Category: Campus

Houghton College’s English, Writing, and Communications departments are conducting a search for a Theater Workshop Director who would produce a spring 2016 theater production. Communication Professor, Douglass Gaerte said, “This new initiative is intended to bring a bit more continuity as well as professionalism to the drama offerings on campus.”

Although there has never been a stand-alone theater department at Houghton, there are two theater related classes, Introduction to Theater and Oral Performance of Literature, which students can be involved with. Students interested in being in the college play can sign up for the one credit class, Comm 236: Theater Workshop, and try out for the play in the fall. According to Gaerte, in the fall of 2015, the director will have auditions for actors, assign the parts, and interview others interested in being crew members for the production. This will allow students to begin working on their lines in preparation for the spring semester.

In the spring of 2016, the director would then teach a theater workshop where they would work with the cast and crew for about a month, running through rehearsals and preparing for the public performance of the play that would happen at the end of the month. English Professor, James Wardwell said, “[We are] inviting a different voice into our community…This person will be really in touch with outside experiences and [will] bring that voice in and give that voice a means to communicate with the entire community.”

Over the years, Houghton has had various student theater groups who performed some original productions of dramatic pieces they wrote. This has allowed students to have more opportunities to direct and perform. According to Gaerte, in the past, there were around eight or nine drama productions on campus consisting of School of Music productions, college plays, series of one-acts directed by students, and a Broadway musical revue directed by students. According to Kaitlyn McKinney ‘17, there was a collection of skits put on by a drama club last year that lasted for about thirty minutes in the recital hall. However, not many people attended. McKinney, who starred in the “Odd Couple” at the Fire Hall last year said one of the reasons she loves theater is, “You build a family in theater and become really close to the people in the production.”

According to Gaerte, a student Shakespeare club was formed from a Shakespeare class that Wardwell taught. Wardwell believes theater is a “potentially marvelous community building activity where people interact with one another in significant ways about significant ideas” and then “invite a larger community [an audience] to come in and interact with those relationships through a performance.”

The English, Writing, and Communication departments hope that bringing a guest director to campus each spring to direct a play will help get more students interested in theater here at Houghton.  Wardwell hopes, “this can stimulate a growth path that can lead to something legitimate academically in theater.” Gaerte said, “We will be advertising for this position, as well as reaching out to our alumni who work in theater as we try to identify good candidates for this position.” According to McKinney, an individual who knows how to advertise and get people interested in theater will help develop the theater program.

This past year, the Campus Store has set up a selection of their inventory in the Kerr-Pegula Field House (KPFH) during highly attended sports events like the Section V and Section VI track and field meets. The arrangement is still being treated as an experiment, but it has the potential to allow for the Campus Store to increase its revenue on weekends and at special events, as well as to increase exposure for the Houghton brand.

Since the KPFH officially opened in October of 2014, the building has hosted approximately 18,700 guests for multiple events held by outside groups, a figure that does not include Houghton College students, faculty or staff. However, these guests do not necessarily travel from the KPFH to the college’s main campus during their visits. Anticipating this, Campus Store Director Heléna Oden asked to meet with Executive Director of Athletics Harold “Skip” Lord to see if plans might include space for a storefront in the KPFH at the time of the building’s design. While there was no room in the plans for a permanent store, they agreed that the Campus Store should have a presence in the KPFH, especially at events attended by non-Houghtonites.

“To my mind, our main goals have been to increase revenue for the store, as well as to increase brand exposure for the college,” said Lord. Robert Pool, Vice President for Student Life, agreed the arrangement could help advertise Houghton.

“It’s a way to get the Houghton name out there,” he said. “It’s strange, because when you get outside of Allegany County, not many people have heard of Houghton College unless they have some sort of formal connection through family or a close friend; it’s just not in the consciousness, even in Buffalo. Getting the word out there, getting the exposure is a key opportunity.”

Oden agreed with this statement, adding that the set-up would also allow for Houghton families to find apparel even on weekends when the Campus Store has limited hours. With these goals in mind, Oden and Lord worked to find a trafficked area in the KPFH to set up a temporary space. They decided it would be best for Oden to set up her stock at the brick wall between the men’s and women’s restrooms by the concessions stand.

With help from her intern, Lauren Campbell ‘16, Oden then selected items from the store’s inventory to sell at events. At first, they chose mostly brand name products, but they quickly received feedback that attendees would prefer less costly options. In response, the duo included Houghton foam fingers, blankets, hats, and less expensive t-shirts to lower the price. In order to increase the variety of stock, Oden and Campbell tried setting up an iPad to display their website so that visitors could see the store’s full inventory. Visitors were also given the option of ordering an item on the website while at the event, and then picking it up at the store when they opened again the following week.

“We’ll do more of that in the fall, too,” said Oden. “We also thought we could make specific t-shirts for certain events, or even more specifically athletic related items. That way we don’t have exactly the same inventory moving in both locations. It’s still a big work in progress.”

This work in progress will continue next year at other major events hosted at the KPFH, including Homecoming and other sporting events.

The new solar array, which will save the college over four million dollars over 25 years, will be dedicated will be April 17 at 1 p.m. at the Field of Dreams, followed by a tour. The event is open to the public and “is a chance to mark the significance and formally recognize the start of the solar array,” said Brian Webb, Houghton’s Sustainability Coordinator. State Senator Cathy Young, representatives from Groundwater and Environmental Services (GES), and President Shirley Mullen, will be there as well. After the dedication, there will be a guided tour of the array for those interested in seeing the solar panels up close and finding out how renewable energy works.

Over the array’s lifetime of 25 years, it will save the college approximately $4.3 million in energy costs. Not only is this structure a representation of a cost savings for the college, but it will also allow the community to “interact with God’s creation in a responsible way,” said Webb.

According to Webb, the array will take a huge chunk of energy from a renewable source, the sun, turn it into electric energy which will then power about half of the college throughout the year. The funding, provided by GES, will allow for the maintaining and owning of the solar array for the next 25 years. Webb explained in the end, “Houghton wins out because we have lower energy costs with no cost to build the structure in the first place.”

However, the solar array has raised some concerns regarding if Houghton will actually benefit from the array. Houghton senior, Katherine Tomlinson, said when she first heard of the project, she was skeptical, “I was concerned about the habits it would possibly be destroying, specifically honey bees since they are endangered than the benefits it would be bringing to campus.” However, Webb explained Houghton was the perfect spot for the solar array; there was no natural habitat such as streams or trees the college would have needed to clear. “The area was not needed for Houghton or any critical wildlife. The only environmental impact I could see would be what happens to the panels after we are done using them” said Webb.

Solar energy, along with other renewable sources of energy, help promote a healthy global climate. “It has everything to do about how our actions impact the world,” said Webb. In addition, Tomlinson explained it was not until she learned more about climate change this past and found, “the solar array is an important step for our community [Houghton] to purify our energy use and lessen our contribution to the problem [climate change].”

Twenty-five years from now, Houghton will have some different options for the array. The array can be removed from the Field of Dreams or Houghton can buy the array from GES for a low rate. Webb’s prediction for the future of the array is if it is still producing a reliable source of energy after 25 years, the college will buy it.

On April 16, there will be a forum in Java to talk about Faith and Sustainability to tie into the dedication of the solar array. This event will be in partnership with Student Government Association and have a panel of Dean Jordan, Brian Webb, and one other student. Complimentary coffee will be provided for all who attend.

On Feb. 19, 2015 President Shirley Mullen officially became a United States citizen. Her previous citizenship before this date was in Canada, where she was born and grew up.

Mullen has been living in the U.S since 1966, but chose to wait to gain citizenship partially because she has a sentimental attachment to where she grew up. She also felt there was a chance she would go back to Canada at some point in her life. She stated, “As I’ve realized that I’m probably not going to go back to work in Canada ever, it just seemed like the sensible thing to do, to make the change by becoming a citizen.”

Mullen explained that while she was waiting for her interview, which happened in Buffalo, she was surrounded by people who were seeking citizenship to gain refuge in America. She shared that it was a fascinating experience. “I was more affected by the process than I thought I would be,” said Mullen. “There were people from 16 different countries represented the day of the interview. It was moving to see the value of American citizenship through the eyes of people who in a sense needed this… We take safety and freedom for granted.”

To become a U.S citizen one must undergo a process called naturalization. Some of things that can come along with citizenship include taxation, voting rights, military service, and jury duty. According to the official website of homeland security, one must firstly fill out an application which includes questions about family, traveling, and other practical questions. The next step in the process is a background check where they take fingerprints. After this  is a test of American history, which is followed by an interview. The last step of the process is a formal swearing in.

Mullen said the experience was a great realization for her of the culture that we experience every day in the U.S and too easily take for granted. People from all over the world are blended together in the same place to find freedom. In most countries there is a sense of never giving up citizenship, but the American citizenship is seen by many as more of a man-made process. Anyone can come to find hope of a bright future.

President Mullen was also reminded that although our citizenship to a country is important, “Our citizenship to a country is always secondary to our citizenship in God’s Kingdom.”

Plans have been put in place for the outdoor recreation and physical education majors to be phased out and replaced with a sports recreation and wellness management major. The new major is a hybrid of the old majors, but adds new requirements, including some business courses.

According to Linda Mills Woolsey, vice president for academic affairs and dean of the college, outdoor recreation and physical education are two of the oldest majors offered at Houghton. After periodically evaluating all the majors, these two were put under consideration to be critically examined, due in part to their curriculum being outdated.

Both outdoor recreation and physical education are the only majors at Houghton that have not had developement since the major was initiated, according to Woolsey. Many students who declare this major seek to be employed in careers such as camp directors or physical education teachers. However, according to the data gathered by Woolsey and her team, the career outlook for those with degrees in outdoor recreation and physical education is slim. The job market for those interested in this industry is aligned more with sports and wellness management, an industry that includes jobs such as fitness instructor, professional team manager, nutritionist or dietician, and physical therapist.  Creating the sports recreation and wellness management major will enable students to have more options when deciding on a career.

The new major’s collaboration with the business department will give students the opportunity to enter into a wider variety of management positions, including the traditional camp director or national park specialist.  “The business department at Houghton does a very good job in setting up our students to be socially and ethically responsible,” said Woolsey. The incorporated business courses will capitalize on a student’s complete set of skills.

The decision to phase out the outdoor recreation and physical education majors was first brought to the Academic Council, which, for this particular change, included Professors Sandy Johnson, Andrea Boon, Ken Bates, and two students.  After the council approved the change, it was sent to the faculty to be discussed at the first of two monthly meetings. If the faculty approve the new major, it will then be brought to the New York State Education Department to be approved.  Woolsey plans to have the major available for the incoming fall class of 2019.

The old majors will be completely phased out by 2018.  Woolsey encouraged those who have already declared an outdoor recreation or physical education major, “We are committed to students in the major currently and want to hire the most qualified people to help and be attentive to those students’ needs.”

Due to Professor Thomas Kettlekamp’s retirement at the end of this semester, Laura Alexeichik, who has previously taught at Houghton, will be stepping in as an adjunct professor for the department. Alexeichik has a Ph.D. in recreation with interests in intercultural studies and a dissertation on an “experiential learning environment.”

According to Woolsey, students who typically go into this field, whether with the old majors or the new hybrid, are people who want to serve. These students are not just  interested in finding a job, but more so in helping and serving those in their community through things such as physical therapy or summer camp management.

Woolsey stated, “We are, at the same time, phasing out old programs and building in new ones. This is the way any thriving college should operate, practicing frequently examining all programs to meet the career needs of its students.”