Trinity Magazine | Spring 2024

THE MAGAZINE OF TRINITY UNIVERSITY SPRING 2024

illustration by James Lee ’26 In a world where artificial intelligence is disrupting the status quo, people have two things that machines still don’t: curiosity and empathy.

You can’t answer questions without wanting to ask them in the first place. And Trinity University, in the true spirit of the liberal arts, is where students go to ask the big ones, while understanding different perspectives that lead to new answers, and, in turn, even more questions.

We know that artificial intelligence can’t ever replace human intelligence, because people aren’t machines. They are emotional, moral, ethical, critically thinking human beings, and this complexity of the human experience is what drives innovation forward in our quest for knowledge.

Trinity prides itself on this innovation. We are committed to wielding the liberal arts as an essential tool to enhance the experience of using AI, not just the other way around.

HI, meet AI. We’re better together.

PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE TRINITY Spring 2024 Dear Reader, As I read over the draft of this issue of Trinity magazine, I recalled some of the origin stories of the liberal arts. In ancient Greece, for example, philosophers and poets alike laid the groundwork for scientific inquiry, critical thinking, and the expression of human emotion. In ancient China, scholars emphasized the importance of ethical conduct, education, and the arts in cultivating a harmonious society.

To be human is to be complex and even contradictory.

We can be mysteries to ourselves at times, and yet we can also strive for introspection and self-awareness. We can hold our own beliefs closely while also valuing empathy and argumentation. We can seek self-improvement while also learning to love ourselves—and others—just as we are, aware that accepting our own imperfections can result in our ability to offer deeper levels of compassion.

At the core of Trinity’s educational experience, we provide opportunities for both growth and resilience based on a commitment to, in Provost Mustain’s words, “getting better at getting better.” Daily, members of our campus community are invited into crucial conversations and challenges that require collaboration, innovation, research, and imagination.

These are basic liberal arts skills: the intellectual tools we need in order to solve problems together.

These skills are also already being shaped by tools rooted in artificial intelligence (AI), and this trajectory is advancing at a dizzying pace. As students of the liberal arts, we now have the opportunity to consider how, where, when, and why we want to use AI. Grounded in human-centered connections, our graduates are known for being equipped to ask critical questions and, yes, question answers, even those derived from AI tools. I remain confident that as the information economy is disrupted by new technology, the core value of a Trinity education will only increase. Trinity graduates know how to read the room and then ask the next questions—the questions that will matter in the future because they matter to people.

I hope you will enjoy reading these pages and the people you meet here. As you will discover, Trinity faculty, students, staff, and alumni bring sincere and voracious human intelligence to everything they do. I see it every day on campus and when I’m off campus meeting alumni, and I find that quite inspiring.

Warmly,

Vanessa B. Beasley, Ph.D. President, Trinity University

Editor Molly Bruni Art Director Anh-Viet Dinh ’15 Magazine Staff Jeanna Goodrich Balreira ’08 Jeremy Gerlach Kennice Leisk ’22 Mason McLerran

Josh Moczygemba ’05 Laura Rodriguez Ryan Sedillo Alfredo Valenzuela

Copy Editor Ashley Festa Interns Caleb Aguiar ’25 Samuel Damon ’24 Abigail DeNike ‘20 Kathryn Detweiler ’25 Mackenzie Gasner ’23 Sofia Leobas de Macêdo ’24

Kait Nash ’27 Alexander Park ’26 Gabi Salgado ’25 Eve Slemp ’27 Emma Utzinger ’24 Suly Welsh ’24

Contributors Kenneth Caruthers ’15 Ryan Finnelly Genevieve Humphreys ‘21 Justin Parker ’99 Tom Payton Aimee Rowse

Armando Saliba Carla Sierra Claire Siewert ’22 Samantha Skory ‘16 Burgin Streetman Amanda Wise ’06, M’08

Trinity is published by the Office of Strategic Communications and Marketing and is sent to alumni, faculty, staff, and friends of the University who remain engaged with Trinity.

Editorial Office Trinity University Strategic Communications and Marketing 1 Trinity Place, San Antonio, TX 78212-7200 marketing@trinity.edu | 210-999-8406 trinity.edu/trinity-magazine

President Vanessa B. Beasley Board of Trustees Ruth K. Agather Shari Becker Albright ’83, M’86 April Ancira ‘02 Erin M. Baker ‘99 Annell R. Bay ‘77 Ted W. Beneski John Brozovich Stephen W. Butt ‘77 Miles C. Cortez ‘64 Sally Deitch M’03 Janet St. Clair Dicke ‘68 Cydney C. Donnell Thomas E. Evans ‘84 Marshall A. Hess ‘88 Gen. James T. Hill (Ret.) ‘68 Jelynne L. Jamison M’88 E. Carey Joullian IV ‘82 The Rev. Dr. Richard R. Kannwischer ‘95 Christopher M. Kinsey ‘79 Katherine Wood Klinger ‘72 John C. Korbell

Oliver T.W. Lee ‘93 Michael Lynd Jr. ’95 Steven P. Mach ‘92 Melody B. Meyer ‘79 Jeffrey Mueller ’00 William Scanlan Jr. Thomas Schluter ‘85 Pat Semmes Nicholas A. Severino ’88 Darsh Preet Singh ’08 L. Herbert Stumberg Jr. ‘81 Jessica W. Thorne ‘91 John Thornton ’87 Scott W. Tinker ’82 Nadia Islam ‘12 National Alumni Board, President The Rev. Dr. James D. Freeman ‘83 Synod of the Sun Rep.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

24 DEPARTMENTS 10 Trinity Today 14 Syllabus 18 Tiger Pride 20 Trinity University Press 22 Lit Picks 23 In Memoriam 52 Class Notes 58 Club Activities Our designer ran out of ideas for this page, so they asked DALL·E to help.

60 Commentary

Making the Cover This issue’s cover was illustrated by James Lee ’26, an incredibly talented Trinity student whose interests are in computer science, communication, and new media, which his art reflects. Lee blends images generated by artificial intelligence (AI) with his own digital illustrations to create unique and inspired art that cross the divide between technology and humanity.

While the cover is decidedly Trinity University, from the nacho cart and Trinicats to Leeroy’s birthday dunk in Miller Fountain, we didn’t originally start there. You can see some of our early-stage brainstorming images, all generated by AI, on this page.

Read more about James Lee ’26 on page 32!

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EDITOR’S NOTE MEET THE STAFF

Hey Trinity Tigers,

Molly Bruni editor

Anh-Viet Dinh ’15 art director

Jeanna Goodrich Balreira ’08 words

Jeremy Gerlach words

Kennice Leisk ’22 words

Mason McLerran multimedia

Josh Moczygemba ’05 multimedia

Laura Rodriguez graphic design

Are you ready to dive into the coolest clash of minds since peanut butter met jelly? Get your thinking caps on because we’re about to explore the ultimate tag team: human intelligence and artificial intelligence. At Trinity, we’re all about that liberal arts life, and let me tell you, we’re needed now more than ever. In a world where Siri’s got sass and robots are running marathons, it’s our job to keep the conversation real, meaningful, and oh-so-human.

Trinity magazine readers, I hope you didn’t think I actually wrote that introduction. That paragraph is part of what ChatGPT gave me when I prompted it to write a warm, personal letter from the editor about this magazine’s theme. Could you tell? If you couldn’t, I hope it at least caught your attention!

That introduction is just one example of why artificial intelligence (AI)—the trendiest topic right now, with people’s opinions running the full spectrum—has to be paired with human judgment to be most effective. AI is most useful as a tool, with human interaction bookending it; AI users must be able to prompt the technology with creative, thoughtful questions and then think critically about the output and decide the next steps.

Using curiosity and critical thinking to answer questions and question answers—does that sound familiar?

That’s the hallmark of a liberal arts education, of course, and it’s why Trinity students are well-prepared to use AI as a tool to make a difference in this world.

As curious creatives ourselves, we used AI to help us create this issue about AI, from transcribing interviews and drafting story outlines to brainstorming feature art and titles. We learned very quickly that people are imperative to this process (as you can tell from the beginning of this letter!), and even the best technology needs the human touch to make a meaningful difference.

Whatever you think of AI, I hope this issue helps you consider other perspectives and possibilities for this technology. AI isn’t just for Amazon product recommendations, email filtering, and social media algorithms (though those might be my most frequent uses of the tech). It is changing the world, and higher education along with it—with a side of Siri sass, of course!

Sincerely,

Molly Bruni Ryan Sedillo multimedia

Alfredo Valenzuela graphic design

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The Big Picture Tennis champion and entrepreneur Venus Williams visited Trinity University in January as the 2024 Distinguished Lecturer. Williams sat down with University President Vanessa B. Beasley, Ph.D., in Laurie Auditorium to share her insights from her remarkable journey to success, emphasizing the importance of determination, leadership, and embracing diverse passions.

The Distinguished Lecture Series is made possible through the generosity of the Walter F. Brown Family of San Antonio.

Photo by Anh-Viet Dinh ’15

TRINITY TODAY

Trinity University Accelerates Science Education Through Record Gift The D. R. Semmes School of Science is a catalyst for Trinity to reshape the future of the liberal arts through a focus on the sciences With the largest gift in Trinity’s history of $26.5 million

by the Semmes Foundation, Trinity University now boasts the newly named D. R. Semmes School of Science.

This transformational gift will bolster the University’s commitment to the liberal arts through the exploration and problem solving inspired by and realized through the sciences.

“This investment by the Semmes Foundation accelerates our goal to deliver the best undergraduate science education in the U.S.,” says Vanessa B. Beasley, Ph.D., president of Trinity University. “Trinity and the Semmes Foundation have long been partners in opportunities for undergraduate science education, and this historic investment will help us advance our mission to deliver world-class teaching and increase students’ access to research opportunities in STEM.”

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“The sciences are at the core of a broad liberal arts education, and Trinity fundamentally understands this.

We are creating the next generation of scientists across an array of disciplines that will address the world’s major questions,” says Tom Semmes, president of the Semmes Foundation.

The D. R. Semmes School of Science houses the Departments of Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Earth and Environmental Geosciences, Engineering Science, Mathematics, Physics and Astronomy, Psychology, and three interdisciplinary programs: Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Mathematical Finance, and Neuroscience. The gift will endow the dean of science position and two science faculty positions, provide dedicated funding for undergraduate research opportunities, and support faculty and professional development.

Trinity Initiates Collaborative Strategic-Planning Process Community input will shape a multiyear strategic plan for the University Trinity University has embarked on a collaborative journey, launching a comprehensive strategic-planning process to illuminate the future for the institution. The collective effort will engage faculty, staff, students, parents, alumni, and donors in defining a shared vision and priorities for the University.

Trinity aims to complete its strategic-planning process by Fall 2024 and launch its new, multi-year strategic plan later that semester. The University has partnered with Kennedy & Company, a Virginia-based higher education strategy firm, to help shepherd the community-driven process.

Trinity’s previous strategic plan, Trinity Tomorrow, concluded in May 2023, with successes culminating in the University garnering reclassification as a national liberal arts university.

A Major Moment The Trinity University community gathered at the Magic Stones in late February for Major Declaration Day to celebrate students who had recently declared their majors. Amid snacks and good conversation, students connected with their academic homes and marked the completion of a major milestone on their Trinity journey.

Friendly Faces Tigers fill big roles on campus

Ruth J. Simmons Speaks at Trinity University welcomed higher ed leader as DeCoursey Lecturer

Trinity welcomed both new and familiar faces into important roles at the University.

Trinity welcomed Ruth J. Simmons, Ph.D., who served as the president of three universities over nearly three decades, as the 2024 DeCoursey Lecturer in late February. During the lecture, she talked with Trinity President Vanessa B. Beasley, Ph.D., about her remarkable journey to university presidency and her trailblazing efforts to promote colleges and universities as these communities of higher education have come to terms with their histories relative to slavery.

Simmons is a Distinguished Presidential Fellow at Rice University and adviser to the president of Harvard University on initiatives for historically black colleges and universities. She served as president of Prairie View A&M University until March 2023, president of Brown University from 2001-12, and president of Smith College from 19952001. Simmons details her life story in The New York Times bestselling book Up Home: One Girl’s Journey.

Brandi P. Jones, Ph.D., is Trinity’s inaugural vice president for Inclusive Engagement. She previously served in research and leadership roles at the University of Southern California, Princeton University, Occidental College, and California Institute of Technology. A national thought leader in STEM education, Jones has focused much of her research on the experiences of minoritized communities in science and engineering, where her work has contributed to the creation of best practices for access, inclusion, and talent development.

At Trinity, her new role is designed to promote opportunities for learning among all members of the campus community as well as engagement within San Antonio and the region.

Nicole Monsibais, J.D., is the Title IX/ EEO coordinator. She joins Trinity from Our Lady of the Lake University and has prior experience at St. Mary’s University and the University of Texas at San Antonio.

Carmen Aramanda is the director of the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE). Aramanda joined Trinity’s CIE in 2016 and served as interim director beginning in October 2022.

Terris “T” Tiller ’00 is the inaugural director of alumni career engagement and networks. A former Team USA elite athlete, Tiller also worked for the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee for more than 15 years.

Kyle Gillette ’01, Ph.D., is the special adviser to the provost for expression and civil discourse, a newly created role. Gillette is a longtime professor in the Department of Human Communication and Theatre and former acting dean for the School of Arts and Humanities at Trinity.

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TIME Tabs Trinity a Top School for Leaders Trinity University sits among the top colleges in the nation for creating leaders, according to a TIME Magazine analysis.

This list, “Best Colleges for Future Leaders”, sees Trinity checking in at No. 62. Trinity also represents a unique facet in these TIME rankings as one of only six liberal arts schools on the list.

This ranking is another reflection of Trinity’s consistent track record of student success—recent graduating classes have seen positive outcomes rates as high as 98%, meaning nearly all Trinity graduates in these classes had jobs or were accepted to graduate school within six months of graduation.

#62

TIME Best Colleges for Future Leaders

98%

Positiv

e Outc omes lass of 2023

Rate, C

Launching a New Wave of Careers Tigers, CELCS experiencing an unprecedented era of success

by Jeremy Gerlach At Trinity University, positive student outcomes are all

about embracing the whole journey—from hands-on opportunities throughout the undergraduate experience to holistic support for academic and personal wellness—not just the destination.

And there’s no stronger force driving the outcomes for Trinity students and graduates than Trinity’s Center for Experiential Learning and Career Success. CELCS is more than a career center: It’s an all-encompassing resource where Tigers go to find volunteer, internship, and workstudy opportunities, as well as undergraduate research openings. Students get help with career exploration, interview preparation, graduate school applications, salary negotiation, and articulating the value of their college experience to employers.

For the past four years, CELCS (and Trinity students) have been on an absolute roll. Each of the past four graduating classes (’20, ’21, ’22, and ’23) has posted, respectively, 97%, 98%, 97%, and 98% positive outcomes rates. That means, within six months of each respective graduation, nearly all survey respondents in these graduating classes were employed, interning, engaged in a service opportunity, or enrolled in graduate school.

“One of the experiences we have with employers is that once they have a Trinity Tiger in the door, they want to hire more, whether it’s as an intern or a full-time hire,” says Katie Ramirez, director of CELCS. “Honestly, we have more jobs than Tigers to fill them, which is phenomenal.”

The center represents a crucial moment of vindication

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for Trinity’s continuing strategic-planning process, which has initiated both the creation of CELCS and the expansion of its resources.

“Trinity is increasingly becoming known as one the best universities in Texas for launching students into their chosen careers right after graduation,” says Vanessa B. Beasley, Ph.D., Trinity president. “We continue to pride ourselves on the education we offer that makes our exceptional outcomes rates possible, the relationships that we’ve formed with employers across the country, and our commitment to staying connected with Tigers beyond their time on campus.”

CELCS was further bolstered this year by a special alumni commitment in the form of a generous gift. This donation, made by the Whitacre Thorne family, ensures that CELCS can continue to provide opportunities for career exploration and other career development initiatives.

As a result of the gift, CELCS marked a reopening and renaming of its physical space as the “Whitacre Thorne Suite,” as students, faculty, staff, and distinguished guests from the Whitacre Thorne family gathered to celebrate CELCS’s tradition of excellence in preparing and empowering Tigers for success.

When Tigers are ready to launch, CELCS is helping to put graduates in a position to reach success on whatever terms they’re aiming for. And you can help! Reach out to celcs@trinity.edu to learn how to get involved, from representing your company at the University’s career fairs to sharing open internships or jobs with Trinity students.

Watch students share why scholarships mean so much to their Trinity experiences.

The Trinity Commitment: An Investment Today for Generations to Come Trinity University launches $25M endowment matching initiative for student scholarships

by Jeanna Goodrich Balreira ‘08 For Trinity students with financial security, a day in the

life of a Tiger might look much like you’d expect: wake up, go to class, hang out with friends, meet with a student group, get some exercise, study, go to bed, repeat. But for the Tigers who need to work part-time jobs to afford tuition or living expenses, or for those who drive home on the weekends to support their families, the tried-and-true college experience is complicated by financial stressors.

Can you imagine a Trinity where these financial stressors don’t exist? We can. It’s why we’ve made the Trinity Commitment.

Trinity University is proud to announce the Trinity Commitment, a $25 million endowed scholarship initiative, championed by the University’s Board of Trustees, that empowers the best and brightest students to choose Trinity—and strengthens their connection to our community knowing that Trinity chose them in return.

“Trinity’s strength as an institution is connected directly to the strength of our students and the strength of our community,” says Vanessa B. Beasley, Ph.D., president of the University. “To live into our mission of offering a transformative liberal arts and sciences education for our students, we must ensure access to that education. That’s why we’re making this threefold commitment: to our students, our philanthropic partners, and our institution.”

Through the Trinity Commitment, donors who pledge a gift of $50,000 or more to create or bolster an endowed scholarship will unlock a dollar-to-dollar matching fund from Trinity’s endowment, up to $25 million total. Donors can create more than one scholarship, and those with existing endowed scholarships are eligible for additional funds of $50,000 or more to also be matched. These will strengthen a collection of more than 360 existing endowed scholarships and will bring us that much closer to our aspirational goal of

ensuring 100% of Trinity students receive the financial support they need to make the most of their college experience.

At the heart of the Trinity Commitment is community.

For more than 150 years, Trinity has galvanized a stalwart sense of community, opening our arms to the curious, the fiercely intelligent, the leaders eager to make an impact on the world. With this massive philanthropic commitment, we’re making a difference in the lives of those who seek to join our community—and we’re making that difference together. If philanthropic investors fulfill the full commitment of $25 million dollars, and the University matches those funds with $25 million of our own, our community will have created the impact of 500 new endowed scholarships.

“Ensuring equitable access to higher education is imperative as demographic changes reshape our student body,” says Eric Maloof, vice president for enrollment management. “As the number of college-aged students shrinks over the next five to ten years, financial aid will be a critical decision-making factor for many of the students we want to join our community. To compete for these impressive students and to prioritize their individual backgrounds and perspectives, Trinity must commit the all-around support for these students to not just be here, but to thrive here.”

The same way the Trinity community has helped us for generations before, it’s our turn to help these students thrive for generations to come. In doing so, students can envision a college experience unburdened by financial stressors and a life after graduation launched and immersed in their own communities through service and support. It’s philanthropy, full circle. And we’re not stopping there.

We’ve made the Trinity Commitment. Will you?

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SYLLABUS

Kelly Lyons (left) and Trinity students helped plant more than 2,500 native grasses and wildflowers along Mission Reach for an ecological restoration project.

Trinity Participates in Mission Reach Ecological Restoration Project San Antonio River Authority and Trinity volunteers gather for planting initiative

by Carla Sierra Volunteers from Trinity University, the San Antonio River

Authority (SARA), the River Warrior Volunteers, and Microsoft gathered in February to plant over 2,500 native grasses and wildflowers along Mission Reach as part of a 23-month ecological restoration project.

Funded by the Society for Ecological Restoration (SER) Standards-based Restoration in Action program and supported by a grant from Microsoft’s Community Environmental Sustainability program, the project aims to restore the Mission Reach area by controlling invasive plants, enriching native plant and animal diversity, and improving native food resources that support a thriving local ecosystem.

“It was a glorious day. Approximately 40 volunteers showed up early in the morning on a day with rain in the forecast. We are grateful to SER and Microsoft for making this collaboration possible,” says Trinity biology professor Kelly Lyons, Ph.D. “The project manifests the spirit of Trinity’s dedication to vigorous training in undergraduate research and experiential learning.”

Lyons has been an integral member of this project since Fall 2023, offering scientific guidance, project design and monitoring, and volunteer training. Through her hands-on lab, Lyons’ students have participated in this

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project, gaining real-world, field-based undergraduate research experience. After completing their work, Lyons’ students will be co-authors in a scientific journal publication and will present their research at conferences such as the annual meeting for the Texas chapter of the Society for Ecological Restoration.

“I feel lucky to have been a part of it. It was beautiful to see people from different organizations and backgrounds come together to restore the land,” says Joslyn Boyer ’26, one of Lyons’ undergraduate research students.

Going forward, each fall, Trinity volunteers and members of the public will collect data on the efficacy of suppression treatments and the establishment of native species. SARA will provide equipment, personnel, and expertise for conducting the large-scale restoration projects.

Through this initiative, dozens of Trinity undergraduates will be trained, and over 100 community members will gain exposure to the Mission Reach project.

SARA staff and Trinity will use the project to continue developing a knowledge base and best practices for invasive species removal and control over time as well as native grassland restoration.

Claudia Stokes Receives National Humanities Grant English professor awarded $45,000 for research on Harriet Beecher Stowe’s religious works

by Kennice Leisk ’22

Is Ball Really Life?

Sport management professor wins San Antonio Business Journal 40 Under 40 Award

by Molly Bruni

Trinity University English professor Claudia Stokes, Ph.D., has been awarded a

$45,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) for her critical edition of the religious works of Harriet Beecher Stowe.

Stokes’ edition is part of the Collected Works of Harriet Beecher Stowe, a series that will be published by Oxford University Press. Stowe is best known for her bestselling blockbuster Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852), but all of her other works have been out of print for a century. This series seeks to restore her wider, influential literary career.

Stokes began her research on Stowe’s religious writings back in Spring 2022. Since then, she’s been working full-time on the project with the help of Trinity undergraduate researchers. Stokes spent Summer 2022 and 2023 working with two Mellon Initiative Summer Undergraduate Research Fellows, English majors Dean Zach ’24 (in 2022) and Emma Utzinger ’24 (in 2023), whom she says were “enormously helpful.”

In Spring 2023, Stokes continued this close work with students in her inaugural Scholarly Editions Lab, a one-credit-hour English course, funded by the Mellon Initiative, where students transcribed, collated, and annotated Stowe’s primary documents.

“Dr. Stokes created a community in this lab. We worked together, we learned together, and most importantly, we explored Stowe’s writings together,” says Dale Martin ’25, a junior double-majoring in English and history.

Together, Stokes’ lab students transcribed almost the entirety of the first volume of her critical edition.

“The students transcribed everything—we’re talking over 100 periodical pieces by Stowe,” Stokes says. “I can’t overstate how important the students’ contribution has been. I taught them all these different stages of scholarly editing, and they just ate it up.

They shaved years off the project.”

Over the next year, Stokes will be on sabbatical for the NEH grant, working on the second volume of her edition.

When transitioning out of their playing days, many athletes

struggle with figuring out who they are outside of their sport— a phase commonly called “identity foreclosure.” Some have already spent time discovering themselves, while others may feel lost and need help finding their way.

Black athletes may especially struggle with identity foreclosure, says Brandon Crooms, Ph.D., who teaches sport management courses at Trinity University.

“Research has shown there is a direct correlation and association of racial identity and athletic identity amongst Black athletes,” Crooms says. “Essentially, that means a lot of young [Black] athletes have this expectation for them to be exceptional athletes because of the expectation that’s been placed on them by society.”

The relationship between racial identity and athletic identity is one area of Crooms’ research. As a minister, Crooms is especially interested in how the Christian faith affects that relationship; if athletes can place some of their self-worth in faith, how does that change their athletic identities?

For his research, as well as his work at Trinity and in the community, Crooms was honored with a San Antonio Business Journal 40 Under 40 award this past spring. The award recognizes young business and community leaders making an impact in San Antonio.

Crooms is one such leader, offering motivational speaking, coaching, consulting, development, and mentoring for young athletes through his business, Crooms Collective LLC. He has also held virtual worldwide summits for leaders in athletics, mentored youth in Cape Town, and is currently working with the Trinity men’s basketball team on holistic identity and personal development.

“We talk about being disciplined, being proactive, and having purpose,” Crooms says. “I want to focus on them being successful, not just as athletes but also as students, and as students who are preparing themselves beyond their sport.”

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SYLLABUS

Samantha Scandal ’24 (left)

A Night on the Town, for Credit

and Madison Reich ’24 attend

Hands-on music course sends students to symphony concerts in downtown San Antonio

performance for their “Nights

a San Antonio Philharmonic at the Symphony” course.

by Emma Utzinger ’24 and Kennice Leisk ’22 Orchestral music is almost omnipresent in our entertain-

ment landscape—it forms the basis of movie soundtracks, video game soundtracks, and musical theater, and it even inspires iconic pop songs.

But when was the last time you had the chance to sit down and solely focus on the orchestra, the musicians, and the instruments?

For Trinity University students, the “Nights at the Symphony” course has got them covered.

Taught by music professor Carl Leafstedt, Ph.D., MUSC 1344, or “Nights at the Symphony,” gives Trinity students class credit for attending symphony concerts in downtown San Antonio.

“Good concerts. New music. Nights out on the town— for credit. What’s not to like?” Leafstedt says.

The class originated in 2016. Leafstedt and his fellow music faculty wanted to create a new, hands-on course that would take advantage of Trinity’s location in a major metropolitan area.

Though it’s a music class, students don’t need to have musical experience to take part in “Nights at the Symphony.” Students of all backgrounds are encouraged to join the class, and Leafstedt ensures that the course feels engaging for all students, no matter their musical experience.

“Dr. Leafstedt creates a wonderfully open and welcoming atmosphere for students who might not have a history in music or attending orchestra concerts while still keeping it engaging for the musicians in the room,” says Samantha Sandal ’24, a percussionist in Trinity’s Symphonic Wind Ensemble, Symphony Orchestra, and Percussion Ensemble.

Throughout the semester, students get the chance to watch six to seven orchestra concerts around San Antonio. Most concert tickets are offered at a deeply reduced price, and some concerts are even free. To help prepare them for the concerts, Leafstedt familiarizes his students with the music, guest artists, and conductors for the upcoming show.

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After attending the concerts, the students are required to write concert reviews, which constitute the majority of their grades in the course.

“I am no stranger to music, but being able to first learn about the history of the pieces and then listen for particular moments of interest during the performance just makes the entire symphony experience more exciting as you find yourself catching things that you would never have noticed before,” Sandal says.

Through lectures and readings in arts management, the course also touches on the business of running a modern orchestra. “I served on the board of the San Antonio Symphony, which exposed me to the business side of running a large nonprofit organization,” Leafstedt says. “I integrate discussions about nonprofit management into the course, giving students a different view of what they’re seeing.”

After the San Antonio Symphony went bankrupt in 2022, its successor organization, the San Antonio Philharmonic, launched in 2023. “We are getting to watch as they rebuild a cultural centerpiece of the city,” Sandal says. “It has been fun getting to explore what constitutes an orchestra, from the instruments to the behind-thescenes directorial work and how symphonies are formed and operated.”

Ultimately, Leafstedt hopes this course will remind his students that classical music is for everyone, not just musicians or conductors. “Everyone in the course will take something different away from the experience. Some will become Mahler or Beethoven fans or suddenly develop an interest in cello music. Some will simply enjoy the opportunity to explore downtown San Antonio more. My goal is to create lifelong learners who don’t find the concert hall intimidating.”

Want to attend a symphony concert? Check out upcoming events for your local symphony, or visit events. trinity.edu for upcoming concerts by Trinity’s ensembles.

Limes I remember the first housewarming gift we received was a Mexican lime tree.

It was given to us by our friend Lorena, who is a sculptor of some local renown, and it was delivered to us in a gorgeous ceramic pot that Lorena herself had made. This thing will live forever, she’d said to us the night she’d dropped it off. And she was right. That Mexican lime tree proved to be the most resilient of all of the plants and trees on our back deck, the only one to make it through that first frosty winter in San Antonio. By spring, we were using those limes to garnish our margaritas, and by summer Lorena was married again, her fifth husband and, she hoped, her last.

I love and I love and I love being in love, she often said, and I even like getting married. But somehow I just don’t seem to like being married. But that fifth one would stick, and for years afterward I would make a connection between that marriage and our lime tree. I’m not really sure why. I’m not a superstitious person, but I was about that tree. Winter after winter, I would water it and protect its leaves with burlap tarps. Somehow it seemed the most important thing in the world.

This excerpt is from The Disappeared, a collection of stories authored by Trinity English professor Andrew Porter, Ph.D., and published by Penguin Random House in 2023.

Lime tree generated using Adobe Illustrator

Assistant Director of Wellness Services Receives National Award Marlaina Widmann recognized for outstanding achievements during her first year at Trinity

by Claire Siewert ’22 Marlaina Widmann, MPH, was named the “Outstanding

New Professional” by the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA) Wellness and Health Promotion Knowledge Community, the preeminent national organization of student affairs administrators in higher education. Widmann was chosen for this honor because of her achievements during her first year as assistant director of student wellness services at Trinity University.

“Marlaina’s work at Trinity reflects her genuine passion for advancing student wellness,” says Marcy Youngdahl, M.D., director of integrated counseling and health services. “I am thrilled that her work has been recognized

by NASPA, and I join them in my appreciation of the advances Marlaina has brought to our students.”

Widmann’s work has modernized the Office of Health Services and positioned it for the next phase of growth.

Her notable accomplishments this past year include

developing and implementing a peer health education program, instructing and creating course content for the three wellness-focused courses, and implementing the National College Health Assessment, which is a national survey from the American College Health Association that collects information about students’ health and wellness. She was significantly involved in developing a strategic plan and securing the funding for this year’s Mental Wellness Initiative, which partners with the Office of the President and the Student Government Association, alongside Integrated Counseling, Health, and Wellness Services, to demonstrate a campus-wide commitment to improving student mental wellness. The initiative received a $100,000 commitment from the SGA, the largest single-sum commitment ever made by Trinity’s student government organization.

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TIGER PRIDE

Fall 2023 Athletics

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All fall sports competed in the postseason

1 4 of only

DIII schools to have all fall sports represented in postseason

3 8

conference championships

All-Americans

3 170

individual national academic honors

student-athletes named to SCAC or SAA Academic Honor Roll (3.25 GPA or higher)

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Salony

Cross Country Trinity finished second in the SCAC in both men’s and women’s cross country, extending streaks for both programs. The Tiger men have been first or second at the SCAC Championships race for 12 straight years, while the Trinity women made it lucky number 13 in 2023. Will Salony also extended another streak for the cross country program as he qualified for the NCAA Championships and earned All-Region honors; Trinity has had at least one individual or team qualify for nationals every year since 2015. Salony wasn’t done there, though, as his second straight shot at the NCAA Championships event resulted in Trinity’s best-ever finish at nationals for a men’s runner. Both men’s and women’s cross country were selected as United States Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association All-Academic, which requires a 3.1 or better team GPA during the semester. The men have achieved this feat 14 times over the past 19 years, including the past six in a row. Trinity’s women have accomplished this feat for 19 straight seasons.

Football Trinity won its fourth SAA Championship in the past five years, sporting a 10-2 overall record that included a perfect 8-0 conference mark for the third straight year. The Tigers

Horn

advanced to the NCAA Playoffs for the third consecutive season and advanced to the Second Round before falling to the NCAA runner-up for the second time in three seasons. Trinity had three players named to the D3football.com All-America teams: linebacker Caleb Harmel (Second Team), kicker Tyler Huettel (Second Team), and defensive lineman Jacob Munoz (Third Team). Harmel (First Team) and Huettel (Second Team) were also voted as Associated Press Division III All-Americans. Harmel was selected as the SAA Defensive Player of the Year for the second time in his career, while Huettel earned the Special Teams Player of the Year award from the SAA. The conference also elected Tucker Horn as its Offensive Player of the Year for the third straight season, and Horn was also a finalist for the 2023 Gagliardi Award (the Division III Football Player of the Year award). Horn was also the Dave Campbell’s Texas Football Non-FBS Player of the Year, and Harmel was the Defensive Player of the Year for the same entity. Horn and Harmel were also named the Regional Offensive and Defensive Players of the Year, respectively, for D3football.com this season. Horn also brought in Academic AllAmerican accolades from the CSC, earning a spot on the Second Team. Head Coach Jerheme Urban was named the SAA Coach of the Year and the American Football Coaches Association Regional Coach of the Year.

Adjei

Harrison and Assistant Coach Spencer Valdespino were named the SCAC Coaching Staff of the Year for their efforts. Bailey Meyer was voted as the SCAC Defensive Player of the Year for the third straight time and also earned her second straight selection as a College Sports Communicators Academic All-American. Michaela Bosco earned the SCAC Elite 19 Award for her performance both on and off the field.

Men’s Soccer Trinity finished as the SCAC runner-up for the third straight year, but earned an at-large bid to the NCAA Playoffs. The Tigers had a record of 12-3-4 and made the postseason for the 20th time in the past 21 years, advancing to the Second Round before being eliminated.

Chen Adjei received the SCAC Offensive Player of the Year award and was named a Second Team All-American by the United Soccer Coaches Association. The United Soccer Coaches also recognized Michael Meese as a Scholar All-American.

Meyers

Women’s Soccer Trinity finished the season with a record of 12-5-2 that also included an undefeated 7-0-0 record in the SCAC. The Tigers won the SCAC Championship for the 27th time in school history, including a fourth consecutive SCAC Tournament win. Head Coach Dylan

trinity.edu/live Logan

Volleyball Trinity finished with a record of 31-5 and won its 21st overall SCAC Championship this fall, qualifying for the NCAA Playoffs for the seventh consecutive season. The Tigers also reached the NCAA Quarterfinals for the fourth straight time before falling to eventual champion Juniata. Four players received American Volleyball Coaches Association All-America honors: Mackenzie Logan and Maddie Fate were on the Second Team, while Brette Thornton and Marisa Amarino achieved Honorable Mention recognition.

Logan was the SCAC Player of the Year, while Amarino was Trinity’s first Setter of the Year award winner. Head Coach Julie Jenkins was named the AVCA Regional Coach of the Year for the ninth time in her career. Coach Jenkins and her assistant coaches Maggi Linker and Brad Bulycz were also honored as the SCAC Coaching Staff of the Year.

Tiger Network is Trinity’s livestreaming network, covering athletics and special events for a worldwide audience.

Tiger Network showcases #TigerPride in full HD with realtime replays, color commentary by professionals and student-athletes, and on-demand options.

Watch events ON DEMAND On-demand videos include: • Tiger Enrichment Series webinars • Concerts and performances • Archived speakers and lectures • Commencement exercises • And more!

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TRINITY UNIVERSITY PRESS

1

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1

5

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A Sunny Place for Shady People: How Malta Became One of the Most Curious and Corrupt Places in the World

by Ryan Murdock

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Texas, Being: A State of Poems edited by Jenny Browne Texas, Being includes more than 45 poems from and about the beautiful and brutal state of Texas. Selected by Jenny Browne, the 2017 poet laureate of Texas and Trinity poetry professor, these poems draw a picture of one of America’s vastly sublime yet most audaciously independent corners.

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More Finish Lines to Cross: Notes on Race, Redemption, and Hope

by Cary Clack A collection of Clack’s best short- and long-form columns since his return to the San Antonio Express-News in 2019, More Finish Lines to Cross includes more than 80 pieces about the issues of the day and, along the way, reminds us to reflect on how we become the people we are.

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Witness to War: Mexico in the Photographs of Walter Elias Hadsell

by Susan Toomey Frost Frost presents a compelling visual record of a young American man’s venture in Mexico as the country veered into revolution in the early 1900s. Walter Elias Hadsell, a skilled photographer, documented a critical period of foreign investment in Mexico’s mining industry and, in the process, captured scenes of Mexican life.

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Dwelling in the Wilderness: Modern Monks in the American West

by Jason M. Brown In an intimate journey into the lives of contemporary Benedictine Roman Catholic monks and their sense of place, Brown examines how these monks in the American West fall in love with their landscapes and how we might do the same.

Murdock offers a personal and thorough examination of how a powerful cabal on the Mediterranean island nation of Malta planned the assassination of Maltese investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia in 2017.

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The Mexican

by Jack London A graphic novel adaptation of a classic tale of unbridled passion for the revolutionary cause as well as the drama within the boxing ring, The Mexican is a story about the complex balance of individual interest and commitment to a larger cause.

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West of the Creek: Murder, Mayhem and Vice in Old San Antonio

by David Bowser Thirty-five classic stories fill this reissued book about San Antonio’s seamier side from the days of the Old West. A map of the 22-block red-light district west of San Pedro Creek shows more than 100 houses of ill repute, inhabitants listed.

Trinity University Press is committed to civic engagement with

ideas. Published books, public programs, and related media focus on helping us all understand our place in a crowded world with a particular focus on the following areas: bilingual early childhood literacy; the human relationship to the physical environment ranging from wilderness to constructed, urban life; social equity and justice; the interdependence of animal and human life; and southwestern U.S. and Mexican regional studies. For more information, visit tupress.org.

Libraries Are Life-Changing

by Tom Payton, Trinity University Press director When I make presentations about Trinity

University Press and its history, editorial focus, and such, I always make a point to explain my reference to the importance of mission-driven work.

On a recent trip to Puebla, Mexico, I set out to visit the legendary Biblioteca Palafoxiana, which dates to 1646 and is designated by UNESCO as the oldest library open to the public in Latin America. I had long wanted to visit this library. It is home to the original collection of 5,000 books donated in 1649 to Colegio Universitario de San Juan by storied bishop and New Spain viceroy Juan de Palafox y Mendoza, with the stipulation that the books be made available to the general public. Today the library houses more than 40,000 volumes.

After browsing the collection for an hour, I sat in the courtyard and was surprised by the emotions that overwhelmed me. I have visited many legendary libraries and bookstores in my travels, but this was different. Reflecting on Palafox’s democratic and transformative donation, I teared up a bit when considering what a truly revolutionary act this was.

At a time just after the advancement of the printing press and the ways it would change the world in the centuries to come—a time

when literacy rates varied worldwide but hovered at about 20%—a single person in the Americas enabled the true ideals of egalitarianism. Was his act celebrated, controversial, or both? Literacy opens minds and transcends boundaries, empowers underrepresented and misunderstood voices, and gives hope—actions that those in power work to undermine at times.

Far more modestly, at Trinity University Press, we endeavor to make our contribution through the evolving scope of the books we publish. We celebrate the important role libraries play in this process and the bold and socially disruptive decision Juan de Palafox y Mendoza made almost 400 years ago. We are proud to represent Trinity University and all it stands for when we send our books into the world and work to get attention for our authors and their important ideas.

In particular, this includes our library partners, who are vital as a force for access to information and education and provide social stability and important reconsiderations of our shared stories and values. Join us in taking time to celebrate—and visit—your local libraries and support their critical role in our lives.

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LIT PICKS

Editor’s Note: Trinity magazine’s resident bookworm, Coleen Grissom, Ph.D., died this past January. Grissom worked at Trinity Uni-

versity for more than 70 years, nearly half the age of the institution itself. Her literature selections first appeared in Trinity magazine in 2010, and soon she was writing a regular column for our readers. Though she retired in 2019, Grissom continued to recommend, with her trademark wit and gruff commentary, books to our readers up until her death. Grissom’s Lit Picks column was one of the most-read sections of the magazine (second only to Class Notes), a testament to her deep-seated impact on the Tiger community.

For the final Lit Picks column of Trinity magazine, we wouldn’t dare try to speak on behalf of Grissom. Instead, we excerpted a portion of her 2007 speech for Gemini Ink’s Autograph Series, which was published in Grissom’s 2008 A Novel Approach to Life (Trinity University Press). The template for the speech, Grissom explains, came from a “last lecture” series at Trinity in which professors deliver the lecture they would want to give if they knew it would be the last one they’d ever make.

A Novel Approach to Life I have absolutely no memory of being read to—I

cannot conjure up a single moment of lying in bed or sitting in a parent’s lap having a story read to me. But, I remember reading: slouched in a huge fabric-covered armchair with both legs flung over the side, totally absorbed in a story, and, thank God for dentists, sucking on a lemon half.

Memories of my mother’s admonition that “if you don’t quit reading so much, Coleen, no boy is ever going to like you” do ring occasionally in my ears, but also to this day I credit my ability to read rapidly and read with concentration no matter what’s going on around me to my mother’s regularly letting me “just finish this chapter” before setting the table for lunch (at noon) or supper (at five o’clock) and to our home’s being a noisy, active one well before there was television. I learned long before there were iPods to “tune out” and to focus. Useful skills.

Looking at my love of reading from a psychological perspective, I realize that this could easily be labeled “escapism,” but I don’t recall a need to escape. Certainly, I grew up in a sexist, racist, postdepression,

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world-war time in East Texas, but I think I had a happy childhood. I loved athletics and starred in and was captain of many softball and basketball teams. Thanks to my daddy, I could throw a mean, highly effective spit ball, striking out many batters; I was a strong, fast runner, and, unlike many of my female peers, I had absolutely no hesitancy about sliding into the base. I have the scars to prove this—as do some pitiful souls who tried to stop my big feet. (Similarly, in basketball, I was the only girl to wear knee pads and still have the original knees to prove it. Yes, always eccentric.)

I don’t think I became a bookworm because I was unhappy, but somehow I did, in fact, fall in love with reading, and, surely, influences upon me were my mother’s constant perusal of all Readers Digest Condensed books, Good Housekeeping and Ladies Home Journal, and Daddy’s Business Week and daily newspapers. Sitting and reading in the big, open “family room” is a vision I clearly have of all the Grissom family on weekends and in evenings, when I wasn’t outside playing “piggy want a whistle” and “kick the can.” Thus, reading became important to me, and so let me tell you more than you could possibly want to know about ways in which reading has shaped my life.

The thesis of my remarks is simple

(remember, I’m a teacher by trade): One should make reading an integral part of one’s life. One should do this in spite of the joys, challenges, and attractions of tempting television and films, of cocktail parties and athletic competitions.

Reading, I believe, helps me be more observant, more attentive to detail, more aware of what engages and interests me—even more analytical—more able to explore “whys” of my life. I have found and continue to find in reading some suggestions about the importance of self-awareness, self-acceptance, and self-reliance. I find the importance of developing a faith in something bigger than ourselves—about the basic dignity and goodness of all humankind—about the truths, so clearly evident and repeated throughout the history of fine literature.

Let me close this presentation with a carefully selected few of my other favorite quotations—ones that guide my life, and, if I were in charge of the world, would contribute to guiding yours.

E. B. White: “Wilbur never forgot Charlotte . . . she was in a class by herself. It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both.”

Katharine Graham: “To love what you

IN MEMORIAM

do and feel that it matters— how could anything be more fun?”

John Hoyt: “Figure out what you care about and live a life that shows it.”

And, finally, two from Kurt Vonnegut: “Hello babies. Welcome to earth.

It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded.

At the outside, babies, you’ve got about a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies: God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.”

And dear Vonnegut in his last book, A Man Without a Country, advises us with these words: “And, I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.’”

Good Lord Almighty—or, as my mother would have preferred, “Goodness Gracious, sakes alive”—how can one not choose a novel approach to life when great fiction’s full of stuff like this?

Godspeed.

Go online to find all 100+ of Coleen Grissom’s book recommendations for Trinity magazine readers over the years. We recommend starting with Charlotte’s Web, her favorite book!

COLEEN GRISSOM

JAMES L. ROBERTS

Coleen Grissom, Ph.D., professor emerita of English, died on January 28 after a brief illness. She was 90.

Grissom first came to Trinity in 1958 as head resident and counselor for the McFarlin dormitory complex. As she rose to the post of associate dean of Student Life (and concurrent assistant professor of English), then of dean of students in 1972, Grissom’s steadfast advocacy for women on campus stood in bold juxtaposition to an outside world that still lagged behind in many social conventions.

Grissom was eventually named vice president for Student Affairs in 1979, becoming the first woman at Trinity to rise to such a level. In 2001, Grissom stepped away from administrative duties to teach English full time. She retired in 2019.

In addition to her time at Trinity, Grissom was a regular resource for literary organizations and initiatives in the local community. She will continue to inspire and ignite a love of learning in future students through the Coleen Grissom Endowed Scholarship.

James L. “Jimmy” Roberts, Ph.D., professor emeritus of biology, died at home in San Antonio on October 30, 2023. He was 72.

In 2008, Roberts joined Trinity University as the Ruth C. and Andrew G. Cowles Distinguished Professor of Life Science to help build the neuroscience undergraduate major. In true Trinity fashion, he valued an interdisciplinary approach to science, seeing the similarities between being a scientist and an artist.

Before arriving at Trinity, Roberts taught students in medical and graduate school for 36 years. In 1986, Roberts founded the Dr. Arthur M. Fishberg Research Center for Neurobiology of Aging at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, creating one of the foremost centers for neuroscience in the country. In 2001, Roberts and his wife moved to the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio (now UT Health San Antonio), where he helped build the Center for Biomedical Neuroscience.

After retiring from Trinity University in 2018, Roberts worked with UTHSCSA/UT Health San Antonio until 2021.

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Art created by Anh-Viet Dinh ’15 using DALL·E

26 The Art(s) of Intelligence 32 Creative Convergence: James Lee ’26 34 Analyzing the Language of AI 40 Leveling Up: Marcos Morales ’25 42 Function Junction 48 Heads or Tails?

49 What Is the Life of a Trinity University Student Like?

50 Humanity in Health Care: Jerold McDonald M’08

What exactly is artificial intelligence?

Though artificial intelligence (AI) has been around for decades, generative AI has seen a recent surge in popularity thanks to new technology like ChatGPT and DALL·E. Here’s the gist: If we showed a smart robot tons of pictures of tigers, it would learn what tigers generally look like and could, when asked, use what it has learned to create a new tiger drawing. Similarly, Gen-AI creates new content (images, text, etc.) based on patterns it learns from existing data, such as public information on the internet.

Read exclusive online-only stories, including how AI supports the student experience outside of the classroom, how students are using the technology in their fields of study, and the full gallery of San Antonio-themed generated art.

The

rts of Intelligence At Trinity University, the liberal arts help us navigate a changing future with wellrounded perspectives that span diverse disciplines and viewpoints. Hear from four voices across campus about what excites, concerns, and inspires them about artificial intelligence. words by Jeremy Gerlach illustrations by James Lee ’26

Meet the Panelists KYLE GILLETTE ’01, PH.D. Special Adviser to the Provost for Expression and Civil Discourse Author, longtime theater professor, and former acting dean of the humanities, Gillette is now charged with advancing civil discourse on big topics at Trinity.

RONNI SADOVSKY, J.D., PH.D. Philosophy A researcher into social norms, Sadovsky has taught courses on the ethics of artificial intelligence.

Q: HOW IS ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) CHANGING YOUR FIELD? KG: I love that the advent of AI requires faculty to rethink the point of pedagogy for writing. Why does the act of writing matter? If you answer that question like most faculty do—that learning to write is about learning to think—then you have to start interrogating more deeply the contexts and stakes of composition. Computers can generate certain kinds of generic texts quickly and without grammatical errors. But they can’t interrogate or unpack or anticipate other minds; they can’t think associatively or metaphorically.

“AI is no more a threat to writing than the invention of photography was to painting.”

In that sense, AI is no more a threat to writing than the invention of photography was to painting. Photography didn’t make painting obsolete. It made it much, much more interesting. From impressionism and cubism to abstract expressionism, painters reimagined the medium and emphasized the subjective, human basis of art.

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The same thing will happen to writing. Universities don’t have to fear machines that write like humans if they don’t teach humans to write like machines. As President Beasley has put it, in a world of technologically generated answers, the people who ask the most interesting questions make all the difference.

RS: The primary change I see is a change in the relationship between philosophy and the wider world. Like many earlier technological revolutions, this one has generated a renewed demand for philosophical expertise and a recognition of its importance. Philosophers can help answer questions about when (if ever) we should think of AI systems as sentient, as holders of beliefs, or as partners in knowledge creation. Philosophers can also help practitioners in other fields think through the ethical problems raised by specific applications of artificial intelligence— including high-stakes applications in finance, criminal justice, medicine, and education. Many philosophers have been hard at work trying to answer these questions and help practitioners of other fields investigate their own questions with more clarity.

BH: AI techniques in my field have been used for decades. Even though there are numerous ways to generate content, my research area (procedural content gener-

BRITTON HORN ’09, PH.D. Computer Science Horn conducts research on game design, procedural content generation, and artificial intelligence in games.

ALTHEA DELWICHE, PH.D. Communication Delwiche, a longtime researcher into digital media, big data, political propaganda, and virtual worlds, has recently launched a lab studying media coverage of artificial intelligence.

“Universities don’t have to fear machines that write like humans if they don’t teach humans to write like machines.” ation for games) has seen a dramatic increase in focus on using AI for generating content such as game levels, music, and art. In teaching, I have found that students who use AI to help create homework solutions don’t fully understand what they are learning. Because of this, I have created more scenarios where they must comprehend and trace code that I produce rather than creating code from scratch on their own.

Read about this lab on page 34!

AD: For the past 80 years, communication researchers have relied on a method known as quantitative content analysis to detect systematic patterns in media content. The rise of AI is enabling something known as large language model-assisted content analysis. This semester, I’m working with an interdisciplinary team of undergraduates to analyze popular press articles about the rise of artificial intelligence.

On the teaching front, AI changes every-

thing. We are being forced to rethink prompts and expectations for all of our assignments and assessments.

We should all be asking ourselves questions like, “Why are we asking our students to do this?” and “How can we clearly differentiate tasks that can be delegated to AI from tasks that must reflect unaided human skill and judgment?”

Q: CAN YOU TELL US SOMETHING YOU LOVE AND SOMETHING YOU HATE ABOUT AI? BH: I love that AI has caused more people to understand how influential computer science as a whole is to higher education and our world in general. However, I hate that some people view computer science as only AI, even though there are a plethora of topics that AI does not begin to address.

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Did the camera ruin the art of painting?

Quite the contrary, says Kyle Gillette.

New technology makes the creation of art that much more interesting.

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“Students become self-confident problem-solvers by building up a tolerance for the feeling of being stuck; they need to discover for themselves that there are strategies for finding their way or getting unstuck.”

AD: Generative AI tools such as GPT-4, Pi, Gemini, and Claude can function as interactive tutors when attempting to master any new field of inquiry. AI models are wonderful creative and strategic collaborators and can come up with surprisingly good suggestions about how to refine questions and methods in the context of complex research projects. I love this about AI. I hate that so many people are approaching AI models as if they are universal answer machines. Instead of iterating and guiding the AI model to more sophisticated and nuanced outputs, many people simply accept the first answer from the model and move on (the equivalent of uncritically clicking on the first Google search result).

RS: One thing I love about AI is, as I mentioned before, the way it draws people into philosophical questioning—questions about the nature of language and cognition, about values like privacy and fairness that we hope to preserve in our evolving institutions, or about the value of creative works that AI can now mimic.

In the context of higher education, one thing I hate about AI is that it tempts our students to avoid productive frustration. For high-achieving students like ours, the experience of feeling truly stuck or hopelessly lost may be one that they never had before college.

These experiences are unpleasant, but they are also incredibly important to the learning process. Students become self-confident problem-solvers by building up a tolerance for the feeling of being stuck; they need to discover for themselves that there are strategies for finding their way or getting unstuck, so that they don’t give up when they are utterly confounded by a hard problem in the future. But with ChatGPT offering them a way to avoid that frustration, it becomes very challenging for us as teachers to create assignments that will facilitate that kind of learning.

Q: DO YOU SEE AI AFFECTING THE WAY TRINITY STUDENTS AND FACULTY CAN COLLABORATE AND DISCOVER ACROSS DISCIPLINES? WHAT DOES AI MEAN FOR THE FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS IN GENERAL? AD: AI and the liberal arts are like peanut butter and chocolate: two great tastes that go great together. One of the most exciting elements of AI is the fact that it enlarges our understanding of how to program computers and invites liberal arts majors to take a seat at the table as institutions design, train, and deploy new AI systems. In fact, our students are uniquely well-prepared to participate in these conversations.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is influencing much more than academics at Trinity University. Read how AI is supporting student life outside of the classroom.

RS: AI presents complex ethical and political problems that cut through our traditional disciplinary divisions. We will make no progress on those problems if we allow disciplinary boundaries to restrict our thinking. So, I am hopeful that this new technology will give us opportunities to collaborate across disciplines.

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PROFILE

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James Lee ’26 Creative Convergence (mostly) by Molly Bruni

From Leeroy’s birthday dunk in Miller Fountain and a robot mimicking

Michelangelo’s “The Creation of Adam” to a delicious peanut butter and chocolate mashup and passionate jazz musician, the art of James Lee ’26 fills this entire magazine issue. A Trinity University student from San Antonio, Lee is majoring in computer science and communication and minoring in new media. This trifecta places him squarely in the center of the conversation around technology and humans’ places in creative creation.

Lee believes generative artificial intelligence (AI) is a valuable new tool in an artist’s supply kit, and his art reflects his belief.

Throughout this issue, Lee’s illustrations mash together AI-generated art with his own digital art, creating something completely new.

Learn more about the artist behind these creations.

installations, transforming a space, and I’ve been doing a lot of work just improving my overall artistic skills while at Trinity. It is really satisfying to see your vision come to fruition whenever you finish a big project.

You attended SAY Sí and are now heavily involved in the program as a mentor and instructor for middle school and high school students.

Why is it important to mentor young, creative students?

Middle schoolers are especially impressionable, so I think it is very important to be there to help guide them and help nurture their creativity. I think one thing a lot of schools lack, which SAY Sí does really well, is helping them to think creatively, push them to challenge themselves and the world around them, and understand a lot of really important life skills as well as artistic skills.

“Any time technology makes art easier to learn—more accessible, more efficient—we should applaud it.”

First things first: Why did you choose to attend Trinity?

How do you perceive the role of AI in the future of art creation? Do

I was attracted to the blend of courses that Trinity offered. I am still unsure of what I want to do with my life, and as a liberal arts college, Trinity gives me the option of trying tons of new things.

you see it as a tool for enhancing human creativity?

Why are you drawn to the intersection of computer science, communication/media studies, and new media?

I’ve always been interested in computers from a young age, especially when it came to video games. Through SAY Sí, an afterschool arts program for underprivileged youth, I found that there is a lot more that you can do when it comes to creating art with computers other than video games. To tell a story through new media art, as the field encompasses so many different mediums, you can really do whatever you set your mind to. Now I especially love creating experiences and

AI is a great tool for assisting with the creation of illustrations in situations that demand quickness and for experimenting with ideas that I would not have imagined myself. There is currently a lot of debate on whether AI art is really art, and for my purposes, yes, it is.

AI art is a type of assisted artwork. It’s a cheat code similar to how all technology is a cheat code. Just like how filming on a digital camera rather than a film camera is a cheat code or editing footage on a computer versus splicing film by hand is a cheat code. Any time technology makes art easier to learn—more accessible, more efficient—we should applaud it. AI allows art to be in the hands of everyone, taking away a lot of stress that people might otherwise feel when creating art, because people should feel good when making their art.

Editor’s Note: For this student profile, we wanted to mirror Lee’s use of generative AI as a creative tool, so we used AI to help our creativity on

the writing side. Some of the questions were generated by AI after we prompted ChatGPT with Lee’s biography and the story direction. The title was also suggested by ChatGPT (and is far better than any alliterative title we could have conjured!).

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ANALYZING THE LANGUAGE OF AI Undergraduate researchers examine media coverage of artificial intelligence words by Jeremy Gerlach images by Ryan Sedillo

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Computer science and communication intersect in communication professor Althea Delwiche’s lab, which uses large language model analysis to study the media coverage of AI.

BY THE TIME YOU FINISH READING THIS STORY, THESE WORDS WILL HAVE AFFECTED THE WAY YOU THINK ABOUT ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE. The way we communicate about artificial intelligence (AI) affects our opinion of it. But how can we quantify the effect that one written article has? How about 1,000 articles? And here’s the trippy part: Is AI affecting its own discussion? These are perfect questions for Trinity University communication professor Althea Delwiche’s lab, where undergraduate researchers are hard at work analyzing the language—with both positive and negative characterizations—that’s circling this high-tech topic right now.

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“This is a cutting-edge lab where computer science and communication intersect. We are analyzing the effects of powerful large language models on the media coverage of AI,” says researcher Matvei Popov ’25, a computer science major from St. Petersburg, Russia. “What is affecting the media coverage of AI? How do people talk about it? What is their sentiment and how does the public opinion shift over time? Are we all doomed?”

Not to leave you hanging—because the jury’s still out on that last one—but the good news is that Popov and his classmates are compiling some impressive research on the other questions, thanks to high-level faculty support and Trinity-style interdisciplinary collaboration.

Popov, and the rest of Delwiche’s team, is primarily focused on a technique called large language model-assisted content analysis. That’s “LACA” for short.

This is quantitative communications research that, in simple terms, counts the number of times events occur— events such as the use of a word or phrase, or the emergence of larger patterns of language. Before the rise of AI, Delwiche, Ph.D., says, quantitative content analysis was a “useful but grueling” task for researchers, and, to boot, “it does not scale well in a world of large data sets.” But now, current research relies on large language models (LLMs), which are artificial neural networks (a type of AI) that can process and classify language.

But now, researchers like Popov, alongside teammates including Mylo Mittman ’27, a communication major from Dallas, and Gayatri Rajamony ’25, a computer science major from Austin on the pre-law track, have access to a new world of technological tools that can rapidly accelerate the pace and scope of this type of research.

This semester, Popov and the rest of Delwiche’s team are busy compiling a huge number of news articles that mention AI—a part of the project that heavily relies on the communication students in the lab. The next step for the team is developing a tool called a content analysis codebook, which is a refined framework for sifting through and categorizing these mentions of AI as either negative or positive.

Ultimately, the group will use various LLMs in conjunction with this codebook (and their dataset of articles) to find patterns in the language surrounding AI. Each week, the group huddles into a snug conference room deep in Trinity’s Richardson Communications Center, discussing research goals and assigning tasks.

The lab relies on teamwork: its computer science majors share their growing coding and programming knowledge with the communication students, who in turn lend their burgeoning expertise in media analysis and language.

“Trying to apply computer science to communication is very challenging but also rewarding.

If I’m trying to train a machine learning model to understand communication without understanding it myself, it is likely not going to end well,” Popov explains.

“Without the comm majors there, it would take me a year and a half, probably, to understand some of these concepts.”

Being part of the lab is a distinctly tech-focused experience, but it’s one that revolves around human connections across disciplines, says Mittman, one of those communication majors who’s helping the team with data collection and cleanup.

“If I’m trying to train a machine learning model to understand communication without understanding it myself, it is likely not going to end well.”

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“Having the opportunity to look at things from multiple perspectives makes me excited about learning,” Mittman says.

For Rajamony, who is planning to pursue a career in patent or copyright law, this interdisciplinary research is the exact type of hands-on opportunity that made coming to a liberal arts school like Trinity so appealing in the first place.

the chance to work with a driven, dedicated faculty member like Delwiche.

Mittman, who found the lab after taking a previous Delwiche course on AI, loves the professor’s openness to collaboration, stating, “She’s very accessible, and when it comes to the lab, she’s willing to talk to everybody and hear everybody out. She’ll say, ‘If you have an idea, just let me know, and we’ll organize it with the rest of the lab to

“AI...is kind of like a baby. We are teaching it, we are tweaking it, and we are basically helping the baby learn.”

“I knew pretty much immediately that I wanted a smaller liberal arts college, a place that valued the interdisciplinary nature of my interests. And it’s just always nice to see other people’s perspectives on computer science stuff, such as having a comm perspective,” Rajamony says. “It’s really useful to me as a computer science major who wants to make ethical decisions.”

One of the biggest links for these students, across all their different disciplines and interests, has been

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see how that can fit into our bigger project.’”

On the horizon for the group? Continuing to experiment with (and train) a series of LLMs that can perform the operations the group needs to start analyzing all the data they’re collecting.

“We’re basically training (these LLMs) to perform text analysis, which can help us identify the spectrum of sentiment about AI over time,” Popov says. “The better we can fine-tune and customize these models,

Look, it’s James Lee ‘26, our illustrator for this issue! Read more about him on page 32.

the closer we will get to our desired analysis; that’s definitely been kind of a challenge, but I think we are very close to solving it.”

Rajamony, who spends her days working on automating the process that “feeds” these models in the hopes of speeding it up, says the challenge remains to figure out how the group can take this model and adjust it to perform more with what we value.

Behaving, training, feeding—if we’re examining the group’s language around AI, Mittman says, you might notice a pattern developing already.

“My initial impression of AI is that yes, I think it’s cool, but it’s still kind of like a baby,” Mittman explains.

“We are teaching it, we are tweaking it, and we are basically helping the baby learn, for lack of a better term.

That’s what I think is really cool about this project, too: that we’ll be able to contribute something meaningful to … the growth of this field.”

And as for the fields of computer science and communication, this project is another perfect example of how growth at Trinity happens best when it happens together.

“I’m so glad that this lab has so many people of different backgrounds and experiences,” Popov says, “because everybody can address different problems and create some really cool ideas by working together. When different majors can combine together on solving big problems, that’s just fascinating.”

For Mittman, this is the type of research that is more than a line on a résumé.

“I’m in my third semester, and it’s honestly amazing to me that if things go right in this lab, which I bet they will, I could possibly be part of a team that publishes a paper—a project that I helped take these next steps in research for such a developing field, such a new field, such a field that some people are excited about but scared of,” Mittman says. “I think one of the coolest things about what we’re doing is that hopefully, in some small way, we’ll have a hand in shaping public perception of this emerging technology.”

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PROFILE

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Marcos Morales ’25 Leveling Up

by Abigail DeNike ‘20

Marcos Morales ’25, a junior from Guatemala City, Guatemala,

remembers feeling like he couldn’t find his footing as a first-year on Trinity University’s campus. “It was a struggle to go from being so close with my family to only talking to them through the phone,” he says.

It was one of his cherished phone calls with his dad that shifted his perspective. “I rang him one day, and he said, ‘I heard that Trinity is one of the best universities for entrepreneurship. You should go check the program out,’” Morales says. “That changed things for me.”

Morales looked to combine his newfound curiosity for entrepreneurship with his skills in computer science. As a teenager, he had a talent for coding that led him to attend numerous summer camps and complete a degree at the Bloom Institute of Technology to hone his skills.

“I always wanted to do some level of professional coding because I enjoyed the idea of picking apart a problem and understanding how to fix it,” he says. A computer science major, Morales never anticipated his passion for entrepreneurship. “I came into it completely unprepared,” he says with a laugh, “but I knew I wanted to bring value to others’ lives.”

Morales came up with an idea that could help people in their fitness journeys, something he had struggled to navigate since starting

says. Instead, AI generates these paths based on user input.

Morales also views AI as a tool that can be used to level the playing field. “It gives the capability for people who don’t have as many resources to bridge gaps. I don’t have the funding Google has or a giant team of developers, but with AI, I’m capable of giving value to the user at a much cheaper cost.”

Morales entered BFit into the 2023 Louis H. Stumberg New Venture Competition Seed Round, where student-led teams pitch their start-ups to a panel of judges in hopes of receiving funding. After BFit was selected to advance to the finals, Morales, along with WooJin Han ’26 and Mollee Priddy ’24, spent the following summer in the Trinity Accelerator, a program where students refine their start-ups and build connections with local businesses.

While BFit did not win the Stumberg Competition, Morales learned a lot from the experience and has applied this knowledge to a new project, FitQuest. Staying motivated to work out is a huge hurdle, so FitQuest brings the fun, enjoyable component of video games to fitness.

“We’re using the same feedback system as BFit, but we are game-ifying everything,” Morales says. “We’re letting your progress be correlated to a video game character, and the only way that character will get stronger is if you are consistent [in exercising].”

“I don’t have the funding Google has or a giant team of developers, but with AI, I’m capable of giving value to the user at a much cheaper cost.” college. “Freshman year, I was not my healthiest,” he says. “I started doing some research, and I realized there are a lot of fitness apps out there, but the problem is they will give you a one-size-fits-all solution.”

Morales was inspired to begin BFit, a start-up that customizes workout plans for the user, modeled after how personal trainers work.

“What do trainers bring to the table?” Morales asks. “They know you. They know your specifics, they know what works for you, and they fine-tune your workouts based on that. I wanted to use AI to offer that service at a much cheaper cost,” he says.

Artificial intelligence (AI) played a crucial role in developing BFit, Morales explains. “Coding is limited. When you’re coding something, it’s like carving out a path and you have to take into account every possible path. That’s hard to do with human fitness journeys,” Morales

Currently, FitQuest is in its prototypical stage. “We onboarded 20 users, and all of them are still active. They do a daily quest based on the things they want to accomplish, such as completing 10,000 steps or eating a meal has 45 grams of protein. Based on those quests, their character gains abilities,” he explains.

Morales dedicates most of his spare time to getting FitQuest off the ground. His team just advanced from the 2024 Stumberg Competition and will compete in the finals in the fall. Morales remains inspired by one of his entrepreneurship professor’s advice on starting his own business: “You can spend your whole life working to make someone else’s dream come true, or you can work to make your own dream come true.”

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Biology and computer science intersect to study AI’s potential in gene function prediction words by Jeremy Gerlach | photos by Suly Welsh ‘24

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above Trinity computer science major Cole McGuire ‘25 (right) examines a yeast sample alongside biology professor Bethany Strunk.

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left McGuire (left) blends cutting edge aspects of computer science into his research, in partnership with computer science professor Matthew Hibbs. above The team has tasked elements of artificial intelligence with speeding up research that would otherwise be insurmountable.

On a weekly basis, Cole McGuire ’25 stands at an intersection of two

different worlds.

A computer science major who came to Trinity University with a passion for biology, he’s using this unusual combination of interests to conduct interdisciplinary research that could have huge implications for how machines (namely, computer algorithms) can solve some of humanity’s biggest biological mysteries.

“I have a passion for research in two things that seem in some ways almost polar opposites: the natural world and the artificial one.

Trying to get those to interact in a way that can be beneficial to us has been just fascinating,” McGuire says.

At Trinity, McGuire works alongside an interdisciplinary duo of computer science professor Matthew Hibbs, Ph.D., and biology professor Bethany Strunk, Ph.D. Now in its third year of research, the team’s project, “A Deep-Learning Approach to Gene Function Prediction,” is building on a tantalizing way to use artificial intelligence (AI) to speed up the human understanding of genes, which in turn has potentially crucial applications for fields such as cancer research.

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Here’s the project’s abstract: Genes are segments of DNA that command various parts of your body to perform countless duties. Humans have about 20,000 genes in total, and we still don’t know what they all do. Testing each one individually is impossible, and working through the sheer number of potential combos to figure out just what goes right and wrong (such as with cancer) is a labor-intensive, expensive, and, frankly, superhuman task for biologists.

The time scale of doing this manually would be “not just one or 10, but 100 lifetimes,” Hibbs remarks.

“But with artificial intelligence,” Hibbs says, “we can find correlations between the levels of genes in our bodies, and we can use that data to predict what the genes are actually doing. When we can predict what a gene does, we can study specific diseases without having to go through the whole testing process one by one of all 20,000.

And maybe we can narrow down the search space to something that’s more manageable to do with our experimental colleagues.”

And thanks to Strunk, the team just needs to start at 6,000, which is the number of genes in yeast, a workhorse research organism that allows this type of research to happen more efficiently and without needing to use human cells.

“Our ability to manipulate yeast genetically is so simple and so fast,” says Strunk, who hosts McGuire in her lab as he switches back and forth between computer science and biology modes weekly. “This is an awesome learning experience and way to interact with people that I might not otherwise get the opportunity to interact with and to see if they can help biologists answer the questions that we’re asking.”

There’s a name for this crossover field: bioinformatics. “I like to think of it as trying to solve biological problems using the tools and abilities of computer science,” Hibbs explains. “And that’s become more important in the genomic (gene-studying) era because the amount of data and the number of questions that biology has right now is greater than any one person can hold in their head.”

McGuire (left), working alongside faculty collaborators in Strunk and Hibbs, is thrilled to continue his passion for both computer science and biology.

“Maybe we’ll never come to a full understanding of the human body, but just uncovering a little bit of these threads that wind in specific places can improve our quality of life so much.”

McGuire was seemingly destined to excel in this bioinformatics field as a student at Trinity, where the liberal arts put students seeking hands-on opportunities that bridge disciplines in a position to thrive. Alongside his computer science major, he’s a biology minor (just a few classes short of a major) and a philosophy minor to boot.

“With computers, we’re able to achieve and do some things that feel like magic,” McGuire says of his passion for computer science.

“Whereas with biology, it is fascinating to take a glimpse into … these extremely complex systems that are all working in harmony to produce what just seems average to us. Maybe we’ll never come to a full understanding of the human body, but just uncovering a little bit of these threads that wind in specific places can improve our quality of life so much.”

McGuire decided to enroll at Trinity thanks in part to a tour that gave him a peek into a computer science course with professor Mark Lewis, where students were excited to participate in class.

And upon arriving on campus, McGuire took a First-Year Experience (an interdisciplinary class for new Tigers) in science fiction, meeting many of his future classmates in biology, computer science, and other STEM fields.

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Just three weeks into his college career, McGuire found himself reaching out to Hibbs to see whether there was a way he could start doing research that bridged biology and computer science.

“I was a bit nervous. I’m just a first-year who’s taken one computer science class. I haven’t taken a biology class,” McGuire says with a laugh. “But he recommended a few papers that I could read to get an understanding of the field, and then just a few weeks after that, he asked me if I would like to do some research.”

Finding someone like McGuire was a godsend for Hibbs, who needed a student with an interdisciplinary perspective; in short, he needed a Trinity Tiger.

“When you get that student who understands both worlds, there are different problems that they can tackle,” Hibbs says of McGuire’s dual interests. “If I was working with just a computer science student, we might be thinking about a really technical aspect of machine learning or optimizing some algorithm. But with a student like Cole, we’re really able to analyze the results of what we’re predicting, to think about the biological quality of those predictions. You get to ask a whole different set of questions with someone with that interdisciplinary background and desire.”

Working with both Hibbs and Strunk has evolved past the point of nervous emails for McGuire.

“We’ve gotten to where Dr. Hibbs feels very much like a colleague,” McGuire says. “He is very collaborative, extremely open to experimentation and trying things that are just super off the wall. It might be a bit intimidating sometimes for a student to go to their professor and say ‘I have this crazy idea of this new thing that we can do,’ and Dr. Hibbs is just like, ‘Let’s try it.’ And that’s always been an exciting prospect.”

And partnering with Strunk on the biology side of the project has been a plus for McGuire, who says he feels honored that he gets to work in a bio lab without having to be a biology major.

“Dr. Strunk is one of the friendliest and most kind people I’ve ever met,” he says. “The way this really applies to research is that she … is someone who is able to take tons and tons of ideas and connect them in ways that are also off the wall, but she can keep them all on her mind. This allows for such a rich discussion that you’ll have with her.”

As they cross these disciplinary lines, this research team is doing work that even five years ago would seem truly futuristic. But Hibbs says the idea of using AI to cut down on gene research time is not new—people just have better tools now.

“Neural networks, which is what we call ‘deep learning,’ are a very old idea that dates back to the ’70s, but they sort of went out of fashion because they’re very computationally intensive to train and

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“When you’re in your classes, you’re learning ‘the known’— what our knowledge of the field is currently. But what makes research exciting is the unknown.” run, and they require a lot of training data,” Hibbs says. “The good thing with genomics is we have a lot of data, and now with a lot of the (technological) advancement … our idea was to return to these older methods and see if these newer technologies and developments in neural networks could outperform what we were doing back in the day.”

Both McGuire and Hibbs are guardedly excited about AI’s potential for their field.

“AI has not gotten to the point where it really scares me in terms of its potential, but I do think you’re starting to see it dipping its toes into every area (of our lives),” McGuire says. “Being someone who’s working on a very specialized use of AI in a non-computer-science field shows me the wide array of potential it has, but it also shows me some of the limitations, and it shows me the places we still have to go.”

And as helpful as AI has been to the team’s work, it will never replace the most powerful tools the group has: a natural sense of curiosity, collaboration, and passion for the journey of research, not just the end result.

“When you’re in your classes, you’re learning ‘the known’—what our knowledge of the field is currently. But what makes research exciting is the unknown. There’s not a set answer in front of you,” McGuire says.

That fascination, to professors like Strunk, is just as much of a valuable result of undergraduate research at Trinity as any thesis or headlining publication.

“Sharing a student’s excitement, that type of teaching becomes a reward in itself, even more than the productivity of making some kind of splash in the field or maintaining some kind of reputation,” Strunk says. “It really makes my life a lot happier that this is a big part of the job.”

See Cole McGuire’s research in action in the yeast laboratory of biology professor Bethany Strunk.

top Hibbs and McGuire, after working together for three years, have developed a collaborative partnership where new ideas are encouraged. bottom McGuire has high hopes for the future of AI in his research field.

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Heads or Tails?

That time when DALL·E designed some alternate Trinity University mascots (kind of) by Jeanna Goodrich Balreira ’08 What could OpenAI’s ChatGPT DALL·E integration create if we asked it to help us design a new mascot? For this profoundly hilar-

ious assignment, I got curious about what else could be out there, deeply enmeshed in our history and folklore, throwing in a few new traditions along the way. Needless to say, DALL·E knocked it out of the park … way out. (What’s with the horrendous spelling, and what’s with the UT orange?)

A Tiger with Values

Lest we forget our true namesake, I started here with a Trinitonian and told DALL·E all about our commandeering of the Detroit Tigers’ mascot more than a century ago. I reminded DALL·E that we have changed a lot as an institution since then—no longer grubby mascot stealers, we have values! Enter AcademiTiger, the feline with a fondness for discovery who also has uncomfortably human-like hands. And clearly can’t spell.

The UNIVRSITY in the Sun

First we copy Detroit, now we copy Phoenix? Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, I suppose. DALL·E did not disappoint when I prompted for a new mascot using our old traditions. I want to run my fingers through these fabulous maroon and gold rays. With such a sunny disposition, this mascot takes “University in the Sun” to a completely different level. Now, if only he had a right arm and, again, knew how to spell.

What the Duck

Speaking of traditions, DALL·E certainly has a taste for the established and the new. Give it a beanie, birthday dunks, and the feathered friends that have been calling Miller Fountain home during the spring these past few years, and we get this lovable retro duck who looks homesick for San Diego. Let’s pretend the “O” stands for “One of a Kind” and not “Oregon.” Regardless, TriniDucks does have a nice splash to it. Feathers up!

Spelunking Spider

I really need y’all to take me seriously here: This IS our new mascot. It’s got everything that’s truly Trinity—the quirky, the nerdy, the environment-y, the history-y. Featuring Cicurina baronia, an almost-extinct spider known as the Robber Baron Cave Meshweaver found on Trinity’s Oblate property, and nodding to our humble San Antonio beginnings in a limestone quarry, this fuzzy little guy is the perfect balance of cute and creepy. Doesn’t “Go, Robber Baron Cave Meshweavers, Go!” roll right off the tongue?

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Inviting

Innovative

Proven

Vibrant Life-changing Versatile

What is the life of a Trinity University student like?

Trinity’s street team asks AI to find out!

by Kathryn Detweiler ’25, Gabi Salgado ’25, and Kait Nash ’27 As Trinity University’s street team, our job is to share stories

about student life, acting as a bridge between Trinity students and the University’s social media platforms. This past semester, while we were collecting student stories, we were curious about what story artificial intelligence (AI) had to tell about the life of the Trinity student.

When we asked ChatGPT what the life of a Trinity student is really like, the AI listed the description and characteristics of student life but said that the response is not based on AI’s real-life encounters. Interestingly enough, the chatbot explained that because it is AI, its capabilities of describing human interactions and experiences cannot accurately describe what Trinity has to offer. Because AI is a software program running on computers or servers, it cannot interact with the physical world in the same way humans can.

So, we looked to the Trinity community to gather information that AI cannot obtain. The University recently surveyed its alumni, faculty, staff, and students about

ChatGPT The life of a Trinity University student is characterized by academic rigor, diverse extracurricular opportunities, community engagement, and a vibrant social scene, all within the backdrop of a supportive and inclusive campus environment.

what defines the Trinity experience. These answers were collected from real human experience and interactions on campus, in the classroom, in the city of San Antonio, and more.

After examining the data, six keywords rose to the top.

They embody Trinity’s personality and most valued traits, and that is something that AI will never fully comprehend or be able to express.

Check out the street team’s storytelling on Trinity’s Instagram account!

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PROFILE

Jerold McDonald M’08 Humanity in Health Care

Photo by Ryan Wilburn

by Kenneth Caruthers ’15 With a heavy call center volume, mountains of paperwork, and com-

plex scheduling demands, healthcare staff commonly face burnout and consider quitting due to high stress levels, leaving organizations in a “revolving door” of staff turnover. This heightened stress often prevents them from resolving patient needs in real time and offering the personalized care people expect.

Jerold McDonald M’08 wants to solve the root cause of the healthcare staffing crunch by using artificial intelligence (AI) to automate routine tasks, thereby increasing productivity, reducing costs and the risk of error, and, most importantly, humanizing the care patients receive.

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“AI’s potential is endless,” he points out. “You’re already surrounded by AI today, whether you realize it or not, from navigation and dating apps to recommendation engines. Now the question is, how can you leverage it to help and minimize harm, to optimize for health and human potential, and to be like the Iron Man suit for you?”

McDonald envisions health care without the busyness, leading to increased access so that health care can be more equitable and work for everyone. Along with Ani Bagepalli, he founded Omaiven Health in 2018 with the mission to “save one billion minutes of busywork across health care.” Omaiven is a spin on the word “maven,” which is a person who is experienced or “one who understands,” and the “ai” in the middle of the name is a nod to how the company uses artificial intelligence to drive purpose and profit.

McDonald earned undergraduate degrees in economics and corporate communication from the University of Texas at Austin and then enrolled in Trinity University’s Health Care Administration (HCAD) On-Campus Master’s Program. After earning his master’s degree, McDonald gained experience in operations, healthcare consulting, and technology implementations.

Across his work in different areas of health care, McDonald realized how deeply access and resources are intertwined. A lot of paperwork in health care is repetitive, which opens the door to human error. If the wrong box is checked on a form, for example, all sorts of issues could arise. Omaiven’s technology works 24/7 for organizations to help offload calls, leverage digital forms to update demographics, communicate with patients at scale, complete financial

“The only way to make healthcare technology better is to be around humans and exercise empathy to understand the reality people are facing.”

McDonald calls health care a space that occupies simultaneously two different worlds—one of fast-moving medical innovation and slow-moving administrative tasks. He hopes to bridge the gap between those worlds with Omaiven.

“On the medical or care side, you can literally see what your heart looks like in real-time images. We can perform surgery where a patient and doctor are on opposite sides of the country. We can map the human genome. At the same time, all of the administrative work is still primarily done on a piece of paper, through fax machines, or with tons of manual tasks” McDonald says. “Our job is to close that gap [in healthcare operations] so that we are accelerating the same type of innovation.”

McDonald has always felt at home in a healthcare setting.

Growing up, his brother frequently required hospital care.

With regular visits, the hospital became a comfortable place for McDonald. He also connected with the service element of the healthcare industry.

“The through line of my life is service, especially coming from a family of military, social workers, and educators. Since I did not end up serving in the military, health care administration was a good way for me to take my business skills and still be of service,” McDonald says.

clearance, and more. By automating those repetitive tasks, Omaiven uses AI technology to create a digital “workforce” to support healthcare staff, freeing them up to build the deep, meaningful relationships patients seek in their health care.

“Technology is not supposed to be the solution; it’s supposed to enable the solution,” McDonald says. “Think of AI as your support team, not your competition. In an odd way, we’re using AI to enhance humanity in healthcare interactions.”

Keeping in line with his spirit of service, McDonald continues to stay involved with Trinity’s HCAD program. He currently serves on the department’s Advisory Council, and in 2022, he received the program’s Momentum Award. Just as he mentors current Trinity students by preparing them to lead with empathy and creative confidence, McDonald follows the same approach in his work with Omaiven.

“The only way to make healthcare technology better is to be around humans and exercise empathy to understand the reality people are facing. If you want to improve the accuracy of AI, that requires constant pursuit of representative data and improved feedback loops to power algorithms,” McDonald explains. “In other words, we have to deepen our understanding of the human experience. AI is an endless string of evolving possibilities, but humans matter and always will.”

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CLASS NOTES

1974

1983 Stephanie King Mattingly is

A book by Brett Hall about the men in his family, Our Fathers, will be published in the fall. It’s been in the works for the past 15 years. His book’s message is how rich a life one will have when blessed with fatherly men in their lives.

the author of the forthcoming book titled The Secret You Hide Holds You Back: How Letting Go Sweetens Life and Makes You Free. She is the host of the Challenge What Holds You Back podcast.

1984

1988

1992

Jonathan Freeman joined

Heather Gilbert was nominated

the United States Agency for International Development in Washington, D.C., after working for 34 years as an officer in the Department of Defense in the Army. This is the start of a new career not in uniform. He hopes to connect with any alumni in the D.C. area.

Bill Tucker was promoted to full

professor of computer science at Stellenbosch University in 2021 after working up the ranks at the University of the Western Cape from 1998-2021. He achieved his Ph.D. at the University of Cape Town in 2009.

for a Tony Award for Best Lighting Design of a Musical for the musical Parade by Jason Robert Brown and Alfred Uhry, starring Ben Platt and Micaela Diamond.

Parade won the Tony Award for Best Revival of a Musical. This was Gilbert’s second Tony nomination. Her first nomination was in 2020 for Best Lighting Design of a Play for The Sound Inside by Adam Rapp.

Steven P. Mach celebrated

1990

10 years of service on the five-member Texas Public Safety Commission in November 2023.

Mach was named chairman of the Public Safety Commission by Gov. Greg Abbott in March 2017.

Cathy Marston was a panelist

1993

1976 Thomas Masinter owns

a thriving piano instruction studio and an antique piano restoration business. He writes and directs music stage shows.

1981 David Otey

double-majored in physics and radio-television-film, but it was his liberal arts education at Trinity that made it possible for him to do what he does now.

After a career in broadcast engineering, he now works with STEM professionals on their presentation skills. His newest keynote is titled “Audiences Don’t Need Speakers.” Contact him to find out what they do need! David@davidotey.com

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David Collenback earned his

500th career victory as a head baseball coach in his 24th season. He is presently at Antonian Preparatory College and was formerly at O’Connor High School for 21 years.

1987 Carlos Balido is celebrating 18

years since he helped start his law firm, Walters, Balido & Crain. His law firm has grown to over 70 lawyers in four Texas cities: Dallas, Houston, Austin, and Decatur. He was recently honored by the Dallas Bar Association with the Tort Trial Legend Award. His daughter Elizabeth ’16 is in her third year of law practice with his firm.

in October 2023 for “Turning Pain into Power: Empowering Domestic Violence Survivors,” a national virtual town hall sponsored by Crime Survivors for Safety and Justice.

Show your #TigerPride Submit your updates online at gotu.us/ alumniupdates

David Guenthner was

promoted to vice president of Government Affairs at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy in January 2023. Guenthner graduated from the Leadership Program of the Rockies in June 2023.

Chris Meyer joined GoDaddy

Inc. as a senior director, providing legal counsel on global privacy, cybersecurity, and artificial intelligence matters.

Brian Pillsbury, Ph.D., became

director of career services for Northern Illinois University in September 2022 after nine months as interim director.

Jen Scott, Ph.D., was promoted to

1996 Marie Mendoza

earned her Ph.D. in education from Northcentral University in 2022. She is currently serving as the executive director of Emergent Bilingual Programs in Fort Worth Independent School District in Texas. She published her first children’s book, Skin, Skin, Don’t You Know Me? The book is available on Kindle via Amazon and soon will be in Barnes & Noble stores.

associate professor at Louisiana State University.

2002

This group of ’77 and ’78 alumni have been on a long and winding road together since their days at Trinity.

Madeline Stephens Zeringue (Maddy) worked for Red Bull for

1998 Jan Thomas Pasek retired to

his hometown of Chicago, living just one block away from Lake Michigan in the Rogers Park neighborhood. He went home after spending 20 years in the Corporate Communications Department of the Philadelphia Housing Authority, where he handled a wide variety of responsibilities in addition to communications. Before that, he spent 30 years in broadcast journalism, including WOAI radio in San Antonio.

15 years and left in 2022 to enjoy a fresh challenge as vice president of communications at Teton Ridge.

Teton Ridge is the first omnichannel Western lifestyle and entertainment company that brings the best that the American West has to offer in one place. She would like any fellow alumni to reach out if they have any touchpoints in the American West or would like to make inroads with the highly engaged community. Her husband, Chris Zeringue, is a 2010 healthcare administration alum who enjoys the best of the West every day from their little piece of pie in North Texas. Chris is the CEO of Texoma Medical Center in Bonham, Texas.

2001 2004 Emily Boles accepted a position

as the director of Idaho Special Education Support and Technical Assistance at Boise State University. This statewide, grant-funded project provides training, resources, and targeted support to educators across the state in service of improved outcomes for students with disabilities.

Get Your Kicks on Route 66 A group of ’77 and ’78 alumni hit the road for their 45th reunion A week before their 45th reunion, a group of

Trinity University alumni hit the road for an epic trip along Route 66. Laurel Guy ’78, Rick ’78 and Dawn Gray, Betsy Gerhardt Pasley ’77 and Dave Pasley ’77, Amy Brown St. Clair ’77, and Susie Smith Thurmond ’78 packed into a rental car on October 16, 2023, eager to see what adventures lay ahead on the “Mother Road.” Over the course of eight days, the friends traveled 2,300 miles from Chicago to Santa Monica, California, stopping along the way to see the kitsch, history, and natural beauty of our country. They concluded their trip with just enough time to fly back to San Antonio for their Trinity reunion at Alumni Weekend 2023.

Sarah Davis started a new position

with the Successfully Aging and Living in San Antonio Collective Impact Initiative with the San Antonio Area Foundation as their AmeriCorps VISTA program director after finishing graduate studies in social gerontology.

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CLASS NOTES

IN MEMORIAM Anne Reid Lewis ’47

Charles Danner ’62

Gaelyn Willms Burk ’71

Yvette Sanchez ’82

November 27, 2023

November 7, 2023

October 1, 2023

October 16, 2023

Gloria Rothlisberger Ideus ’49

William McDonald ’62

Oscar Villarreal ’71

Howard Bahr ’85

September 14, 2023

July 13, 2023

November 29, 2023

December 2, 2023

Santos Venzor ’49

Edgar Hart ’63

Craig Wright ’71

Russell McCall ’90

August 16, 2023

December 13, 2023

December 13, 2023

September 30, 2023

Paul Gowen ’50

Harold Lafield ’63

Mark Krause ’72

Eric Saur ’92

October 9, 2023

December 14, 2023

November 26, 2023

January 17, 2024

Charles Urbanowich ’51

Frank Thomason ’63

Deborah Legros ’72

Elizabeth Bartholow Garza ’93

September 9, 2023

September 10, 2023

October 23, 2023

December 9, 2023

Alanna Saladino Caldeira ’52

Richard Batz ’65

Gilberto Salinas ’72

Kelly Berretta ’94

May 7, 2023

October 10, 2023

November 10, 2023

October 28, 2023

Sidney Potter Payne ’53

Henry Blanks ’66

Curtis Jones ’73

Douglas Pollok ’98

August 29, 2023

August 16, 2023

August 27, 2023

November 29, 2023

William Kenney ’54

George Ford ’67

Gerardine Frost ’74

Samuel Kaminski ’06

November 16, 2023

December 12, 2023

November 29, 2023

December 28, 2023

Dixie Grace Steck ’56

Jan Caskey Martin ’67

Richard Schmidt ’75

Spencer Davison ’11

August 28, 2023

September 9, 2023

October 1, 2023

January 3, 2024

Anne Warren Burt ’57

Robert Coy ’67

Denis Tidrick ’76

January 24, 2024

October 1, 2023

December 3, 2023

James Wardlaw ’58

John Petry ’67

Elizabeth Amen O’Brien ’78

November 23, 2023

September 17, 2023

December 27, 2023

Kathryn McDowell Stone ’59

Jack Pool ’68

Gerald Sweet ’79

October 31, 2023

August 16, 2023

December 27, 2023

David Wright ’59

Robert Rosenfels ’68

Richard Waldron ’81

April 12, 2023

January 1, 2024

September 23, 2023

Harold Kimes ’60

Hazel Goodspeed Topoleski ’68

Eva Howell Cox ’82

November 16, 2023

December 29, 2023

October 22, 2023

Deanna Querner Selzer ’61

David Knight ’69

Elvira Del Real ’82

September 16, 2023

November 17, 2023

December 25, 2023

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Among the papers in University Archives are those of Walter Huntley Jr. ’71, M’73.

More Than Memorabilia University Archives asks for alumni donations to build collection

by Kenneth Caruthers ’15 When University Archivist Abra Schnur, MLIS, began work-

ing at Trinity University in January 2020, one of the first projects she tackled was sorting through massive amounts of duplications of yearbooks and courses of study bulletins.

With the limited space the Special Collections and Archives division of Coates Library must work with, Schnur has had to be selective with the materials that she accepts.

“We’re not set up like a museum where we can take a lot of three-dimensional items,” Schnur explains. “We had an abundance of the beanies that the first-years would wear, a lot of t-shirts from various events, and common materials like that.”

Still, Schnur noticed that one area of archives was lacking—papers and other documents of students’ time at Trinity and beyond.

“I noticed that there’s room to really develop materials from under-documented student organizations and alumni materials that show institutional impact through life and career experiences,” Schnur says.

As an example of alumni materials that the Archives desires, Schnur points to the papers of Walter Huntley Jr. ’71, M’73, who was the first African-American trustee

of Trinity and has been extremely influential in the urban and economic development of Atlanta. Huntley’s papers show the institutional impact Trinity has had throughout his life and career.

“That’s what I feel the ideal university archives should be,” Schnur says. “It’s not just Trinity memorabilia, but it answers the question, ‘How did Trinity set this person up to succeed in life based on what they learned here?’”

If members of the Trinity community are interested in donating materials to the Archives, Schnur encourages them to have a conversation with her.

“The best approach is to talk it out,” Schnur says. “Are you somebody who really does feel that coming to Trinity set you up for the things you’ve accomplished in life? We’ll talk through that and then see how we can represent that in an archival collection, whether that’s a series of personal papers, family papers, institutional records, or documents from your career.”

Alumni can email Schnur at aschnur@trinity.edu to learn more about the archiving process.

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55

CLASS NOTES

Mary Caton

2009

Lingold au-

thored a book titled African Musicians in the Atlantic World: Legacies of Sound and Slavery, which was published in 2023 by the University of Virginia Press.

2005 Christopher Mammen was

A Sweet Leap of Faith Alumna pursues passion for baking by starting her own business

by Kenneth Caruthers ‘15 After long corporate days, Annie Vu ’07 began

to unwind by kneading the day’s stress into delicious baked goods that she would bring to her colleagues and friends. As word got out, her baking hobby quickly turned into an allnight affair.

“People started ordering from me, and the next thing I know, I’m staying up until three or four o’clock in the morning finishing these orders,” Vu recalls.

In 2014, she decided to take a leap of faith and leave behind her successful corporate career to pursue her true passion. Since then, Annie’s Petite Treats in San Antonio has been dishing out all sorts of scrumptious sweets, from bite-sized cake pops to elaborate floral cakes. A large part of her business comes from Trinity University families who send their Tigers care packages or cakes celebrating occasions like birthdays or graduation.

“It feels amazing to be able to walk away from a career and do something that you’re passionate about and be in control of your own destiny,” she says. “Taking that leap has allowed me to have the honor of being a sweet part of so many milestones in the lives of my customers, and it’s always especially meaningful to connect with Trinity families.”

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TRINITY Spring 2024

named to the Texas Business Journal’s Texas 100: Influential Texans to Watch in 2024 for his leadership in managing workforce initiatives for greater: SATX. He was also selected to participate in the 48th cohort of Leadership San Antonio.

Dr. John Ligon

is an assistant professor of pediatrics in the division of Hematology/ Oncology at the University of Florida after intense training in medical school, pediatrics residency, and three subspecialty fellowships. He is heavily involved in translational bench-to-bedside research to develop clinical trials to treat pediatric cancers. His research is supported by prestigious foundations, including the V Foundation for Cancer Research.

Elizabeth Eder Northern became

the director of research in the Office of Institutional Research at Tarrant County College.

Stay Connected @TrinityUAlumni

@trinityu.alumni

“Trinity University Alumni Association” “Trinity University Alumni Group” “Trinity University Alumni” group Trinity University Alumni Association

Find an Alumni Club Network, volunteer, and attend events with Tigers in your area. There are Alumni Clubs throughout Stay connected with Trinity’s latest alumni news, events, and more!

the United States—visit gotu.us/alumniclubs to find one near you!

2010 Christina Rasmussen Carni

joined the executive leadership team of Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center (PBGMC) as an associate administrator. In her role, she oversees imaging, orthopedics, environmental services, food and nutrition, security, plant operations, marketing, contract, and emergency management programs. Christina transitioned to PBGMC from her role as senior director of enterprise operations, in which she brought extensive experience working with hospitals and leadership across Tenet Healthcare.

Show your #TigerPride Submit your updates online at gotu.us/ alumniupdates

Linden Marie Northern to Elizabeth Eder

2022

Northern ’09 and the Northern family May 12, 2023

Nathaniel Hajovsky began

2018

attending the University of Texas at Austin iSchool in Fall 2023 and entered the Master of Science in Information Studies program.

Isaiah Mora started as the an-

2023

nual giving and grants manager at Hemisfair Conservancy in January. The Conservancy works to redevelop and activate the site of the 1968 World’s Fair into three parks in the heart of San Antonio.

NEW ADDITIONS

Donya Ahmadi

This issue of Class Notes includes notes submitted from September 2023 through January 2024.

For more recent Class Notes, visit gotu.us/classnotes.

is attending Rice University in a financial technology program.

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CLUB ACTIVITIES

1

3

2

1 The Denver Alumni Club welcomed Trinity President

Vanessa B. Beasley, Ph.D., as part of the Presidential Tour, hosted a Tiger Yoga, Sushi and Sake event (pictured), and gathered to unwind from the cold weather at their Burn Down Happy Hour event.

2 The Seattle Alumni Club came together to celebrate the

holiday season and enjoy delicious Texas cuisine at the Third Annual BBQ Bash.

4

3 The North Texas Alumni Club volunteered at Family Night

at the Warm Place, a safe space for children and their families to find hope after the death of a loved one.

4 The Albuquerque Alumni Club hosted a variety of Tigers—

local alums, current students and their parents, and recently admitted students and their families—at the Third Annual Sips and S’mores event.

5 The San Antonio Alumni Club volunteered in the communi-

ty with the Texas Ramp Project by building an accessibility ramp at the home of a San Antonio resident. They also hosted the Annual Alumni Holiday Party at Trinity (pictured) as well as the Trinity Takes over Lightscape event at the San Antonio Botanical Gardens. not pictured

The New York Alumni Club met up to show their support for the San Antonio Spurs during the game against the Brooklyn Nets.

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TRINITY Spring 2024

5

Regional Club Locations Albuquerque, New Mexico Atlanta, Georgia Austin, Texas Denver, Colorado Houston, Texas New York City, New York

Hello Fellow Tigers,

North Texas (Dallas/Fort Worth area) San Antonio, Texas Seattle, Washington St. Louis, Missouri Washington, D.C. Connect with your club at gotu.us/alumniclubs.

My name is Amanda Wise, proud Trinity graduate ’06, M’08 and new associate director of

alumni regional programs. Now that I am back on campus, I am privileged to partner with our 11 outstanding active regional clubs across the country. Our club members are from all walks of life, ages, areas of study, and careers. They join forces to organize a variety of events, including social and volunteer initiatives, educational and recruitment activities, and more. They also serve as Trinity ambassadors for new alumni to their cities. Joining your local alumni club is a great way to connect with other alumni in your area, engage your Tiger network, and stay connected to the University. Please reach out to me at amartin1@trinity.edu with any questions about getting involved with your regional club or if you’re interested in starting one in your area!

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59

COMMENTARY

Remembering a Trinity Professor’s Passion For Fiction

Andrew Dansby and Coleen Grissom in 1995.

by Andrew Dansby ’95

A month ago, while doing the New York Times’ Spelling Bee, I enjoyed

a moment of satisfaction keying in “denouement,” good for 10 points.

I screengrabbed it with the intention of sending the image to the person who introduced me to the word.

Among the many wonderful teachers I had over the years, Dr. Coleen Grissom was a legend at Trinity University, serving there from 1958 to 2019. While the gravitational center of her legacy resides on campus, the breadth of her influence extends wide: branches that sprout offshoots that sprout greenery.

Her class on 20th century fiction was transformative for me. For better and perhaps worse, it is the reason I do what I do. On the first day of class, she presented a clutch of words with which she hoped we’d become familiar. I remember “verisimilitude” on the list. And I remember “denouement.”

I had, by senior year at Trinity, spent ample time with the canon, a byproduct of being an English major. I feel like we should all enroll in literature classes again at age 50 to appreciate better the works we partially understood decades earlier. But Grissom’s syllabus wasn’t concerned with the past. It was a field in bloom. I wish I could remember all the titles, but a few: Toni Morrison’s Beloved, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, Cormac McCarthy’s All the Pretty Horses, Susan Sontag’s The Volcano Lover, Peter Høeg’s Smilla’s Sense of Snow. Her class was neither a revision of the canon nor a condemnation of it. It simply asked if there might be benefits in a broader guest list, the sort of approach that could kindle a creative restlessness in her young charges.

More than advocating for a particular title, Grissom encouraged reverence for the discussion of these works. The environment she established made the works feel not like requisite reading, but they felt nevertheless like required reading simply because her manner invited buy-in from us. I struggle to name any one cultural thing I’ve felt such reverence for as each hour spent in her class.

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TRINITY Spring 2024

When I returned to Texas 20 years ago, I thought I’d see more of her, but sometimes the three hours between Houston and San Antonio feels like 30. But because the San Antonio Express-News is a sibling publication to the Houston Chronicle, I’d have the occasional story run there. To hear from her about something I’d typed was a singular validation.

At some point during my four years at Trinity, there was a student art exhibition that made a collage out of Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are and some printed pornography. I don’t know how I recall the title, but it was “Tawdry Shells and Cheese.”

The curation of memories is a curious puzzle not easily solved.

Upon graduation, I gave her a copy of Sendak’s book, devoid of penises. “Tart,” she said. “And warmly appreciated.”

She referenced the book before I moved to New York, telling me, “Your supper waits for you there.”

I wish I had a better denouement here. One in which I sent off that Spelling Bee screengrab instead of just meaning to do so. So, instead, I’ll offer up a quote that Roger, a teacher friend, commented on a social media post I made about Dr. Grissom. The quote is from John Steinbeck: “I have come to believe that a great teacher is a great artist, and that there are as few as there are any other great artists. Teaching might even be the greatest of the arts since the medium is the human mind and spirit.”

Andrew Dansby ‘95 covers culture and entertainment, both local and national, for the Houston Chronicle, where this excerpted tribute originally ran. He has written for Rolling Stone, American Songwriter, Texas Music, Playboy, and other publications.

“This scholarship has allowed me to be an active member of the student body.

When I can, I volunteer my time to the admissions office in order to help the next generation of Tigers.”

- Graycen Hall ’25

“We are grateful for the remarkable liberal arts education that we received at Trinity and the professional doors that it opened for us. Finances should not be an obstacle for those wishing to attend Trinity, and we are thrilled to pay it forward to a new generation of deserving students.”

- Jeffrey ’98 and Reka (Mozsgai) ’97 Osborne

“This scholarship has allowed me to have once-in-a-lifetime experiences that I will always cherish and will help me break generational barriers.”

- Jose Ayala ’25

Trinity University has launched a $25 million endowment matching initiative for student scholarships.

We’ve made the Trinity Commitment. Will you?

www.trinity.edu/trinity-commitment

Non-Profit Organization U.S. Postage PA I D Permit No. 210 San Antonio, TX 78212

1 Trinity Place San Antonio, TX 78212-7200 CHANGE SERVICE REQUESTED

On The Cover Trinity University student James Lee ’26 experimented with blending images generated from artificial intelligence (AI) with his own illustrations to create the cover.

Can you tell which elements of the piece were made by a human and which are artificial? AI still leaves imperfections—and room for human eyes, hands, and expressivity in the artistic process as a result.