A S P E C I A L P U B L I C AT I O N F R O M C H A P M A N M A G A Z I N E ■ S U M M E R 2 0 1 3
CHEVERTON HONOREE Takes Place in History
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new dictionary documenting an old language; a nationally-honored history journal; original research exploring the death and survival of Amazonian languages — these are just a few of the scholarly achievements of Priya Shah ’13, a double major in history and Spanish and one of Chapman University’s most remarkable new graduates. During Priya Shah ’13 the weeks approaching Commencement, Shah’s name was called out at award ceremonies all across campus, culminating with the Cheverton Award, the highest honor given to a Chapman graduating senior. None of her achievements surprised William Cumiford, Ph.D., one of her mentoring professors and a faculty advisor to the award-winning history journal Voces Novae, which Shah edited. “Her work represents not just excellent research, but she deals with exceptionally difficult theoretical material. She’s really quite amazing,” Cumiford said. Chief among Shah’s accomplishments was her work as a research assistant for Professor Pilar Valenzuela, Ph.D., whose project documented two endangered languages in the Peruvian Amazon. Shah traveled to Peru three times to conduct original research. “Priya has done work that will help strengthen indigenous identities as well as preserve distinct world views,” Valenzuela said. This fall Shah will begin doctoral studies at Duke University.
SKEWERING A STEREOTYPE Wins Him a National Award
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hapman University’s Mark Pampanin ’15 grew up when the “the gay best friend” was glibly known as the must-have accessory for every fashionable female needing a sympathetic ear or a martini pal. But Pampanin says it’s time to dump the cliché and change the conversation. In fact, he said it so well that he won a first-place national award at the 100th Biennial Pi Kappa Delta tournament, besting competitors from 89 other colleges and universities in the After Dinner Speaking category. Pampanin’s victory led the eight-member Chapman speech and debate team, which won 24 awards overall. “They’re a very special group,” said Allan Axibal-Cordero, the team’s coach. With his speech, Pampanin skewered the notion that the gay best friend, popular in situation comedies, movies and fashion media, is a clever symbol of a forward-thinking society. Rather, as a gay man he finds it demeaning. Pampanin’s message won an encore as one of the featured speeches at the June 4 TEDxChapmanU event in Memorial Hall. To view Pampanin’s presentation, visit www.tedxchapmanu.com.
“These faux relationships can reduce gay men to tools and undermine the value of the friendship,” Mark Pampanin ’15 said during his award-winning speech, which he adapted and presented during TEDxChapmanU.
CHAPMAN STUDENTS
Set Fulbright Record
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s Cambria Findley-Grubb pondered what Fulbright research project to pursue, she spread a world map across her desk and studied it day and night. “I thought, ‘This is amazing,’” she said. Ultimately Findley-Grubb, a double major in political science and peace studies, chose research examining the impact of educational policy on indigenous populations in Canada. And now that she has the award and is preparing to travel to Nova Scotia, the excitement is only growing, as it is for three other 2013 Chapman University Fulbright Scholars. Findley-Grubb, Azriel Dror, Erika Sanders and Nou Vang, all 2013 graduates, represent the largest single class of Chapman students to enter the Fulbright U.S. Student Program. “Our students have accomplished something extraordinary,” said Eileen Jankowski, Ph.D., director of fellowships and scholar programs at Chapman. “They are joining a select group of outstanding individuals.”
Madrid, Spain
Rousse, Bulgaria
Nova Scotia, Canada Taichung, Taiwan
This year’s three other Chapman Fulbright Scholars each earned English Teaching Assistantship awards: Dror, a biology and chemistry double major planning to attend medical school, will teach English, biology, chemistry and math to bilingual students in Madrid, Spain. Sanders, a political science and peace studies double major, will teach English at a foreign-language high school in Rousse, Bulgaria. Vang, an integrated education studies major with minors in women’s studies and psychology, will teach English in Taichung, Taiwan. (Photo above) Chapman’s 2013 student Fulbright scholars — from left, Erika Sanders, Cambria Findley-Grubb, Azriel Dror and Nou Vang — are among the last group of undergraduates to work with the late Professor Barbara Mulch, whose long career at Chapman included helping students apply for prestigious fellowships. “I feel really honored that Barbara believed in me,” Vang said.
HER ENTREPRENEURIAL TOUCH HELPS KIDS SOCK IT TO CANCER n 2009, Katie Murphy ’15 was in a race for her life as she launched into a sevenmonth treatment to battle stage III Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Today she is a cancer survivor and studio art major at Chapman University. But this past spring semester, Murphy was in another race. As a nominee for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s Woman of the Year, Murphy worked to raise as much money as possible by May 15 to benefit the society’s mission of blood cancer research. Murphy embraced the challenge. “They basically funded the research that cured me,” she says. Murphy caught the society’s attention by creating a bit
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of fashion flair to cover patients’ surgically implanted catheter, or PICC line, for the delivery of chemotherapy drugs. “I’m an art major and I love artistic expression and I love fashion,” Murphy says. Her spark of imagination grew into the PICColina Foundation, which she and her mother founded and for which they sew the colorful covers and make them available to children’s hospitals. As for the contest, Murphy raised $15,520. She didn’t win Woman of the Year, but she launched a lasting commitment. “I’m definitely going to work with them as a lifelong volunteer,” she says. To read more about the PICColina Foundation, visit www.thepiccolinafoundation.org.
Pomp
Cyberspace At Commencement 2013, joy was #trending, as for the first time Chapman University displayed a ticker of social media messages on Jumbotron screens during the ceremonies for six of its schools and colleges. The idea was to engage more members of the community, and all told better than 1,200 tweets were received on the Twitter #ChapmanU hashtag, quadrupling the number from a year ago. The most popular tweet was a quote from Hawk Koch, president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, who addressed graduates of Dodge College of Film and Media Arts. “Take chances, because that’s when you get lucky,” Koch said. Another lesson from this year’s Commencement: when you take 1,746 celebratory graduates, more than in any other class in Chapman’s history, and put them in flowing gowns and goofy caps, you find out that you have room for more than 140 characters.
Alexi Theodore @Lexitheodore They said to dream big @ladygaga #chapmanu College of Performing Arts.
Steven Lieb @StevenLieb #Chapmanu Class of 2013 Dodge College: Do something that matters. Chapman Law School @Chapman_Law “Professor Mainero, you’re scarier than the Bar. And for that, we thank you.” – Damon Pitt (J.D. ’13). Mackenzie Weber @macweber #chapmanu Thanks, Mom & Dad, for giving me the world and a world class education. Krystal Nungaray @krystalnungaray Congrats to the #chapmanu class of 2013! Remember, once a Panther, always a Panther. Welcome to the @ChapmanAlum family!
Chapman University @ChapmanU “Choose a productive life and live that life with integrity” – Joe Kiani, 2013 ASBE Commencement. #ChapmanU.
Chapman University @ChapmanU Now that graduation has come to a close, we ask this from our 2013 grads: Keep in touch! #ChapmanU #PantherPride.
MIDNIGHT
SWIM By Anna Leahy Published in Constituents of Matter, Kent State University Press Leahy, Ph.D., is an associate professor of English and director of Tabula Poetica: Poetry at Chapman University.
At seven years old, I should have been in bed. Instead, the suits, the beach, the August moon,
To offer our skin. I imagine myself A fish, a scuba diver, a boat, here with translucent ferns
The air cooled as if by magic – the night itself A bewitched pleasure I don’t speak of.
Against legs, twigs, and the shadow of our peninsula In the shadow of our sky. I find a cold spot,
Pebbles – the solid things in this world – Shift, footed by my enchanted tiptoes
Float half in it, half out, thinking two thoughts at once. Like lake and sky. I believe I can do anything and will.
Like starlight striking. To keep my head above water, I unhitch my arms. They float.
I believe my parents bring me to lakes So that I can disappear into them, into the grace
My thighs rise in the murky lake. All I know of my body I learn at this moment
Of liquid, and come back knowing who I am And why. I come back each time needing more
Of unwilling my small self. My sister’s screech travels across the lake.
From this moment, any moment, more than a lifetime Can possibly offer me: an unbelieving, unwilling girl
We hear it leaving us. We hear midnight Taking it in, just as midnight takes light
In the world’s midnight at my age of reason. I leave sleepy and slaked, listening to our lake
Into its gargantuan self. We hear mosquitoes Around our heads waiting for us
As we drift toward an obsequious daylight, toward our buoyant waking.
At Chapman University, water is a source of research for scientists and inspiration for artists, who are drawn to its powers of mystery and renewal, especially in summer. Join us as we take the plunge.
WAVES
OF CREATIVITY
Everyone needs a place of escape — an environment that conjures comfort and serenity. For photographer Sarah Lee, Class of 2012, that place is amid crashing breakers as big as buildings. No, really, it is. child of Hawaii, raised on a coffee farm “up
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mauka” (up the mountain) from the Kona Coast,
Lee is never more at home than she is in the
roiling surf. And these days her constant companion is
a digital camera inside a custom waterproof housing — a combination she uses to capture ethereal surf-zone images. Her dramatic underwater photos (seen here and on the cover) have gained her a sprawling web of Internet followers and prompted recent projects in Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and the whitewater of the Grand Canyon. When she’s not shooting for the upcoming Web series Alison’s Adventures, she’s taking commissions such as one for Italian clothing designer Giada Forte, who was looking for
To see more of Sarah Lee’s photos, visit www.vivantvie.com.
a splashy way to showcase her 10th anniversary collection. Under the surf, kicking against the current, Lee directed swimming models draped in expensive dresses. Along the way, she pioneered a new realm of fashion photography, adding power and fluidity to the natural grace. The hardest part? Wearing a cumbersome backpack full of couture designs so the models could make undersea changes. “Luckily, I had fins,” Lee relates. It’s all in the service of her underwater aesthetic: “to accentuate the beauty of what already exists.” No matter where she travels in pursuit of her art, she is always drawn to the sea. “It’s where I feel more confident about what I can do,” she says. “There’s a constant state of change, and you have to be completely switched on so you can adapt to anything the ocean throws at you. The experience is very freeing. The beauty of that is what I want to translate with my photography.”
T POOLS
SOLITARY
he parched landscape of coastal Southern California is largely a surface phenomenon, for beneath
its plains and arroyos and rocky gullies lie vast aquifers of water-bearing rock. Unceasing, invisible
cataracts flow beneath the dry beds of intermittent streams, and where strata of granite and basalt lie
close to the surface, the water above is forced upward until it lies in quiet, leafy pools in the shaded canyons
even in the driest years. Elsewhere, almost as a counterpoint to these solitary pools, creek water tumbling down
Adapted from the prologue to his novel The Rainy Season By James P. Blaylock
rock-strewn beds might vanish suddenly into the ground as if into a chasm, and within a few short yards, what
had been a flowing stream over mossy stones and boulders is a desert of dry sand and rock, littered with broken limbs and fallen leaves, its scoured stones bleached white in the sun. And then with winter rains the groundwater rises again, and dry springs bubble to life. In wet years, once in a decade or two, long-vanished waterfalls abruptly reappear, coursing down sheer canyon walls and feeding creeks and streams that have grown overnight into deep torrents of rushing water. In the otherwise
Blaylock is an associate professor of English at Chapman University and the author of 24 books, including the recently released The Aylesford Skull (Titan Books).
silent darkness of the canyons, one’s sleep is troubled by the water-muffled clatter of heavy boulders shifting and rolling in swollen streams. Unwary canyon residents awaken to find themselves hopelessly stranded: crossings washed out, footbridges undermined, narrow hillside roads swept utterly away, paths blocked by fallen trees. And even on the plains below the mountains and in the hollows of grassy foothills, shallow, spring-fed pools arise in once dry meadows, and water seeps into long abandoned farmhouse wells like the revived ghosts of lost and despaired-of memories.
LAB PARTNERS His pursuits are atmospheric and hers aquatic; put them together and you get great chemistry, with their shared research fueling oceans of understanding. By Dennis Arp ven for environmental scientists working to solve
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early 2000s. It was on the fourth floor of Hashinger
major mysteries, discovery can come masked
Science Center that they found out how well they
as a day of play at the beach.
complement each other as scientists.
Like the day Catherine Clark and Warren de Bruyn,
Chapman University chemistry professors linked in
He envisions the big picture, she sweats the details; he’s energized by lab work, she enjoys collecting samples;
marriage and research, took their then-2-year-old son,
his inquiry sometimes takes him to remote stretches
Jack, to the shoreline in Orange County. Jack brought
of ocean, hers has long centered on surf zone waters;
along his Thomas the Tank Engine train, and the magnet
she loves writing papers for scientific journals, he loves
at the back of the toy started pulling tendrils of something
that she loves writing papers for scientific journals.
foreign out of the sand. Clark recognized it as iron. Hmm,
Individually and together, they’ve enjoyed consider-
she thought. Maybe the iron in the sand is why hydrogen
able success with their teaching and research. The
peroxide occurs naturally in county shore waters, even
peroxide findings alone have yielded four published
at night, when the sunlight isn’t there to cause a reaction.
papers. They’re also studying the effects of urban
And maybe the peroxide explains the decay of bacteria
runoff, the dynamics of kelp bed and salt marsh
that’s showing up in these same waters.
communities, and the role of the oceans as a source
“Each answer leads to another question, and that answer to the next question,” said Clark, Ph.D., professor and associate dean at Schmid College of Science and Technology. “Solving the puzzle is fun. It’s exciting.” And it never stops, as Clark knows from occasionally
and sink for oxygenated hydrocarbons — one of the largest sources of uncertainty in global models. Along the way, de Bruyn and Clark have earned considerable funding for their projects from the National Science Foundation and other organizations while also
Environmental research allows Chapman University chemistry professors Catherine Clark and Warren de Bruyn to work together in the lab and to stay close to the ocean. “I don’t know how people can live away from the sea,” Clark says.
quickly, de Bruyn and Clark said. “We choose our projects in part because we’ve seen that our undergraduate students can handle the research,” de Bruyn added. During summer, the lab and field work continues for Clark and de Bruyn as they progress on individual
trying to separate her work and home lives. That’s usually
bringing numerous undergraduate students into the
and joint tracks. There’s also time for de Bruyn to slip
when de Bruyn, Ph.D., professor in Schmid’s School of
research fold. One of those students, sophomore Jenny
in some surfing and for both to share family time with
Earth and Environmental Sciences, gets a breakthrough
Bowen, is preparing to present research at an international
Jack, now 10. After all, they’re counting on him to
idea and wants to discuss it at the breakfast table. In
conference in Barcelona this summer after previously
eventually join the team.
the end, Clark wouldn’t have it any other way.
speaking at a national meeting in New Orleans.
“Jack is really interested in science, and we want
“He’s so smart and curious and inquisitive, and we
“I didn’t know what I wanted to do in college, but
share a love of the oceans and a fascination about the
once I joined this research team, all the pieces came
he’s going to have to be the missing part. Warren is
world,” she said.
together,” said Bowen ’15. “Their passion for research
atmosphere and I’m water, so Jack is going to have
really helped me realize what I want to do, and I’m so
to be geosphere.”
Though they’ve been together for more than 20 years, having first met as students in their native South Africa, Clark and de Bruyn didn’t intend to share a lab and partner on research until they both landed at Chapman in the
thankful for that.” The quality of Chapman students is why they’re able to learn concepts and adapt to methods of discovery so
him to come to Chapman,” Clark said. “We joke that
“He’ll probably be a musician,” de Bruyn added with a smile. Also not a bad way to spend a day at the beach.
SHORT STORY PRIZE Is Long on Prestige
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hapman University Professor Richard Bausch is in some heady company as this year’s winner of the prestigious Rea Award for the Short Story. The list of past recipients reads like a Who’s Who of American Fiction, including Eudora Welty, Tobias Wolff, Joyce Carol Oates, Ann Beattie and John Updike. The Rea Award comes with a $30,000 prize. In selecting this year’s honoree, jurors Stuart Dybek and Richard Ford said Bausch’s stories “bear out the directive that literature should renew our sensuous and emotional lives and foster a new awareness in its readers.” Bausch received news of the award at about the time that his story Valor was being read for broadcast by Academy Award winner William Hurt in honor of victims and responders to the April 15 Boston Marathon bombing. The story, from Bausch’s collection Someone to Watch Over Me, is about a man who rescues the victims of a bus accident. The reading aired on NPR’s Selected Shorts program; a link is at www.chapman.edu/magazine. Bausch is the author of eight collections of stories and 11 novels. His other honors include two National Magazine Awards, a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. “I’m in some tall cotton,” Chapman University Professor Richard Bausch said of winning the Rea Award for the Short Story.
In Service to the University
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erhaps Jack Lindquist appreciates the power of knowledge so much because at a key moment in his life, he had to make do without it. “Walt Disney knew exactly what he wanted in that park physically,” said Lindquist, the first president of Disneyland, “but he wasn’t sure totally sure how to operate something called Disneyland, and fortunately neither did we. So maybe all of us had a great thing going when the park first opened — ignorance. Because we didn’t know you couldn’t do something, we just went ahead and did it.” Lindquist shared his reflections and trademark wit this spring as Leatherby Libraries dedicated The Jack and Belle Lindquist Dream Room and Disney Collection, made
Dr. Daniel Temianka, left, joins CoPA Dean Dale Merrill at the unveiling of a bust honoring Daniel’s father, acclaimed violinist Henri Temianka.
TEMIANKA GIFTS MAKE a Virtuoso Statement
T Chapman Emeritus Trustee Jack Lindquist celebrates with a friend at the dedication of the Jack and Belle Lindquist Dream Room and Disney Collection in Leatherby Libraries.
possible by the generosity of the Chapman University emeritus trustee and author of In Service to the Mouse. The third-floor library space includes two study rooms, display cases full of Disney mementoes, awards, memorabilia and artwork, all donated by Lindquist and reflecting the culture of adventure he helped foster a few miles from the Chapman campus.
he Temianka name is profoundly influential in the world of classical music, and that impact continues to grow, including at Chapman University. In spring, the College of Performing Arts announced two new endowments totaling $2 million — the Henri Temianka Endowed Professorship in Music and the Scholarship for String Studies for the Hall-Musco Conservatory of Music in honor of Temianka, a virtuoso violinist, conductor, author and educator. Throughout his brilliant career, Henri The Temianka endowments will enhance the Temianka performed in more than 3,000 conservatory’s acclaimed string studies program concerts in 30 countries. He also authored and ensure that opportunities are available for gifted more than 100 articles as well as the student musicians who need scholarship assistance. autobiography Facing the Music. “The generosity of the Temianka family will make the conservatory’s program even more highly competitive by attracting world-class professors and bringing the most promising students to our university,” said Dale Merrill, dean of the College of Performing Arts. In the Chapman tradition, a bronze bust was commissioned to commemorate the endowments. Henri Temianka’s likeness will be located between the busts of Mozart and Puccini on the new Aitken Arts Plaza at the Musco Center for the Arts.
Juárez Bust Unveiled
Honoring a Mentor
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enito Juárez, one of Mexico’s most revered presidents, has joined the more than two dozen luminaries of history to be captured in bronze on the Chapman University campus. The Juárez bust commemorates the Donald P. Kennedy Chair in Economics and Law held by Bart Wilson, Ph.D., in the Economic Science Institute at Chapman. Wilson also holds an appointment in the School of Law. Helping to celebrate the new bust were Parker S. Kennedy, Donald Kennedy’s son and a member of the Chapman Board of Trustees; the Hon. Gaddi Vasquez, former director of the Peace Corps; Ruebén Martinez, a presidential fellow appointed to Chapman’s College of Educational Studies; and Alejandra Garcia Williams, consul of Mexico in Orange County. This Juárez bust is made possible by a generous gift from Southern California Edison.
his spring, Lecture Hall 142 at the Chapman School of Law became the Professor Frank J. Doti Lecture Hall. The naming was made possible by a gift from Dr. Zeinab Dabbah (J.D. ’12), a former student of Doti, and her husband, Dr. Daniel Temianka. “This donation makes a tremendous statement about how the generosity of one alumna can be turned into a meaningful recognition of the excellent experience she had at Chapman Law,” said Cary Bowdich, assistant dean of development. Doti is a CPA as well as a tax attorney, distinguished scholar and teacher. School of Law students selected him to receive the M. Katherine Baird Darmer Memorial Award for Best Teacher of the Year in 2012. In addition, his Contracts Law Flowcharts and Cases is widely used across the nation. He holds the William P. Foley, II Chair in Corporate Law & Taxation.
A gift from former student Dr. Zeinab Dabbah (J.D. ’12) and her husband, Dr. Daniel Temianka, has named the Frank J. Doti Lecture Hall, honoring the Chapman School of Law professor, CPA and tax attorney.
C L A S S
N O T E S
1960s Rich Grimes, B.A. history ’68, published his second novel, Angel in My Backpack. A
A Mary Parker, B.A. government ’68,
recently enjoyed a snorkeling trip with Barbara (Campbell) Phipps, B.A. physical education ’67, and Barbara’s husband, Larry. The friends get together at Mary’s home in Kona, Hawaii, about twice a year.
1970s Karen (Tennyson) Haren, B.A. home economics ’71, is retiring June 30 from her role as president and CEO of Harvesters Community Food Network in Kansas City, Mo., which she has led since 1999.
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B Dr. Richard T. Pitts, B.A. chemistry ’70, presented research findings at the American College of Physician Executives in New York City. His study focused on the effectiveness of an organizational socialization program for new doctors entering large medical groups. Pitts is an osteopathic physician, associate clinical professor at the University of California, Irvine, and consultant.
1990s Peggy Hesketh, M.A. English and MFA creative writing ’99, published her debut novel, Telling the Bees. Peggy teaches writing and rhetoric at UC Irvine.
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Joe L. Hudson, B.S. computer information systems ’91, married Denise Maryland-Hudson on March 9 in Tombstone, Ariz. William (Bill) C. Phillips, B.S. business economics ’91, joined California United Bank as senior vice president, senior relationship manager. Pete Sepenuk, BFA communications ’92, is co-writer and editor of Chasing Beauty, a feature documentary on the modeling business.
2000s
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Brandon Adams, BFA film production ’07, won the top prize in the short film category at the 2013 San Antonio Independent Christian Film Festival for his film Useless. Brandon was awarded $250,000 to fund, co-produce and distribute a feature film. Meserbee Chek, B.A. English ’01, graduated from the University of Phoenix in 2011 with an M.A. in education/curriculum and instruction. Cynthia (Bemis) Howard, B.A. English ’01, recently accepted a position at the law firm of Holland & Hart in Denver as the marketing manager for the Energy, Environment & Natural Resource Group (EENR).
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Lori Johnson, B.A. social science and French ’02 (MBA ’11), started a new role directing brand strategy and digital and social efforts at AHMC Healthcare Inc. in Alhambra, Calif. She also serves on the Board of Directors of the Redlands Shakespeare Festival.
C Chad Kessler, B.S. business administration ’05, was promoted to managing director of wealth management services at C.K. Cooper & Co. in Irvine.
Breanna Martin, B.S. business administration ’08, is engaged to Derek Robinson, B.S. business administration ’08. The couple plan to marry in August. Elizabeth McCroskey, B.S. accounting ’07, is a senior accountant for the Baltimore Ravens NFL football team. Shannon McKemie, B.A. history ’01, was accepted to the Emerging Media and Communications graduate program at the University of Texas at Dallas and will begin this fall. Last October, Shannon spent a week in Haiti with the Haitian Timoun Foundation. D Michelle Philo, B.A. legal studies ’03, was
appointed by the Board of Trustees of the State Bar of California to serve as a delegate to the American Bar Association’s House of Delegates. Michelle is an attorney with Kring & Chung, LLP, in Irvine. Robert Pitts, M.A. counseling ’09, was promoted to program director at Crestwood Behavioral Health, Inc. in Eureka, Calif. He also recently celebrated the baptism and first birthday of his youngest son, William Loy Pitts. Joshua Snyder, BFA theatre and dance ’04, and Harmony McElligott, B.A. psychology ’06, opened for Laurie Kilmartin, a writer for Conan, in March at Flappers Comedy Club in Claremont, Calif.
2010s Kristen R. Breit, B.A. psychology ’10, is pursuing a graduate degree at Purdue University in behavioral neuroscience on a full scholarship. E Jennifer (Preda) Burkhardt, B.A. integrated educational studies ’10, married Greg Burkhardt on July 7, 2012, at Red Horse Barn in Huntington Beach, Calif.
Cliff Chroust, MBA ’10, was recognized by Florida Gov. Rick Scott for helping recover $80,000 by discovering a payment glitch that prevented vendors from reimbursing the state. Cliff works for the Florida Department of Management Services. F Brian Drummy, BFA theatre performance ’10, is appearing as a lead in the off-Broadway production of Spandex the Musical. The show opened May 10.
Emmeline Kim, B.A. screenwriting ’12, is an associate editor for dot429 Magazine in San Francisco. She is also working on her first book, a collection of poems, philosophy, essays and short stories. Elizabeth Lewis, B.A. liberal studies ’11 and M.A. teaching ’13, started a tutoring company, Elizabeth Lewis Tutoring, in Seattle. Mischa Pouyavand, B.A. art ’12, lives in New York City and works for Modavanti, an online boutique that specializes in sustainable and ethically produced clothing. Shanel Shack, B.S. business administration ’12, is engaged to Corey Leitch, B.S. business administration ’11. The couple plan to marry in January 2014.
Friends We Will Miss Richard Jeffrey Ayres, B.A. economics/business administration ’73, passed away April 13 in Cypress, Calif. , at age 68. Richard was a Navy veteran who served a tour of duty in Vietnam. Prior to his retirement in 1998, he enjoyed a career of more than 30 years as a financial manager with Rockwell Semiconductor. Kenneth R. Compton, B.A. sociology ’54, passed away Feb. 16 at his home in Medford, Ore. He was 79. Roberta Widdicombe, B.A. psychology ’80, passed away May 3 in Orange. During her time at Chapman, she participated in World Campus Afloat and cited it as a life-changing experience. Roberta is remembered for her compassion and generosity. F
Rep. Loretta Sanchez ’82, center, presents Certificates of Congressional Recognition to Sinan Kanatsiz ’97 (M.A. ’00), founder of Chapman50, and Ashley Teran, representing President Jim Doti, marking the launch of the alumni leadership group.
Chapman50 Creates Pipeline of Leadership
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hapman University has launched a new alumni leadership group called Chapman50, and in March, Rep. Loretta Sanchez ’82 presented Sinan Kanatsiz ’97 (M.A. ’00) and Chapman President Jim Doti with Certificates of Congressional Recognition for creating the program. Sanchez, a Chapman trustee, said there’s a need for more alumni serving in positions of influence “to grow Chapman’s reputation and help each other out along the way.” The Chapman50 program was founded by Kanatsiz, a Chapman Board of Governors member and CEO of KCOMM, a public relations and Internet marketing company. The program’s goal is to develop an enduring alumni legacy model for the university, whose alumni ranks have swelled over the past 10 years as the size of graduating classes has steadily increased. “Chapman50 was created to bridge a leadership and giving gap between higher-level trustees and younger alumni seeking engagement with the university midway through their careers,” says Kanatsiz. “The end product is something we can all be proud of.” The program’s name reflects the plan to select 50 founding members, all younger than 50. The hope is that the group will grow to also represent all 50 states. Members are selected based on professional, civic and philanthropic leadership.
THE GOAL IS TO DEVELOP AN ALUMNI LEGACY MODEL. “These are people in powerful positions, who can open doors for our students, their fellow alumni and the university as a whole,” said program administrator Ashley Teran. The group’s first 15 members represent the diversity of Chapman’s talent, such as Casey Kasprzyk ’01, Emmy-winning producer of the CBS show The Bold and The Beautiful, and Mike Brown ’06, who as a student founded ModBargains, now a multimillion-dollar company. Beyond connecting with each other, Chapman50 members will have an opportunity to mentor current students through the Chapman50 Scholars program. Academically accomplished Chapman juniors and seniors who have demonstrated leadership will be selected as scholars, supported by the members’ annual dues. When these scholars graduate, they will be considered for Chapman50 membership, continuing the cycle of alumni leadership and mentorship for the next generation. Since the program kickoff in March, members have already raised more than $100,000 for the Chapman50 Scholars Fund. They also enjoyed a backstage tour of the Disneyland Resort, led by Chris Lowe ’01, director of global development and public affairs at Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, and featuring the reflections of the first president of Disneyland, Chapman Emeritus Trustee Jack Lindquist. In addition, the group was recently entertained by American Idol winner Taylor Hicks. Chapman will recognize the first 50 members as founders in launching Chapman50. For information on how to be considered for membership, please visit www.Chapman50.org.
During his annual visit, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Elie Wiesel counsels young writers to winnow until they reach the essential. s the acclaimed author of more than 60 books, including the widely admired memoir Night, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel seems the perfect candidate to talk about how he summons confidence to share his literary journeys. Instead, each work is more of a solitary experience, he says. “I know that Night is taught in every classroom, but I’m still not convinced that I chose the right words,” he said during his annual weeklong visit to Chapman University as a distinguished presidential fellow. “I’ve never fallen in love with my own words.” About his fiction writing, Wiesel added, “Every one of my novels to me was a miracle. I go from surprise to surprise. But then what is art but being surprised?” Still, words are incredibly powerful tools, and those surprises can be revelations, he told students, faculty and visitors during the first of his several public conversations this spring at the Wallace All-Faiths Chapel inside Chapman’s Fish Interfaith Center. The discussion focused on those who have shaped Wiesel’s writing and was led by Tom Zoellner, ALSO DURING HIS ANNUAL VISIT TO CHAPMAN journalist and associate professor of English at Chapman. THIS SPRING, PROFESSOR ELIE WIESEL: The discipline of journalism was an early professional influence that helped shape • WAS JOINED IN CONVERSATION ON Wiesel’s work. “GENOCIDE AND THE OBLIGATION TO “Writing in general is not what you leave in but what you take out,” said the Boston REMEMBER” BY RICHARD HOVANNISIAN, University professor, who visits with Chapman students each year in conjunction with PH.D., PROFESSOR EMERITUS AT UCLA AND AN EXPERT ON THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE. the Rodgers Center for Holocaust Education. Wiesel equated good writing to fine sculpture, JENNIFER KEENE, PH.D., PROFESSOR OF which requires the artist to winnow the material to its most important essence, HISTORY AT CHAPMAN, MODERATED. or “not one word too many.” Wiesel’s lifetime of writing includes memoir, fiction, nonfiction, biography, • PARTICIPATED IN A READERS’ THEATRE
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essays and plays. He listed ancient religious texts and the novels of Albert Camus, Charles Dickens and Fyodor Dostoyevsky among his literary influences. Regarding his own prodigious amount of work, Wiesel said he is propelled by his uneasiness that he has yet to get it just right. So he keeps writing. “What is the alternative? Not to write? No. There is the imperative to bear witness,” he said. “Wherever there is injustice, the least you can do is speak up.”
PRESENTATION THE WORLD WITHIN THE WORDS OF ELIE WIESEL WRITTEN BY PROFESSOR MARILYN HARRAN, PH.D., AND MODERATED BY PROFESSOR NINA LENOIR, PH.D.
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DISCUSSED HOW “WORDS CAN CHANGE THE WORLD,” WITH TOM CAMPBELL, PH.D., J.D., DONALD P. KENNEDY CHAIR IN LAW AND DEAN OF THE CHAPMAN SCHOOL OF LAW.
omeday the story of a rainy March day at Chapman University will come back to life for high school sophomore Katie Mukai. After conversing with Holocaust survivors at the Fourteenth Annual Holocaust Art & Writing Contest, Katie already plans to share the memories with the next generation. “My children won’t get to interact with survivors, so I will have to tell them,” the Irvine student said. Such is the intent of the contest and get-together, offered each spring by the Rodgers Center for Holocaust Education in collaboration with The “1939” Club, one of the world’s largest Holocaust survivor organizations. More than 5,500 youngsters from 10 states, and this year one from Chile, entered the contest, which encourages students to create poetry, prose or artwork in response to the oral testimonies of survivors. “Learn from them, honor them, remember them, give them voice,” William Elperin, president of The “1939” Club, told the students gathered in Memorial Hall. “Later in life you must share these principles, experiences and memories with your children, grandchildren and, yes, even your great grandchildren. Pay it forward.”
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The winning entries in Chapman’s Fourteenth Annual Holocaust Art and Writing Contest include Hands of Oppression, above left, a painting by Ella Louise Khan of Glendale High School in Glendale, Calif.; A Portrait of Hope, above right, a German Expressionist-style woodcut by Espen Oh of Lakeside Middle School in Irvine; and Survivor’s Symphony, a painting by Elizabeth Elder of Trabuco Hills High School in Mission Viejo.