or who are intrigued by this unique academic focus.

According to the course description, this new class “will explore critically import films (domestic and foreign) that focus on how cultural ideas and attitudes have shaped how we think about women, gender, and identity.” Potential films viewed by the class may include Thelma and Louise, Mouchette, Lost in Translation, Late Spring, and the Afghan Film Osama, as well as additional formative films. As outlined in the course description, these films will be used to address topics “such as body image, feminism, politics, theology, rebellion, relationships (marriage, family, friendship, and rivalry), violence, agency, and current issues including #MeToo and #Time’sUp,” as well as various artistic considerations.

The course will follow a discussion-based format, with small groups of about three students each. Each small group will create questions to direct the conversation. As the instructor, Professor Murphy views himself as a discussion moderator rather than as a lecturer. He understands that to some, it would appear problematic for a male teacher to tell students how to view women and film. Instead, he wants students’ opinions and ideas to be expressed and developed throughout the semester. In fact, Murphy suggested that students would be invited to bring other faculty to visit the class and share their insight on relevant issues. As Professor Murphy explained, “I’m not trying to change anyone’s mind…I would prefer a class to have competing voices.”

Photo of Female Directors.
During the fall 2018 semester, Houghton College plans to o er a new art course guided by Professor Ted Murphy. The course willl be titled “Advanced Topics in Film: Women and Film.”

Murphy’s own interest in this topic was sparked by his daughters, whom he describes as brilliant, outspoken feminists. In Murphy’s opinion, “feminism isn’t anti-male… but says that there is a distortion to how we value things of this world.” However, he acknowledges that many Houghton students may shy away from the label of feminist since “Houghton students are polite” and “have been raised to not be combative.” Nevertheless, Murphy thinks many students would agree with various feminist tenants which will be discussed during his course. He sees feminism as an important societal critique, reminding both men and women that the “quality of relationships in one’s life should be what we live our life for.”

Murphy believes that this course is important for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is the fact that the majority of the Houghton student population is female. In his course “The Art History of Film,” he has also noted that there is a low ceiling for women in the film industry, emphasizing that the author of the film is the “director.” According to Murphy, this issue is worth exploring in greater depth.

Moreover, Murphy considers it important to address the way in which “women have been objectified by the media.” As an art professor who has critiqued countless student self-portraits, Murphy has noticed the media’s influence on students’ perception of self and body image. He has observed that students “don’t know how to look at themselves and just appreciate what they see.” Films are just one avenue through which students’ views of themselves and of women are influenced. All forms of media exert their own influence through culturally created perceptions. As Murphy stated, “No film is ever about nothing.”

In the end, Murphy hopes that this new fall 2018 course focusing on women and film will spark students’ interest and inspire earnest discussions among them. He explained, “My overall goal is to have a class in which students become critical thinkers of their own culture and examine the many important contributions women make in the art of film.” His course “Advanced Topics in Film: Women and Film” offers the perfect opportunity to do just that.

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Campus News

Faculty Lectures: A Lifetime of Learning

This semester’s upcoming faculty lectures boast an impressive array of professors and topics. The series began yesterday, January 18th, with recreation professor Laura Alexeichik and will next be moving to the chemistry department with Paul Martino on February 1st.

The final four presentations are valedictory lectures to be given by retiring faculty, including art professor Gary Baxter on February 15th, Judy Congdon of the music department on March 8th, philosopher Carlton Fisher on April 12th, and finishing with the political science of Ronald Oakerson on April 26th.

On February 15th, Professor Gary Baxter intends to speak about “the challenge of balancing teaching with making art” as well as his unexpected journey of becoming a teacher. He views this combined role as artist and instructor as being “an integral part of who I am as a person.” While this topic is important to Baxter and relevant to many budding artists, Professor Baxter also believes in the ability of art to help all individuals “gain confidence in the area of problem solving and recognition of quality” and to provide “important skills that can affect one’s quality of life and pertain to many other aspects of life.”

Dr. Judy Congdon will follow with her lecture on March 8th by reflecting on what her twenty-seven years as an organist on the Houghton faculty has taught her about Christian worship, and how through her experiences she has “been formed to be a better worshiper and learned more fully how to draw near to God.”

Since “we are all called to be worshipers of God, regardless of our college majors or disciplinary competencies,” Dr. Congdon hopes that the “details of my journey and principles I have learned about worship, to be shared in this lecture, will be informative or helpful” to all who listen.

In his lecture on April 12th, Dr. Carlton Fisher intends to focus on a challenging topic which he first began to consider before his own college education. Professor Fisher will explore “certain questions about God’s knowledge, what God does not, or might not, know.” According to Professor Fisher, “Anyone who is interested in theology should be interested” in this lecture topic, adding in his characteristic tongue-in-cheek style, “And all Houghton students are interested in theology- aren’t they?”

This semester’s upcoming Faculty Lecture Series offer insight on a variety of topics from Houghton professors with years of experience in their disciplines. The faculty presentations are, in the words of Professor Fisher, “enrichment opportunities” amidst the hectic pace of college life.  

However, these lectures are not only valuable for students, but as Dr. Congdon noted, this series “provides an important outreach to the wider community—enabling those no longer in school (along with those still in school) to be stimulated and challenged by new ideas or new ways of looking at things.”

Gary Baxter summed up the immense importance of the Faculty Lecture Series by explaining, “I think it is a great way for everyone to access a lifetime’s worth of information in 45 minutes.”

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Campus News Sports

Houghton Hosts National Championships

On Saturday, Nov. 11, hundreds of runners from over fifty colleges will converge on the Field of Dreams to participate in the 2017 NCAA Division III Cross Country Atlantic Regional Championships.

Since only eight of these meets are held across the nation, the regional championships are the only way for teams and individual athletes to qualify for the NCAA Division III national championships. After submitting a bid advocating for its course, Houghton College was selected for the privilege of hosting this important cross country meet in the Field of Dreams.

Houghton College will not only host the Atlantic Regional Championships, but will also contribute fourteen of its own top runners to participate in the competition. The seven athletes from the men’s team will include Tyler Deuschle ‘20, Matt Gostomski ‘19, Dan Burdo ‘20, Joel Wheeler ‘21, Dillon Bell ‘21, Dominik Sullivan ‘21, and John Vernick ‘20.  Meanwhile Shelby Langlois ‘20, Rachel Hummel ‘18, Emily Blosdale ‘20, Anja Oberg ‘21, Shannon Pigott ‘19, Gwen Stokes ‘20, and Abbey Naylor ‘20 will represent the women’s team.

Participating in the regional championships is undoubtedly a daunting honor, but cross country head coach Patrick Hager believes this meet will be “business as usual” for his athletes. Not only are the Houghton runners familiar with racing on their home course, but the 2017 Highlander cross country teams have already shown that they can succeed under the pressure of stiff competition. This season, three Houghton runners earned all-conference recognition at the Empire Eights, with Tyler Deuschle placing ninth overall, Shelby Langlois finishing fifth, and Emily Blosdale coming in fifteenth. According to Coach Hager, the women’s team collectively “exceeded expectations to finish fourth” in the conference, and the men’s team ended with its fastest record in recent years. The cross country head coach also noted that for both teams “the intensity is at an all-time high. Not only are they a strong community, but they like to kick each other’s butt in practices.”

This team-wide intensity will hopefully serve the Houghton runners well as they look to fulfill some impressive goals in the regional championships. For Coach Hager, seeing his men’s and women’s teams finish in the “top twenty-five is the goal.” Cross country athlete Shelby Langlois echoed this aspiration but also added, “The goal for this meet is to represent the character of Houghton athletics through our actions on and off the course. We are obviously hoping for a lot of personal bests for both the men and women’s teams, but are really looking to have a strong team finish.”

For a sport such as cross country, which can seem highly individualistic, the Houghton teams are remarkably close-knit. Sophomore runner Blosdale described the team as being “like one big family” that is “super supportive of each other through both good and bad performances” and is “also really intentional about supporting each other in other areas of life as well.”

Langlois agreed, explaining, “My teammates and Coach are probably my biggest source of support.” She also emphasized the team’s intention to glorify God. She admired how her fellow runners “carry themselves humbly, value God in their lives, and raise each other up rather than calling each other out” and praised the way in which Coach Hager “takes it upon himself to create a Godly environment and teach us valuable life lessons.”

Bolstered by the support of their teammates and coach, along with their impressive intensity and proven success, the fourteen Highlanders who will compete in the Atlantic Regional Championships on Saturday have earned the pride and encouragement of the wider Houghton campus and community as they seek to represent their college and their God through running. Regardless of the results of this important meet, the Houghton cross country teams can feel accomplished in their achievements over the 2017 season and the community they have formed through their sport.

The athletes recognize the gift of participating in Houghton cross country. Langlois explained, “I have come to love those around me and the way we run for ourselves as individuals, for the team, for our coach, and most of all for the glory of God.” Affirming this view, Blosdale stated that “it has been such a blessing for me to be on this team.”

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Opinions Two Views

Two Views // On New Vision Week – Abigail Reeth

Sometimes when I’m grabbing a bite to eat in the dining hall, I can’t help but overhear pieces of the conversations around me. Nibbling my breakfast the Wednesday of New Vision Week, I absentmindedly tuned into the conversation of two students seated at a nearby booth. One of the young women mentioned that she was planning to skip chapel that morning. Having earlier listened to the visiting speaker, Mick Veach from Mosaic Midtown Church in Detroit, she wasn’t interested in hearing more from him. To her, his message seemed more like a rehash of personal achievements than encouragement to follow the Lord’s call to missions. The two friends at breakfast regretted that Mick Veach and New Vision Week seemed to glorify people in remarkable missions rather than remembering God’s work in the mission fields of everyday life.

My initial reaction to these opinions mingled disappointment with self-righteousness. If these students disagreed with Mick Veach or with his speaking style, I thought, they should listen more to understand his perspective. I would not skip chapel because the speaker rubbed me the wrong way. Besides, who were these students to decide whether Veach’s message was prideful self-glorification or an honest recounting of God’s work through him?

However, maybe my disappointment over their concerns was the result of recognizing my own doubts reflected in their words. Truthfully, Mick Veach’s stories unsettled me. He told of his passion in his early Christian years for sharing the Gospel, of leading a classmate to Christ, and of this resulting in his peer’s testimony being printed on the front page of a newspaper. Veach told of serving in a Muslim country, of the impressive growth of Christianity during his time there, and of establishing a multiracial church in the “hood” of Detroit. These stories of Veach’s faithfulness, passion, and willingness left me struggling not to view him as arrogant in his success.

I have always struggled to define the thin line between boasting in personal success and honestly sharing about God’s work in me. In high school, I became so concerned about boasting that I would not even tell my parents about my earning an “A” on a test or scoring a goal in a soccer game. Thus, Mick Veach’s stories of his success in missions struck me in a tender spot. Veach’s approach of openly relating his accomplishments clashed with my instinct to remain silent about success to avoid boasting. But can I say that Veach’s method of sharing his missionary achievements was wrong?

Scripture offers a helpful perspective on boasting. 2 Corinthians 10:13-18 says: “We, however, will not boast beyond proper limits, but will confine our boasting to the sphere of service God himself has assigned to us, a sphere that also includes you…But, ‘Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.’ For it is not the one who commends himself who is approved, but the one whom the Lord commends.” Believers should boast in the Lord, in the service to which God has assigned us. This seems to be what Mick Veach did during New Vision Week. He told about his work within “the sphere of service” to which God assigned him. Perhaps Veach boasted, but he boasted in the Lord and in God’s accomplishments through him. According to Scripture, Veach’s boasting in the Lord is better than my silence which fails to acknowledge God’s work in the world.

The difference between boasting in ourselves and boasting in the Lord is a matter of the heart. I cannot judge the humility of Mick Veach’s heart or say whether, in his heart, Veach commended himself or acknowledged Christ’s commendation. However, I can examine the humility of my heart. When I share about my service, I know if I’m boasting in myself or in the Lord. I cannot always ensure that others will correctly judge my boasting or my heart’s attitude, but I can leave that up to God. I can only know the source of my own boasting, and I can only give Mick Veach the benefit of the doubt and the grace to assume that when he boasts, he boasts in the Lord from a humble heart.

Abigail is a sophomore majoring in writing and art.

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Campus News

Metz Walks the Walk

After surviving one-third of a semester as the new dining service on campus, Metz Culinary Management is working hard to satisfy the various dietary requirements of students and to promote sustainability and environmental stewardship.

Metz Culinary Management sets high corporate standards. Advertising that they “bring you the best on-campus food program with a variety of tastes that is sure to please,” Metz is concerned not only with appealing to the wide-ranging nutrition preferences and needs of students and faculty, but also with prioritizing sustainability and minimizing the company’s imprint on the environment. Metz also voices a commitment to providing vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free options daily. For students with dietary restrictions like these, it is vitally important for Metz to dependably live up to this pledge.

From the perspective of one first-year student who consumes a vegetarian diet and preferred to remain anonymous, Metz has so far done a satisfactory job of providing vegetarian options. She noted that, despite her dietary restrictions, “There is always something I can eat.” However, this student also pointed out that “sometimes there is not a variety” among the vegetarian options. In spite of this, she has been satisfied overall with the diversity and quality that Metz offers with regard to her vegetarian requirements.

Likewise, in the opinion of Alexis Lamb ‘18, Metz is doing well at providing nutrients for her limited diet. Lamb is restricted to consuming wheat-free foods, and she appreciates the simplicity of the gluten-free section provided by Metz. This station in the dining hall, which generally serves a meat, a grain, and a vegetable option, offers a reliable source of nutrients for Lamb and other students limited to gluten-free foods. As a senior, Lamb cannot help but compare Metz with their predecessor, Sodexo. She decided that Metz is “definitely a step up from Sodexo. More fresh, I think.”

However, Lamb did have a recommendation for Metz: “One thing I really liked about Sodexo was that they had the labels that said what was in the food,” the upperclassman recalled, “so right now [with Metz] there are items that I’m not sure if there’s wheat in them, so [labels] would be helpful.” Despite this point of criticism, Lamb described herself as “definitely satisfied” with the gluten-free food options provided by Metz.

Aside from their commitment to serving quality food for students with various dietary restrictions, Metz Culinary Management is also dedicated to sustainability. On their corporate website, Metz states, “We pledge to be environmental stewards by working closely with clients, sustainability partners and vendors on dining concepts, products and programs that meet your needs while protecting resources for future generations.”

According to the Houghton College’s sustainability coordinator, Brian Webb, “Metz actually walks the talk.” In Webb’s opinon, the college as a whole benefits from this transparency and dedication. Webb explained, “Metz has already begun investing in significant water and energy conservation measures in the kitchen that are projected to save the college thousands of dollars by reducing water usage, cutting electricity, and conserving heat in the building.” Moreover, Webb praised Metz for putting “their money where their mouth is” by “investing $15,000 every year in Houghton’s campus sustainability initiatives.” Regarding Metz’s commitment to sustainability, Webb concluded, “I’m very proud to have them on campus.”