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First flu-related death in Hillsdale County This month, Michigan Department of Health and Human Services reported widespread flu outbreaks which lead to one death. A6

Birnam wood doth come to the Arb Shakespeare in the Arb to perform Macbeth this weekend.

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Vol. 139 Issue 23 - 14 April 2016

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‘Taking over the government’ Cause of Libertarian presidential candidate Austin Petersen wants to ‘leave everyone alone’ By | Breana Noble Assistant Editor

Austin Petersen is a Libertarian presidential candidate from Missouri. He is the founder of The Libertarian Republic and Stonegate LLC, a photo and video services company that specializes in consulting for brands and campaigns. In the past, Petersen was the director of production at FreedomWorks and associate producer for Judge Andrew Napolitano’s show “Freedom Watch” on the Fox Business Network. He also has experience as a model and actor. The Collegian spoke with Petersen Thursday, April 7 in a phone interview.

What can Libertarians accomplish this election?

Libertarians have the opportunity to play on the dissatisfaction of voters of the two major parties’ candidates.

Whoever is going to win the nomination of the Libertarian Party is going to have the chance to build coalitions among conservatives that are upset over the non-conservative Donald Trump and Democrats who are upset about the non-principled Hillary Clinton. If the Libertarian Party were to get just 5 percent of the national vote, that in and of itself would be an incredible victory because it would open up ballot access and matching funds, making the Libertarian Party a true, strong national party.

I’m hopeful, but I never like to make false promises. I do think it would take a real, sincere revolution on the part of the people to come together behind a third party candidate.

The only way we have a good chance of doing that is if I’m nominated.

At 35, what makes you experienced enough to hold the position of president?

Most people complain because they say they’re tired of career politicians, and then when someone who isn’t a career politician runs for office, they say, “You don’t have any experience.” Most of our presidents have different backgrounds...All of them have one thing in common: the ambi-

tion to run for the office and some sort of business or governmental experience. I have business experience, nonprofit experience, been a CEO and done payroll, and have done public service. I believe my background as a business own-

“People who discriminate against other people are bigots.” er and in public policy makes me suited for the job.

On July 4, 1776, Thomas Jefferson was 33 years old. James Madison was 25 years old.

Alexander Hamilton was 21.

Marquis de Lafayette was 18 years old. People always complain the younger generation isn’t stepping up, and they’re not taking responsibility. Our Founding Fathers stepped up and won a revolution against the most powerful army in the world. It’s young people that founded this country, and it’s young people that will restore it.

How would you deal with the Islamic State?

I think it’s possible to protect our liberty and our security at the same time. The first thing that I want to do is not use fear mongering and use fear as an excuse to take away our liberties. I believe it’s possible to protect our Constitution and not take away any of Americans’ Fourth Amendment rights. The first thing I would do is remind the American people that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

And yes, they are a sincere threat, but they are not an existential threat.

If we’re going to fight terrorism, I would follow the Constitution. I would only go to war if there was a congressional declaration of war, but if we’re going to fight terrorists like ISIS, we might consider the advice of our Founding Fa-

Hard drinks hard to buy on Sundays in Hillsdale By | Nicole Ault Collegian Reporter You can’t order a margarita in Hillsdale on a Sunday like you can in most other Michigan cities.

That’s because of little-known Sunday sales laws, known as “blue laws,” that prohibit bars and restaurants in Hillsdale County — such as El Cerrito, Here’s To You Pub & Grub, and Hunt Club — from serving liquor on Sundays.

Hillsdale County Prosecuting Attorney Neal Brady said the laws have religious origins.

“The Sunday prohibition was simply designed to control behavior in respect to the Sabbath,” Brady said. “It is a sign of the times. Today, Sundays and religious holidays have become just another day in the retail and service worlds.”

But today, the laws frustrate local business owners.

“Every election year we try to get the issue on the ballot.

Unfortunately, we have to get 1,400 signatures,” said Kevin Conant, co-owner of Here’s To Follow @HDaleCollegian

You Pub & Grub.

According to Michigan state law, businesses can sell liquor on Sundays as long as they purchase a “Sunday Sales” permit. The Michigan Liquor Control Commission distinguishes between two types of Sunday sales permits: the “A.M.” permit allows the sale of liquor, beer, and wine on Sunday mornings, while the “P.M.” permit allows liquor sales on Sunday afternoons.

Permits are not needed to sell beer and wine on Sunday afternoons.

But the state law also allows local governments to override the Sunday Sales permit option by holding a vote to restrict liquor sales.

In the 1980 general presidential election, Hillsdale County voted to prohibit businesses from serving liquor on Sundays, according to a document provided by Hillsdale County Clerk Marney Kast.

The document states that Hillsdale County residents voted not to permit the sale of s p i r i t s See Spirits A6

thers, who put in the Constitution letters of marque and reprisal...We could put a price on the head of the enemies of the United States, and that way, we could avoid collateral damage, which tends to cause more terrorism than it’s worth...We could issue a letter of marque, which is how Thomas Jefferson fought terrorism in his days, and I think that would be a cost efficient way to fight terrorism.

You said you would cut one penny from every dollar the federal government spends, which equals 1 percent in cuts across the board.

What does that mean for the Department of Defense and national security?

I think we have a lot of waste, fraud, and abuse in the DOD, and I think most people would admit that. If you’re cutting waste, fraud, and abuse, I don’t think that would mean we’d be less secure. I think that’d mean we’d be more secure because then we’d have our resources being directed toward good usage. I don’t think we’d have any worry about our security with a 1 percent budget cut, especially if we audit the Pentagon. If we audit the Pentagon, we will know where the waste, fraud, and abuse is occurring, and we can fight it.

What would your pro-life stance look like in a Petersen administration?

Ending the federal war on drugs would allow women to cut back on abortions. Ending the federal war on drugs would allow people to have the right to purchase birth control, and that is a very libertarian way to solve abortion because it is a very non-coercive way to solve the problem.

I want us to focus on those types of solutions for us to have fewer abortions, but we should absolutely take a stand that it is a human being. We should protect life at any opportunity we can using the simplest and most cost-effective and least

coercive means in our toolbox.

As an agnostic, would you take the oath of office on a Bible?

Sure I would because it’s tradition, and it means a lot to people. Thomas Jefferson said, “When it comes to religion, I don’t have a problem with it if it neither picks my pocket or break my leg.” I would have no problem taking my oath on the Bible. There’s a lot of good philosophy in the Bible, and a lot of Judeo philosophy and law had an influence on the creation of American law.

How do you plan on getting government out of marriage when so many laws mention it?

You have to have Congress write the laws, of course, but I can still speak my mind and say what I think the best way to do it is. It won’t happen over night simply because I won’t be a dictator, but I will ask Congress to send me legislation that will reduce the role of

government in marriage and how I plan to do that is work with Sens. Mike Lee, R-Ut.; Rand Paul, R-Ky.; and Ted Cruz, R-Texas, as well as congressmen like Justin Amash, R-Mich., and Thomas Massie, R-Ky., to send me good legislation that I can sign.

During the Libertarian Presidential Forum on Fox Business Network, you called those who refused to bake wedding cakes for gay couples “bigots.”

Why do you think that and how do you plan to gain support from Christians?

The foundation of Christianity is accepting and spreading Christ’s message of love to all, even those who reject traditional roles in society. Indeed, Jesus spent his days amongst prostitutes, the downtrodden, and other sorts of deviants spreading the word that it is not an individual’s place to judge God’s children but our place See Petersen A2

Austin Petersen, 35, of Missouri, is a Libertarian candidate for president. Petersen won Hillsdale’s Students for Liberty straw poll after the first-ever televised Libertarian forum last week.

Wikimedia Commons | Courtesy

CRs boycott convention Hillsdale chapter sends no delegates to state gathering By | Breana Noble Assistant Editor Hillsdale’s College Republicans boycotted the Michigan College Republicans State Convention April 3, withholding its 58 delegates — more than one third of the total delegates — from the event.

After the chapter’s leadership interviewed both candidates running for chair of the Michigan Federation of College Republicans, Hillsdale’s executive board decided not to send its delegates because neither candidate represented

the chapter’s “values, beliefs, or principles” of government’s purpose, according to a Hillsdale College Republicans press release.

“We felt they didn’t share the values and beliefs that we look for in candidates for high offices,” Hillsdale College Republicans Trustee senior Sam Holdeman said. “They both very openly said the purpose of government is to redistribute things and make sure everybody has a fair amount of stuff.”

Two Hillsdale students, who are members of the club,

Spring 2016 Convocation

did attend the convention but did not represent the chapter, Holdeman said.

Holdeman said Hillsdale boycotted the event because it was too expensive to send 58 students to Lansing, Michigan, to not vote for the most important position on the MFCR executive board, even though Hillsdale students were running for MFCR co-chair and second vice-chair.

“Looking at the numbers going in, it wouldn’t have made a difference, even with our 58 delegates,” Holdeman See CRs A2

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discolored water on campus unknown By | Philip H. DeVoe Assistant Editor While city officials do not yet know the reason for discolored water in on- and off-campus buildings last week, the Hillsdale Board of Public Utilities has ruled out work on a water main service line as the cause.

“We’re not sure where [the discoloration] stemmed from,” BPU Water Superintendent Bill Briggs said. “We have launched a full investigation, and we’re still trying to determine the root cause.”

Kevin Lawrence, water treatment superintendent at the Hillsdale Water Treatment Plant, said the discoloration could be many things, including a disturbance in the velocity of the water flow.

“We ran a couple of tests and didn’t find any positive results that would point to a reason for the discoloration,” Lawrence said.

Although the BPU was repairing a water main service lead on College Street April 6, Briggs said neither the work on nor the issues with the pipe caused the water discoloration last week, contrary to what many affected by the discolored water believed.

As the Hillsdale College administration purchases and then tears down houses in the area, service leads, which are the lines stemming from water mains and connecting to the houses, are disconnected at the curb stop per regulations, where water flowing to a home can be turned off.

“The water line had been turned off at the curb stop, but it developed a leak, possibly due to soil corrosion, so we had to dig to the water main, turn off the valve, disconnect the line, remove it, then fill the hole,” Briggs said.

The BPU completed work on the service lead by early afternoon on Wednesday and did some terrace work, which includes laying dirt and seed at the work area, on Thursday.

Chief Administration Officer Rich Péwé said via email the college is also unaware of the cause of the discoloration.

“Sometimes they flush the system or have to do work on a main and it causes the rust color… I don’t think they were flushing the system,” Péwé said. “They can’t always explain what the cause is.”

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Petersen from A1 to spread his love through kindness of spirit. The fact of the matter is that people who discriminate against other people are bigots, and because of their judgement and self-righteousness, they are rejecting Christ’s message of love. Real devotion means rejecting bigotry and loving one’s fellow man, even if one believes that fellow man to be on a wayward path, and I hope that good Christians understand that.

CRs from A1 said.

The chapter’s leadership interviewed then-MFCR CoChair Charlie Kolean from Michigan State University and Central Michigan University’s Greg Pernicano on March 14.

The convention elected Kolean as MFCR chair April 3.

In the interviews, sophomore Michael Lucchese asked each about his opinion of government’s purpose.

“I think the purpose of government is to allocate resources most efficiently,” Kolean said in the recorded interview.

“Looking at it from an economic standpoint, I believe government typically doesn’t do a good job at managing things. I think it does a poor job because of low accountability.”

Pernicano dropped from the chair race shortly before the convention, but he also advocated for the reallocation of resources.

“We felt they didn’t share the values and beliefs that we look for in candidates for high offices.”

“The main purposes of government, one, is to facilitate the equal distribution of resources or, at least, make sure that everybody has a fair chance at acquiring those resources,” Pernicano said in the interview. “Second is to ensure that basic needs are met like

Hillsdale’s great books program ranked No. 3 in nation By | Hannah Niemeier Collegian Reporter According to an online college review journal, Hillsdale College has made an odyssey into the nation’s top-ranking literature programs.

Hillsdale was ranked No. 3 on a list of the 25 Best Great Books Programs in the country, published in July by Best College Reviews. The review recommended Hillsdale’s literature program as part of a curriculum that requires all students to take great books courses as part of a liberal arts education, preparing them for work in many disciplines.

“Imagine being taught by the greatest masters of the mind that walked on this Earth,” Best College Reviews said on its website. “If you can imagine such a place, you’ve imagined a great books or liberal arts education.”

Best College Reviews judged colleges according to a strict definition of the liberal arts. To qualify, colleges food, water, and shelter. They have a moral responsibility to keep people from severe poverty and afford them opportunities for those things.

Thirdly, to maintain order.”

Holdeman said Hillsdale’s College Republicans board did not support these ideas.

“As Republicans and Hillsdale CRs, none of us on the board feel that way at all,” Holdeman said. “I’d be surprised if any of us here at the college in general do.”

Two other chapters did not attend the convention, including the University of Michigan’s, said Luke Strobe, treasurer for Aquinas College’s chapters.

Although Kolean did not respond to media inquiries, College Republicans Chair James Dell at Calvin College, a friend of Kolean’s, vouched for his leadership abilities.

“He loves serving in this capacity,” Dell said. “Everyone at MFCR goes out of their way to make sure everyone has a voice, whether it’s Hillsdale College or Calvin College.”

Holdeman said looking forward, he hopes the future leadership of Hillsdale’s chapter will work with those in the federation.

“I’m sure they will work to reach out and make sure that there are a bridge and bonds there,” Holdeman said.

CRs bring James O’Keefe of Project Veritas to campus By | Chris McCaffery Student Columnist Hillsdale College Republicans brought James O’Keefe, the controversial political activist best known for his undercover videos of the community activist group ACORN’s workers, to campus to speak and sign books April 7. Students received free copies of O’Keefe’s book “Breakthrough: Our Guerilla War to Expose Fraud and Save Democracy” at the lecture.

O’Keefe discussed several case studies in his career practicing what he calls “guerilla journalism” and addressed questions on the legality and ethics of his techniques. College Republicans paid O’Keefe no speaking fee for the event.

O’Keefe is president of Project Veritas, an organization he founded in 2010 to “investigate and expose corruption, dishonesty, self-dealing, waste, fraud, and other misconduct in both public and private institutions in order to achieve a more ethical and transparent society.”

His targeted undercover investigations of Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now workers and

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other high-profile organizations have generated frenzied media coverage since 2008.

In 2010, O’Keefe was arrested with partners in New Orleans, Louisiana, when attempting to record a government official.

He was charged with a misdemeanor for attempting to gain access to federal property under false pretenses.

“I thought it was very interesting,” said sophomore Claudia Sladick, College Republicans chairwoman. “I was not aware of many of the things he has done in his career, and I’m glad we had him on campus to share with us.”

The College Republicans invited O’Keefe to speak, even though his tactics are controversial, because he is an influential voice in national politics.

“O’Keefe has been on the front lines of exposing modern liberalism throughout the country,” said sophomore Michael Lucchese, College Republicans trustee. “Even though his tactics may be controversial, he has exposed many important things, and we thought it would be good to bring him to campus and have him educate the Hillsdale electorate.”

have to offer at least 30 credit hours of “great books-style education” in small classes where students engage in Socratic dialogue while discussing classic texts.

Hillsdale’s curriculum requires all students to take two great books courses regardless of their major. These classes give students a foundation in fundamental questions, said Dwight Lindley, professor of English at Hillsdale College.

“We study great books to form our understanding of the kinds of things humans are interested in,” Lindley said.

“They help us think well about the things we’re going to think about anyway: What does it mean to be human? What is community? What is love? A great books education has the virtue of forming our way of thinking about those questions with the most impressive thinkers we have access to.”

But Lindley said not all great books programs are created equal.

Other featured liberal arts

colleges, including first-ranking Biola University’s Torrey Honors Institute in California and runner-up New St. Andrews College in Idaho, focus almost exclusively on the classics in their curricula, according to Best College Reviews’ website. St. John’s Col-

“Learning how to analyze literature with great books can be scary.” lege, which finished fourth, is famous for its unstructured, tutorial-based education centered on the great books.

“St. John’s has a more text-centric approach,” Lindley said. “Hillsdale’s great books model is more historicized.

One of the defining features of our model is that we also teach

history courses that place texts within a broader narrative.”

Best College Reviews noted this wide scope of study at Hillsdale.

Lindley, who graduated from Hillsdale in 2004, said he has seen Hillsdale’s professors shift toward a more traditional canon of selected texts in the English department, as well as in politics and philosophy, in the past 15 years.

Rebekah Slonim, a senior English major, said studying a selected set of great books helps students appreciate good literature while also improving their writing skills.

“Students get to read works that are worth reading,” Slonim said. “The list is somewhat ambiguous — How do we know something is as good as ‘The Odyssey’? — but it’s a great way to learn to analyze literature.”

While tutoring students at the Douglas H. Hawkins Writing Center, she said she noticed students often are intimidated by the great books

courses at first.

“Learning how to analyze literature with great books can be scary,” Slonim said. “Students are just learning to write, and they say, ‘I have to analyze “The Odyssey”?’ It’s hard, but once you’ve done that, you can do anything.”

Students in all majors benefit from reading and analyzing great literature, Lindley said.

“I teach literature as analogous to scientific study,” Lindley said. “Though some people see literature as mostly subjective, they’re really just two different kinds of analysis. We use the evidence in front of us to reach a probable conclusion about the things we all care about. People learn better that way. Humans connect to humans — not just ideas.”

Slonim said the great books courses provide a foundation for further studies.

“Hopefully studying great books opens their minds — and their imaginations — to what’s in them,” Slonim said.

Wiese resigns from Student Fed presidency By | JoAnna Kroeker Collegian Reporter During the April 7 meeting, Student Federation President junior Christian Wiese announced his resignation following his younger brother’s unexpected death.

“I need to take a step back and do some thinking and grieving,” he said. “I would like to say many thanks to everyone on campus for being so supportive and encouraging during this difficult season.”

Vice President junior Joseph Spica will swear in as president Thursday, April 21.

While Van Andel Graduate School of Statesmanship Rep. Andrew Heim, Chi Omega Rep. junior Emma Klaserner, and Independent Rep. sophomore Christie Mittelstaedt were eligible for the vice president nomination, Heim and Klaserner decided not to run, leaving Mittelstaedt to take Spica’s place. Heim said the graduate students elect their representative on a semesterly basis, and running for the position would preemptively elect himself for the fall.

Director of Student Activities Anthony Manno said Wiese needs to do what’s best for him.

“He’s good at what he does,” Manno said. “I’m going to miss him.”

Wiese said he will miss serving on the federation, as well.

“I really love Student Fed,” Wiese said. “I have appreciated the discussions that have happened. Everyone has been respectful and, in my opinion, encouraging of one another.”

Spica said he feels comfortable taking the new position because Wiese and the current

board set a good foundation.

Student Fed also fully funded requests from Students Activities Board and Lighthouse, Hillsdale’s mental health awareness club.

The federation members unanimously approved S A B ’ s $6,214.99 request for the 10th a n n u a l CentralAfter months of service as Student Federation hallapalooza, or CHP, president, junior Christian Wiese resigned on a decrease April 7. Facebook | Courtesy from $7,000 last year and lower performance and pro$10,500 two years ago. duction cost this year, SAB has Manno said SAB had to more money for food and cabudget less money this year tering. for CHP because it has held Additionally, Manno said more frequent, smaller events because the right atmosphere this year for people to notice makes the event memorable, SAB’s presence more often. decorations are a point of emThe group also has done fre- phasis this year. quent giveaways to encourage Last year’s decorations were participation in surveys and less expensive due to the rustic athletic events. theme. This year’s decorations, Director of SAB senior unlike hay, are more expenCorinne Wiggins said since sive, SAB Events Coordinator CHP is one of the group’s junior Shelby Phillips said. most-attended events, SAB The event, scheduled for conducted surveys in order to April 30, is arguably one of the receive feedback about where most foundational traditions best to spend the money. Stu- to the student body of Hillsdents responded they wanted dale, Wiggins said. more money toward food so Lighthouse received $530 that it would last all night and for food and speaker’s travelmore student bands. With a ing costs for its fifth Behind

the Stigma event held April 6. The speaker, mental health counselor Ashley Culver, spoke to approximately 120 people about self-harm and the mindsets that contribute to it.

In addition to approving the funds, Student Fed also commemorated the professor of the month for February.

Assistant Professor of Politics Adam Carrington received the award for his appearance on a radio show to discuss the death of Justice Antonin Scalia and an article he published, which Hillsdale College’s website featured.

“Dr. Carrington is loved by all his students, even though he is a Cincinnati Reds fan,” Alpha Tau Omega Rep. senior Tyler Warman said. “He facilitates an engaging discussion that sparks curiosity in even the most cynical Constitution 101 student.”

Warman highlighted the hard work Carrington puts into every lecture as well as his genuine care for all of his students and eagerness to resolve concerns.

“It’s a very great honor, and very much appreciate it, even if I feel completely undeserving,” Carrington said.

Student Federation will have one more meeting on April 22 before the end of the semester. Students can submit suggestions for campus improvements to Independent Rep. freshman Tom Ryskamp at tryskamp@hillsdale.edu before then.

For those interested in becoming involved with Student Fed, it is holding a coffee social on Monday, April 18, and representatives will answer questions and provide more details.

The bells of Central Hall ring again By | Breana Noble Assistant Editor It was a little quieter around campus this semester, until April 6.

Since finals weeks in December 2015, Central Hall’s clock tower chimes did not ring out every 15 minutes as usual.

Once a student brought attention to administration about the silence, maintenance turned on the bells, which had apparently been off since final exams the prior semester.

“I’m kind of surprised it went that long,” said Richard Day from maintenance.

Day said he believes the bells have not rang since December because they were turned off for finals week and forgotten to be switched back on.

“We try not to disturb the classes,” Day said.

An automatic system times the chimes. Along with finals week, the college turns off the

How to: Advertise with the Collegian If interested in placing an advertisement in the Collegian, please contact ad manager Patrick Nalepa at pnalepa@hillsdale.edu.

bells when commencement occurs outdoors. The bells also go silent when maintenance adjusts the clock faces, such as at daylight savings time.

Yet, it took someone to the point when there were only five weeks left in the semester to notice the bells weren’t ringing.

“I spoke with some of the guys I work with, and they didn’t notice,” Day said.

Chief Administrative Officer Rich Péwé said turning the bell on is simple, a matter of flipping a switch.

“We’ve probably been oblivious,” Péwé said. “I haven’t noticed at all.”

Now that the bells are chiming again, students said, unlike at times in the past, the rings are happening at each 15-minute interval in an hour. Some claimed that the bells were slow before.

“It’s nice it rings on time now so you know if you’re late to class,” sophomore S a r a h Casebeer

said.

Day said the mechanisms that control the clock faces and chimes are two different system, so sometimes they become slightly off in timing from each other.

“They don’t tie together,” Day said. “We try to keep it as close as we can.”

In the future, if someone does notice a discrepancy with the clock faces and the bells, Day recommended notifying administration or maintenance.

“Let us know,”

Day said, “and we’ll do what we can.”

Vivian Hughbanks | Collegian

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Man of science, man of God

Brother Guy Consolmagno speaks in Markel Auditorium on Wednesday, April 13. Anders Kiledal | Collegian

By | Kaylee McGhee Collegian Reporter Brother Guy Consolmagno addressed the student body during Hillsdale’s biannual convocation ceremony Thursday.

Consolmagno is a native of Detroit, Michigan, and earned his undergraduate and master’s degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and his doctorate in planetary science from the University of Arizona. He served in the Peace Corps in Kenya and taught physics at Lafayette College before becoming a Jesuit in 1989.

In 2015, Pope Francis appointed him Director of the Vatican Observatory, where he conducts research exploring the origin and structure of asteroids. His research has taken him to every continent on Earth and has led him to publish more than 200 scientific publications.

In 2014, he received the Carl Sagan Medal from the American Astronomical Society Division for Planetary Sciences for excellence in public communication in planetary sciences.

Hillsdale College chose Consolmagno as this semester’s convocation speaker because of his harmony with the college’s mission.

“I first heard about Brother Guy when I gave a speech at the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition,” President Larry Arnn said in an email. “The founder, Ken Ford, knows Brother Guy well and praised him as a learned and interesting man.”

Consolmagno’s reputation preceeded him, and it was apparent to Hillsdale’s leadership that he is sympathetic with the school’s purpose, Arnn said.

“He is a very distinguished academic and an important figure in the Christian faith,” Arnn said.

By | Philip H. DeVoe Assistant Editor What initially drew you to astronomy?

I’ve always loved looking at the stars, and, as a kid, I had my own little telescope. It was also a part of the times. I was a kindergartner when Sputnik went into orbit and a senior at [University of Detroit Jesuit High School] when man landed on the moon, so it was just part of the zeitgeist.

But I was also a big fan of science fiction. To me, planets are places where people have adventures, and I wanted to know about the places where people have adventures. It was always part of a story.

Who are some of your favorite science fiction authors?

I have very low taste in science fiction. There are some authors who ask deep and profound questions, but I do deep and profound for a living. I read science fiction for the fun of it. One current favorite is a husband and wife team, Steve Miller and Sharon Lee. They write the worst type of trashy space opera, and I love it. It’s relaxing, it’s fun, and it makes you look at the world in a different way. There are some of the classic [writers] who people have long since forgotten, like James Schmidt, who wrote space opera.

Again, what I love in a good science fiction book is a sense of fun. Someone who does write profound stuff but has that sense of fun is Connie Willis. She has done a lot of time travel stories, which are very good, and has more content than the others. Gene Wolf was a modern writer of fantasy. It’s interesting — of the

latter two, Connie…is Episcopalian and Gene…is Catholic.

I think having a religious sensibility gives you a compass that allows you to orient what is right and wrong. The laws of right and wrong are as inflexible as the laws of physics.

What are your duties at the Vatican Observatory?

First and foremost, I am an astronomer. I work in the field of planetary science and, particularly, meteoritics. I am interested in small bodies in the solar system, how they formed, where they formed, what we can learn about them today, and what clues they give us about how the solar system formed. What we’ve done in the laboratory is measure the physical properties of meteorites — are they porous or tightly packed, and what does that tell us about how they are formed?

At the telescope, we look at the colors of distant objects beyond Neptune to see if there’s a pattern between which ones are gray colored, which ones are red colored, compared to their orbits and how stirred up the orbits have been over time.

It’s a lot of little bits of a few bricks that eventually build the cathedral. You aren’t going to build it yourself.

Your talk is titled ‘Does Science Need God’—does science need God? I don’t think we would have science without God because God gives us the motivation to do the science. We do science — I don’t care what your religion is — we do science partly because it’s fun, and that sense of joy, I think, is evident of the presence of God. We also do it out of curiosity, and that curiosity is what makes us more than just animals, more than just “what’s for lunch,” and we do it out of a desire for the truth. God is a source of truth. Any scientist who cares more about “Is it true?” than “Is it going to help my reputation?” is worshipping something that’s transcendent and is as close to God as one can be.

Have you ever found anything in your research that has challenged your faith in

A3 14 April 2016 God? Nothing in my science has ever challenged my religion and my faith in religion, but it has challenged my faith in science. I’ll see one bit of science that I thought I understood and see another bit of science that contradicts it, and of course, that’s exciting because it means that I didn’t understand either enough, and I have to learn more, and I know I’m never going to understand my religion completely. I’m never going to understand God, and I shouldn’t be surprised if I’m taken aback by God creating the universe in a way different than I expected.

I’ll give you an example.

“I was a kindergartner when Sputnik went into orbit.”

It has nothing to do with science, just my own life. When I was in my 30s, I was confident that God had given me great freedom to find him wherever I looked, however I wanted to live. When I was in my 40s, and I had become a Jesuit scientist, and it was so obviously right that this is what I was supposed to be doing, I realized he may have given me the freedom, but e also had an idea of what he really wanted me to do. How you balance that wonderful freedom versus no, this is what you’re destined for. Well, of course, that is the theme of all literature. How do you balance freedom and destiny? How do you balance an omnipotent God and a God that is so powerful he chooses to be weak and born as a baby?

You find that theme in theology. You also find these sorts of contradictions in science, and that’s why I love science, because it gives me a sense of God’s personality, and when you see a familiar trait, a familiar sense of humor, then you have confidence that you’re looking at the same thing.

Do you find that you’re

in the minority among your colleagues, being outwardly religious?

That is what I expected, and I was shocked when I came back to the world of science, after taking a few years off to become a Jesuit, to hear so many of my friends come up and say, “Let me tell you about the church I go to, since religion is one of the things we don’t talk about.” I think we all think we’re the only one, and to discover that there’s someone else who goes to church as well is reassuring.

After a while, though, it became silly, since everybody goes to church, and we were all keeping it quiet thinking we were the only ones… It’s not true in all fields, and I have friends who are atheists or agnostics, but even there, to be an atheist is to have a very clear idea of the god it is you know you don’t believe in, and I believe in only one more god than Steph en Hawking. Most of the ideas of God we have come across over the years don’t work, aren’t right. We’re still looking to improve the vision we have, but in terms of participating in a religion, it’s been amusing to see that I have friends who belong to every religion you could imagine and some you couldn’t, and the proportion of scientists who also are people of faith pretty much matches the population of the culture they come from. In the Midwest, I’d say 50 percent of the scientists I know are church-goers because that’s typical of the Midwest. In England, maybe 10 percent. Oddly, there’s absolutely no correlation between how good you are as a scientist and whether or not you go to church. There are wonderfully devout people who are pretty awful scientists and wonderfully devout people who are great scientists. There are ferocious atheists and people with terrible lifestyles who do good science and others who don’t.

It’s a completely different dimension of one’s life. But if you think about it, that shouldn’t be surprising.

Thackston elected 2017 class president By | Anders Hagstrom Collegian Reporter Hillsdale College’s class of 2017 elected rising senior Jacob Thackston as class president Wednesday.

“I’m truly grateful to my fellow classmates for their support,” Thackston said. “Hillsdale really is about the people, and I’m excited to embark on a purpose-driven year together this fall.”

More than 170 juniors voted Tuesday and Wednesday to elect their senior committee. Victoria Fassett will serve

as Thackston’s vice president.

The class secretary is Hannah Andrews, the treasurer is Ian Gensler, and the social chairwoman is Jada Bissett. Jessie Fox will fills the new class development officer position.

Responsible for planning all senior class events, including parties, the senior gift, and future class reunions, the committee will lead the 2017 senior class to graduation and beyond.

While the traditional responsibilities of the class president are limited to leading senior committee meetings,

speaking for fellow classmates in the selection of a commencement speaker, and serving as host for certain college functions, Thackston said he hopes to have a more substantial impact.

“I feel that many of the opinions of our student body go unheard by the administration,” Thackston said. “I was elected to serve the student body, and I plan to use that position to make sure our thoughts are heard.”

Thackston, a philosophy major and politics minor, is spending the semes-

the other Hillsdale team at the competition, placed fourth.

“Both groups did a fantastic job at representing the college and should be congratulated for doing us all proud,” said Douglas Johnson, project management professor at Hillsdale College.

Spectrum Health, a health and insurance provider, pairs with the Project Management Institute, or PMI, to host the competition every year. The competitors, 12 different teams from 10 schools, had to address a problem posed

by Spectrum Health and the PMI. To do this, the teams created projects to present at the event, a capstone of more than a semester’s worth of work for a three-credit business class.

This year, the project required the teams to develop a solution and implement a project management business plan intended to prevent chronic disease and promote the health of Michigan children to a panel of judges.

Team Truth focuses on

obesity. Gresenz said its campaign slogan is “Eat Athletic,” a catchy and recognizable slogan similar to “Got Milk?”

“Our idea is for people to see ‘Eat Athletic’ and live by that, and that is going to change lives,” she said.

Nalepa said their idea had different prongs: start education on healthy eating choices early with postnatal mothers in the hospital; partner with schools; team up with the NFL Play 60 campaign, which encourages kids to exercise for one hour a day; have increased access to kids through the YMCA; and start after-school programs.

Spectrum Health expressed an interest in implementing the recommendations offered by the winning team, Gresenz said. Since the competition, Team Truth has remained in contact with Spectrum Health.

The company invited Team Truth to present again to higher tier representatives.

“They said they can definitely see rolling out this plan,

Panama Papers implicate world leaders

Speaker Paul Ryan will not seek GOP nomination

ter studying in Washington, D.C. through the Washington-Hillsdale Internship Program. He also serves as president of A Few Good Men, is a George Washington fellow, and serves as the vice president of the campus philosophy honorary, Phi Sigma Tau. As vice president, Fassett will organize senior committee meetings and assist Thackston and the rest of the committee in planning senior events.

In addition to vice president, Fassett is also a member of the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority.

Fox will fill the new role of development officer. Taking the place of fundraising chair from previous years, the development officer is responsible for working closely with the 1844 Society and managing plans for support of the college following graduation.

As treasurer, Gensler will be responsible for organizing the class gift; as secretary, Andrews will manage agendas for committee meetings and publicity for senior class events.

Finally, as social chair, Bissett will hold responsibility for planning all senior class social

events, namely the senior tailgate party at homecoming.

Each of the committee members expressed gratitude toward their fellow classmates and an excitement to lead the class of 2017 through and following its final year at Hillsdale.

“Our class has elected a great committee,” Fox said.

“We look forward to having a voice with which to give back to the school, which has given so much to us.”

Team Truth wins big at management competition

By | Emma Vinton and Hannah Leitner Assistant Editor and Collegian Reporter Six Hillsdale students were the first team ever to win a business project competition with a perfect score Monday.

The team — called Team Truth — traveled to Hudsonville, Michigan, where they presented a project on the competition’s theme of childhood obesity, asthma, and diabetes.

“One of the judges said it was because of our passion that we beat them,” Restuccia said.

Seniors Alex Buchmann, Dominic Restuccia, Molly Gresenz, and Patrick Nalepa; junior Molly Scott; and freshman Lydia Reyes earned $5,000 for their work with Spectrum Health and the Project Management Institute in the fifth annual competition.

They beat Cornerstone University’s team by two points for first place. Team Liberty,

5

things to know from this week

The International Consortium of Journalists revealed a collection of leaked documents known as the ‘Panama papers’ linking prominent world politicians and businessmen to tax havens routed through a law firm in Panama City, Panama. Among those named in the documents are -Compiled by Philip H. DeVoe close friends of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., announced Tuesday he will not be seeking the GOP nomination for president. “I do not want, nor will I accept, the nomination for our party,” Ryan said at the Republican National Convention headquarters in Washington.

though they might make some minor changes to certain elements,” Gresenz said. “Who knows? In a few years, we might see ‘Eat Athletic’ on billboards all over.”

The different teams acquired points through the semester by completing various assignments of the presentation. Restuccia said Team Truth was in sixth place before presentations on Monday and

did not have much hope. But the team’s mentor, Spectrum Health employee Matt Boon, encouraged the team.

“He believed in us from day one to us standing on that platform and getting the check,” Restuccia said.

The project is the main portion of Hillsdale College’s three-credit project management class. Team Truth began work on the project before

Christmas break and had three virtual lectures via Skype, as well. The competitors returned early to school in the spring semester to meet with the team and share ideas for the project.

Nalepa said each team presented once for a panel, and the final four teams presented again for executive judges.

These judges were high level employees at Spectrum, other sponsors, as well as teams that did not make the final four, local companies, and recruiters.

“Presenting was nerve-wracking, but at the same time, it felt natural,” he said. “The difference was those two points; it was that passion.”

The six members will split the winnings. Gresenz said she will probably save her share, though others may not.

“Molly Scott said she is going to Disney World,” Gresenz said.

The team members will receive their trophies at the May 9 meeting of PMI’s Western Michigan chapter.

Protesters swarm U.S. Capitol

Sanders wins Wyoming primary

Red Wings head to Stanley Cup playoffs

Capitol police arrested more than 400 protesters participating in ‘Democracy Spring’ after the protesters marched 150 miles from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C. for unlawful demonstration.

The protesters will be charged with crowding, obstructing, and incommoding and tried using mass arrest procedures.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Ver., won the Democratic primary in Wyoming with 55.7 percent of the vote, and Hillary Clinton lost with 44.3 percent of the vote. Each candidate earned seven delegates, bring their respective totals to 1,069 and 1,758. Fewer than 300 people voted in the primary, and Sanders beat Clinton by a 32-vote margin.

The Detroit Red Wings hockey team made their 25th consecutive Stanley Cup playoffs. Even though they lost their final game of the season, 3-2 to the New York Rangers, a loss by the Boston Bruins to the Ottawa Senators guaranteed them a spot. The wings LOST their first playoff game to the Tampa Bay Lightning last night 3-2.

Seniors Dominic Restuccia and Alex Buchmann with Spectrum Health employee and mentor Matt Boon.

Dominic Restuccia | Courtesy

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Online: www.hillsdalecollegian.com Editor in Chief | Macaela J. Bennett News Editor | Vivian Hughbanks City News Editor | Kate Patrick Opinions Editor | Sarah Albers Sports Editor | Nathanael Meadowcroft Arts Editor | Ramona Tausz Features Editor | Amanda Tindall Design Editor | Meg Prom Web Editor | Evan Carter Photo Editor | Anders Kiledal Associate Editor | Micah Meadowcroft Senior Reporter | Natalie C. McKee Circulation Managers | Sarah Chavey | Conor Woodfin Ad Managers | Drew Jenkins | Patrick Nalepa Assistant Editors | Stevan Bennett, Jr. | Philip H. DeVoe | Andrew Egger | Jessie Fox | Madeleine Jepsen | Breana Noble | Tom Novelly | Joe Pappalardo | Emma Vinton Photographers | Madeline Barry | Elena Creed | Stacey Egger | Madeline Fry | Brendan Miller | Hailey Morgan | Carsten Stann | Ben Strickland | Lillian Quinones Faculty Advisers | John J. Miller | Maria Servold

The opinion of the Collegian editorial staff

Sometimes our professors seem sadistic, heaping papers and exams upon us with glee. But our faculty here at Hillsdale are some of the nicest around. They’re even taking steps to help us sort out our sordid love lives.

On Monday at 8 p.m. in the Heritage Room, Associate Professor of English Patricia Bart, Director of Health Services Brock Lutz, Assistant Dean of Men Jeffrey Rogers, and Kathryn Wales will participate in a panel on Hillsdating.

Hillsdating — if you’re fortunate enough not to know what the term means

— is “a relationship where a guy and a girl who like each other spend every waking moment together but refuse to admit or agree that they are dating,” according to Urban Dictionary.

Whether you think Hillsdating is a problem or not, the fact that faculty and staff are taking time out of their evenings to discuss a topic so significant to students shows just how much they care about us.

So as the semester toughens up even more and sleep comes your way even less, don’t complain about how hard professors make their

classes. If you take advantage of their generosity, your load will feel lighter. When you go to office hours to ask for help on a paper or an assignment, don’t try to make your time there as short as possible. Ask them how they’re doing. When they return the question, don’t just spit out the typical “Good, thanks.”

It’s OK to tell them you’re struggling a bit to complete the paper they assigned with everything else you have to do. They really do care about how you’re doing.

So thank you, each member of the faculty, for putting up with us, helping us, giv-

ing us advice, and getting to know us. Thank you for helping us grow not only intellectually, but relationally and spiritually. Thank you for viewing us as people and not as a means to a paycheck.

Not every college’s student body can say that. Hillsdale College certainly wouldn’t be what it is without you.

The editors welcome Letters to the Editor but reserve the right to edit submissions for clarity, length, and style. Letters should be 450 words or less and include your name and number. Send submissions to salbers@hillsdale. edu before Saturday at 3 p.m.

The case for young adult literature By | Hannah Niemeier Special to the Collegian

Is conservatism good for America?

“Conservative politicians and pundits seek

By | Jonathan Walker Special to the Collegian

Michael Lucchese asks (“Bring Trump voters back into the GOP,” April 7), “What should conservatives do when we wrest our movement away from national populism and Donald Trump?” But is the conservative movement worth saving in the first place?

Lucchese supports William F. Buckley’s method of making conservatism “respectable” by purging “extremists.” But that entails shifting the political center leftward as ideas on the right are marginalized. Since the left retains its extremists, thus making the bulk of its members appear moderate by comparison, the result is continual retreat by the right.

Such retreat has characterized conservatism for decades, as ideas that were once unthinkable become tolerable, then acceptable, and finally unquestionable, such as no-fault divorce and “same-sex marriage.” Today’s conservative defends yesterday’s victories of the left, accusing those to his right of various isms and phobias (Lucchese lists “racism, sexism, xenophobia,” and “quasi-fascism”) for the thoughtcrime of even countenancing arguments once printed in National Review — such as critiques from the early

Guest: Micah Meadowcroft

Hannah is a sophomore studying English and journalism.

William F. Buckley, Jr. and President Ronald Reagan in 1967, after Reagan's first apperance on Buckley's show, "Firing Line."

Public Domain | Flickr

Uses of a Liberal Arts Education

According to a Time magazine list of the top 100 young adult novels, “We’re living in a golden age of young-adult literature, when books ostensibly written for teens are equally adored by readers of every generation.”

The widespread popularity of young adult fiction shows that readers of all ages appreciate the message of hope that mark the enduring works in the genre: Battles can be won.

Love can be found. Dragons can be slain.

The reading public has not always been as stratified as it is today. The term “young adult literature” appeared in the late 1960s when writers such as S.E. Hinton in “The Outsiders” began to focus expressly on the struggles of “adolescents,” another newly-minted term for people lost in the abyss between childhood and adulthood. Passionate stories of identity, belonging, and young love eclipsed nostalgic, out-of-touch stories written — condescendingly — “for” children.

But even before this distinction separated children’s and young adult literature, generations of adults have taken refuge in young people’s stories. Two masters of the genre, C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkein, returned to fairy tales throughout their lives.

C.S. Lewis, whose “Chronicles of Narnia” could be considered the quintessential fantasy story for all ages, said literature should not be marketed to specific age groups.

Lewis said that children’s literature improves with age.

Tolkein took this further. “Insofar as [fairy stories] have been so banished, they have been ruined,” he said. For Tolkien, a good story is valuable at any age.

Daniel Coupland, professor of education, said students in his children’s literature class gain a deeper understanding of stories from their childhoods, including Aesop’s “Fables,” “The Wind in the Willows,” and “Pinocchio.”

But depth of understanding is not the only attraction of young people’s literature. Meghan Gurdon, children’s book reviewer for the Wall Street Journal, said young adult books like Ruta Sepetys’s “Between Shades of Gray” offer a challenge to readers.

“Teenagers have a natural instinct for stories of grueling challenge: it’s a time of life when we’re venturing into the world, and it makes us ask: do I have what it takes to survive?”

Gurdon said. “Could I make it through an avalanche or a zombie apocalypse, or the hunger games — or even just a high school filled with mean girls? Books allow us to live vicariously, to try on personae, to seem to be experiencing these brutal tests, without risking our actual lives.”

But in a reading culture inundated with every possible variation on the vampire romance and the “awkward girl gets popular boy” story, all young adult fiction is clearly not created equal.

“A lot of young adult literature seems to be merely therapeutic. We tell kids, ‘It’s okay,’” Coupland said. “But what about rising above our problems?”

Though teachers and parents often hail the young adult fiction craze for bringing children back to the library, some stories give readers what they want, not what they need.

Writers imagine — often rightly — that teens want to escape the anxieties of adolescence through glorified daydreams: What if that boy asked me out? What if zombies took over the world, and I had to fight them? What if a zombie and I fell in love? What then?

But for a young adult fiction novel to resonate beyond the hallways of high school, it must offer more than a mental refuge. It must take readers on a journey that teaches them how to live, transporting the reader out of his weary life and into an adventure in which characters grow, learn, and conquer their struggles.

Young adult literature draws its strength from adolescents’ passionate search for identity in their teenage years. Done poorly, this devolves into an indulgence of teens’ fantasies.

Done well, young adult literature can be a powerful expression of discovery and hope.

“Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist,” G.K. Chesterton said. “Children already know that dragons exist.

Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed.”

The rising popularity of young adult fiction shows that a story’s value lies not in its label, but in its promise that dragons — no matter their shape, size, or target audience — can be slain.

to preserve a watered-down leftism clothed in hackneyed references to the Founders.”

90s of the 1965 Immigration Act — before the “respectable” right deemed them, well, unrespectable.

Today, it’s not uncommon for the respectable right to dismiss a person or proposal as “not conservative.” But this tactic proves weak against someone who argues that his proposals are good for Americans' security, prosperity, and happiness. Exit polls suggest that two-thirds of Republican primary voters in various states support frontrunner Donald Trump’s proposed suspension of Muslim immigration. Of this proposal, conservative Paul Ryan said, “This is not conservatism.” Seventy percent of GOP voters in his state replied through polls, “So what?”

If conservatives want to keep Americans in their movement, they should explain how their movement actually benefits Americans. Too often, they defend policies like endless war and mass immigration as beneficial to foreigners, not citizens.

When conservatives do mention citizens, they usually disregard the common good

and pander instead to leftistapproved identity groups while dismissing — to borrow Lucchese’s term — the “Other,” namely, rural whites.

Thus, National Review’s November 2 cover story was about how “Republicans can win black voters.” Last month, they published an article titled “The Father-Führer,” excoriating “white working class” Trump supporters whose “dysfunctional, downscale communities … deserve to die.”

Its author, NR correspondent Kevin Williamson, calls people on Twitter “peckerwood,” a derogatory term for poor whites. Just another day’s work for the respectable right.

Granted, Lucchese opposes such rhetoric, contending that conservatives should follow the lead of Lincoln’s Second Inaugural, and welcome back voters who have taken to “national populism.” But this presumes that such voters are akin to treasonous insurrectionists, when the betrayal actually runs the opposite way: Conservative politicians and pundits have chosen respectability over their fellow citizens.

Conservative politicians and pundits have chosen respectability over their fellow citizens. They seek to preserve not their nation and its people, but instead their loser movement, a watered-down leftism clothed in hackneyed references to the Founders.

Does the movement merit being saved? Conservatism means purging on the right, capitulating on the left, and always, always shifting leftward.

All a conservative has to do to be shunned by his fellows is to stand firm.

The conservatives of tomorrow will purge you as a closed-minded, bigoted “extremist” for supposing, say, that men who call themselves women might not actually be women, and perhaps shouldn’t be allowed to look at girls in the women’s locker room. But don't worry. Whatever might become of America, at least conservatism will remain respectable.

Jonathan is a Ph.D. Candidate in Politics.

A5 14 April 2016

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Don’t take our ‘inestimable blessings’ for granted By | Chris McCaffery Student Columnist I came to Hillsdale College because I wanted a normal college experience.

Of course, I wanted Hillsdale’s liberal education, to read the canon of the western tradition — you've seen the brochures. I was skeptical, too, of the monastic environment of “great books” schools like the 100-student Thomas More College of Liberal Arts or 400-strong Thomas Aquinas College. That was not the college life about which I’d heard so much — where the football games, where the fraternities, where even the majors and minors?

Hillsdale seemed to offer good young Republican boys a solid education that could be comfortably set aside for time with friends and recreation. I was going to a normal college, like the ones you see on TV. In that sense, Hillsdale has been nothing but a disappointment to me.

I know now that Hillsdale College is a profoundly strange place. From my first interactions with my peers and upperclassmen, I began to understand that a strange and scary thing happens: Hillsdale changes you into one of its own.

The real glory of Hillsdale is that I wasn’t entirely wrong about her when I chose to come here. Hillsdale is in fact a school with a vibrant

Greek life, successful athletic programs, parties and dorm rooms with video games and pranks and even enough anonymity to make it feel comfortably uncloistered.

I wasn’t wrong about a lick of that stuff. I was simply uninformed about the real, core, unrepeatable “only at Hillsdale” experience: that these things are in no way exclusive of or set apart from our intellectual life.

Professor of English John Somerville enjoys bragging about the success of the Visiting Writers Program here and sharing the testimony of previous campus visitors about their experience with the college and its students.

What stands out about these stories is that the writers, many of whom are not familiar with Hillsdale or its reputation, all identify in Hillsdale’s students some element of unique intellectual engagement. You can find nerds anywhere in honors colleges and humanities core curricula. What you cannot find just anywhere is the type of partnership which Hillsdale has been so quietly intentional about creating among us as it transforms us from Hillsdale students into Hillsdale’s students.

Provost David Whalen warned me during an October visit to campus in 2011 that Hillsdale students can’t go home again without feeling like they’ve just left

home. Halfway through my freshman year, I experienced that ridiculous claim as personally true. I realized I’d been wrong: that Hillsdale doesn’t simply mean that you happen to be cocktail-party comfortable with The Western Tradition and The American Founding. What it can mean, if it is allowed to, is that things which have been in most places and for many years dead letter become a part of our shared life. It's organic, unnoticed as it develops.

This is, in my estimation, Hillsdale’s greatest strength as a college. It is informed by the conservative ethos of her professors and students and by the large core curriculum in the oldest, greatest things, but it’s not really reducible to that.

It’s the ability to learn while living, or more accurately, live through and in our learning.

We should never take this for granted, and we should take some inspiration from our founders, “grateful to God for the inestimable blessings resulting from the prevalence of civil and religious liberty and intelligent piety in the land, and believing that the diffusion of sound learning is essential to the perpetuity of these blessings, having founded and endowed a college at Hillsdale, Hillsdale County, State of Michigan.”

Chris is a senior studying English and journalism.

Chi Omega, Kappa Kappa Gamma, and Pi Beta Phi sorority members during Greek Week.

Courtesy | Jessie Fox

Greek Week makes Hillsdale Greeks weak By | Jessie Fox Assistant Editor What a beautiful week to be a Greek here at Hillsdale College. Or at least, I wish it were.

Greek Week is supposed to be a week where all members feel immense pride to be a part of the Greek community.

Instead, each house oozes with pride for its own sorority.

I am normally a very Panhellenic person. I enjoy friendships in every house and avoid trash talking other girls because they wear different letters.

But during this one week, I feel the urge to paint my body blue, scream Kappa cheers from the top of Central Hall, pummel that darn Chi-O owl to a pulp, and snap the Pi Phi arrow over my knee. Perhaps it’s just my competitive side.

Perhaps it’s the nature of Hillsdale College Greek Week.

Here at Hillsdale, you can always find assorted Chi Os and Pi Phis at the Kappa Kupcake Wars. I know the Pi Phis and Kappas wouldn’t miss Chi O’s pancakes for the world. But for Hillsdale Greeks, with three sorority houses and an average of only 70 girls participating in formal recruitment each year, things get personal as every house wants to make their favorite rushees into new sisters.

Relationships are strained again during Derby Days as the sororities search couch cushions for every last penny to raise money for the Sigma

“A week where letters come off means a week where the walls between houses come down.”

Chis' philanthropic efforts.

Agitation fills the air as women of all three houses are squished into crowded bleachers where they are forced to interact and be civil.

But why is this so hard?

In reality, the houses on campus are all so obviously similar. Chi Omega, Kappa Kappa Gamma, and Pi Beta Phi are huge national organizations, each with fantastic philanthropic efforts and deep appreciation for tradition and ritual. Each house was created to promote womanly behavior, love, and sisterhood. But somehow we forget to exercise these ideas with women outside of our specific house.

It’s crucial that we remind ourselves of these many similarities when tensions rise on Greek row. Especially our most important similarity: We’re all Hillsdale College students. We all struggle through Western Heritage, we all receive Bill Whorley’s email warnings, and we all cheer for the Chargers. We all chose Hillsdale and we all love Hillsdale. Isn’t that outstandingly unifying?

Shouldn’t that be enough?

Maybe it’s not.

It’s time that Greek Week underwent a couple of positive changes. All Greek women could be mixed together, then separated into three teams composed of women from each house. This alternative would give women the chance to meet, play, and bond with women whom they might not know. A week where the letters come off means a week where the walls between the houses must come down.

And if the thought of mixing seems too extreme, maybe the Panhellenic council could rethink the events. Instead of throwing elbows during a basketball game, we should be racing tricycles. Instead of strategizing how to win the volleyball game, we should be putting on a fashion show and raising benefits for charity.

Greek Week has the potential to change, and the potential to improve — we just have to let it.

Jessie is a junior studying marketing management, Spanish, and journalism.

Donald Trump, GOP presidential candidate, at CPAC 2013.

Gage Skidmore | Wikimedia Commons

Trump is a constitutionalist, even if he doesn’t know it By | Nicholas Brown Special to the Collegian When Donald Trump announced his presidential campaign, I watched from a cubicle in a top-notch political consulting firm.

Nearly his every word drew snickers and eye rolls from the campaign professionals who had gathered around the TV. “Well, at least we’ll have a *&%! show to keep us entertained for a few months,” one remarked.

I assumed Trump could never launch a legitimate presidential campaign, yet I found myself nodding in agreement with a few of Trump’s claims. Nine months later, Trump has unexpectedly swept the country.

This has been a year dominated by outsiders, and Trump is no politician.

There is little “Washington speak” in his presentation.

It caters to millions of people who feel left behind by the system. In style and tactics, Trump has revived a kind of populism which invites the reengagement of those who have given up on politics. But the hidden genius of his success is found in his messaging, however unintentional. Trump has honed a unique pitch which hints at elements of the natural-rights founding.

Those looking to defeat Trump must recognize that the only way to do so is through the genuine embrace of Constitutional principle.

The American people have shown a natural appetite for it, but few politicians have been brave enough to embrace it.

While the angry rhetoric, coarse claims, and misogyny

“While Trump is no Washington or Licoln, many of his policy proposals are rooted in American tradition.” that come with Trump’s candidacy have obfuscated the substance of his policy proposals, the essence of his appeals still resonate. Most voters recognize that Trump is no expert on the Founding, but his tacit appeal to the rights of American citizens has inspired many to look past his faults.

Nowhere is this clearer than in his immigration policy. His advocacy for the the construction of a wall and the deportation of illegal aliens prioritizes the rights of citizens above those of non-citizens.

Specifically, Trump claims that enforcing current immigration law will prevent dangerous crime while improving economic opportunities. With this policy prescription, he has tacitly embraced the rule of law, national sovereignty, and government by consent.

The language of the social contract is back in the national debate, and it’s effective.

Similarly, Trump has unknowingly made an appeal to the Founders’ conception of the purpose of government.

When confronted with the challenges of Islamic radicalism and its threat to America, he responded by proposing a ban on Muslim

immigration. Despite its controversial nature, this targeted proposal seems more direct than the “War On Terror” which has now given way to ISIS. When the Founders formed the government with the intent to protect of the rights of its citizens — including life, liberty and property — they laid out a clear design which has since been forgotten. Many of Trump’s proposals hint at this older design for government, as it prioritizes the protection of the rights of American citizens.

While Trump is no Washington or Lincoln, many of his policy proposals are rooted in an older American tradition.

Though his candidacy is complex, his success offers proof that the ideas of the American Founding hold an enduring appeal. For that, conservatives should be thankful. His unconscious revival of the Founders’ natural rights language has uncovered the road map to electoral success.

Nick is a senior studying politics and economics.

Letter to the Editor Dear Editor,

In his column last week (‘Hillsdale students ought to oppose local corporate welfare,’ March 31, 2016), Tyler Groenendal correctly made the point that government agencies that are used to subsidize any particular business ought to be eliminated. But part of his solution seems to be for the City of Hillsdale to not participate in the MEDC program. This is incorrect for two reasons.

First, once a government program exists, it becomes much like a common property resource. For example, fisheries become overfished because each individual fisherman knows that if she doesn’t catch that next fish, someone else will and the fishery will be ruined anyway.

If Hillsdale did not seek or accept MEDC money, money from Hillsdale taxpayers would simply go elsewhere in Michigan. The solution would be to convince our state rep-

resentatives and senators that they should vote to eliminate the MEDC altogether, so there is no common property resource to begin with.

Second, the money that the City of Hillsdale obtained is not being used to subsidize one business over another. It is being used in every case to deal with what economists call a negative externality — in this case, blight. When a property owner abandons a property or lets it deteriorate he is only considering the loss to him of the property value.

If the value of the property when rehabilitated is less than the cost of rehabilitating the property it is rational for him to simply let the property fall apart.

The condition of his property affects the property value of his neighbors and perhaps a broad number of properties in the community, but he doesn’t take that into consideration when deciding not to fix up his property. One solution to this externality

problem is for government to provide a subsidy to repair the building. This repair creates a positive externality by improving the value of other surrounding properties. Such a subsidy is called a Pigouvian subsidy in the economics literature.

Every MEDC grant that is being used in Hillsdale falls into this category. These grants are only being used for “blight elimination.” So Groenendal is correct that government subsidies to individual businesses will be less efficient than simply letting taxpayers keep their money and have the market determine which businesses succeed and which fail. But as long as the MEDC money is there, Hillsdale should continue to seek it out — particularly because it uses the money in a way that actually solves a market inefficiency.

Professor of Political Economy Gary Wolfram

City News

A6 14 April 2016

www.hillsdalecollegian.com

Fowl flu and pox flock to Hillsdale

By | Madeleine Jepsen Assistant Editor After the first flu-related death in Hillsdale County on April 1 and outbreaks of chickenpox in Hillsdale and St. Joseph, health officials encourage vaccinations in order to prevent additional cases of illness.

The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services reported widespread flu outbreaks statewide, with the H1N1 strain being most prevalent.

Kim Wilhelm, prevention services director for the TriCounty Health Department, said this year’s flu vaccine includes inoculation against the H1N1 flu strain. She also said getting the flu vaccine now would still be effective, and this year’s vaccine is a good match for the main strains of the virus prevalent this flu season.

“There’s been a lot of flu, and most of it has been the A strain, the H1N1, which typically is a harder flu on people,” Wilhelm said. “It was in this year’s flu vaccine, however, and we do give the vaccine through June.”

Rebecca Burns, TriCounty Health Department health officer, said those who received the vaccine were 59 percent less likely to catch influenza than those who are unvaccinated.

Nichole Ellis, a privatepractice pediatrician, said the flu season has been later than usual this year, and cases of H1N1 she has seen this year are less severe than previous years.

“What we see is that the more we’re exposed to a virus or strain of a virus, the better immunity we develop,” she said. “2009 was very difficult because we hadn’t seen H1N1 in a very long time. With a shorter time span, people may have some long-lasting immunity if they had H1N1

or the vaccine for H1N1.

You slowly build up some of that retained immunity, so I think that’s why it wasn’t as bad.”

Unlike the flu vaccine, which can vary in effectiveness based on the prevalence of certain strains and the number of people

the St. Joseph school system to request the intervention of the Tri-County Health Department.

By law, students without proof of immunization or a medically-confirmed history of the disease can be excluded from the school system for up to 21 days in

In order for students to enroll in the school system, Michigan law requires parents to confirm that their child is vaccinated or has already had chickenpox.

Parents with religious or philosophical objections to vaccination can obtain waive their child from these

7

595 flu hospitalizations in MI from Jan.2015 - Mar.2016.

cases of chickenpox in Hillsdale County in January.

they got it from, but a lot of times they just don’t know — no one else in the family gets it, and it just kind of goes away, but that didn’t happen this time.”

Ronna Steel, superintendent of Hillsdale Intermediate School District, said she did not realize the

7 cases of chickenpox in St. Joseph in March.

Those who recieve the vaccine are 59% less likely to catch the flu.

Those who are vaccinated for chickenpox are

90%

less likely to contract the disease.

Meg Prom | Collegian

who become ill, Ellis said the chickenpox vaccine provides a protection rate of over 90 percent.

Outbreaks of chickenpox totalling seven cases each occurred in Hillsdale County in January and St. Joseph County in late March. While the seven cases in Hillsdale primarily involved children too young to attend school or attended in private schools, Wilhelm said the seven cases in St. Joseph required

order to prevent further infection.

“It’s procedure when you get so many cases in a small area,” Wilhelm said.

“If you just have one or two isolated cases in a school, and there doesn’t seem to be any connection, we probably wouldn’t intervene then, but we do look at it case-by-case.

There have only been a few times we’ve had to keep kids out of school, and this is one of them.”

requirements after meeting with a health officer to discuss the risks of this decision.

Wilhelm said chickenpox and other contagious diseases are especially prone to outbreaks in the school setting, where children have frequent interaction and infrequent handwashing.

“A lot of times, we’ll just get one case, and no other ones,” she said. “We’ll call and try to figure out where

serious risks that come with having chickenpox until it threatened the life of her 1-year-old daughter, who suffered from abnormal bleeding associated with the virus. Her daughter was unvaccinated because of the seizure risk posed by her epilepsy.

“She was in the intensive care unit for two or three days,” Steel said. “Up until that point, I never knew that chickenpox could be deadly

to that small portion of kids, I just thought it was you wanted kids to get and get over with so they didn’t get it when they were older.”

However, Steel recognizes not everyone agrees that vaccination is healthy for children.

“It’s a hard topic, and not all parents believe in the power of that,” she said.

“My mother has a very philosophical problem with immunizations, and I think the exact opposite — I think they do more good and harm. It’s a touchy subject.”

Once reported to the health agency, Wilhelm said health officers investigate the extent and severity of the cases.

“What we try to do is find out where they may have picked it up, and educate them on how not to transmit it, when it’s safe to go back to school or out in public, and encourage them to get vaccinated if they haven’t been,” she said.

Ultimately, all action taken by the schools and health department are for the wellbeing of the children.

“Immunizations are the best way to protect your child from getting these diseases,” Wilhelm said.

“When the parents come in and sign these waivers, we do go over it with them.

When exclusion does become necessary, parents sometimes get a little upset, but we want everyone to understand that it’s done to keep everyone healthy.”

Man behind ‘The Most Popular Fair on Earth’ retires Hillsdale County Fair Manager Scott Dow steps down after 18 years By | Kaylee McGhee Collegian Reporter After 18 years of faithful service to the Hillsdale County Fairgrounds, home to “The Most Popular Fair on Earth,” manager Scott Dow is stepping down.

Dow said he is retiring to take care of himself, after fighting for his health over the past few years. Mark Williams, who formerly worked in the investor side of business, will be taking his place. Williams said he applied for the position because he was looking for something completely different. Williams will be the 15th manager of the Hillsdale County Fairgrounds.

President of the Fair Board Tom Richards, who worked closely with Dow throughout his years as manager, said he was “devastated” when he heard the news.

“When Scott told me he was stepping down, I said two things to him,” Richards said, “as president, I’m devastated, but as your

Blue laws, from A1 establishments “in which the gross receipts derived from the sale of food or other goods and services exceed 50 percent of the total gross receipts.”

Hillsdale County is included in a November 2015 list published by the MLCC of “Local Governing Units that have opted out of Sunday sales [of liquor].” It says that Hillsdale County prohibits businesses from serving alcohol on Sundays because of the vote on the 1980 general election ballot.

“We can’t sell liquor on Sundays in Hillsdale County.

It’s just a local law. We have the Sunday sales license, but

friend, you’re doing the right thing.”

Reflecting on his time as manager of the fair, Dow believes some of the greatest accomplishments during his time as manager were the tremendous amount of improvements to the facilities, and the growth of a teamwork approach.

“None of it was accomplished by myself or even because I was the manager,” Dow said. “It wasn’t one person who made that happen. We were able to accomplish all of these things because of the dedicated people that we have worked with.”

Dow said that one of the most challenging aspects of his time as manager was generating revenue to maintain the 37 fairground buildings. The Hillsdale County Fair is part of the 541c non-profit Hillsdale County Agricultural Society, and is not county-funded or city-funded. In order to fund the fairgrounds, Dow and the fair board have had to promote what they do in a variety of ways.

“We have a treasure here,” Dow said, “and it is important to preserve it.”

Dow’s 18 years as manager has taught him several things, but above all, he learned patience.

“I met people from all walks of life with different interests and agendas, and I had to learn to be patient and work with them in order to pull all of those interests together and look at the whole. That’s really what the fair is all about,” Dow said.

Richards said that under Dow’s selfless management and excellent leadership, the fair has grown. He’s sure Williams will continue to follow in Dow’s footsteps and uphold the beauty and tradition of the Hillsdale County Fair.

“The fair has a great tradition and history. It is very unique and it’s a different experience in today’s day and age. It’s also very successful and running well, and I’d like to keep it that way,” Williams said.

Moving forward, Richards and Williams are looking to expand the use of the

we can only sell beer and wine,” Conant said.

According to the MLCC list, Hillsdale is the only county to prohibit restaurants and bars from serving liquor all day on Sundays, although three villages in Michigan have the same restrictions, and 16 cities, townships, and villages prohibit sales of packaged liquor on Sundays.

Other local governments prohibit liquor sales on Sunday mornings only.

Hunt Club bartender Liz Myers said patrons from outside of Hillsdale are surprised that they can’t buy liquor and that the liquor sales restrictions affect

business for the Hunt Club.

“We do have a lot of people who ask for liquor.

People who aren’t from this county will try to order a drink and they’ll think it’s bizarre that they can’t. We’d probably make a lot more money—a lot of people try to order Bloody Marys,” she said.

Dan Stevens, a manager at the Hunt Club, said he’d probably acquire the Sunday sales permit if it were allowed, but he said he was told the permit is only for retail stores.

Retail businesses that sell packaged liquor—rather than serving it—do not face the same restrictions that

Mark Williams (left) will be the new Hillsdale County Fair Manager as Scott Dow (right) retires after 18 years. Kaylee McGhee | Collegian

fairgrounds.

“It’s too good of a place to be left empty for months at a time,” Richards said.

The fair board is also eagerly seeking ways to partner with Hillsdale College, and the board is planning to set up a booth at the Hillsdale College Source in the fall.

Over the next few months, Dow plans on finishing various fair projects and

making himself available to Williams. He hopes that as they move forward, Williams and the rest of their team will continue to provide energy and enthusiasm for the fair.

“There needs to constantly be a willingness to change while maintaining the traditions that make the fair what it is,” Dow said.

As Dow steps back and Williams takes his place, the fair board remains optimistic about the transition. Dow’s

commitment to the fair and its traditions were invaluable, and his sacrificial leadership impacted the Hillsdale County Fairgrounds in innumerable ways.

“I’ve worked hard to pattern myself after Scott,” Richards said, “He is a good role model in every sense of the word — as a manager, and as a friend.”

apply to bars and restaurants.

Before deciding to stay closed on Sundays altogether, Broad Street Downtown Market could not serve liquor—but it did have a license to sell packaged liquor on Sundays, Broad Street manager Cindy McCoy said, until it sold the license in September 2015.

“You can sell packaged liquor on Sundays but not serve it,” McCoy said. She said the business had to obtain an extension on its liquor license in order to sell the packaged liquor on Sundays.

Hillsdale Market House also does not need a Sunday permit to sell packaged

liquor on Sundays, said Kevin Abbott, a manager and the director of beer, wine, and spirits at the Market House.

Although retailers are not prohibited by the blue laws from selling packaged liquor, the Hillsdale Kroger—which sells only beer and wine— apparently faces liquor sales restrictions for other reasons.

Kroger Communications Manager Ken McClure said he could not obtain a liquor license for the Hillsdale Kroger, although he was not sure of the reason.

“There is not license available for that location.

In addition to the limited

number of licenses available in Hillsdale County, there are also proximity clauses regarding the distance to schools, places of worship, and other licensees,” said McClure.

Clauses and complex restrictions appear to characterize the alcohol sales laws in Hillsdale. The police department had to look up the Sunday sales laws, and other county officials were uncertain of the restrictions as well.

“It takes a legal mind to figure out what the law is actually saying,” said Hillsdale County Clerk Marney Kast.

City News

www.hillsdalecollegian.com

A7 14 April 2016

Hillsdale couple recognized for artistic leadership By | Katie Scheu Collegian Reporter After years of dedication to the arts and the Hillsdale County community, Ned Wyse and Debbi Wyse have been recognized as Hillsdale County’s artists of the year

by Artworks of Hillsdale, Inc. Hillsdale Artworks celebrates Ned Wyse for his talent in memorizing and reciting poetry and passages of the Bible, and recognizes his wife Debbi Wyse for her musicianship as a pianist, organist, and harpist.

A reception will be held in honor of the Wyses at the Hillsdale Senior Center on April 17 from 2-2:30 p.m.

There, they will be presented with a State of Michigan Special Tribute Award signed by Gov. Snyder.

“We’ve recognized a series of very talented people over the years and it was time for the Wyses to be honored,” Hillsdale Artworks board member Janet Lee said.

Lee, who leads the Artist of the Year award committee in choosing its recipients, said candidates stand out when their commitment to the Hillsdale community mirrors their dedication to the arts.

“The Wyses have shared their talent with the community, they haven’t just kept it under a bushel basket,” Lee said.

The Wyses’ talent shines throughout Hillsdale County. Debbi Wyse has worked at Hillsdale College

since 1981, where she currently accompanies the choirs in addition to teaching private lessons. Ned Wyse is a pastor at Salem Mennonite Church and performs his poetry throughout the county regularly.

Debbi Wyse began studying piano at age 7.

“I had an interesting teacher when I was little,” Debbi Wyse said. “She pushed me pretty hard and

tango and the Debussy Fetes from his “Nocturnes for Two Pianos,” both of which she played with Kristi Gautsche at their duo concert in February. She also enjoyed playing for the Hillsdale College Opera Workshop performances of “Amahl and the Night Visitors.”

Like his wife, Ned Wyse began developing his artistry at a young age, when his mother helped him to

“We’ve recognized a series of very talented people over the years and it was time for the Wyses to be honored.” gave me challenging things to do.”

By age 10, she played organ for daily mass at the parochial school she attended.

“We just showed up at church and the priest gave us the hymns and we played them,” Debbi Wyse said.

“When I look back at that I think it’s pretty remarkable.

At the time I didn’t think it was a big deal, I could just do it.”

Wyse continues to play hymns every Sunday at Salem Mennonite Church, but she applies her talent to a broad range of musical literature.

Debbi Wyse said her favorite piece she performed this year was a Piazzolla

memorize his first Bible verses and poems. Among his favorite poets is Robert Frost.

“I’ve liked Robert Frost since I was a junior in high school, when we were studying ‘Mending Wall,’” Ned Wyse said. “I started memorizing it when I fed the cattle at night. I like Frost because he talks about things that I’m familiar with. Nature, the farm is the setting, but it’s really poems about people. Human relations — that’s what I’m interested in. How we relate to this world and how we relate to each other.”

This fascination carries into Ned Wyse’s work as a pastor. Licensed in 1985, Ned Wyse searched for

creative ways to deliver biblical messages to his congregation, remembering the boredom he sometimes felt in church as a boy.

“Poetry has been for me an avenue of ministry that I never thought of,” Ned Wyse said. “You never know who’s sitting at your feet, what they will become. I’ve just had so many wonderful conversations that started with poetry, that moved into some other important things.”

He began to memorize entire books of the Bible, reciting them in church as first person accounts, selecting Peter as his first subject.

“What happened to me in memorizing scripture was that I found a whole new side of Jesus,” Ned Wyse said. “I love memorizing because of how it changes me. I’m really glad for my mom’s encouragement to memorize scripture.”

Despite each of their evident commitments to the arts and Hillsdale County, Ned Wyse and Debbi Wyse disagree over who warranted the award more.

“I was not at all surprised that Debbi won — she deserves that and I don’t consider myself an artist,” Ned Wyse said. “I certainly felt honored, but I just happened to be along for the ride.”

Debbi Wyse thinks otherwise.

“Ned and I have this kind of mutual admiration where

Debbi and Ned Wyse will be recognized for their artistic leadership in Hillsdale County by Artworks of Hillsdale, Inc. on April 17.

Ned Wyse | Courtesy

each of us thinks the other is the more artistically gifted.

Ned is convinced that he is only receiving the award because we are a couple, and I’m convinced that Ned is more deserving of the

honor.”

Though the Wyses disagree, one thing remains certain: Hillsdale County recognizes both as critical leaders in the art community.

Charges against Gadelkarim temporarily dismissed in favor of further investigation By | Vivian Hughbanks News Editor District court charges against David Fayez Gadelkarim, 54, of Hillsdale were temporarily dismissed

on April 7, according to court documents.

Hillsdale Police Chief Scott Hephner confirmed that further investigations are ongoing, but that charges have been dropped at present

because of concerns for the defendant’s constitutional right to due process.

Gadelkarim, who owns both the Shell Gas Station and Hillsdale Smoke Shop on Carleton Road,

was arrested Feb. 18 and subsequently charged with unlawful imprisonment, a 15-year felony, and criminal sexual conduct.

After several cancelled probable cause hearings,

charges were dismissed when further evidence surfaced following his arrest.

The prosecutor’s office anticipates reinstating charges against Gadelkarim upon further investigation,

according to reports by the Hillsdale Daily News. It is unknown whether charges will be amended or altered based on further evidence.

Jonesville robotics ‘exceeds expectations’ to compete in state competition By | Evan Carter Web Editor The Jonesville High School robotics team qualified for the FIRST in Michigan robotics state competition in Grand Rapids after finishing the regular season ranked 68 of 411 teams. The “Cobrots” will compete against 101 of the state’s top teams this week, April 13-16.

The top 76 teams from the state competition will then move onto the world round in St. Louis April 27-30.

“We’re very proud of what the kids have been able to do and very pleased with their progression — they’re a new team and competing against bigger teams with more kids,” said Jonesville High School Principal, Dustin Scharer.

Parent Phil McDowell started the robotics team during his son Randal’s sophomore year because his son wasn’t interested in any of the other extracurricular activities the school offered.

“I didn’t have anything to do after school until I saw FRC, and I decided I wanted to do something with robots, so my father and I got the

robotics team set up,” Randal McDowell said.

Phil McDowell worked with Chris Voisin, science teacher and team adviser of the North Adam’s FRC team to get Jonesville’s team started.

FRC is a world-wide competition that seeks to get students to get involved with math and science through

With the help of Phil McDowell and a second team advisor, Jared Page, the eight members of the robotics team designed and built a remoted controlled robot and then wrote the computer code to operate it.

This season, robots were tasked with driving over obstacles, shooting exercise balls through goals, and

“We’re very proud of what the kids have been able to do and very pleased with their progression — they’re a new team and competing against bigger teams with more kids.” competitions that challenge students to design, build, and pilot robots through different tasks. Teams have six weeks to build a robot to complete the tasks for that year. After the six “build weeks” have been completed, teams compete in two regional competitions over the next six weeks, with the potential to then qualify for the state and world competitions.

pulling themselves upwards on a bar several feet above the ground.

The robotics team began to succeed at the second regional competition of the season, coming in first along with their competition “alliance,” defeated 37 other teams, including four from Hillsdale County.

Phil McDowell hopes this year’s team can even compete beyond Michigan’s

Members of the Jonesville robotics team pose for a photo at one of the regional robotics competitions.

Courtesy | Phil McDowell

The Jonesville Cobrots team (left to right) Gleb Goryunov, Brody Longman, Steve Koppel, Randal McDowell, Michael Pope, Georgia McDowell, advisers Phil McDowell and Jared Page will attend the FIRST in Michigan robotics state competition in Grand Rapids this week. Courtesy | Phil McDowell

state competition.

“They’ve already exceeded my expectations, so I think anything they do from here on out is just wonderful,” McDowell said.

“But I think the team has a

realistic chance of going to the next stage which is the world round in St. Louis.”

As a result of the success of the robotics team, Jonesville has added a Lego robotics course to its

regular course schedule, to encourage students to continue exploring robotics and similar technologies in addition to the STEM courses the high school already offers.

Two members of the Jonesville robotics team work on their robot at one of the regional robotics competitions. Courtesy | Phil McDowell

A8 14 April 2016

www.hillsdalecollegian.com

Sports

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Baseball

Softball Sunday, Apr. 10

Tuesday, Apr. 12

Hillsdale

Ohio Dominican

Hillsdale

Malone

Hillsdale

Ohio Dominican

Hillsdale

Malone

07 01

06 03

08 00

09 01

Tuesday, Apr. 12 Hillsdale

Northwood

Hillsdale

Findlay

Hillsdale

Northwood

Hillsdale

Findlay

09 03

Upcoming

Bekah Kastning - .444, Amanda Marra - .382, Sarah Grunert - .361 Kastning - .488, Marra - .468, Cassie Asselta - .442 Kastning - 3, Asselta - 2, Grunert - 2 Grunert - 9, Sarah Klopfer - 7 Klopfer - 2

03 17

04 03

SEASON LEADERS AVG OBP HR W SV

Wednesday, Apr. 13

09 03

SEASON LEADERS

Upcoming

AVG OBP HR W SV

Luke Ortel - .448, Connor Bartlett - .394, Ethan Wiskur - .390 Bartlett - .492, Ortel - .490, Chris McDonald - .472 Bartlett - 6, McDonald - 6, Ortel - 5 Will Kruse - 5, Mitchell Gatt - 3, Chris Stewart - 3 McDonald - 11

Friday, Apr. 15

Saturday, Apr. 16 Sunday, Apr. 17

Tuesday, Apr. 19

Saturday, Apr. 16

Sunday, Apr. 17

Wednesday, Apr. 20

At Ferris St.

Vs. Saginaw Valley

Vs. Wayne St.

Vs. Lake Erie

Vs. Ashland

Vs. Ashland

At Findlay

3:30 PM 5:30 PM

1:00 PM 3:00 PM

12:00 PM 2:00 PM 3:30 PM 5:30 PM

1:00 PM

1:00 PM

4:00 PM

Women’s Tennis

Men’s Tennis

Results

Results

Golf

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Upcoming

Friday, Apr. 15 GLIAC Championships at Longaberger Golf Club Nashport, OH

Saturday, Apr. 16 Border Battle Hillsdale, MI

Nathanael Meadowcroft

The NBA’s most impressive season No team has ever accomplished what this NBA team did this season. And I’m not talking about the Golden State Warriors.

Everyone expected the Warriors to be exceptional this season after winning the NBA Finals last June, but no one predicted what the Portland Trail Blazers accomplished this year.

The Blazers entered the 2015-16 regular season — which wrapped up last night — with low expectations.

After losing four of their five starters from the previous year over the offseason to free agency and trades, NBA analysts and pundits predicted the Blazers to struggle through a season of rebuilding. Sportsbook had the Blazers finishing the season with 27.5 wins, and even the most optimistic projections only had Portland fighting for the eighth seed in the Western Conference.

Yet here we are, two days away from tip-off of the NBA Playoffs, and the fifth-seed Blazers are preparing for a first-round matchup with the fourth-seed Los Angeles Clippers. No team in NBA history until this year’s Blazers had ever made the playoffs returning only two or fewer players with 1,000 or more minutes from the previous season. The Blazers blew by Sportsbook’s prediction of 27.5 wins with their 28th win all the way back on Feb. 19 with an impressive 137-105 blowout of the NBAbest Warriors.

But it wasn’t as if it looked like the Blazers were going to smash expectations from the beginning of the season.

Portland was 15-24 on Jan. 8 before exploding for 18 wins over their next 22 games. It wasn’t until the middle of the season that the Blazers found their identity and started stringing together wins.

How’d they do it?

It helps to have a leader like Damian Lillard. Lillard, a fourth-year point guard out of Weber State, is one of only five

5:00 PM

Saturday, Apr. 16 Vs. Walsh 1:00 PM Sunday, Apr. 17 Vs. Tiffin 1:00 PM

01

Track and Field

2:00 PM

Upcoming

Saturday, Apr. 9 Hillsdale - 0 At Wayne St. - 9 Sunday, Apr. 10 Hillsdale - 8 At Northwood - 1

Saturday, Apr. 9 Hillsdale - 9 At Huntington - 0

4:00 PM

players in the NBA with more than 1800 points and 500 or more assists. He is one of just four players in the top 10 in the league in points and assists per game. And yet he wasn’t even named an All-Star this season, adding to the sizeable chip on his shoulder that has motivated him throughout his career.

Starting alongside Lillard in Portland’s backcourt is thirdyear guard C.J. McCollum, the obvious favorite to win Most Improved Player this season.

McCollum has taken advantage of a large jump in playing time this year, averaging more than 20 points per game this season after averaging just 6.8 points the previous year. Lillard and McCollum combined for more than 400 3-pointers this season, joining Golden State’s Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson as the only teammates to do so this year.

The Blazers feature several other players who have blossomed into more than competent NBA players under a new system and with increased minutes. While Lillard and McCollum are leading Portland’s charge, they wouldn’t be where they are without the improved play of once-nobodies like Maurice Harkless and Allen Crabbe.

Blazers head coach Terry Stotts and Blazers GM Neil Olshey should be considered for Coach of the Year and Executive of the Year, respectively, for their accomplishments, and Lillard should be considered a top-five MVP candidate for where he has taken his team.

So if you don’t have a team to root for in the NBA Playoffs, don’t jump on the Warriors bandwagon, take a chance on the Blazers. Sure, the Warriors just completed what will be undeniably remembered as one of the greatest regular seasons of all time. But what the Blazers accomplished this season might just be more impressive.

HOF, from A10

since his recent recognition.

“We played a lot of ball. We had a lot of good people,” Robinson said. “Together we grow and we earn friends like that.

I’ve had a number of people call me, talk to me, and want to come because of me being recognized. But then there are some people who don’t even know me who came to see me talk. And that’s beautiful.”

According to Wolfram, Dave Springer — the sole Hillsdale basketball player in the 2016 class of inductees — has been called “the best pure-shooter” that many have ever seen, but he is also known for his humility. He was named the ’83-’84 GLIAC Player of the Year. His name was scattered all over the record books after his senior year in a Charger jersey. His class won a total of 83 games in their four years on the court, which is the fourthmost in Hillsdale history.

Springer took the time to tell personal stories from his time at Hillsdale, and express his gratitude for family, friends, and coaches who have had major impacts on his life.

“The bottom line is that God put those people in my life to make my life better, and I’m not so sure why I was the one put in that position,” Springer said. “I was just so blessed to be around so many quality people, and it goes way beyond basketball.”

After graduating a mere six years ago, Veldheer was the youngest of the 2016 inductees. In his career as a Hillsdale offensive lineman, Veldheer never once allowed a sack.

As the starting left tackle for the Arizona Cardinals, Veldheer played a significant role in making the Cardinals the highest scoring offense in the NFL in 2015.

Veldheer expressed his grat-

itude for his Hillsdale coaches, professors, friends, and also for his family.

“It’s a tremendous honor to be up here, especially being not even a decade out of college. This was really where my love for football took off. All the tools that I use today to be successful and play professional football I really owe a lot of it to them,” Veldheer said. “It was all the little things that are special to playing college football. Even though I’m still playing football, it’s a lot different at the professional level especially with relationships between teammates.”

10 current junior and senior student athletes with a grade point average of 3.8 or above were also honored at the banquet as they received the President’s Scholar Athlete Award.

Hillsdale’s 2015-2016 Athletic All-Americans also took the stage to receive recognition.

Softball, from A10

“There were a number of line drives right at people that were nice. Also our hitting really came together — everyone made the adjustments they needed in the box, and got the hits we needed. There were a number of clutch hits to get us ahead as far as we were.”

Klopfer allowed no earned runs in the second game, which ended in the fifth in-

ning when Malone was unable to return Hillsdale’s runs with one of their own.

Asselta said the team’s hard work has provided them with a strong team mentality.

“We’ve recognized our weaknesses and turned them into strengths,” she said. “A while ago, bunting was a reason that we lost the game.

Now, we’ve been able to come

back, and we’re getting the bunts down just like we need to. Anything that we have not executed well we’ve practiced, we’ve worked on it, and we make sure that we can execute it the next time.”

This weekend, the Chargers will face Ferris State University, Wayne State University, and Saginaw Valley State University.

experiences in the classroom and on the field allowed me to accomplish my goals of teaching and coaching. So with that I want to say thanks to Hillsdale.”

Next to the stage was Robinson, “one of the toughest defensive backs in Charger history,” Wolfram said. During his four seasons he set a school record of 20 interceptions and racked up 116 total tackles. He was named first-team All-American as a safety in 1971. Robinson was also the captain of the Hillsdale baseball team in ‘71. As his 4.6 40-meter dash speed caught the eye of professional scouts, he was the 13th-round draft pick for the Miami Dolphins.

At the banquet, Robinson reflected on the friendships he made during his days as a Charger, and how those friendships have been revived and running,” Abraham said.

“But those two bunts were huge for us.”

The second game against Malone started on a strong note with Grunert’s solo home run, and continued on with multi-hit games for Gockman, Asselta, and Kastning.

“Our defense made some huge plays,” Klopfer said.

Men’s track fights through rain and shine for solid showings By | Jessica Hurley Collegian Reporter The Hillsdale College men’s track and field team competed in two meets this weekend: the Miami Hurricane Alumni Invitational in Florida and the OWU Marv Frye Invitational at Ohio Wesleyan.

Just five athletes competed in Miami for the men’s team.

All-American sophomore Jared Schipper had a notable performance in the pole vault, winning the event. He jumped 16 feet, 3/4 inches, which was only slightly under his performance last weekend.

“I had a good time. The weather was super nice the whole time, and everyone was in a good mood. I didn’t jump very well — no excuse for that.

Everyone did really bad there because the sun was in our eyes,” Schipper said. “It was just kind of like a fluke that I won in all honesty.”

At Ohio Wesleyan Hillsdale put up several solid performances.

Junior Todd Frickey took

first in the 100-meter with a time of 10.63 seconds, just off the provisional standard for the national list.

Hillsdale took second, third, and fourth in the 200-meter. Freshman Nathan Pando placed second, finishing in 22.05 seconds. Freshman Levi Wyse was right behind with a time of 22.30 seconds, and senior Alex Mexicotte took fourth in 22.51 seconds.

Senior Noah Hiser placed second in the 400-meter with an impressive time of 49.81 seconds.

Freshman Tanner Schwannecke placed second in 800-meter with a time of 1:55.69, and junior Andrew Beaird took third, finishing in 1:57.91.

“I’m alright with it, I just opened up. I would have liked to get first place. But that just gives me more fuel to add to my fire for the rest of the season,” Schwannecke said. “I’m hoping I can improve upon those times and do big stuff at conference.”

Sophomore Evan Tandy ran both the 110-meter and 400-meter hurdles this weekend and placed second and third, respectively. Tandy set two new personal records — in the 110-meter with a time of 15.30 seconds, and 57.79 seconds in the 400-meter.

The 4x100-meter relay came in first for the second consecutive weekend. Frickey, Pando, Hiser, and Wyse ran the relay in that order, finishing with a solid time of 42.18 seconds— not far from the provisional standard time.

“These first couple meets are where we learn our responsibilities and see where people fit and everyone has taken it to heart — trying to achieve our goals of making it on the podium at conference and at the national meet,” assistant coach Nathaniel Miller said.

“I’ve been really pleased with the sprinters these past couple weeks.”

The 4x400-meter relay placed second, running the race in 3:25.51. The relay was

run by sophomore David Chase, Hiser, Schwannecke, Tandy.

In the long jump, Mexicotte took second, jumping 21 feet, 8.25 inches. This is his first year competing in the event and fourth time overall.

Miller said he’s happy with the dynamic of the team, explaining that so many freshmen have stepped up and the veterans have improved. He said they continue to focus on the process each day and remember that they need to keep working on the little things in order to reach their final form.

“This is a really challenging time of the season. The training load is the highest of the season and on top of that they have to compete out in the weather they compete in.

They’ve been performing really well considering all those obstacles,” Miller said.

The team will be competing at home this weekend against other GLIAC teams as they prepare for the conference meet in only three weeks.

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Women’s track picks up provisional marks

By | Evan Carter Web Editor The Hillsdale College women’s track team split their squad again last weekend, with some athletes competing at the Miami Hurricane Alumni Invitational in Miami, Florida, and others at the OWU Marv Frye Invitational in Delaware, Ohio.

Six sprinters and field event specialists who had previously qualified for a national competition traveled down to Miami in order to take advantage of the warmer and more predictable weather at a time when conditions in the Midwest are harsh and adverse to top performances.

Senior captain Corinne Zehner earned a provisional qualifying time in the 100-meter hurdles, running it in 14.25 seconds, and placed 10th in the 400-meter hurdles, running it in 1:02.48.

Junior Dana Newell and sophomore Rachael Tolsma both threw provisional qualifying marks in the hammer throw and are now ranked

16th and 18th in the NCAA Division II national qualifying list.

Juniors Sarah Benson and Alex Whitford and freshman Kristin Freeman also competed.

“I thought our two hammer throwers did a nice job, and I thought Corinne made a good step forward,” head track coach Andrew Towne said.

Although she enjoyed the warm weather and getting to see other top athletes compete, Whitford said she wasn’t happy with her performance in the pole vault.

“I’m doing a lot of technical work right now, so I’m tearing down my vault and breaking it up into little pieces and working on it all because I came into college with a pretty terrible form,” she said. “We’re doing it step-by-step and it’s not fully put together yet, so it kind of didn’t come together for the meet.”

Like Towne, Whitford highlighted the performances of the hammer throwers as successes at the meet.

“We were really happy with

how they did,” she said. “They capitalized on the opportunity.”

The remaining sprinters and field event athletes travelled to Ohio Wesleyan last Sunday. Middle distance and distance athletes had the weekend off.

While the weather in Ohio wasn’t as nice as in Miami, the athletes competed well, winning the 100, 200, and 400-meter dashes. Sophomore Maddie Estell also won the triple jump.

“Ashlee Moran did a really nice job. She came on during the end of the indoor season and is becoming who we thought she’d be,” Towne said.

“Allison Duber hasn’t had a chance to race a good time because of the weather, but she’s been racing well.”

Duber, a junior, agreed with Towne and said a wind in the last 100-meters of her 400-meter dash on Sunday did slow her down, but still felt like she had a good race.

“I felt like it was a breakthrough race for me. During indoor season I went through

a really big mental block, and I had to question altogether why I was running,” Duber said. “I could have run almost a :56, but again that wind on the home stretch killed me.”

After her performance on Sunday, Duber is looking forward to another opportunity to compete this weekend in what should be better weather.

“I’m dying to run a personal best; I really want to run a :55 or at least a :56 by the next meet,” she said.

Towne is also looking forward to the women’s home meet this Saturday — the first weekend this season where the whole team will compete at the same meet.

“Ideally, this will be the first weekend they compete at a high level in a decent amount of events,” he said. “Most of our top-notch kids will do something similar to what they would be doing at GLIAC, especially from the 400 on down.”

The Hillsdale Border Battle will take place at the college’s outdoor track this Saturday started at noon.

Sophomore Rachael Tolsma reached a provisional qualifying mark in the hammer throw on Saturday. Anders Kiledal | Collegian

Men’s tennis drops two over weekend By | Amanda Tindall Features Editor After a tough weekend, the Hillsdale College men’s tennis team came home with two losses.

On Saturday, the Chargers took a 9-0 loss at Wayne State University in Detroit, and Sunday they took on Northwood in Midland, falling 8-1.

“We’re just not at that level this year yet,” head men’s tennis coach Keith Turner said. “It was predictable what was going to happen, but the matches were closer than how they appeared in the final score. We made them work for it.”

Despite the losses, Turn-

er said a number of players showed great improvement.

“John Ciraci played the best doubles he’s played all year.

Both matches he and his partner did well, and were able to pull out a No. 2 win against Northwood, and Jerry Hewitt really showed some improvement all weekend.”

Ciraci said the team played well in doubles all around, and these matches were good experience going into the coming weeks, during which pressure will stay high.

“We knew the pressure was really high, so I was trying to do everything I could to get a win for the team,” he said. “We played pretty well overall.”

Next weekend, the men will play Walsh University and Tiffin University at home, on the newly dedicated courts.

“On paper they aren’t quite as strong, they should be a little bit closer match up,” Turner said. “We need to win at least two of the next three matches to make it to conference tournaments.”

Before christening the new outdoor courts on Saturday against Walsh University at 1 p.m., the Chargers will dedicate the courts to Mary Jane Delp. On Sunday, the Chargers will play at home again, playing Tiffin University at 1 p.m.

Senior Lindsay Peirce recorded a 6-2, 6-0 win at No. 5 singles on Saturday in the final match of her collegiate career. Brendan Miller | Collegian

Women’s tennis wraps up season with win By | Hannah Leitner Collegian Reporter The Hillsdale College women’s tennis team took the courts by storm on Saturday, sweeping all matches to beat Huntington 9-0 in their final match of the spring season.

After two weekends of cancelled matches due to poor weather, Hillsdale finally had the chance to compete in Huntington at their last scheduled match of the season. The win left the Chargers’ overall record at 9-9.

With strong performances throughout the lineup, head coach Nikki Walbright said that she was proud of the entire team’s effort.

“I really think everyone stood out,” Walbright said. “It was one of the first times of the whole year I really felt we had a complete team effort and everyone stood out with their wins.”

Seniors Sydney Delp and Lindsay Peirce both won their final singles matches of their

college careers. Delp, at No. 4 singles, cruised to a 6-3, 6-0 win over her opponent, while Peirce dominated with a 6-2, 6-0 win at No. 5 singles.

Freshman Halle Hyman, who was named GLIAC Freshman of the Year in the fall, closed her first collegiate season with a 6-1, 6-0 win at No. 1 singles.

Junior Dana Grace Buck grabbed a 6-1, 6-1 win at No. 2 singles, and freshmen Madeline Bissett — at No. 3 singles — and Julia Formentin — at No. 6 singles — also eased to wins.

On the doubles side of the day, Hyman and Peirce brought home an 8-2 win at No. 1 doubles. Freshman Corinne Prost and Delp won 8-2 at No. 2 doubles, and at No. 3 doubles, junior Jada Bissett and Buck picked up an 8-2 win.

Delp said she enjoyed her time competing as a collegiate athlete, although she feels the the fact she is done competing hasn’t sunk in yet.

“It’s such an honor and privilege to compete at the collegiate level,” Delp said.

“I couldn’t have been more happy with the experience. It completely exceeded my expectations.”

Now with the seniors heading out, Delp wishes her teammates the best for the future “I would like to see the program really succeed,” Delp said. “Hillsdale has such talent.”

Prost said she will miss the seniors’ example on the team.

“I’m pretty sad to see them go, but at the same time I feel grateful to have had them as captains and have them to look up to.”

Now, Prost said the team will continue with practices to prepare themselves for next year’s fall season. As a young team with four new recruits coming in the fall, she said she is excited to see what they can do.

“We are a new team with a lot of energy and a lot of fight to bring next year.” Prost said.

Freshman Gianpiero Placidi (above) teamed up with freshman John Ciraci at No. 2 doubles for a 9-7 win at Northwood on Sunday, Hillsdale’s only win over the weekend. Anders Kiledal | Collegian

CHARGER CHATTER: PETER BENETEAU a golf team. I come from a very Catholic upbringing, and a lot of the stuff they preach about here is very close to my beliefs. It’s a perfect fit.

Peter Beneteau | Courtesy

Freshman Peter Beneteau came to Hillsdale from Canada to play on the golf team. He has not yet chosen a major, but he is considering either economics or business.

How did you choose Hillsdale?

With golf, opportunities to play collegiately in Canada aren’t really there. You can, but there aren’t scholarships.

I had been looking to play in the U.S. for awhile, and then Coach Harner reached out to me. I’d heard about the school before, and learned they had

What’s the camaraderie of the golf team like?

It was different at first. Golf is such an individual sport, you finish a round and you couldn’t really care less about how you shot, it’s about how your teammates did. I like all the guys on the team. We’re a really close group. Our main swing coach is Coach Gilchrist. He really knows the game and really knows what we need to work on and how to make us better. I’m self-taught, and I teach myself pretty much everything, so it’s been really cool to actually have someone else look at my swing and what I’m doing. To have him on the course with us during a round is really cool, especially if you see him and you need help or have anything to ask. I love everything about the program so far, it’s been great.

You said you’re self-taught.

How did you start teaching yourself?

I just kind of taught myself how to move, and I’d try to replicate the motions of the swings I’d see, and just focus on making it all comfortable.

I also play with a different grip. Normally you have your right hand low, and you play right-handed, but I play with my left hand low. “Crosshand” is the term for it. I get teased about it a little bit. I was probably supposed to be left-handed, because that’s how I play, but I’m actually right-handed. So I guess I just grabbed it that way when I was a kid, and I guess my dad just saw it and didn’t think to change it. He probably thought I was gonna grow out of it, but then as I got older, when he saw me as I turned 10 and 11 and was hitting the ball a lot, he probably said, ‘Oh, might as well let him do his own thing, it seems to be working.” I’ve stuck with it and it’s worked so far, although I can hit the other way too. If I dedicated a whole

year I could probably switch over, but I don’t want to do that.

How did you get your start in golf?

There’s all the stupid little home videos of me hitting shots when I was little. I guess my dad taught me — just hitting little plastic balls in the backyard. I got my first membership when I was 11 and I’ve been playing nonstop since then. Our high school team wasn’t very good, but I made it pretty far individually.

What has your first season been like?

Not as good as I would have liked, if I’m being 100 percent honest. I’ve had a couple good finishes, a couple top tens, but even the top tens were less than great scores, in my personal opinion I could have been a lot better. But it’s been tough to balance it all at first, so the first year has been a bit more of a trial year. I haven’t played badly by any means, but I haven’t played as good as I would like to. All in all, it’s

been good learning this year and I think next year will be a lot better. And we still have the conference championships this weekend. It’s time to get ready for that and try to play a really good tournament.

What do you miss most about Canada?

Family. I’m the oldest of 10, so I have nine younger siblings and I have a little brother that’s two-and-a-half, so I miss him to death. I don’t miss the weather, since it’s pretty similar down here. It’ll be great to get back over the summer.

How have you adjusted to America?

I do like being down here a lot, it was different at first, but it’s not too different. There’s obviously noticeable things, like the speed limits and stuff, but it’s been an easy adjustment. I feel more Americanized now. I don’t feel like a Canadian anymore.

What’s the biggest difference between Canada and the US? The craziness for college sports, in terms of football and basketball, blows me away. I guess I can understand why, but it was definitely new to me to see everybody gathered around the TV for football games. I’m like, “It’s just football!”

What are your personal goals regarding your performance for the next four years?

It’s tough to say, it’s such an individual thing. It’s hard to really set long-term goals, other than just try to improve everything. This year, I’ve improved a lot of things, but the scores haven’t quite come down just yet. You’ve got to just keep swinging the club and hope that the scores come down eventually.

-Compiled by Ramona Tausz

Charger Women’s Tennis wraps up season with 9-0 win Chargers sweep Huntington in final match of spring. A9

Peter Beneteau | Courtesy

Brendan Miller | Collegian

Charger Chatter: Peter Beneteau Peter, a freshman on the golf team from Canada, talks about his first season as a Charger and living in America. A9

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Women’s track picks up provisional marks Chargers return home this weekend for Border Battle on Saturday at 12 p.m. A9 Anders Kiledal | Collegian

BASEBALL BLASTS TO HOME-OPENING SERIES VICTORIES By | Stevan Bennett Jr. Assistant Editor After cancelling its home opener on both Saturday and Sunday due to weather, the Hillsdale College baseball team finally got a chance to play at Simpson Field this week, sweeping a doubleheader against the Northwood Timberwolves on Tuesday before splitting a doubleheader with the Findlay Oilers yesterday.

“Coming out of it 3-1, we will take it,” head coach Eric Theisen said. “It was a long week with a lot of games.”

After the week’s three wins, the Chargers are now 20-10 on the season, tying the most wins the program has had in a single season since 2003 — with still a month remaining.

The Chargers started the show early in Tuesday’s front end, scoring three runs in the bottom of the first inning on an RBI single from junior Ethan Wiskur and a two-run double by designated hitter sophomore Alex Walts.

Sophomore Hillsdale starter Will Kruse was outstanding on the mound, recording his fifth win on the season by throwing six innings in which he allowed no runs on three hits while striking out three batters.

Hillsdale’s offense fell silent until the bottom of the fifth inning, when the Chargers exploded for six more runs, stretching their lead to 9-0. Senior centerfielder Luke Ortel and Wiskur both homered in the inning, with the final run coming on a Northwood error.

Northwood struck for three runs in the top of the seventh,

The Chargers welcome senior third baseman Chris McDonald back to the dugout after a home run on Tuesday. Anders Kiledal | Collegian

but Wiskur added to his already hefty contribution by coming onto the mound to record the final three outs of the game.

Game two on Tuesday proved to be exciting for an entirely different reason.

After the Timberwolves scored first in the top of the first inning, the Chargers responded with a run of their own in the bottom of the second thanks to a solo shot from senior rightfielder Connor Bartlett.

The seniors continued to flex their muscles the very

next inning, when the Chargers added two more runs on a two-run homer from senior third baseman Chris McDonald to push their lead to 3-1.

After allowing an unearned run in the first, Hillsdale senior starter Jacob Gardner settled into a groove, and didn’t allow another for the next five innings. Gardner ended the day with an impressive line, hurling 6 1/3 innings, while allowing three runs — two earned — on four hits.

Seniors Evan Chalker, Mitchell Gatt, and McDonald — who was credited with the

win — combined to shutout Northwood over the next 1 2/3 innings, sending the Chargers to the plate in the bottom of the ninth inning with the score knotted at 3-3.

Hillsdale took advantage of the opportunity when, after pinch-hit singles from freshmen Jacob Hoover and Chris Ackerman, Ortel delivered a walk-off double down the rightfield line, capping off a 5-for-7 performance on the day. Ortel was rewarded with an ice-cold shower from a Gatorade bucket.

The Chargers had a new foe

yesterday, when they returned to Simpson field for a doubleheader against Findlay.

Game one saw the Oilers score two runs in the top of the first inning, followed by three Charger runs in the bottom half, with RBIs coming from Ortel, Wiskur, and McDonald.

The game ended in a lopsided 17-3 Findlay victory, despite Findlay only out-hitting the Chargers 14-13.

“The first game was the first game,” Theisen said. “The game will humble you every once in awhile, remind you that you can’t go out and beat

anyone with your eyes closed.

We were over that one as soon as the last out was made.”

The main storyline of game two was Hoover, who was informed that he would be starting only twenty minutes prior to gametime. Hoover — who is not even listed as a pitcher on the roster — threw 4 2/3 innings, allowing two runs — one earned — on five hits.

Hoover said that after he got some jitters out in first inning, he really settled in.

“You have to know your going to go in and be successful, because any doubt you have can impair your play,” Hoover said. “Any time I can give the team a chance to win, you can bet I’ll do it.”

The offense took the chance to win that Hoover offered them, scoring eight runs over the final three innings.

McDonald was a large part of the offensive success, gathering 3 RBIs in the game. With these RBIs McDonald became the all-time RBI leader in program history.

“The RBI record is special to me because it means I have been able to do my job in helping us win games,” McDonald said. “The guys that hit ahead of me in the order have done an incredible job getting on base and allowing me the opportunities to get RBIs.” The bullpen was once again fantastic, combining to throw 4 1/3 innings, while allowing only one earned run.

The Chargers will host Ashland this weekend with doubleheaders on both Saturday and Sunday, before heading to Findlay next Wednesday for a doubleheader.

Four Chargers inducted into Hillsdale Hall of Fame By | Jessie Fox Assistant Editor

Senior Sarah Grunert pitched seven innings and gave up just two earned runs in Hillsdale’s 6-3 win over Malone on Tuesday afternoon. Anders Kiledal | Collegian

Softball powers to five-game win streak

By | Madeleine Jepsen Assistant Editor

The Hillsdale College softball team achieved a five-game winning streak after sweeping Malone University on Tuesday and Ohio Dominican University on Sunday, invoking the NCAA mercy rule in the second games against both teams.

The Chargers are now 16-6 overall and 11-3 in the GLIAC. Although Hillsdale played as the visitor in the games against Ohio Dominican, it was a hometown doubleheader for senior pitchers Sarah Grunert and Sarah Klopfer, assistant coach Kate Ardrey, and head coach Joe Abraham, who are all from the Columbus area.

“In the car on the way back, I told a couple of the girls, ‘It’s really neat to get a doubleheader sweep in your hometown,’” Abraham said. “I had friends there, Klopfer had her high school coach there, Grunert had friends there, we all had friends there, and as a team we played practically perfect softball, and they both pitched

great, so that was a lot of fun.”

“It was like playing a home game,” Klopfer added.

The team opened the doubleheader with three runs in the first inning, beginning with senior outfielder Ainsley Ellison’s single. Grunert followed with her first of two doubles that game, compounded by hits from junior centerfielder Bekah Kastning, junior catcher Cassie Asselta, and sophomore Kelsey Gockman for RBIs. Ultimately, the Chargers won the first game 7-1.

“In the first game, we got to their pitcher immediately for three runs,” Abraham said.

“Even at Ohio Dominican, our hitters were making really good adjustments at the plate, so by the second time through the batting order, we were scoring runs.”

Grunert allowed no earned runs the first game, and Klopfer pitched a shut-out second game.

The duo’s pitching was complemented by a strong offensive lineup, with eight of nine starters getting hits in the second game for an 8-0 win in six innings.

The team battled for their first victory against Malone, which Abraham said was characteristic of Malone’s games this season.

“It’s always a little unsettling coming into a doubleheader like this, playing a team at the bottom of the league,” he said.

“Even though they’re at the bottom of the league, they’re a capable team, and they can beat you, as they’ve shown in the league. You know Malone is going to jump up and beat some teams, and you just hope it’s not you.”

Abraham said the team made good offensive adjustments after watching Malone’s pitcher the first time through the lineup. Good execution allowed Hillsdale to take a decisive lead in the sixth inning with Kastning’s double and two runs batted in.

“Specifically, what got us going in game one was Haley Lawrence laying down a bunt for a hit, and Brittany Mahan followed with another bunt for a hit, and next thing you know, we get four runs, and we’re off

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A common theme ran through the four Hillsdale College Athletic Hall of Fame inductees’ speeches on Saturday night at the Athletic Hall of Fame Banquet: their gratitude for Hillsdale. After the trophies had been presented and the inductees had taken their seats, Dr. Larry Arnn took the stage and he, too, took a moment to express his gratitude — for the inductees.

Arnn explained that the student athletes at Hillsdale teach a “visual lesson in human excellence” as they endure extreme stress on their body and their soul— and they do it without complaint.

“The ones who get in the Hall of Fame here, that means in the body and soul they have exhibited these excellences to an unusual degree,” Arnn said.

“They can be an example to the rest of us, and the college then can be an example to our endangered country. And so I am so very grateful to them.”

Friends, families, and fans enjoyed dinner in the Searle

Center on Friday night to celebrate the induction of Andy Kincannon ‘57, Archie Robinson ‘72, Dave Springer ‘84, and Jared Veldheer ‘10 into the Hillsdale College Athletic Hall of Fame.

After guests finished their meals, Sports Information Director and Chairman of the Hall of Fame Committee Brad Monastiere welcomed current Hall of Fame members in the crowd — Paul Beachler, Dave Trippett, and Dr. John Wilson— then gave brief introductions of the four newest inductees.

The inductees were welcomed to the stage in chronological order as Gary Wolfram offered more extensive introductions followed by videos of each inductee sharing their feelings toward their recent honor and their time at Hillsdale. The videos featured photos of the inductees in their Charger uniforms as well as video of current Hillsdale athletes.

After receiving his award from Athletic Director Don Brubacher, each inductee was asked to deliver a short speech.

Kincannon’s ‘57 graduation year gave him first dibs on the podium. In the last three years of his career as a Charger football receiver, Kincannon and his team never lost a game.

Kincannon also found success on the Hillsdale track and field team, setting a long-standing javelin throw record for the college. After graduation, Kincannon was signed by the Detroit Raiders, a professional football team, before serving as an assistant football coach for Saginaw Valley State University.

Attending college was not an expected feat for most people in the ’50s, Kincannon said, but the opportunity to attend Hillsdale College was something that changed his life.

“My journey started when I came to Hillsdale,” Kincannon said. “I have to thank Hillsdale College and Coach “Muddy” Waters for the opportunity to continue my athletic career.

When I finished high school I thought it was over with, but then life started again. My opportunity started here, my

See HOF, A8

Jared Veldheer ‘10, starting left tackle on the Arizona Cardinals, addresses the crowd at Hillsdale’s Athletic Hall of Fame Banquet on Saturday. Nathanael Meadowcroft | Collegian

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Arts

Shakespeare in the Arb produces ‘Macbeth’ The annual student-produced performance runs in the Slayton Arboretum April 16 & 17 By | Anna Timmis Collegian Reporter Shakespeare in the Arboretum’s production of “Mac-

beth” opens with the bodies of soldiers stretched out on the grass following a battle.

Only one soldier remains alive to be rescued by his com-

Assistant Professor of Politics Adam Carrington and junior Nick Baldwin rehearse for this weekend’s production of “Macbeth.” Madeline Barry | Collegian

panions. Soon after, Macbeth, general of the Scottish king’s army, stumbles upon the Weird Sisters. The bent and old hags prophesy his rise to power. Macbeth is horrified by his own growing desire, afraid to think what he himself would do to be king.

Thus begins the story of a man’s struggle for dominion and his battle with conscience.

Lady Macbeth, played by senior Kendall Karpack, counters her husband’s reluctance to assassinate his cousin the king, rejecting morality in a chilling prayer for cruelty and hardness of heart.

“I love it. It’s such a challenge,” Karpack said of her role. “I did theater all throughout highschool, and I’d usu-

ally play romantic leads. I love broadening my acting horizons, so she’s definitely the most fun character I have played.”

Sophomore Sarah Schutte

she gains the sympathy of the audience. Longing to see her exiled husband, she mourns that her son must live without a father. Her monologue exemplifies the honest simplicity

“The Arb is beautiful, so performing something as dark as ‘Macbeth’ is difficult...However, that’s what the play is about: appearances can be deceiving.” portrays Lady Macduff, gentle and motherly, as the antithesis of Lady Macbeth. In a scene during the second act,

of her relationship with her husband in contrast with the scheming of the Macbeths.

In a wrenching climax, Lady

By | Lillian Quinones Collegian Reporter

“This is one of the finest groups of men I’ve ever been associated with. The fact that we make music together is an added bonus.”

Fair, Mrs. Stocks’ Park, and church events. With their spring concert on May 7, every Tuesday evening the Perennial Park Senior Center resounds with distinctly agrarian-themed songs as the Chorus rehearses the songs of their melodrama “Dire Days at the Dairy.”

See Shakespeare, B2

Hillsdale Camerata to perform Josquin, Mozart

Barbershop quartet chorus performs at senior center The 40 members of The Hillsdale Town and Country Barbershop Chorus share a love for barbershop-style music and call upon the ubiquitous Hillsdale city motto, “It’s the people,” to explain their commitment to the Chorus — some of whom have been involved for nearly half a century.

For many of these veteran singers, time’s passing finds them gray-haired but with voices that command well-plied vocal chords.

Formed in the late 1980s from already existing chapters in the surrounding cities, the Hillsdale barbershop chapter performs an average of 20 performances, or “Singouts,” each year. They sing at venues like the Hillsdale County

Macduff and her son are attacked by Macbeth’s men, and she dies bravely fighting to defend her family.

A grassy pavilion in the Slayton Arboretum serves as a stage, backed by firs and evergreen bushes. Peaceful and lovely, the natural setting proves a challenge when considering the dark mood of Shakespeare’s production.

Macbeth’s lines frequently describe his inner struggle, creating a mood that is tense and almost suffocating as it causes the audience to wait in suspense for the disaster that must follow his treacherous actions.

The darkness of the story might seem out of place in the

By | Brendan Clarey Collegian Freelancer

The Hillsdale Town and Country Barbershop Chorus practices barbershop music at the Perennial Park Senior Center. Lillian Quinones | Collegian

Barbershop music is distinct for its “closed harmony,” where four voice parts form a capella closed harmony. With the Barbershop Harmony Society headquarters in Nashville, Tennessee, participating in a barbershop quartet or chorus can be a well-organized affair in the United States and a hobby rift with competition internationally.

Don Slamka, director of The Hillsdale Town and Country Barbershop Chorus since 2010, was a member of the 2003 International Gold Medal Quartet, a competition held in Montreal, Canada.

“This is one of the finest groups of men I’ve ever been associated with,” Slamka said. “The fact that we make music together is an added bonus.”

“We celebrate the joys and sorrows of life with each other, 80th birthdays, funerals, and grandchildren,” Slamka added. “These are the guys that build cities, and move

walls for each other.”

Members credit Slamka for raising the quality of music produced by the Chorus. With such a large group, Slamka records himself singing the bass, baritone, lead, and tenor parts of the quartet onto a CD so that each section of the Chorus can practice separately.

A select group of singers also meets with Slamka following practice to highlight weak areas to be rehearsed in the following week.

For the majority of members, their voices were first tuned as children. Roger Brook, the chapter’s secretary, has sung in different musical groups his whole life.

“This is my first barbershop quartet and I enjoy singing with this group,” he said. “It’s challenging to get the harmony because we are trying to sing four different parts in the last two voice types, tenor and bass.”

One of Brook’s favorite Cho-

rus performances was “Malt Shop Memories,” a 1950-60s-themed performance in which the guys dressed up for a high school reunion of that time period. Recalling that he wore a jean jacket, Brook said that performance theme “resonated well with this group because most of us are in the 50-to-70-yearold range.”

For the last 12 years, Gary Meyer has been traveling from Montpellier, Ohio, to attend the Tuesday evening practices.

“This is a tri-state chorus. We have members from Ohio, Michigan, and even Indiana,” Meyer said. “After spending so much time together and traveling to concerts together, above all, barbershop is a family.”

Promising “Udder Mayhem” on May 7, the Chorus will feature actors from the Sauk Theatre and Don Slamka singing with the original gold-medal-winning quartet.

The Hillsdale Camerata is playing a concert titled “Rather Mozart” at 11:30 a.m. this Saturday, April 16, in Mauck Dormitory.

The concert will feature performances of Bach’s Suite No. 2 and Contrapunctus No. 1, Mozart’s Symphony No. 23, and a vocal piece by Josquin des Prez in a relaxed setting along with with coffee and doughnuts.

The Camerata is a chamber orchestra of about 20 students who want to play in a smaller setting.

They rehearse and perform voluntarily and have no conductor.

“You have to learn to work together,” junior violinist Rachelle Ferguson said. “It’s something that’s really good for us. I think it even helps us in regular orchestra, the learning to listen and pay attention to other sections.”

The Hillsdale Camerata performs Baroque and classical music written for chamber orchestras.

“It is sort of a special outlet because we can play music that we don’t really have the opportunity to in other ensembles on campus,” Ferguson said.

The informal location and time of the concert also distinguishes the Camerata from other groups on campus. The Camerata aims to juxtapose high culture with hot coffee to create a pleasant listening environment for students.

“It’s just a very comfortable atmosphere,” Ferguson said. “The concerts aren’t too long, 30 or 40 minutes.”

Alumna donates $40,000 cello to music department

By | Sarah Chavey Collegian reporter

Mary Ann Marks ’64 walked out of the room without turning around. After 54 years playing on the cello — “an old friend,” according to her husband Bob Marks — Mary Ann was ready to say goodbye.

When Mary Ann decided to give up her cello, her first thought was to sell it. The $40,000 instrument proved difficult to sell, however, so Mary Ann considered donating it instead. Bob suggested her alma mater.

“The people here were so open to it and they made us feel so good about it,” Mary Ann said. “Holleman said he’d be thrilled to have it, so I knew it was the right decision.”

The cello will join the ranks of the $90,000 Eberle violin and the $150,000 Bosendorfer piano already available for

students’ playing use on special occasions.

“I just want someone to play it,” Mary Ann said. “It’s a wonderful instrument that has gone up in value, and someone should be playing it.”

Though the details are unconfirmed, the cello will most likely serve the same function as the Eberle. Concerto Competition winners and students playing senior recitals are some of the most likely candidates to play the new instrument.

“Students will use it if they have something special to perform, or a difficult piece that requires that kind of color quality,” Professor of Music Melissa Knecht said. “The Eberle teaches students how to find more colors when they’re playing and improves Mary Ann Marks ’64 will donate the cello she’s played for 54 the quality in their sound. It’s years to Hillsdale’s music department. a great teaching tool and mo- Mary Ann Marks | Courtesy tivates students to be better.” gift from Mary Ann’s parents lege. She travelled to Chicago The cello was originally a during her junior year of col- to test a few and picked this

one out.

“It was red. It has a pretty red tone to it. I liked the sound of it. It was full and rich,” Mary Ann said. “But I don’t play it as well as I used to. Every time I play I sound terrible, and I didn’t want to sound that way. This cello is too good to just sit in my house and collect dust.”

Mary Ann finds practicing increasingly more difficult.

“I don’t have the dexterity with my fingers and the cello keeps getting heavier and heavier,” she said.

But for 36 years after graduating from Hillsdale, she played in the Plymouth Symphony Orchestra. She loves performing much more than she loves practicing, and she particularly loves concerts — both performing in them and listening to them.

“I love to hear an orchestra,” Mary Ann said. “There are so many things going on.

It’s a work of art to have ev-

erybody on the same page.

I’ll always be a music lover. I love going to concerts much better than practicing. I go and I clap real hard. Music was not my vocation, but I always want it to be a part of my life.”

Mary Ann began playing in fifth grade, but she was following in the footsteps of her sister, am even more dedicated musician.

“My sister plays violin and viola. I’d wake up every morning in high school and she’d be playing the Mendelssohn violin concerto,” Mary Ann said. Her sister’s daughter, Lisa Tarzia, now teaches violin at the college.

Mary Ann pursued a career in teaching elementary school rather than music, despite graduating with both a major and minor in music from Hillsdale and after serving a See cello, B2

Arts

B2 14 April 2016

www.hillsdalecollegian.com

Arts News April 10-15

Senior Art Exhibit No. 2 features work of seniors Joel Calvert, Meg Prom, and Tracy Brandt Daughtrey Gallery Sage Center for the Arts

April 15 & 16

Big Band performs the music of Count Basie 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday Markel Auditorium Sage Center for the Arts

April 17-22

Senior Art Exhibit No. 3: artwork of seniors Phoebe Kalthoff, Ben Strickland, Heather Buell, and Forester McClatchey Daughtrey Gallery Sage Center for the Arts

April 16 & 17

Shakespeare in the Arboretum presents “Macbeth” 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday Slayton Arboretum (in the event of rain, McNamara Rehearsal Hall)

Former Simpsonite produces ‘ode’ to campus dormitory

By | Michael Lucchese Collegian Reporter Simpson Residence is a strange place.

The residents’ antics, from taking homecoming week too seriously to dangling someone in the cafeteria to announce a party, may seem childish to an outsider. But to those living in dorm culture, Simpson is a community built on tradition, friendship, and personal growth. To many Simpsonites, the dorm is a place where boys become men.

Former student Joshua Hamilton’s new short film, “Ecce Viri,” began as a documentary project to film a year in the life of Simpson. However, the final version of “Ecce Viri” — Latin for “Behold Men” — is not a traditional documentary, and the cinematography of “Ecce Viri” is not styled as a traditional photographic history.

If anything, the 10-minute “Ecce Viri” can more accurately be described as cinematic poetry, an ode to the places that made Hamilton who he is. There is little traditional plot. Rather, Hamilton cut the film’s shots together to evoke the spirit of memory itself.

Hamilton uses the camera to reveal deeper truths about manhood than appear on the crude surface. He combines images from his home state of Texas with scenes from Simp-

son shenanigans. Footage of memorials to the fallen soldiers of the Texas Revolution intermingle with the mischief of college boys.

At first, this may seem dissonant. However, as the film progresses, the connections between the places becomes more apparent.

In a 1954 speech to the Chi Omega sorority, historian Russell Kirk said, “Voluntary associations, true fraternities, unite individuals by the power of sympathy against arbitrary measures, and train their members to stand forthrightly against oppression.”

“Ecce Viri” expresses this teaching of Kirk. The men of Simpson, and similar voluntary institutions, are growing to change the world and do good in it. “Ecce Viri” points out that Simpson acts as a transitory stage in its residents’ lives, taking them from being boys, to being “boymen,” and eventually into manhood.

The short film ultimately explores two important questions: How do boys grow into men? and, What are these men?

Hamilton’s grandfather, interviewed for the film, answered the latter question simply: “Total integrity.”

Manhood is tied directly to the cultivation of the soul and active pursuit of virtue in “Ecce Viri.”

Manhood, for the subjects of “Ecce Viri,” is not to be

Stills from “Ecce Viri,” the documentary about Simpson Dormitory produced by former Hillsdale student Josh Hamilton. Michael Lucchese | Collegian

found in the things society considers “mature” — things that would get a movie an R rating. Rather, manhood is tied to things society might even consider immature — lessons from children’s stories, for instance, forgotten by many students in contemporary America.

Junior Sam Clausen, interviewed in the film, claims that those childhood lessons,

about virtues like kindness or wonder, are what help boys transform into men. Rather than shed these lessons like a cocoon, the boy-men beheld in the film embrace them and carry them into adulthood, ready to face the terrors of the world firmly rooted in the right.

“Ecce Viri” is a love letter to one of those voluntary associations of which Kirk spoke. It

April 16

Cello, from B1

Hillsdale Camerata presents “Rather Mozart” 11:30 a.m. Saturday Mauck Solarium

April 22

Phi Mu Alpha Coffee House 11 p.m. Friday A.J.’s Cafe Grewcock Student Union Shakespeare, from B1 fresh atmosphere of the arboretum, but the directors chose to take advantage of this feature in their portrayal.

“The arb is beautiful, so performing something as dark as Macbeth is difficult,” co-director senior Faith Liu said.

“However, that’s what the play is about. Appearances can be deceiving. So we are playing on that theme.”

The script features multiple double meanings. Liu and fellow director senior Daniel Negri drew on this theme when

is not ideological propaganda, nor is it simply cut together to stimulate emotion in the viewer.

Real art defends and sustains what is Good, True, and Beautiful in the world, not by imposing standards on it, but by reflecting nature. And “Ecce Viri” does just that.

The film is being shown at 7 p.m. on Saturday, April 17, in the basement of Lane Hall.

Junior Luke Martin, sophomore Patrick Lucas, and alumnus Joe Banovetz ’15 rehearse for this weekend’s Shakespeare in the Arboretum production of “Macbeth.”

Madeline Barry | Collegian

making artistic decisions.

They cast actors to play both protagonists and antagonists within the same performance, suggesting the potential for corruption in all humans. The actors playing the Weird Sisters in the second act also play innocent characters in the first act. Freshman Molly Schutte, cast as a Weird Sister, praised Liu and Negri for their directing skills.

“It’s been interesting to

watch Faith and Dan shape how we play our characters because they have a specific vision for how they want us to portray them,” she said. “But they also give us freedom to think about what our characters are saying.”

The second act opens with a famous incantation of the Weird Sisters, “Double, double, toil and trouble,” propelling the story at the same rapid pace as the first act, onward

Senior Kendall Karpack plays Lady Macbeth in this weekend’s Shakespeare in the Arboretum production of “Macbeth.” Madeline Barry | Collegian

toward a tragic close.

The cast includes Joe Banovetz ’15 as Macbeth and senior Kendall Karpack as his dominating wife. Junior Austin Benson will play the honest Banquo, Senior Dominic Restuccia will portray Malcolm, and Shelby Ripley will take the role of Macduff. The cast, a majority of which are students, is joined by Assistant Professor of Politics Adam Carrington as King Duncan.

The production will stage

two performances this weekend: one at 2 p.m. Saturday and the other at the same time on Sunday. In case of rain, the performances will be held in McNamara Rehearsal Hall at Howard Music Building.

music fraternity. Those who know her will miss hearing her play.

“I like to listen to her play,” Bob said. “When our neighbors found out she was going to donate this to Hillsdale, they tried to talk her out of it.

One neighbor came over the other day because he wanted her to play one more time. It’s the end of an era.”

Mary Ann and Bob described a lady who played in the Plymouth Symphony orchestra. Though the lady attended every rehearsal and performance, she sat in the last chair, the place the least-experienced performer usually sits. Mary Ann never wanted to be the person in that chair; she said she didn’t want to be known as someone not very good. So she stopped playing instead.

Now, she will enable younger students to develop their musicianship instead using her valuable instrument.

“I just want people to play it,” she said. And at Hillsdale, they certainly will.

Son of William F. Buckley Jr. satirizes Reformation in ‘The Relic Master’ By | Hannah Niemeier Collegian Reporter When you have to sell the toes of saints for a living, you know something is rotten in the system.

At first, “The Relic Master,” a comedy about the exploits of a Reformation-era businessman, doesn’t sniff of political commentary. But journalist Christopher Buckley’s new novel, published in December 2015, uses a relic collector’s run-in with the Shroud of Turin to satirize the political corruption that led to the chaos of the Reformation — corruption that still unsettles readers today.

The historical fiction novel is a departure for the political journalist who has focused largely on contemporary issues in “The White House Mess,” “Supreme Courtship,” and “Losing Mum and Pup: A Memoir,” Buckley’s self-conscious tribute to his father, National Review founder William F. Buckley Jr. But Dismas, the novel’s main character, takes a modern approach to church corruption; a practical businessman from the start, he’s getting filthy rich by selling holy relics throughout pre-Reformation Europe.

At a relic fair in Basel, Dismas fleshes out the already bursting collections of his two patrons, the Archbishop of Mainz and Frederick of Saxony. These relics, especially the body parts of saints, are later displayed in churches to boost indulgence sales.

For Dismas and for church leaders in 1517, “Religion is a business just like any other.”

Morals, scruples, and religious convictions have little to do with it.

So when Dismas’ friend Albrecht Durer, the narcissist and brilliant artist who painted Frederick and Luther, concocts a moneymaking scheme to duplicate the Shroud of Chambery (later known as the Shroud of Turin), the most envied relic in the world, Dismas is all for it.

Through a series of mishaps and drunken revelations, however, the scheme goes awry, and Dismas must make “penance” by stealing the true shroud.

It’s a messy plot that reads like the script of a sitcom, and Dismas’ comrades only complicate the situation. On top of saving his own life, the disgraced businessman must manage a motley crew that includes the moody Durer, a

runaway beauty named Magda, and three meatheaded bodyguards.

Buckley’s breezy, often irreverent narrative tells history with attitude, conveying the spirit of a tumultuous age.

Buckley caricatures historical figures with abandon, satiriz-

Christopher Buckley’s “The Relic Master” satirizes the Reformation period. Simon&Schuster.com | Courtesy

ing Archbishop of Mainz as a pompous careerist with a love for the royal “we,” painting Frederick of Saxony as

a well-meaning, but rather dense teddy bear of an “uncle” to Dismas, and mocking the miraculous properties of relics in a scene where a church official wipes his makeup on the Shroud of Turin in an attempt to cure his skin condition.

Far from trivializing the revolutionary consequences of the Reformation, though, Buckley’s insouciant tone expresses moral questions in the voice of the common man, showing just how murky the moral ground can become as a result of political and religious corruption. Even Dismas and Durer, worldly as they are, question the doctrine of indulgences, watching Luther’s rise from afar.

Though Durer hesitantly sides with Luther in a chapter entitled “To Hell with Purgatory,” Buckley refuses to champion either side of the Reformation. The comedy of errors rolls on, and Dismas uses the doctrine of the Reformation to justify a heist that is just as shady as his trade in relics.

If worshipping relics is a sin, Dismas and Durer theorize, then the two are Reformation-era Robin Hoods, stealing the Shroud of Turin from the rich and giving truth to

poor, misguided Christians.

Right? After all, how heinous can crimes against a false relic really be? On the other hand, Dismas’ business sense conflicts with this selflessness: if the Reformation revolutionizes Europe and dethrones his patrons, Dismas’s relic business is in dire trouble.

But in Buckley’s historical adventure, these weighty questions are carried off in a whirlwind of action, entertainment, and irreverence.

Though the earthy tone may seem offensive at times, especially when chronicling the immorality of Dismas’ virile bodyguards, Buckley’s sometimes unflattering representation of historical figures may expose a tendency to create a “holy relic” of the Reformation movement.

Regardless of its appropriateness, Buckley’s comic voice is the core of the novel, and when he shifts his focus, the whole work falters. For example, after Dismas wins a fierce battle against rival thieves of the Shroud, both Buckley and Dismas seem unsure what to do next; Buckley seems unsure whether he should moralize or satirize Dismas’ victory.

However, when Buckley confidently cartoonized the

Reformation period, his versatile, boyish, energetic voice presents historical fiction at its sauciest, mocking the buffoonery of hypocrisy from the eyes of the common man.

Though he may paint Reformation history with a bit of a wide brush, Buckley’s satire hits home when one realizes how deeply church corruption affected society in the Reformation. These moral undercurrents show that Buckley is thumbing his nose at more than the Reformation period itself. Amid his coarse language and irreverent rewriting of history, Buckley betrays his aims as a political journalist: “The Relic Master” shows Buckley’s fear that the corrupt practices of a diseased government can spread through an entire political body.

In a recent interview with CBS News, Buckley said, “American politics are self-satirizing. I don’t think they need me.” But by using history to alert readers to the scent of hypocrisy, “The Relic Master” shows just how much Americans depend on satirists like Buckley.

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Features

B3 14 April 2016

Students reach out to deaf community through ASL By | Breana Noble Assistant Editor Senior Daniel Slonim and junior William Persson can say plenty without making a sound.

Both know American Sign Language, or ASL, and have interpreted for those in the deaf community. Slonim interprets songs and sometimes sermons at Pine Ridge Bible Church in

Senior Daniel Slomin interprets a song into American Sign Language at Pine Ridge Bible Church.

Breana Noble | Collegian

Quincy, Michigan, on Sundays, and Persson formerly interpreted his high school’s theater productions in Minnesota. Those experiences, they said, allowed them to access a community they wouldn’t have otherwise.

Slonim learned ASL with his family using websites, computer programs, and a formal class at a deaf school after the deaf mother of a member of his church began attending.

Although she passed away several years ago, Slonim said she taught him perseverance.

“She had such a positive attitude,” Slonim said. “She expressed so much joy through all of that.”

That perseverance he learned from her shows through as Slonim grows in his ability to interpret at Pine Ridge, where he came for the first time during his sophomore year. Slonim saw Laura Loveberry, who has interpreted at Pine Ridge for 20 years, signing for Dale and Elaine Miller in the front pew.

Slonim went right up to the group to introduce himself. Loveberry said she was impressed.

“Most people are a little bit afraid to talk to someone who is deaf,” Loveberry said. “It was a brave and bold and awesome thing to do, because a lot of people in the deaf community feel like people don’t want to approach them because they don’t know what to say.”

It didn’t take long before Loverberry was urging Slonim to try interpreting. He started with signing songs and said he was thankful that the Millers were so patient with him.

“Anything is better than nothing,” Slonim said. “I just pray God will help me to get the message through, and whatever I do, I hope it’s not terrible heresy.”

Since then, Slonim said he has grown in his ability to interpret. He normally does the songs at services, but sometimes he signs the sermons, too.

Loveberry said she appreciates Slonim’s assistance and their ability to tag team on the interpreting during church service.

“He’s been an encouragement to me,” Loveberry said. “When you are signing for a sermon and songs, that is totally focusing for an hour and a half. When you’re done, you’re exhausted.”

Since Slonim is a senior, Loveberry said she will miss having him to share the job of interpreting at the service.

“You’re giving the person a visual picture of the song, and he’s able to get into the music of the song,” she said. “He has a heart for service and a love for God. We’re literally being the hands and feet of Jesus by getting the message to them.”

For that, Dale Miller said he appreciates the ministry Daniel has done over the past three years.

“He’s been growing and growing and improving and improving,” Miller said. “He shares my language.”

Persson said he enjoys serving the deaf community by interpreting, as well. While attending Minnetonka High School, Persson decided to stop studying Spanish and tried his hands at sign language instead.

“I just jumped into it,” Persson said. “I had always wondered what it would be like.”

Persson said he excelled rapidly at his courses, and his teachers were soon helping him to learn to interpret. With one other student, Persson became involved with his high school’s theater department as a junior, and they would interpret the plays and musicals together.

“The theater productions are open to all deaf people at any time,” Persson said, adding that since he has left, students have continued to interpret the shows. “They’d come up and talk to you afterward. They were always so thankful because it’s not very typical.”

Persson said his experiences with interpreting and speaking to deaf people taught him about the isolation and even prejudices that come with being unable to hear.

“You can tell they really struggled with that, and it changed them a bit,” Persson said. “I learned to be more respectful of them and those who are learning English.”

Now at Hillsdale, Persson said he continues to practice ASL to make sure he doesn’t lose it, but there are not many places to use the skill while at college.

“It was really nice being a volunteer in that community,” Persson said. “It’s something I miss here.”

Nevertheless, Persson said he hopes to get involved with using ASL after graduation.

Persson and Slonim agreed that learning and knowing sign language can allow people to have access to those who speak the sixth most popular language in the United States.

“Why learn Latin? That has value in and of itself,” Persson said. “But this one has value because there is this community, and you can’t understand their community as well without the language.”

Slonim said he appreciated the visual aspect of it, adding that people normally talk with their hands.

“Talking with your hands and having it mean something is pretty cool,” Slonim said.

Persson said he likes the emotion that sign language can capture.

“I admire how beautiful it can be,” Persson said. “You can see their joy so much more evidently because it’s very different from English.

It’s all about the way you express your body in all sorts of shapes.”

Slonim said that animation allows you to be more expressive than using English, since you can’t make some facial expressions when forming words.

Halter Shooting Sports Center hits the mark in sponsorships By | Joshua Paladino Collegian Reporter The Hillsdale College John A. Halter Shooting Center is the only college owned shooting facility that is entirely funded by private donations.

“This doesn’t exist anywhere else,” Range Master Bartley Spieth said.

Since 2008, the shooting sports center has collected $12 million in individual and corporate donations.

“The facility is unparalleled when it comes to college owned shooting ranges. It is truly oneof-a-kind,” Hillsdale’s shotgun team member junior Drew Lieske said.

Spieth said private donors earmark their donations to support shooting sports at Hillsdale, unlike other colleges, which take money from a general fund to support their shooting programs.

Corporate sponsors include Browning, Beretta, Smith & Wesson, Winchester, and AcuSport.

They provide guns, ammunition, and funds to maintain and improve the Halter shooting center, according to Spieth.

Winchester is the official ammunition sponsor for the Halter shooting sports center. Spieth said ammunition donations from Winchester have exceeded $250,000 since 2010.

Winchester has committed to another five years as the ammunition sponsor for Hillsdale’s shooting programs, according to Spieth.

“They donate ammunition for our ladies for liberty camp, our couples for liberty camp, our liberty and learning youth camp, and the fall shoot,” Spieth said.

FROM GRAVITY B4 universe.

“This is the same thing,” Halmrast said. “Now instead of just looking at it through the electromagnetic spectrum, we can look at these gravitational waves.”

“It turns out the universe sends in radio signals and we can hear the universe,” Jessup said.

On March 13, Halmrast and Jessup traveled with Dolch to his alma mater, California Technical University, to attend a two-day NANOGrav conference. Each day, the students heard a lecture and worked on a different project. The work was meant to improve their understanding of the detection of the waves.

“We’d simulate the data and then we’d try and extract the information about the sine wave using data analysis techniques,” said Halmrast.

The data wasn’t a clear line at first, because of interference with the signal. The s-shaped curve of the sine wave was only visible once the researchers ignored the extra “noise,” Halmrast explained.

The readings could be distorted by the material between earth and the stars, called “interstellar medium.”

“If there were nothing at all between us and distant stars, we would receive the radio signals exactly as they were sent from the pulsar,” Dolch said.

Because they spent more than 25 hours observing the telescope data, Jessup and Halmrast are both authors on NANOGrav’s next data release.

While they shared excitement over their work and accomplishments, the students said using one of the world’s largest telescopes and studying groundbreaking scientific evidence was just part of class.

“It was just an independent study for us,” Halmrast said. “It was a fantastic opportunity though.”

The fall shoot alone, which is an event open to all students, faculty, staff, and invited guests from the public, attracted 280 shooters, Speith said.

On top of providing free ammunition for these events, he said, Winchester offers discounted ammunition for student’s classes, the shotgun team, and additional events.

Winchester’s sponsorship, along with all of the individual contributions, make expenses low for shooting classes and the shooting team.

Student’s firearm classes all cost less than $100 for 16 hours of range time.

In comparison, a typical two-day class, with 16 hours of range time costs between $400 and $600, while private instruction costs between $25 and $175 an hour, according to Spieth.

Senior Samantha Fletcher said she has taken Introduction to Firearms, Basic Pistol, Basic Shotgun, and Advanced Shotgun. However, she said she would not have taken them if the cost had been much higher.

“I think the fact that they make the classes so affordable is crucial to whether students take them,” Fletcher said.

Lieske said Winchester’s sponsorship saves team members about $3,000 per year on ammunition.

“It is truly a blessing to be able to continue competing in the shooting sports while attending college, and here at Hillsdale the members of the shotgun sports team are lucky enough to be able to do so at no cost,” Lieske said.

Spieth said Hillsdale’s shooting team is one of very few schools that is fully funded.

Smith & Wesson provides all the handguns for the ladies for liberty and couples for liberty events. Browning and Beretta also offer firearms

at discounted rates for certain events, according to Spieth.

Another donor to Hillsdale’s shooting program is AcuSport. They gave funds for the lodge, an olympic bunker trap, and they provide endowed scholarships for shooters, according to Spieth.

In addition to corporations donating to Hillsdale’s shooting programs, private individuals donate to shotgun team members directly.

“Members of the shotgun sports team are provided scholarships from private donors who allocate funds specifically to members of the team,” Lieske said, “Most provide up to half tuition.”

On top of scholarships through Hillsdale College, Lieske said he is personally sponsored by Michigan Shooting Centers, Kolar Arms, Fiocchi Ammunition, Promatic Traps, Pilla Sport and White Flyer Targets who provide him with money and equipment.

“Winchester donates because they understand, like other companies do, the need to support youth and new shooter programs,” Spieth said, “Most clubs operate at an average member age of 60 or higher.”

Spieth said he blamed the anti-gun media for harming the image shooting has, but he also said parents and grandparents are not passing on their guns or teaching their children and grandchildren how to shoot.

“They’re fearful of the perception,” Spieth said.

The goals of the shooting sports center are to invoke participation in shooting and to change the mindset that people have about guns, according to Spieth.

“There is a stigma attached to guns that they are an inherently violent object,” Fletcher said. “But if you learn to use them under safe, controlled

conditions, like out on the range, then people are comfortable and they feel safe around guns.”

In order to achieve these goals, Spieth said the Halter Sports Shooting Center is crucial.

“There’s no local club that would give their facility for education on a Saturday,” he said. “We work hard to introduce new shooters to the sport, and with this facility we have an opportunity to do that in a quality way.”

Spieth said people are fearful of shooting because they don’t have quality experience, and that has to combine safety and marksmanship skills.

“The shooting sports are a safe, fun and exciting opportunity for citizens to exercise their Second Amendment rights,” Lieske said.

Spieth said he was surprised, when he started to work with youth programs 12 years ago, most kids in the Hillsdale community had not shot a gun. He said even at Hillsdale College, with most students coming from a conservative background, many had never shot a gun.

When the Halter facility first opened in fall 2008, 10 percent of the student body participated in shooting in some way. Now, 20 percent of the student body participates in shooting recreation each semester, whether through classes, the fall shoot, or other events, according to Spieth.

Spieth said he wants to provide experience for people to be proficient with guns so they do not see them as a danger.

“If you have no experience, and you place no value in our Second Amendment, why would you fight for it?,” Spieth said, “But when you experience it, you know this is worth having, worth saving, worth fighting for.”

Miller serves with simple kindness in the sports complex By | Nicole Ault Collegian Reporter Every weekday, from 5:40-10 a.m., Jerry Miller sits at the front of the Roche Sports Complex.

For this mild, white-haired gentleman, interaction with people gives life and work their richness.

“We laugh here together every morning,” he said. “I do not want people coming through the door with a frown on their face. I share so much joy with these kids every day. And we talk about families, talk about brothers and sisters. We even get talking about politics.”

“These things are the simplicity of life,” he said, noting that the simple things can also be the most profound, an idea that has become his life’s philosophy, learned over the past 80 years of his life.

From a farm in Saline, Michigan, Miller worked in the farm industry for several years — first in Saline, and then, after his marriage in 1955, in Tecumseh, Michigan.

Around 1965, he worked automotive parts factory and then in the trucking industry.

He said his most memorable experiences were selling trucks in Alaska for the pipeline project in the ’70s, opening a convenience store called “Miller’s Main Stop” in Reading, Michigan, leasing and servicing trucks again in the ’90’s. and, in the early 2000’s, working for New Carbon Distribution selling pancake and waffle mixes to businesses.

His work for New Carbon brought him in contact with Hillsdale folks, who informed him of a job opening at the Roche center. Since 2011, he said, he’s been manning the front desk and helping out at special events and games.

Miller told about his notable life’s work with a sense of gratefulness and humility.

He said his greatest passion is his service work for the Shriners organization, of which he’s been a member since 1981. Miller said the organization has opened 22 hospitals that provide medical services for children for free. He often drives buses to transport children to hospitals, even as far as Chicago.

“The organization is about brotherly love, relief, and truth — if you display those things, you will be better and other people will be better around you,” he said. “I live the Shriner’s program every day of my life.”

To the students and staff who frequent the Roche center, his dedication to serving others is evident.

“He just seems to start your day off with a smile and always says something nice to you to make you feel good about yourself,” Staff Assistant for Athletics Sue Olmstead said. “ I think he tries to be a father to all the kids here.”

Since her freshman year, junior Marie Landskroener has been going with friends to the Roche center to work out, and she said Miller makes it “a joy to go.”

“We get up really early to work out, and that can be hard, but one of the reasons we’ll go anyway is so that we can see Jerry,” she said.

Miller’s love for people is also evident in his care for his wife Karen of 60 years and family.

“I lucked out, I really did,” he said. “Karen is a wonderful woman — she’s a tremendous mother, a great wife — I guess I don’t know how you could say more about her. She is the reason I am what I am; she’s been my rock. When the going was tough she was the tough one.”

Miller and his wife have three daughters, four grandchildren, and three great-grandsons. Olm-

stead, who knows one of his daughter, said “she would say he’s the best dad in the world.”

Miller said young people are adults’ “greatest asset,” and he has wisdom to share with them — “accept the enthusiasm of the day,” “at some point in time, you gotta believe in Jesus Christ,” and “don’t stop pursuing the next thing.”

“What you’re doing right now is simple in the grand scheme of things but it matters,” he said.

Miller got up with a chuckle: “Well, enough philosophy!” But he’ll keep living his philosophy day by day, person by person, with his smile and his friendly conversation and all the simple things that make him memorable for everyone he meets.

Roche Sports Complex Receptionist Jerry Miller said he loves getting to know all those who come through his door in the morning. Gerald Miller | Courtesy

B4 14 April 2016

www.hillsdalecollegian.com

Features

Finding post-grad freedom from debt How alumni pay off student loans

By | Natalie C. McKee Senior Reporter Hillsdale’s financial aid counsellors met with graduating seniors last week to review the state of their student debt and prepare graduates to pay off their loans.

While the class of 2016 has been finishing papers and applying for jobs, last year’s graduates have had a year to work hard and make progress on paying back those dreaded debts. According to Director of Financial Aid Rich Moeggenberg, Hillsdale students in 2014 left with an average of $25,502 in student loan debt.

Chris Pandolfo ’15 said he has no regrets about the loans he took out to attend Hillsdale — one private Hillsdale loan, and another from Wells Fargo — even though his payment is nearly $600 a month.

“Things are going pretty well,” Pandolfo said. “I haven’t missed a student loan payment.”

He has no other loans right now,

and lives in Greenville, South Carolina working for Conservative Review, a start-up media outlet, where he only pays $400 a month in rent and food is equally inexpensive.

His trick to success? A budget.

Pandolfo said he doesn’t have an excel spreadsheet, but he has a general idea that gas will cost him about $22 a week and groceries around $200 a week. He has a certain amount set aside for savings, tithes, and bills.

To keep track, he assigns his paychecks to certain bills that are due. His Hillsdale loan is due on the first of the month, the Wells Fargo bill on the fifteen, his rent after that, and his credit card on the last week of each month.

“I’m probably living a little more unhealthily than I should be, but I can’t cook,” Pandolfo said. “Crock pots are your friends.”

He also said he works at building a savings account, depositing $50 each month. He blew a tire after a couple months of saving and was able to pay it off with what he had

in the bank instead of racking up credit card debt.

He added that he uses his credit card like cash — he only puts groceries and gas on the card and then pays it off at the end of each month.

Because he doesn’t plan on getting married in the near future, Pandolfo said he is putting off buying a house.

“I don’t want to have this debt for ten years,” Pandolfo said. “As soon as I’m able I’m going to increase my payments to get it over with.”

Shaun Lichti ’15 has also been making his payments each month.

He graduated from Hillsdale in three years, so he does not have huge student loan payments. He has three separate loans with fairly low interest rates.

“If I had $50,000, I’d probably be very freaked out about it,” he said.

That makes paying it off early less pressing, however, Lichti said.

It’s easier to put off. He plans to start paying it off more aggressively in September.

With interest, Andie McGowan

’15 owes $81,000 in student loans.

To date, she has paid $9,180 toward her loans, but only $1,500 of that has been from the principal.

She has been making timely payments each month.

“My goal is to never miss a payment so that my credit remains unblemished,” McGowan said via email. “My eventual plan is to have an investment account that generates enough to make payments each month at larger increments so I can pay it down faster.”

Linda Edelblut ’14 will pay off all $36,000 of her student loans, including interest, next month, exactly two years after graduation and 18 months of full-time work later.

She took two years of community college so she wouldn’t accrue too much debt at Hillsdale, and even with a half tuition scholarship and an RA position for three semesters, she came out with more than the U.S. average for student debt.

Edelblut said her parents couldn’t help her pay for college or co-sign

her loans, which is why she had one loan at 14 percent interest.

She married Tim Edelblut ’13 after graduation and they now live near Boston, where they live off Tim’s salary and put hers toward paying off her student debt.

Between parental contribution and scholarship, Tim graduated debt-free. He had a savings of six months’ salary for their emergency fund when they married, and Linda Edelblut said she was tempted to use that to pay off her loans.

“It was important to him that we had that buffer and that I paid off my loans myself,” Edelblut said.

She and her husband live frugally — they don’t have a Netflix account, or even a television, and they rarely eat out.

Her advice to other students?

“Live in poverty, get debt off your back, and then you are free,” Edelblut said. “I’m going to go spend money with my next paycheck.

I’ve never been able to spend my own money.”

Radio quiet zone: Physics students study gravitational waves By | Joe Pappalardo Assistant Editor In Green Bank, West Virginia, cell phones don’t work. There is no AM or FM radio or wireless devices of any kind. The town uses landlines and cables for internet and telephone.

That is because, in this “radio quiet zone,” the world’s largest movable land object rests. Amidst farms and forested hills, a massive white dish, capable of holding a football field while still comfortably seating thousands on either side, stands. Barns lie like pebbles in its shadow.

This gigantic dish receives radio signals from space and helps scientists detect gravitational waves. The 8,500-ton, 450-foot tall device can be controlled from a desktop computer in Hillsdale College’s physics department.

“We’re in a new frontier of astronomy,” senior physics and politics Cody Jessup said.

Twice a month, Assistant Professor of Physics Timothy Dolch and an independent study group enter the Strosacker Science Center at 6 a.m. to record data from the world’s largest steerable radio telescope. Dolch is a member of the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves, a group that hopes to detect gravitational waves, just as se-

nior Joshua Ramette did with LIGO. Along with the Green Bank telescope, the students also take readings from a radio telescope at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. This device, the largest single dish in the world, sits in the ground and tracks movement across its surface. Measuring 1,000 feet in diameter, it was a major set piece for the James Bond film, “GoldenEye,” but its practical use is far more exciting.

The gravitational waves that these telescopes may be used to detect are, as Jessup explained, “ripples in the fabric of space-time.”

Jessup and junior physics and math major Daniel Halmrast have been working with Dolch, as the first undergraduates to participate in NANOGrav’s research. Dolch has been a part of the project for five years, and NANOGrav has passed 12 years in collecting data. The research involves waves with year-long periods, and the scientists finally have enough data to search for a pattern that may indicate a gravitational wave.

“There are many different ways of detecting gravitational waves,” Dolch said. “Ours are with pulsars.”

Pulsars, according to Dolch, are stars made entirely of neutrons that rapidly spin and shoot a beam of radio emission at the telescope. NANOGrav studies an array of 49 pulsars, using the two radio telescopes to receive signals from the stars.

“We see it like a pulse,” he said. “It goes ‘doot-doot-doot-doot if you put it through a speaker. These are scattered throughout our galaxy, and we can use those as a tool to detect gravitational waves.”

NANOGrav is searching for gravitational waves, like LIGO, but on a much larger scale.

“These waves come from pairs of black holes that are spinning towards each other and ultimately merge,” Dolch said. “What LIGO detected are a pair of black holes in which each was 30 times the mass of the sun, which is pretty big to begin with. The kind of gravitational waves we’re looking for come from merging supermassive black holes. Each one is 1 million times the mass of the sun.”

The scientists are looking for disturbances in the time it takes a pulse to reach each telescope. If the signal reaches the telescopes at different times, then a wave may have caused the change.

“If you receive a radio pulse, you form what is called a timing model,” Jessup said. “The timing model is going to predict when the next wave or the next radio signal is supposed to come in. The way we’re going to detect a gravitational wave is due to a change in the time of arrival of a radio pulse.”

According to Halmrast, the detection of these signals could radically change the way scientists study the universe. The field of radio astronomy

T he Green Bank Telescope, Green Bank, West Virginia from nrao.edu. In the left, buildings and cars are miniscule in comparison to the gravitational wave detection telescope.

was established in the 1930s, but scientists hadn’t been able to directly detect gravitational waves until LIGO’s discovery last September.

“It’s opening a completely new area of astronomy,” Halmrast said. “It’s likened to when we first discovered that we could look at X-rays and radio waves, and all that from space and not

`

just the visual band. That opened up astronomy.”

He explained that gravitational waves, like light, can be measured by frequency over a spectrum. While the radio emissions aren’t visible light, they offer a new perspective on the

SEE GRAVITY B3

Frank Bruno

By | Amanda TIndall How would you describe your style?

I have two very distinct styles. The first, I like to call industrial punk.

J-Town Chic, which is where I’m from, and the underground punk vibes of the surrounding area.

Second, I like to call the “Go Getter” style. It emphasizes the struggle to be successful and the willingness to tackle the professional world.

Who inspires your fashion?

The first style is inspired by every hockey fan, dads on Saturday, unsuccessful alternative bands, and various homeless people.

The second style is inspired by Nicholas G.

Hahn III, Dean Martin, James Bond, and Carl Cameron Where do you shop? a) Kohl’s, any discount rack, and Salvation Army b) Banana Republic and Louis’ For Men What is the most unique item of clothing in your closet?

My XL Molson’s Hockey Jersey or my painting sweatpants What is your most embarrassing piece of clothing?

A woman’s jean jacket I found after a party once.

Madeline Fry | Collegian

Madeline Fry | Collegian