Mount Holyoke Alumnae Quarterly Spring 2007 by Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College

Spring 

Alumnae Quarterly

Alumnae friends never let go of the laurel chain

The College-Cost

Worldwide Surgeon

Revisiting Student Life

Who holds the keys to educational success?

James Steinberg

10Conundrum

Global Visions

Volume 91 • Number 1 • Spring 2007 Managing Director of Print and Online Magazines Emily Harrison Weir Staff Writer Mieke H. Bomann Class Notes Editor Andrea E. Reynolds ’80 Editorial Assistant Stephanie S. Miedema ’07 Designer James Baker Design Quarterly Committee: Linda Giannasi O’Connell ’69, chair; Kara Baskin ’00, Susan R. Bushey ’96, Maya Kukes ’95, Marissa Saltzman ’07, Julie L. Sell ’83, Mary Graham Davis ’65, ex officio with vote; W. Rochelle Calhoun ’83, ex officio without vote Ideas expressed in the Quarterly are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official position of either the Alumnae Association or the College. Published in the spring, summer, fall, and winter and copyrighted 2007 by the Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College, Inc. Periodicals postage paid at South Hadley, MA 01075 and additional mailing offices. Printed in the USA by Lane Press, Burlington, Vermont. The Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College serves a worldwide network of diverse individuals, cultivates and celebrates vibrant connections among all alumnae, fosters lifelong learning in the liberal arts tradition, and facilitates opportunities for alumnae to advance the goals and values of the College. Comments concerning the Quarterly should be sent to Alumnae Quarterly, Alumnae Association, 50 College Street, South Hadley, MA 010751486; tel. 413-538-2301; fax 413-538-2254; e-mail: eweir@mtholyoke.edu. (413-538-3094, ecwinter@mtholyoke.edu for class notes.) Send address changes to Alumnae Information Services (same address; 413-538-2303; ais@mtholyoke. edu). Call 413-538-2300 with general questions regarding the Alumnae Association, or visit www. alumnae.mtholyoke.edu. POSTMASTER: (ISSN 0027-2493) (USPS 365280) Please send form 3579 to Mount Holyoke Alumnae Quarterly, 50 College Street, South Hadley, MA 01075-1486.

www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu

O n t h e C ove r Illustration by James Steinberg

The College-Cost Conundrum

Who Holds the Keys to Educational Success? By Av i c e A . M e e h a n ’ 7 7 a n d J oa n n e V. C r e i g h to n

A first-quality college education comes at a substantial cost. Institutions nationwide face affordability and accessibility challenges; governmental bodies and private foundations issue reports on what should change. Can Mount Holyoke maintain its commitment to funding high-ability students, and will those efforts be enough?

Face Value

Surgeon Kristin Stueber ’65 Transforms Patients Worldwide By M i e k e H . B o ma n n

Plastic surgeon Kristin Stueber ’65 has done her share of nipping and tucking but prefers the field’s original emphasis, restoring function and repairing injury. She provides those services, free, to patients in developing nations.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

The Legacies of Peter Viereck J o s e p h J. Ell i s a n d L i sa A . S z e f e l ’ 8 8

A November 2006 campus symposium paid tribute to the life and work of professor emeritus of history Peter Viereck. Here are memories from a colleague and a former student.

Take 2

Making Money Work

Reliving Student Days Decades After Graduation

The Save-Spend Dynamic

By A n n e S i bl e y O ’ B r i e n ’ 75

Writer-illustrator Anne Sibley O’Brien ’75 spent a few days on campus this past fall living like a student again. She had a dorm bed and a roommate, attended classes, and talked with students and professors. She found a lot had changed, but MHC was still the same.

By M a rya n n T e al e S n e ll ’ 8 6

To help sister alumnae get a financial grip, MHC financial advisers suggest how saving even small change can lead to big changes in your life.

Sharing Global Visions

A photo contest, sponsored by the McCulloch Center for Global Initiatives, shows students are thinking globally.

25 2 Viewpoints

Your comments on reviving MHC friendships, changes to reunion format, and whether President Ham was “frumpy”

4 Campus Currents

Time editor teaches journalism at MHC; what an emeritus professor is up to; student makes the transition from refugee camp to college; intro drawing classes draw crowds; and more campus news

30 Alumnae Matters

Great reads from alumnae book clubs; MHC journalists network in NYC; Mary Lyon Awards given to three; and alumnae clubs’ news

37 Off the Shelf

Faculty and alumnae offer their latest books, CDs, and films, dealing with, among other things, a mathematical way to describe the shape of the universe, mysteries, and writing a play a day for a year.

Microcosm of the World International signposts now dot the campus, pointing the way to cities across the globe. Students helped narrow the selection of cities, many of which they call home. Photograph: Paul Schnaittacher

40 Class Notes

News of your classmates, and miniprofiles

79 Bulletin Board

Announcements and educational travel opportunities

viewpoints

MHC Friendships

The years at Mount Holyoke are a huge part of my life, and yet I have not maintained a substantial friendship with anyone from then. In 2005 I decided to make the effort to say hello before only goodbye is left. I sent out Christmas cards to the two women for whom I had valid addresses. One responded right away, and it was like no time had passed. She is successfully balancing children and career, and is my conduit for a group of former teammates. I am ecstatic to be in touch with them again. The second woman responded much later. She apologized for the delay, but had spent the last year recovering from cervical cancer treatments. She positively impacted my time at MHC immensely, I am so thankful I had the chance to tell her that. Then the oddest thing happened. After posting the news about my daughter’s medical condition, one MHC classmate contacted me with a sincere and uplifting e-mail. I searched in vain for my Llamarada to make sure I was putting

the right name and face together because I can’t remember ever having a conversation with her in college. At this point, she and I have had such in-depth correspondence, revealing freakish parallels in our lives, that my description of her has morphed from, “some girl I barely knew” to “my friend.” This is where we are in our lives. In between all the promotions and awards, real life is happening. College was a long time ago. We are twice as far in our lives as we were, but that time, and in particular the experience of Mount Holyoke, is a bond strong enough to reach across the years; a laurel chain twining us to one another no matter where we are in our life journey. Shawn Reilly Mills ’85

Steamboat Springs, CO

New Reunion Format Draws Sighs The planned change in the format for reunions makes me terribly sad. I attended most of my reunions since my graduation in 1971. The programming was

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sometimes interesting, but never the reason for my attendance. I came in order to connect with members of my class and, even more important, to be a part of something huge and wonderful that spans the generations. My next reunion will be my fortieth. I don’t want to wait until my seventieth to be invited back for commencement [and] be among graduates who are younger than forty-five. It’s a loss for the younger alumnae too, to miss out on seeing the dynamism of their fifty, sixty, seventy, and eighty-year-old counterparts. If there were no programming at all, the incentive for me to attend reunions would still be powerful. But if my next six reunions do not include any young women, the most powerful incentive for me to attend will disappear. Is it possible we’re giving up too much? Joan Schwartz Weber ’71 Ann Arbor, MI I was astonished at the decision of the Ad Hoc Reunion Committee that decided everyone after

the twenty-fifth (except loyalty classes) is to be banished to Reunion II to mingle with the similarly aging and aged (winter 2007Quarterly). I cannot begin to say how wrongheaded this is. The greatest experience I had at my fortieth was standing in the rain for the laurel chain and watching the kids’ faces as they put together the concept that one could be cool well beyond the age of thirty. I absolutely reject the notion that women between forty-six and ninety-one must be banished from the company of younger women. What happened to the wonderful generation-hopping joy of meeting younger, talented, funny people? What new politically correct ruling says that women after the age of forty-six are confined to a ghetto of discussions about menopause, sex after sixty, golf scores, and indigestion? Guess what? We older people who still have an interest in the world like to be with younger people. I am bored to tears by the geriatric agenda I see looming before me. What

is the college to us older ones if not the students, the vivacity of young minds, the latest fashions and, always, the laurel chain? Lisa Lansing ’64

West Cornwall, CT Who said that younger and older alums don’t share the same interests? … My daughter Lindsay Nystrom ’06 is pictured twice in the winter 2007 Quarterly. Her “senior family” made contact with the group of fortieth reunion classmates also pictured. The two groups met for tea, and Lindsay was thrilled when she and her friends were presented with the ’66 parade costumes. She came home full of how much it meant to the graduates to see the older alums and what interesting and vital women they were. Too bad this sort of gathering can never happen again. Ida Quackenbush Nystrom ’69

Holden, MA

Response from W. Rochelle Calhoun ’83, executive director of the Alumnae Association: I appreciate the alumnae who took the time to

write with questions and concerns about the Alumnae Association’s new reunion format, which we will launch as a pilot program in 2008. Alumnae feedback is important to us, and we will be paying close attention to it as we move ahead with the new programming. The new reunion format is a direct response to extensive alumnae feedback. A dedicated committee of alumnae, staff, and board members (the Reunion Ad Hoc Committee), conducted a year and a half of research and surveyed more than 3,000 alumnae. The new reunion format represents the preferences and recommendations of the vast majority of alumnae. As always, we will do all we can to make your reunion a success and a pleasure. We continue to be interested in your thoughts and suggestions. For more about changes to reunion, and about how the decisions were made, please visit alumnae. mtholyoke.edu//reunions/ index.php.

Frumpy? No Way! I am dismayed by the letter describing Roswell

Gray Ham as “frumpy” (winter). It is most certainly untrue. Even if it were, one would not have noticed, thanks to his acclaimed achievement as an educator: intellectually rigorous, always amiable, wryly humorous, sophisticated yet caring, and world-wise during the challenging war years when I was a student. Among many offbeat memories: the time he spotted my sister and me with friends on a Nantucket street, stopped his car, and invited us to his home “for tea or cocktails—you choose;” and most especially his recitation of Walt Whitman’s poem “I Hear America Singing,” accompanied by the Glee and Dance Clubs, and delivered with all the eloquence of the Yale literature professor he once was. A truly unique, exciting evening for Mount Holyoke, especially in those dark times. And a uniquely fitting president, in so many ways, to lead us through them. This was “frumpy”? To be endured by Ms. Brown?

viewpoints

“ What happened to the wonderful generation-hopping joy of meeting younger, talented, funny people? What new politically correct ruling says that women after the age of forty-six are confined to a ghetto of discussions about menopause, sex after sixty, golf scores, and indigestion?”

We welcome letters reflecting the varying viewpoints of the Mount Holyoke community. Letters should be no more than 300 words, and we reserve the right to edit them for accuracy, clarity, and to meet space needs. Letters must be signed. Letters addressing topics discussed in the previous Quarterly are given priority. On any given topic, we will print letters that address it, and then in the next issue, letters that respond to the first letters. After that, we will move on to new topics. Send your thoughts, with your full name and class, to Mieke H. Bomann, 50 College St., South Hadley, MA 01075-1486. Send e-mails to mbomann@ mtholyoke.edu.

Mary “Betty” Morris ’43

Jackson Heights, NY

Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

campuscurrents In session

Real-Time Journalism

Priscilla Painton ’80 makes a point to her MHC journalism class.

Painton, who has more than seventeen years of journalistic experience, brought with her numerous guest speakers from Time, including Jane Bachman “Bambi” Wulf ’76, assistant managing editor. “The guest speakers were an important addition to the class, as they brought different perspectives to the subject of the day,” said participant Maiko Nakagaki ’07. For her part, Painton said she was “thrilled” that her students were

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“engaged and passionate about being smart consumers of media.” Eager to promote women in journalism at Mount Holyoke, she added that “women have a huge role to play in shaping the future of the news.” Her engagement with students and their views in class also reinforced the way she thought about the news, she said, and broadened her understanding of how people access it through different sources. The wide variety of ways in which students access information, academic or otherwise, also underscored the changing nature of journalism. “When I asked the class if we needed paper copies of the assigned articles, they simply looked at me and said that they could find the articles online,” Painton recalled. This is significant, she said, because

“it makes it all the more important that we know what the rules are for making journalism real and reliable.” When asked to offer advice to aspiring journalists, Painton said it’s most important to have “the passion for the story.” Thanks to her own passion, students more fully appreciated the profession’s inner workings. According to Stephanie Miedema ’07, “Painton’s class was astonishingly insightful, giving students an inner look at what really happens in the world of journalism. We got a chance to feel like we were a part of something larger than just one three-hourand-fifty-minute class, and she gave us great opportunities to examine print journalism in its various guises.”—Joey Chopra ’07

Pa i n t o n : Fr e d L e B l a n c

Last fall, Priscilla Painton ’80, deputy managing editor of Time magazine, returned to Mount Holyoke to teach a course titled Can You Trust a Journalist? The class examined the intricacies of journalism including fact checking, writing articles with and without bias, and statistics and how they can be misinterpreted and manipulated.

It’s another record-breaking year in the admission office. By the end of the second week in February, the college had received 3,160 applications for admission, a 4 percent increase over last year. Several factors are likely responsible for the increase, said Jane Brown, vice president for enrollment and college relations. The college launched a new Web site that included several new features attractive to prospective students, including a virtual tour and “My Point of View” profiles.

Budding artists flooded MHC drawing courses last fall, forcing art department chair Joe Smith to add a fifth section of introductory drawing. “It was great,” said the teacher and sculptor. “We could have had two more sections, making a total of seven, but would certainly have run out of room. I think the reason the course is so popular is that students learn to make a drawing through the use of drawing strategies and they begin to literally see things as new. That is what happens to me when I teach it.”

Students: Courtesy of Joe Smith

“We know that prospective students do most of their initial search for information about colleges online,” noted Brown. “The My POV profiles are a way to introduce the campus to students through the eyes of current students. Of particular importance is the authenticity of these profiles. Prospective students are very wary of information that is overly packaged and prefer to hear from real students about their experiences.” The college also encouraged all students to apply online this year and did not print a formal application. As an incentive, the application fee was waived for those who did apply online. Finally, Brown said, alumnae continue to be a wonderful source of new applicants and, together with current students, are “our best ambassadors for the college.” Additional alumnae admission volunteers are always welcome, she added.—M.H.B.

Watch big trucks move dirt, workers engage in deep conversation, and the overall construction progress of the new residence hall next to Pratt. A live Web cam takes you there at http:// www.mtholyoke.edu/lits/ webcams/10914.shtml.

campuscurrents

Admission Applications Still Rising

Environmental racism and its solutions was the subject of a talk by Monique Harden, an attorney and activist advocating for human rights remedies to the Gulf Coast disaster. The damaged interior of a New Orleans home is shown here. The lecture was sponsored by the Center for the Environment and the Black History Month Committee.

Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

cancer survivor Sandra Steingraber also came to campus. An expert on the environmental links to cancer and reproductive health, she is the author of Living Downstream: An Ecologist Looks at Cancer and the Environment, and Having Faith: An Ecologist’s Journey to Motherhood. A film series on health and environmental contaminants was the final component of the series and included Rachel’s Daughters, which follows a group of women who have faced breast cancer.

Rachel Carson, “patron saint” of environmentalism, in 1963

Founder of Environmental Movement Honored The 100th anniversary of the birth of Rachel Carson, who has been called the “patron saint” of the environmental movement, was celebrated at MHC with a series of public events on women’s health and the environment sponsored by the Center for the Environment.

Carson, a marine biologist and zoologist, is perhaps best known for her 1962 book, Silent Spring, which alerted the world to the dangers of chemical pesticides. Her work, noted center director Lauret Savoy, “was among the first to turn our attention to how the environment enters our bodies, [which] is the tie

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between health, including the reproductive health of women, and the integrity of air, land, and water.” The winter series debuted with A Sense of Wonder, a one-woman play about Carson, whose love for the natural world drew her into battle with the chemical industry, the government, and the press as she fought to get her message to the American people. Ecologist, author, and

“Questioning Authority,” a new weekly MHC Web site feature, will “highlight the brilliance of our faculty” as professors briefly address contemporary topics and issues, says Sarah Barrett, periodicals editor. The feature’s first offerings included Sandra Lawrence, associate professor of psychology and education, answering questions about her course Whiteness: The Other Side of Racism, and criminologist Richard Moran, a sociology professor and author of Executioner’s Current (2002), who offered his thoughts on the execution of Saddam Hussein. To read these stories, go to http://www.mtholyoke. edu/offices/comm/news/ index.html.

Car son: Asso ci at ed P ress/B ob S chu t z

Professors Question Authority

From Refugee Camp to MHC: Studying A World and a Lake Away

Until then, Senia plans to further investigate the pleasures of water. During January term, she set sail with professor Chris Pyle on a schooner in the Lesser

Antilles. Then it was back to her lakeside home on campus, and the oceans of dishes she faces as a student worker in dining services.—M.H.B.

From her bedroom window in MacGregor Hall, Senia Bachir-Abderahman ’10 has a beautiful view of Upper Lake and the forest that surrounds it. The college’s rural quality was enticing to this North African for whom woods and lakes had been, for the most part, the stuff of dreams. The desert landscape of southwest Algeria where Senia grew up is not only treeless and arid but nearly devoid of sand. The bare rock and small-stone terrain is inhospitable to all but the most hardened of life forms. Nevertheless, some 200,000 refugees from neighboring Western Sahara have subsisted there since the mid-1970s. Senia’s family was among them.

campuscurrents

Student Edge

Senia Bachir-Abderahman ’10 grew up in this Algerian refugee camp.

The desert camp is virtually unknown to outsiders. Sheltering mainly women and children—most men join the Polisario Front to fight for Western Sahara’s self-determination— the camp is utterly dependent on humanitarian aid. When her MHC peers as children were playing with fashionable Barbie dolls, Senia was making her own dolls out of camel bones. But because she made good grades in school— she attended boarding school in northern Algeria beginning at age eight—Senia was sent to summer camps in France and Spain by international donor agencies. When she was fifteen, she attended the United World College in Norway, situated in a rural area ringed by fjords. Despite her initial dislocation and with only a limited knowledge of English, Senia began to feel more comfortable within a month. (This was especially true after she held a question-and-answer session regarding her hijab—she was the first at the school to wear the headscarf favored by some Muslims.) Senia has never been to Western Sahara but has lived and breathed both the anger and hope of the diaspora in Algeria. She plans, as her mother does, to one day make her way to that nation first burdened by colonialism, then partition, and currently a stalled self-determination referendum. “My aim of study abroad is to bring back something to my people,” she explains. A biology major, her current plans are to become a physician, like her father.

Senia BachirAbderahman ’10

Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

Historian Lowell Gudmundson’s research shows how African ancestry in Latin America has been ignored and suppressed.

histories of the Americas, Gudmundson, professor of Latin American studies and history, has learned that thanks to a romanticized view by Latin American nationalists of the region’s Iberian-Indian heritage, the significant African genetic component in many Latin populations has been conveniently ignored. In a National Endowment for the Humanities-funded project, “Choosing a Color for the Cosmic Race: African Americans and National Identities in Central America,” Gudmundson points to

thrust of the project— which has also resulted in a Web site and a book in the works—is not necessarily to “enable more folks to get seats at the table— although, of course, that is the underlying subversive motivation.” Rather, he says, he and his colleagues hope to combat the Indian versus non-Indian mentality of Latin America by “deconstructing these homogenous categories.” There are any number of ways to skin a racist cat, as it were. One is to ally with radicalized groups overtly, Gudmundson

Blackness has been “otherized”—Gudmundson

B rai n s t o rm s

Illuminating African Heritage in Latin America Every other year, historian Lowell Gudmundson teaches a course titled Afro-Latin America since 1800. Centered on the ways in which African American ancestry in Latin America has been suppressed, the course often results in a real

awakening for interested Latina students who have personally experienced the culture’s warm embrace of mixed-race ancestry but are unaware of how the culture favors those of Iberian and Indian blood. Turns out, North Americans haven’t cornered the market on anti-black bias. In his more than thirtyyear research into the social and economic

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Now at the tail end of the $115,000 NEH project begun in 2001, Gudmundson and two Central American colleagues have illuminated this hidden heritage by investigating the African ancestry within elite families in public imagery and the well-documented unions of female slaves and upper-class males. Gudmundson spent most of his time in Guatemala and Nicaragua. “Our point is that what has been done with blackness is to ‘otherize,’ ‘essentialize,’ and ‘territorialize’ it,” says Gudmundson. But the

points out. Another is to give people a history of their country through a less politicized lens, which is Gudmundson’s preferred method. “We also want to help people see why [some felt] blackness needed to be suppressed,” he explains, including the geographic juxtaposition of the isthmus with a historically anti-black North America. When all is said and done, Gudmundson points out, historians everywhere will finally have a nuanced account of African Americans’ contributions to the formation of nation-states in Latin America. And when his students—especially those of Latin origin— begin to understand that they have been exposed to a largely homogenized version of history, his work will have been especially successful, he says.—M.H.B.

G u d m u n d s o n : Pau l S c h n a i t tac h e r

data that show that even in Costa Rica, a nation considered by many to be of overwhelmingly European ancestry, 10 percent or more of the general population in all socioeconomic levels is of African heritage.

Retired but Hardly Retiring Alumnae often ask what their favorite professors, now retired, are up to. We’re checking! Here is the first in an occasional look at the lives of emeriti professors.

He r b e rt : Pau l S c h n a i t tac h e r

Sp o rt s Sh o rt s

Basketball The defending ECAC champions from 2005–06 have maintained a level of high-caliber basketball this season. Senior Joeanna Silvey scored her 1,000th point against Amherst and ranks among the top scorers in the conference. The Lyons clinched their fifth consecutive Seven Sisters title in December, downing

Professor Emeritus of History Eugenia Herbert describes her scholarly journey as serendipitous— with a twist. While her interests are broad and seemingly unrelated, in fact each of her research subjects has been a natural outgrowth of the one before. Swarthmore 71-50 in the championship game. The Lyons are among the top teams in the conference again this season, fighting for a berth in the NCAA tournament. Squash Pam Anckermann ’09, Menusha Hettiarachchi ’09, and Laura Robinson ’10 are all undefeated at the number 1, 2, and 3 positions, respectively,

Herbert came to the subject of colonial gardens via a relationship she developed with a former British administrator in Northern Rhodesia, now Zambia, while she was researching precolonial iron smelting. this season for the squash team. MHC won the Seven Sisters Championship in January, sailing past Vassar, 8-1, in the deciding match. With a 13-4 record and just two matches to go before the Howe Cup tournament, the Lyons are poised for a strong postseason performance. Indoor Track and Field Andi Villasenor ’07 has had a spectacular season

She has spent most of her career focused on African metallurgy and the social systems, gender distinctions, technology, and economics it encompassed. The administrator piqued her interest in late British colonialism in Africa, which resulted in her understanding of the importance of gardens in the British colonial mentality. Researching the gardens established in India, which has a much longer colonial history than Africa, was the logical next step.

campuscurrents

Professor Emeritus of History Eugenia Herbert

Retired since 1997, Herbert lives in South Hadley with her husband, Robert, a professor emeritus of art history, and is working on a series of essays about “garden imperialism” in colonial India and Africa. The first, “The Taj and the Raj,” contrasts the original layout of the Taj Mahal gardens under the Emperor Shah Jahan with their restoration under Lord Curzon as viceroy of India, replacing a classic Mughal garden of flowers and fruit trees with an English park of lawn and shade trees. A second, “The Gardens of Barrackpore,” describes the efforts of the British to imprint a proper English garden on the tropical landscape of Calcutta. Both have been published in the research journal Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes.

Herbert hopes her essays will eventually be published in book form and that she will have written them in a manner accessible to the lay reader. “As a historian, what I’ve more and more come to is wanting to write in ways that are accessible,” says Herbert. “I find that so much academic writing is turgid and uninteresting. Eventually, I would like to have the essays in a form for someone as interested in gardens as in history.”— M.H.B.

for the Lyons, resetting the school’s shot-put record twice in consecutive meets. Also performing well for MHC, junior Grace Bauer (long jump, 55-meter dash), Jessica Brezicha ’10 (55-meter high hurdles) and Malai Tananone ’07 (55-meter high hurdles) all qualified for Division III New Englands based on their performances in the first meet of the season at Wesleyan.

Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

The College-Cost

Conundrum

College is a complex consumer product, one that embodies hope for the future and the promise of social mobility while connecting consumers (otherwise known as students) to centuries of scholarship that will inform the rest of their lives. Yet even as the value of the product increases, the price of acquiring it elicits extreme anxiety among the purchasersâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; parents and students. By Avice A. Meehan â&#x20AC;&#x2122;77

Illustrations by James Steinberg

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At Mount Holyoke, which has a long tradition of making a first-class liberal-arts education affordable and accessible, college is a consumer product with a conscience. “Mary Lyon founded the institution for women of modest means, and we have continued in that tradition,” says Jane B. Brown, the college’s vice president for enrollment and college relations. “The college makes a real commitment to providing financial aid, and the numbers are quite staggering.” Yet with the cost of a year in South Hadley over $44,000, it’s fair to ask what the college’s commitment means for today’s parents and students. Can a college education that carries a four-year price tag of more than $176,000 be described as affordable? Can it be described as accessible to students of modest means, to

students from families without a long history of higher education? And can a college that invests forty-five cents of every dollar in financial aid sustain that commitment over the long haul?

Who Holds the Keys to Educational Success? Mount Holyoke provided $32 million in financial aid this year alone, up more than $10 million from a decade ago when it moved to a “needsensitive” admission policy. Although ability to pay figures into a small portion of admission decisions, the college meets the full financial need of each woman admitted and provides financial aid to about 65 percent of all students. Family circumstances

vary—even families with high incomes may qualify for aid if they have multiple children in college or catastrophic medical expenses—but close to one-third of all students come from families with incomes below the 2004 national household median of $54,064. The profile of students entering in the class of 2010 is instructive. Fiftytwo percent were awarded financial aid and, on average, received a total package of $30,145 in grants, scholarships, and loans. Loans account for 10 percent of the total, and most of the grant aid comes from the college itself.

Is It Affordable? The price that students, their families, and society pay for a college education is a major national issue: Congress is under pressure to boost federal grants and loans for the neediest students;

Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

Ivy-League schools such as Harvard are digging into their large endowments to essentially guarantee a free education to students from families with incomes below $50,000 a year; think tanks and foundations issue trenchant reports on what seems like a daily basis. Worry about college affordability crosses all income levels. “The liberal-arts colleges are definitely in danger of pricing themselves out of the market,” says Katharine Stephens

Milar ’71, mother of Kendall A. Milar ’08. “We started saving when she was born and grossly underestimated the cost of the education, but I passionately believe that the liberal arts is the best kind of education you can get.” As a psychology professor at Earlham College, Milar sees the challenges posed by cost and affordability from both sides of the tuition balance sheet.

“The public reports greater concern about the cost of their children’s college education being priced beyond the income of the average family than about a secure retirement, housing, or automobiles, other elements of the American dream,” says Patrick M. Callan of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education. The center’s 2006 report card gave failing grades on affordability to fortythree states, including Massachusetts.

Investing in a college education isn’t the same as buying a new car. College is more expensive, and the U.S. Census Bureau would tell you that it’s a virtual necessity for a higher standard of living—but in both cases, the sticker price is just a starting point. “The first thing you have to understand is that the sticker price is not the true cost [of a college education], and it’s not what many

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people pay,” says Mary Jo Maydew, MHC’s vice president for finance and administration. “This has always been true, but the difference has become more pronounced in recent years.” While tuition, room, and board charges were $44,120 for 2006–07, the actual cost to educate an MHC student this year is $62,141. The gap is filled by annual gifts, endowment income, and grants. The college’s 45 percent “discount rate”—financial aid expressed as a percentage of tuition revenue—is slightly higher than average among selective liberal arts. Here’s where the “conscience” comes in. “There is a heroic story to be told about Mount Holyoke and the other women’s colleges of national distinction, because they already allocate a significant part of their resources to enable students to have this privilege and they are doing [so] at the same time they are ratcheting up their academic quality. It is an extraordinary achievement,” says Eugene Tobin, a program officer at the Mellon Foundation and coauthor of Equity and Excellence in Higher Education. “The issue is, can you continue to make these huge financial sacrifices and, at the same time, attract young

women who are equally talented but have less need? It is a precarious position.” Heroic? Consider a few numbers. Tobin notes that college attendance nationally has been stratified by income for three decades: A student has only a one in ten chance of attending college if the family’s income is between $35,000 and $61,000, and those chances plummet to one in seventeen for students from families with incomes below $35,000. But national data on the income levels of college students’ families is tough to find, so the best yardstick for income diversity at four-year colleges is how many students receive Pell Grants, according to a report from the Century Foundation. These grants go to the neediest students, and federal data from 2000 show that 90 percent of Pell Grant recipients come from families with incomes below $41,000. In the last several years, about twenty percent of Mount Holyoke students have received Pell Grants, as compared with 8.3 percent at Kenyon College or 14.8 percent at Bryn Mawr in the period covered by the Century Foundation analysis. Among MHC’s peer schools, only Smith

College had a higher percentage of Pell Grant recipients, with 24 percent.

Is It Accessible? For less-affluent students, however, access is as big an issue as affordability. Half of all undergraduates attend community colleges, and even the most talented among them face diminishing opportunities to transfer to elite schools, according to Threading the Needle of the American Dream, a report commissioned by the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation and two other organizations. Of the 11,000 students who transferred to top institutions in 2002, only 10 percent came from disadvantaged households and fewer than 3 percent overall went to liberalarts colleges. “For the least affluent in our society, the chances of transferring to an elite institution are practically negligible,” the report concludes, while offering recommendations for expanding opportunities for these students. “Frankly, Mount Holyoke is at one end of the spectrum because it has a long history of equity,” says Matthew J. Quinn, executive director of Jack Kent Cooke. The foundation has given the college a $779,000 grant, which it will share with

Holyoke Community College, where 80 percent of the students are women and nearly two-thirds are the first in their families to attend college. The funds will go toward enhanced recruitment and advising, a studentto-student mentoring program, and courses at MHC and HCC.

Different Families, Different Choices Some parents are cleareyed about the tradeoffs they make as they write the tuition check to a private college; others don’t feel it’s a choice they can make.

many families who might have considered Mount Holyoke are opting for state universities or question the value of a liberal-arts education. “It’s about economics, not a rejection of a liberal-arts

librarian, Reinfried says her aunt made Mount Holyoke possible by paying the cost of tuition after she did not qualify for financial aid. “Coming out without loans puts me in the place to think about graduate school,’’

“... the sticker price is not the true cost [of a college education]...” Cynthia Allen DeSoi ’81 considers tuition for her daughter Claire ’09 a “major deal” that required years of saving. Yet the Maine physician also understands what her tuition dollars make possible. “If I am helping to subsidize [other students] because I can pay full tuition … that’s good. Mount Holyoke has done a good job with diversity, and the students are not all preppy kids.” Jane Brown regards cost as one of the most significant hurdles in the admission process because

education per se,” says Beth McGoldrick ’77, whose two oldest daughters attend UMass–Amherst. “I hope that Mount Holyoke is always there, but I worry about the future of the school, because the costs are not going down or even leveling off. I see a lot of middle-class people waking up and saying, ‘We cannot afford a private college.’” For Courtney E. Reinfried ’07, her aunt made the difference. Now headed to graduate school and a career as a school

she says. “This one is on me.” The continuing challenge for Mount Holyoke is to maintain the balance between the college’s longstanding mission of educating women of modest means and the economic realities that face parents when it comes time to send a daughter to college. T Avice A. Meehan ’77 is vice president for communications at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

Access and Affordability: the Mount Holyoke Difference B y P r e s i d e n t J o a n n e V. C r e i g h t o n

Much has been written recently about access and affordability in higher education. It is unfortunately true that many of America’s leading private colleges and universities draw a significant majority of their students from families within the country’s top quintile of wealth. Such demographics reinforce the privilege of the privileged. Faced with this disquieting reality, some well-known institutions, with a kind of noblesse oblige, have begun to reach out to more students from less advantaged backgrounds, but the effect on their socioeconomic diversity is modest so far. Mount Holyoke College is different. Our students are drawn from all strata of the United States and from scores of countries around the world. We are truly an institution of access and have always been so. Indeed, because of Mary Lyon’s commitment to providing an affordable, highquality education to women of modest means, Mount Holyoke stands apart in the history of higher education. We are proud of that history and of the heterogeneous population of students who gather here today, making us per capita one of the most cosmopolitan places on earth! How better to educate women for global citizenship in the pluralistic world that is their inheritance? Understanding that education is an expensive enterprise, Mary Lyon, in one of her less-heralded but more remarkable achievements, built an endowment that would help defray the cost of education for students, foreshadowing the structure of higher-education finance as we know it today. The underlying principle that guided Lyon, and from which Mount Holyoke has never wavered, is that investing in the next generation is a benefit to all of society, not just individual students. Today a college education is sometimes reductively seen as a commodity purchased for private benefit. But the generosity of our alumnae and friends is testimony to our shared belief that education remains a public good and that we all bear responsibility for those who come after us.

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As daunting as our current tuition levels are, they are far short of the total cost of a Mount Holyoke education. Every student is subsidized by endowment and gift income. Additionally, nearly 70 percent of Mount Holyoke students receive some financial aid from the college, a sizable institutional investment, making our tuition discount higher than most of our peers. Still, we are aware of the significant burden tuition places on our students and their families. What can we do? We are ever vigilant in holding down costs, but the irreducible truth is that excellent liberal arts education is expensive and labor-intensive. Its expense will always be a function of the quality of the people who provide it: the professors, librarians, deans, network technicians, and the like, not to mention the academic and residential facilities where it all takes place. So the driving questions behind keeping college affordable are, as they were in Mary Lyon’s day, really two: is the College operating as efficiently as possible to minimize costs while preserving its educational core? And, second, are others willing to contribute resources that maintain and enhance the College’s academic quality? In our case, the answer to both questions is yes. We may not require our students to do housework as Mary Lyon did, but we do require work-study and self-help for those on financial aid, and we run a very lean and savvy operation. And, second, our alumnae body and extended community are extraordinarily loyal, generous, and committed to giving back to the institution that nurtured them. Indeed, we are depending on that commitment to carry us forward to success on our new campaign. Thank you for your indispensable part in keeping Mary Lyon’s legacy robust and strong! T Much more information about the college-cost conundrum is available at alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/ go/costs.

THE SECRETS OF THE UNIVERSE . . .

. . . can’t be found using MHConnect. But just about everything else can— if it has to do with Mount Holyoke alumnae. MHConnect is your fast track to alumnae services and information online. Register once, get your password, and log on to MHConnect whenever you want, wherever you are. In seconds, you can find out: • Where your old roommate is living now (search our up-to-the-minute alumnae directory) • How many alums are working in your field—and how to contact them (check out LifeNet, our career and social networking service) • How to update your directory listing, post a job or a résumé, or get a lifetime e-mail address • What alumnae are talking about right now in discussion groups (join a lively online conversation about books, career, health, family, and other topics) • Who just sent an online class note—along with a photo of her new baby (go to online class notes for the latest news) • What alumnae-run businesses are out there—and what they can do for you (find a company or advertise your own on our yellow pages)

GET IN ON THE SECRET. GET CONNECTED.

www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu

Face Value Surgeon Kristin Stueber â&#x20AC;&#x2122;65 Transforms Patients Worldwide

In the last thirty years, plastic surgery in America has undergone a radical change in the public consciousness. Anti-aging procedures once reserved for the wealthy have been popularized in the media, and old and young people of all economic persuasions routinely use cosmetic surgery to hide scars and tattoos, augment or reduce breast size, and even change the shape of their eyes. Plastic surgeon Kristin Stueber â&#x20AC;&#x2122;65 has done her share of nipping and tucking but would prefer to talk about the fieldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s original emphasis, restoring function and repairing injury, and her experience delivering those kinds of services to patients in developing nations.

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Chief of plastic surgery at Bay State Medical Center and medical director of Baystate Plastic Surgery Associates in Springfield, Massachusetts, Stueber devotes most of her time at home and abroad to breast and skin cancer and auto-accident reconstruction, and repairing cleft lips and cleft palates and foot and hand anomalies. But the clinical description of her work hides what a colleague says is another notable talent, that of an artist who restructures faces and scars in a lifeaffirming way. Life-altering Surgery Cleft lips and cleft palates are two of the most common congenital

deformities in the world and affect approximately one in 700 babies born every year. A cleft lip is an upper lip that has not fused together properly. Similarly, a cleft palate results when the roof of the mouth does not fully come together. In America, babies born with cleft lips usually have them surgically repaired by the time they are three months old; cleft palates are addressed within eighteen months. Children who would have had problems swallowing or speaking and would likely have been the targets of bullies for their unusual looks can live normal lives. Sadly, the situation is not as promising in developing nations.

p h oto o f St u e b e r b y E dwa r d Ju d i c e

By Mieke H. Bomann

Faced with limited health care systems and extreme poverty, many parents of children with cleft anomalies in Latin America, Africa, and Asia cannot hope to have them corrected, if they even know that a solution exists. That’s where Interplast comes in. A humanitarian group that provides free reconstructive surgery to children in sixteen developing nations, it puts together volunteer medical teams including surgeons like Stueber, who travel abroad to perform life-transforming surgeries. Nearly Two Decades of Service Stueber has been part of fifteen Interplast teams and has traveled to Nepal eleven times. While the work is hard, she says serving the indigent is extremely rewarding and the break from the medical bureaucracy that dominates the U.S. health care system a relief. “It’s an interesting experience,” she explains. “No team has ever worked together before, and I think it probably speaks to the level of professionalism that everyone knows what their job is … and [does it].” But, she

stresses, the program is also about pitching in. If a nurse gets sick, for example, doctors do the job. “There’s no union that says, ‘You can’t do that,’” Stueber points out. Indeed, an Interplast experience reminds many doctors of the reason they went into medicine in the first place, says Sara Anderson-Hsiao, director of communications for the group. “They all love the lack of paperwork and … [enjoy] interaction with patients and families and other surgeons,” she said. “When you have a team that’s working together 24/7, the communication is good from the start.” Teamwork is essential for every Interplast trip, as it is not unusual for a hundred patients to show up at a clinic the first day. Two surgeons, together with the medical support team, may operate on sixty people in eight days. In addition to cleft lips and palates, Stueber has helped correct disabling injuries caused by severe burns. One in every 200 girls in the developing world suffers a burn-related injury, according to Interplast, which often are the result of open cooking fires

How Plastic Surgery Got Its Start Coming from the Greek word plastikos, which means to shape or mold, plastic surgery really began to evolve in ancient India as a way to repair the faces of accused adulterers whose noses were routinely cut off. Plastic surgery declined in the Middle Ages, was reborn during the Renaissance, and saw increased attention in the late nineteenth century. Surgical techniques were honed further during World War I in an effort to restore the faces of soldiers that were literally blown apart. Today, more than 1.2 million reconstructive procedures and one million cosmetic procedures are performed in the United States every year.

at ground level. Toddlers fall into them; women’s clothes catch on fire. Transforming horrific scarring requires not only the skills of an experienced surgeon but the vision of a creative mind. “Like many of the plastic surgeons I have met through Interplast, [Kristin] is an amazing artist,” says pediatrician David Norton, who has worked with Stueber on several Interplast expeditions. “Restructuring faces, making new smiles, redoing scars to allow for more function” are in many ways like brushstrokes on a canvas. And it requires a steady hand. On one trip to Puno, Peru, which sits about 13,000 feet up in the Andes, he described her work as nothing less than amazing. “Working long hours standing at an operating room table when you are jetlagged and oxygen-deprived is no easy feat,” recalls Norton. “She is also an incredibly calm surgeon—some of them aren’t—and seemed unflappable in spite of a very busy schedule, trying physical circumstances, and a very different cultural situation than at home.” T

View, California-based group. Stueber has been a member of fifteen Interplast medical teams. Laden, who works in the group’s home office, is director of international services and has been with Interplast for almost thirty years. (While they have gotten to know each other recently, the two women did not meet at MHC, and Laden only learned of Stueber’s work with Interplast in a 2005 Quarterly story.)

Interplast: Healing Bodies, Changing Lives Interplast, founded in 1969 by Dr. Donald Laub, then chief of plastic and reconstructive surgery at Stanford University Medical Center, provides free reconstructive surgery to 3,000 children throughout Africa, Asia, and Latin America every year. Both Kristin Stueber ’65 and Amy Laden ’65 (above, with a patient) are integrally involved with the Mountain

Interplast’s focus is increasingly shifting to education. The group teaches 500 medical professionals overseas every year and supports nine permanent outreach centers where local physicians perform 2,100 surgeries annually. The organization’s Web site includes an amazing array of stories and pictures of patients and surgeons in the field, as well as blogs from medical volunteers. Log on at www.interplast.org.

Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

The Legacies of Peter Viereck The late Professor Emeritus of History Peter Viereck, a man of almost mythic proportions, remains an influential figure in the MHC community. The following comments are excerpted from those given at a November 2006 campus symposium in his honor. Others who spoke about the Pulitzer Prize winner that day included the late historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. and poet Richard Wilbur.

From remarks by Joseph J. Ellis, Professor of History on the Ford Foundation. Ellis said that Viereck’s request that he assume responsibility for Viereck’s memorial service reminded him of Thomas Jefferson’s last request to James Madison: “Take care of me when I am dead.”

As for his legacy, which we are gathered here to

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Illust r at ion by B ob Co

… Like [Walt] Whitman, Peter contained multitudes, though in his case, the multitudes arranged themselves in juxtaposed pairs: a comic sense of human tragedy; an American mind bundled up in a European sensibility; a selfproclaimed conservative who embraced the New Deal and whose favorite presidential candidate was Adlai Stevenson; a man old beyond his years at twenty, with a preternaturally mature sense of the abyss into which the world was headed, and yet a man who remained, in several senses, a child to the end, incapable of cooking for himself, famously wandering the College dining halls with plastic baggies in his pockets, our local version of the manchild in the promised land.

m m a n d e r

… We have opted for a secular celebration of Peter’s legacy, both intellectual and personal. If Peter were with us today, he would probably quip that we have come to praise Viereck, not to bury him.

salute, let the facts speak for themselves. He was the author of six books of prose and eight books of poetry, though the numbers multiply if you count all the reprints and new editions. He was one of the most original and influential American thinkers of the mid-twentieth century, who predicted the Nazi horrors at a time when the Munich Treaty was being trumpeted as a triumph, who forecasted that Stalin’s Russia would be just as bad or worse than Hitler’s Germany before

the Cold War began, and who condemned the scare tactics of Joseph McCarthy while McCarthy was being lionized by the American Right and tolerated by the mainstream press. In retrospect, he got all the big questions right, an achievement that very few American intellectuals of the era could claim.

From remarks by Lisa A. Szefel ’88, who took five classes from Viereck, once claimed the “Most Likely to Invite Peter Viereck to Dinner” prize, and who now teaches in Harvard’s History and Literature Department.

did not want to miss his lectures and that, today, twenty years later, I can still remember so many facts.

… Peter Viereck inspired devotion in his students. Whenever I meet an MHC alum, the first question I ask is whether they took classes with Viereck, and, even if they did not, they knew about his legendary lectures. His lectures were so famous because of his mastery over the facts—the events, individuals, and ideas of the past—and because of the way he animated inert information with anecdotes; much of the history Peter taught he lived through himself, so he interspersed lectures with personal stories. This meant that students

If this is his national legacy, there is also a local legacy that, given our location, merits a separate salute. Peter joined the Mount Holyoke faculty in the fall of 1948 and taught his last class, which

… Here is a sample test question from the Europe 257 midterm exam in April 1986: Time: an hour; leaving ten minutes to proof the exam for Freudian slips. Write a dialogue in a café between F (a French middle class nationalist, supporter of the Entente alliance, avid for Alsace) and G (a German middle class nationalist, but not a Nazi, and fearing a war on two fronts). Have them argue violently but with specific concrete evidence (bring in all your specific evidence from readings in Kohn, Craig, class lectures, etc.) about causes and guilt of World War I, about the justice or injustice of the Versailles treaty and Reparations, and

I attended, in the spring of 1997. That means he taught on this campus for forty-nine years, longer than any faculty member in recorded history. (The college archives for the nineteenth century are incomplete on this score, but my scan of the records suggests that no one else comes close.) In part because of his longevity, and in part because of the popularity of his Russian history survey, he also taught more students than any Mount Holyoke professor ever, though the incredible numbers of

Vinnie Ferraro give him a shot at the title if he lasts for another decade. Six years ago, when a play based on his life was performed in the College theatre, I witnessed a current student, her mother, and her mother gather around his wheelchair to thank him for his teaching. As others also gathered around him, he said: “I can’t remember all your names, but I remember all your faces.” He was a very unlikely and highly eccentric version of Mr. Chips.

about Poincaré’s occupation of the Rhineland to enforce Reparations. Bring in as many different historical citations as you can, and do justice to both sides.

few years. Then, about five years ago, I was … invited to Thanksgiving dinner in South Hadley with [Viereck and his family]. To see Peter in his retirement surrounded by such warm, loving, kind people came, I must admit, as a shock to me. I had learned yet another lesson from Peter: I had thought his life was so marvelous because he got to work on history each day, but that was only the half of it. The other half was creating and nurturing loving relationships, and living the values that he talked about. … [These], as much as Peter’s writing and inspiration to generations of Mount Holyoke students, are his legacy.

This question is typical because Viereck wanted us to see both sides, to understand the contingencies and complexities people in the past confronted, and it required creativity. … Viereck taught me about the life of the mind. In our many conversations he always treated my ideas and perspectives with the utmost respect. … The whole time I was an undergraduate, I imagined Viereck as this solitary figure on Silver Street, living the life of the mind. We kept in contact through letters and he would send notices of his books and ask me about my studies. Though, we did lose touch for a

The complete text of these tributes to Peter Viereck can be read at alumnae. mtholyoke.edu/go/ vierecktributes. T

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Take 2

Reliving Student Days Decades after

Graduation

At the Quarterly’s invitation, writer-illustrator Anne Sibley O’Brien ’75 spent a few days on campus this past fall living like a student again. She had a dorm bed and a roommate, attended classes, and talked with students and professors. Here, she shares her impressions about student life at MHC today.

y Te x t a n d i l l u s t r a t i o n s b 5 Anne Sibley O’Brien ’7

September The course catalogue arrives in the mail, thirty-five years since I first arrived on campus. Going through it is like sampling a giant smorgasbord. Only I don’t have to worry about a balanced diet—I have no prerequisites to fill, no requirements to meet. I can taste anything I want. There’s a far greater range of choices, including computer science, complex organizations, and film, architectural, environmental, Jewish, and Latin American studies. The course schedule is online, as is the event calendar. Creating an actual schedule, even for four days,

is like assembling a giant jigsaw puzzle. Some courses aren’t offered in the fall. Very few meet on Friday. Several I choose meet at the same time. As happened in college, most of the choices on my list fall away, until I’m left with the ones that fit together. October 11 Just arrived on campus, walking the paved paths, I’m conscious of the familiarity of every part of the landscape, a sense of “I have walked here before.” There are also noticeable differences: the swipe card required to get into any dorm, students talking on cell phones, and computers

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everywhere. In the library atrium, which now houses Rao’s Coffee, young women sit at tables with cups of coffee, pecking away on their laptops. In the Stimson Room in the library, 4 p.m. “tea” is a casual affair, with tea bags, mugs, pots of hot water and coffee, and a platter of cookies. Students in jeans and sweatshirts sprawl on couches with their feet on the low tables, chatting with friends. They seem almost interchangeable with my ’70s classmates, with only slight differences in footwear (more athletic shoes and flip-flops).

The set for La Dispute featured Astro turf lawns, a stream made of mirrors, and flying cherubs.

Back at Buckland, I meet my delightful roommate, Dieu (pronounced Zeo) Nguyen ’09, from Vietnam, who welcomes me with a hug. We join her friends for dinner: Cindy (from

Rao’s café has made the library’s atrium a hot gathering spot.

Hong Kong); Phuong and Hien (from Vietnam); Grace (Taiwanese, raised in Japan); and Anike (from the United States). The international student presence on campus is much stronger than it was thirty-five years ago. Chatting pairs or lone students on cell phones may be speaking French or Korean, Arabic or Spanish as well as English. The food has improved dramatically. Students can now choose among eight dining centers on campus. Each meal offers a varied menu of five or six dishes, including vegetarian options. There is also an extensive salad bar available

Professor of Anthropology Andrew Lass lecturing in a What is Performance? seminar.

at lunches and dinners, and it really looks fresh. Food is also available many more hours of the day. You can get pizza at Blanchard—and a full dinner menu—until midnight. There are also coffee and bakery counters at Blanchard and at Rao’s open as late as 11 p.m.

October 12 Thursday morning starts at Kendall Hall with yoga at 10 a.m. The wide wooden floor of the mirrored studio is covered with colorful rubber yoga mats, bolsters, folded blankets, and wooden blocks. Soft music plays in the background. The students nearly fill the room. The instructor, Heidi, is upbeat and lively as she guides us through a series of postures. “Lovely,” she murmurs, “yes.” As we sit at the end of class, she instructs us to “acknowledge the perfection you bring to your practice. You are fundamentally already perfectly complete.” What

a difference it could make to these young women to have such a model of body awareness and acceptance, combined with the stressreducing benefits of mindfulness and relaxation. Whiteness: The Other Side of Racism meets at eleven in Reese. Professor Sandra Lawrence is relaxed with her firstyear seminar of sixteen students from a variety of racial backgrounds, interested in what they have to say, fostering lots of participation and interaction. In small groups they share their responses to an article about why Asian Americans continue to be viewed as outsiders. Lawrence’s teaching is

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Spring 2007

Tables outside Blanchard Campus Center are frequently full in good weather.

connective, reminding students of concepts from previous classes or readings: race is a social construct, she says, and a “plastic process” that changes over time and due to context, circumstances, and law. What Is Performance?, also a first-year seminar, joins another class today for a lecture on the anthropology of performance in Shattuck. As soon as Professor Andrew Lass begins speaking, I’m hooked by the pleasure of listening to a brilliant, engaging thinker. Lass is examining the topic of rites of passage, the

process of moving from one state to another by passing through a kind of gate into a liminal state between past and future. He offers the example of being at Mount Holyoke College, a community marked by a gate, in which the liminal state could be said to last for four years. He identifies classic elements of ritual in commencement, including the laurel chain with its seniors dressed in white, the procession to Mary Lyon’s grave, and the transformation of the graduates into a new stage of being. “The thing about

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rituals,” Lass says, “is that they work.” A small group of students is blowing bubbles in front of Blanchard as I pass. “Bubbles!” their poster proclaims. “While MHC may not be perfect, we wanted to celebrate the safety and acceptance within the ‘Mount Holyoke Bubble.’ Sponsored by True Colors as part of Queer Awareness Week.” Over dinner, students tell me about Facebook, an online social network in which participants share personal profiles, “like a live yearbook,” one says. “What

do you use it for?” I ask. “To procrastinate.” Students have automatic access only to their own school’s Facebook. The most common use is chatting with friends and arranging to meet for a meal, for study, for an evening. In Rooke Theatre, I attend a run-through of La Dispute, by Marivaux, concerning an experiment about whether men or women are more prone to infidelity. A small “black box” theatre has been constructed on stage, with the audience seated in tiers of seats rising on three sides of a small

center square. The square is covered in bright green Astro turf with a winding stream of mirror glass. Beyond, the backstage area has more Astro turf, and layers of flats painted to resemble a Victorian pastoral scene, complete with flying cherubs. The English translation seems fresh and contemporary, and the student actors—young women convincingly playing both female and male parts—are winsome and engaging as they discover the marvels of first love. Back in the dorm, Dieu and I talk about her parents, who were teenagers in North Vietnam when I was at MHC. Despite protests and peace marches, the politics of the time said that her parents and I were enemies. Who could have foreseen that just a generation later the children of the warring countries would be attending college together?

Pau l S c h n a i t tac h e r

When I fall asleep at midnight, Dieu is still awake, as she is at 1:30 a.m. when the pulsing blare of the fire alarm wakes me. Pajama-clad students stream out of the dorm into a cold rain. Luckily, it’s just a drill, so it’s only minutes before we’re allowed back in. October 13 Waking to sunlight flooding the room, I feel as if I dreamed the fire drill. Dieu’s alarm went off at 7:15 and she’s gone, off to her 8 a.m. job in a departmental office. She never seems to sleep more than five hours.

In Reese Hall for Philosophy 101, I hear the professor talking about getting the “blue books.” I decide to skip the midterm to go for a walk along Upper Lake on this brilliant autumn day. I pick up lunch at Torrey Hall, which has a “grab and go” menu of sandwiches, soups, and sides. Strolling across campus, I reflect on the number of choices today’s students face. There seems to be so much more competition for their attention: things to do, places to hang out, cell phones and e-mail, Facebook and MySpace, TV and DVDs. In the 1970s we had our classes, each other, phones in rooms, one TV downstairs, and activities on weekends. Most weekday evenings, except for the occasional film or lecture, there was nowhere to go, nothing to do. Once the dining room was closed, you couldn’t find a cup of coffee or a plate of food anywhere on campus (though we still managed to gain weight). You could get on the five-college bus, but especially on a school night, Amherst and Northampton were pretty quiet towns. I don’t know how today’s students find the time to work, given all the distractions. On the other hand, young people today seem better at multitasking. And perhaps campus life today is a better preparation for juggling the demands of an adult life than was our set-apart time. At 2:30 the Multicultural Student Forum meets in

Anne Sibley O’Brien ’75 (left) works on this article, while her temporary roommate, Dieu M. Nguyen ’09, looks on.

Chapin, an opportunity for students from all backgrounds to share concerns in a relaxed, supportive atmosphere, moderated by staff members. Six or seven students—African American, African, South Asian, Latina—in a circle on the floor share a candid and lively conversation about the challenge of living in a diverse community. The moderators take note of student suggestions for positive changes. Dieu and I attend an evening session at WillitsHallowell for students to network with visiting alumnae. The alums introduce themselves, then make themselves available at tables representing

their work sector—law, finance, nonprofits, arts, etc. Slipping back into my identity as an alum, I talk at length with a sophomore who wants to write and illustrate children’s books (that’s what I do), and a first-year who wants to write novels. Back in our room, Dieu announces that she’s going to show me “what college students’ lives revolve around,” via an Internet tour. She starts with YouTube (for online videos), Google (for research), and Wikipedia (for “totally random information”). Then she shows me ELLA, MHC’s Electronic Learning Arena. ELLA offers a file for each course, including a syllabus, list of readings

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to download, online class discussions, and/or notes from the professor, possibly even a blog. Depending on the class, the file may be optional or required. Those who don’t have computers can check out laptops for three hours at a time from the library. Dieu has managed to find a ticket for tomorrow’s sold-out Las Vegas Night, the event of the fall. In preparation, the campus is flooded with messages urging responsible behavior. There are signs on dining tables reminding students of “what’s hot” (eating first, not drinking too fast, having a great time) and “what’s not” (getting drunk and passing out or going to the hospital with alcohol poisoning). October 14 It’s another spectacular fall day, sky a cloudless blue. Dieu is long gone; though it’s Saturday, her alarm went off around 6. She is working registration for the New England Women’s Global Finance and Business Conference. Returning from tea and a muffin at Rao’s, I see a paper basket on the dorm’s entrance desk, with free condoms and information on safe sex. At dinner in Wilder, the kosher-hallal dining hall, I share a table with four first-year students. “What are you doing tonight?” one asks another. “Working.” The students tell me there are alcohol-free parties planned in some dorms

as an alternative to the usually wild Las Vegas Night. We talk about the bathroom signs promoting alcohol awareness, with the information that drinking among U.S. women has increased substantially in the last ten years. I tell them I rarely saw my classmates drinking to intoxication (though I certainly saw it at Amherst frat parties). As I leave Wilder, I see five or six Muslim students, dressed in skirts and head scarves, gathered in the living room. They have placed a sheet on the floor and are taking turns prostrating themselves in prayer, facing east. Around 10, a transformed Dieu struts into the room in knee-high black boots, wearing a skintight black minidress with spaghetti straps. By 11:30, crowds of partygoers are flowing between the Las Vegas Night venues in Blanchard and Chapin. Earrings and spike heels sparkle with rhinestones. Though most wear minidresses, some young women are dressed in nothing but lace corsets, panties, and fishnet stockings. It’s 38 degrees outside, but it’s “Vegas” inside. Though it’s not yet midnight, one or two young women are visibly drunk. There are crowds of young men, some of them bellowing. Security officers are keeping a visible presence. Back in the dorm, Flossie, a friend of Dieu’s, comes looking for her to plan

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“elfing.” An ambulance has already taken one student to the hospital, a case of alcohol poisoning, she says. October 15 “Well, at least it’s only one night of the year,” one student remarks this morning. “And the rest of the time we get Mount Holyoke.” Sunday brunch offers fresh crepes to a crowd, including all the guests for the party weekend. A conversation with several students turns to the topic of writing papers. I describe typing, on a typewriter, from a draft or outline. I posit that the fluidity of today’s word processing must contribute to a corresponding fluidity of thought, a willingness to take intellectual risks. The students listen with polite interest to my theory, but I don’t think they can fathom a world without word processing. I spend the afternoon attending an Art Museum exhibit and a classical concert at Pratt, cultural offerings I rarely took advantage of as a student. Indeed, there are few students among the concert audience; most appear to be retired. The night’s a cappella concert in Blanchard is performed by two MHC groups, the M&Cs (Milk and Cookies, remember?) and the Nice Shoes, with a guest appearance by the Haverford College Humtones. More than a hundred students turn out for this, showing their

appreciation with raucous cheers. October 16 Monday morning the hallways of Buckland are decorated with pages torn from magazines. Handwritten dialogue featuring the names of first-year students has been added to photos of sultry male and female models: “I’m dreaming of Hien!” “Am I as hot as Stephanie?” It’s a contemporary version of elfing, playfully toasting and roasting the first-years. Dieu was up half the night preparing the display, along with the more traditional treats left in front of students’ doors. I attend my final class, an introductory drawing session taught by visiting artist Karin Stack, in a studio on top of the facilities building. Stilllife exercises and critiques remain the foundation of the course. This year Karin is also teaching a class in digital art. Heading away from campus on my way home, I can feel how my brief return to student life has tired me. I no longer have the stamina of a twenty-year-old. But my mind is wide awake and buzzing. Just as it was in the 1970s, MHC life in the twenty-first century is a stimulant for the brain, heart, and spirit. T Anne Sibley O’Brien ’75 is a writer, illustrator, and performer who lives in Maine.

Making Money Work

amic n y D nd e p S l ’86 ve a Snel S e l e a e Th nn T arya By M

Around my house are urgent notes I’ve written to myself

describing budget woes, admonishing my behaviors, and suggesting reform: Spending $500/ month on food; budget is $300! Figure out how to cut back! In my attempts to get a financial grip, I’ve tried the cash-only method. (Attached to my credit card is a ratty Post-it note with the command No! It’s ratty from all the times I’ve removed it to use the card, and then stuck it back on.) I toss change into a little cast-iron crock several times a week (yield: $45 annually, used for groceries). I stash a modest sum ($150) from my paycheck in a savings account, but there’s always a surprise expense (new brakes) or one I forgot to budget for (oil delivery), or some sudden, dire need (a hammock). Being savvy about the savespend dynamic is no small task, especially if it doesn’t

come naturally—and that’s true for most of us, says money coach Olivia Mellan ’68. But setting realistic goals, creating an accurate budget, and striking a balance between discipline and deprivation are steps in getting there.

Savings Challenges Saving even a few dollars at a time may seem impossible if you’re living paycheck to paycheck. When Lisa M. Utzinger ’02 started work at a nonprofit in Boston, she supplemented her entry-level income with odd jobs, but still couldn’t save. A little self-examination, though, has yielded insights: “A city lifestyle is expensive. I spend way too much on clothes, eating out, and entertainment.” After graduation, Sabra L. Smith ’81 got in the habit of stashing away a bit of her paycheck each month. “I feel better if I’m sitting on a pot of cash in case of an emergency,” she says. Now divorced, the once stay-at-home mom is paying grad-school tuition as she prepares to reenter the workforce, shelling out

money for home repairs, and trying to support her two young children. She says it’s “extremely discomfiting to see my bank book hemorrhaging.” Like Utzinger, Smith concedes, she’s not sure she can afford the way she lives. “I feel trapped in my house … I’m terrified that I should [instead] be in a crappy little apartment with a roommate, to cut costs,” she says. “I’m used to buying what I want at Target when I want, but I have a feeling I should be buying ramen and eating at home more than I do.” The first step toward saving money is understanding your short-, medium-, and long-term goals, says Mellan. “Until you know what you’re saving for—a vacation, your kids’ college educations, something you want to buy—you can’t get motivated about saving.” She has clients keep a “spending diary” of where their money’s going and how they feel about it. “Then they can think about what they need to change to come up with more money. It’s simple: You

have to work more or spend less—or both.”

Setting Goals Jennifer K. Dick ’93 wants to buy property. She lives “on less money than most everyone I know,” but the savings process is slow despite a contract teaching English and American literature in Paris. Still, what she sets aside is adding up, and soon she hopes to invest her savings in home ownership. Beth Regish Smith ’92 too is saving for a down payment on a home. While Boston-area housing prices are “out of sight,” she and her husband are saving what they can and seeing progress. Utzinger’s goal is to save $30,000 over the next five years, to make a down payment on a house. Toward that end, she has $250 automatically deducted from each paycheck. But “things inevitably come up—car repairs, Christmas shopping, trips—so I’ve had to dig into my savings,” she says. “Balancing competing priorities—home, school

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“ ... things inevitably come up–car repairs, Christmas shopping, trips–so I’ve had to dig into my savings...”

Spending $400/ month on clothes and entertainment! These are not even in the budget! Do without!

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debt, emergency funds”—is a challenge for Beth Smith. That, and having the patience and discipline to “plan for long-term goals at the expense of short-term ones.” Women, she adds, “need to be more vigilant about saving for retirement. We need to plan for ourselves, not just our families.”

Approaching a bank for answers can be daunting, especially if you sense you’re getting a sales pitch rather than helpful information. Dick says she taps friends, family, and the Web for info—as well as bankers.

Many of us just want to know what our savings—and investing—options are, and to receive useful, unbiased advice from a trustworthy source.

“Saving and spending are like opposite ends of a tilted pencil,” says Dam T. Nguyen ’02, a financial adviser setting up her own firm. “If one goes

Expert Advice

P h o t o b y Pau l S c h n a i t tac h e r

– Lisa M. Utzinger ’02

up, the other goes down. To get a handle on saving for any purpose—retirement, a home, a wedding—you need a clear understanding of where the money’s going.” Tiffany Ross ’93, a financial representative for Northwestern Mutual Financial Network, says “it’s critical to ‘pay yourself first.’” Consider your savings a “bill” you’re responsible for each month, she advises. “Pay it just like you’d pay the rent, mortgage, or cable bill.” “The best way to save is through automatic deduction via payroll or from your bank account,” says Camille M. Gagliardi ’90, a certified financial planner® with Ameriprise Financial Services. Sign up for “an employer-sponsored plan (such as 401(k), 403(b), or 457), where you receive a match.” If that’s not available, set up a monthly [payment]

to an investment account from your checking account. It’s easier than trying to make yourself sporadically save.” Inspiring people to take charge of their finances is part of Olivia Mellan’s job, but she encourages selfcompassion while learning how to put money aside. “You shouldn’t save so much that you feel so constrained and then go out and have a binge,” she says. “Also, some people say if you have credit-card debt, you shouldn’t save anything, you should just pay it off. But many of us in the money field don’t believe that,” Mellan adds. “We think it’s psychologically important for people to start saving something, even if it’s a teeny bit. It helps them see that they can save.” Any way you look at it, being master of your

monetary domain requires effort. Mellan suggests keeping a picture of what you’re saving for in your wallet, as a reminder. Expect to fall off the wagon now and then. “As a nation we are very bad at delaying gratification for deeper fulfillment,” she says. “We don’t seem to understand the value of it. But getting better at it can be a tremendous boost to people’s self-esteem.” As someone who has paid down her credit-card debt from $35,000 to $5,000, is now making monthly payments to a savings account, and has recently managed to satisfy a couple of decades-old yearnings (drum set and pickup truck), I can attest to that. T Maryann Teale Snell ’86 is a writer and editor in Saratoga Springs, New York.

10 Tips from the Trenches

1. Redefine “emergency.” Consider your savings account off-limits except in a true emergency (not that the boots you’ve lusted after are on sale, or that you bought too many mai tais on vacation and the credit-card bill has now arrived). 2. Set spending priorities. Forgo the Starbucks latte and drink free office coffee (or, if coffee is your thing, have your Starbucks every morning, but bring lunch). 3. Keep your mitts off. Put a small amount in an account that can’t be touched for several years. It will earn interest, and you won’t empty the account when things get tight around holiday or tax times. 4. Live within your means. If you can’t afford that ski trip, don’t take it.

5. Be real. Buying something on sale doesn’t mean you’ve saved—you’ve still spent money. 6. Live modestly. Even if you can afford to drive a BMW, join a fancy gym, and go to an expensive hair salon, that doesn’t mean you should. 7. Be binge-free. When you see something you want but it’s at the limits of your budget, think hard: will you really wear it, use it, value it? Why or how often? 8. Nip that paycheck. Get a savings account and have money automatically transferred to it every pay period.

9. Split your raises. When you get a raise, put at least half of it in your 401(k). You won’t miss that money and you’ll still see an increase in your paycheck. 10. Keep your eyes on the prize. Save for something specific—a house, a wedding, grad school, a new car, a trip to Europe. It helps to visualize a goal. A tip of the hat to Jennifer Dick ’93, Sabra Smith ’81, and Lisa Utzinger ’02 for their advice.

Web Extra: There’s more “Making Money Work” information at alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/money

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Sharing Global

Visions

The McCulloch Center for Global Initiatives’ photo contest, now in its second year, has led student photographers to share their glimpses of the wider world with colleagues back on campus. Students who studied, interned, or conducted research abroad last year submitted their photos, and the best were displayed in the library’s café and are posted online at mtholyoke.edu/acad/programs/global/photo_gallery/contest_06_index.html.

Weltmeister Dreams (Michelle Thorne ’07) “The World Cup of 2006 ignited in Germany an unprecedented passion for soccer. Flags streamed from cars, chants filled the air, and the entire country was alive with the spirit of “Fussball.” There was electricity in the air; the nation tingled with anticipation. Could the National Eleven carry the country to victory?” While studying in Leipzig, Thorne cofounded an international students’ soccer team there. A teammate learned of job openings checking passes and translating in the press section of the World Cup stadium, and she jumped at the “amazing opportunity” to be part of the World Cup experience.

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Los viejitos en la Plaza de Ponce (Charlene van Dijk ’07) “Sunday, noon. The heat is unbearable, the humidity is even worse. A seat in the shade is precious. There’s no point in moving; you will inevitably break out in a carpet of sweat. Spend a few hours in the sanctuary of the shadows cast by the ceiba trees. But mostly, just take pleasure in the rustle of the emerald leaves above your head. Tomorrow is Monday and there are no trees at work.” Van Dijk spent spring semester 2006 at the Universidad del Sagrado Corazón in San Juan, Puerto Rico. As a result, she developed a senior independent study project titled “Revolutionizing the Jíbaro: Community Education in Puerto Rico” and spent this past January doing research at the General Archives of Puerto Rico.

Untitled (Robyn Nedelcu ’07) “This is one of the photos I treasure the most from my time abroad in Mali. Pictured here is a Muslim man praying on the steps of the Great Mosque of Djenné, which is known for being the largest mud building in the world and a UNESCO world heritage site. In many ways, this was a hard picture to take. I tried my best to not be the annoying tourist [seeking] the ‘authentic cultural experience.’ Yet here I was taking a picture of something not only for the fact that it was different from the American experience, but for the fact that this was something I was actually experiencing. I wondered why the man was not inside praying.” This photo was taken during Nedelcu’s spring semester in Mali, while traveling “to observe the diversity of desert life existent in the Sahel region.”

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alumnaematters

Alumnae Book Clubs Are Best Sellers

hey’ve followed a doctor to the mountains of Haiti, considered a murderous mind, and explored the recesses of the human brain. Book clubs are ubiquitous, and Mount Holyoke alumnae have organized at least two dozen affiliated with their regional clubs. Most report good attendance, interesting conversation, and a wealth of “good eats.” Some groups have just started. Kati Zeller Buehler ’74 organized one in Santa Barbara, California, last fall that will meet every two months. Others, like the Afternoon Book Group

affiliated with the Genesee Valley Club in New York, have been going strong for almost twenty years. The most populous state in the union has the greatest number of MHC book clubs. The Peninsula Club in California boasts three; two more are in the San Francisco Bay area. Book group size ranges from small—four to five members in Charlotte, North Carolina—to sizable—twelve to fourteen in the Genesee Valley. Choosing books is often done casually, as when someone’s read a good review or a friend has recommended it. But some groups have a more structured approach, where a member suggests a book, reads it, and then

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presents a review to others in the group, who are encouraged to read it, too. Meeting locations range from sublime (bookworms in California conduct entire sessions floating in a swimming pool) to lively (readers gather at a local

coffeehouse) to relaxed (gatherings at participants’ homes). Some clubs include non-MHCers; most welcome diversity in age and interests. Louise Hayes Booth ’70 of the Oakland/Berkeley book club notes that one

Oakland/Berkeley book club members (left to right) Bea BacherWetmore ’67; Lyn Johnson Reese ’60; Louise Hayes Booth ’70; and nonalumnae friends Rachel Parker and Esther Hirsch

“Among us there are a clinical psychologist, a medical researcher, a biologist, an environmental consultant, a research psychologist, a psychiatric nurse, a lawyer,

a consultant to schools on history, and two aspiring writers,” notes Booth. The broad range of expertise and interests leads the group to read books that she probably would not have picked on her own, says Booth, but that she nevertheless finds

Special editions:

Alumnae Book Clubs’ Choices

One of the hardest things about keeping a book club going is coming up with titles everyone in the group wants to read. It’s often helpful to have the suggestions of dedicated readers outside the group. With that in mind, we offer you the recent book lists of several MHC book clubs.

Peninsula (California) Book Club Mountains Beyond Mountains, by Tracy Kidder Collapse, by Jared Diamond

A Crack in the Edge of the World, by Simon Winchester

a book club in New Haven, Connecticut, five years ago, says she has particularly enjoyed getting to know two classmates also in the group whom she knew only peripherally when they were all at MHC. —M.H.B.

East of Eden, by John Steinbeck

Lighting the Way, by Karenna Gore Schiff

The Hours, by Michael Cunningham

Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, by Doris Kearns Goodwin

A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole A Million Little Pieces, by James Frey

American Gospel: God, the Founding Fathers, and the Making of a Nation, by Jon Meacham

In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote

Dallas/Fort Worth Book Club My Cousin Rachel, by Daphne du Maurier

San Francisco Book Club Running With Scissors, by Augusten Burroughs

Under the Banner of Heaven, by Jon Krakauer The Known World, by Edward P. Jones

My Year of Meats, by Ruth Ozeki

New friendships are often the result of book club gatherings, and getting to know classmates who were relative strangers while on campus is an added benefit. Natasha Domina ’96, who started

Self-Made Man, by Norah Vincent

The Memory Keeper’s Daughter, by Kim Edwards

Shiksa Goddess, by Wendy Wasserstein ’71

immensely enjoyable.

alumnaematters

member, Helen Murphy Tepperman ’38, has attended every meeting.

A Long Way Down, by Nick Hornby Don’t Let’s Go To The Dogs Tonight, by Alexandra Fuller

Iran Awakening, by Shirin Ebadi

Oakland/Berkeley Book Club Fireweed, by Gerda Lerner The Great Influenza, by John M. Barry Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, by Jared Diamond Freakonomics, by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

Wait Till Next Year: A Memoir, by Doris Kearns Goodwin

Genesee Valley/ Afternoon Book Club Cellophane, by Marie Arana Leaving Home, by Anita Brookner The Island at the Center of the World, by Russell Shorto

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Blue Ribbons, Bitter Bread, by Susanna de Vries

Southern Arizona Book Club

Genesee Valley/ Evening Book Club

The Power and the Glory, by Graham Greene

Ireland: A Novel, by Frank Delaney

Independent People, by Haldor Laxness

The Merchant of Venice, by William Shakespeare The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief, by Francis Collins The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design, by Richard Dawkins I Fell in Love With a Con Man: A True Story, by Elizabeth Grzeszczyk FP ’87

Web Extras

March, by Geraldine Brooks Isabella Greenway: An Enterprising Woman, by Kristie Miller Year of Wonders, by Geraldine Brooks The Far Side of the Sea, by Ben Clevenger Uncle Tungsten, by Oliver Sacks

Charlotte Book Club The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini

Reading Lolita in Teheran, by Azar Nafisi The Bookseller of Kabul, by Asne Seierstad The Glass Castle, by Jeannette Walls Water for Elephants, by Sara Gruen The Places in Between, by Rory Stewart

• Can’t make it to a book club meeting? The Alumnae Association has just launched online alumnae discussion groups. Join a book discussion group—or create one of your own— at alumnae.mtholyoke. edu/connect/index.php. You can also register at this page. (Already registered? Click on “Discussion Groups” and get the conversation started.) • For MHC faculty book recommendations, go to www.alumnae.mtholyoke. edu/go/facbooks

Chemist, Education Specialist, and Adoption Expert Honored

Award winners (left to right) Hollee McGinnis ’94, Sarah Cureton Chinn ’97, Sara Vecchiotti ’95

Three young alumnae who have demonstrated promise and sustained achievement received Mary Lyon Awards at a

ceremony in February. Sarah Cureton Chinn ’97, a staff chemist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, leads a team

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in the weapons materials compatibility and aging group that investigates the degradation of materials like plastics, rubbers, and

Sara C. Vecchiotti ’95 is director of strategic planning in the Child Care and Head Start Division of the New York City Administration for Children’s Services. She is responsible for the citywide implementation of a plan to improve early child care and education services for low-income

Awa r d w i n n e r s : Fr e d L e B l a n c

foams used in defense applications. Considered by a supervisor to be one of the top three hires within the Chemistry and Material Science Directorate at the lab in the last five years, Chinn has served in lead roles in major national security programs and in the lab’s nonproliferation and stockpile stewardship programs.

extensive analysis of daycare resources throughout the United States” and has worked with “some of the major players in child policy matters.” Hollee A. McGinnis ’94 is policy and operations director at the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute in New York. An American studies major at MHC, McGinnis is currently the lead

researcher on a project investigating positive identity formation in transculturally adopted young adults. She also recently developed a project to evaluate implementation of the Hague Convention on international adoptions. McGinnis also formed an organization of Korean adoptees called Also Known As, and is actively

involved in supporting other adopted persons. The Mary Lyon Award is given to young alumnae who have been out of college fifteen years or fewer and who demonstrate promise in life, a profession, or the community consistent with the humane values exemplified by Mary Lyon.—M.H.B.

alumnaematters

children in the city. As an undergraduate, Vecchiotti had a strong interest in a career in child-welfare policy and went on to earn a law degree and a PhD in applied developmental psychology. According to MHC psychology professor Robert Shilkret, Vecchiotti as a graduate student “reached a national audience with an

Their expertise was diverse and abundant. In September, alumnae shared career, internship, and study-abroad advice with the sophomore class over s’mores. “I love coming back,” said Anna P. Bennett ’04 at the “More for Sophomores” event. In October, Emily Weber LeBrun ’96 and Elizabeth Onyemelukwe Garner ’89 spoke to students aspiring to be doctors about women and the medical profession at an exhibition, Changing the Face of Medicine: Celebrating America’s Women Physicians.

At the annual senior fair, students picked up tips from alumnae on job searching, networking, financial planning, and thinking strategically.

Alumnae and Students Share Insights at AA Campus Events

St u d e n t fa i r : Pau l S c h n a i t tac h e r

Thanks to a host of events and activities offered by the Alumnae Association, alumnae appeared all over campus in 2006, offering wisdom and support to current students and each other.

Proposed Changes to the Alumnae Association’s Bylaws The following bylaws amendments will be considered at the annual

meeting of the Alumnae Association on May 26. 1. The board of directors proposes adding the following sentence to the current text in section 6 of article I (Introduction): A copy of the Mount Holyoke Alumnae

The Alumnae Council brought alumnae and students together in October for an award ceremony. “Mount Holyoke girls used to be a lot wilder than they are now,” concluded student blogger Stephanie Miedema ’07 after reminiscing with a diverse group of alums. In November, many alumnae maintained their dedication to the college and community by participating in an Alumnae in Action day of volunteerism at the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts. All the activities were as important for students as for alumnae, participants noted. “We need alums to tell us what they did, to reassure us that things are going to be OK,” said class president Ximena A. Gomez ’09 at the “More for Sophomores” event.—Shoshana Walter ’07

Quarterly magazine shall be sent to each member of the Alumnae Association. 2. The board of directors proposes deleting section 4 (Composition and Responsibilities of Standing Committees) of article VII.

The bylaws are available online at www.alumnae. mtholyoke.edu (choose “About Us,” then “Governance”), and will be available throughout reunion weekend at the registration area.

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Hosted by the Alumnae Association in coordination with the college’s Office of Communications and Career Development Center, the event was held at the home of Mary Graham Davis ’65, president of the Alumnae Association. According to Davis, the event was a “spectacular success, if the noise level was [any indicator] of how much networking was going on.” Guest speaker Priscilla Painton ’80, Time magazine deputy managing editor, gave a lively speech on her optimistic view of print news, the rising tide of blogging and Internet journalism, and her belief that women have a place in journalism. Painton was a guest faculty member at the college last fall, teaching the course Can You Trust a Journalist? (See related article on p. 4.)

Journalists Sheryl McCarthy ’69 (left) and Priscilla Painton ’80 (right) with Mary Graham Davis ’65 at the NYC event.

MHC Journalists Network in NYC

Nearly sixty Mount Holyoke alumnae journalists, TV producers, writers, and editors gathered in late January for the first-ever networking reception for New York alumnae in the communications and journalism industries.

Tuition Prepayment Plan Available to Alumnae Mount Holyoke College has joined the Independent 529 Plan, which allows alumnae and their families to prepay tuition at less than today’s price for use in the future. More than 240 private colleges have joined the consortium administered by TIAA-CREF that enables families to plan for the rising costs of private higher education. MHC alumnae family members are automatically eligible. The plan operates on a

simple principle: in return for prepaying college costs, member colleges carry the investment risk and protect you from future tuition increases. The percentage of tuition you purchase today pays for the same percentage of tuition in the future and is guaranteed to satisfy costs at the time your child or other family member enrolls. For example, if the college your child will eventually attend has a current tuition of $20,000 a year, and you prepay $20,000 to cover one year of tuition at today’s rate, that amount also will cover one year of tuition

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With women still relatively underrepresented in the field (Painton, who began her career at the Berkshire Eagle, referred to the industry back then as a “sexist swamp”) and few journalism-related resources available on campus, younger Mount Holyoke women rely on networking to garner support from older alumnae. Elettra R. Fiumi ’05, assistant research editor at Departures magazine, believes that “young alumnae need mentors, people you can talk to comfortably [and] there’s something about talking to a Mount Holyoke alumna that feels safe.” Beyond networking opportunities, the reception offered alumnae something less tangible but equally important: hope. As Amy Kommatas ’01 observed, with so many successful Mount Holyoke alumnae in journalism and communications, it’s clear that “print really isn’t dead.” —Stephanie Miedema ’07 ten years from now—even though the projected cost is $35,817 (assuming a 6 percent annual tuition rate increase.) By prepaying, you save $15,817, and that savings—the increase in value—is taxfree. In addition, each participating institution offers a discount on today’s tuition prices, so the savings is even greater. The savings benefit you gain is proportional to the amount you prepay. However, even regular, small contributions will yield savings and help take the sting out of rising college costs. Plan certificates may

be redeemed at any participating college as long as a student is accepted for admission and enrolls. For more information, go to www. independent529plan.org.

In Search of Board and Committee Members Are you interested in volunteering for an Alumnae Association committee? The Nominating Committee is always eager to hear of potential volunteers. Recommendations should be sent to W. Rochelle Calhoun ’83, executive director of the association, at rcalhoun@ mtholyoke.edu or 413-538-2300.

ADP (Automated Data Processing) for 10 years

The Nominating Committee of the Alumnae Association is pleased to announce the following slate of directors and committee members for election at the May 26 annual meeting. All terms, unless otherwise noted, are for three years, beginning July 1.

Patricia Shipman ’92, Cogan Station, Pa. Past president, Philadelphia Club; book award chair; program; assistant admission rep; San Antonio Club; class agent; reunion gift caller. Staff attorney, Community Legal Services, Philadelphia

Alumnae Association Board of Directors

Linda Maria Yu Bien ’75, Vice President, Los Altos, Calif. Former trustee of MHC; major gifts volunteer; Campaign for Legacy and Leadership chair; Asian Scholarship Nucleus Committee; ALANA Committee; reunion gift caller; reunion lead gift chair. Acting chief executive officer, Northeast Medical Services, Los Altos, CA Linda Ing Phelps ’86, Treasurer, Manhasset, N.Y. Alumnae Association Finance Committee; Strategic Planning Committee; vice president, treasurer, first vice president, program chair, New York Club. Associate director, Standard and Poor’s, Structured Finance Ratings Susan Swart Rice ’70, Classes and Reunion Committee Chair, Greensboro, N.C. Alumnae Association Classes Committee; class president; class agent; reunion volunteer; treasurer; reunion gift caller. Senior project manager, Center for

Creative Leadership, Global Initiatives Group, Greensboro, N.C. Jill M. Brethauer ’70, Nominating Committee Chair, Gibsonia, Pa. Alumnae Association board clerk; Nominating Committee member; executive director, Search Committee; Finance Committee. Class agent; reunion gift caller; Mary Lyon Society class chair. Volunteer Naomi Friedman Lindower ’84, Glastonbury, Conn. Class president; reunion chair; class nominating chair; reunion gift caller; class agent; Mid-Atlantic Club young alumnae chair; NYC special gift phonathon. Homemaker and volunteer Alumnae Association Committee Members

Alumnae Relations Committee Lois Dinsmore Meyer ’71, Madison, N.J. Past Nominating Committee chair, treasurer and recording secretary for Northern New Jersey Club. MS, computer science. Programmer at

Alumnae Association Research Committee

Kathleen Egan Norton ’83, South Hadley, Mass. Assistant director, collection development, MHC library Alumnae Quarterly Committee Charlotte M. Overby ’87, Ventura, Calif. M.A. journalism, University of Missouri. Currently print production coordinator, creative services, Patagonia Inc. Former freelance writer/editor with focus on natural history, science, and environmental journalism Hannah M. Wallace ’95, Brooklyn, N.Y. Freelance writer with focus on travel, alternative medicine, nutrition trends, and book reviews. Former associate editor at Travel + Leisure, former assistant to literary agent Phyllis Wender, interned at Ms. magazine Clubs Committee

coordinator, alumnae admissions representative; Dallas-Fort Worth Club alumnae admissions representative; Genesee Valley Club vice president, public relations representative, alumnae admissions representative; Lancaster-Harrisburg Club vice president and program chair. MBA in marketing from University of Rochester William E Simon School of Business Administration. Director of marketing, IP Unity

alumnaematters

Nominees for Alumnae Association Directors and Committee Members

Nomination of Alumnae Trustees/Awards Committee Ann Kotting Sadowsky ’63, Stamford, Conn. Past class president; class agent; cornerstone representative; reunion gift caller; Nominating Committee chair; Alumnae Association Program Committee member. Fairfield Club book group coordinator, Nominating Committee chair, membership chair, Ways and Means Committee member, newsletter editor. Chicago Club president, second vice president, program chair. medal of honor recipient. CER health administration, George Washington University; MPA in public administration, Syracuse University. Consultant, health care; former administrator, Stamford Housing Authority

Jerrienne Barrett ’83, San Jose, Calif. Peninsula Club president, secretary, newsletter, book group Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

Clubs Corner The Mount Holyoke Club of Central Maine will hold its annual luncheon and business meeting on June 23 at the Down-East Village Restaurant in Yarmouth. The annual picnic will be August 4, and the sendoff to Maine students is scheduled for August 23. Diving into the college’s historical memories, Associate Professor of Sociology and Gender Studies Eleanor R. Townsley spoke to the Mount Holyoke Club of Northern New Jersey. Her talk was titled “The Memory and Promise of Mount Holyoke: Notes from the Archives.” The Mount Holyoke Club of Milwaukee enjoyed a potluck, discussing the atmosphere and current character

of the college with Joan Cocks, professor of politics, at the Miller Inn. Ushering in 2007, the Mount Holyoke Club of New York held a wine tasting at Moore Brothers Wine Company. Members and guests enjoyed light sandwiches, cheese, and charcuterie. Members of the Mount Holyoke Club of DallasFort Worth book club read and discussed Ian McEwan’s novel, Saturday, heralded by the New York Times as an “up-tothe-moment, post-9/11 variation on Virginia Woolf ’s Mrs. Dalloway.” World-renowned artist and Mount Holyoke alumna Jane Hammond ’72 gave a tour of an exhibit of her works on paper to the Mount Holyoke Club of Southern Arizona at the Tucson Museum of Art. In honor of Mary Lyon’s birthday, the Mount Holyoke Club of Chicago held a Mary

Lyon potluck brunch. Combining architecture, art, networking, and desserts, the Mount Holyoke Club of Southern California gathered at the Getty Center in Los Angeles for tours of the gardens, architecture, and artwork. The Mount Holyoke Club of Fairfield Villages hosted a talk by Ellen Perrella, senior lecturer in physical education and athletics, titled “Separating Fat from Fiction: The Truth about Obesity, Exercise, and Diets.” The Mount Holyoke Club of Genesee Valley gathered for a performance of Wendy Wasserstein’s The Heidi Chronicles put on by the Nazareth College Theater Department. Lindsay Reading Korth ’78, a professor of theater at the local college, led a pretheater discussion. The Mount Holyoke Club of Boston enjoyed

an elegant English tea at the Four Seasons Hotel in March. Scones were served with clotted cream and homemade preserves. Members of the Mount Holyoke Club of the Greater Palm Beaches celebrated Mary Lyon’s birthday at a cocktail party in March. Guest speaker was Barbara McClearn Baumann ’77, who chairs the college’s Finance Committee. Barbara Dallinger Crowell ’64, a family court judge, spoke about her work with young women at risk at the winter meeting of the Mount Holyoke Club of Delaware. The Alumnae Association supports more than ninety clubs and informal and affiliate groups around the world. Contact Assistant Director of Clubs Krysia Villón ’96 at kvillion@ mtholyoke.edu or 413-538-2738 with club-related questions, ideas, comments, and brief overviews of activities for possible inclusion in this section.

Help Us Update Your Bio Information

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Watch your in-box: in early summer, you’ll receive a questionnaire from our alumnae directory publisher, Harris Connect, asking for updates about you. If you have moved, changed jobs, had a baby, or have been promoted—or even if things are exactly the same—please let us know by completing the questionnaire. We’re preparing now for the next alumnae directory, which will be published (in book form and online) in 2008. We’re also converting to a new, more advanced data system, so when you send that questionnaire, you help us make sure that your alumnae information is 100 percent correct.

Fiction

offtheshelf The Messy Self By Jennifer Rosner (Paradigm Publishers) This edited volume of essays, poems, plays, and short stories challenges the idea of a coherent, harmonious self and offers a diversity of perspectives on creativity, love, and understanding. Originally published as a special edition of The Massachusetts Review, the book includes a previously unpublished play by Wendy Wasserstein ’71, who died in 2006. Psyche in Love is examined in a prologue by Jane Crosthwaite, MHC professor of religion. “I chose to read it through a certain kind of ethical lens that saw how Wendy had collapsed time and different eras, had worried about the fickleness and constancy of life and love, and had used her insightful wit to suggest that we could live without confusion and without strictly imposed absolutes,” writes Crosthwaite. “Wendy’s death has left us all bereft and lost without her good humor—that is, her use of humor for our common ‘goodness.’” 365 Days/365 Plays By Suzan-Lori Parks ’85 (Theatre Communications Group) On November 13, 2002, Suzan-Lori Parks got an idea to write a play every day for a year. She began that very day, and the result is an extraordinary testament to artistic commitment. This collection of 365 impeccably crafted pieces, each with its own distinctive characters and dramatic power, is a complete work by an artist responding to her own world, each and every day. Suzan-Lori Parks is a playwright, screenwriter, songwriter, and novelist. In 2002 she became the first African American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for drama with her play Topdog/ Underdog. Her other plays include In the Blood (2000 Pulitzer nominee), Venus (Obie award) and Imperceptible Mutabilities in the Third Kingdom (Obie award, best new American play).

Jennifer Rosner is a Five College associate and has published numerous articles on the self in academic journals. She has taught philosophy at MHC. That Girl Lucy Moon By Amy Richardson Timberlake ’89 (Hyperion Books for Children) Lucy Moon is the kind of girl who loudly supports animal rights—during hunting season. She wears a woven hat made of hemp in support of thirdworld workers. Lucy Moon is the kind of girl who spots injustice and isn’t afraid to fight it. So when classmates land a trip to the police station for sledding on Wiggins Hill and the local paper refuses to report it, Lucy takes up the battle. Ms. Wiggins, the town’s wealthiest resident, and owner of Wiggins Hill, becomes Lucy’s most formidable adversary. Soon, Lucy is embroiled in a battle for justice that leaves her wondering whether the struggle is worth it, and whether one person can really make a difference. Amy Richardson Timberlake won the Golden Kite Award for her picture book The Dirty Cowboy. She has worked as a book reviewer and columnist, a children’s bookseller, a book-event coordinator, and as the public information officer at the Virginia Commission for the Arts. That Girl Lucy Moon is her first novel.

Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

D yad : P et rie Museum of Egy pt i an A rch aeolo gy, Un iver sit y College L on d on

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Egypt Comes to MHC Excavating Egypt: Great Discoveries from the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, University College, London will be on display through July 22 at the MHC Art Museum. The exhibition traces the development of Egyptian archaeology from its beginnings in the 1880s to the present day through spectacular artwork and rare archival materials. Ancient Egyptian dyad (late 18th dynasty)

The SummerMath Program

Boston Vespers Save this date: Friday, December 7, 2007, 8 p.m., for the Christmas Vespers concert at Old South Church, Boston. For information, contact Cerise Jalelian Keim ’81 at clarkkent128@ comcast.net.

Considering Applying to Medical School?

Each July fifty to sixty high school girls from across the country come to Mount Holyoke College for four weeks to open their minds to mathematics, computer programming, and a college environment. Do you have a daughter or friend of high school age who would like to spend a month with a diverse group of academically motivated students at Mount Holyoke? Please visit www.mtholyoke.edu/proj/summermath to learn more, or contact the directors, Charlene and James Morrow, at 413-538-2608 or summermath@mtholyoke.edu. The 2007 program will be held July 1–28.

MHC alumnae who think they may apply to medical school in 2007 (for 2008 admission) are strongly urged to contact the Career Development Center by the end of April for crucial information. Help us to help you put together the best application possible! E-mail Dr. David Gardner, assistant director for prehealth and science advising, at dgardner@mtholyoke.edu.

The SEARCH Program

Docents Wanted The Mount Holyoke College Art Museum welcomes alumnae to join its dynamic team of museum interpreters. Volunteer docents receive rigorous training and learn to give tours both of the museum’s permanent collection and of special exhibitions. Other perks of the job include free lectures, social opportunities, and field trips to regional museums. Some background in art history is a plus. For more information, contact Jane Gronau at 413538-2085 or jgronau@mtholyoke.edu.

MHC is recruiting students for Summer Explorations and Research Collaborations for High School Girls (SEARCH), a four-week program on campus. We encourage girls who have a sense of curiosity and adventure about mathematics to apply. Students will explore exciting topics outside the usual high school curriculum. Do you have a daughter or friend who would like to find out what is exciting about mathematics? Please visit www. myholyoke.edu/proj/search to learn more or contact the directors, Charlene and James Morrow, at 413-538-2608 or search@ mtholyoke.edu. The 2007 program will be held July 1–28.

Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly

Spring 2007

DVD From Offshore Outsourcing Conference Available In March 2006, MHC’s McCulloch Center for Global Initiatives hosted a conference with international experts examining who wins and loses from offshore outsourcing and the policies that are needed to harness globalization for the benefit of all. To order a DVD that includes edited versions of the conference presentations, send $12 per DVD (make checks out to Mount Holyoke College) to Jennifer Medina, Center for Global Initiatives, Mount Holyoke College, S. Hadley, MA 01075 USA. For more information, go to www.mtholyoke. edu/acad/programs/global/conferences/2006conf_dvd.html.

Educational Travel Opportunities sponsored by the Alumnae Association

Athenian Acropolis (Aegean Odyssey trip)

Les Andelys (Village Life Along the Seine trip)

See What Our Travelers Saw Relive past alumnae trips or experience them for the first time! Photographs of past alumnae trips are available at our Web site, www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu. (Click on “Experience Virtual Café” and then the photo gallery.) There you’ll find dozens of pictures of Australia and New Zealand, the Italian Lake District, and Russia. Aegean Odyssey: The Greek Isles and Turkey July 8–18, 2007—Accompanied by Faith Dillon Hentschel ’65, a professor of classical archaeology and art history On this trip we travel aboard the elegant Sea Cloud from Athens to Istanbul. We focus on the Acropolis and Piraeus in Athens before sailing for beautiful Santorini, the important archaeological site of Delos, and Patmos, once home of St. John the evangelist. In Turkey, visit the ancient sites of Ephesus and Pergamum. There is an optional twonight stay in Istanbul at the end of the trip. Celtic Lands August 10–20, 2007 Cruise for ten nights aboard the deluxe Andrea from the beaches of Normandy

and historic Mont-Saint-Michel in France across the English Channel to magical Cornwall and on to Cork, Dublin, and North Wales. We then visit Scotland’s Iona, Isle of Skye in the Inner Hebrides, and Kirkney in the Orkney Islands. There is an optional two-night stay in Edinburgh following the trip. Village Life Along the Seine October 5–13, 2007 Enjoy a memorable seven-night cruise along the Seine River combining the scenic countryside of Normandy with its great historic and artistic heritage. We embark on the MV Cezanne in Paris and visit Rouen, the D-Day landing beaches, Monet’s house and gardens in Giverny, and the Maison van Gogh in Auvers-surOise.

The Janet Tuttle Alumnae and Student Service Travel Program Check our Web site, www.alumnae. mtholyoke.edu, for details about future trips. INTERESTED? For more information on Association-sponsored travel, please contact the Alumnae Association at 413-538-2300 or alumnaeassociation@ mtholyoke.edu.

Contact Mont-Saint-Michel (Celtic Lands trip)

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This column carries announcements of services and events sponsored by and benefiting Mount Holyoke College, the Alumnae Association, and its subsidiary groups. Club and class products are published in each fall’s issue, and are always available online at alumnae.mtholyoke.edu. To submit information for Bulletin Board, contact Mieke H. Bomann (413-538-3159; mbomann@mtholyoke.edu).

From MHC

to the deep blue sea Meet future marine conservation attorney Jennifer Mehaffey ’04, winner of the 2004 Mary E. Woolley Award for graduate study in public-interest law. “The Mary E. Woolley Award changed my life. It gave me both the financial resources and the confidence to pursue my dream of becoming a public-interest lawyer. I’m now a Sea Grant Law Fellow in my third year of law school at Roger Williams University. I’m also close to completing a master’s in marine affairs. “Growing up, I never dreamed that someday I’d be writing environmental law reports to present to Congress. My goal is a career in international maritime law. I want to use my education to help draft laws for the good of the oceans, and the people who use them.”

For more than seventy years, the Mary E. Woolley Award has helped Mount Holyoke alumnae begin brilliant careers. But the award wouldn’t be possible without the Founder’s Fund. The Founder’s Fund—the endowment fund of the independent Alumnae Association—supports postgraduate work from law school to language study, business to biology. Please give generously to the Founder’s Fund, and help launch a talented alumna into the world beyond the gates. Your gift may change not only a life, but also an ocean or two. To make a gift to the Founder’s Fund, visit our Web site at www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu, or write a check to the Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College, Mary E. Woolley Hall, 50 College Street, South Hadley, MA 01075. Mou n t Ho lyo k e Al u m na e Qua r t e r ly Spring 2007 Photo by Paul Schnaittacher

From MHC

As a day student, I longed for the social, cultural, and academic connections others enjoyed at night, when I was not in South Hadley. One golden semester, I actually got to room on campus, on the French floor of Ham Hall. Heading for the lights of that tall slice of brick each evening, seeing the water and sky beyond it, and knowing that both good work and good company awaited, virtually defined contentment. The darkness embraced me in an invisible but inviolable communityâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;one of the truest meanings of "home" I know.

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Anne W. Jackson '72