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Calvin seeks to equip students to Calvin seeks to equip students to Joint Artificial Intelligence Center think deeply, act justly, and live think deeply, act justly, and live (JAIC), he works to incorporate wholeheartedly as Christ’s agents of wholeheartedly as Christ’s agents of artificial intelligence into the renewal in the world. These stories renewal in the world. These stories functions of the Department of demonstrate how our alumni are demonstrate how our alumni are Defense. living out that mission. living out that mission. Allison Vermeer VanWyngarden Ariangela Davis-Kozik is doing Ariangela Davis-Kozik is doing has always loved horses. Now, she’s postdoctoral research on the postdoctoral research on the combining her love of horses with a microorganisms that live in human microorganisms that live in human passion for children in a new horse airways, hoping to better understand airways, hoping to better understand therapeutic riding program that asthma in adults. She’s also co-led asthma in adults. She’s also co-led helps children in Iowa. Black in Microbiology, a weeklong Black in Microbiology, a weeklong conference that attracted global conference that attracted global When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, attention. attention. movie theaters closed. J.D. Loeks is the president of a chain of Michigan When he graduated from Calvin, Lt. theaters, and he and his team have Gen. Michael Groen joined the U.S. found some creative ways to reach Marine Corps. As the director of the audiences.
When he graduated from Calvin, Lt. Gen. Michael Groen joined the U.S. Marine Corps. As the director of the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC), he works to incorporate artificial intelligence into the functions of the Department of Defense.
Allison Vermeer VanWyngarden
has always loved horses. Now, she’s combining her love of horses with a passion for children in a new horse therapeutic riding program that helps children in Iowa. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, movie theaters closed. J.D. Loeks is the president of a chain of Michigan theaters, and he and his team have found some creative ways to reach audiences.
Janet Lenger Staal ’98 Ariangela Davis Kozik ’13 Katelyn Ver Woert Egnatuk ’13 Lt. Gen Michael S. Groen ’86
Ariangela Davis Kozik ’13 Biotechnology Postdoctoral research fellow University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Michigan
On the edge of what we don’t know
When you take a breath, the air travels into your trachea, your bronchial tubes, your lungs. You may have learned in a Calvin biology class about alveoli and how they get oxygen to your cells. What you might not have learned is that there are microscopic organisms in your airways.
Scientists didn’t even know about them until 2010. It’s the edge of what we don’t know—and that’s exactly where Ariangela Davis Kozik ’13 likes to be.
“We’ve only scratched the surface of understanding all the ways the microbiome is involved in keeping us healthy,” she said.
In addition to her research, she organized a virtual conference and awareness week called Black in Microbiology, which has earned her national recognition. She was profiled in The New York Times in September 2020 and was recently named one of the top 1,000 inspiring Black scientists by Cell Mentor.
This recognition comes as no surprise to Calvin biology professor John Wertz, who first met Kozik in his “phage hunters” class, where students isolate a unique bacterial virus or phage.
“After doing a major research project as a freshman—and getting a publication from it—she was on fire for scientific research,” Wertz said.
Wertz hired her to work in his lab, where he was studying the bacteria that live in the guts of termites. “He loves insects,” said Kozik, who added with a laugh, “I do not.”
“What impressed me about Ari was that her fire, passion, drive, was in everything she did,” said Wertz.
Kozik went to Purdue’s interdisciplinary life sciences program, earning a Ph.D. in comparative pathobiology.
—John Wertz, biology
“I love the concept that we humans are literally covered by other organisms. We don’t think about them because we don’t see them, but they impact our health,” she said.
As a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Michigan, her current research looks at the microbial communities of adults with asthma.
Black in Microbiology
She came away from Calvin with a passion for scientific research and a framework for restorative justice. “I learned that justice is not something that is confined to a certain area—the entire world should be just, science included.”
Kozik and a virologist friend co-founded Black in Microbiology, an online conference to raise the visibility of Black scientists across industries and career stages in the field of microbiology.
Before she started organizing, she knew only one other Black microbiologist, which she said isn’t unusual. She was inspired by similar online conferences, including Black in STEM, Black Birders Week, and Black in Chemistry. “As Black people, there are stereotypical limits on who we are and what we can achieve. We’re trying to counteract that typical narrative,” she said.
She networked on Twitter, using the hashtag #blackinmicro to find other microbiologists. The conference had 3,500 people register, attracted a global audience, and garnered academic and corporate sponsors.
Kozik and other organizers launched the nonprofit Black Microbiologists Association (BMA) to partner with other scientific organizations, scientific journals, funding agencies, and institutions to promote the advancement of Black microbiologists while advocating for a more equitable and just scientific enterprise.
“There are problems and disparities everywhere across all of the layers of society. Black in Microbiology is something that I, as a Black academic, am able to do to effect change,” said Kozik.
Her Calvin community continues to cheer her on. “When Black microbiologists deserved the limelight, she built a power plant. I am not surprised in the least at what Ari has done, both in and outside of the laboratory. But I am incredibly, incredibly proud,” said Wertz.
Lt. Gen. Michael S. Groen ’86 Engineering Director, Joint Artificial Intelligence Center Department of Defense Washington, D.C.
Compelled to continue military service
A 35-year career in the military is not the path Lt. Gen. Michael Groen ’86 was expecting to take when he joined the U.S. Marine Corps officer candidate school upon his graduation from Calvin.
“My intention was to join the service for a couple of years and then move on,” said the three-star general. “But every time I thought about getting out, some new exciting thing that I wanted to pursue came along. I have found the service very compelling.”
Groen has served multiple tours overseas and led battlefield intelligence centers. He has also served as the director of intelligence for the Joint Chiefs of Staff and director of Marine Corps Intelligence, and he earned master’s degrees in systems management, applied physics, and electrical engineering.
His current position as Director of the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC) is something he never would have imagined, he said, but in looking back, all of his experiences have contributed to his preparedness for this role. Established in 2018, the JAIC was formed to direct and accelerate the efforts of incorporating artificial intelligence into the functions of the Department of Defense.
“We are all very experienced in the use of artificial intelligence in our personal lives whether we know it or not,” said Groen. “That technology has not been as integrated into our defense systems. We are looking to apply the same technology that drives internet companies into our business processes and into our warfighting.”
Steering decisions
Sophisticated technology that uses data to provide citizens with everyday assistance— like driving directions, restaurant reviews, online shopping opportunities, and potentially self-driving cars—is the same technology the JAIC is working to integrate into America’s defense systems.
“There are thousands of potential applications for these capabilities,” said Groen. “For example, a commander could use it to make good data-driven decisions by determining what the enemy position looks like, where our own forces are, and what risks our threats pose.”
Artificial intelligence can also be used to protect network systems, to automate surveillance, and to simplify business practices.
“There is a vast opportunity to make the department more effective and more efficient,” said Groen. “There is opportunity to up the value of human capital and do the drudgery with machines.”
Character at the core
Seated at his desk in the Pentagon, Groen said he is challenged by the intertwining of technology and ethics every day; he is grateful for a strong moral foundation, which he said was bolstered by his education at Calvin.
“When you take a step back and look at how you approach your life, your job, you realize that character is built at places like Calvin,” he said. “I knew I had a good foundation, an ethical baseline, and that is so important in this work.
“In artificial intelligence, you can look at how the Chinese surveil their population and see that the U.S. rests on a completely different ethical baseline,” he said. “Government service requires a cadre of civil servants who have that same ethical baseline, the kind that is built at places like Calvin.
“I would recommend military service or civil service to any grad,” he added. “It is enormously rewarding, and it demands persons of character. It is absolutely critical that we don’t shy away from that. You would be joining a large cadre of people of good faith, who are committed for all of the right reasons.”
Allison Vermeer VanWyngarden ’03 Business Director of Therapeutic Riding Program Grace Therapeutic Riding Pella, Iowa
Career grows from horse training hobby
A two-time world champion in showing American Saddlebreds as a youth, Allison Vermeer VanWyngarden ’03 believed her horse training days were over as an adult.
“I always loved horses. I worked in the barn growing up; I was always around horses. But when I got to Calvin, I made a conscious choice that I was not going to go into horse training,” she said. “I decided that horses would be my hobby but not my job.”
Upon graduating from Calvin, VanWyngarden stuck to that decision: first pursuing a career with a large financial company, then earning her master’s in business administration from Drake University, and finally working for her family’s business, Vermeer Corp., a worldwide manufacturer and distributor of industrial and agricultural equipment.
“That was the first 10 years of my career,” said VanWyngarden. After a hiatus to stay home with her and husband Kyle’s two young children, she planned to return to the family business.
Joyful noise
That’s when her career path took an abrupt turn.
She had heard about a program called Mainly Music, an interactive program for babies, toddlers, preschoolers, and their parents that provides education and development outcomes through music and play, and, “I had thought, ‘I wish we had that here,’” she said.
Despite an initial hesitation, VanWyngarden lanched Mainly Music at Calvary Christian Reformed Church in her hometown of Pella, Iowa. This, she said, prepared her for her current venture: Grace Therapeutic Riding.
“Mainly Music taught me how to gather volunteers, how to start a program, and it
made me realize how much I care about kids— blessing them, seeing them grow, and helping them build community,” she said.
Meaningful work
So when VanWyngarden was introduced to the idea of training her family’s horses for therapy, she was interested but tentative.
“I reached out to Kinetic Edge Physical Therapy in Pella, and told them I have access to horses and I’m willing, and then went on to tell them all of the reasons it wouldn’t work,” she said. “But God kept opening doors, and I kept walking through.”
VanWyngarden earned certification as a therapeutic riding instructor and now serves as the director of the therapeutic riding program at Grace Therapeutic Riding, which serves 1520 participants—mostly children—a week.
“I love the idea of using animals to help people,” said VanWyngarden. “It’s amazing how animals can do this, and it’s good for the horses, too. It’s really important for them to have meaningful work.”
Embracing God’s plan
The riding program has also brought her parents, Bob and Lois De Jong Vermeer ex’67, full circle in the horse business. The Vermeers offer their support by providing the horses, the arena, and encouragement.
VanWyngarden’s goal is to include more adults in the program and expand more on the mental health side. She has focused her recent efforts on hippotherapy, a form of therapy that uses the natural gait and movement of a horse to provide motor and sensory input for participants with physical and mental disorders.
“I am really embracing who God created me to be,” said VanWyngarden. “I have this love for working with animals, and I am trying to lean into that and grow while creating a place for people to belong.”
J.D. Loeks ’99 Business President Celebration Cinema East Grand Rapids, Michigan
Planning a new celebration
A movie quote seems like an appropriate place to start. Near the end of The Martian, when the lead character is asked how he reacted to an impossible situation, he says: “You just begin. You do the math. You solve one problem. And then you solve the next one. And then the next. And if you solve enough problems, you get to come home.”
J.D. Loeks ’99 can identify with that kind of relentless determination. Loeks is the president of Celebration Cinema, a company that manages 13 movie theaters in Michigan. And in spring 2020, while he wasn’t stuck on another planet, he faced a situation that felt impossible.
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, movie theaters in Michigan were closed for months. Even when they reopened, there were restrictions to navigate, and studios stopped releasing major films.
“A year ago, I thought I was good at solving problems,” Loeks said. “Now, I’m solving problems I didn’t even know existed.”
Creative change
Loeks can rattle off a dizzying list of problems—pivoting programming, lobbying the government, restructuring debt, and becoming well-versed in unemployment laws.
“And like a lot of leaders, I’ve also had to become an armchair epidemiologist to figure out how to keep our staff and guests safe,” said Loeks.
“The irony is that our business is to give people a two-hour vacation from the stress of life. At the moment in history where we’re needed the most, we’re unable to do it in the ways we used to,” said Loeks.
Loeks has been at the helm of the leadership team at Celebration Cinema for 14 years and worked to cultivate a culture that is open to change. “We don’t want to get comfortable with the status quo,” he said.
It might come as no surprise that Celebration Cinema has found some small, creative ways to continue its mission in the time of the pandemic. They created a drive-in movie experience by stacking 40-foot shipping containers and attaching screens to them. In the summer, they hosted 100 guests at a time in an outdoor lawn environment for movies and concerts.
Family business
Loeks has been interested in problem-solving for a long time. Philosophy classes at Calvin sparked his interest
“Philosophy teaches you how to make decisions and process complex things,” he said. He graduated with a business major, just one class short of a double major in philosophy. “I had a great time at Calvin. I sang in the choir, played lacrosse, was involved with dorm leadership, and made a ton of lifelong friends.”
Loeks wasn’t sure if he would go into his family’s business for his career. His grandfather, Jack Loeks, was a movie theater pioneer. J.D.’s father, John, also served as president of the company.
After Calvin, J.D. worked for his dad for two years and moved to Colorado to work in residential real estate and earn a master’s in business finance. “I realized that I wanted to lead a company that could have a lasting impact on the community, and that I could do that back in Grand Rapids,” he said.
Hello, Studio Park
For the past several years, Loeks has spearheaded a major development that’s having that kind of lasting impact: Studio Park. Located in downtown Grand Rapids, this development has a cinema, restaurants, shops, offices, and apartments.
“Though it’s the smallest part of Studio Park, my favorite part of the project is the Listening Room, a 200-seat small-format music venue,” said Loeks. “That’s got a special place in my heart, and what I’m personally looking forward to most as we get to the other side of this current crisis.”
