Author: Katie Adametz

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News

Update on Student Government Activities

Recently, Houghton’s student Senate has been focusing on issues smaller and less apparent than in semesters past, but the work they have been doing and the conversations in their Tuesday night meetings are still relevant, and, arguably, increasingly more so, to the entire campus.

1452019_10152015908004173_341939960_nPresident Benjamin Hardy said one of “the most important things the SGA has done this semester [is] helping to distribute information about the recent budget cuts via word-of-mouth communication by senators and cabinet members to their peers.” This is one of the essential functions of the Senate: to distribute information on a personal basis, and increasing the amount of actual face time between students serving as senators and their peers was one of the goals of the restructuring of the Senate, which happened last semester.

Since, nothing quite so large or cumbersome has taken place, but Senate had been engaging in conversations about SPOT, the potential dropping of the Islamic Studies program, and, as stated above, the budget cuts that the college has been both contemplating and enforcing. These issues have come up during the open floor portion of Senate meetings, which is a time when any student may bring a concern or question to the SGA.

Though the student Senate cannot make the direct decision to, for example, keep Islamic Studies as a program, the members can engage in conversations with concerned students and then take those concerns into committee meetings.

President Hardy stressed the roles of students on committees. He said “[Senate has been] electing students to college councils and committees which service the present needs of students and help speak into the changes that are happening in meaningful ways. I think that a lot of students, even, sometimes, the students on committee, don’t realize how important this function is. Organizations are run part by committees and part by administrators and many of those administrators are closely advised or informed by committees.” Essentially, any student from the general population at Houghton can be a part of a committee, and they range from dealing with Houghton’s care for the environment to working with administrators in Student Life on concerns voiced by students.

Miriam Harms, a senior senator, feels that her involvement with Senate has made her better informed about the conversations and changes happening on campus. She participates on the Creation Care and Academic Council committees, and also thinks that Senate’s talks with President Mullen are educational and helpful. The President visits Senate once a month, and Harms said “You can really ask her anything you want. She explains what the college is doing, and we can even give her questions beforehand from students and senators so that she can prepare information for us.”

In the coming semester, SGA will be working with the Student Programs Office to streamline the event proposal process and forms for students. President Hardy explained the intended benefits of SGA’s work in this area. He said, “This will enable [students] to have a ‘one-stop-shop’ experience when coordinating their event, as the [potential new form] will be designed to forward relevant information to, for example, the person who coordinates the Houghton fleet, persons who manage room reservations in the intended building, or the custodians to be aware of chair or table needs.”

Other plans of the SGA include creating some sort of central, physical calendar, which should cut back on the amount of emails, posters, and slips in CPO boxes as advertising for events.

In addition to helping better organize, advertise, and support events, SGA has been working to negotiate a deal with Sodexo for a discounted price on coffee for student-run events. Java 101 and SGA had an agreement which allowed for student organizations to have coffee at events for a good price, and Sodexo has been convinced to work with students in this way.

Vice President Andiana Sidell said, “The accomplishments of Senate have been more laidback in terms of importance, but are working towards a more unified and complete support of what programs we do run … See You at the Pole and Operation Christmas Child were a hit this semester and Blood Drives continue to be something that students and Senate alike puts time into.”

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News

Houghton College Equestrian Show Hosts Spring Shows

Courtesy of facebook.com
Courtesy of facebook.com

On April 20, the Houghton College Equestrian Center hosted its annual Western New York Dressage Association’s Challenge Series Show. This Saturday, April 27, the Equestrian Center will host its annual Spring Hunter-Jumper Show.

These two shows allow students to interact with outside riders, trainers, and judges every year. The Dressage Challenge Show is one in a series of shows, put on at different farms, that is sponsored by the Western New York Dressage Association (WYNDA), of which Professor Jo-Anne Young, Houghton’s Equestrian Program Director, is the Vice President.

Carrie Keagan, senior psychology major and equestrian minor, will be competing for her last time as a student at Houghton. She said, “The shows is a great chance for Houghton students to get a chance to compete against people outside of Houghton and see how they really match up against other riders. Most of us enjoy competing, and, as a group, we generally place very well in the classes.”

Last Saturday, students in Dressage, Competition Dressage, and those who practice and train outside of a class setting, competed on Houghton’s school horses. Students who board their own horses at Houghton have also competed in the past, but none chose to this year.

Historically, the highlight of the show is the Twelve-Horse Quadrille, which is a pattern ridden to music by twelve horse and rider pairs. Every spring semester, a different group of Houghton students learn the pattern and perform at the WYNDA Dressage show and at the Equestrian Program Senior Exhibition that will take place on May 10.

The first three levels of Dressage, Introductory, Training, and First Level were performed by many different riders at the show. The Junior High Scorer was Joanna Sudlow, riding one of Houghton’s schoolmasters, Entertainer. Kate Shannon, also riding Entertainer, placed first in the Senior Training Level One class, where she competed solely against riders not from Houghton College.

Dressage is one of the elements of the Equestrian sport that is performed at the Olympic level. Houghton teaches all its Equestrian majors the basic movements and theory behind the discipline, and, if they wish, students have the opportunity to learn movements that are performed at the Olympic level from Professor Young, if they choose to put in the time and perseverance.

Students from Horsemanship I to Mini-Prix Jumping Equitation (the highest level jumping academic course available to Houghton’s students) will be competing this Saturday. Classes will be offered in the under-saddle and over-fences categories. Under-saddle simply means that the horse and rider will compete with everyone else registered in their class at the same time and only have to go through the different gaits; there are no fences involved.

The spring Hunter-Jumper show also offers classes in both Hunter and Equitation categories. If the class is designated Hunter, then the horse and rider pair are judged only on what the horse does in the ring: the quality of its gaits and movement, its athleticism and conformation (or build), and several other technical factors. In an equitation class, the horse and rider pair are judged based upon the rider’s position and skills when riding, regardless of the horse, whether it behaves perfectly or takes off bucking.

The show ends with three jumper classes, which are not judged by the horse or the rider, but rather the speed that the pair can complete a course. The obstacles are higher and more complicated or distracting in jumper classes, and the goal is to leave all the fences untouched in the shortest amount of time.

Andrea Ypma, a senior, said, “The hunter-jumper show provides students a chance to show what they have learned over a variety of courses designed to test their skill.” Ypma has a vast knowledge of course design concepts and spent her internship at Thunderbird Equestrian Show Park in Canada, a facility that hosts high-level hunter-jumper competitions. She has helped to design challenging and interesting courses in the past.

Houghton’s Equestrian Center also hosts an annual USEF/USDF Recognized Dressage Show, a horse trial in the fall, which incorporates, dressage, showjumping and cross country, and a Christmas Hunter-Jumper Fun Show. All events are free to spectators, and the Equestrian students would love to see the rest of the college spend some time at the horse barn.

The program offers many excellent opportunities, the shows being just a few. Young said, “The Equestrian Program gives students a solid foundation in Equestrian Studies, based on the principles of classical dressage, and incorporating riding, teaching riding, training horses, and care of the horse. If you love  horses, and are willing to take the time and effort to learn to understand their culture and how to ‘speak their language,’  the amazing lesson horses at the Equestrian Center have some fantastic things to teach you.”

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Arts

“Annie” Performance a Hit

Last weekend, The Houghton Musical Theatre Players, also known as HMTP, performed “Annie”, a Broadway musical that tells the story of an optimistic orphan girl and her journey of finding a family and a home.

Set in New York City during the Great Depression, the musical also includes the economic and social tensions of the time through a musical number performed by homeless people and a particularly interesting scene which involves Annie, President Franklin Roosevelt, his advisors, and Mr. Warbucks.

Annie, played by Liana Wool, functions in this scene as the ultimate force of good feelings and bright expectations. The President, played by Mike Heyd, and his advisors join her in a reprise of “Tomorrow” after which they come up with the idea for The New Deal: the plan that changed the fortunes of America during the Great Depression.

While these scenes dealt with the very real and devastating poverty of the time, HMTP found moments appropriate for comic relief, blending both heavy and light concepts into an enjoyable presentation.

Crowd favorites were Miss Hannigan, played by Janelle Conklin, and Rooster, played by Aaron Young. Despite having only five weeks to memorize lines and put together the majority of the performance, the actors seemed beautifully rehearsed and very comfortable performing together. The orphans, as an ensemble, displayed a particular comfort and chemistry with each other. Director Wynn Horton said, “The orphans were the easiest to teach; they just had to be loud and have lots of energy.”

Josh Mertzlufft, who played Oliver “Daddy” Warbucks, commented on the diversity of the cast and crew and that diversity’s implications for the performance. He said, “There were people from everywhere [on campus] involved. There was no stereotype. We were really a cross-section of the campus, and the group was definitely not dominated by music majors.”

Horton and the cast felt that they could fulfill a greater calling while enjoying their talents in music, acting and dancing; 25 percent of the profits from the ticket sales went toward the Hillside Family of Agencies. Hillside, based out of Rochester, provides a wide variety of services, one of which happens to be adoption.

Because Houghton regularly deals with social justice issues both locally and globally, supporting an agency that provides help with adoptions is in line with the college’s overarching goals.

Mertzlufft said, “There is a campus drive for social action, and a lot of groups on campus are concerned with raising awareness. Not as many are actively pursuing those convictions. Sometimes, Houghton is being more of a mouth than hands and feet. ‘Annie’ was a way to be active.”

Elisabeth Nelson, a sophomore who played one of the orphans, said, “My greatest memories come from creating new relationships and meeting many different people. I would not have gotten to know some of the people I did without ‘Annie’, and that is what I will take away from my experience.”

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News

Climate Survey Takes Campus Temperature for Diversity Audit

With the Campus Climate Survey, issued this week by the Diversity Audit Committee, Houghton College has begun to “take the temperature” of the students, faculty, and staff on campus regarding topics of ethnic, racial, sexual, gender, and disability-based diversity.

Image courtesy of http://www.meridianschools.org/
Image courtesy of http://www.meridianschools.org/

Professor Intí Martínez-Alemán explained from where the need for a Diversity Audit came. In 2009 an incident occurred during a chapel celebrating Black History Month. Two students, one dressed as a gorilla and another in a banana costume, ran through the aisles. Professor Martínez-Alemán cited this event as a key piece of evidence in Houghton’s administration’s realization that diversity, and the way students perceive it, might be an important issue to address on campus.

Later in 2009, a few professors and college administrators attended a conference in Vermont which dealt with diversity topics on college campuses. Documents concerning the then-current state of diversity on Houghton’s campus and goals for where the discussion on diversity and the implementation of policies encouraging diversity should have gone in the coming years. According to Professor Martínez-Alemán, this document and its ideas were not explicitly implemented in any way. The Diversity Audit is ultimate result of earlier attempts to analyze Houghton in light of ethnic, racial, sexual, gender, and disability topics.

Once the results of the survey are compiled, the Committee plans to analyze the results and then create focus groups based on these results. This April, Jane Higa, current Vice President for Student Life and Dean of Students at Westmont College, will be coming to Houghton to look at the Committee’s and focus groups’ findings and to help draft a final document to present to the Board of Trustees and Administration of the college.

Professor Martínez-Alemán said “[we] have this idea of an average Houghton student: white, female, and 18-22 years old. Anyone that does not fit that description [, on our campus,] is diverse.” And so the Diversity Audit’s purpose is to take a look at why Houghton is most attractive to young, white females and to discover how, once students enroll and spend time at Houghton, the college shapes their thinking about themselves and people from different ethnic and racial backgrounds, for example.

Dennis Stack, Houghton’s Dean of Students, emphasized this purpose as primary to the committee. The Diversity Audit, and particularly the Campus Climate Survey is not at all meant to target any one group or make individuals feel guilty for thinking or feeling a certain way about others. Stack described the survey as a “safe, risk free, and comfortable” way for people to share their honest feelings about people different from themselves.

“We really want to know, or it would be really great to know, what lens everybody is looking at life through,” said Stack. And he followed by saying, “it would be of course ideal for everyone to see through the same lens, and for that lens to be the same one Jesus sees through.”

In order to get an accurate idea of the campus climate as related to issues of diversity, the Committee hopes for people to be willing to participate. Stack said, “we want everyone to take [the survey] because we want everybody represented.” The number of responses to the survey has already surpassed Stack’s original expectation, and he is hopeful that the rest of campus will take the initiative and contribute.

Ellen Musulin, a sophomore, is one of the students who chose to participate in the Campus Climate Survey. After completing the survey, she said, “It made me think, and took longer than I expected.” Musulin also related the relevance and merit of the survey; she said “I think the survey will help begin the process of looking at the topic of diversity;  If this is truly an issue, then the college should really continue talking to students, faculty, and staff.”

President Mullen is also involved with the Diversity Audit. In response to a question that came up in the SGA student forum concerning the purpose of the Campus Climate Survey and the Diversity Audit, President Mullen said, “The Audit really should have happened three years ago.” And now that the Diversity Committee has been reformulated, with the President’s input, she is encouraging students to “participate thoughtfully.”

President Mullen also echoed and expanded upon the sentiments of Dennis Stack. She said, “we need to figure out a little more fully what it means to have a theology [in the realm of diversity] that is as rich and deep as the kingdom of God.”

In conclusion to the SGA Senate, President Mullen admitted that the process of a hard look at the college in light of diversity will not necessarily easy. She concluded her short address of the topic by saying “if we are going to go through with this, it is going to require some tough discussions, and I am committed to having those discussions.”