St. Andrews By The Lake - August 2016

AUGUST 2016

Remembering Dr. Alexander 4

Black Mountain College Festival 10

Riding into my Purpose 14 Photo by Rooney Coffman

“The only time I feel alive is when I’m painting.”

-Vincent Van Gogh

Our alumni certainly had a lively time painting around campus:

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When Alumni Council met in February, members Bekah Webster '15 and Mike Cody ’92 hatched a plan to gather a group of volunteers to paint the Center for Academic Success (CAS), located in Pate Hall (formerly Kings Mountain.) The Center serves to support the University's educational programs by providing resources and services to assist students in developing their academic potential.

It's a place for quiet study for individuals and small groups. The Office of Disabilities Services is also housed there.

On hand that Saturday morning to paint the CAS were Mike Cody '92, his wife, Ruth, and their son.

Both Robin Lea ’83 and Bekah Webster ‘15 from the CAS were on hand, as well as Allen Johnson '92, Michael Iannuzzi '15, and his sister Sophie Iannuzzi '17. In addition, friends of St. Andrews Gail Troost and Larry Horne donated a leather sofa and a chair, respectively. With a generous donation from Mike Cody, counter stools and other equipment were purchased to create more study-friendly areas.

When photos of the project turned up on Facebook, a whole slew of alumni volunteered to pitch in for the next project: painting the Admissions Office during Alumni Weekend. On Saturday morning of Alumni Weekend, myriad alumni turned out in the LA Building to help paint the various offices in the Admissions area. They included Wally Mann ‘91, Charles Young ‘93, Allen

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Johnson '92, Lee Martin ‘93, Lisa Gaw-Chenausky '90, Susan Walmsley Hyams '95, Catherine Holsopple Hengstenberg ‘93, Kaille Padgett ‘93, Katherine “Cup” Clark '92, Doug Calhoun ‘95, Jane Karpenske Bockhart ‘91, Wendy Harris ‘93, Kelly Walling ‘92,

It’s always a good time to GIVE!

Lane Moore '91,Tom White '69, Brandon Rowe ‘94, Marina Lail Kelly '91, William McLean '94, Joey Schnople ‘94, and Mike Cody ’92 (and yes, we know—alumni from the ‘90s rock!)

Eleven gallons of paint later, the office walls in Admissions all had fresh coats of paint, and the alumni volunteers were ready to play some volleyball. Cup Clark and friends provided additional sand and a net on Granville Beach. And it didn't hurt that Mike Cody brought his beer truck!

Moss ‘13, Michelle Eld ’15, Samantha Taylor ‘15 and Scott Carter tackled painting the Registrar’s Office as part of their Innovations class project.

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At the Heart o D REMEMBERING

Dr. William M. Alexander, beloved retired Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and Religion, and one of the original “inventors” of St. Andrews, died June 9, 2016. Dr. Alexander was the Commencement speaker for the graduating class of 1997. He gave the following speech. Having heard parts of it quoted at his memorial service in June, we were intrigued and went into the archives to read it in its entirety.

“The Fragility of the Intellectual Life”

I start with several odd propositions: 1. You are outnumbered. You are a very small percentage of people on this planet who have had the opportunity of an education in the sciences, arts and humanities. Even more rarely, you have developed a critical and inquiring mentality which is frightfully out of sorts with most of the populations and cultures of the world.

2. You are not wanted. You are not appreciated.

Nobody is likely to be interested in your real opinions.

It is likely that nobody is hiring you as an intellectual.

Dr. Phil Barrineau has no file folder on intellectual jobs!

Nobody is asking you to raise questions that are “out of bounds,” that are not job-related, that have no cash value. The world does not want you as an intellectual.

The part of you that is wanted is the part that can do a job or exhibit skills useful to somebody to make money for the company. Smart employees know this and suppress undesirable, unwanted thinking and embarrassing questions. Smart women know this about the male world and play dumb. Smart kids know this in school and act as though they don’t know the answers.

The intellectual life survives in a fragile environment.

3. You are starved. As an intellectual you are starved by your culture. To put it another way, there is no money in it. You are an unnecessary fringe of culture. It has not been demonstrated yet that most cultures need intellectuals. The intellectual life must be 4

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subsidized, principally out of your own spare time and energy, out of your own pocket. It is likely to get the leftovers in your life.

The intellectual life is fragile and survives in a dangerous environment. It has always been so.

Speaking of fragility, “A human life is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature; but a human is a thinking reed. The entire universe need not arm itself to crush this human.

A vapor, a drop of water suffices…All our dignity consists in thought. By it we must elevate ourselves…”

This is Blaise Pascal, seventeenth-century mathematician, religious thinker and philosopher. This is thesame Pascal who invented one of the first machines leading to the modern computer. It is no accident that a computer language is named for him. When he says “The entire universe need not arm itself to crush this human. A vapor, a drop of water suffices…” we might add that a microscopic malaria protozoan also suffices…

So life, and the intellect with it, is fragile. Then there is the fragility of species. Many are endangered!

Many we are losing every year, every month. The envelope that shelters life on our little planet we are finding out is also very fragile. Abuse and stupidity have consequences. We cannot ignore the connection between our thinking and our life.

Then there is the fragility of the conditions of evolution itself. Cultural evolution rests of biological evolution, biological evolution rests on the evolution of planetary systems (and it can’t be just any old kind of planet which will sustain life), planetary systems evolve from the evolution of stars, etc. (“The leg bone is connected to the thigh bone….”etc.)

How did the stellar universe evolve? Contemporary astrophysicists now talk of a series of unusual and fragile conditions, any of which could fail to materialize and thus make impossible the evolution of life and intelligence. We are the result of an extremely unlikely set of events. As the astronomer Fred Hoyle

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of It All

ALEXANDER put it,

“A common sense interpretation of the facts suggest that a super intellect has monkeyed with the physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature.”

To the Polish cosmologist and astrophysicist Marek Demiansky, “Somebody had to tune it very precisely.”

Likewise, George Wald,

Harvard biochemist and Nobel Prize winner, referring to life as a precarious development in the universe, comments that “it is as though Nature were trying to tell us something almost to shake us into listening.” From another perspective, “the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows God’s handiwork.” (Ps. 19:1.)

Science as a theoretical enterprise

(not technology) is unusual, rare and quit fragile, if we are looking at all the cultures throughout human existence on earth. Science does not start up everywhere. It begins apparently on the Aegean coast in several Hellenic cities about six hundred years B.C.E. Not surprisingly, this was a crossroads of trade, culture and ideas. Here begins the long and tenuous journey which eventuates in quantum mechanics, in molecular biology, in sum, in all the modern and natural and

social sciences. Mesopotamia and Egypt, India, China and the Islamic world also made their contributions.

Just as fragile, and a part of the same journey, is freedom of expression, freedom to think, freedom to create, paint, sculpt, dance, compose, write. Just as rare in human affairs, and a part of the same journey, is democratic government, due process, a bill of rights, the end of slavery and discrimination, the rights of women and children, the end of oppression of sexual minorities.

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The sciences had a delicate and fragile beginning. Even today, contrary to popular opinion and media attention, science may have only fragile support.

Anti-intellectualism, including antipathy to scientific inquiry, is always just beneath the surface. The North Carolina legislature is even now considering laws which would dictate what can be taught as science and as biology. Religious fundamentalism and other kinds of dogmatism are making a resurgence world-wide. Most people are dominated by myth or religion. This does not mean that everyone who lives by myth or religion is anti-intellectual. It does not mean that myth and religion are anti-scientific or anti-intellectual. Quite the contrary. They are essential to the development of the intellectual.

The Church recognizes this essentiality in giving birth to universities. The Church is the origin of higher education. The Church established St. Andrews in the belief that the intellectual life is important in the Church’s mission.

However, the intellectual exists in a fragile environment. In a recent New York Times article on the arts and leisure, it was pointed out that most Americans like a fake world much more than a real world. One has only to think of television and “virtual reality.” Quite often what should be the solution is part of the problem. All the major religions have a poor record on exposing fakery, illusions and prejudices, a poor record on social and economic justice. Religion is conservative, slow-moving and very slow to update or change.

It is a fragile environment for the intellectual life.

But there is a bright side. All major religions have an intellectual side; each can boast an enlightened elite, a class of thinkers who are outposts of intellectual life which will hold high the torches of learning. These are our theologians, teachers, scholars, our religion schools and religion departments. They are the equal of intellectuals anywhere and they make impossible a blanket of dismissal of religious ideals, values and tradition.

To mention only one tradition, it is impressive that all 6

St. Andrews by the Lake Alumni Magazine

humankind know of a God who demands justice for the poor, the outcaste, the marginalized, the oppressed, the discriminated against, has come virtually from one source, the prophets of ancient Israel. Not even the smartest intellectuals came up with this!

All in all, it’s a mixed bag. It’s ambiguous, like history, like real life.

All in all, it is a fragile environment out there. So what’s there to do?

Maintain and support and nurture fragile systems.

1. Nurture your mother! (This includes both parents and all your family.) Return the favor. They have sacrificed for you. Show your thanks.

2. Nurture your mother! Mother church. In Calvin’s language, “Holy Mother Church,” or your synagogue or temple or mosque. Now that you have grown up, you don’t have to act like an adolescent any more. You don’t have to reject your parents or your church.

3. Nurture your mother, your other mother, your alma mater! Send checks often! Visit! Lend support! If the intellectual life is not fostered in your college, where will it be supported? This is our unique excuse. Other activities are important: preparation for career, community service, sports, socializing, recreation, fun. But this is our unique excuse for existence.

4. And as my colleagues Carl Walters and Skip Clark remind me, do not forget Mother Earth! Nurture the earth, our home, and care for her.

So, find causes, agencies, groups, churches that nurture the fragile and support them!

Don’t allow your intellectual life to get snuffed out. Nor your spiritual life. Nor your moral sensitivities.

Nor your hopes, your faith, your love. Nor your creativity. Nor your sense of justice.

The most fragile things in the universe are the most valuable. Like a friend, or a mate, or a loved one.

Or an animal friend, or a flower. Or a child. Or as Luther put it, the good news of the vulnerable and fragile Savior. Don’t lose it!

Alumni and Friends Remember

Carol White Wood ’69 noted, “His intellectual brilliance was only more lovely because of his humor and his big, big heart.”

“I came to my first year at St. Andrews in a body cast. It was hard, very hard. But Bill Alexander took the time to get to know me and encouraged me. And I never had him as a professor that first year,” Douglas Dalton ’84 said.

Nick Mitchell ’98 said “He didn't just teach you, he listened and engaged you. He attended every home basketball game during my time as a player at SA. I would always look forward to receiving the Laurinburg Exchange sports section in my mailbox from Dr. A if my name or picture was in it. He would always leave a little note on it to let you know he was there in person.”

As a well-respected academic, Dr. Alexander knew what was what. (In fact, one of his take-home tests in a Greek philosophy course featuring Heraclitus was to answer the simple question “What is what is?”) As Ben Irvin ’75, who taught Chemistry at SA in the 1980s recalls, “Whatever the faculty issue of the day was, when we were ready to let it rest Bill would say, ‘OK, now let’s get to the serious stuff’—by which he meant scheduling our next racquetball bout.”

Mary McDonald ‘79 notes, “When Dr. Alexander left his teaching position at St. Andrews during 2014 due to health issues, his office was left untouched.

It was as if he walked out the door one day and never returned to get anything from it. This is believed to be his original office when the college opened (1961), located in LA- A21. The office was piled to the ceiling on every wall with an estimated 7500 books he had purchased over the years (and some he wrote himself ).

“Bill kept everything, and this included tiny notes and pieces of papers from students who dropped by, postcards, letters, and many cartoons he cut out. His door was plastered on both sides with bumper stickers, cartoons, decals, slogans – many philosophical, political, religious, and hilarious in nature.

“Working together with Dr. David Herr ‘91, Chair of HFA and staff we packed all the books and moved the book shelves to the Vardell Building in the corner conference room. About 35 newer books were added to the Library’s collection. Bill had talked with me for years about wanting his collection of books to be accessible to undergraduates because they represent a wide range of important texts including all the interdisciplinary subjects important to a strong Liberal Arts education. The original Christianity and Culture program brought together the world’s great thinkers and writers, and Bill had read and taught most of them. He came to St. Andrews before it opened to help plan this groundbreaking curriculum.

“It has taken over a year to process all the materials. The two boxes of files represent the life and work of one of St. Andrews founding fathers, and an outstanding teacher and true scholar. He was a man of great intellect who could transmit that love of knowledge and thinking to students for decades. He was quirky and funny, rambling, and always ready to question policies and procedures. He was dedicated to St. Andrews and spent his career here when he could have moved on to bigger places. Bill Alexander was one of a kind. His contributions to this university will be a lasting legacy.”

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Andrews alumni in the 86- St.Triangle Area have been meeting for lunch on the first 95 Friday of the month (except on holiday weekends) at Cantina 18 in Raleigh. Pictured left to right at their gathering in July are: Rebecca Harvard Barnes, Debora Degnan O’Neill, Katherine Clark, Marina Lail Kelly, Kathleen Franklin Griffin, Doug Calhoun, Laurie Nederveen, Adam Breakey and Stormy Ingold.

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David Henderson and his wife Susan have retired and moved to a CCRC in Hanover, NH. Both of their children have married this year. The Hendersons remain professionaly active, doing workshops at various campuses for faculty using simulation games to teach science and public policy.

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Diane Hogg Flynt was recently featured in a Wine Enthusiast article on winemakers in Virginia. Diane grows heirloom varieties of apples to produce a world-class cider, “reviving a beverage that was an integral part of colonial America.”

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A collection of the work of Atlanta-based photographer Billy Howard, from his “Epitaphs for the Living: Words and Images in the Time of AIDS” is now open at Emory University’s Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives and Rare Books Library. An exhibit from the same series is planned for 2017 at Emory’s Robert W. Woodruff Library.

Barnhardt Hatling 78- Lee and Yvonne Mason surprised Susan Russell 79 in Raleigh in late July. Susan,

who is a theater professor at Penn State University, had a role in the Kennedy Theater’s production of “Steel Magnolias,” and Lee and Yvonne were in the audience.

Susan said it was the first time she had been on stage since 2002, when she appeared in “Phantom of the Opera.”

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Nathalie Christophe Martin has retired from GlaxoSmithKline after 23 years and has recently started her own business, Martin Medical Writing and Consulting, LLC. Nathalie has been a key support of the St. Andrews Coffman Fund for the past several years and helped it reach endowment status.

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Amy Tripson is living in South Korea and working for the Korean Racing Authority, LetsRun Park near Seoul. She is both a Therapeutic Riding Coach and adviser for the development of their Therapeutic Riding program. She has been working closely with PATH International as well as other instructors in the industry to brainstorm ways to instill industry standards, including safety and horse welfare, into their therapeutic riding program. Amy says, “I am excited to have found a niche in the therapeutic riding industry which allows me to work with centers from a programming, teaching and administrative side, all of which I really enjoy. I am excited to continue my work here in Korea and look forward to more learning and adapting along the

SAU Calendar

For a complete list of events visit www.sa.edu/events

August 17, 2016

December 2, 2016

Every 1st Friday

New Student Orientation

Last Day of Classes

August 22, 2016

December 5, 2016

Triangle Area alumni group meet at Cantina 18 in Raleigh for lunch. Except on holiday weekends. (September meet on the 16th)

Classes begin (Sandhills & Night)

August 23, 2016 Classes begin (Lbg. Campus)

August 26, 2016 Black Mountain College Festival Begins. View pages 10 & 11 for more information.

September 9, 2016

Exam week begins.

January 9-10, 2017 Orientation

January 10, 2017 First Day of Classes (Sandhills)

January 11, 2017 First Day of Classes (Lbg. Campus)

Science Call Out Avinger Auditorium

March 4-12, 2017

October 1, 2016

March 18, 2017

Scotland County Highland Games. At the John Blue House. www.schgnc.org

October 1, 2016 Fall Open House

October 8-9, 2016

Spring Break

KNIGHT Life Day

March 25, 2017 Science Olympiad

April 1, 2017 April 7-9, 2017

October 6-9, 2016

April 14-17, 2017

October 14-15, 2016 Equestrian Scholarship Weekend

October 25, 2016 McNair Lecture (RSVP)

November 23-27, 2016 Thanksgiving Break

Offering new items for purchase including sportswear, books, sundries and so much more. Visit on campus or online at www.standrewsgear.com.

Store Manager, Sarah Wilmoss 561-312-1147 | 1553mgr@follett.com

Spring Open House

John Blue Cotton Festival www.johnbluecottonfestival.com

Fall Break

New Campus Bookstore and Online Store

Alumni Weekend - go ahead and mark your calendars.

Easter Break

April 29, 2017 Exam Week begins

May 5, 2017 Baccalaureate

May 6, 2017 Commencement AUGUST 2016

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St. Andrews to Revive

BLACK MOUNTAIN

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Over the course of the fall semester, St. Andrews will recapture the halcyon days of a long-closed institution of higher learning as it reprises its 1974 Black Mountain College Festival.

The festival will begin on Aug. 26, with multiple events — featuring more than 30 artists, poets, scholars, musicians, dancers, and inventors — scheduled most weeks until it closes on Nov. 19. All events, performances, and presentations will be free and open to the public.

Black Mountain College opened in 1933 near Asheville. Its founder, John A. Rice, had left Rollins College in Florida to establish a college that placed the study of art at the center of liberal arts education.The college attracted as guest lecturers the likes of Albert Einstein and Aldous Huxley, and became identified with German expatriates and the Bauhaus movement.

“It was an arts-centered college, so that artists taught how to paint, musicians taught how to play an instrument, and poets taught how to write poetry, which today seems normal but then it was not,” said festival co-host Ted Wojtasik, a member of St. Andrews liberal and creative arts faculty.

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“It was really apprenticeship for the arts and mentorship for aspiring students. They didn’t have grades, they didn’t have tests, it was sort of a process school.”

Black Mountain College closed in 1956, and a single building now used for a summer camp is all that remains of its physical campus. But its legacy is alive and well.

“It was a short thing but it just had this tremendous impact on the arts,” said Wojtasik.

Its alumni include Bollingen Prize-winning poet Robert Creeley, artist Josef Albers, composer and pioneer inmusic theory John Cage, National Medal of Arts recipient dancer Merce Cunningham, and inventor and architect Buckminster Fuller — all of whom contributed to St. Andrews’ original Black Mountain College Festival in 1974.

On that occasion, Fuller, who was later presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Ronald Reagan, created a geodesic dome, for which he became famous, on the St. Andrews campus.

St. Andrews recently introduced a Black Mountain College Scholarship for students, and will use this fall’s semester-long festival to revisit the college’s principles and highlight St. Andrews as a spiritual successor.

The festival will include three art exhibitions in the Vardell Art Gallery: Jonathan Williams’ Outsider Art Work from Aug. 26-Sept. 23, Photographs and Tapestries of Dobree Adams with poems by Jonathan Greene from Sept. 30-Oct. 21, and Basil King Art Work from Oct. 28-Nov. 19.

There will also be six performances given by Douglas Dunn and Dancers and Helen Simoneau

COLLEGE FESTIVAL Danse, in addition to a full roster of poetry and prose readings, musical performances, discussion panels,

and lectures.

“Guests were chosen in that they had some type of influence by the Black Mountain College spirit, either directly or indirectly, and then we have some historical figures,” said Wojtasik.

“The original 1974 festival happened over two months and it was every weekend or every other weekend. Just through the excitement of inviting people and people wanting to be part of the festival we filled it up rather quickly over the entire fall semester.”

A full schedule of events and presenters will be available in the events listing on the www.sa.edu/events website. - This article originally published in the Laurinburg Exchange.

August 26 in Vardell at 6 p.m.: The first event of the BMCF 2016: a panel discussion by former North Carolina poet laureate Joseph Bathanti and Black Mountain College scholar Mary Emma Harris on “BMC: Its History and Its Influence.” There will also be the opening of the first art exhibition called Jonathan Williams’ Outsider Art: Way-Out People Way Out There, curated by Tom Patterson.

Joseph Bathanti is a poet, a writer, a scholar, and a professor at Appalachian State University who has written essays about BMC. He also was our North Carolina Poet Laureate from 2012-2014.

Mary Emma Harris is an independent scholar and a writer who is considered one of the best-regarded scholars on BMC. Her most recent work is The Arts at Black Mountain College (2002).

The two will discuss and answer questions about BMC. Jonathan Williams, a poet, critic, editor, and photographer, dropped out of Princeton University to study at BMC in the early 1950s.

He founded Jargon Press in 1951 to publish the work of poets “outside” the usual high-profile poetic circles.

Tom Patterson ‘74 has organized group and solo exhibitions for institutions including the American Visionary Art Museum (Baltimore), the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, Virginia Commonwealth University’s Anderson Gallery, and the Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning (Queens, NY), to name a few. He is also the author of several color-illustrated books: Howard Finster: Stranger from Another World, St. EOM in The Land of Pasaquan, and Contemporary Folk Art: Treasures from the Smithsonian American Art Museum. His latest book is the catalog for the exhibition Farfetched: Mad Science, Fringe Architecture and Visionary Engineering, which he co-curated with Roger Manley in 2013 at N.C. State University’s Gregg Museum of Art & Design in Raleigh, North Carolina.

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Verhey Appointed Dean of Students President Paul Baldasare has announced that the Rev. Dr. Tim Verhey, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, will serve as Dean of Students at St. Andrews for the upcoming academic year. Tim will continue to teach the fall, with a reduced load of two courses. A search committee will be formed this fall to find a new Dean of Students to take Tim’s place at the end of the upcoming school year.

Tim brings to the Dean of Students position administrative experience from his work at Davidson College and from his leadership over the past few years implementing our vocational discernment grants from the Council for Independent Colleges’NetVUE program.

Tim’s appointment will enable Glenn Batten to focus exclusively on his work serving as St. Andrews Vice President for Administration and Athletic Director.

Record Breaking Post Special thanks to Rob Freeman, Jr. ‘90 and the use of his drone in gathering the beautiful aerial views of our campus. After compiling all of the footage and posting to our social media outlets, we have organically reached over 82,000 people and had over 33,000 views. Thanks for the 529 of you who shared our post to help us reach this many people!

The video can be viewed on YouTube and Facebook: https://youtu.be/KZBiFjwzMtg OR https://www.facebook.com/StAndrewsUniversity/videos/10154233536836422/

Black Mountain Scholars Travel to Black Mountain

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Black Mountain Scholars this semester traveled to Black Mountain, NC, where they visted the two campuses of the college, researched college papers in the NC Western Regional Archives, and engaged in experimental learning, reminiscent of the old Black Mountain College days.

While there, they also visited the Asheville Art Museum, viewed the Mural of Knowledge at the Lake Eden campus, and held class with former NC poet laureate and SA faculty member Joseph Bathanti on the porch of Lee Hall - the first BMC campus. Students included: Jeb Forehand, Darrien Bailey, Matteo Polimeno, Alex Varisco, Dakota Harsany, Erica Curtis, Danae Mokma, Sarah Morris, and Steven Dennis. The students were accompanied by Dr. David Herr and Prof. Tanner Capps.

WHAT’S HAPPENING AROUND CAMPUS? MJ SCIENCE BUILDING Morgan-Jones Science Center is getting a new roof thanks to

the Cannon Foundation’s $150,000 grant and the generous $10,000 donation for materials by Barnhardt Manufacturing Company of Charlotte. The work is being completed by ACI Systems, Inc. In addition to this project, ACI Systems will also repair the coverings above the walkways leading to MJ and a small portion of the roof in the PE Building.

FOOTBALL PRACTICE FIELD The groundbreaking is underway for the new football practice field. It is located beside the softball field. Coaches have already recruited 58 new students for this fall semester and we are poised to have a record-breaking number of first-year students in the fall.

DORM & CLASSROOM UPDATES

Some classrooms in Vardell and the Liberal Arts building have been updated with fresh paint, new flooring and new projectors. Also, Albemarle is being renovated. Expect newly painted rooms, updated celing tiles, flooring, bathrooms and new furniture in the common area.

Belk Main Lounge also received an update! Thanks to an anonymous donor we have a new motorized screen. The project was spearheaded by Tom Waage, who also donated the projector for the screen. The last stage will be to add speakers once funding is solidified.

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Riding Purpose into my

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Embracing entrepreneurship as a young African American professional in a town of well-known equestrian “legends” has taken an enormous leap of faith. I’d like to share my journey with you. Pursuing my purpose has been filled with many difficult lessons of patience and courage. Learning to ride horses teaches us more than how to communicate with an animal, it teaches us many life lessons that usually start at a young age with a pony.

During my years at St. Andrews, I was an active member of the Intercollegiate Horse Show Association (IHSA) which is quite different from USEF competitions. An IHSA rider competes on horses that are unfamiliar to the rider; this form of “catch riding” teaches riders to understand and instinctively respond in accordance with the emotions and the psychology of the horse.

I had a successful intercollegiate career; I won at IHSA Nationals in 2009 in the Novice Over-Fences division. By the time I was a senior, I progressed to the Open Division and qualified for the USEF Cacchione Cup Finals at the National Horse Show. I won the flat phase of the class and ended up third overall.

After graduating from St. Andrews in 2011, I received a call from the St. Andrews Equestrian Program Director, Peggy McElveen. Peggy offered me an opportunity to teach riding lessons and to assist in coaching the IHSA team. I knew that interacting with riders of all levels was something I would enjoy and would be good at. I believe that helping beginners reach their goals can be as rewarding as helping an advanced student qualify for a national final.

I consider St. Andrews “home” and after teaching there for two and a half years, I realized if I were to continue to grow as a professional, I needed to step out

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St. Andrews by the Lake Alumni Magazine

by Rob Jacobs ‘11

of my comfort zone. In January 2015, I moved to Wellington, FL for the Winter Equestrian Festival (WEF) circuit. This was my first time experiencing Wellington. I worked as an assistant trainer for a farm based on the west coast. Experiencing the caliber of horses and riders in Wellington motivated me to continue to grow and become a better teacher and rider. The overall experience of competing in Wellington afforded me a chance to be exposed to an international level of the sport.

In 2015, the conclusion of WEF birthed in me an unexpected eagerness to pursue entrepreneurship as an equestrian professional. I moved back to Maryland to live at home with my parents where I grew up. I worked for my parent’s construction business, Kiroma Contracting, Inc., which helped me further develop

my business skills while I figured out how and where to start my business.

In October 2015, RLJ Stables, LLC, was formed in Southern Pines, NC. RLJ Stables is a freelance business designed to give horseback riders confidence with their animals and provide riders with the educational tools needed to communicate effectively with the horse.

Southern Pines, NC is a small town known for its unique horse and golf communities. I came upon Southern Pines as a student at St. Andrews, thirty miles away. I would occasionally come to town for lessons with Mike Rosser. Mike was a tremendous help in developing a few young horses I was working with.

When I decided to start my business, I knew I wanted to get my start in Southern Pines.

Starting in a town of well-known professionals in the sport such as Patty Heuckeroth, Mike Rosser, Mike Plumb, and Tommy Serio (just to name a few), took a lot of courage. I considered it a leap of faith and felt passionately about pursuing my dreams and taking steps toward my purpose. I believe my purpose is to serve as a recourse, a leader, and an inspiration to young horse enthusiasts as they navigate their way through life.

Though I have been a professional since 2012, RLJ

Stables is only ten months old. Like any new business, the first two years are the toughest, but I have had a very blessed start. I continue to work hard at growing my business in an honest and ethical way regardless of the difficulties I face. Completing my Masters in Business Administration has been very helpful in understanding many important concepts about managing and growing a business.

This year at Pony Finals I am helping Sophie Mitchell from Wilmington, NC, whom I trained in Wellington, FL, this year. I occasionally meet the Mitchell family at shows when their full time trainer at home can’t make it. I have known Sophie and her family for two years. It has been wonderful watching her riding and level of horsemanship progress. I am grateful for the opportunity to be a part of her Pony Finals experience, especially my first year of being in business.

During the process of qualifying for the finals, riders learn so much about their ponies, which helps them once they get to Kentucky. All that is learned prove to be valuable life lessons the riders will carry with them for many years to come. I wish all the riders good luck!

Just remember, what you’ve learned along the way in getting to the finals is an accomplishment within itself!

This article was published with permission from Rob Jacobs, it was originally published in the Paisley Magazine.

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In Memoriam Sympathy is extended to Laura Humphress Getty ’73 and Sydney Humphress Chalfa ’75 on the death of their mother.

Sympathy is also extended to Nancy Hinkle Brouthers ’79 and Scott Brouthers ’79 on the death of Nancy’s mother.

Dr. William M. Alexander, Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and Religion Emeritus died June 9, 2016 (see page 4) Josephine Stephenson Taylor ’41 died on June 12, 2016 in Tarboro, NC. She was 96.

Kathryn Crews McCoy ’42 died June 30, 2016 in Chapel Hill, NC. She was 93.

W. Robert “Bob’’ Whittle ’75 died on June 15, 2016 in Louisville, KY. He is survived by his wife, Paula Brown Whittle ’75, and brother, Charlie Whittle, both St. Andrews alumni.

Josephine Futrell ’84 died on May 15, 2016 in Jacksonville, NC.

Photo by John Holloway

St. Andrews by the Lake is a publication of the Alumni and Communications Offices of St. Andrews. We welcome your feedback and ideas for future issues.

To contact the Alumni Office, call Ellen Thompson at 910-277-5665 or email thompsonje@sa.edu.

A Branch of Webber International University

1700 Dogwood Mile Laurinburg, NC 28352 910-277-5000