Category: Stories In Focus

Since the start of her freshman year, Jacqi Lewis ’18 has been a natural student-leader on campus. From her job as a Visit Intern at the Admissions Office, which she’s held for three years, to her position as captain of the women’s tennis team, to her role as a member of the Student Athletic Advisory Committee (SAAC), Lewis has grown into her leadership strengths.

Lewis applied for the Visit Intern position during her first year at Houghton. After three years, she still holds the same passion and appreciation for the job. “I make a lot of schedules and call a lot of students. We also contact a lot of professors to coordinate when they can meet with visiting students and if they can go to classes,” she said. “I love the people I work with. Everyone in admissions is so fun and it’s a really laid-back environment.” Lewis has found that working in the admissions office has grown her confidence in sending emails, talking on the phone, and managing conflict.

In addition to this position, Lewis served as captain of the women’s tennis team this past season. She was responsible for coordinating team bonding activities and being a representative voice for the team.

Lewis was nominated by her team to sit on the Student Athletic Advisory Committee (SAAC), a nationally organized group that meets “to provide insight on the student-athlete experience and offer input on the rules, regulations and policies that affect student-athletes’ lives on campus.”

“Every school with an athletic program has a SAAC,” Lewis explained. “It’s basically leaders from each team that are on it, and they do a lot of different things like fundraising and special Olympics, but it’s also the group that discusses current issues on sports teams and how we can make them better.”

In these meetings, the committee discusses a range of issues that student-athletes encounter and works towards a collaborative solution. “SAAC is anything that happens with students and athletics,” Lewis said, adding that the committee later gives “an overview of what’s going on the Committee on Intercollegiate Athletics (CIA).” Lewis was further nominated to join the CIA, which meets once a month to help maintain a healthy relationship between academics and athletics.

Although Lewis is involved in a range of commitments, she feels like she’s struck a healthy balance in her time management strategy. “My freshman year I tried to do everything,” she admitted. “I was in Organic Chemistry, I was in Calculus 2 and I did Science Honors and I played tennis and it kinda burnt me out my freshman year. I think freshman year should really be about building those connections, and then once you have your support group it’s easier to focus on your studies because you have those friends. I’m glad I worked hard in school, but I’m really glad for the relationships I’ve built.”

“Ultimately,” Lewis concluded, “branch out and try to make friends, because when you leave that’s really what you’re going to remember.”

The first encounter many prospective students have with Houghton comes through the Admissions Office, whose employees are essential to the Houghton community. The office helps enlarge Houghton’s campus by bridging the gap between prospective students and the faculty, staff, and current students. “We do our best to give prospective students the best glimpse of Houghton and all that this community can do to equip them to lead and labor as scholar servants in a changing world,” said Rebekah Smith, the Assistant Director of Admissions. Our hope is to add other students who will be difference-makers and will add…to this already beautiful community.”

The Admissions Office hosts three main departments: Operations, Recruitment, and Visit and Events. The operations department is responsible for marketing, communications, data, and admissions materials. The Recruitment Department cares for individual prospective students, acting as a bridge to other places and people on campus. Admission counselors, who operate under this department, play a large role in admissions and recruitment. They are responsible for a certain territory or student type, and are tasked with assisting each student within that area through the admission-to-enrollment process. They care for the needs of a prospective student from the time they inquire about admission until the time they step onto campus as a Houghton student for orientation. The position requires strong communication skills, excellent work ethic, and attention to detail. The Visit and Events Department organizes all incoming visits and the hosted by the Admissions Office, both on and off campus.

A wide variety of people work in the admissions office, and they fill a vast array of roles. According to Smith, the variety and quick pace of the work draw people to working in the Admissions Office. “Every day is different. Each day has a new set of surprises and challenges. The work keeps up on our toes! I think the constant change and movement of the seasons is what attracts people to this line of work,” she said. “This is not always an office job and there is plenty of room for new ideas, new challenges, and new ways to grow.”

Although the Admissions Office plays an essential role in bringing new students to Houghton, the office also greatly enjoys working with community to bring new people in. Smith said, “We don’t want to be remembered by the students coming to Houghton as the reason they came. We want Houghton to be the reason they came! Staff, faculty, and fellow students who will be walking alongside new students as soon as they come to Houghton through graduation are the most significant, and can be huge difference makers.”

When Matt Young ’18 graduated from high school in 2010, instead of immediately going onto higher education, he enlisted in the Army. For the following three years, Young was stationed at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. In those years, he married his wife, Arielle, and welcomed their first son, Liam. The Young family later moved to western New York, where he worked one year for the Buffalo News before enrolling at Houghton in the fall of 2014.

As a non-traditional student, Young found the transition into civilian life after the Army “weird.” He said, “It was weird because the army is not a normal work experience. It was weird getting out of the Army and going into the normal workforce for a year, and then to come here is just completely different.”

Young is a father of two young sons, Liam and Owen, who was born during the year that he worked for the Buffalo News. Owen suffered from several birth defects, an experience that Young described as a “punch in the gut to my faith.”

“It was during that time that I was considering which college to attend, and we settled on Houghton because of its Christian focus. I hoped to find some answers to why a good and powerful God would let things like this happen to children like my son,” Young said. “What I found at Houghton was a religious faculty that was willing to sit with me in my pain, frustration, and confusion, without shrinking away. They looked at the hard questions with me and did not offer trite and simplistic answers. I am very thankful to them for that.”

Although Young’s faith is not what it was when he arrived at Houghton almost four years ago, he still values Jesus “and his message of self-sacrificial love for our neighbors. Maybe one day the faith will come back,” Young said. “But as the author of Ephesians says, that will be a ‘gift of God.’”

Young is a philosophy major, and dreams of using his degree to “teach at some level, either as a professor or to use it as a springboard for a masters of education work,” he said. “I wouldn’t mind being a high school teacher either.”

Not only is Young an active voice in the philosophy program, he is also the vice president of the Student Government Association (SGA). Although his position came about a bit unexpectedly, Young filled the role with grace. “Last spring, the former vice president, Daniel Merriam ’17, and Joanna Friesen ’17 invited me to lunch and they said, ‘We think you should run for Daniel’s position in SGA. Have you ever thought of it?’ I said, ‘Not really, but tell me more about the position.’” After hearing more, Young was highly interested in stepping into the job. “I really like trying to make a difference in whatever community I’m a part of,” he stated. “I thought it was a good opportunity to represent the students’ needs to the administration, and vice versa. I try to do whatever I can.” All of the campus clubs fall under the SGA’s administration, so each club has to register and report to the SGA. In some cases, the SGA partners with clubs on campus.

Sergio Mata ’19, who serves as the SGA president, frequently shares responsibilities with Young. “I basically assist all the other executive officers with their duties. I keep track of all our office hours and attendance at our meetings,” Young said. “I also run all the blood drives in partnership with the Red Cross. That’s actually my favorite part.”

At the most recent blood drive, Young reported that they processed roughly forty donors. With each donation on average saving about three lives, “we literally saved 120 lives as a campus.” Houghton will host one more blood drive in April.

When asked what he would advise underclassmen to do in order to make the most of their time at Houghton, Young focused on the opportunity students have to learn from professors outside of the classroom. “One of the things I’ve enjoyed the most at Houghton has been the faculty lecture series,” he said. “It’s something that not a lot of students go to, but some of the most interesting research topics get covered from a variety of the faculty every semester and it always surprises me how few students are actually there. It’s a great opportunity to learn things outside of class.”

What started out as a simple hobby for Garrett Bock ’18 has recently morphed into a full-blown passion and creative pursuit. As a Wellsville native, Bock and his brother grew up skateboarding and snowboarding, all the while making videos to capture their experiences.

Bock was first drawn to Houghton because of the opportunity to learn more about film. As a communications major with a concentration in media arts, Bock has been continuously refining his creative style. “I was kind of the nature photographer at first. Now I’ve tried to find my style a bit more, which is more towards fine arts and conceptual works,” he said. Anything involved with the psyche, Bock continued, “is fascinating to me. I mean, we have this gift to think, so we should use it.”

Many of Bock’s photography classes have been formative in his maturation as a photographer, especially Introduction to Digital Photography with Professor Ryann Cooley. “I learned all the technical aspects, but it was also cool learning the formal elements of photography, like what should be in an image, what makes it meaningful, and how to create a concept,” Bock said. “Before, I would just point and shoot a camera at something because it looked really cool, but it didn’t really have a meaning. Now, I’m finding things that have meaning. It means something to me, but I also want it to have that same feeling for someone else.”

Bock’s professors and classmates have been extremely influential and supportive in all his endeavors. “Before I came to Houghton I was homeschooled, so it was a huge change for me because I had to go to class every day and communicate with these people all the time,” he said. “But it was actually really helpful because everyone has all these different ideas, so being able to get some critique on ideas steered me in the right way of my style which I’m still working on. I probably will be working on it for a long time,” he added. “You just never stop creating things.”

For aspiring photographers, Bock advised, “Bring your camera wherever you go. Shoot something every day whether it be self-portraits or nature, or something that really inspires you. Eventually you’ll find out exactly what you love to do and you’ll meet so many new people that way, and have all these new connections just through doing something that you absolutely love to do.”

Bock is also the president of the Houghton Ski Club, an adventurous crew that travels every Sunday to Holiday Valley for a day of skiing or snowboarding. Bock has been snowboarding since he was twelve years old and has always seen it a way to escape for a while from everything going on in his life by getting outside and enjoying nature with friends.

The Houghton Ski Club is open to anyone who enjoys being outdoors in the winter and is interested in either learning or improving in their skiing and snowboarding skills. “If you’re still not sure how to ski or snowboard, there are people will will help you,” Bock said.

Just like artistic sensitivity, Bock has found that these adventurous pursuits are best developed in tandem with others.“Spending time trying to figure it out on your own is difficult,” he said. “Honestly, it’s open to anybody who’s interested in those kind of activities. I highly encourage it.”

“Houghton has been a home for me and a place where I have grown and changed,” stated Emma Steele ’18 as she reflected on the past four years. As a major in business administration with minors in math, art, data science, Bible, and communication, Steele embodies what it looks like to be a passionate student-leader with a host of diverse interests.

Over the past three years Steele has been involved in her class cabinet, serving as vice president her sophomore and junior year, and the senior class president this year. She was also a Highlander leader and an EMT, running with the Houghton ambulance for the past two years.

One of Steele’s passions is student engagement on Houghton’s campus, since “there is so much more that Houghton has to offer than simply taking classes and getting a degree.” Her leadership roles also reflect her deep-seated desire to “reflect God’s love for me in the way that I interact with and help others.” These motives have manifested themselves in her leadership roles, and have led her to cultivate a deeper love for people. “Serving in these positions has fostered my love for people and desire to help them,” she said. “And, of course, working in these positions has helped me see Houghton’s needs as a campus in a much clearer light.” Her passions have “given me the drive I’ve needed in order to take on these positions and fulfill all that they require. It hasn’t always been easy with classes, friendships and life in general, but I would say that it has definitely been worth it!”

Steele considered it “an absolute joy” to serve as a Highlander leader. The role involved “working with another leader to guide a group of incoming students on a wilderness adventure in the Houghton woods and then the Adirondacks. Along the way, a Highlander leader not only needs to have the hard skills required in outdoor living, but also the soft skills required to help mentor the Highlander participants through this change in their lives. Working the ropes course and balancing decisions and viewpoints with my co-leaders were fantastic experiences for me.”

Steele would encourage underclassmen “to pursue any and all interests or passions they have energy for, and intentionally invest in the people around them. Houghton is this unbelievably cool opportunity where you can dive into areas of study that most people would never have the time to explore, and do it with the support of faculty that care deeply about their students holistic growth.” She added, “As a side note, I think all students should take a math class while at Houghton because our math faculty rock. And try to get involved in Highlander. If you missed the chance to do the actual program, take Outdoor Leadership Training from Coach Smalley!”

Following graduation, Steele will be getting married to Luke Duttweiler in May and moving into the Rochester area, where she is currently job hunting. “Even though it will be bittersweet for me to graduate, I feel confident in leaving that I am ready for what God has prepared next.”