Alumni Profiles

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Calvin seeks to equip students to think deeply, act justly, and live wholeheartedly as Christ’s agents of renewal in the world. These stories demonstrate how our alumni are living out that mission. are living out that mission.

Jaylyn Gough is the founder of Native Cheri Ackerman has been Women’s Wilderness, which strives researching a new technology. It to create a platform for native women could lead to a diagnostic platform, to use their voices to speak out which could test a person for against injustices, to bring awareness every single virus, including the to indigenous people and land rights, coronavirus, every time they got and to serve as adventure-seeking role sick and could eventually be used models for native girls.for broad public-health efforts.

Janet Staal and Katelyn Egnatuk Calvin professor of nursing Katie launched one of West Michigan’s first Kunnen serves with Samaritan’s nature-based preschools, a movement Purse and was recently deployed that is rapidly gaining momentum across the country. Grand Rapids’ Aperitivo manager to New York, during the peak of the Evan Talen has taken his passion coronavirus outbreak, to work with to a whole new level by winning other medical staff in the emergency the Cheesemonger Invitational, a COVID-19 field unit in Central Park. national competition that pitted him against many of the top cheese con Daniel Hartman leads a team that noisseurs from around the country. provides technical expertise in drug and diagnostic development, where Tim and Andrew Harris are the the goal is to provide high-impact founders of ColorHub, an innovative health products and services to the digital printing company specializing world’s poorest communities. in high-end graphics packaging and retail displays. Twana Davis, a speech language pathologist, seeks to connect, strengthen, and inspire her clients through her work in schools and an applied behavior analysis clinic in Katy, Texas.

Janet Lenger Staal ’98 Cheri Ackerman ’11 Katelyn Ver Woert Egnatuk ’13

Evan Talen ’06 Katie Kunnen ’09

Cheri Ackerman ’11 Biochemistry and Spanish CEO and co-founder Concerto Biosciences Boston, Massachusetts

“Calvin was a place where I learned that my mind and my faith are not at odds. In fact, they work together.”

Connecting science with faith

As a postdoctoral fellow at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, what Cheri Ackerman ’11 was doing in the lab is about as relevant as it gets in the current environment.

“We were working on this a couple of years before the pandemic happened and then this turned out to be more relevant than we thought it was going to be,” said Ackerman.

The this Ackerman is referring to is a new technology developed in Broad lab that flexibly scales up CRISPR-based molecular diagnostics, using microfluidic chips that can run thousands of tests simultaneously. A single chip’s capacity ranges from detecting a single type of virus in more than 1,000 samples at a time to searching a small number of samples for more than 160 different viruses, including the new coronavirus.

“The thing that motivated this project is a longstanding need for diagnostics, and that is something that our collaborators have been working on for a long time,” said Ackerman.

“We started dreaming about what would it look like for us to actually have a diagnostic platform that would allow you to diagnose every viral infection a person could get?” said Ackerman. “What would it look like for every person who went to the doctor to get a real diagnosis, to know which virus made them sick? Could we design technology that was comprehensive enough, fast enough, cheap enough that you could imagine testing every single person for every single virus every time they got sick and actually get that level of data throughput, sample throughput?”

The result? Combinatorial Arrayed Reactions for Multiplexed Evaluation of Nucleic acids (CARMEN). In short, it’s a technology— validated on patient samples—that provides same-day results and could someday be harnessed for broad public-health efforts.

Ackerman’s leading role in this amazing story had its genesis in a 10th-grade biology class.

“I learned how DNA goes to RNA goes to protein,” Ackerman said of the class. “This literally blew my mind. I thought this was the coolest thing I could possibly imagine in the world.”

Just a few years later she found herself in Professor Dave Koetje’s biology lab at Calvin University. “I was doing normal lab things like pipetting, and I remember him coming up to me and saying, ‘Hey, I think you are kind of good at this, what do you think about summer research?’”

From there, Ackerman’s piqued interest was soon cultivated into a deep passion. She got connected to a summer research experience at the Van Andel Research Institute and soon knew this passion was only beginning. Her next stop was grad school. She earned a PhD in chemical biology at the University of California-Berkeley. She also won the prestigious Hertz Fellowship, which meant a full-ride scholarship.

In June, Ackerman left the Broad Institute to co-found Concerto Biosciences, a scientific startup that seeks to identify groups of microbes that perform useful functions for plants and people.

But her impressive journey thus far has its foundations at Calvin, she said.

“A liberal arts education is so important,” said Ackerman. “It is not enough to be good at science. You have to be able to communicate that to the world. You have to be able to write about it, to be able to talk to people about why the science is relevant, and care about those people and figure out what they need, and why they need this technology.

“The aspect of incorporating faith and science has also been really powerful in my life. Calvin was a place where I learned that my mind and my faith are not at odds. In fact, they work together,” said Ackerman. “Having that sense of grounding, the sense that the work that I do is because God has put me here, to God be the glory for this work, it is just an amazing way of going through life, and I think Calvin was central to me exploring that and feeling comfortable owning that, feeling comfortable expressing that.”

Fearlessly following God’s call

Katie Pruss Kunnen ’09 Nursing Professor of nursing/nurse practitioner Calvin University/Samaritan’s Purse Grand Rapids, Michigan

“There is no fear in love ... .” (1 John 4:18)

It was this verse that Katie Pruss Kunnen ’09 had scrawled across her PPE as she served in New York City’s Mount Sinai Hospital emergency COVID-19 field unit, temporarily set up in Central Park. It is also the verse that she lives by.

Kunnen, who began teaching at Calvin in 2016 following her doctoral studies at University of Michigan, Flint, was asked to come to the nation’s hot spot for the illness in late March by Samaritan’s Purse, a Christian organization that deploys emergency medical response teams to victims of natural disasters, wars, disease, poverty, and famine.

“I’ve never been scared,” said Kunnen, who has previously served with the organization in Ecuador and Iraq. “I trust that the Lord has a specific plan for me, and he will take care of me. My mom, though, she always worries,” she added with a laugh.

Kunnen was able to answer the call due to Calvin University’s change to online learning during the outbreak and some flexibility in her scheduling.

“My students always come first,” she said. “But I do think this makes me a better professor. Outside of my Calvin schedule there is not much time to practice nursing, so I gain a lot from these situations. Stories from real experience are what teach us.”

And Kunnen has many of those from her recent deployment in New York. “It was very unique to be doing this in the U.S., on our own soil,” she said. “Samaritan’s Purse also had DARTs (Disaster Assistance Response Teams) in Italy, so we were learning from them.

“When we arrived, the hospital was very eager for us to take a lot of patients quickly,” she said. “I was there during the peak of the curve, which was in early April, and it was a huge undertaking. During the first few weeks we were taking as many patients as we could handle without maxing out the oxygen system and many more than the USNS Comfort ship.”

Besides treating patients, Kunnen was also involved in establishing admissions protocols and evaluating and arranging other practices.

“The city of New York did a great job,” said Kunnen. “Having tents set up in Central Park with the capacity for electricity and everything else we needed was pretty amazing.”

But for the medical staff, including Kunnen, the experience was difficult. “For the ICU team, there were hardly any ‘wins.’ Scientific articles were coming out that illustrated the hard truth reflected around us that by the time someone was on a ventilator, the mortality rate was 80-88%. It was really hard to wake up and think about the patients you wanted to see get better. And for the families, it was also hard.

“There were so many stories of families being split between hospitals—like a son trying to get discharged so that he could attend his mom’s funeral,” she said. “It was heartbreaking, and you had to process things as you could while still working.”

After three weeks of 12- to 14-hour days in the field, Kunnen returned home April 20. She plans to respond to additional requests to serve; she recently deployed to serve the Navajo Nation with support for contact tracing.

“I believe the first call on my life is obedience to God’s calling,” she said. “I think it’s important to listen and think deeply about what you are being called to do and then follow it wholeheartedly. We are all called to see where people are not flourishing, and ask, ‘What is it I can do about it today?’”

“... I gain a lot from these situations. Stories from real experience are what teach us.”

Daniel Hartman ’84 Biology/chemistry Director, Integrated Development, Global Health Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Seattle, Washington

Making a difference for the underserved

While social distancing, handwashing, and mask wearing, according to experts, are the only measures we currently have to combat the spread of the coronavirus, what happens in countries where these tactics are not feasible or even possible?

This is the type of question, albeit with much more complexity, that Dan Hartman ’84 and his team at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation are faced with every day. Hartman, who serves as the director of Integrated Development, leads a team that provides technical expertise in drug and diagnostic development, where the goal is to provide high-impact health products and services to the world’s poorest communities.

Hartman, who received his medical degree from Wayne State University and has extensive management and pharmaceutical experience, joined the foundation team in 2012. His focus is the production of vaccines, diagnostics, and therapeutics that will improve the lives of the most underserved populations in the world.

Preventable diseases like malaria and tuberculosis are among the top causes of death in most low-income countries. “Half a million people die of malaria every year, mostly children, and we don’t hear about it,” said Hartman.

This is a problem Hartman and his team are addressing. Similarly, rotavirus sickens and kills many children worldwide despite the existence of an effective vaccine, but affordability is an issue.

Hartman has spent the last eight years traveling around the world visiting underserved populations, where he has witnessed many of these significant health care challenges.

“Professors in these classes really made you think deeply; that was one of the best skills I learned at Calvin.”

“There is a massive shortage of health care workers in these countries,” he said. “I’ve visited hospitals where there are two people sharing one bed. … We have hospitals here that have more ICU beds than entire countries in Africa.”

While these situations are difficult to witness, Hartman is grateful for the opportunity as it motivates him to work for change and makes his work more effective. “You need to recognize the capacity and capability in order to make good decisions.”

In fact, decision-making has become central to his role as he is faced with limitations in the manufacture of drugs, challenges in regulatory issues, and demanding analysis in quantitative sciences.

Most recently, throughout the pandemic, Hartman has focused on ways to prevent coronavirus infections. “Their hospitals can’t handle the level of severity that has been prevalent in other countries,” he said. “Their countries don’t have ICUs or ventilators, and when a vaccine or treatment becomes available, how do we scale up the manufacturing to get it to the poorest populations?”

Involving himself in this kind of deep thinking and decision-making causes Hartman to reflect on his Calvin background.

“While I was very well-prepared in the technical sciences, looking back it was the core classes in religion, philosophy, and history where I learned how to think,” said Hartman. “Professors in these classes really made you think deeply; that was one of the best skills I learned at Calvin.”

Through a career that has taken him from a fellowship in pulmonary medicine to research and development in some of the country’s leading drug companies, Hartman finds himself grateful for where he is now.

“I am so fortunate in what I get to do every day,” he said. “I love to develop products that can help people. I’m working harder than I ever have in my life, but I have the energy for it; we’re making a difference for the most underserved people on the planet.”

Living wholeheartedly

To spend time with Twana Davis ’93 is to experience what it means to live wholeheartedly. She exudes joy, warmth, and care for everyone she meets.

In the late ’80s, Davis intended to pursue her college education at Purdue or Dartmouth, but Calvin was offering a bus from Chicagoland for a Fridays visit, and she decided to make the trip.

At lunch, most of the tables were full, so she took an open spot at a communications arts and sciences table. She sat next to professor Marten Vande Gutche, who asked her what she wanted to study. She told him she had considered journalism but was also interested in something health or education related. She attended a school for visual and performing arts in middle and high school and was also considering a career that incorporated her artistic side. Vande Gutche encouraged her to consider speech pathology, explaining that it combines health care, education, science, and art. Intrigued, she went home and realized the direction of her life had changed from a single conversation.

Davis enrolled at Calvin the following year and pursued a degree in communication disorders, later adding elementary education with a language arts focus. Having grown up in the public schools, student teaching was her first exposure to Christian elementary education. Through the experience, she gained a deeper understanding of how different social and cultural groups see the world through different lenses. Reflecting on that experience and the recent civil unrest in the United States reminds Davis of how important it is to be aware of cultural differences when interacting with one another.

“In some of my SPAUD [speech pathology and audiology] and education classes at Calvin, I learned fairly early on that God’s masterful hand can be seen interwoven in the rich lives of each of his children, fashioned in a mosaic of colors and creeds; that each is profoundly valuable and come uniquely bejeweled with individual gifts, talents, and needs. It is our responsibility as Christ followers to connect, strengthen, and inspire those whose paths we are so blessed to cross and be reciprocally enriched and blessed by their journeys.”

During her time at Calvin, the university considered eliminating the SPAUD major, but Davis and her classmates lobbied to keep it. Today, it’s one of Calvin’s strongest majors and one of its first master’s programs. After Calvin, Davis earned her master’s in speech pathology from Michigan State University before moving to California and working in the San Jose school system. Eventually she started a private practice and found success working with children with autism spectrum disorder. Her reputation grew, and she was getting referrals from industry notables in Beverly Hills and Hollywood. Eventually she relocated to Texas and is now the clinical director for therapies at Rise with ABA, an applied behavior analysis clinic for children with autism spectrum disorder, as well as a speech language pathologist for Katy Independent School District, in the Houston area.

In the past decade, Davis has reconnected with Calvin by joining the Calvin Alumni Board and serving as president of Calvin Alumni Association during the final year of her term. She also deepened her relationship with the SPAUD department.

Through all her moves, she clearly sees God’s hand guiding her. “I believe the work I’m doing embodies Calvin’s mission as my colleagues and I help to redeem speech and communication for patients who have trouble expressing themselves. I’m profoundly grateful for being able to play a role in that mission.”

“It is our responsibility as Christ followers to connect, strengthen, and inspire those whose paths we are so blessed to cross and be reciprocally enriched and blessed by their journeys.”

Twana Davis ’93 Speech pathology and audiology Speech language pathologist/clinical manager of speech therapy Katy Independent School District/Rise with ABA Katy, Texas