Boston College Chronicle

The Boston College

Chronicle Published by the Boston College Office of News & Public Affairs march 28, 2013 Vol. 21 no. 14

Three Days of Celebration

INSIDE •BC Law grad’s Iraq war diaries, page 2 •NRG Games winner announced, page 2

•Edmond’s gets into the ‘Pi Day’ spirit, page 2 •BusinessWeek ranks CSOM 6th, page 3 •Gov. Patrick to speak at BC, page 3 •BC Law panel features Sandra Day O’Connor, page 3 •Gray writes on importance of playtime, page 3 •Sesquicentennial Q&A with Clare Schoenfeld, page 4

•Symphony Hall concert, page 4 •CWP reports on wealth transfer, page 5 •Shrayer on poets who bore witness to the Holocaust, page 6

•Two win language scholarships, page 7 •BC bOp! to mark its 25th anniversary, page 8 •Gawlick composition recalls artist, page 8

Scenes from last week’s Sesquicentennial events (L-R): Ninety-four immigrants took the oath of allegiance in Robsham Theater; Clough Professor James O’Toole during symposium on migration; Chris O’Donnell ’92 narrated “A Lincoln Portrait” at Symphony Hall. (Photos by Justin Knight and Gary Gilbert)

BC Freshman Happy to Be Among Newest US Citizens

By Sean Smith Chronicle Editor

In a ceremony replete with civic rituals, historical meaning and profound emotions, Boston College — and the United States — officially welcomed 94 new American citizens who took the oath of allegiance on March 21 in Robsham Theater.

Hosted by BC and the Graduate School of Social Work as part

of the University’s Sesquicentennial celebration, the hour-long naturalization ceremony gathered immigrants from 42 countries — including Albania, China, CongoKinasha, the Dominican Republic, France, India, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, Spain, Turkey and Vietnam — who were ready to take the final step toward citizenship.

Although held under the authority of US Citizen and Immigration Services, the March 21

Sesquicentennial Forum Tackles Thorny Issues of Immigration

By Ed Hayward Staff Writer

Despite the contentiousness that defines the ongoing debate over immigration reform, the current focus on the controversial issue in Washington, DC, and across the country may translate into the best opportunity for effective policy reform, according to a panel of experts at last week’s Sesquicentennial Symposium “Migration: Past, Present and Future.”

The symposium, sponsored by the Center for Human Rights and International Justice, was launched March 21 with a speech by California memoirist Richard Rodriguez and continued the next day with a series of panel discussions and a luncheon address by Clough Millennium Professor of History James M. O’Toole about the role of immigration in the founding of Boston

College in 1863.

In addition, at a ceremony presided over by O’Toole’s brother, US District Court Judge George A. O’Toole Jr. ’69, 94 men and women from 42 countries took the oath of allegiance in a federal naturalization ceremony hosted by the Graduate School of Social Work in Robsham Theater [see separate story].

The scene at Robsham, with the newest Americans waving miniature American flags, beaming at their certificates of naturalization and posing proudly for snapshots with the judge, stood in sharp contrast to the vitriolic debate in Washington and beyond that has defined the latest public and political discussions about how to fix US immigration policy.

Millions of immigration requests are pending in an overwhelmed bureaucracy and politicians from either Continued on page 4

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event had a strong Boston College presence — not least in the person of freshman Chuda Rijal, who spent most of his childhood in a Nepal refugee camp before his family immigrated to the US five years ago. Administering the oath to Rijal and the other 93 citizens-to-be was 1969 alumnus US District Court Justice George A. O’Toole Jr. In addition, University President William P. Leahy, SJ, made brief remarks to the audience, which included family and friends of the immigrants, as did GSSW Dean Alberto Godenzi — who noted that he and his wife and daughter had been naturalized three years ago — and Westy Egmont, director of GSSW’s Immigrant Integration Lab. “Those individuals who desire

to be citizens of the US are animated and sustained by the promise of a better life,” said Fr. Leahy. “We participate with you, because this is an opportunity for you, and for us, to build a better nation — and a better world.”

Members of the BC community also contributed to the rites and pageantry of the ceremony: Vice President and University Secretary Terrence Devino, SJ, gave the invocation; Undergraduate Government of Boston College Vice President Kudzai Taziva ’13 (whose family was from Zimbabwe) led the Pledge of Allegiance; members of BC bOp! sang “The Star-Spangled Banner” as well as other appropriate musical selections; and the BC ROTC Color Guard presented the American and Continued on page 5

McAleese at BC This Fall

By Sean Smith Chronicle Editor

Mary McAleese, who as president of Ireland helped bring about an end to “The Troubles” she had known during her youth in Northern Ireland, will come to Boston College this fall as the Burns Library Visiting Scholar in Irish Studies.

As Burns Scholar, McAleese — now studying for a doctoral degree in canon law at the Gregorian University in Rome — will present lectures in dif-

ferent disciplines during the fall semester while pursuing research in the Burns Library Irish Book and Manuscript Collection.

“Coming to Boston, using that wonderful Burns Library, talking with students and faculty members from a variety of disciplines, including my beloved Irish Studies,” said McAleese, “will be for me a seminal opportunity to enrich and deepen the insights I can bring to my own research and also hopefully to add a little to the insights of Continued on page 6

“War is not glorious or heroic; it is not romantic; there is no end for those who were involved; and it has absolutely nothing to do with movies that are otherwise ‘well received.’”

—Timothy McLaughlin JD’09, page 2

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Stories and lessons from a veteran

Students at the Edmond’s Hall “Pi Day.” (Photos by Jung Yun Kim ‘13)

Slice of residential life

Poetry in motion

where a large and diverse group of students could gather for conversation and social exchange. Although one might suspect the theme of the event would largely draw math/ science majors who would be privy to the concept of ‘pi,’ we ended up seeing students from a whole range of academic areas at BC: humanities, education, counseling, business and nursing.

“Amongst students of all interests,” Yu quipped, “‘pie’ proved to be the common denominator for the event.”

—Sean Smith

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It doesn’t get a whole lot of attention, in part because of its proximity to St. Patrick’s Day, but “Pi Day” — held on March 14 (“3.14”) to commemorate the mathematical constant — did not pass unnoticed at Boston College.

In honor of the day, Edmond’s Hall resident assistants Clement Yu GA&S ’13, Joseph Weber GA&S ’13 and Maeve Gormly GSSW ’14 organized a one-hour social event featuring a variety of pies — pizza, cherry, apple and more — for attendees to sample, and a competition to see who could recite the most digits of pi. More than 70 students came, and the hall’s Pi Day turned out to be “a huge success,” said Yu. As Yu explained, the idea behind the Edmond’s Pi Day observance was to provide a brief break for students girding for midterms, and a little nostalgia for their schooldays of yore when they were introduced to the concept of pi.

But more importantly, “we wanted to have an environment and venue

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The residential staff for the area of the Mods and Stayer Hall pose with the award for winning the Boston College 2013 NRG Games. ModsStayer finished first in the five-week competition by decreasing their total energy use 30.31 percent, while Ignacio/Rubenstein and Cheverus/ Mederios/Kostka finished second and third, respectively.

According to the Office of Sustainability, which sponsored the NRG Games, the competition produced a savings of some 26,708 kWH, the equivalent of 19 metric tons of carbon dioxide, electricity for nearly three homes and annual gas emissions of four cars. Altogether, according to the office, this amounted to a cost savings of $4,300.

your three years at BC Law? McLaughlin: The transition was difficult for me. In 2006, while I was in Professor [Robert] Bloom’s Civil Procedure class, I had to step outside for a moment to take a phone call from a Marine I had recently trained. My Marine told me another of my Marines had just been blown up and lost the lower half of his body. I then went back into the classroom and answered questions about personal jurisdiction.

In 2008, I was fortunate to spend six months studying abroad as a prosecution intern at a domestic war crimes tribunal in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Getting away from the classroom and moving to Bosnia allowed me an opportunity to examine how a country that is so badly affected by war can put itself back together.

I also feel fortunate to have spent time as a student at Holy Cross for undergrad and Boston College for law school because I think that both schools are committed, as institutions, to creating men and women for others, in the concept of “how then shall we live.”

—Sean Smith

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based description of war as it exists for those who are involved. War is not glorious or heroic; it is not romantic; there is no end for those who were involved; and it has absolutely nothing to do with movies that are otherwise “well received.”

This being the 10th anniversary of the beginning of the Iraq War, there’s been a lot of reflection in the media and among the public. How has this week been for you, emotionally and spiritually?

McLaughlin: I feel fortunate to be able to share my experiences, add my voice to the national dialogue, and I hope that people are willing to spend the time to read my diaries and Peter’s writings, look at Gary’s photographs, form their own opinions, for better or worse, and think more critically the next time we as a nation are in a position to send our young men and women off to war. My fear is that most Americans would rather do something else, something easier, than confronting the consequences of their decision to send other people to war.

Do you think the time is ripe for a national dialogue on the war, its successes or failures, and — most of all — the impact on American servicemen and women, and on the Iraqi people?

How could this dialogue be accomplished?

McLaughlin: It is very frustrating for me to answer a question about when the time is ripe to discuss what actually happens when a country decides to go to war. The time is ripe for a national conversation about war before we engage in it; not after.

You went from service in Iraq to BC Law: How was that transition for you? How do you view

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Timothy McLaughlin, a 2009 Boston College Law School alumnus and former Marine lieutenant, is sharing his Iraq War experiences through a multimedia exhibit that opened in New York City this month.

On display in the Bronx Documentary Center until April 20, “Invasion: Diaries and Memories of War in Iraq” comprises personal and military journals McLaughlin kept while serving in Iraq, along with photos by Gary Knight and texts by Peter Maass, who both encountered McLaughlin shortly after the invasion began 10 years ago this month. The “War Diaries” website at http://wardiaries. org includes a free app that provides a sampling of material from the exhibit, including McLaughlin’s complete diaries.

McLaughlin — who assisted fire and rescue teams following the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon — drove a tank into Iraq at the outset of the invasion and, after the fall of Baghdad, had his American flag draped on the statue of Saddam Hussein in front of a global television audience.

Knight’s photographs of the war were featured in Newsweek and Maass’ stories ran in The New York Times Magazine and the New Yorker.

Now an associate at a Boston law firm, McLaughlin also is president of Shelter Legal Services, a charitable organization that provides free legal advice to homeless and low-income veterans. He was interviewed by Chronicle last week, which marked the 10th anniversary of the Iraq War’s beginning.

It’s been almost a week since War Diaries opened — what kind of response has it gotten?

McLaughlin: Our project has been received as it was intended.

We intended it to be a reality-

The Boston College

Chronicle

Director of NEWS & Public Affairs

Jack Dunn Deputy Director of NEWS

Student poets from a record 26 colleges and universities, including Boston College junior Helen Spica, will participate in this year’s annual Greater Boston Intercollegiate Undergraduate Poetry Festival, which will be held on campus April 11.

The festival takes place at 7:30 p.m. in the Yawkey Center’s Murray Function Room, where students, who are selected by professors from their respective institutions, will share their original poetry. In addition, Irish poet Peter Fallon, who is the 2012-13 Burns Visiting Scholar in Irish Studies, will present a keynote address.

“Each year area poetry faculty respond enthusiastically to the opportunity to come together to showcase talented undergraduate poets,” said poet and festival organizer Suzanne Matson, English Department chair and professor.

“We’re fortunate to have Peter Fallon deliver keynote remarks. Peter has a central position in the Irish literary scene as a celebrated poet himself, as well as founder and editor of the Gallery Press, Ireland’s pre-eminent publisher of poetry and plays,” she said. [Read a Chronicle article on Fallon at http://bit.ly/ZXsKGw] Spica will read her works “Witch-

es’ Brew” and “The Horses,” which contain scenes and experiences that relate to her past in the Midwestern United States, she said, and “have transcended the natural world and become something distinctly spiritual.”

“When I was asked to be Boston College’s Intercollegiate poet, I was naturally thrilled,” Spica said. “But participation in the Greater Boston Intercollegiate Poetry Festival is, for me, a privilege that goes beyond artistic honor and becomes something far more personal.

“Poetry has played a primary role in my development as an individual,” she added. “Though poetry, like so much of the arts today, is often overlooked and under-appreciated.

This festival represents our University’s continuing commitment to poetry — and more broadly, the creative arts — and for that I am very grateful. That Boston College and other area schools support and celebrate the arts to such an extent is a truly special thing, and I am thankful to have been chosen to represent the University in this year’s celebration.”

The event is sponsored by Poetry Days and Boston College Magazine.

For more information see www. bc.edu/poetryfestival.

—Rosanne Pellegrini

& Public AFFAIRS

Patricia Delaney Editor

Sean Smith Contributing Staff

Melissa Beecher Ed Hayward Rosanne Pellegrini Kathleen Sullivan Michael Maloney Photographers

Gary Gilbert Lee Pellegrini

The Boston College Chronicle (USPS 009491), the internal newspaper for faculty and staff, is published biweekly from September to May by Boston College, with editorial offices at the Office of News & Public Affairs, 14 Mayflower Road, Chestnut Hill, MA 02467 (617)552-3350. Distributed free to faculty and staff offices and other locations on campus. Periodicals postage paid at Boston, MA and additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: send address changes to The Boston College Chronicle, Office of News & Public Affairs, 14 Mayflower Road, Chestnut Hill, MA 02467.

Contact Chronicle via e-mail: chronicle@bc.edu.Electronic editions of the Boston College Chronicle are available via the World Wide Web at http://www. bc.edu/chronicle.

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Chronicle march 28, 2013

Gray says playing is invaluable in shaping children’s development

By Rosanne Pellegrini Staff Writer

The importance of play — crucial for children’s healthy psychological development and ability to thrive in life — is woefully underestimated by parents and educators, according to Psychology Research Professor Peter Gray, author of the new book Free to Learn: Why Unleashing the Instinct to Play Will Make Our Children Happier, More Self-Reliant, and Better Students for Life.

“Playing with other children, away from adults, is how children learn to make their own decisions, control their emotions and impulses, see from others’ perspectives, negotiate differences with others, and make friends,” says Gray, an expert on the evolution of play and its vital role in child development.

“In short, play is how children learn to take control of their lives.”

All children are born with an innate curiosity, playfulness, sociability and deep desire to learn, but at some point after they enter school, what was once fun and engaging begins to feel forced, he explains. Anxiety and stress levels are at an all-time high among youths, bogged down with homework, over-scheduled with extracurricular activities, deprived of free play, and faced with the pressures of getting into a top college.

“How did we come to the conclusion that the best way to educate students is to force them into a setting where they are bored, unhappy and anxious?” Gray asks.

“Our compulsory education system

Caitlin Cunningham

BC Psychologist: Just Let the Kids Play

Prof. Peter Gray (Psychology)

features forced lessons, standardized tests, and seems specially designed to crush a child’s innate and biological drives for learning.” The traditional “coercive” school model, he adds, was originally developed to indoctrinate, not to promote intellectual growth.

Free to Learn outlines the difference between structured play and free play — for example, Little League versus a pickup game of baseball — and emphasizes the need for the latter in society worldwide.

Reasons for the disappearance of free, unstructured play include a decline in families’ familiarity with their neighbors and a rise in parents’ fear of dangers to children who are not under adult supervision, which Gray says comes partly from exaggerated media reports. Gray also cites increased time demands from school, homework and adultdirected activities outside of school, and most significantly, a rise in the societal attitude that childhood is a time for résumé building — and that free play is wasted time.

He presents scientific evidence

that self-directed learning and free play permit children to realize their optimum abilities to learn, grow, and develop naturally and positively. Gray also shows how the hunter-gatherer way — where children spend their days in mixed-age groups, engaging in self-directed play and exploration — leads to the development of socially, intellectually, and emotionally healthy adults.

But schools, Gray notes, aren’t only to blame for the decline in play: Parental fears have brought about a decline in outdoor play in recent decades. He cites a direct correlation between the decline of play and the rise in emotional and social disorders among young people, and outlines what parents and communities can do to promote and reinstitute play in children’s lives.

“I present compelling evidence that over the past 50 years — as children’s opportunities for free play and exploration have declined — there has been a dramatic rise in anxiety, depression, and suicide in young people, who have not had the opportunity that free play provides to find meaning and joy in life.”

Free to Learn has earned acclaim from prominent psychologists, anthropologist and evolutionary biologists.

“Peter Gray is one of the world’s experts on the evolution of childhood play, and applies his encyclopedic knowledge of psychology, and his humane voice, to the pressing issue of educational reform,” according to Harvard College Professor of Psychology Steven Pinker, author of How the Mind Works.

Contact Rosanne Pellegrini at rosanne.pellegrini@bc.edu

CSOM Climbs to 6th in BusinessWeek The Carroll School of Management rose to a sixth-place ranking among the best undergraduate business programs in the US, according to Bloomberg BusinessWeek’s latest rankings of Top Undergraduate Business Programs.

The Carroll School climbed to sixth among US business schools, up from ninth place last year and a full 10-place climb in the rankings since 2011, when the undergraduate program was ranked 16th.

Carroll School Dean Andy Boynton said the ascent into the upper echelons of US business programs has been greeted with excitement by the school, which enrolls approximately 2,000 students.

“We continue to be recognized as one of the elite undergraduate business programs in the country, which is gratifying to our entire community,” said Boynton. “The credit goes to our terrific faculty, staff, students and alumni who together have laid the groundwork for this to happen through their talent and hard work.”

Boynton said the school’s increasingly accomplished reputation is just one piece of the larger story of BC’s rise among the nation’s best universities.

“The reality is that Boston College is an elite research university that delivers a great undergraduate education and the Carroll School is honored to be part of that,” Boynton said.

The school earned high marks from students for the quality of its teaching, academic culture, career placement services and facilities within Fulton Hall.

The Bloomberg BusinessWeek rankings are based on measures of student satisfaction, post-graduation outcomes, and academic quality. Approximately 86,000 graduating seniors at more than 140 universities received a 50-question survey focused on topics ranging from the quality of teaching to recreational facilities.

The 2013 responses were then combined with marks from the 2011 and 2012 surveys to determine the current rankings.

The Bloomberg BusinessWeek rankings are available at on.bc. edu/11jznsW. —Ed Hayward

Gov. Patrick Will Present Talk on Inclusion April 2 Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick will present a talk, “The Politics and Policies of Inclusion,” on April 2 at 11 a.m. in Robsham Theater.

Patrick’s talk, which is free and open to the Boston College community, is sponsored by the Graduate School of Social Work. Prior to his appearance in Robsham, Patrick will speak at GSSW’s annual Mary Mason Field Appreciation Breakfast, held to honor field supervisors for their contribution to GSSW students’ training and education.

The former assistant attorney general for civil rights in the Clinton administration, Patrick was elected governor of Massachusetts in 2006, winning reelection in 2010. Among other areas, Patrick has pursued initiatives in clean energy, affordable health care and public education, and reforms in pension systems, ethics laws and transportation bureaucracy.

“The Graduate School of Social Work is very honored to have Gov. Patrick as a keynote speaker in conjunction with the Mary Mason

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Breakfast,” said Westy Egmont, director of GSSW’s Immigrant Integration Lab, which invited Patrick to speak. “GSSW has more than 425 students engaged in social work and social policy across the commonwealth and thousands of alumni who serve at every level of human service organizations and state government.”

Egmont, who co-chairs the Governor’s Advisory Council on Immigrants and Refugees, said Patrick’s talk will address “the challenges of sustaining an open, inclusive and empowering administration, a commitment of his and one that has led to record diversity in appointments.

“Working with the advisory council, I am witness to an extraordinary commitment to inclusion, requiring plans of action by all cabinet members and thus all state departments, to be sure access is offered and barriers are eliminated.”

For more information, email swfield@bc.edu, call ext.2-4027 or see www.bc.edu/socialwork.

—Office of News & Public Affairs

Retired Justice O’Connor to Speak at BC Law Symposium Retired US Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor will join three distinguished law school deans, including Vincent Rougeau of Boston College Law School, as part of a symposium on “Law Schools and the Education of Democratic Citizens” to be held April 2 at the Law School.

Also appearing at the event, which takes place at 10 a.m. in the East Wing Ropes and Gray Conference Center (room 115) will be Harvard Law School Dean and Jeremiah Smith Jr. Professor Martha Minow and Timothy Macklem, head of School of Law and professor of jurisprudence at King’s College London.

O’Connor became the first female to sit on the US Supreme Court justice when she was confirmed in 1981, after being nominated as an associate justice by President Ronald Reagan. During her quarter-century of service on the court, O’Connor participated in high-profile rulings on the use of school vouchers for religious schools, sexual orientation as a basis for selecting Boy Scouts troop leaders, the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance bill regulating “soft money” contributions, and several abortion-related cases, among other decisions.

Minow is an expert in human rights and advocacy for members of racial and religious minorities and for women, children, and

persons with disabilities. She also writes and teaches about privatization, military justice, and ethnic and religious conflict.

Macklem’s principal research interests are in the philosophical foundations of certain fundamental political rights and freedoms.

Rougeau, who became BC Law dean in 2011, is a national expert on Catholic social teaching and the role of moral and religious values in law making and public policy. His current academic research focuses on global migration and multicultural citizenship, with a special emphasis on the challenges posed by religious pluralism.

[Registration is now closed for the event, which is being held as part of the University’s Sesquicentennial celebration. See www. bc.edu/150.]

—Office of News & Public Affairs

Correction in US News story In its coverage of the 2014 US News & World Report Best Graduate Schools rankings, Chronicle neglected to report the Boston College Organic Chemistry program’s 16th-place finish, tying it with Yale. Overall, the Chemistry Department ranked 45th in the country, according to US News.

Chronicle regrets the omission.

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Boston College music lovers packed prestigious Symphony Hall on Saturday to hear four of the University’s student ensembles at a concert held as part of the BC Sesquicentennial celebration.

The University Chorale, Boston College Symphony Orchestra, BC bOp! and the University Wind Ensemble performed at the event, which featured a rendition by the Chorale and Symphony Orchestra of Aaron Copland’s “A Lincoln Portrait” that was narrated by actor Chris O’Donnell ’92.

Student musicians felt fortunate to not only help mark a major in milestone in BC history, but also to do so in what is regarded as one of the finest concert venues in the world. Of course, the magnitude of the event did make for a few butterflies in a stomach or two, such as for University Wind Ensemble flutist Katelyn Jeffreys, a senior math major from North Massapequa, NY. “In the hours leading up to going on stage, particularly while watching the Symphony Orchestra and Chorale perform, I was quite nervous,” she said. “It was important to our conductor [Sebastian Bonaiuto] and the Wind Ensemble as a whole that we perform the best quality music

Lee Pellegrini

Symphony Hall Concert Leaves Musical Memories

John Finney conducts during Saturday’s Sesquicentennial concert.

possible during such an important event for Boston College. However, once we were on stage playing the first few notes of ‘Symphonic Dances from West Side Story,’ those nerves disappeared. At that point, it felt like just another performance.”

Even senior Patrick Andrea, a saxophonist with BC bOp! who had already played at Symphony Hall prior to Saturday’s concert, felt some pins and needles.

“I did not think I would be a big deal, but as it got closer to the time that we went on stage, I did get a little bit nervous,” said Andrea, an accounting and information systems major from Norfolk, Mass. “The

crowd was probably one of the biggest that I have ever played in front of. Having the opportunity to play in front of such a big crowd in such a distinguished venue is something that I will never forget.”

John Finney, director of the University Chorale and Symphony Orchestra, got a special treat after the event, when University Chorale alumni threw him a surprise reception — complete with a group serenade of the Chorale’s signature piece “Tollite Hostias” — to mark Finney’s 20th year, as well as the Chorale’s 100th anniversary.

—Sean Smith

Sesquicentennial Symposium on Migration Continued from page 1 party are pushing a range of proposals that focus on issues ranging from amnesty to statutory fixes to border security. In the end, it may help to focus on the simplest of questions, according to journalist and “PBS NewsHour” correspondent Ray Suarez, who moderated the panel “The Future of Migration Policy: Who Is Immigration For?” Throughout the history of the United States, a nation founded by immigrants, he said, immigration has fulfilled the many roles, loosely grouped into economic and workforce development, political and personal refuge, and family unification across borders. But each of those areas is easily buffeted by forces such as overall global economic health, conflict zones and America’s political environment — all seemingly beyond the reach of the rules and regulations that govern who can enter the US, take up residency or pursue citizenship.

“It’s great to have this conversation now, as we appear to be on the verge of a real donnybrook in deciding what that next phase of immigration law will be,” said Suarez.

Over time, the degree of openness of US borders, even of society itself, has swung between peaks and valleys. Nearly two centuries ago those shifting trends helped to lay the groundwork for BC’s founding, said James O’Toole.

In the 1820s, scarcely 2,000 migrants entered the Port of Boston on a yearly basis, he noted. By 1845, the famine in Ireland and political

Prof. Peter Skerry (Political Science) introduced the closing panel “Future of Migration Policy in the US” at last week’s symposium. (Photo by Justin Knight)

turmoil in Germany had pushed those numbers to 100,000 men, women and children arriving by ship to Boston every year. By the 1850s, Rev. John McElroy, SJ, was at work trying to create a “college for boys of the city” to educate the sons of the newest immigrant generation.

Panelist Peter H. Schuck, professor emeritus at Yale Law School, said America has had a unique immigration experience when viewed with the rest of the world.

“It has been very much a winwin situation for us, but I have to emphasize how extraordinarily rare that has been elsewhere in the world,” said Schuck. “Compared to other countries, the US has always been open to immigration — although not necessarily all immigrants at every point in time.”

Immigration has strengthened families, the economy and the identity of a nation founded by immigrants. The 4.2 million people with pending immigration applications,

largely stalled, could be well-served by a careful overhaul of immigration statutes last revised in the 1986, said panelist Donald M. Kerwin Jr., director of the Center for Migration Studies.

He said it would be difficult to ask those individuals to “go to the back of the line” by prioritizing new migrants.

But University of Virginia Law School professor David A. Martin said he did not expect to see the total volume of documented immigrants increase from the current level of 1.1 million people a year.

Still, the compromises and tradeoffs required to produce a bill may produce workable reforms, added Schuck. “I don’t think we will see a situation where everybody entirely agrees on this issue. But we may agree enough to muddle through and get some better policies in place than we have now.”

Contact Ed Hayward at ed.hayward@bc.edu

Clare Schoenfeld ’72 grew up — literally and figuratively — “in the shadow of the Towers on the Heights.” Her family home was on Beacon Street at the intersection of Hammond Pond Parkway. Schoenfeld’s father, Richard Sr., was a 1943 BC graduate and later served as president of the Boston College Alumni Association. Four of her five siblings would follow her to Boston College.

Schoenfeld came to BC in 1970 after two years at Boston’s Emmanuel College, one of the few transfer students to enroll at the University at the time, and the only female member of the School of Management’s graduating class in 1972.

Graduating with a degree in the emerging field of computer science, Schoenfeld took a job with Exxon in Houston. Within two years, she added an MBA from Babson College and after moving to Exxon International began to climb the corporate ladder, with executive positions at Arthur Andersen, American Express and Goldman Sachs, before accepting an assignment overseeing business systems at United Nations headquarters.

Now president and CEO of a marketing research and communications firm, CAS ERSPECTIVES Associates, Schoenfeld and her husband, Tom Flaherty, live in Tiverton, RI, and are Photo by Lee Pellegrini the parents of Meghan Flaherty ’12.

Recently, she shared some of her Boston College memories with Chronicle correspondent Reid Oslin. [The full interview is available at www. bc.edu/chronicle] What was Boston College like in the early 1970s?

When I came as a student to BC, W. Seavey Joyce, SJ, was the president and BC was nearly going bankrupt. There was no question about that. One of the major reasons was that they were offering all kinds of classes without necessarily having enough students to support them.

My dad was president of the Alumni Association in 1969-70 and also won the McKenney Award [as the University’s outstanding alumnus].

He was a member of the committee that found Fr. Monan [J. Donald Monan, SJ] and nominated him to become president of Boston College.

When Fr. Monan came in, they looked around at the talent that they had in the School of Management. I was very lucky to have had Frank Campanella for finance classes and I know that one of the first things that Fr. Monan did was to pull Frank out of SOM [to become the University’s executive vice president] because he knew the college was in serious financial straits and Frank might be able to help find a solution.

Frank was an amazing man.

What was it like being one of the first women in the School of Management?

It was an extraordinary experience. It wasn’t anything like I thought it would be — it turned out to be better. What happened was, my classmates became good friends — almost very protective of me in many ways; there was a real camaraderie, it was almost like I was their “little sister.”

Computers were a new field of study in the 1970s. What were your learning experiences?

Jack Neuhauser was the chairman of the Computer Science Department at the time. He wasn’t much older than we were. The computers at the time were located in the basement of Gasson Hall, and the best time to go there was at night, because during the day the school was using the computer for administrative purposes.

We used to do all of our programs on punch cards and they would run it at night. There was a little room off to the side that had two teletype machines. The machines were connected to Dartmouth, where they had a time-share operating system. We could do Fortran and basic programming on this. We found out there were some games on the computer, too, so periodically we would play a golf game. We had a lot of fun down there.

What about the student activism of the ’70s?

BC was becoming active — it had been sleeping for a long time, but suddenly there was a lot of activity because of the war in Vietnam, because of the draft. They had a tuition strike [1970] just before I got there and there were a lot of war protests in the 1970s. I remember that when Cambodia was invaded, the school shut down. It was very stressful. There was a lot of turmoil.

I remember there was a march down Beacon Street by McElroy.

There were branches along the sides of the road that had fallen off in a snowstorm and students took the branches and blocked the street.

Someone said to me, “Don’t worry. It’s just springtime.” But it really caused a commotion.

P

on the Heights

Read the full interview at www.bc.edu/chronicle

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John Havens, left, and Paul Schervish (Photo by Lee Pellegrini)

Despite Recession Impact, Researchers Remain Upbeat on Wealth Transfer

(Above) Leticia Ferreira Fonseca smiled as the naturalization ceremony neared its end. (Right) Another citizen-to-be, BC freshman Chuda Rijal, took in the scene at Robsham Theater. (Photos by Justin Knight)

University Welcomes New US Citizens Continued from page 1 Commonwealth of Massachusetts flags.

Speakers touched on Boston College’s legacy as a school founded to serve the children of Boston’s immigrant populations, and its continuing interest in social and humanitarian issues related to voluntary and forced migration — the subject of a two-day symposium at BC that kicked off in Robsham later in the day [see separate story on page 1].

As the ceremony progressed, Rijal — who, along with the other immigrants taking the oath, held a small American flag — occasionally turned around to smile at his mother Devi, father Dilli and younger brother Yogesh seated farther back in the theater. Interviewed earlier, Rijal talked about his family’s resettlement in Concord, NH, after leaving Nepal, where his parents had gone after being forced to flee their native Bhutan due to sectarian tensions.

“My parents didn’t speak much English, so I had to take on adult responsibility,” recalled Rijal, who was 14 when his family arrived in New Hampshire (he prefers not to discuss the years in the refugee camp). “Fortunately, we had a neighbor friend who helped us a lot with the acclimation, as did Lutheran Social Services. It was a very welcoming community.”

His parents worked an assortment of jobs to support the household, Rijal said, and did everything they could to help him and Yogesh adapt to life in the US. And there was one thing above all they emphasized, he said.

“Education. My parents value education very much, because they didn’t have as much as they would’ve liked. So they made sure we worked hard at our studies.”

Rijal picked up English quickly, enough to test out of the high school ESL classes, and made the honor roll regularly; he later became the first Bhutanese refugee to be inducted into the National Honor Society. There was no question of him going to college,

and Boston College appealed to him immediately.

“I liked the campus, the academics seemed challenging, and on the whole it was a welcoming place,” said Rijal, who also was swayed by the fact that an older school friend was attending.

“It’s going very well,” he said of his BC experience: He’s active in the Southeast Asian Student

University President William P. Leahy, SJ, welcomed the 94 immigrants to the naturalization ceremony.

Association and FACES (a student organization exploring issues of race, identity and systems of power and privilege), and is likely to major in biochemistry.

Later in the March 21 ceremony, after administering the oath, O’Toole invited the new citizens to stand as he recited their respective countries of origin. Some

stood and sat down quickly, waving modestly to the applauding audience; others took time to revel in the moment. When he heard “Bhutan,” Rijal stood, looked back at his family again and gave one of his ever-present smiles.

And then the ceremony was over, and the new citizens exited the auditorium to celebrate with friends and family members in the Robsham lobby. But Chris Mulumba, who has been in the US since 2003 after fleeing turmoil in his native Congo-Kinasha, went straight to a voter registration table that had been temporarily set up.

“It is a great honor to be a US citizen,” said Mulumba, a registered nurse, when he was finished registering. “Being able to vote is very important to me. I look forward to my first election.”

Rijal, meanwhile, was busy having his picture taken with his family and accepting congratulations from various well-wishers, some of whom he hardly knew.

How did he feel, now that it was all over — at least his journey to obtaining citizenship? Once again, a smile spread over his face, and he patted his chest lightly.

“Happy,” he said. “Very, very happy.”

Contact Sean Smith at sean.smith@bc.edu

After the ceremony, Rijal celebrated with his family, while Immigrant Integration Lab Director Westy Egmont (right) and US District Court Clerk Samantha Stoutenburg (second from right) offered congratulations.

Although the Great Recession of 2007-2011 will resonate through the philanthropic sector over the next half-century, Greater Boston households and estates could give $600 billion to more than $1 trillion to charities between now and 2061, according to a new report by Boston College researchers.

The estimates are among the findings of “The Transfer of Wealth in Greater Boston: The Toll of the Recession and Prospects for the Future,” a study by Center on Wealth and Philanthropy at Boston College Director Paul Schervish and Associate Director John Havens that was released this month at an Understanding Boston forum.

The report, based on Wealth Transfer and Potential for Philanthropy in the Boston Metropolitan Area, is a follow-up to the researchers’ 2006 study on the Great Wealth Transfer and its impact on Greater Boston. That study — which, along with the just-released report, was commissioned by the Boston Foundation — found that an estimated $381 billion (in 2007 dollars) in Greater Boston household wealth would be donated to charities by 2055 in lifetime donations and charitable bequests, as part of a wealth transfer of $1.25 trillion dollars over that time period.

In the follow-up report, Havens and Schervish say that the recession erased an estimated $350 billion of the anticipated wealth transfer, reducing it from an estimated $1.86 trillion transferred in Greater Boston by 2061 to $1.51 trillion. Even so, charities could collect an estimated $627 billion (in 2007 dollars) in donations between 2007 and 2061.

The increase in the charitable impact is largely driven by a major shift in the amount donors are expected to give to charity during their own lifetimes.

While Massachusetts has proven relatively resilient in its recovery from the recession, 91 percent of Greater Boston’s 1.7 million households saw their net worth decline in 2008-2009, according to Schervish and Havens, with households under $100,000 net worth faring especially poorly.

The authors highlight implications of the changes in philanthropy

since the Great Recession, such as lingering uncertainty about the economy and tax laws governing charitable donations, income and estates, as well as opportunities for charities and non-profits to engage with donors who are becoming more engaged and strategic with their philanthropy.

The greater prevalence of donor-advised funds means higher-income families and individuals can play a larger role in their own philanthropy without operating and administering a separate foundation, say Schervish and Havens, and strategic partnerships may provide a means for smaller foundations and nonprofits to offer donors more sophisticated vehicles for lifetime and bequest gifts.

Lifetime giving, which now accounts for 13 to 17 percent of wealth transfer, is expected to eclipse bequests by 2061. The model predicts that in the short term (2007-2026), 47 percent of all potential gifts to charity (or $92.42 billion) will be made during a donor’s lifetime and the remainder will come from charitable bequests. In the long-term scenario, that percentage rises dramatically to 64 percent (or $399.72 billion), exceeding the amount of bequests. Bequests account for the remaining $227.58 billion in estimated giving.

“While the models used by researchers assumed an average economic growth rate of 2 percent over the forecast period,” said Havens, the study’s major architect, “an economy that grows more quickly (or slowly) will have a major impact on potential charitable giving. A growth rate of 4 percent, instead of 2 percent, would drive potential charitable giving from $195 billion to $240 billion in 2007-2026, and from $627 billion to $1.629 trillion in 2007-2061.”

Schervish, a professor of sociology, said, “It is important to remember that none of the projections is written in stone. Not only will higher rates of economic growth provide for greater charitable giving.

More giving also will be spurred by the ways charities act to deepen the engagement and self-fulfillment of their donors as they enhance the well being of their beneficiaries.”

To read the report, see http://bit. ly/Yb7CeE —Office of News & Public Affairs

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Continued from page 1 others.”

A Catholic from Belfast, McAleese became the first Northern Irish native to be elected Irish president when she took office in 1997, bringing with her memories of sectarian violence that forced her family to move out of North Belfast. Believing the tides of history were changing, McAleese proclaimed “Building Bridges” as the theme of her presidency and advocated for peace and reconciliation through regular trips to Northern Ireland and by hosting visitors from the North at her official residence.

Following the 1998 Good Friday Agreement that established new political structures for Northern Ireland and dealt with civil rights, policing and other controversial issues, McAleese continued to promote a new era of understanding and cooperation. She also broadened her “Building Bridges” vision to focus on economic inequality in an Ireland that, at the time, was experiencing tremendous growth through the so-called “Celtic Tiger.”

McAleese visited Boston College in 1998 to formally open Connolly House — the headquarters for the University’s Irish programs — and meet with members and friends of the Irish Institute and the Irish Studies Program. She praised BC for its various initiatives to aid the peace process, including a program to assist members of the new Northern Ireland Assembly in preparing for their roles as leaders in government, and the economic development of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

“We know that you shared our joy when the historic agreement was made in Northern Ireland last Good Friday. You take pride, too, in our economic success and you foster strong business links between Ireland and Massachusetts,” said McAleese at the event. “I want to offer our profound appreciation for that and our continued reliance on your support as we enter a new phase in Ireland, but one filled with hope.”

McAleese was reelected to office in 2004, and in 2011 rang down the curtain on her presidency with a history-making event: She hosted Queen Elizabeth II, marking the first visit by a British monarch to the Irish Republic.

“The life of Mary McAleese represents an abundantly appropriate model for Boston College now celebrating its sesquicenten-

Bearing Witness to the Unthinkable Shrayer book explores poets’ role in calling attention to Holocaust

By Rosanne Pellegrini Staff Writer

Mary McAleese

nial year,” said Center for Irish Programs Executive Director and University Professor Thomas Hachey.

“Our institution’s journey, from modest Irish immigrant roots to that of a globally distinguished university,” he said, “mirrors Mary’s own life in which she persisted from early adversity to the pinnacle position of head of state in her native country. And in that career she has unfailingly projected the Jesuit focus on being ‘men and women for others.’”

McAleese’s achievements have not been confined to the political arena. She earned a law degree from the Queen’s University of Belfast and became a barrister, then was appointed Reid Professor of Criminal Law, Criminology and Penology at Trinity College Dublin. She later served as director of the Institute of Professional Legal Studies at Queen’s University, where she subsequently became the first female pro-vice chancellor.

McAleese also is an experienced broadcaster, having worked as a current affairs journalist and presenter in radio and television with Radio Telefís Éireann. She and her husband Martin have three adult children.

There will be a familial dimension to her tenure as Burns Scholar, McAleese noted recently: When McAleese was nine, her beloved cousin moved to Philadelphia, an event that “was like a death.” Her cousin’s daughter is now a doctoral student at BC. “Now in the way that the saints have of showing us their care,” she said, “we will gather the generations again, this time in Boston, and marvel at the indissolubility of familial love over time and oceans and generations.

“Thank you, Boston College, for giving me such a gift.”

Contact Sean Smith at sean.smith@bc.edu

In his groundbreaking new book, I SAW IT: Ilya Selvinsky and the Legacy of Bearing Witness to the Shoah, Professor of Russian, English, and Jewish Studies Maxim D. Shrayer is the first to explore how Jewish-Russian poets became the earliest literary witnesses to the Holocaust (Shoah).

Shrayer brings a new and illuminating perspective to Holocaust studies and Soviet historical studies, and highlights a critical, but previously unexamined, dimension of the world’s awareness of the Shoah. I SAW IT “closes gaps in the history of Soviet Russian literature and in the history of the literature of the Holocaust,” according to Leona Toker of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

I SAW IT introduces the work of Ilya Selvinsky (1899-1968), the first Jewish-Russian poet to depict the Holocaust in the occupied Soviet territories. Selvinsky spoke of the Shoah and of Jewish losses in the Soviet press as early as January-February 1942, long before the subject entered the North American cultural mainstream.

“Selvinsky and other JewishRussian authors viewed the war and their calling not only in Russian and Soviet terms, but also in Jewish ones,” Shrayer explained.

“By bearing witness to the immediate aftermath of the murder of Jews by Nazis and their accomplices in the occupied Soviet territories, Selvinsky simultaneously committed acts of civic courage and Jewish zealotry. His contribution to Shoah literature is all the more significant because he managed to keep his poems in print during the most destructive years for Soviet Jewish culture.”

While serving as a military journalist in January 1942, Selvinsky witnessed the immediate aftermath of the massacre of thousands of Jews outside the Crimean city of Kerch. He then composed and published poems about it.

Shrayer reconstructs the details of the Nazi atrocities witnessed by Selvinsky, and shows that in 1943, as Stalin’s regime increasingly refused to report the annihilation of Jews in the occupied territories, Selvinsky paid a high price for his writings and

Lee Pellegrini

Ex-Irish President McAleese Will Be Next Burns Scholar

“It fell to Jewish-Russian poets to tell the Soviet people and the world that the Nazi atrocities, which the Soviet government tended to present as aimed at ‘peaceful civilians,’ were systematic acts of genocide carried out with the purpose of a total annihilation of the Jews.”

—Maxim D. Shrayer

actions.

“It fell to Jewish-Russian poets to tell the Soviet people and the world that the Nazi atrocities, which the Soviet government tended to present as aimed at ‘peaceful civilians,’ were systematic acts of genocide carried out with the purpose of a total annihilation of the Jews,” said Shrayer, who co-founded BC’s Jewish Studies Program in 2005, introduced courses on Jewish literature and culture in the BC curriculum, and works closely with other colleagues on aspects of Jewish-Christian dialogue.

Titled after one of Selvinsky’s poems, I SAW IT features more than 60 rare photographs and illustrations and includes Shrayer’s translations of the poet’s principal Shoah poems.

A prolific, acclaimed and award-winning scholar, author and translator, Shrayer considers I SAW IT to be the most important book of his career.

“This book is about the memory of the Shoah and about the poets’ mission as witnesses and memory-keepers. I don’t believe I could ever write another book as steeped in the history of the most devastating crisis of humanity,” he said. “Researching and writing this book pushed

its author to live the Shoah by reconstructing both the suffering of the victims and the wrath and trepidation of the earliest witnesses. I wanted to understand what Selvinsky experienced as he stood, in January 1942, over an anti-tank ditch filled to the brim with thousands of bodies of massacred Jews.

“This book,” he added, “is dedicated to the memory of my paternal grandfather Pyotr (Peysach) Shrayer, who volunteered in 1941 and finished the war as a 34-year-old lieutenant-commander at Königsberg, fighting against Nazism.”

Shrayer’s book is based on years of both archival and field research—including in the former Soviet Union at the sites of mass executions of Jews in 1941-1942—and on previously unknown historical evidence.

Part of the research was made possible by a Boston College Research Incentive Grant, which Shrayer gratefully acknowledges.

The completion of his project was supported by a 2012 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation award. Guggenheim Fellowships recognize advanced professionals in all fields who exhibit unusually distinguished achievement and exceptional promise for future accomplishments.

Shrayer’s book has already garnered attention and praise from the world’s leading Holocaust researchers in the US, Europe and Israel.

According to Timothy Snyder of Yale University, author of Bloodlands, “This beautifully close reading of a major Soviet poet restores for us an important vision of the Holocaust.”

“This is the remarkable story, never before told, of the JewishRussian poet Ilya Selvinsky, who despite all odds first taught his fellow Jews and Russians how to mourn their incalculable losses,” commented David G. Roskies of the Jewish Theological Seminary.

“A sophisticated literary analysis of Ilya Selvinsky’s texts, Maxim D. Shrayer’s book demonstrates a deep knowledge of the history of the Holocaust in the USSR,” said Ilya Altman of the Russian State University for the Humanities and the Russian Holocaust Center. “It is the first study of poet’s career in the context of Shoah memorization.

Shrayer’s book must be published in Russian translation.”

Contact Rosanne Pellegrini at rosanne.pellegrini@bc.edu

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WELCOME ADDITIONS L. Matthew Petillo is an adjunct assistant professor in the Theology Department whose research interests are Bernard Lonergan, Karl Rahner, theological anthropology, and comparative theology with a focus on the conversation between Christianity and Buddhism. Petillo, who holds a doctorate in systematic theology and master’s degrees in theology and philosophy from Boston College, teaches Perspectives and courses in Catholic systematic theology. Prior to joining BC, he was an assistant professor of religious studies at D’Youville College in New York and a visiting assistant professor at Canisius and Saint Anselm colleges.

Connell School of Nursing Assistant Professor Stewart Bond has a clinical background in oncology, geriatrics and palliative care, with a specialty in symptom management and palliative care for cancer patients, particularly in older adults with cancer. His recent research focuses on treating neuropsychiatric symptoms, such as delirium, in older cancer patients. He earned a bachelor of science in nursing from the University of Virginia and master’s degree and doctorate in nursing from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as well as a master of theological studies degree and a post-master’s certificate in psychiatric-mental health nursing from Vanderbilt University. Bond, a former research assistant professor at Vanderbilt’s School of Nursing, won the Journal of Gerontological Nursing’s 2010 Edna Stilwell Writing Award.

Assistant Professor of Economics Ryan Chahrour, who came to BC after earning a PhD from Columbia University, has research interests in macroeconomics and monetary economics, and is currently teaching monetary theory. He has been published in the American Economic Journal and Economic Letters. A former researcher at the Federal Reserve Bank in Boston, Chahrour has given professional presentations at colleges and universities across the country, including at Purdue, Duke, Santa Clara and University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill.

As chair of the Carroll School of Management MBA core faculty, Lecturer Richard Powers coordinates curriculum development, course offerings, and scheduling for graduate programs. A 1978 BC Law graduate, Powers has 25 years of experience representing Fortune 500 companies and other corporations. While pursuing a master’s degree in higher education administration in 2007, Powers focused his research on the discipline of academic advising. He now serves as academic advisor to Portico undergraduate students and full-time MBA graduate students, as well as pre-law undergraduate students, collaborating with the University’s pre-law advisor and the Academic Advising Center. In addition, Powers teaches Managing the Legal Environment of Business.

—Kathleen Sullivan and Melissa Beecher Photos by Lee Pellegrini “Welcome Additions,” an occasional feature, profiles new faculty members at Boston College.

NOTA BENE Amanda Rothschild ’11 was selected as one of 100 “Leaders of Tomorrow” for the 43rd St. Gallen Symposium. The 100 — chosen from a pool of 1,000 graduate students worldwide, representing 350 universities and 81 countries — will attend meetings as part of the St. Gallen Symposium in Switzerland. Other attendees at the symposium include: Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Fu Ying; Vuk Jeremic, president of the 67th session of the UN General Assembly; International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde; retired US Army General Stanley McChrystal; and Irish Minister of Finance Michael Noonan.

Angelo McClain, a 2001 alumnus of the Graduate School of Social Work, was named the new Chief Executive Officer at the National Association of Social Workers, the largest membership organization of professional social workers in the world. McClain served the last six years as the Commissioner for the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families.

Newsmakers Numerous Boston College Jesuits, faculty and students were interviewed regarding the selection of Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the first pope from the Society of Jesus, among them Founders Professor of Theology James Keenan, SJ, National Catholic Reporter; Prof. James Bretzke, SJ (STM), Bradenton Herald, Fla; Prof. Stephen Pope (Theology), “Here and Now” on WBUR-FM; and Diana Sanborn, a Lynch School of Education studying in Rome, Boston Herald.

Vice President and University Secretary Terrence Devino, SJ, discussed

the signs, symbols, and invitations to holiness prevalent on the campus of a Jesuit university in a Lenten podcast highlighted by National Jesuit News.

BC BRIEFING Asst. Prof. Franck Salameh (Slavic and Eastern Languages) wrote on the artificiality of the modern Middle Eastern state-system, particularly as it relates to Syria, in an essay for The National Interest.

Center for Retirement Research Director Alicia Munnell and Sloan Center on Aging and Work Director

Undergrad, Law Student Receive Critical Language Scholarships Presidential Scholar Andrew Babbitt ’15 and Boston College Law School student Benjamin Barkley have been awarded US State Department Critical Language Scholarships for intensive foreign language study abroad this summer.

More than 4,900 US undergraduate and graduate students applied for the 2013 Critical Language Scholarships (CLS). Babbitt and Barkley are two of approximately 600 winners, representing more than 200 institutions of higher education. The CLS recipients will spend the summer overseas in structured cultural enrichment experiences mastering one of 13 critical languages: Arabic, Azerbaijani, Bangladesh, Chinese, Hindi, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Persian, Punjabi, Russian, Turkish, or Urdu. CLS Program participants are expected to continue their language study beyond the scholarship and apply their critical language skills in their future professional careers.

Babbitt will study Chinese at Suzhou University in China and Barkley will study Russian at the Kazan Institute of Social Sciences and Humanities in Russia.

A math major in BC’s pre-med program, Babbitt is interested in a career in international public health and sees the benefit of combining his interests in medicine and Chinese.

“I first took Chinese in high school and was lucky enough to travel to China on a cultural exchange trip sponsored by the Chinese government after my sophomore year.

Since then, I have loved the language and culture,” said Babbitt, who is from Hampden, Me. Babbitt has continued his Chinese studies at Boston College, hoping to complete a minor in Chinese. Last summer, he interned for a month at the Shanghai United Family Hospital.

For Barkley, the trip to Kazan is a bit of a homecoming. As a young child, he lived in Kazan for a year with his parents, who were missionaries. He attended kindergarten in Kazan, where he first learned to

speak Russian. His family then spent another four or so years in Ufa, Russia.

Barkley’s program at Kazan involves intensive group-centered language lessons for 20 hours a week as well as regular cultural excursions and activities. “I plan on using this opportunity to practice my Russian and become further acquainted with Russian culture. In my spare time I plan to seek out opportunities to work with local businesses or volunteer organizations to get to know the community better. I also hope to reconnect with the woman who practically adopted my family and became my Russian ‘grandmother’ while we were living there.”

Barkley’s return to Russia has been a long journey. After his time in Russia as a youngster, he and his family lived in Belgium for four years, where his parents continued their work assisting refugees. His family then moved to Texas, where Barkley finished high school. He continued Russian language studies in high school and eventually enrolled in the University of Texas at San Antonio. During college, Barkley had hoped to study overseas and had made plans to join the Peace Corps, but the discovery of a brain tumor put an end to such plans, and he underwent surgery and radiation.

Though occasional headaches, light sensitivity and regular medication are reminders of his ordeal, Barkley is ready to take on the “exciting” opportunity to study in Russia.

After law school, Barkley wants to pursue a career with the State Department as a foreign service officer.

The Critical Language Scholarships for Intensive Summer Institutes is a program of the United States Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

Selection is administered by American Councils for International Education. The CLS Program is administered by American Councils and The Ohio State University/Ohio University.

—Kathleen Sullivan

Marcie Pitt-Catsouphes discussed issues facing retirees with the New York Times. Munnell also was interviewed by the national financial news program “First Business.”

Publications Assoc. Prof. Nancy Pineda-Madrid (STM) published “Resistiendo al Feminicidio, Interrogando la Salvación” in La Teología de la Liberación en Prospectiva, “Feminicide and the Reinvention of Religious Practices” in Women, Wisdom, and Witness: Engaging Contexts in Conversation and “Redemption, Latinas, and the Contribution of Rosemary Radford Ruether” in Voices of Feminist Liberation: Writings in Celebration of Rosemary Radford Ruether.

Honors/Appointments Prof. Jorge Garcia (Philosophy) was elected to the American Catholic Philosophical Association Executive Committee, while serving on its council and standing for election to its vice-presidency.

Time and a Half Assoc. Prof. Thomas D. Stegman, SJ (STM), participated in the panel discussion “A Morning with the Apostle Paul (and Friends)” at St. Mary’s Seminary and University.

Prof. Jorge Garcia (Philosophy) offered a two-day workshop, “Ethics across the College, at Emmanuel College”; presented “The Ethics & Mores of Race” in the American Society for Value Inquiry’s session at the American Philosophical Association meeting in New Orleans; joined a panel discussion for humanities postdoctoral fellows in the annual Ford Fellows Conference at the National Academy of Sciences center in Irvine, Calif.; and spoke on virtue ethics at Rutgers’s Institute for Diversity in Philosophy.

JOBS The following are among the most recent positions posted by the Department of Human Resources.

For more information on employment opportunities at Boston College, see www.bc.edu/offices/hr/: Head Librarian, Social Work Library Manager, Human Resources Service Center Vice President for Student Affairs Associate Director, Diversity and Inclusion, Office of Institutional Diversity Assistant Director, Football Operations, Athletics Department Senior Associate Director, Development, BC Law Advancement Staff Psychologist, University Counseling Middleware Manager, Information Technology Technology Manager, Office of Residential Life

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LOOKING AHEAD Making the Connection to a Memorable Artist

By Rosanne Pellegrini Staff Writer

On April 8, Gasson 100 will be transformed into a unique performance space, as at 8 p.m. that evening Assistant Professor of Music Ralf Yusuf Gawlick debuts his new song cycle on a legendary German graphic artist.

Against tall black dividers, nine large reprints of self-portraits created over a span of six decades by painter, printmaker and sculptor Käthe Kollwitz will furnish the backdrop for Gawlick’s “KollwitzKonnex...im Friedan seiner Hände” (the title translates to “KollwitzConnection...in the Peace of His Hands”). Based on Kollwitz’s life, art and writings, the song cycle will be performed by Canadian soprano Anne Harley and internationally renowned guitarist Eliot Fisk.

A prolific and award-winning composer, Gawlick hopes his composition will bring greater attention to Kollwitz (1867-1945), whose work offers an eloquent and searing account of the human condition, and the tragedy of war, in the first half of the 20th century. “KollwitzKonnex,” he says, is his tribute to a lifelong inspiration, and now muse.

“She was a remarkable woman and artist, relatively unknown to American audiences,” said Gawlick. “It is my desire, and that of the living Kollwitz heirs, to bring the

profound humanism and artistry of her art and writings to Boston College and the wider community.”

In conjunction with the premiere of “Kollwitz-Konnex” — which was commissioned by Fisk and Harley — will be a symposium, a student concert, and art exhibits on display in Burns and Bapst libraries.

Kollwitz lived through two world wars, the great German Depression of the 1920s, the Weimar Republic and National Socialism.

She was the first woman elected to the Prussian Academy of Arts, but was forced to resign in 1933. She endured censorship and artistic and professional humiliation, and lost both a son and grandson to war.

The main themes of Kollwitz’s art — life and death, family, children, old age, misery, deprivation, hunger, loss and innocence — confront her day and age, but are everpresent and relevant, according to Gawlick. “Her themes are also ours; every self-portrait is part of a profound humanity with which we can, and must, identify ourselves.”

Gawlick says his deep admiration for the art of Kollwitz – “an art of social conscience” – prompted him to explore her writings, particularly her diary. This exploration led to the conception of a song cycle leading to the collaboration with Harley and Fisk, a connection with Kollwitz’s grandchildren and the Kollwitz Museum directors, he said – and the idea for an interdisciplinary symposium at BC. “I wanted to give voice to this spiritual kinship with a song cycle

Lee Pellegrini

Gawlick’s song cycle evokes life, works of Käthe Kollwitz

Asst. Prof. Ralf Yusuf Gawlick (Music) hopes his song cycle will bring greater attention to the career and legacy of Käthe Kollwitz (inset).

that explored the artist through the most intimate self-presentations in image and word: her self-portraits and literary reflections in her letters and diary,” explained Gawlick, lauding the Kollwitz heirs’ generosity to, and assistance with, the project.

Self-portraits figure prominently in Kollwitz’s body of work; she created some 130 in techniques including drawing, etching, lithography, woodcut and sculpture.

Gawlick chose nine of these portraits — which represent the six decades of her creative life — as the “fons et origo” [source and origin] of his work, complemented by her writings. “I had no intention to ‘translate’ the selected images into programmatic music. I did seek to establish direct connections between the portraits’ specific graphic mediums and the cycle’s musical language and architecture.”

He was “immediately drawn to the combination of voice and guitar to capture the intimacy of the selfportrait and diary genres. Through-

out history, the guitar has been the most faithful companion of the voice. Motivated by its subject, ‘Kollwitz-Konnex’ celebrates the most intimate of musical companions in an unprecedented scope,” Gawlick noted.

The portraits and diary excerpts will be displayed at the April 8 public concert, to “invite the listener-viewer-reader to delve into Kollwitz’ art through the interrelationship of these sisters: music, art and literature,” he added.

Preceding the concert will be the April 7 symposium, “Kollwitz Connection: Artistic, Social and Gender Commentary in the Life and Works of Käthe Kollwitz.”

Interdisciplinary presentations and discussions at the event — from 4-7 p.m. in Devlin 101 — will address literary, artistic and linguistic perspectives. Along with Gawlick, participants include faculty members John Michalczyk, Claude Cernuschi and Michael Mulhern (Fine Arts), Michael Connolly (Slavic and Eastern Languages) and Ra-

chel Freudenburg (German Studies). Students also will take part.

A second Kollwitz musical program takes place April 11 at 8 p.m. in Gasson 100. Organized

by Adjunct Assistant Professor of Music and Chamber Music Director Sandra Hebert, BC faculty and students will perform music by women composers — some of them contemporaries of Kollwitz — including Clara Schaumann, Lily Boulanger and Cécile Chaminade.

Burns Library will display two of Kollwitz’s works, courtesy of the Boston Public Library Print Department collection, while from April 5-12 the Bapst Library Gallery will feature a student show, “Issues of Self-Portraiture,” organized by the BC Art Club and students in the Art of Portraiture course of Fine Arts Department Visiting Professor Sammy Chong, SJ. The student works were inspired by the study and analysis of Kollwitz portraits and enabled them to depict themselves in this personal artistic genre.

On April 21, “Kollwitz-Konnex” will have its European premiere — attended by the artist’s heirs — at her namesake museum in Köln, Germany.

For more information on the Kollwitz campus events — which are open to the public and free of charge — see the Music Department home page at http://www. bc.edu/music.

Self-portrait of Käthe Kollwitz used by permisson of Kreidelithographie, Kn 209, Käthe Kollwitz Museum Koln, Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Twenty-Five Years Later, Still Bopping Along Fresh from an appearance at the Boston College Sesquicentennial concert [see page 4], the University’s acclaimed jazz instrumental-vocal student ensemble BC bOp! celebrates its 25th anniversary next week with a pair of Robsham Theater concerts featuring BC bOp! alumni and world-renowned trumpeter Wayne Bergeron.

Bergeron, a former member of the Maynard Ferguson Band, has played on more than 300 TV and movie soundtracks and appeared in recording projects involving performers such as Ray Charles, Lou Rawls, Harry Connick Jr., Bette Midler and Rosemary Clooney, among many others. His first solo album “You Call This a Living?” was nominated for a 2004 Grammy Award.

In addition to the concerts, which will take place at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m. on April 6, there will be a special clinic given by Bergeron and BC bOp! on April 5 at 8 p.m. in Robsham.

Since its debut, BC bOp! has showcased its traditional and jazz contemporary repertoire at numerous campus events, and outside BC at such venues as Carnegie Hall, the Walt Disney Resort in Florida and the Reno and Lionel Hampton jazz festivals. The band has performed for former Jesuit Superior General Hans Kolvenbach, SJ, and the 50th wedding anniversary celebration of former House Speaker Thomas P. O’Neill Jr., and has consistently placed among the top 10 college instrumental and vocal ensembles in national competitions.

BC bOp! was a student creation, one born out of necessity, according to co-founder David Healey ’90, who is assistant director of BC Bands. When in 1987 the BC Bands program dropped stage band from its offerings, Healey explained, several students decided to form their own ensemble, inviting the top instrumentalists and theater vocalists to

join.

The students also asked marching band brass assistant Sebastian Bonaiuto, who had been the stage band director, to provide musical leadership.

It was Bonaiuto — now director of BC Bands — who came up with the catchy name for the new ensemble, which eventually became part of the bands program, Healey recalled.

“BC bOp! enabled students to achieve a deep sense of identity, purpose, and achievement,” said Healey.

“For many of us at the time, our membership in the ensemble was our greatest commitment at Boston College.

We cared deeply about each other, and we challenged each other to work diligently toward meeting our group objectives.

“The group has continued to grow and flourish under Seb’s leadership in subsequent years.”

Said Bonaiuto, “Our students, in the form of this wonderful ensemble, get to learn about jazz — the only true

BC bOp! at Saturday’s Sesquicenntennial concert in Symphony Hall. The group is celebrating its 25th anniversary year. (Photo by Gary Gilbert)

American art form — through the study, preparation and performance of jazz literature. The members of the ensemble create a community of student musicians who share a passion for this musical form, forge strong bonds, both artistic and social, to each other and to Boston College and do so while perpetuating the study and performance of this great music.

“While the achievements and milestones of these 25 years have served

to highlight the talent and hard work of our students, the contribution that these experiences have made to the personal formation and growth of each member are the most meaningful.”

Tickets to the April 5 clinic and the 3 p.m. April 6 concert are free, but of limited availability; admission to the 8 p.m.

April 6 concert is $10 for BC students, $15 for adults.

—Sean Smith