Amid pre-finals madness two Tibetans—one of them a Buddhist monk—came to campus to share their art, introduce their culture and to tell their story to the students of Whitman.

“I think it will be educational for the Whitman college students to understand the kind of disadvantages that people in different communities around the world have to suffer, have to go through, and that in turn might give them a better perspective on all of the blessings that they enjoy in their lives,” said Karma Tensum, of the Tibetan Children’s Education Foundation.

The sand mandala creation began on Monday. Photos by Faith Bernstein.

WEB sponsored a four-day, multifaceted visit by two representatives of the Tibetan Children’s Education Foundation. It began on Monday at 10 a.m. with a prayer. Over the course of the next four days a monk dressed conspicuously in traditional orange and red quietly constructed a sand mandala on the Reid landing between Coffeehouse and the main floor.

“The mandala is basically a pictorial representation of a celestial palace, the palace of a Buddha. This mandala that we’re creating at Whitman is the mandala of compassion. So we can say that this mandala is a depiction of the realm of the Buddha of compassion,” said Tensum.

On the first day, the artist started at the very center of the piece slowly adding layer after layer. This particular art form has existed for millennia.

“Part of their organization’s goal is cultural preservation, and raising awareness of cultural traditions so their unique Tibetan culture doesn’t get erased,” said senior and WEB cultural events director Osta Davis. “And so part of their work is, you know, going to universities and leading trips to keep that part of the culture alive.”

An artistic meditation, sand mandalas are a uniquely Tibetan practice. Monks carefully construct these detailed pieces of art from colored sand. Yet, after the days of focused work, the practice ends with the mandala’s ritualistic destruction.

“They erase it all at the end which I think is supposed to speak to the impermanence of life, everything,” said sophomore and co-organizer of the Namaste meditation club Theo Ciszewski.

The artwork focuses on the insight of impermanence, but the organizational goal of the foundation is quite different.

“The Tibetan children’s education foundation works on the premise that the Tibetan culture is ancient, it is sacred, and that it is something worth preserving,” said Tensum. “The second fact that we deal with is this that Tibet itself, under the Chinese communist rule, our culture is not doing that well. So what do you do as a small non-profit here in the United States to help preserve that culture? We believe that one way we can do that is by informing, educating people in the west about what a wonderful culture it is.”

Under Chinese rule Tibetans are not allowed religious freedom, their traditional lifestyles have been made impossible by social displacement and they receive little benefit from China’s booming economy.

“Tibetans on all accounts have become like second-class citizens in their own country,” said Tensum.

Tensum and the Tibetan Children’s Education Foundation work on multiple fronts to preserve the Tibetan culture. They have constructed dozens of mandalas throughout the United States trying to bring the Tibetan lifestyle, beliefs and political challenges into the public consciousness.

In addition to constructing the spiritual sand mandala, the visitors gave Whitman students a view into the cultural past and present of Tibetan Buddhists. They presented a film on Tuesday, April 30, and Tensum delivered a lecture on his experience during the Tibetan Diaspora on Wednesday, May 1. In his presentation he recounted and reflected on his escape across the Himalayas as a child.

The Tibetan Children’s Foundation gave the Whitman community a window into the struggles of a people, and a meditation on the themes of impermanence and compassion, perhaps the perfect reality check at this late hour in the semester. “We hope that we can keep Tibet in the hearts and minds of people in the west,” said Tensum.

Armed with statistics and a powerful slide show, veteran of advertisement critique Jean Kilbourne came to campus with a reminder: We might not constantly think about advertisements, but they are constantly affecting us.

Jean Kilbourne spoke in Maxey last Tuesday. Photos by cade beck.

Kilbourne gave a lecture on Tuesday, April 16 at 7 p.m. in Maxey Auditorium. Her presentation incorporated findings from 40 years of research on the portrayal of women, tobacco and alcohol in advertisements.

“I was involved with the women’s movement,” said Kilbourne. “I had some experience as a model which was very soul-destroying … and it left me with a lot of interests—the whole idea of the image and of beauty and who wins and who loses. This was in the late ’60s, so I’ve been doing this a really long time. I was the first person to look at gender and advertising.”

In her lecture, Kilbourne recast the issue of advertisements as one of public health. She tied images of emaciated models to the emergence of myriad psychological disorders affecting young women. She argued that most of us are not aware of it, but we live in a toxic cultural environment.

Kilbourne barraged her audience with objectifying images and rapid-fire commentary, which affected audience members on an emotional level.

“I think [Kilbourne is] very charismatic, and she brings a lot of specific examples that really reinforce her point in a way that’s emotionally poignant,” said senior Robyn Metcalfe, who attended the lecture.

During the question-and-answer session following the presentation, Kilbourne also described advertising as a product of a culture that prizes profit over happiness.

“The type of monopoly capitalism that we have is being called to question these days … we’re beginning to see some of the terrible consequences of the drive for profit being the be-all and end-all of life,” said Kilbourne.

According to Kilbourne, these corporations are responsible for damaging the psyches of many young people through the presentation of these images in advertisements. She sees movements away from advertisement as part of a broader struggle.

“She brought up Citizens United as an example,” said Metcalfe. “I’d never made that connection before.”

“A movement is emerging … It’ll take a critical mass to make a difference and whether that’ll happen I don’t know, but we’re seeing everything from … Campaign for Commercial-Free Childhood to things like Occupy, you know, that are beginning to break through,” said Kilbourne.

Audience members were glad to see that she incorporated several important points into her overall argument.

“The sort of barrage of sexualization that she showed us really hammered home how pervasive the problem is … I think [by] integrating things like the fetishization of chastity, and commodification of childhood and anorexia, and other eating disorders and depression, and tying them in with the early adolescent self-esteem slump, she really painted a complete picture of the problem,” said junior Ben Harris.

This year’s Whitman Undergraduate Conference features over 120 presentations and posters highlighting students’ original works produced in their courses and during semesters abroad, summer internships or research, among others. The Pioneer has chosen three presentations that we have found particularly interesting to attend this Tuesday, April 9.

Hunting for Recoiling Black Holes by Becky Nevin

Becky Nevin ’13 will present her research on black holes at Tuesday’s Undergraduate Conference. Photos by Halley McCormick.

“It’s our universe. You have a right to know what’s going on.”

Senior astronomy major Becky Nevin will be presenting on research she did over the summer through the Harvard Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. Using images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, Nevin studied the phenomenon of recoiling supermassive black holes.

“Most if not all massive galaxies host what’s called a supermassive black hole. It’s at the center of the galaxy, and the galaxy rotates around the supermassive black hole… During a galaxy merger what happens is the galaxies, and then the black holes, will coalesce… Because of the geometry of the merger they don’t come together just flat on. They will come together with some asymmetries. Therefore, the resultant black hole will actually shoot off in some random direction,” said Nevin.

The event of coalescing galaxies is highly likely, and Nevin suspects that our galaxy will eventually experience a merger.

“We will eventually merge with the Andromeda galaxy…according to the research that I did it’s highly likely that the resultant black hole might not stay in the center of the galaxy,” she said.

That is to say, it will recoil.

“This is definitely the highest level of research that I’ve done as an undergraduate so that’s why I wanted to present it at the Undergraduate Conference,” said Nevin. “Also it’s pretty cool science so I think people will like astronomy a little bit more if they come to my talk.”

Nevin’s presentation will be part of the ‘Heavens and Earth’ grouping at 9 a.m. in Science 100, Brattain Auditorium.

Biophilia by Paul Hamilton-Pennell

Paul Hamilton-Pennell ’13 will share the philosophy and process of fermentation.

“It has absolutely nothing to do with my academics.”

Senior Paul Hamilton-Pennell will be presenting on the non-academic process, philosophy and social practice of fermentation.

“For a long time fermentation was seen as a very magical kind of process,” said Hamilton-Pennell. “Microbes weren’t scientifically identified until relatively recently even though fermentation predates civilization.”

“I like to fantasize about the intrepid hominid that was poking around in the roots of some tree and sort of drank this first sweet, honey booze liquid like, ‘hmm this is interesting’.”

Despite the fact that he understands the science of fermentation Hamilton-Pennell prefers to think of it as a kind of alchemy.

“Alchemy is more about a mystical exploration of the properties of matter. Just pouring liquids together to see what happens… it’s sort of metaphorically making gold… out of mundane things,” he said. “There are all of these accounts of the community gathering together to say a prayer, pray to the yeast gods to come and bless their drink and start the fermentation.”

On his own time Hamilton-Pennell has begun fermenting as a tradition within his own community, specifically by making his own microbrew.

“It’s super involved,” said Hamilton-Pennell, “Most of the things require two sets of hands, and it takes about 8 continuous hours of work to brew a batch of beer. And a lot of that is waiting for one step to finish so that you can start the next one. The whole time you’re just waiting, talking, hanging out, drinking beer, and it’s just such a fun thing to share with other people. And so there’s this new sense of community that I think comes out of participating in those traditions that we generally lack.”

Hamilton-Pennell stirs his homemade sourdough starter.

“I went to a potluck last night and filled a gallon jug [of apple cider] from the tap and took it with me and passed it around and it cost me literally nothing. I got the apples off of the tree next door … all you need to do is grind up the apples and stir a little bit and then it just starts bubbling. Which is why [people throughout history] thought it was magic. Life just spontaneously arose from these different ferments. They didn’t realize that [the yeast] was all airborne.”

Hamilton-Pennell said this book was his “bible.”

Blurring the lines between tradition and science, Hamilton-Pennell will also explain to audience members the philosophical significance of fermentation.

“I think that there are implications of fermentation for the way that imagination works, the way that we come up with new ideas, the way that we construct possibilities for ourselves … If you think about the Arab Spring and the guy who lit himself on fire in the square in Tunisia; we see that as this singular event that caused all of these things to happen, but what we don’t often think about is the that that change had been fermenting for a very long time. The flavor had been changing.”

“I called the talk ‘Biophilia’ because it’s inspired this profound love for living food for me. And the more I eat it the better I feel and the more I love it … I’ve become a fermentation evangelist.”

Hamilton-Pennell’s presentation will be part of the ‘Genes and Germs’ grouping at 9 a.m. in Science 151.

In the age of ‘Modern Family’ by Jenna Fritz

Jenna Fritz ’13 will discuss how sexual orientation influences concepts of family formation.

Senior sociology major Jenna Fritz will be presenting next Tuesday on the impact of sexual orientation on young people’s conceptualization of family formation. In particular, Fritz will emphasize the role that media representations of LGBT people play in these conceptualizations.

“A really positive thing about … LGBT characters in media is that it’s physical; we’re seeing it in popular shows,” said Fritz. “Most TV shows tend to have a storyline that has a gay character and so the visibility aspect is really great.”

Fritz interviewed Whitman students, alumni and members of the Walla Walla community to gather young people’s conceptions of the non-heterosexual family.

“There’s a lot of stereotypical things going on with the characters, which actually came up in a few of my interviews, the role of gay characters in the media… that being a positive as well as a negative thing,” said Fritz.

“Younger generations are being socialized in a way that that’s more acceptable, but a lot of the images are really stereotypical…they are portrayed as being gay in a certain way, and I think that’s hard for some people who don’t identify with those certain characteristics.”

“I have so many friends, I have family members who’ve really struggled with having an identity that’s not heterosexual… I think all of the political and social momentum is really wonderful, but it’s still really hard for people… People still struggle with coming out and part of my thesis is paying homage to that.”

The research that Fritz will present was done for her sociology thesis.

“Not at a lot of places can undergraduates show research that they’ve done. It’s primary research; it’s original thought; it’s innovative.”

Fritz’s presentation will be part of the ‘Gender and Sexuality’ grouping at 3:45 in Olin 130.

In 2011, President George Bridges launched the “Now is the Time” campaign to encourage patrons to invest in Whitman.

“My idea was simple. It got at the heart of things,” Bridges explained earnestly. “Most people make plans for the future. The true genius of this campaign was that I identified now as the time frame,” he said.

Recently, however, a cloud of confusion has descended upon campus. Students have begun plastering “Now is the Time” stickers on their computers, binders and water bottles. One student was even so audacious as to put a sticker on a paper towel dispenser in Olin. At first glance, it seems as if students are merely taking part in achieving administrative goals, but a closer look reveals that these stickers are not at all related to the financial campaign.

The stickers depict a gas can draping our Mother Earth with an opaque shroud of oil. They were designed by a secretive activist group on campus known only as “the CCC.” Given my prestige as a reporter for the Pioneer, I was able to score an interview with sophomore Colleen Smythe, the self-described “Ra’s al Ghul” of the Whitman divestment campaign. She described the group’s aim to divert the college’s investments from fossil fuel companies and their supporters to more sustainable options.

“We thought that [our use of the “Now is the Time” slogan] would give old man Bridges something to furrow his brow over,” Smythe said. “Consider it a challenge …  our administration is steering the college against the tides of history. Unless they change their tune, I may very well begin publicly referring to Bridges and his cohorts as mere suits, snoots, squares and phonies!”

When asked for his opinion of the stickers, Bridges gave me a puzzled look. When I handed him a sticker his eyes went wide. “Whoever these sticker-makers are, they’ve been caught red-handed,” said Bridges, his eyes still wide. “I thought of the slogan first. And I have proof.”

His eyes grew wider still.

“It’s troubling and confounding that [the sticker-makers] didn’t notice the flags all over campus. I definitely had the idea first. Put that in the paper!” Bridges stood, threw the sticker to the ground and waved his arms frantically. “People of Whitman, students and stoats alike, pay no attention to the stickers!”

The CCC’s protest has run into challenges. Whitman’s investments are controlled by over 50 managers, and the administration does not hold the reins tightly.

“I’m just a man!” insisted Bridges. “The managers are more than that. They’re investment professionals … They probably studied economics!”

Critics of the Divestment Campaign often point to the fact that there are very few investments that make it rain quite like fossil fuels.

“They rightly raise concerns about where investments will be diverted,” admitted Smythe. “The college has a unique opportunity to combat climate change, though. This is a critical time for the college, for the country, for our species. We co-opted the phrase ‘Now is the Time,’ and we mean it, by golly!”

When I asked Peter Harvey, Whitman’s treasurer and chief financial officer, about the college’s investments as related to our changing climate, he clearly misunderstood the question.

“We in Memorial are letting out a huge sigh of relief,” said Harvey expressively. “The crash of 2008 really gave us a scare, but the investment climate has really been improving lately. We’re pleased as punch,” Harvey beamed.

As I clarified what CCCers meant by climate change, Harvey became preoccupied, checking his watch and giving a slapstick double-take. He began packing up his things.

“Excuse me, I need to slip into my lilac zoot and get down to the fairgrounds!” Harvey said with a conspicuous wink. “That’s on record.” He winked again for good measure and left.

At the end of the day, confusion abounds over the “Now is the Time” campaigns.

“We at CCC HQ have worked tirelessly to engage the administration, the trustees, the finance committee and the student body,” panted Smythe. “The League of Shadows … erm, I mean the CCC, is committed. The college as an institution will have to take a stand one way or the other.”

“Someday I’ll own a branch of the International House of Pancakes,” concluded Bridges.

Alumnus Chris Garratt ’00 spoke to current students during a recent Crucible lunch. Photos by Brennan Johnson.

Forward-thinking Whitman students gathered in Reid G02 on Feb. 27 to discuss the transition to the “real world” with alumnus Chris Garratt ‘00.  

About 10 students gathered to watch videos, ask questions of Garratt and discuss their own preparations for post-Whitman life. The Crucible Lunch Series, sponsored by the Student Engagement Center (SEC), aims to help students bravely face the coming transition to the work force.

The SEC works to complement that education with information on the nitty-gritty realities of the imminent transition into the work force for those not directly entering into graduate programs. In the Crucible Lunch Series, Kyle Scott, technology & marketing fellow for the SEC, aimed to foster discussion of these details.

“It’s about bringing together the experience of local alumni, the great nuggets of knowledge that the [iOnPoverty] videos have to offer and the students to start a conversation about social entrepreneurship,” said Scott.

Scott was excited when he found iOnPoverty.tv, a web series highlighting advice from successful social entrepreneurs. Social entrepreneurs actively seek out information and deploy the skills necessary for entrepreneurship, but hold social justice as their primary goal.

Scott saw potential for this idea at Whitman, where discussion of social problems permeates many departments. Along the same lines as many SEC events, the Crucible Series complemented academic discussion of such issues by presenting students with more practical information about entering the job market.

“It’s a disappointing experience when you graduate. I hate to say it … it’s a rude awakening,” said Garratt. “At Boeing I had a very entry-level position on the accounting team, this team of like 300 people, and actually the majority of them didn’t even have their college degree. That was really frustrating to me that I went and spent four years but … these people had been working for 15 years already, and they spent 15 years to get to that point.”

Garratt noted that Whitman students often find jobs out of college for which they are academically overqualified, but experientially underqualified. Agreeing with ideas put forward in the iOnPoverty videos, Garratt noted the necessity of students to understand the financial realities of socially-minded work.

Senior Rachel Quednau, who attended one of the Crucible events, noted the shortcomings of the Whitman experience in this regard.

“I know for me, my first two years here, I didn’t really do that much off campus,” she said. “Then I did an off-campus semester in D.C. and had a bunch of internships and … really got energized about organizing and politics … Coming back, it’s been really valuable to have an outlet like [the Crucible Series].”

Scott hoped that, as an alumnus of Whitman, Garratt would hold credibility with an audience of current students, bridging the gap between peer and mentor.

“I wish there was a series like this when I went to school,” said Garratt.

This Saturday, Feb. 23, students, faculty and community members met in Maxey Auditorium to participate in the fifth annual Global Studies Symposium. The topic of the day was food.

Dr. David Kessler speaks about the end of overreating. Photos by Catie Bergman.

According to Professor of Religion and Ball Endowed Chair of Humanities Jonathan Walters, director of this year’s symposium, food came up repeatedly during the annual Global Studies Faculty Development Seminar, so it was chosen as a fruitful topic for the symposium.

Walters brought together a panel of experts to deliver lectures and engage in discussion.

There were three speakers on the panel. David Kessler, the former commissioner of the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA), delivered a lecture on the social, political and scientific bases of the rapidly growing trend of obesity in the United States. Peter Rosset followed with a lecture on La Via Campesina, a movement connecting the millions of small, family-run food producers of the world, outlining the challenges faced by small agriculture which still produces 70 percent of the world’s food.

Jon Rubin speaks about Conflict Kitchen, a food stand in Pittsburgh.

Jon Rubin, the third panelist, discussed an art project that intervenes into public life. His piece, “Conflict Kitchen,” is a functioning food stand in Pittsburgh, Penn. that serves food from countries that the United States is in conflict with, literally wrapped in statements made by people in those countries.

Walters looked for a diverse group of speakers to make up the panel.

“We wanted to create some real clash, some real distinction of perspective … [The symposium] creates a forum to bring these disparate voices together,” he said.  

Each of the panelists has worked with food in extremely diverse capacities. Kessler delivered a dynamic speech covering food on the scale of the neurotransmitter dopamine, as well as in terms of our built environment. Corporations exert pressures for us to overeat via vending machines and the patterns of reward in our brains.

Rosset, on the other hand, spoke of food as the labor of the small-scale farmers around the world. He presented corporately produced food as an active force of death as it harms environments, drives traditional food production out of the market and is correlated with heart disease and cancer.

Lastly, Rubin engaged with food as his material rather than his topic. He focuses on the inherently social dimension of consuming food in a city.

“You’re the performer, and thus you’re constructing the institution itself,” Rubin said. He actively engages people just living their lives through food as art.

Alumna Katherine Deumling commented on the panel.

In addition to the three panelists, seniors Haley McLeod, Suzanne Jaszczult and William Newman-Wise; alumna Katherine Deumling ’96, chair of Slow Food USA; and Associate Professor of Politics Aaron Bobrow-Strain all offered responses to the panelists’ presentations.  

McLeod did research over the summer with Assistant Professor of Biology Leena Knight that related to Kessler’s work on how sugar, fat and salt affect patterns of the brain. She gave a response speech to Kessler’s presentation at the symposium.

McLeod was excited to add a student voice to the symposium.

“It will hopefully facilitate a discussion around food issues that might bring in some new ideas for Whitman students,” she said.

William Newman-Wise ’13 responded to “Conflict Kitchen.”

Global studies is not a course of study or a program. Walters describes it as an effort to spread this common theme—globality—throughout all disciplines of the college.

“Our idea is that global studies is something that is a meta-level kind of thing. It’s infusing the whole curriculum,” he said.

In addition to the symposium, the Global Studies Faculty Development Seminar has led to the creation of interdisciplinary courses such as “Violent Subjects” in Spring 2012, “Raw Geographies” and “Reading India,” which are being taught for the first time this year. The interdisciplinary approach exposes points of tension that might otherwise go unnoticed and demands that students grapple with the subject matter.

Walters believes that Whitman’s unique approach to interdisciplinarity is at the heart of the liberal arts approach to education, and anticipates continuing success.

“[Whitman is] ahead of the game in this. We’re actually helping shape … how this discussion [of globality] proceeds.”

The panel listens to Katherine Deumling’s commentary.

Dr. David Kessler

Whitman students and community members alike crowded into Maxey Auditorium to hear Spencer Wells, explorer-in-residence for National Geographic, lecture on the genetic history of humans.

Spencer Wells spoke in Maxey Tuesday night. Photos by Marie von Hafften.

Wells, a professor at Cornell University, leads the Genographic Project, which has collected DNA samples from more than 500,000 people around the world. He and his team are attempting to track with greater specificity the journey of our species as we spread around the world.

“It is really the most epic story ever told,” he said.

Wells and his team build upon our current reckoning of our species’ prehistory through the field of human population genetics. The Genographic Project examines an individual’s mitochondrial DNA and Y chromosomes to determine his or her prehistoric and recent genealogy. The team has made significant discoveries helping to reveal anomalous episodes in human history.

“That had never occurred to me before, that the Sahara didn’t even exist,” said sophomore Carrie Walker, referring to the recent discovery that the climate of the area now occupied by the Sahara desert was once something of a savanna.

Wells described how the reconstruction of the area’s prehistoric climate coincided with his research. The timing of the milder climate matched the hitherto unexplained African diaspora. Before, scientists had no satisfactory explanation for how humans traversed the desert barrier.

Wells proffered an analogy, likening the changing climate to a pump. A wetter climate invited human migration. Later, when the climate shifted back to its desert state, the populations that inhabited the area were “pumped out.” Some returned to sub-Saharan Africa while others travelled north, setting humans on the way to populating the world.

Wells regards climate as the primary determinant of ancient migration routes. Answering a question from the audience, Wells suggested that this is not just a history, but rather a trend in human existence. According to Wells, 10 percent of those displaced by Hurricane Katrina did not return. Climate-caused migration is prevalent.

In addition to explaining the great journey of our species, Wells hopes to spread a sense of connection.

“I think it’s important for people to realize that despite all of these surface features that distinguish people from all over the world, underneath … we’re much more closely related at the genetic level than anybody might suspect,” said Wells.

Community member Mike Gillespie expressed excitement at the idea of a shared human story.

“The breadth of knowledge and the interest in the whole human family … It’s a thrilling project for all of us to know more about,” he said.

Although most research of the Genographic Project is done in the field testing willing members of indigenous populations, Wells also emphasized two other parts of the project. They have raised $1.9 million for the preservation of indigenous culture and practices around the world.

The project also has a public participation component in which all are encouraged to send in cheek swabs to discover their own genealogy.

“To the extent that the public is interested in getting involved in the research effort … it helps us to improve the story for everybody,” said Wells.

“I’m really tempted to send in my cheek swab now,” said Walker.

This March, Whitman students will be able to go on new spring break service trips to Portland and Northern California. The selection of new trips reflects an upward trend in students looking for co-curricular experiences to complement their formal education. The two new spring trips will give students the opportunity to apply and enlarge their understanding of education and environmental conservation work in diverse communities.

This year the two trip coordinators, Lauren Kutler and Kenna Little, have established contact with the Emerson School in Portland, a small charter school that attracts a diverse student body, and Friends of the Dunes, a conservation organization based in coastal Northern California. Basing their choices on Whitman students’ expressed interest in the topics of education and conservation work, Little and Kutler hope to challenge participants, and encourage them to bring these community conversations back to campus and Walla Walla in general.

In Portland, Whitman students will be divided up to assist teachers at Emerson Elementary School. Kutler picked Emerson—an urban charter school—because she hopes that it will prompt Whitman students to challenge and evolve their understanding of education.

In Arcata, Calif., Whitman students will roll up their sleeves and learn by working with the organization Friends of the Dunes. Little called it “learning by doing.” They will work on the dunes doing habitat restoration, a complement to the urban environmental service trip of previous years.

Kutler and Little hope that the new organizations and locations will appeal to specific demographics and cover community issues not addressed in previous years’ service trips.

“Education is really important, so that you’re not just blindly going in and accidentally doing harm, but trying to understand . . . the limits of what you can do for this issue, and how can you raise awareness about it and share that awareness with other people,” said Kutler.

Spring service trips, along with the Summer Community OutReach Excursion (S.C.O.R.E.) program, place Whitman students directly in the middle of the conversation over community issues. Kutler sees the education trip to Portland, in particular, as potentially creating community for students interested in education since the department was cut.

Although sponsored by the Student Engagement Center, Noah Leavitt, Assistant Dean for Student Engagement, emphasized the crucial role students have played in these programs’ development.

“The way that most of the existing community service programs have wound up on campus, they’ve been the outgrowth of a particular excitement or a particular enthusiasm or area of passion of one student … or a small group of students and they’ve gotten something going and the college has picked it up,” Leavitt said.

Last year 58 students applied to the Spring Service Trips. This year that number increased to 82.

“We try to be really intentional about providing a diverse group of students [the opportunity] to go,” said Abby Juhasz, the Community Service Coordinator at the Student Engagement Center.

In choosing candidates to go on the trips, the program coordinators aimed to achieve class year diversity, gender balance and an array of community service backgrounds. Working with Juhasz, Little and Kutler selected an unprecedented 44 students to go on trips this upcoming Spring Break.

“There’s a real obligation on our [the Student Engagement Center’s] part to keep in touch with what students want as they’re coming to Whitman in terms of experiences in civic engagement or off-campus working,” said Leavitt.

Through collaboration with the SEC staff, Little and Kutler have channeled their enthusiasm and continued the blossoming tradition of service-learning at Whitman.

“Service is my thing,” said Little. In this regard, it would seem that Little is not alone at Whitman.