Silhouettes 2024

The Pitt News’ annual Silhouettes project seeks to disrupt this by bringing you profiles about individuals in the Pitt community who aren’t always recognized in the news. The people highlighted in this year’s magazine were each nominated by their peers for their dedication, compassion and interesting perspectives on life. From professors and fellow students to athletes and musicians, each individual is appreciated and vital to their respective communities on campus.

I’ve seen this project grow immensely during my time at The Pitt News. Four years ago, I watched as my editors and fellow writers produced the magazine virtually during the height of the pandemic. Now, as a graduating senior and the editor-in-chief, I’m extremely proud of the work my staff has put into this special edition. I’m also happy to have finally contributed a profile of my own during my last year.

Your neighbor, your barista or that person you see on your morning commute often gets overlooked in the news cycle and ever-changing media landscape. Silhouettes is sponsored by University of Pittsburgh’s Department of English

I’m proud to present the ninth annual Silhouettes magazine to the Pitt community. Our committed editors, writers, photographers and designers worked tirelessly to produce this year’s edition. After months of planning, we’re excited to share this labor of love with our community. In reading these profiles, we hope you come to appreciate the people who make up our Pitt community and learn something new through their stories and advice.

Thank you to the entire editorial team for producing another amazing edition, our business team for its help in marketing and the Department of English for its generous contributions, which made this print edition possible. And of course, thank you to all of our profile subjects and our readers for picking up this edition!

Betül Tuncer Editor-in-Chief

As chair of the English department, I am proud to sponsor Silhouettes this year. My colleagues have been profiled regularly in past and current issues, and it’s always a thrill to see them in such a light. We work hard every day in our department to connect with students and in particular with aspiring writers of all stripes—journalists, novelists, essayists, poets, and more. And we are inspired by the student work that goes into producing Silhouettes every year. We’re excited to be a part of this.

Gayle Rogers Chair of the Department of English

Gabriela Herring Staff Columnist

Shay Roth graduates from the University of Pittsburgh for the second time this spring — this time as a published author.

“It’s funny — I never expected it to snowball into what it’s become, but it doesn’t feel like work when you’re passionate about it,” Roth said.

She first received her Bachelor of Science in Pharmaceutical Sciences in April 2022 and has continued on to work towards her Doctor of Pharmacy degree. During her graduate program at Pitt, she has also pursued concentrations in global health and pharmacotherapy during graduate school. Soon, Roth will begin her residency at Johns Hopkins Hospital as a Health-System Pharmacy Administration Resident. During this period, Roth will also be pursuing a Masters of Business Administration at Johns Hopkins Carey School of Business.

Roth lists off her accomplishments in a casual manner, as if her six years at Pitt — “That’s a quarter of my life now, which is crazy,” Roth said — are not much to note in comparison to her peers. But not many have published their own series of children’s books while attending higher education.

Roth said her debut book, co-authored by Pitt alumna Jaccie Hisashima, explains what a pharmacist is to kids and what one can do with a pharmacy degree.

“Pitt is really big into recruitment for high school, but there wasn’t really any resources available for middle school or younger,” Roth said. “And what we found is that there are a lot of books out there — but none of them were really written from the pharmacist’s point of view. And none of them showed that a pharmacist can help you manage your disease and help you be successful in doing that.”

Roth said she had always dreamed of writing a children’s book and felt lucky to have been able to recognize that dream three times. Roth’s second and third books “Diabetes, Pharmacy, and Me!: Understanding Childhood Diabetes,” and

SHAY ROTH: HEALTH LITERACY WARRIOR

“Asthma, Pharmacy and Me!: Understanding Childhood Asthma and How Pharmacists Can Help,” aim to teach children management skills of long-term diseases.

Growing up, long before her foray into pharmaceutical studies, Roth dealt with health struggles of her own.

“I had a lot of hearing surgeries and problems with my ears, so I was constantly going to [the] Children’s [hospital] in Pittsburgh,” Roth said. Each appointment caused her to miss a day of school.

The four-hour round trip commute between her hometown of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, to Pittsburgh enlightened her to issues of disproportionate access to healthcare.

“That really kind of just struck something in me when I was young — that I wanted to increase healthcare access — and I wanted to be a healthcare provider,” Roth said.

However, Roth had no commitments to a specific career in the medical field and maintained an open mind as opportunities presented themselves naturally.

“As I progressed throughout high school and everything, I started taking more advanced science classes and I really, really liked chemistry. And that’s whenever I initially thought, ‘You know, maybe I should start looking into pharmacy,’” Roth said. “I didn’t even know half the careers you can do, and I feel like I’m still learning so much about the field and learning that there’s so much you can do with the pharmacy degree.”

Now, nearing the end of her time in the School of Pharmacy, Roth laughs at her younger self, who had no desire to even attend Pitt.

“Honestly, I thought it was gonna be too big for me, because I’m from such a small town,” Roth said.

Though her parents ultimately forced her to tour Pitt’s campus, Roth found herself right at home.

“There’s 118 people in my class, so it’s a small cohort. So you really get to know your professors and you really get to know your classmates. You have that personalized relationship, even

at a big university,” Roth said.

Roth said she formed an especially influential relationship with Ashley Yarabinec, a professor who advised Roth as she dove into the experiential element of her curriculum. The two worked together to develop a personalized clinical rotation plan that would allow Roth to explore all the areas of pharmacy that held interest for her.

“[Roth] spent one of those five-week blocks with me and we designed a new type of rotation [in which] she was able to see a whole bunch of different areas of pharmacy practice in a really short period of time,” Yarabinec, associate director of experiential learning at the school of pharmacy, said.

This rotation emphasized reflection, teaching Roth to recognize her personal and professional values and how to incorporate them into her identity as a pharmacist, Yarabinec said.

The relationship between Roth and Yarabinec evolved into a mentorship over time. This led to Roth eventually approaching Yarabinec with one of her most ambitious endeavors yet — her first children’s book, “All Aboard the Rx-Express!”

The book had such a positive reception from the Pitt community following its release that Roth decided to write a second children’s book. Recently retired, former associate dean Randall Smith approached Roth and Hisashima with the idea to focus on Type 1 diabetes.

“Ironically enough, after the book came out, I was actually diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes, which was crazy, because it was a year after we had published it,” Roth said. “But I think that put it in perspective, for me even more, that even at my age, then having been a pharmacy student for five years, and having taken endocrinology classes, how overwhelming that diagnosis still was.”

The decision to subsequently focus on asthma in Roth’s next book manifested due to the disease’s prevalence in children and from the desire to further bridge gaps in health literacy as early as possible. Along with asthma, the book also discusses the role of the pharmacist in learning to manage the disease.

“Pharmacists play such a big role in counseling and how to use an inhaler, so we wanted to highlight that and just the importance of having an asthma action plan. So you’re prepared whenever you do need help,” Roth said. “The earlier you can teach that to a kid is so vital to their success in their health throughout their lives.”

The feedback Roth has received so far has made the experience all the more rewarding.

“We’ll get notes from parents sometimes saying, like ‘Oh, I read this to my kid,’ or ‘Oh, I read this to the sibling and they finally understand,’ and that just makes it all so worth it,” Roth said.

Yet somehow Roth knew this journey had just begun.

Carla Medina-Gil first en-

countered Roth’s books during office hours with Yarabinec. Her desire to be involved with Roth’s work was instantaneous.

Medina-Gil frequented clinics with her mother throughout her childhood.

“There were always resources in Spanish and English,” Medina-Gil said. “So I was like, [Roth’s book] would be a great resource for Spanish-speaking children if these were available in Spanish.”

Yarabinec agreed wholeheartedly and encouraged Medina-Gil to connect with Roth. Medina-Gil quickly became part of the team as a translator.

“I didn’t think it was possible until I talked to Shay Roth and she was like ‘Yeah, this is very possible. Let’s do it together,’” said Medina-Gil.

The Spanish editions of the series became available to the public throughout 2023. Recently, Roth and Medine-Gil received a grant from the Pennsylvania Pharmacy Association. This money will transform their work and allow them to expand their health literacy efforts.

“We’re going to work on getting those books out into the communities through different community pharmacies, libraries and just community centers for kids,” Roth said about their plans to utilize the funding.

Though the two are now partners in this health literacy mission, Medina-Gil said she still views Roth and her work as an inspiration.

“Shay is definitely a leader in her field of work, and I can see her doing many great things after she becomes a pharmacist,” Medina-Gil said.

Roth wanted to thank the following people for their contributions to and support for her project: Jaccie Hisashima, Carla Medina-Gil, Dr. Amy Donihi, Dr. Roberta Farrah, Dean Randy Smith, Dr. Ashley Yarabinec, Dr. Martha Ndung’u, Dean Patricia Kroboth and Dean Amy Seybert.

Photos courtesy of Shay Roth

MARK KRAMER: WRITER AND EMPATHY FARMER

Andrew McLaughlin Staff Writer

Walking into Mark Kramer’s office is like entering a mosaic of mementos. Pictures of his two children sit on his desk, and trinkets cover shelves along one wall. The shelves are also full of books that reflect one of his greatest passions — creative writing.

Kramer said he discovered his love for writing while pursuing a bachelor’s degree at Miami University, but writing is just one of his many interests. After college, Kramer devoted time to community service and spent a year leading volunteer groups in Northeast Kentucky.

“That was pretty formative, just to volunteer and be with people who were having experiences that were new to them,” Kramer said. “We were getting our hands dirty building houses while meeting new people and experiencing a culture the students had never experienced..”

Service remains an important theme in Kramer’s work and teaching. Following a stint in freelance journalism, Kramer earned his Master of Fine Arts at Pitt in 2009 and has worked at the University ever since. Currently, he is a teaching professor in the English department.

“I see myself as a co-learner, as a teacher,” Kramer

said. “I have expertise, I tell students, but I also want to hear their expertise and their experiences.”

In 2010, Kramer helped found The Corner, a community center in West Oakland that serves as a neighborhood outlet for the arts and social justice advocacy. Kramer said he lived in West Oakland at the time specifically because of his desire to be involved in community service.

“I volunteered there for several years before becoming the executive director, and that taught me a lot about community work,” Kramer said. “I would say that’s been pretty central to my experience at Pitt as well.”

Kramer describes himself as a “writer and empathy farmer” on his website, and he stressed empathy as a core theme both in the classroom and in his writing.

“Empathy has been a long-term interest for me,” Kramer said. “In some ways, I feel like all my writing has

been about empathy.”

Kramer believes the ideal classroom environment is inclusive and democratic, pointing to one memorable class period in which students asked questions that took the class in a new direction.

“I actually ended up almost on the outside of the conversation, and I said, ‘Hey, just run with it,’” Kramer said. “I’m continually trying to democratize the room as much as I can and let students take the lead.”

For Kramer, his philosophy on teaching ultimately returns to empathy, providing takeaways for his students that go beyond improved writing.

“My writing is about helping myself and my students understand what life is like in somebody else’s shoes,” Kramer said. “That’s an aspiration that I think we should all have.”

Gayle Rogers, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of English and department chair, has worked with Kramer for over 15 years.

In 2019, he helped nominate Kramer for the Chancellor’s Distinguished Service Award, which Pitt awarded to him in recognition of his work.

“His students praise him endlessly for his dedication to helping them improve as writers through engagements with communities in need, especially communities that are not their own,” Rogers said. “It’s a remarkable skill.”

Cheyenne Filous graduated from Pitt in 2018 and said her experience with Kramer as a professor was “invaluable.”

“Mark created an atmosphere in class that felt both safe and empowering for all students to be subjected to constructive criticism — a necessary experience,” Filous said. “He went above and beyond in his role as an educator, and in him I found a mentor, an advocate and a friend.”

Kramer’s freelance work has appeared on various news sites, including PublicSource, The Atlantic and Pittsburgh Quarterly. In 2006, he published a book titled “Dispossessed: Life in Our World’s Urban Slums,” in which he spent four years researching informal settlements worldwide. Whether in an article or a book, Kramer said his work always returns to understanding the experiences of others.

“Whether my writing is about informal settlements in another country or writing about the city of Pittsburgh, it’s about helping people have a vicarious experience,” Kramer said.

Kramer also desires to understand history through empathy. When the travel and food show “Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown” released an episode about Pittsburgh in 2017, Kramer authored a piece for the show’s website about the Civic Arena in the Hill Dis-

trict. This article profiled one of the more than 8,000 residents of the historically African American neighborhood displaced by the arena’s construction.

“I got to write a piece that highlighted the life of somebody who grew up in the Hill and became a community leader,” Kramer said. “I was glad for that because it showed the context of the neighborhood as opposed to just the food featured in the show.”

Kramer finds himself more comfortable in nature than in the city and sometimes feels as if he doesn’t fit into the Pittsburgh landscape.

“I’m a little surprised I work in urban spaces, because I don’t feel like I fit in some ways,” Kramer said. “I grew up on five acres of land in rural Ohio, and I miss the woods.”

As an outdoors enthusiast in an urban setting, Kramer said much of his writing is focused on the intersection of urban spaces with the natural environment.

“I’m interested in income inequality, race and neighborhood change, but I’ve also been writing on urban nature and the integration of green spaces and urban spaces in Pittsburgh,” Kramer said. “And that does come back to justice issues too.”

Many of Kramer’s articles reflect these themes, such as “The Urban Deerhunter,” which describes camouflaged deer hunters who hunt in wooded pockets around the city. Another article, one that he cited as a favorite, investigated the owner of a troubled apartment complex in Penn Hills. Despite Kramer’s inclination to the outdoors, he said Pittsburgh offers no shortage of interesting topics for his writing.

JC Lee, a teaching professor in the English department, has long appreciated Kramer’s kindness.

“He’s one of the most down-to-earth people I know,” Lee said. “What I love about his teaching is that he has students get out of their own lives and experience a place that is unfamiliar to them.”

In the two decades that Lee has known him, many students have told Lee they enjoyed Kramer’s classes.

“I often have students come through my classes who have taken Intermediate Nonfiction with Mark, and it’s been their favorite writing class,” Lee said.

In the classroom, Kramer shares lessons learned through his own writing with his students but does not consider himself as “merely handing down expertise.” Kramer said he desires to learn alongside his students, and hearing their insights is why he enjoys being an educator.

“We’re here to continually work toward an approximation of understanding, but we never fully arrive at understanding, and that’s the educational process,” Kramer said. “It’s not about becoming experts but to continually unlearn what we thought we knew.”

When asked how he hopes to impact his students, Kramer said although improving one’s writing is an important goal, he wants to impart empathy and understanding to his students above all.

“I want us to be thinking about who we are to other people around us,” Kramer said. “I do want [my students] to become more thoughtful writers … but I think even more than that, I want them to grow as people.”

Photos by Bhaskar Chakrabarti | Staff Photographer

ALEX BORG: HER ACCORDION

ANCHORS A ‘NO-MAN JIMMY BUFFETT BAND’

Patrick Swain Culture Editor

A bulky, boxy suitcase sat tucked under Alex Borg’s bed on the third floor of Nordenberg Hall during her first year at Pitt. During moments when the dorm sounded a bit too quiet, a lucky few crowded around with eager ears as Borg’s accordion emerged from its hideaway.

Bridget Armon met Borg in the Music Living Learning Community during their orientation and said it wasn’t long before she saw an accordion in Borg’s hands.

“There were about seven of us packed in her dorm room, sitting around on the floor while she was in her chair with a massive accordion in her lap,” Armon, a sophomore English literature and writing major, said. “It was a major surprise — when she told us she played accordion, I thought she was joking.”

Another resident of the third floor, Borg’s future roommate Freya Norwood, said the massive case made Borg look like she just arrived at Ellis Island. Her new friends’ surprised reactions weren’t unexpected, Borg said.

“Not really many people, especially my age, play the accordion — it’s kind of a dying instrument, which is sad, but I think they’re shocked, they’re a bit interested,” Borg said. “They’re kind of like, ‘Why?’”

Borg, a sophomore linguistics and German major, played clarinet in her high school’s marching band in Hunterdon County, New Jersey. She discovered her next musical curiosity upon hearing the accordion in songs like Billy Joel’s “Vienna” and the soundtrack to the Broadway musical “Hadestown.” After persuading her mom, Borg scoured Facebook and drove half an hour to Lambertville

to borrow an accordion from a music center. The love affair didn’t stop there. With some practice, Borg got her own and left for Pittsburgh — accordion in tow.

Since arriving on campus, Borg’s exploration of the accordion has touched on a multitude of genres. With her right hand resting on white keys and her left laid on a bevy of black buttons, Borg said she gets occasional requests from her Ukrainian grandmother to play her preferred polkas.

“She’s Ukrainian, and she likes Ukrainian folk music, so she’d be like, ‘Oh, can you play this?’” Borg said before launching into a rousing polka. “I just think it’s fun. I think it’s a happy sounding instrument — it’s also involved in a lot of different cultures, and a lot of different folk music, which I think is really interesting. The history of the instrument is what drew me to it even further.”

In addition to polkas, Borg is partial to playing waltzes, and hopes to spread her appreciation to anyone who will listen in Oakland. She said exposure will teach concertgoers to dance in 3/4 time.

“I think people underappreciate waltzes — I feel like they should find their way into the DIY scene,” Borg said. “They can learn.”

Borg inhabits a musical household in Pittsburgh — her roommate is Norwood, a sophomore music and film major. Since sharing a room in the Music LLC, playing music together became the cornerstone of their relationship. Norwood recalled a musical moment she shared with Borg and her accordion before she left to study abroad in London.

“I normally keep a keyboard in our apartment because I

gotta have something, I gotta have that access to music. But my family had picked it up to move me out a week early, so I was without my keyboard and just itching,” Norwood said. “I sat Alex down and I was like, ‘Alex, I need you to play chords for me.’ And so, it was leading up to Christmas and our other roommate was out, and so we took the opportunity to sit in the living room while she played chords and I sang Christmas carols. We did that for, I think, an hour or two. It was the most perfect little send-off.”

When Norwood enrolled in an orchestral composition class last semester, Borg got the opportunity to take her accordion playing to the next stage. Norwood said she composed a piece for Borg to perform at a classical concert with the Pitt orchestra.

“It’s a very big thing to get told that you’re supposed to write something and 60 people will figure it out, so I wanted to narrow it down to doing something I’m comfortable with, which is participating with people I love, with my friends,” Norwood said. “I was like, ‘Hey, Alex, this is crazy, but would you consider doing this?’ She said yes on the get-go … I was like the proudest parent, honestly, to go and watch the performance.”

Norwood and her professor, Roger Zahab, find that accordionists carry a goofiness that’s essential to their ethos as musicians. Norwood said composing for Borg’s accordion presented an opportunity to look at musical composition through an unconventional lens.

“I sing with the Heinz Chapel Choir on top of that, and so I think I’m very comfortable with the voice. I think I thought of the accordion, a little bit, as a voice,” Norwood said. “I mean, it’s a wind instrument — you do get it to sing and to crescendo, and I think that’s the beautiful part about also watching her get to sit up front in front of the orchestra. The accordion is such an expressive instrument — you

literally get to see it breathe.”

Borg relished the chance to share her accordion chops with the public.

“It was really fun — it was really nerve-wracking, because I obviously don’t get a lot of opportunities to play the accordion in public, unless I want to sit on a street corner and busk, which I could,” Borg said. “My friend Bridget [Armon] and I, we want to start doing that when the weather’s nicer.”

Borg got a taste of busking outdoors as her accordion became the bedrock of blossoming friendships throughout her first year. Armon said together with her guitar, Borg’s accordion and Norwood’s vocals, the trio serenaded Soldiers and Sailors with the sound of their soulful stylings, playing impromptu covers of Phoebe Bridgers and Sufjan Stevens.

“I remember one time last year, we all took our instruments on a really nice night out to the Soldiers and Sailors lawn, and it was the middle of the night, it was dark, but she was playing her accordion, I was on guitar and our other friend was singing,” Armon said. “We were just trying to figure out how many songs we could both play that would fit with the guitar and the accordion.”

Months later, on Sept. 2, 2023, Borg and her fellow musicians discovered their next musical infatuation — the late singer Jimmy Buffett.

“He unfortunately passed away the day before their housewarming party, so Bridget and her roommates put up photos of Jimmy Buffett and we kinda turned it into a Jimmy Buffett-themed event,” Borg said. “We started listening to more of his music — and we were like, ‘OK, he’s kind of a fun guy, it’d be kind of fun if we played some of his music.’ And so it kind of evolved from there. We haven’t played any gigs yet, but fingers crossed.”

With a repertoire of exclusively Jimmy Buffett covers, Borg and Armon became a burgeoning band. They enlisted their friend Lauren Shutyto play the keyboard. Jimmy and the Buffetts, a moniker born of an ad hoc quip on a dating app, is an up-and-coming outfit hoping to cater to Oakland’s niche of Jimmy Buffett accordion enthusiasts.

“I was asked if I perform music on a dating app by someone who runs a venue, and I said ‘Yes, I’m actually in a band with an accordion player, and we only play Jimmy Buffett covers, and we’re called Jimmy and the Buffetts,’ which wasn’t true at the time,” Armon said. “But we did start practicing … we’re waiting to get a gig. We’ll see.”

Photos by Bronco York | Staff Photographer

KAMALANI AKEO:

Matthew Scabilloni Senior Staff Writer

It’s the 2014 offseason, and Pitt volleyball coaches are as busy as ever recruiting, getting hundreds of emails from high school athletes asking the coaches to watch their highlight tape. In all of these highlight tapes, one girl standing about 5 feet, 8 inches from Kapolei, Hawaii, catches the eye of Pitt head coach Dan Fisher.

He thinks he found the future libero of Pitt volleyball.

But Kamalani Akeo never wore the libero jersey. She ended up becoming the setter of Pitt volleyball and a perfect example of perseverance to associate head coach Kellen Petrone.

“She’s just this shining example of grinding out your goals,” Petrone said.

This gritty setter from Hawaii is Pitt volleyball’s assistant coach, and is one of the unsung heroes behind the meteoric rise of Pitt volleyball.

When Akeo first arrived in Pittsburgh from the island of O’ahu for her first semester of college, the culture shock of the Yinzer accent or the difference in weather wasn’t a huge ordeal to her. Akeo was mostly amazed by the business and go-go-go attitude of Pittsburghers.

“Everyone has something to do or go to, or someplace to be,” Akeo said. “Things just move a little bit faster.”

At home, they don’t have this same type of urgency.

“In Hawaii, people joke about Hawaiian time,” Akeo said. “It’s like, when you are 30 minutes late, ‘Oh yeah, you are on Hawaiian time.’”

Akeo, however, adjusted to the Pittsburgh lifestyle of constant movement during her four years playing for Pitt. To Fisher and Petrone, Akeo may have molded herself with this lifestyle a little bit too much.

“She literally showed up every day to work,” Petrone

AN UNSUNG HERO CONTRIBUTING TO THE SUCCESS OF PITT VOLLEYBALL

said. “I remember during her senior year that [Fisher] and I had to tell her that she needed to add some other things in her life besides just volleyball and school.”

But Akeo’s dedication to volleyball alone did have its perks. She was a three-year captain for Pitt volleyball, won ACC Setter of the Year as a sophomore and earned herself All-ACC honors in 2016-2017. Her name is forever engraved into the concrete of the University of Pittsburgh Varsity Walk.

Akeo enjoys acquiring these honors, but it’s not as important as it was to return the Panthers to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in 12 years during her sophomore year.

“That year was really, really fun for me,” Akeo said. “I felt like I got a lot better over the spring and summer … I was kind of validated for how I felt, which was really good. Our team was great and nobody expected us to be that good this year.”

Fisher believes that even some of Akeo’s teammates were surprised by the Panthers’ success.

“They were a lot of really good players that worked hard to become great,” Fisher said. “In many ways, we probably did more with that group than they ever dreamed as they came in.”

Akeo’s underrated 2016 squad started an active streak of eight straight seasons of earning a bid to the NCAA Tournament — a streak that players expect to continue when playing for Pitt volleyball.

In these eight consecutive seasons of postseason play for Pitt volleyball, Akeo was with the program for all but the 2019 season and 2020 fall season. During these years away from the team, Akeo lived overseas even further away from Hawaii, playing volleyball professionally in Slovenia.

Photo courtesy of Pitt Athletics/Alex Mowrey

During the second wave of the pandemic in late 2020, Akeo’s professional career had to halt.

“[Fisher] kept checking in with me because COVID was rising again,” Akeo said. “He was looking for volunteers in the spring. He called me every two weeks in December and was like, ‘Let me know if you think the league is going to shut down or what’s going to happen.’”

Then, once Akeo’s league officially shut down in the winter, Akeo headed back to the States and agreed with Fisher to work as a volunteer assistant coach for just the 2020/2021 spring season.

Akeo’s tenure lasted far longer than just one season. After the 2020 spring postseason, then-Director of Operations Peter Manguiat was hired as an assistant coach at Cal Poly, leaving an open spot for Akeo to take rather than returning overseas.

Akeo took the director of operations job, earning herself a nonvolunteer position on the Pitt coaching staff.

Petrone — Akeo’s former coach, now coworker — saw coaching potential from Akeo during her time as a threeyear captain.

“She showed she was going to lead by example and lead by her work ethic,” Petrone said. “When someone shows an interest in developing their game at as high of a level that she did, as well as wanting to be a leader that early, there are signs that point to her wanting to be a coach pretty quickly.”

The director of operations job also gave Akeo a special opportunity — an opportunity to stay and coach her little sister Lexis Akeo, a sophomore at the time.

“It had its difficulties, but it was amazing at the same time,” Kamalani Akeo said about coaching Lexis Akeo. “I know that what we shared over those four seasons is really, really special. For us to be in each other’s lives as an adult, you just don’t get to be near your family, so that was really special to me.”

In Kapolei, Lexis and Kamalani Akeo were two little girls running around the volleyball gym or the baseball park.

In Pittsburgh, Lexis and Kamalani Akeo are the two sisters who played major roles in Pitt volleyball’s success.

Akeo’s favorite memories as a coach and player always include her younger sister, Lexis.

“One of my favorite memories as a coach was making it to the Final Four the first time,” Akeo said. “Seeing it come to fruition and being able to hug the staff after,

I remember that clearly, and I remember Lexis jumping into my arms.”

Akeo’s senior night in 2018 is another memory that sticks out to her.

“All of my family was there and my sister’s recruiting class was there — Kellen made it work out that way,” Akeo said. “And I’m pretty sure that was the first time we sold out the Field House … I remember all the fans and winning the game. It kind of was surreal. I remember it very movie-like.”

After her promotion to assistant coach in February of 2023, Akeo now reviews the same type of highlight tapes that she once sent to Fisher and Petrone. And as a recruiter, Akeo brings value that Petrone and Fisher themselves don’t necessarily give — the ability to show concrete proof the recruits can have long-term success at Pitt.

“Recruits can see that, ‘Hey, I came here from far away, I had success and now I am back coaching and I am successful in my coaching career,’” Fisher said. “I think modeling is really important, and she’s done a great job at that.”

To Petrone, the recruiting “rizz” — short for charisma — that Akeo brings outside of her ability to relate to the recruits is simple — she is warm and welcoming.

Akeo is one of the building blocks of Pitt volleyball’s rapid upswing in the past eight years.

“She laid the foundation,” Petrone said, “and helped lay the foundation of the success we are having now.”

Over Akeo’s eight years growing Pitt volleyball, she has started to enjoy the hecticness of the Yinzer-filled city.

“I have come to like Pittsburgh a lot,” Akeo said. “It is a lot faster … but that was just me when I was 18 years old. Now I am like, I love how fast things move, I love how there are things to do.”

The go-go-go attitude of Pittsburgh and the connection she has with Fisher and Petrone makes Akeo happy with her role as an assistant coach for Pitt volleyball.

“I plan to be here for as long as I can, honestly,” Akeo said. “I love it here and I love our staff.”

CLARK CHILSON TEACHING ZEN

Brian Sherry Sports Editor

Right before his 19th birthday, Pitt religious studies professor Clark Chilson made a decision that would change his life forever. Standing at a crossroads in his academic career, Chilson opted to pack his bags and fly from his home in western New York to Japan for a study abroad program.

“I was a [first-year] college student in Buffalo, New York, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to be in college,” Chilson said. “I didn’t really see the point of it, and I wanted to get away. When I got to the office, there was a pamphlet for Japan. Five months later, I was on a plane to Japan.”

While he didn’t know it at the time, Chilson’s visit to Japan would spark a lifelong interest in East Asian culture and religion, leading him to stay in the island nation for a total of 15 years. Chilson went on to graduate from Nanzan University in

Nagoya, Japan, before completing his doctorate at Lancaster University in England.

Chilson now teaches about East Asian culture and religion as a professor in Pitt’s religious studies department. The Pitt professor specifically focuses on the connection between Buddhism and psychology — a topic that he says is growing in popularity with the rise of meditative practices in Western culture.

“I always had an interest in the question of, ‘How should we live our lives?’” Chilson said. “When I was in high school, it interested me from the perspective of psychology and philosophy. When I got to Japan, I wanted to take that question from an anthropological perspective. In the process of studying anthropology, I realized I’m most interested in what religions have to say about that.”

With a calm and engaging demeanor, Chilson explains the connection between mental health and East Asian religions in a way that encourages students to evaluate their own lives. Senior political science major Andrew Klepeis took Chilson’s course “Popular Religion in a Changing Japan” in the fall of 2023. Klepeis also had experience with Chilson as a guest lecturer in a “Religion in Asia” course, where the Pitt professor took the entire class through a guided meditation.

“Dr. Chilson came into my “Religion in Asia” class as a guest lecturer, and it was awesome,” Klepeis said. “He came in and said ‘We are going to do 10 minutes of zen meditation.’ [He told us] to put our hands together, look down and do nothing for 10 minutes.”

Klepeis said his experience meditating with Chilson was incredibly powerful and has changed his outlook on the practice.

“It was crazy,” Klepeis said. “I guess I never really had the chance to do something like that in a group setting. So, after 10 minutes, he rang that bell, and I was in a completely different mindset. It was crazy. I actually can’t believe it. I’ve looked into meditation a little bit since then.”

At a university with a 14:1 student-to-professor ratio, one of the biggest challenges for instructors is simply connecting individually with the sheer number of students in their classroom. But Chil -

son still strives to remember students’ names and engage with them individually.

He said he feels a connection with his students on a more spiritual level.

“In Buddhism, there’s something called a karmic connection,” Chilson said. “It basically means that the workings of karma just bring people into your life. I like to think that students who take my classes and I have some karmic connection.”

The Pitt professor also said he is concerned about the future — specifically, the generations growing up after the rise of the internet. Chilson’s position as a scholar in East Asian religions gives him an insightful vantage point into societal change and how people cope with it. As depression rates skyrocket across the country, many are turning to East Asian practices, such as yoga and meditation, for answers to growing uncertainty about the future.

But Chilson warns students to engage with these practices in moderation, as too much meditation, especially done alone and without the guidance of people trained in meditation, can actually have a negative impact on some people’s lives. Chilson’s concern specifically applies to mindfulness meditation — a form of the practice prevalent in Western culture. Mindfulness meditation involves focusing one’s attention on a single object, such as the breath or a mental image, as a way to calm the mind down.

Photos by Pamela Smith | Contributing Editor

“I think some of the students who take my ‘Buddhism and Psychology’ class think I am anti-mindfulness [meditation],” Chilson said. “But I’m not. What I am concerned about is the way mindfulness is taught, which is that it is good, and you should do it. The problem is that different people have different responses to it, and the Buddhist tradition says that you have to be careful not to do it too much by yourself without an experienced teacher. There is a dosage issue.”

Still, Chilson believes that meditation and other religious practices are useful tools to deal with the stresses of modern life. Chilson personally engages with Naikan meditation, which encourages people to focus on positive actions they have done or received from others in their daily lives.

“Naikan meditation is a Japanese form of meditation, which involves three questions,” Chilson said. “The questions are, ‘What did I receive that was positive from other people? What did I give back that was positive? And what difficulties did I cause other people?’ In the process of doing this, I can see things differently.”

To Chilson, Naikan’s focus on the actions of others is crucial because it cultivates kindness and en -

courages social connection. As a mentor to many college-aged people, Chilson is concerned with how technology harms social connections and creates a more self-focused society.

“Everyone’s got a phone in their pocket, and people spend a lot of time by themselves to the point where it’s not healthy,” Chilson said. “Social connection is weaker than ever in America, and you see that with a lot of data. This fundamentally goes against part of our human nature, which is [that] we are social animals.”

To combat this growing inward focus in society, Chilson encourages students to focus less on themselves and more on what’s going on around them. In a world where people spend much of their time alone and social connections are weaker than ever, Chilson wants students to take a moment to reflect on what others have done for them.

“Try to think about how other people are helping,” Chilson said. “How are other people making my life better? That’s a question that people don’t spend a lot of time on. When you think about that for a little while, then you can think about how you can make other people’s lives better.”

ISLAMIC CENTER OF PITTSBURGH

FOOD PANTRY

VOLUNTEERS: FIGHTING FOOD INSECURITY FOR ALL PITTSBURGHERS

Livia Daggett Contributing Editor

The morning of Feb. 16 was the kind of frigid cold that makes most people stay curled up and cozy in bed. Despite the chill, a merry frenzy of volunteers was busy packing, carrying and delivering boxes of food and supplies to local families at the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh’s monthly food pantry.

Around 30 volunteers participated in February’s food distribution, which served approximately 130 families in the greater Pittsburgh area. That morning, some volunteers labeled boxes of donations with their contents, while others formed a fire brigade-like line up the stairs from the center’s basement to pass the boxes on to other volunteers loading them into cars.

There were frequent calls of “Behind!” “Watch out!” or “Wait, this one still needs chicken” — but even more peals of laughter and excited catch-ups between friends. Malak Ayoub, a Pitt sophomore neuroscience major and ICP pantry board member responsible for client services, said she’s always impressed by the volunteers’ willingness to give up a weekend each month.

“A lot of people might not come, you know — these times are kind of inconvenient,” Ayoub said. “But surprisingly, we do see the same people every month. People love it for the same reason I love it.”

The food pantry is affiliated with the ICP, whose building, cradled by the picturesque mansions of Schenley Farms, is not only a mosque but has also be-

come a community center. For some volunteers like Ayoub, service through the food pantry is part of an expression of faith, with charity being a major cornerstone of Islamic faith.

“It’s at a masjid, and the masjid is what started it. In Islam, it’s an obligation on those who are capable to do service, community service, things like this,” Ayoub said. “Charity is an obligation.”

But she said many people volunteer at the ICP regardless of their connection to Islam, adding, “It’s symbolic, kind of. It’s really sweet.”

Beyza Tuncer, a 2023 Pitt graduate, agreed with Ayoub.

“It’s really nice to see everyone from all different faiths, backgrounds [and] identities come together and volunteer for the same purpose,” Tuncer said. “Everyone has the same goal and same mission.”

Ten young volunteers, almost all Pitt students or alums, make up the pantry’s leadership board. Board members are responsible for calling and coordinating with clients, ordering and finding grants to pay for food and managing other volunteers. Each month begins with a hefty logistical effort from the board and concludes with a day of distribution.

On the third Friday of each month, volunteers assemble and pack hundreds of boxes with pantry staples, household supplies, toiletries and more. Each box is tailored to the requesting family’s size, dietary

restrictions and needs. Fresh produce, fish and dairy, as well as halal meat donated by local business Salem’s Halal Market & Grill, are boxed up the following morning and picked up by pantry clients or delivered by car.

Beginning during the COVID-19 pandemic, the pantry partnered with the Pittsburgh organization 412 Food Rescue to deliver food and supplies right to recipients’ homes. Food Rescue volunteers sign up for routes on the organization’s app, pick up the boxes at the ICP and deliver them. This option is especially helpful for families that can’t physically make it to pick up food, which can be a barrier to service at other pantries.

Ayoub said she’s made connections with drivers, volunteers and clients alike and formed her own community, something she sought when she first moved to Pittsburgh.

“I’m new to Pittsburgh, and I didn’t know that I was looking for this, but I just wanted a way to involve myself in the community,” Ayoub said. “My family is still overseas, so to have something that tethers me, that makes me feel happy — it’s just so fulfilling, and I love working with the clients and the drivers. It’s really my favorite time of the month. I love seeing them.”

Aqsa Owais, a Pitt sophomore bioengineering major who started volunteering as a first-year, feels similarly. “For me, this created a big sense of community,”

Owais said. “I’d come every month, and I’d see the same people every month, or I’d meet new people and catch up on their lives, see what’s happening in different parts of Pittsburgh. It kind of made Pittsburgh as a city feel smaller.”

Many of those who serve at the pantry are Pitt and Carnegie Mellon students drawn in by the relationships they’ve built with fellow volunteers, a desire to serve or the alluring promise of service hours that count toward professional school or Greek life requirements. Several come back month after month — some year after year, like senior ecology and evolution major Daphne Plantner. She has volunteered every month of the academic year since she her first-year at Pitt.

“The coolest part to me is the students who run it, and the amount of time that they dedicate to it, and the amount of energy they dedicate to it, to making this,” Plantner said. “There’s a lot of moving parts, and I’m just happy to be able to help with that however I can.”

While the board and many volunteers are young, Tuncer emphasized that the food pantry is a truly intergenerational effort thanks in large part to the volunteers from 412 Food Rescue.

“Most of those volunteers are retired — most of them aren’t students,” Tuncer said of 412 Food Rescue. “They mostly live around Pittsburgh and they just decide to help, which is really nice.”

The food pantry serves anyone in need of food, regardless of religious affiliation. Tuncer stressed that the pantry’s volunteers are there for everyone.

“It just comes naturally to serve and give back to our community regardless of their religion, race or identity,” Tuncer said. “We aim to serve everyone equally with no judgment.”

The pantry serves over 100 families every month, ranging from small to large, new to Pittsburgh to longtime residents. Because of their ties with the Islamic Center and the delivery option, the pantry is able to serve groups who might be missed by other food insecurity relief measures, like recent immigrants or people without ready access to transportation.

monthly check-in calls with clients new to the country, speaking with affection for the people she helps serve.

“There’s so many refugees from all over the world, like Afghanistan and Syria, that come to the mosque each month looking for help,” Tuncer said. “And food insecurity is a big issue within the Pittsburgh community. Everyone that comes to volunteer is aware of that, and they just want to be a helping hand within the mission of helping the greater community.”

Ayoub said she tries to provide personal support along with the food pantry’s supplies when she has

“It’s hard being in a country that’s kind of new, and you need help. It’s hard. It’s not a mystery that immigrants have a really difficult time adjusting. So we’re just always there — for them. I have a lot of conversations with the clients, and I’ll talk to them for a while on the monthly call, as if they’re my friends,” Ayoub said.

Throughout the distribution, volunteers demonstrate their dedication to the community above all else — and show humility in how often they brought up the efforts of their fellow volunteers. Even as she herself directed the flow of box traffic in the ICP basement, Owais praised others who chose to dedicate their time to service.

“The drivers are all volunteers,” Owais said. “They have no obligation to spend their Saturday mornings driving around Pittsburgh delivering food. But they do it, and it helps so many people.”

Photos by Nate Yonamine | Assistant Visual Editor

NANDI THEUNISSEN:

A TEACHER OF PHILOSOPHY AND SELF-VALUE

Nandi Theunissen grew up as “a great reader of literature,” but as she progressed throughout high school, she no longer found that it fully satisfied her interests. When Theunissen went to college, she discovered her true fascination — philosophy.

“When I went to college, I was doing English, and I realized that what I liked about literature was the philosophical content of the material I was reading,” Theunissen said.

Theunissen stumbled into a philosophy class at the University of Western Australia and noted how alienating the field of philosophy can feel at first, especially for a young woman learning about ancient texts written by men. Despite this difficulty, Theunissen said she never gave up on her true interests.

“For me, it was something of an acquired taste,” Theunissen said. “All of my professors were men who were almost 50 years older than me, but I thought, ‘No, there’s got to be more in this field for me,’ and I persisted.”

Despite a lack of connection, Theunissen transferred to a bigger university — the University of Sydney — where she found great professors who acted as even better mentors to her.

“That mentor relationship was so important for me,” Theunissen said. “It was sort of getting me in the door and making me realize that my instinct was right — this is what I want to do.”

When she came to the United States for graduate school at Columbia University, Theunissen felt “so fortunate” to find mentors who trained her relentlessly. These mentors became a huge part of how she found her way within the discipline of philosophy.

“I think I would not have ended up pursuing philosophy

as a vocation, had it not been for mentors who took the time to take my work seriously and take me seriously,” Theunissen said.

Because mentorship acted as such an important part of Theunissen’s professional growth, she continues to make it a part of her life now. While she’s an associate professor of philosophy at Pitt, she is also an adviser for five different graduate students pursuing higher education.

“The graduate students at Pitt are phenomenal. They’re so smart, but not only that, they’re supportive, they’re community-minded and I think with them. It’s genuinely a cooperative, symbiotic relationship … I get so much from them,” Theunissen said.

Rajiv Hurhangee, one of Theunissen’s graduate advisees, said he felt like he and Theunissen had “a spiritual connection” the first time they spoke. From that moment, he said he knew “This is someone I, in some way, want to work with.”

“It was [like] somebody saying, ‘I get it. I get what you’re about, and I’m about it too, so let’s talk.’ It was very natural and a really dynamic development,” Hurhangee said.

Both Theunissen and Hurhangee are interested in the ethical field of value theory.

“A lot of my work is about the value of humanity,” Theunissen said. “So, what is it that makes human beings valuable and such that they should be treated in certain ways and not in other ways? The answer I give to that question is that each one of us is a center of our own life … [and] we should always relate to others in such a way that treats them as the center of their own life.”

This point of connection is what originally attracted Hurhangee to work with Theunissen, making her a “natural adviser.” But this professional overlap isn’t the only reason they bonded — Hurangee highlighted Theunissen’s personality

Briana Bindus Staff Writer

Photo by Liam Sullivan | Staff Photographer

and how she “really draws you in.”

“She’s a very inspiring, elegant person,” Hurhangee remarked. “She has a mesmerizing way of speaking and it really pulls you in and makes you very interested in what she has to say. I find that makes it easy for me to think of her as a philosophical model.”

For Hurhangee, Theunissen is “the best adviser [he] could ever ask for.” He says that an adviser is someone who determines what path of study one takes and that Theunissen does this in a gentle, supportive and encouraging way.

“She’s a very caring adviser, a very committed adviser,” Hurhangee said. “She respects her students very much and really values their ways of thinking. The exploring, trying to figure things out and taking your time to work through things can be very difficult, but she really supports that.”

As an associate professor, Theunissen teaches a range of ethics classes for introductory and advanced philosophy students. Alhanoof Albishi, a sophomore philosophy major, has taken both lecture and seminar-style ethics classes with Theunissen. Albishi reflected on how no matter the class size, she really “takes the time” to listen to her students.

“It comes through that she cares about what she’s teaching. She cares about students’ views and incorporating that into the lecture,” Albishi said. “In such a big lecture, you would think that she might not answer students’ questions, but it isn’t one-sided at all.”

Theunissen strives to make historical philosophical texts more understandable for her students. One way she fosters an organic understanding of fundamental yet hard philosophical texts like Aristotle and Kant is by teaching her students to break them down into outlines.

“I really try my best to be responsive and meet students where they are,” Theunissen said. “I also really try to make texts and the history of philosophy come alive for my students. I’ve always found philosophy really hard to read and no one ever talked about that … so one of the things that I really teach is how to make a reading outline of a passage and how to break it down so you really hear the music for yourself.”

Eithne Maro, a junior philosophy and classics double ma-

jor who took an ethical theory class with Theunissen, recalled the professor’s openness to self-reflection and spirituality. Maro recalled that for a class project, students got to record things such as gratitude journals to foster self-awareness.

“Nandi is very open about the spirituality aspect, yoga and centering yourself,” Maro said. “It’s nice having encouragement from a professor that’s like, ‘Specifically take time to look at your relationship with your school work and yourself.’ I think it’s really all about being in touch with your body and the world around you.”

A huge part of understanding ethics for Theunissen begins with how individuals relate to and care for themselves, which she said “is the closest relationship that we have.” To build this relationship, Theunissen turns to yoga for a sense of relief in her busy life.

“There was a yoga studio in Baltimore … it was like a temple to me,” Theunissen said. “It was this place of community. It wasn’t super social in the sense that you were talking to people, but everybody was coming there, looking for something, breathing and moving. So that was such a grounding and just a source of strength, joy and stability in my life.”

Since coming to Pittsburgh, Theunissen now practices at the Shala in East Liberty, which teaches Ashtanga yoga in the Mysore style.

“The way that you practice is by showing up and there’s a small window where the teacher will show you the sequence. Then, everybody does their own practice and no one is directing you. There’s no voice and it’s in silence, the teacher will just come around and adjust you,” Theunissen said. “I’m just so grateful to be a member of that community.”

Theunissen’s commitment to a range of disciplines is something that Hurhangee hopes to adopt in his own professional life. Her influence as both an academic adviser and a life mentor has guided Hurhangee in his own aspirations.

“It’s not an overstatement to say that I am the philosopher I am today thanks to Nandi,” Hurhangee said. “She is the philosopher I aspire to be, not just in terms of the stuff she works on and the way she thinks about them, but as someone who is very committed, very careful, very attentive and very charitable.”

Being 5-foot-8 and playing Division I basketball is no easy feat. The average height for DI basketball players is nearly a foot taller. But for graduate student KJ Marshall, playing up to a challenge is nothing he isn’t used to.

As a member of Kappa Alpha Psi, the yearly celebration of the fraternity’s Founders Day on Jan. 5 is a significant day for Marshall. But just a few hours before the commemoration began, Marshall celebrated a recognition that fulfilled a fiveyear-long journey of ups and downs.

KJ MARSHALL: AN UNLIKELY JOURNEY TO AND FROM PITT

The day prior, Marshall received a full scholarship from Pitt men’s basketball.

“It was big, because I know what I’ve always worked for,” Marshall said. “When you get something that you always wanted, regardless of any other situation that you could have been in — I feel like it was one of the best days I’ve probably ever had.”

Marshall joined Pitt men’s basketball back in 2019. He walked onto the team after he crafted a relationship with assistant coach Jason Capel through their ties to Fayetteville, NC.

Capel was on the recruiting trail in his North Carolina hometown scouting two players on Raymond Felton’s ProSkills AAU team, where he couldn’t help but notice Marshall.

“I’m recruiting two guys on the team,” Capel said. “But I can’t help but notice the point guard. When I look in the books, I see he’s from Fayetteville, as well. And so that jumped off the page. And I just noticed his energy, how infectious it was, how positive he was and he was a good player.”

Marshall walked onto Pitt’s basketball team as a first-year player in 2019 even though he could have accepted scholarship offers from other schools. But after his first season, a trio of unfortunate events drew him away from the university.

The COVID-19 pandemic, homesickness and his father falling ill drew Marshall away from Pitt. As a walk-on, Marshall was responsible for paying for his education, and these additional factors made it even more difficult to stay at Pitt.

Marshall transferred to Garden City Community College, one of the best junior colleges for basketball players in the country. During his first game, Marshall collapsed due to

heart failure. Though he would return later that season, he wouldn’t return to his initial form.

The next season, Marshall transferred to Mars Hill University in North Carolina, but injuries once again kept him off the court.

During Marshall’s absence from Pittsburgh, he maintained his relationship with Capel and had the opportunity to return to Pitt in 2022. To Capel, this decision was a no-brainer.

“When the opportunity presented itself, with his family, for him to be able to come back, it was an absolute — there was an excitement,” Capel said. “And I think as a program, we were all happy to have someone that we knew would be an integral part of our program coming back.”

Once Marshall stepped back on Pitt’s campus, he knew that Pittsburgh was the place for him.

“I came back after two years and I walked into the building and I’m talking to the janitors, I’m talking to the people who work here in compliance, and you know, there’s nothing but straight love,” Marshall said. “And that’s when I realized I really had no business leaving in the first place. I was like, this is the place where I should be connected to forever.”

Capel and Marshall’s relationship runs deeper than the basketball court. Both Capel and Marshall are brothers of the Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity. When Marshall joined Kappa Alpha Psi in spring 2023, Capel looked out for him off of the court.

“I tried to look out for him,” Capel said. “As some of the big brothers during my process did for me, I tried to look out for him. I was just being an outlet, man. You know, the process is one that is challenging mentally, and so I just [wanted to] be an outlet for him.”

Marshall completed the recruitment process and became a full member of the fraternity, which unlocked a new chapter in Marshall’s life. He fully embraced the opportunity and the National Pan-Hellenic Council as a whole. Marshall became NPHC’s parliamentarian, a position similar to his role as a leader on his basketball team.

“It’s just trying to get command of the room,” Marshall said, “and trying to get as many people as I can to participate in topics but engage within the room and get everyone to speak on their prospective topics.”

Junior applied developmental psychology major Yaneana Leadie, the Greek Week representative of the NPHC, applauded Marshall for his ability to control a room as well as make everyone feel involved.

“He helps keep order,” Leadie said. “He helps ensure that we

are staying on task, but he does it in a way that’s very friendly. No one feels like they’re being bossed around. Everyone has a chance to be heard and say our piece. So it’s very helpful.”

Marshall’s role as a leader shows on the basketball court, in NPHC meetings and in his other philanthropic efforts as well.

Every two weeks, Marshall gives food out to homeless people around the downtown area. On Tuesdays and Fridays, Marshall travels to the Hill district, where he participates in community center engagement with kids.

“I have a platform in the community because I am a part of Kappa Alpha Psi,” Marshall said. “So, things that I don’t like around the city, I can change because I have a fraternity behind me. I know I have NPHC behind me. I have the people around me to help change what I don’t like.”

The day Marshall received the scholarship put to bed any questions he had surrounding his journey.

“That day made me understand what I went through and why I had to go through it,” Marshall said. “If I had to go back and do it all over again, I’d do it all over again the same way.”

For Capel, Jan. 4 was an emotional day for all parties involved.

“If I’m being honest, I got emotional,” Capel said. “I kind of caught myself just because, look, I know what he’s gone through. To know what his family’s gone through, some of the hardships they’ve had, and how this would help them, how this would help him. I was happy, I was proud.”

To and from Pitt, with family and personal struggles along the way, Marshall’s journey has proven difficult. But Marshall prides himself on providing guidance, leading the youth and building up his community in Pittsburgh. Marshall believes he has an obligation to help those around him.

“I was made for this, you know,” Marshall said. “It’s kind of hard for me to walk into a room and not speak to everybody. It’s kind of hard for me to walk into the building and not try to put a smile on somebody’s face. I feel like if I give somebody else that happiness, I’ve finished my job.”

When asked to describe Marshall in one word, Capel used plenty.

“Now, as his fraternity brother,” Capel said, “knowing what he’s been through, knowing the hardships in life, knowing everything he’s had to overcome — he’s come out and he’s excelled under the pressure, under the uncertainty. He’s a Nupe.”

Photos by Alex Jurkuta | Staff Photographer

TRAILBLAZING INCLUSIVE EDUCATION THROUGH GLOBAL ENGAGEMENT BELKYS TORRES:

Betul Tuncer Editor-in-Chief

As the first-born daughter of Cuban refugees and a first-generation college and doctoral graduate, many aspects of Belkys Torres’ life experience and identity shape the way she fosters education at Pitt.

Torres found herself with an opportunity to travel to her parent’s home country, Cuba, for the first time in 2017. During her weeklong trip, Torres experienced a “moment of growth and connection” in learning from Pitt’s university partners at the University of Havana.

“That dynamic and cultural tension between going to a place where my heritage and my roots are and not being fully of that place really opened my eyes to the way in which we talk to students about sense of belonging and respect for culture, tradition, language learning and understanding politics in ways that are incredibly nuanced and personal,” Torres said.

Almost seven years later, Torres still applies the lessons she learned on her trip in her work today as Pitt’s associate vice provost for inclusive excellence in education.

“The more we can sit back and listen and understand other people’s experiences, the more we grow and the more we can evolve and change as well. And so that’s been really special,” Torres said reflecting on the importance of active

listening as an educator and administrator.

Having assumed her inaugural associate vice provost role last January, Torres has worked on various projects during her almost nine years at the University, including increasing multicultural engagement opportunities, reforming general education requirements and establishing the Global Hub, among other things. Torres is also a teaching assistant professor in Latinx and Gender Studies and researches the influence of popular culture for marginalized women.

Before coming to Pitt, Torres worked at the University of Miami as the academic director for Latin American studies in 2015. Ariel Armony, the current vice chancellor for global affairs, recruited her for the role of associate director of international programs at Pitt, which she held for about a year and a half before getting promoted to vice provost for global engagement.

Torres found her path to higher education administration during her undergraduate years as one of only three Latinx students at her school. She and her peers created the first student organization to raise Hispanic awareness at the time as a way to address the concerns of Latinx students who were “outside of the mainstream culture of the institution.”

“That was the beginning of a trajectory for me where I realized that there’s a lot of power in academia — not just inside the classroom, but outside the classroom — to make

a difference in students’ lives,” Torres said.

When Torres came to the university in 2015, one of the first projects she worked on involved developing Pitt’s first Global Plan that would enable the University to invest more into global studies programs.

“We spent about a year talking with student groups, faculty, staff, alumni, partners, abroad and around Pittsburgh, about what this plan would look like,” Torres said. “One of the things that we learned was that students feel really fortunate to be at an institution that has so many resources around global learning classes, internship opportunities, study abroad opportunities [and] funding, but they were always really confused about where to go to just ask the first questions.”

Thus, out of the “Embracing the World: A Global Plan for Pitt 2016-2020” grew the Global Hub — a place on campus where students could come to learn about global opportunities at Pitt and engage with different cultures and languages. During this time, Torres also continued to expand her work at the University taking on the new role of executive director of global engagement in 2018.

As the project lead executive director, Torres played a vital role in the creation and plan for the Global Hub. The two-year process involved student focus groups and much collaboration between faculty, the provost’s office, the project architects and many others.

The Global Hub — “a source of pride” for Torres — officially opened in 2019. Torres said in creating the Global Hub on the main floor of Posvar Hall, the idea was that any student would feel welcomed into the space and could learn more about global studies — which is reflected in the comfortable seating and digital learning environments on display.

“Everything that you see in the space is actually curated specifically for Pitt students,” Torres said. “And so, it’s always changing and evolving. As students provide feedback and share their ideas, the Global Hub will change and it will continue to evolve. And that’s the point, that it grows along with our student community.”

Jeff Whitehead, executive director of global engagement, has worked alongside Torres since she first came to Pitt and noted her role in creating the Global Hub as a “remarkable achievement.”

“She managed to take an empty and somewhat gloomy hallway and make it into something as beautiful as it has become,” Whitehead said. “It’s really an amazing feat.”

At the time, Whitehead served as the director of study abroad and worked closely with Torres on the planning process for the Global Hub.

“I saw the obstacles that she had to overcome to make that come to fruition. And it was really wonderful when it finally did,” Whitehead said.

While the majority of Torres’ work at Pitt has focused on global engagement and multicultural programs, this past year she has taken on new challenges. Her current position in the provost’s office is a first at Pitt and is based on research from the American Association for Colleges and Universities. Her role focuses on questioning what it means for an institution like Pitt to provide “inclusive and excellent education.”

“It’s a position that’s starting to identify what are some of the structural barriers to student success,” Torres said. “Because of the policies or the practices, and procedures that we have in place that, unintentionally, disproportionately affect a part of our student population in some way.”

Just over a year into this new position, Torres has already

taken to reshaping University policies to better fit the needs of students. Most recently she has been working on reforming general education requirements for undergraduates.

Along with her work for the institution, Torres has also made it a point to foster a sense of community at Pitt. Torres serves as the co-chair of the Hispanic Latinx Professional Association, which allows her to collaborate with the Latinx Student Association and the Latin American Graduate Student Organization.

res played a major role in keeping up morale and maintaining strong communication during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Despite the fact that it was a very challenging time, we wound up having some really good memories. So, she kept it lighthearted, and was a really great leader through that very challenging period,” Whitehead said. “I’m happy to say that we came out the other side.”

“It’s been fantastic to work with the LSA this year in that capacity,” Torres said. “I’ve been connecting them with our colleagues in philanthropy to help them develop a more robust and strategic fundraising plan for the organization moving forward.”

Olivia Lopez, president of LSA and a senior athletic training major, said Torres has acted as a resource to students and the organization’s “rock keeping [them] steady throughout the year.”

While Lopez’s relationship with Torres is less than a year old, she described her as an integral part of the Pitt community.

“Her involvement and intense passion for broadening our scope of learning on a global scale has enabled us to access more resources and create more connections,” Lopez said. “She is always eager to collaborate with various organizations and departments to come together to make something magical.”

“Dedicated and incredibly charismatic,” are what come to mind when Lopez thinks of Torres.

“What you won’t learn about Belkys by reading her bio is that she is so easy to talk to,” Lopez said. “Any time you speak to her, she is extremely engaged and knows how to connect with people. You will also definitely share a laugh with her.”

Whitehead emphasized Torres’ passion and ability to foster connection even during challenging times. He said Tor-

Since coming to Pittsburgh, Torres has brought about many changes to the University. She said what excites her about Pitt is that people can recognize the need to constantly improve.

“I think if I leave the institution as one that’s more curious and interested in immigrant and ethnic populations, if we are an institution where we are more welcoming and respectful of folks from all cultures and all backgrounds, I think I’ll walk away really excited about that experience,” Torres said. “I know that there are really a lot of folks everywhere that are committed to that work. And we all recognize that there’s a lot of work to be done.”

From creating the Global Hub and expanding global education to remaining a dedicated leader during a pandemic, Whitehead underscored all of Torres’ hard work at Pitt.

“I think that the impact will have only just begun,” Whitehead said. “She’ll continue to bring her really fantastic personality and demeanor and balanced approach, solving problems and then working towards making the student experience a really great one for sure. You know, for generations, I hope.”

As a first-generation student turned administrator and educator, Torres hopes she can continue to act as a resource for students.

“I’m a believer in conversation and the power of good dialogue,” Torres said. “And so I encourage students to reach out, to come and have some Cuban coffee if they want and have a good conversation, always.”

Photos by Betul Tuncer | Contributing Editor and courtesy of Belkys Torres

HARMONIZING PASSIONS WITH ACADEMICS JAINA DEMETER:

Emma Hannan Staff Writer

Seated at a piano with a stack of sheet music, Jaina DeMeter immerses herself in the world of music, deciphering rhythms and beats. Entrenched in her work, her passion for music shines as her fingers tap the keys.

As a junior music and English writing major, DeMeter not only navigates her academic pursuits but also orchestrates a symphony of leadership roles at Pitt. In addition to her role as a residential assistant in Lothrop, she harmonizes her responsibilities with serving as the business manager for Girl Up, a women's empowerment club at Pitt and singing in the Treble Choral Ensemble, where she also serves as vice president.

Having taken an interest in music in high school, DeMeter continues her music journey through her college career.

“I pretty much did everything my high school offered, like choir, concert band and was field commander in marching band. I also did theater and plays,” DeMeter said.

After graduating and coming to Pitt, DeMeter auditioned for the Treble Choral Ensemble her first year, and successfully made it into the selective group.

“Jaina came to TCE with a lovely voice. In fact, she had a solo in the December concert her first semester,” Lorraine Milovac, the Treble Choir director, said.

DeMeter’s vocal performance has only improved since

coming to Pitt, according to Milovac, as she continues to practice and learn music theory.

“Through singing in the choir, studying privately and taking musicianship classes at Pitt, not only has Jaina's vocal development, tone quality and range matured, but her knowledge as a musician has helped her to sing with better musical phrasing and stylistic nuance,” Milovac said. “Her voice, and her personality, add a lot to the choir.”

Last year, DeMeter served as student director of the choir and often ran group warm-ups, section rehearsals and directed performances such as singing the National Anthem at sporting events.

“Jaina has stood out as a leader in the choir from her freshman year. She asks questions, she asks for help for herself and for those around her, she makes people new to the choir, as well as returning members, feel welcome by greeting them and getting to know them individually,” Milovac said.

DeMeter said she enjoys Pitt’s music department due to the inclusive and holistic approach.

“You don’t have to audition to be a music major,” DeMeter said. “I just love the open environment, and all my professors are literally incredible and amaze me every day.”

DeMeter said music is an important part of her life and

something she needs to “enrich” herself.

“I feel like if I couldn’t sing, my life would be very different,” DeMeter said. “I just love singing with others. I love the process of singing songs for months, then you have one performance of those songs. Those sorts of feelings are really fun as well, really valuable for me.”

Whenever DeMeter goes into an audition for music groups, she said the process can feel scary. She said the point isn’t necessarily that one can do it, but that they’re willing to try.

“Learning those skills will help you further develop in class, and that’s typically what people are looking for in an audition process,” DeMeter said.

When DeMeter is not working on her music major, she is pursuing her second major — English writing.

“When I came to Pitt, I was really confused and switched classes around a lot and ended up in an Intro to Poetry class, and I loved poetry in high school. I think that it just satisfied a part of myself,” DeMeter said. “I guess it was the creative side that I needed.”

Aspiring to work in the music history or research field, she recognizes there is synergy between her music and writing

majors that help her understand music in cultural and historical contexts.

“I feel like they go hand in hand, especially when you’re studying culture. I think they just ended up really suiting each other, and it’s something I’ve really enjoyed and loved,” DeMeter said.

Although DeMeter is currently a music major, she originally came into college wanting to become a teacher, but eventually started to lean more toward her musical interest.

Once this interest took shape, DeMeter said she still wanted to find a space to advocate, inspiring her to join the club Girl Up, a women’s empowerment club started through the United Nations. Although she found a new passion for music, her desire to help teach young girls still persisted. Her original inclination for teaching allowed her to make a positive impact, by advocating for young girls even if she can’t teach them. Some activities the club has previously done include volunteering for Family House, fundraising for charities and hosting general board meetings to discuss world issues.

Coming from the Ohio Valley west of Pittsburgh, DeMeter said she grew up in a poor area and tries to help others with those experiences.

Photo by Alex Jurkuta | Staff Photographer

“The thing about the Ohio Valley is that it’s very economically poor, pretty much no matter where you go. The high school I attended was actually the poorest in the area,” DeMeter said. “So it’s already poor, then it was the worst one. So the opportunities here were things I wasn’t really familiar with.”

By joining clubs such as Girl Up, DeMeter is able to help struggling girls around the world to provide them with the opportunities she missed.

“I joined it my freshman year, and I’m on the board now. It’s been a really wonderful experience,” DeMeter said. “I also met all my best friends in Girl Up, so it’s been really fun to engage in the advocacy and political side of myself in a way my major doesn’t let me, but also have friends that think the same way I do.”

As business manager, DeMeter said she also acts as fundraising chair by organizing fundraisers and keeping track of the club’s money to spend on supplies. Before DeMeter took on the role as business manager for Girl Up, Milovac said she served as the fundraising coordinator for the Treble Ensemble.

“She has outstanding organizational skills, and her dedication to the choir is commendable,” Milovac said.

Due to her organizational skills and previous experience, DeMeter was able to successfully take on the role as business manager with Pitt’s Girl Up club.

“We did a Krispy Kreme fundraiser last semester that was really fun. It’s been really nice to be able to bring doughnuts to everyone since there isn’t a Krispy Kreme around here,” DeMeter said.

Since DeMeter also serves as a resident assistant at Lothrop Hall, she said she gave the leftover donuts to her residents to eat for breakfast. DeMeter came into her RA position this year after her own RA put a card on her door encouraging her to apply for the position last year.

“I felt very lost and misguided, and what helped me get through those times was my RAs. It only takes one person to believe in you, and I was like, ‘I’m going to do that for other people,’” DeMeter said.

Justin Curtis, the lead resident assistant of Lothrop, said he

thinks it is important for an RA to work closely with residents on the floor.

“In regards to Jaina, she started from day one  building strong relationships with her residents. It is very evident the time and intention she puts into this aspect of the job,” Curtis said.

Since Lothrop is an upperclassmen dorm, Curtis said DeMeter does a good job of advocating for residents on the floor and does not put herself above them.

“She really brings a sense of familiarity to the floor and encourages residents to stop by and talk. She goes out of her way beyond the job description,” Curtis said.

This year, DeMeter put together paper heart decorations for Valentine’s Day, a pumpkin painting event during Halloween season and an event encouraging people to vote.

“I think the residents really respond to her putting in the extra effort. It says a lot when RAs are willing to go this extra mile, and it leads to a better floor community,” Curtis said.

To lead a floor community, DeMeter said she finds it important to explore what kinds of communication works for people.

“I had a check-in with one of my residents and I was like, ‘how do you reach out for help?’ And she was like, ‘I don't ask for help,’” DeMeter said. “It made me realize that not everybody communicates in the same way. Everyone embodies that  space differently. I think it’s the same way with the staff in that we’re all leaders, but everyone is so different.”

In the symphony of her life, DeMeter conducts all of her responsibilities, each note resonating with passion and dedication to harmony within herself and the community around her. This is shown throughout the Pitt community, as she continues pursuing her interests and caring for others.

She cares for everyone and everything she does, and this is evident to each person she inspires.

“She is direct and honest in all she does and is respected and loved by her peers,” Milovac said. “Jaina cares. She cares that she is singing accurately and with expression, she cares that the choir is working towards artistic excellence, and she cares about each person in the choir. Jaina is a gem!”

SARAH SIDDIQUI:

BOLSTERING WELLNESS ON PITT’S STUDENT GOVERNMENT BOARD

Irene Castillo Staff Writer

Student Government Board’s office is filled with colorful Post-it notes with scribbles of positivity — “Have a nice day <3” scratched into a bright neon pink, “Happy birthday!!!” on a pale blue or even just a quick portrait on the whiteboard. They glow against the beige walls of the eighth floor of the William Pitt Union, making the space look less like an administrative office and more likea room defined by community and connection. That is Sarah Siddiqui’s mission, not just as vice president of operations for SGB, but as a member of the Pittsburgh community.

Siddiqui is a junior sociology major and part of the Guaranteed Admissions Program at Pitt’s medical school, which secures a spot for “outstanding high school students seniors” interested in attending after graduation. Siddiqui knew as a first-year that she was going to be in Pittsburgh for a while, so she had made it her mission to become part of the Pittsburgh community.

“I think it’s a big decision to make. I think I was 18 at the time when I decided to come to Pitt. [I thought], ‘This is gonna be my home, and I will make the best out of it,’” Siddiqui said, painting the image with her hands as she talked at her desk in the SGB office.

Her desk is a canvas for the Post-it notes. “I love you!” and “best vice-president ever!!!” surround her name. To her right, a whiteboard boasts the office members’ portraits. At the bottom, it reads “Let Sarah know if you want a portrait!”

Her work at SGB ties in with her general interests in policy, especially health. Last year, she worked as chair of SGB’s wellness committee, and in the summer after her first year, she interned for the U.S. Senate.

“I think there is a lot of individual-level impact that you can make as a physician and as a clinician,” Siddiqui said. “But I think there are also broader community-level and social-level impacts that you can make through policy.”

To continue her passion in health policy, Siddiqui will graduate a year early, and will be a full-time grad student next year studying on the health policy and management track before medical school.

“This is my last year of undergrad. It was very bittersweet, very sad, but I really love Pitt and I will still be at Pitt,” Siddiqui said.

As SGB’s vice president of operations, Siddiqui supports students and organizations through funding and other services, such as organizing free legal consultations for students, connecting students with

free student subscriptions to New York Times and allocating the $900,000 student activities budget, which has received a one-time expansion of $200,000. This increase comes from the almost doubled volume of requests from student organizations this year. Siddiqui doesn’t see it as a problem, but as a sign that students feel comfortable requesting funds.

“On one hand, it’s amazing that student orgs recognize this process and know they can use this process, but on the other hand, we have a very finite amount of funds, so it becomes difficult to equitably distribute it,” Siddiqui said.

Students are a priority for Siddiqui. SGB President Ryan Young, chair of the allocations committee, Maddie McCann-Colvard and Siddiqui wrote a letter for interim vice provost Carla Panzella to request more money for the allocation process. While Siddiqui mentioned that the job was shouldered as a team, her colleagues couldn’t help but emphasize her effort and kindness. Young, a mathematics, physics and astronomy major and Siddiqui’s running mate, highlighted Siddiqui’s role in ensuring every student received the help they needed.

“We had a group come to us recently looking to get funding for a trip, and she’s gone out of her way to make sure [they get it financed]. They couldn’t get all the money because there’s a cap in our allocations process, but we have another thing called the Undergraduate Conference Fund, and she’s meeting with them to make sure that all the money gets there,” Young said.

Siddiqui is open to understanding critiques, from unfulfilled budgets to uncomfortable situations for club administrators. During SGB’s open meetings, she often has the chance to directly address any positive or negative experiences that emerge from the allocation process.

“We were talking to some people, and they had mentioned that they had went through the allocations process recently, and kind of had a bad experience. So she’s on it, asking them how it went and working on rectifying it too,” Young said. “She really cares about the experience of students going through the process because it can be very scary.”

Katie Emmert, an SGB board member and Siddiqui’s roommate, explained how much time Siddiqui spends on her job as a bridge for the students and the administrative processes.

“I learn so much from Sarah by being her roommate

and peer,” Emmert said. “Sarah genuinely loves helping people and I always see her jump into action to support someone or answer a question whether it’s at home or in the office, early in the morning or late at night. She makes herself available immediately when needed and I am constantly in awe at the way she prioritizes helping and supporting others.”

Outside of SGB, Siddiqui participated in a plethora of student organizations and causes — she’s a part of PittServes’ Student Civic Engagement Council, the vice president of PERIOD@Pitt and an in-home tutoring coordinator and ESL tutor for refugees at Pitt FORGE.

“She’s also dedicated herself to addressing menstrual inequity,” Emmert said noting Siddiqui’s willingness

to make herself available to student groups working on menstrual equity projects and writing a proposal for a menstrual product vending machine. Siddiqui proposed a contraception vending machine in Ward Allebach’s sustainability class, which she hopes to implement on campus sometime this year.

Siddiqui’s presence and contributions through campus seem as bright as the Post-its in the eighth floor office of SGB. President Young mentioned that she was the one who started the trend of messages that decorate the SGB office.

“She kind of started it! She’s really into those little things,” said Young.

Service is a way for Siddiqui to bring some happiness into people’s lives. When asked what question lives in her mind, the answer came naturally.

“How can I make someone smile today?” Siddiqui asked.

Photos by Bronco York | Staff Photographer

AMY FLICK:

‘YOU’RE NOT JUST TREATING A CHECKLIST OF SYMPTOMS, YOU’RE TREATING A WHOLE PERSON’

Colm Slevin Senior Staff Writer

Amy Flick is a professor in Pitt’s English department and is the adviser for the public communication of science and technology certificate. Her research is in rhetoric in public health systems, and she specifically focuses on harm

reduction tactics and patient narratives.

According to Stella Ross, a junior microbiology major and a mentee of Flick, the reason students connect with Flick is because of her commitment to her profession and her compassion for others.

“She’s willing to go to a place that other people don’t really go to,” Ross said. “I mean, what she did her thesis on in grad school is a prime example of that. It was about harm reduction, and no one talks about that.”

Flick’s journey to Pitt started while she was attending graduate school at Kent State.

“I got hired at Pitt while I was finishing up my Ph.D. at Kent State University in the literacy, rhetoric and social practice program,” Flick said. “But I had actually done most of my dissertation research here in the city. I worked with the syringe exchange program, and that is kind of the focus of my research — public health.”

According to Flick, the war on drugs and much of the anti-drug messaging of the past 50 years is at best, ineffective, and at worst, harmful.

“When I was a kid, it was the D.A.R.E. programs, and it was a lot of scare tactics and a lot of exaggeration, and those aren’t effective,” Flick said. “Because people say, ‘That’s not true,’ and the whole message is lost. But mostly, it’s not what a 15-year-old wants to interact with.”

Flick first started working in the education system in 2010 in a rural school in Ohio that was hit hard by the opioid and methamphetamine epidemic. The school knew Flick made an impact on students’ lives. After her first year, the school asked her to work as the student success coordinator because she made great connections with the children she worked with.

“It really became apparent that even though we have a ton of resources, people really don’t understand those resources or how to access them,” Flick said. “Or they don’t know how to navigate the legal system, or they don’t understand how they can be advocates for their own health. That pushed me into research about health and how the health sciences are discussed in public.”

According to Flick, effective communication is crucial in reporting about the health sciences because the audience’s level of understanding impacts the choices they make about their own health.

“Every other year, eggs are the best thing that you can have, or eggs are the worst thing that you can ever eat,” Flick said. “And the reality is no scientist has ever said either one of those things —it’s just an exaggeration of studies. The reality is eggs are a great source of protein, but also high in fat. But these articles lack nuance, and because the media is trying to get eyeballs, it hurts people.”

For Flick, it’s more than just getting the message across in

a way that the audience understands. People also need to engage the audience — information only goes as far as the audience allows it.

“Public communication is a push-pull with you and an audience,” Flick said. “You have your agenda, but they have theirs, and you have to find a way to accommodate both. How do I reach them? How do I make myself interesting?”

Flick believes the use of social media for communication is changing within fields, and also for audiences outside of their field. A growing number of discussions are happening in online spaces. According to Flick, science communication doesn’t only happen at seminars and lecture series anymore — it happens on Twitter, TikTok and other social media platforms.

“Once people see how health and science communities are using social media, it clicks that, ‘Oh, this isn’t something extra, this is what we do now,’” Flick said. “This is how we communicate with people.”

Reilly Timko, a senior rehabilitation science major, took Flick’s Written Professional Communications class and was inspired by Flick’s work and generosity. Timko states that Flick displays vulnerability with her students and commands mutual respect.

“People hear the word ‘science’ and don’t expect vulnerability and empathy to be involved,” Timko said. “I think that Dr. Flick does a really good job of bringing vulnerability into science.”

Flick doesn’t only work with scientists communicating their abstract ideas. She also works with patients communicating their health needs and maintaining agency, focusing on health narratives. Narrative-based health care uses stories to explore health and address bias in health care.

“I love health narratives,” Flick said. “I love hearing people talk about their own experiences with health and science. I think that it gives us a lot of room to grow. It’s really founded on the idea that a patient’s stories fundamentally change how they relate with a practitioner, and it changes the way that practitioner can treat the patient. You’re not just treating a checklist of symptoms — you’re treating a whole person.”

Jeff Aziz, a professor in the English department and a fellow adviser, believes that genuineness and a positive attitude are what make Flick special.

“There’s something very organic about Amy’s relationship to her to her work — she’s a person who is honest in every interaction,” Aziz said. “She doesn’t have to convince anybody

that she’s for real, she’s for real from the time she gets up in the morning.”

Flick takes a lot of the lessons she learns in her research and the values she teaches and tries to input those into the classroom model. Ross said Flick has a special ability to motivate her students.

“She motivates you to do something that challenges you,” Ross said. “Dr. Flick really understands that life and your well-being comes before your responsibility as a student which I think shows the concern she has for her students and the value she places on their lives.”

Flick prioritizes inclusivity with her students and emphasizes her compassion for them. She does this by having an open revision policy, but also by letting students choose the topic of all of their projects.

“I always tell my students at the beginning of the semester that I see myself as more of a mentor to them,” Flick said. “I have an open revision policy, so they can do an assignment, and they can get feedback, redo the assignment as many times as they want. I’m not looking to tell you what, ‘Here’s what you got, and now you’re done,’ I want you to actually meet your goals.”

Nidhi Girish, a sophomore neuroscience major who took Flick’s Writing in the Health Sciences Professions class, said Flick is one of the most encouraging professors she’s ever had.

“The first thing that we wrote was our health narrative, explaining our experience with health care,” Girish said. “And she gave us all A’s on that because she was like, ‘I’m not going to be someone who gets to judge whether or not your health care experience was valid or not.’”

Another thing Flick does to connect with her students is letting them maintain their agency in the classroom and in meetings with her. She only expects students to share if they are willing.

“I want my students to feel like they retain their sense of agency in my space,” Flick said. “They retain their dignity, and they don’t feel like they’re pressured to give things that they don’t want to give.”

Flick said her motivation boils down to a genuine love for people and a hope to make the world a better place.

“I do this stuff with drug use, and I’ve had so many people ask, ‘Did you have drug issues? Is that why you care about this?’” Flick said. “And never, never in my whole life, but I come from a place of like, I just, I love people, and I want good things for people.”

Photo by Liam Sullivan | Staff Photographer

Anna Kuntz Senior Staff Writer

Most people could never imagine themselves going grocery shopping in a foreign country with the equivalent of one US dollar to their name and only four days’ worth of practice in a new language. For Chris Matthews, however, occurrences like these are a tangible reality.

Having studied abroad in Italy and Tanzania, Matthews has used his broad knowledge of languages to positively impact the lives of others in both the Pitt community and internationally.

Matthews, a senior linguistics and Italian major, serves as the student engagement specialist for the Less-Commonly-Taught Languages Center at Pitt. Gretchen Aiyangar, the LCTL program coordinator, highlighted Matthews’ many

CHRIS MATTHEWS

INSPIRING LANGUAGE LEARNERS AT HOME AND ABROAD

contributions to the program.

“Chris works every day to make sure students on Pitt’s campus are aware of the amazing opportunities that exist in the LCTL Center,” Aiyangar said. “He sees and appreciates our programs and faculty, notices the care and effort that LCTL instructors put into bringing language and culture to their students and adeptly, creatively and passionately opens students’ eyes to the existence of these incredible programs hiding in plain sight in the Cathedral of Learning.”

Matthews’ love of language learning dates back to his first Spanish lesson pre-kindergarten, which led him to continue taking Spanish lessons through middle school.

“I always liked it, but then when I started taking more formal Spanish in sixth grade, I was hooked,” Matthews said. “I took Chinese in ninth grade, and then I did two languages

the whole way through high school. Through comparing those, [I knew] that was something I wanted to do forever, and that linguistics was for me when I went to college.”

While his passion for learning has prevailed throughout his entire academic career, learning a new language often poses challenges even after years of experience.

“One [challenge] is adapting to different teaching styles, professors or teachers,” Matthews said. “The strategy that I prefer is just as much speaking as possible. In my Quechua class, [the professor] started on day one [with] no English, just Quechua, and we figured out all the grammar rules on our own [after] never learning them explicitly, which I thought was very cool.”

Ashley Feiler, a senior linguistics and education major, first met Matthews in a Zoom-based education class during the COVID-19 pandemic in her first year at Pitt, where they bonded over their shared interests in linguistics and education.

Feiler said Matthews has used his love for language learning to positively impact members of Pitt’s campus.

“Through his work with LCTL, Chris has shared his passion for language and facilitating communication across the world with the entire campus,” Feiler said. “His joy and passion for language are contagious. If you have no previous interest in learning a language, talk to Chris for a few minutes and you’ll be signing up to take Quechua, Italian or Swahili 1 the next semester.”

A large part of Matthews’ work as the LCTL student engagement specialist is to help organize the annual LCTL Center Language Coffeehouse, which is hosted by the Department of Linguistics. Aiyangar said after two years of not hosting the coffeehouse due to the pandemic hiatus, Matthews’ enthusiasm and drive helped bring the event back to life.

“He knew the students needed to feel the sense of connection and empowerment that Coffeehouse brings, and he fought to make it happen,” Aiyangar said. “He has had a million brilliant ideas, and he’s made many of them come to life, bringing students together to make things happen in ways we didn’t even realize were possible.”

One reason Matthews is able to excel at his role is his ability to get out of his comfort zone and leave a positive impact on others.

“In Pittsburgh, I always strive to make connections with everyone that I meet and not be afraid of embarrassing myself or making the wrong impression,” Matthews said. “I find if you just live authentically, typically people are going to like you, and if they don’t, that’s their problem. I try to put myself

out of my comfort zone by giving strangers compliments or waving to [someone] on the street, even if I’ve only met [that person] one time.”

Feiler said Matthews’ outgoing and dedicated nature makes him a role model for others.

“Chris is passionate, devoted and energetic,” Feiler said. “He is incredibly sociable and open, which makes him easy to talk to and is a great quality of any leader.”

Matthews has also coordinated a student-run and student-taught Mini Language Lessons event, where students introduced each other to LCTL Center languages through micro-teaching. Additionally, he is working on a podcast for the LCTL Center titled “Less is More,” in which he interviews other LCTL students about their language learning experiences and preserves insights for prospective students.

Matthews said his involvement with the linguistics program has opened up a variety of career options related to helping others receive the tools and support to learn a second language.

“I [have] many routes that I can see myself going down, but all of them are related to education,” Matthews said. “I don’t necessarily want to be a language teacher, but I want to help make language teachers more successful. So, I’ve taken courses about second language acquisition, and I’m really interested in how people learn different languages.”

In addition to improving language education programs, Matthews said he hopes to work towards making study abroad programs more accessible for students.

“I think that if you’re paying for study abroad [completely out of pocket] you’re doing it the wrong way, because [there are] so many resources out there,” Matthews said. “I want to be someone not only that can connect students to resources and the program that suits them best, but also develop new programs with countries that are less-commonly traveled to.”

Above all, Matthews believes language learning is not only a means to communicate, but a tool to connect with others on a deeper level. Matthews said learning a second language can not only help Americans broaden their horizons, but become better people as well.

“I think that if you’re only learning English, you’re really limiting yourself,” Matthews said. “There are studies out there that say the language that you speak influences the way you think, and I think that is true to a degree. When you learn to think like someone else, you’re going to become a more empathetic person in the long run.”

Photos by Alex Jurkuta | Senior Staff Photographer

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