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FALL 2016

It’s a honey of a deal How faculty endowments benefit students

Editor Ellen Modersohn Luther Alumni Magazine Volume 50, Number 1, Fall 2016

Managing Editor Kate Frentzel

Published by Luther College

Designer Michael Bartels

Contributors Sherry (Braun) Alcock ’82 Kelli Billstein ’07 Dave Blanchard Sue (Franzen) Drilling ’78 Lori Ferguson Sara Friedl-Putnam Annalise Johnson ’18 Kirk Johnson ’82 Aaron Lurth ’08 Emily Markee ’17 Gabrielle Meirick ’17 Judy Riha

Luther Alumni Magazine welcomes articles and signed letters to the editor; submissions may be edited for style, clarity, or length. Inquiries and submissions may be sent to the Editor, Luther Alumni Magazine, Luther College, 700 College Drive, Decorah, Iowa 521011045; magazine@luther.edu; phone (563) 387-1350. Class Notes submissions and changes of address may be sent to the Alumni Office at the address above. Alumni news may be emailed to the Alumni Office at alumni@luther.edu. Questions and concerns about the magazine may be emailed to magazine@ luther.edu.

Contents Features 22 Gifts at Work: Faculty endowments

Whether they’re observing Luther’s new beehives or reading a 500-year-old German historical document translated into English for the first time, students have thoughtful endowments to thank for unique learning experiences.

26 Senior snapshots

Eight 2016 graduates reveal how their experiences at Luther helped shape who they have become and determined a path for the future.

35 Washington Semester alumni share their take on government As the presidential election nears, we talk with some of Luther’s Washington Semester alumni now working in politics to get an inside look at the mechanics of governing.

Departments 2 President’s Letter 4 Campus 40 Alumni ANNIKA VANDE KROL ‘19

46 Class Notes z 60 Marriages 61 Births/Adoptions z 62 In Memoriam

Alumni Office (800) 225-8664; (800) 2 ALUMNI Admissions Office (800) 458-8437; (800) 4 LUTHER Web luther.edu luther.edu/magazine Copyright Luther College 2016

64 Endpage Calendar (inside back cover) Share magazine stories online

The alumni magazine is online in a mobile and shareable format. Share stories through email, Facebook, Twitter, or Google+ at luther.edu/magazine. Cover: Honeybees cluster in one of the three hives purchased by biology professor Kirk Larsen for use in entomology classes. The queen bee is marked in white, making it easier to identify her when checking the hive. Read more about how faculty use endowment funds for student education on pages 22–25. PHOTO BY KENDRA LARSEN

Priorities for 2016–18 serve as “North Star” As the Luther community begins our 156th academic year, I’d like to share with you key information from my State of the College speech at this year’s Service of Dedication. As it does each year, the service gave the gathered students, faculty, emeriti, staff, alumni, and friends time to rededicate ourselves to our callings at the college. It was a good time to note the accomplishments of the past year and to look at the challenges and opportunities we see ahead. This past year and in the year to come, the Luther College Priorities 2016–18 are our “North Star.” These priorities were developed over the past year through the participation of individuals from across the Luther community. The guidelines set forth our common goals and ambitions for these three years, and I’ll use them as a frame for looking back and looking forward. PRIORITY I: ACADEMIC EXCELLENCE

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Our first destination report at Luther shows our ‘still seeking’ group in the class of 2015 to be less than 1 percent nine months after graduation!”

Luther Alumni Magazine

Luther’s rich tradition of academic excellence and innovation is our focus in Priority I: to enhance and expand students’ integrated learning experience across their four years at Luther. Our integrative model of education offers students opportunities to acquire knowledge across many fields and to develop expertise in one. It offers them opportunities to become nimble thinkers, probing explorers of new ideas and experiences, adept integrators of seemingly disparate things, and agile creators of innovative ways to approach problems new and old. Luther’s exemplary tradition of integrative learning and academic excellence is nationally recognized. In February 2015, in an address at our Spring Convocation, Dr. Carol Geary Schneider, president of the Association of American Colleges & Universities, praised our curriculum as notably robust, engaging, challenging, and comprehensive. In a recent best-selling book on college admissions, Where You Go Is Not Who You’ll Be, New York Times columnist Frank Bruni praised Luther as a “sturdy cradle for winners of some of the most prestigious academic prizes.” It’s good to be reminded that our excellent, distinctive curriculum and our extraordinary outcomes are nationally recognized.

In Priority I, we aim to be ever more excellent and ever more distinctive as we focus over the next two years on enhancing and expanding integrative learning experiences, particularly in the sophomore and junior years. Our focus in Priority I is woven into our current reaccreditation process as the Quality Initiative that the Higher Learning Commission (HLC) now requires as the first step in our reaccreditation process. This summer I received word from the HLC that our proposed Quality Initiative for the sophomore year was approved. We launched the new initiative in early September, when sophomores joined with faculty, staff, young alums, and their sophomore classmates to celebrate and reflect on what they have learned about their values, strengths, and goals and then to consider with their advisers how their reflection might shape their academic learning and their co-curricular experiences this year. Priority I also challenges us to create majors and minors to attract students by linking courses and personnel in existing programs. Last spring, the faculty approved two new interdisciplinary majors: data science and neuroscience. Luther’s Board of Regents approved data science this spring and is reviewing the proposal for neuroscience in September. We continue to work on plans for renovating Main and the athletic facilities to foster integrative learning in those important spaces. I am very happy to report that a generous anonymous gift will fully fund the renovation of the outdoor tennis courts next summer. Finally, in Priority I we commit to enhance and expand the opportunities and services coordinated by our Career Center to assist our students as they discern their vocations and prepare for their careers. And here I want to say just a word about outcomes. Each year, the Career Center prepares a first destination report that details our new graduates’ first career steps. For the class of 2015, we have good information on first career steps for 95.4 percent of the class nine months after graduation. Of these graduates, 99.4 percent are employed, pursuing further education, or in service positions with organizations such as Americorps, the Peace Corps, and Lutheran Volunteer Corps.

President’s Letter

These are exemplary outcomes, and it’s important for us to share widely the excellent outcomes our students can anticipate. Questions about the value of liberal arts education in the workplace abound in American society today. Misperceptions about the outcomes for graduates of liberal arts colleges are rampant. This summer, for instance, the New York Times reported on surveys conducted by Google Consumer Surveys regarding the American public’s perceptions of college outcomes. The Times article was titled “The One Question Most Americans Get Wrong about College Graduates.” This one question was “What would you guess is the current unemployment rate for four-year college graduates between the ages of 25 and 34?” The most common estimates given by respondents were between 20 and 30 percent. In truth, nationwide unemployment of college graduates ages 25 to 34 is 2.4 percent. Our first destination report at Luther shows our “still seeking” group in the class of 2015 to be less than 1 percent nine months after graduation! We have good news to trumpet! Our students can anticipate extraordinary outcomes— outcomes that our graduates have experienced and attained over generations. PRIORITY II: FISCAL STRENGTH

Priority II focuses on fiscal strength, identifying six initiatives, among them the completion of the Benefits Study Group’s work, attaining the current goals of the Climate Action Plan, and reaching a new record for the Annual Fund. This past spring semester, a Ratios and Benchmarks Task Group was created to work on another of the six initiatives: to identify target workforce and program ratios and implement a plan to meet them. This initiative grew from the Task Group 150’s work in 2010–11 to recommend program and staffing ratios and benchmarks that would enable the college to respond to projections of changing demographics and ongoing economic challenges after the financial crisis of 2008. Like the TG 150 recommendations, the revised ratios respond to current financial challenges faced by colleges and universities.

The revised faculty ratio will return Luther to the range the college maintained throughout the 1990s and into the mid-2000s. I anticipate that plans for reaching target ratios will be solidified by early 2017, and we will complete implementation in 2018. In Priority II, we also commit to setting and meeting enrollment goals that support strong academic and co-curricular programs and assure fiscal strength. This year, we will review TG 150 enrollment projections in light of changes in higher education since 2011 in key factors such as demographics, affordability, and increasing competition. Achieving strong, stable enrollment in a rapidly changing environment for higher education is a significant challenge for all colleges, and it is one we at Luther must and will meet to assure a strong future for our college. The sixth initiative in Priority II sets goals for our development efforts for the Annual Fund, the endowment, and alumni participation. I am pleased to report that this year, we met or exceeded each of the developmentrelated goals named in Priority II. I am deeply grateful to alumni and friends of Luther for their commitment to the college and for their generosity in offering support for our students, academic programs, and campus facilities. Our Annual Fund this year raised $2.1 million, already exceeding the goal we had set for 2018. Our alumni participation rate for all funds was 27 percent, already at the high end of the goal’s range. Total giving to Luther in 2015–16 was $11.9 million, the third highest in Luther history. These generous gifts that alumni and friends of Luther made to the college help to assure that the college thrives. PRIORITY III: WELL-BEING

In Priority III we commit to fostering the wellbeing of those who study, live, and work at Luther. The character of our community is at the heart of the Luther experience. Our mission statement’s call to learn in community, to embrace diversity, to discern our callings, and to serve with distinction for the common good shapes our goals for Priority III. I look forward to our community’s conversations and work this year to enrich current

programs and to develop new programs that inspire and support us to live in concert with our mission statement’s call for community. A particularly compelling facet of Priority III is to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in 2017. The anniversary calls us to affirm anew the “liberating power of faith and learning” that Martin Luther championed. Our commemoration will begin in February with an address by ELCA Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton at our spring semester Convocation. Events, programs, and opportunities for engagement and reflection will continue throughout the year, culminating with Christmas at Luther in December 2017. I look forward to engagement with the Luther community and our guests throughout this year of commemoration. PRIORITY IV: STRATEGIC PLAN

Priority IV of the Luther College Priorities 2016–18 is a commitment to complete a comprehensive strategic plan by 2018. We will begin the planning process this fall, engaging with the Luther College community on campus and beyond to chart strategies for facing challenges and embracing opportunities to achieve the college’s mission in the years beyond 2018. Our strategic plan must be both visionary and grounded. Our excellent academic programs; our vibrant, caring community; our life of faith and learning rooted in the Lutheran tradition—these are the core values of our mission. Our planning process will inspire us to seek, create, and embrace opportunities to achieve our mission in the new environment for higher education. I look forward to engaging with you and the larger Luther community to chart the course of the college beyond 2018. I look forward to imagining with you the ways Luther will become ever stronger, ever more excellent in the years to come. Soli Deo Gloria!

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Campus News

Jim Jermier, new vice president for development, comes to Luther from UNI Jim Jermier has been named vice president for development, effective this past June. He will direct Luther’s development and alumni relations and serve as adviser to the president on the Jim Jermier development operations of the college. Since 2007, Jim Jermier had served as director of collegiate development at the

University of Northern Iowa (UNI), where he led a team of six development officers, with responsibility for the university’s four undergraduate colleges. Jermier was assistant director of planned giving at UNI from 2004 to 2007. UNI has averaged $18.3 million per year in philanthropic support over the past three years, which places it among the top 10 nationally for public, non-flagship universities. Jermier was a part of the leadership team that managed a $150 million comprehensive campaign that was successfully completed a

year early in 2013. Before joining UNI, Jermier worked at Van G. Miller and Associates in Waterloo, Iowa. He earned a bachelor’s degree from UNI with a major in physical education and holds an M.A. in philanthropy and nonprofit development, also from UNI. Jermier succeeds Keith Christensen ’80, who served as Luther’s vice president for development for 15 years, and interim development adviser Mark Kronholm.

New pastor, Anne Edison Albright, joins College Ministries Luther pastor Anne Edison-Albright joined pastor Michael Blair in Luther’s Office for College Ministries in August. Edison-Albright served as pastor at Redeemer Lutheran Anne Edison-Albright Church in Stevens Point, Wisconsin, since 2010. During her time at Redeemer Lutheran, the congregation received the 2015 Portage County Hunger and Poverty Prevention Partnership Award.

In 2014, Edison-Albright was awarded the Beatitudes Society’s J. Philip Swander Brave Preacher Award. Edison-Albright earned a master of divinity degree from Yale Divinity School and completed her Lutheran Year formation at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia. She completed her pastoral internship at Bratislava International Church and taught religion at a bilingual Lutheran high school in Bratislava, Slovakia. She was ordained in 2010. Edison-Albright has been a coach for congregational renewal in the East Central

Synod of Wisconsin, a “Family Matters” columnist for the ELCA’s Gather magazine, a content reviewer for Sparkhouse and their “Whirl” Sunday school curriculum, and a writer for Sundays and Seasons, published by Augsburg Fortress. Edison-Albright used her Spanish-language skills in her work as a hospital chaplain and as a high school teacher. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Michigan State University with majors in English and journalism and a teaching certificate from the University of St. Thomas in Houston, Texas.

Terry Sparkes named to new institutional planning role at Luther Terry Sparkes was named dean for institutional planning and mission at Luther. She began her new duties in August. Sparkes has served as associate dean and director of curriculum Terry Sparkes development and the college honors program since 2008. As dean for institutional planning and mission, Sparkes will serve as project

Luther Alumni Magazine

manager for Luther’s campus-wide strategic planning process and coordinate the college’s reaccreditation process with the Higher Learning Commission. She will oversee two critical components of the reaccreditation process: federal compliance and the assurance review. Reporting directly to the president, Sparkes will be responsible for the supervision of three centers and two programs that are key to Luther’s mission: the Center for Ethics and Public Engagement, the Center for Sustainable Communities, the Student

Academic Support Center, the federally funded TRIO Achievement Program, and College Ministries. Sparkes joined Luther’s Religion Department in 1990. She holds a bachelor of arts degree from Denison University with a major in French language and literature. She earned a master of divinity degree from Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School and a doctorate in the history of Christianity from the University of Chicago Divinity School.

Campus News

Martin Luther restored to luster

ANNIKA VANDE KROL '19

WILL HELLER '16

AARON LURTH '08

The Martin Luther statue on campus is looking good after an extensive “rubdown” last spring. Years of corrosion have been scrubbed off and his warm brown patina restored. Conservators from Midwest Art Conservation Center did the work, overseen by Kate Elliott, Luther associate professor of art history and curator of the Fine Arts Collection. They began the process, which took about a week, by washing the statue and removing corrosion. Two layers of patina were then applied, followed by coatings of wax—first hot then cold. Afterward, cracks in the the statue’s base were repaired. The statue was a gift from the Norwegian Lutheran Synod ministers’ wives in 1911 to celebrate the college’s 50th anniversary. It is a third-generation sculpture, cast from a replica of Ernest Friedrich Riestschel’s original sculpture of Martin Luther in Worms, Germany. Plans are also in the works to add new lighting and limestone landscaping. Landscape designer Jens Jensen, who created a campus design for the college’s 50th anniversary, also designed the base of the statue and chose its location. In a letter to President C.K. Preus (class of 1873) in June 1911, Jensen wrote: “A statue ought to have a background of green to be ideally situated . . . it seems to me that the Luther statue should be placed on the campus with a good background of foliage.” The statue still does have a backdrop of foliage, and once again it projects a burnished glow amid the green.

At top, clean and with new patina, facial characteristics and other details once again stand out on the statue of Martin Luther. Left, patination expert Gita Ghei applies a coat of hot wax. Above, scaffolding and a crane allows the conservators to work securely.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Campus News

At Jane (Greene) Hildebrand’s retirement reception in June, Kristen Agena, right, clinical education coordinator, presented to her a table Agena made from old bleacher boards that were replaced in the Main Gym.

ing, Hildebrand was the longest-tenured coach in the IIAC and in the history of Luther women’s basketball, with a career record of 438-260. Some things remain unchanged since Hildebrand got involved with Luther athletics. The floorboards and bleachers of the basketball courts are the same ones she played on as a student, and many of her early influencers, such as Betty Hoff ’60, Paul Solberg ’61, and Kent Finanger ’54—who, like her, coached multiple sports, taught, and did advising—are still her friends and supporters. “They have been critical role models and mentors for me, and continue to be,” she says. But she’s also seen big changes, in part because of larger athletics budgets in recent decades. When she was a student, she says, “Our basketball team would ride in the coaches’ cars to get to away games. We would stay overnight in our families’ homes. I remember my mother putting up our team in the basement and making breakfast for us before we went to play Iowa

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Jane (Greene) Hildebrand ’74 worked both parts of campus at Luther, as a coach in the Regents Center for 27 years and, for the past five years, as assistant dean for student life, up the hill in Dahl Centennial Union. She retired from Luther in June, and one early summer day, in her office overlooking the playing fields, she visited about her Luther career. Hildebrand laid the foundation for her career by majoring in health and physical education (teaching) at Luther. In 1973, she and Steve Hildebrand ’73 married, and he joined the United States Air Force. They lived in California, Kansas, and Nebraska—Jane teaching high school and coaching multiple sports—before returning to Decorah in 1982, when Steve left the air force. Property along the Upper Iowa River that they’d planned to retire on became the home where they’d raise their three children, Josh ’02, Jake ’02, and Jim ’06. Their first year back, Hildebrand was an assistant coach for field hockey, track and field, and women’s basketball. She became head coach for women’s basketball in 1985, also teaching physical education and eventually taking on the roles of senior women’s administrator and associate athletic director. Hildebrand led her teams to seven Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference championships while posting an IIAC record of 293-155. She was named Iowa Conference Coach of the Year five times. Her teams made nine appearances in the NCAA III National Tournament, advancing to the round of 16 twice and the round of eight twice. In 1992, she led the Norse to the Final Four and returned home with a third-place finish. When she left coach-

GRANT PREHEIM ’18 PHOTO

Jane Hildebrand retires after 31 years in coaching and Student Life

Luther Alumni Magazine

Wesleyan [near her hometown of Columbus Junction, Iowa]. Freshman year, we didn’t have uniforms, so we wore our own shorts and shirts and wore little pinnies over the top.” Asked about some of her best Luther memories, Hildebrand says: “The first thing that pops into my mind is just having meaningful conversations with students, whether it’s a cup of coffee and a roll at Sunnyside or a chat in my office about how they played in the game.” Most of all, she’s glad she was able to be there for students, for the happy times and for the sad, such as telling a student that a grandparent had passed away. Hildebrand says she has enjoyed working with this age group because the students are going through a transitional period in their lives—children growing into adults. It’s been a pleasure to see students “becoming themselves,” she says. It’s a pleasure too when she gets to talk with alumni returning to campus, and she says she remembers everyone—even by their voices. In the Student Life Office, she sat around a corner from the main entrance, but when former students came into the office, she says, “You heard voices and you thought, Oh my gosh, that’s a voice from the past—I know who that is!” Hildebrand says she’s looking forward to having a little more time for her immediate family and for visiting grandchildren in Iowa City and Saudi Arabia. She appreciates the support she’s received over the years from across the Luther community and from other Decorah residents—many of them strong fans of the women’s basketball program—and the sense of family she has felt at Luther. But she says it’s the day-to-day talks and engagement with students she’ll miss the most. —Ellen Modersohn

Faculty retirements. Three faculty members retired from Luther in May: left to right, professor of music Jessical Paul and associate professors of social work Craig Mosher, who was also director of Luther’s social work program, and Ginger Meyette. Luther’s Board of Regents granted faculty emerita status to Paul, who taught at Luther for 30 years. Mosher, a faculty member for 11 years, told the Luther Chips newspaper, “It’s been a great run for me. It’s been really nice to be part of a community like this, where people seem to really care about each other.” Meyette, a faculty member for seven years, said she’ll miss the students most. Paul, who spoke during the Senior Recognition Convocation, said that most important to her was the process of learning about musical expression, whether or not a given student pursued a career in music. “The reward of working with them is still with me,” she said.

Campus News

Three prominent conductors to lead Nordic Choir on interim basis throughout 2016–17 Luther is bringing in three artistic partners to hold interim positions with the college’s Nordic Choir for the 2016–17 academic year—Ann Howard Jones, Jeffrey Douma, and Kenneth Fulton. Allen Hightower resigned his position as director of choral activities, conductor of Nordic Choir, professor of music, and artistic director of Christmas at Luther in spring 2016 to become director of choral studies at University of North Texas. The interim faculty will work with Nordic Choir in three phases. Jones, professor emerita of music at Boston University, where she taught for 23 years, will lead Nordic Choir during the fall semester and teach conducting. She will work with the choir on tour repertoire and begin work on Bach’s Mass in B minor, which will be performed in spring semester, April 1–2, 2017, as part of the college’s commemoration of 500 years of the Reformation. Jones was the 2011 recipient of the Robert Shaw Choral Award for Distinguished Service to the Profession. In 2012 she received the Distinguished Service Award from Chorus America. And in 2015 she received the Lifetime Achievement Award from Choral Arts

New England. From 1984 to 1998, she served as the assistant conductor to the late Robert Shaw and the Atlanta Symphony. Her residency with Luther is a homecoming of sorts, as she grew up in Cresco, Iowa, and holds degrees from the University of Iowa. During January Term, Douma, professor of choral conducting and conductor of the Yale Glee Club at the Yale School of Music, will serve as Nordic’s conductor and will conduct the choir on its Midwest tour Jan. 27–Feb. 5, 2017. Douma is a founding director of Yale Choral Artists and is the artistic director of the Yale International Choral Festival. Prior to Yale he served as director of choral activities at Carroll College and taught at Smith College and St. Cloud State University. Douma also was on the conducting faculty at the Interlochen Center for the Arts for four years. He has appeared as a guest conductor with choruses and orchestras on six continents and has prepared choruses for performances under conductors William Christie, Valery Gergiev, Sir Neville Marriner, Sir David Willcocks, and Dale Warland, among others. As a tenor, Douma has appeared with several of the na-

tion’s leading professional choirs. A graduate of Concordia College and the University of Michigan, Douma has a nephew at Luther and a niece who graduated last spring. During the spring semester, Fulton, alumni professor emeritus of music at Louisiana State University, will lead the choir and teach conducting. He will help prepare the choir for the spring performances of the B Minor mass. Fulton will also prepare and conduct the Showcase Concert during Commencement weekend. Fulton recently retired from Louisiana State University after decades conducting the LSU A Cappella Choir and teaching undergraduate and graduate conducting. Fulton also served as chorus master for the Baton Rouge Symphony and as the artistic director of the Linz International Choral Festival in Austria. He has conducted in numerous world venues and is a published author. His choirs have made many ACDA convention appearances. Fulton holds degrees from the University of North Texas and Texas Tech University.

Grant supports northeast Iowa efforts to teach children healthful habits The W.K. Kellogg Foundation has granted Luther College’s Center for Sustainable Communities $300,000 to be used over the next two years to provide support to early childhood care environments in northeast Iowa. “We are thrilled to have received this generous grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. We know that healthy children are ready to learn and physically develop. By modeling healthy choices, children, parents, and teachers can all learn lifelong healthy habits to improve their overall health in the long term,” says Ann Mansfield ’79, Luther’s project coordinator for NE Iowa Food and Fitness Initiative.

Luther’s Center for Sustainable Communities, in collaboration with Northeast Iowa Food and Fitness Initiative, Northeast Iowa Community Preschool Partners, and the Iowa Association for the Education of Young Children, will create a refined educational model to expand and enhance Farm to Early Care and Education in preschools and early education environments throughout six counties in northeast Iowa. The program makes it possible for children and families to make and learn how to make healthy choices about good food and physical activity in their daily lives. The project focuses on three primary areas: ensuring access to good food in all early

education settings, professional development for early education teachers and caregivers focused on healthy eating and physical activity, and educational activities for parents to encourage families to prepare and serve good food at home and to learn how to make better choices when it comes to family nutrition. “Not only does this grant continue the good work that is happening in northeast Iowa,” says Jon Jensen ’89, director of Luther’s Center for Sustainable Communities, "but it puts Luther College and Food and Fitness at the cutting edge of Farm to Early Education efforts nationwide.”

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Campus News

PHOTOS COURTESY OF DAN DAVIS

Students use latest technology to tell an ancient story in Greece Archeological field school in Greece offers unique, hands-on opportunities If you think archeological work is all kneeling in a trench, brushing ancient dust off potsherds, think again. As Dan Davis, Luther assistant professor of classics, points out, digging up artifacts is only about 10 percent of what an archeologist does. This past summer, students from Luther and other colleges got their hands on the rest of the work during a field school in Greece, learning such skills as archeological drawing, site illustration, architectural and artifact photography, pottery cleaning, and ceramic analysis. Their accumulated work will eventually tell the story of Roman-era Kenchreai, the port of the great city of Corinth on the Aegean City. Luther partners with Vanderbilt University and the University of Maryland to offer the field school. Vanderbilt’s Joseph Rife directs the Kenchreai Archeology Project under the

Luther Alumni Magazine

auspices of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. This year, Davis acted as assistant director for the program in late May and early June, bringing with him 11 Luther students. Undergrads from Marshall, Swarthmore, Skidmore, Cornell, and other mostly four-year liberal arts colleges made up the balance of the 39 participants. A small area of Kenchreai was excavated by the Greek Archeology Service in 1976 in preparation for a public works project building a road to connect southern and central Greece. The Greek archeologists rapidly but thoroughly excavated a Roman villa near the sea shore and stored the artifacts, but didn’t have time to do the archeological reporting and publishing that would tell the world what they’d found, Davis says. So for the past four years, Greece has permitted the U.S. team to work on recording and analyzing the site, allowing students to try out archeological work firsthand. This summer they continued work on the Roman villa.

Made up of various rooms surrounding an internal colonnade, the villa’s architecture is monumental, incorporating huge stone blocks and walls in a footprint of about eight thousand square feet. “We were shocked by the size of this thing when we first started to clear out all the weeds and trees that had been growing over the last 40 years,” Davis says. And each summer, the students’ first task is to again remove the masses of weeds and branches that push up around the stones. After that stint of manual labor, however, they go into high-tech mode to record the site using theodolites, cameras, and computer software. “This year we incorporated 3-D photography, which was a lot of fun, and a steep learning curve for me,” Davis says. With the new technology, the team is trying to create interactive and very accurate plans of the site. Luther sophomore Tatiana Proksch admits that she entered the program with the stereotypical image of archeologists digging up arti-

Campus News Opposite is the Kenchreai site on the Aegean Sea. Right, this photo of Kenchreai is a mosaic of hundreds of images taken from a quadcopter/ drone. The underwater portions are a sunken breakwater that defines the southern part of the Roman harbor, and the structures on land are Byzantine churches built atop ancient temples.

Above, Luther students at the Kenchreai Archeology Project. The Jakob and Clarice Larsen Endowment helps make this experience possible for Luther students. Jakob Larsen (class of 1908), one of the sons of Luther’s first president, Laur. Larsen, was Luther’s first Rhodes Scholar. He earned a Ph.D. in classics at Harvard and taught ancient history at the University of Chicago.

facts and connecting them to historical events. Part of the reason many of us hold that image is because, traditionally, most students have seen only that part of the process. Davis says that after he joined the Kenchreai project four years ago, “I realized that these students learn more about archeology in those three and a half weeks than most graduate students learn at a typical excavation. Oftentimes a graduate student will be just stuck in a trench—you get to know your square or your room really well—and specialists are called in to take it to the next step.” The students in this project get to try a little of everything. Sophomore Jacob Domogalla says he was surprised by the comprehensiveness of the field school. “From organizing sherds of pottery by number to utilizing 3-D modeling and pictures, I was impressed to see the amount of work going into each artifact,” he says. The field school also provided expert speakers. “Bringing in other scholars to lecture offered [students] a chance to see what the careers are in the field of archeology, in case they’re ever interested,” Davis says. Students

50 YEAR REUNION

Below, students make a 3-D photoscan of an ancient column base using an iPad with attached 3-D scanner.

learned about paleography, the study of letterforms over time, and even ancient magic—how amulets found at the site would have been used. Davis spoke on his specialty, marine archeology. In the next few years the Kenchreai project would like to move underwater in the harbor area by using a suite of sensors and an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) to survey the remains of warehouses, temples, and an early Christian church that sank in an earthquake toward the end of the Roman Empire. Busy days also included field trips to such ruins as late Bronze Age palaces and classical theatres, as well as visits to Athens’ museums. For a little recreation, the Americans played a basketball game against the local town’s team. It’s become an annual tradition, with the mayor announcing the game and doling out prizes afterward. Half the town showed up, Davis says. Who won? “We got killed,” he says. “But I like to think we had a good showing.” There’s always next year. —Ellen Modersohn

Alumni profile: Sissel Schroeder ’83 conducts an archeological dig in Wisconsin, teaching students to excavate and correctly read what they're excavating. Story on page 51. Video: Professor Dan Davis talks about seeing students light up as they engage firsthand in archeology. See the video with this story at luther.edu/magazine.

50 YEAR REUNION

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Campus News

On grammar “cops” and “criminals” Last fall, Luther’s English Department hired Mike Garcia and his wife, Marie Drews ’02, to help with writing instruction and program development in Paideia and the firstyear writing courses. Garcia also became the director of Luther’s Writing Center. He hopes to attract more students to the center at various points in their academic career (about 70 percent of visitors are Paideia I students). He’s also training his tutors to specialize in discipline-specific writing and in tutoring ESL students. “The demographics of Luther keep shifting,” he says, “and the more we recruit students outside of the stereotypical ‘Luther student,’ the more we get students from different backgrounds in writing and reading. We’re looking

you’ve spent much time online, I’m sure you’re familiar with “grammar cops,” the people who leave comments on news articles and Facebook posts correcting other people’s grammar, punctuation, spelling, word choice, and so on. Sometimes, these comments appear to be good-faith attempts to assist the writer, similar to a helpful English teacher’s feedback. Far more often, however, the commenter is trying to insult the writer. It’s a way of exploiting the long-standing assumption that language errors indicate a lack of intelligence. Even though this assumption is generally untrue, many of us find it difficult to banish from our minds. Consequently, attacking someone’s grammar can be an effective way to diminish that person’s overall credibility. In the fall of 2015, I started paying closer attention to the human tendency to use people’s English-language usage to make broader assumptions about them—and I quickly confirmed that this tendency wasn’t limited to grammar policing on the Internet. We use language to make all sorts of judgments about other people, their character, and their motives, and sometimes the consequences of those judgments are graver than a mere squabble on the Internet. Consider, for example, a hypothetical Afri-

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for places to help students feel confident in those things.” Over J-term 2016, Garcia taught a course called Grammar Cops and Criminals. It explored how people attempt to protect, preserve, and control the English language, and the motivations behind these attempts. “If someone gets angry over the Oxford comma, where does that anger come from?” Garcia asks. “Language is tied to identity to an extent, and when you start to do things outside of what people want, that may pose a threat to their identity or their notion of right and wrong. Language symbolizes these bigger concepts that are beyond the words.” We asked Garcia to write about this for our readers.

can American or Latino/a student who enters college with strong critical thinking skills and a willingness to participate in class discussion. However, this student uses a dialect of English that isn’t highly valued in academic settings. Will that dialect difference be significant enough to jeopardize the student’s overall chance to succeed? Will that student be labeled “deficient” throughout his or her academic career? What about the immigrant who is learning English but still speaks her first language when talking to her family? Will she be judged as unpatriotic and unwilling to assimilate into American culture? (This became a frighteningly real question at a Minnesota Applebee’s last fall. A woman struck an immigrant mother in the face with a beer mug, causing severe injury, because the second woman was speaking in Swahili to her children, and the first woman was upset that she didn’t speak English.) In the 2016 J-term course Grammar Cops and Criminals, my students and I studied dozens of such examples of language policing— both trivial and serious—and we asked these questions: • What does the English language mean to us? Why do we feel the need to police it? • Why do violations of mainstream/standard English make us irritated—or even angry? What causes the emotional reaction? • Do we sometimes overreact to minor language “crimes,” making them seem more

significant than they probably are? • Do we make false assumptions about the reasons why people use nonstandard varieties of English? • Do we sometimes pretend to misunderstand others when in reality we’re just impatient, irritated, or culturally narrowminded? • Can our policing sometimes go too far, victimizing people whose language backgrounds happen to be outside the mainstream? Don’t get me wrong, however: just because we explored the potentially negative consequences of language policing, that doesn’t mean we always concluded that grammar cops were bad cops. We spent much of the course identifying the types of English that earn the most respect in the academic world and professional workplace. We also learned how a common understanding of language is necessary for communication. As students considered these points, some of them backed away from their initial arguments for complete linguistic freedom and sought out a more balanced approach. Others held fast to their beliefs, arguing strongly on behalf of the “cops” or the “criminals.” But no matter where we each ended up, we all learned to critique our simplistic assumptions about language and to reconsider the notion of language “criminality.” —Mike Garcia

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

ILLUSTRATION BASED ON PHOTO BY WILL HELLER ’16

Campus News

PHOTO COURTESY OF FABIAN POP POP

Luther senior Fabian Pop Pop with women employed by the poultryraising business he started in Guatemala.

Top Erdman prize recognizes business that helps bring self-sufficiency to Guatemalans Fabian Pop Pop '17

Bjorn Mykre '16

Madilyn Heike '19

The 31st annual Luther College Entrepreneurial Showcase was held Tuesday, April 26, in Dahl Centennial Union. Since 1986, the goal of the Entrepreneurial Showcase has been to provide an annual forum for students, faculty, alumni, and friends of Luther who are interested in and support entrepreneurship. The event began with a networking session in which student entrepreneurs displayed their ideas and ventures. Dennis Birkestrand ’64, cofounder of Factory Direct Appliance, gave the keynote address. The Daryl and Audrey Erdman Prizes for Entrepreneurship were awarded to Fabian Pop Pop ’17, Bjorn Myhre ’16, and Madilyn Heinke ’19. To be selected for an Erdman Prize, students who create, develop, and manage a successful enterprise during their years at Luther present their venture to a panel of judges made up of local entrepreneurs. Fabian Pop Pop received the grand prize of $5,000 for his social enterprise and poultry business, Aweb’. Pop Pop, a Davis United World College (UWC) Scholar, attended the UWC in Norway before coming to Luther. He was born and raised in northern Guatemala, and the main purpose of Aweb’ is to aid women in rural Guatemala who are unemployed and living in poverty. The business provides employment for women who have never held jobs or received a salary, and it helps them support their families by providing a reliable source of income. After determining through research that a business that employs women would be likely to help uplift the entire community, Pop Pop searched for a product that would be in high demand and easy and relatively quick to generate. He found that raising and selling chickens, with a production cycle of seven to nine weeks, would provide more than 140 percent return on initial investment in that region. It would also build on skills the women already had. Pop Pop wrote a business plan in 2014 and in 2015 was invited to make a pitch for funding to the Resolution Project in Miami, Fla. He

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made it through several rounds of presentations and questioning from the judges to become one of 14 winners among 191 competing teams from all over the world. With $6,000 in seed money and a fellowship that hooked him up with two business mentors, he started Aweb’. Late that summer, he got training about safe food handling and animal welfare, recruited and trained the 20 women who would work in the business, and organized workshops for women on topics such as resource management, entrepreneurship and self-empowerment, and current challenges for women from rural areas. “People think that if you want to change people’s lives you have to come up with great ideas, but if you can use the skills people have already you can improve their lives,” Pop Pop says. Providing training in areas such as financial and resource management so the women can run the business themselves is better than giving gifts of food and school books, he says. Jobs allow them to buy their own necessities. Aweb’ markets chicken to restaurants and small grocery stories, where there is large demand. “Most of them were also pleased to learn about our social commitment toward creating long-lasting opportunities for women in the region,” Pop Pop wrote in his Erdman application. Pop Pop says more than 95 percent of profits go to the women who work for Aweb’. He plans to invest a portion of the prize money back into his business so he can continue to expand its reach. Bjorn Myhre, who received a $2,500 prize, collaborated with Evan Sowder ’15 to create Sacred Media, a media production company that promotes environmental stewardship and aims to inspire people to visit national parks. Myhre specializes in multimedia productions that showcase outdoor adventure, and he has held a handful of internships that honed his media production skills. Madilyn Heinke was the second recipient of a $2,500 prize. She started her business, M-N-M Sweets and Treats, by selling smoothies, hand-packed ice cream, and a variety of other treats with her sisters, McKendra and Mercede. Their mother bought them a trolley car to use as an ice cream stand, hoping they would earn money for college while also learning the value of hard work.

Campus News

Violinist Tsend-Ayush is on her way to Carnegie Hall debut

ANNIKA VANDE KROL ’19

talked with her about Luther, and then she met Luther associate professors of music Spencer Martin and Andrew Whitfield. They codirect the International Music Festival of the Adriatic, and Tsend-Ayush heard them speak about Luther when they visited Namuun Tsend-Ayush ’17 was the UWC to give a master among the first-place winners in class. Friends of hers had the American Protégé Internaalso spread the word about tional Concerto Competition Luther, and because the last spring (college students/ college is similar in size professional musician category). to UWC Adriatic and is So on Dec. 18, two days after fall known for its music prosemester ends, she’ll perform the gram, Tsend-Ayush thought first movement of Bach’s Violin she could be comfortable Sonata No. 1 in the winners’ in Decorah. recital at Carnegie Hall's Weill She has been. Her Recital Hall in New York. favorite memory so far She used the American Protéis from the first time she gé competition as a way to focus participated in Christmas at her practicing and improve her Luther. She sang in the Auplaying. “Having a goal like that, rora choir and performed Namuun Tsend-Ayush ’ 17 is Torgerson Concertmaster of Luther’s Symphony and to practice for a competition, it with Symphony Orchestra. Chamber Orchestras. A first-place winner in the American Protégé International definitely motivates you more, At one point, while she was Concerto Competition 2016, she will perform at Carnegie Hall on Dec. 18, 2016. and you want to do better,” she singing in the aisles of the says. “When you have a goal in also credits her initiative. Meeting for lessons Center for Faith and Life, mind, you want to push yourself more.” only once a week, Kalnin says, “There’s no she noticed people in the audience tearing up Tsend-Ayush has been refining her playing time to talk about all the details of a piece. as they smiled. “It was such an emotional mothrough contests—and the practice, practice, Students have to take the initiative and have ment, and I thought [performing in Christmas practice they require—since 2004, when she a certain mindset” that drives them to refine at Luther] was a beautiful thing to do, and I’d first competed in her native Mongolia, wintheir playing. Tsend-Ayush has that mindset, like to keep doing it as long as I could.” ning second place, at age nine. She entered he says, and strives to improve the quality of Tsend-Ayush will graduate from Luther the American Protégé contest by submitting her playing and the details of her technique next spring. She’ll have completed the music a video of her playing, but she’s competed in on her own. major and be just shy of a double major in person for the multiple contests in Mongolia, But when it comes time to take the stage, accounting. Her parents enjoy listening to clasthe Czech Republic, and Italy that have proTsend-Ayush isn’t necessarily thinking about sical music but are not musicians themselves, vided her motivation through the years. Walkthe particulars of technique that she’s reand Tsend-Ayush’s accountant mother encouring onto the Carnegie stage will be a familiar hearsed for hours in the practice room. In aged her daughter to learn accounting too. experience in some ways. fact, she says she sometimes doesn’t remember She may yet finish that degree. She’s hedging Of course, the violinist has performed much after a performance—whether she played her bets a little, sure, but she also really likes multiple times at Luther as well—solo, in a certain rhythm just so or hit a tricky note. accounting. small groups, and with the Symphony and She’s concentrating on expressing the music First, though, she’ll follow her passion for Chamber Orchestras. As concertmaster of at this point: “I think that in music, the emomusic and begin graduate studies in violin both ensembles, Tsend-Ayush also tunes the tions that you are portraying or sharing with performance. She’ll be entering the profesmusicians and leads first violin section pracpeople are the most important. . . . It’s not sional music world at a time when there are tices. She’ll be polishing each note of the Bach about perfection but about the general perfora lot of good violinists, Kalnin says, but he is sonata movement for her New York debut in mance.” confident that Tsend-Ayush has a good future December, but Tsend-Ayush has perhaps a bigTsend-Ayush, a Davis United World in music. “She will do well,” he says. ger challenge before then. She won the Hemp College Scholar, took up the violin as a Family Prize for Orchestral Performance first-grader in a music school in Ulan Bator, —Ellen Modersohn earlier this year and will give a recital this fall, Mongolia’s capital city. She made her way to learning a full concert’s worth of new music. Luther via the United World College AdriTsend-Ayush’s violin teacher at Luther, atic. Jon Lund, of Luther’s Center for Global visiting assistant professor of music Igor Learning and International Admissions, first Kalnin, has no doubt about her abilities and

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Campus News Environmentalist Alexandra Cousteau gave the Commencement address, telling the assembly that she hopes the term “explorers” will come to mean “those who rather than conquering a peak to plant a flag, return with an appreciation for the great variety of life in all forms, and with solutions for protecting it.”

Jessica Paul, professor emerita of music, left seniors with a well-stated message, delivered during the Senior Recognition Convocation. “I leave this advice to all my singers and pianists, advice that I believe reaches across the disciplines: “Your relationship with your teachers and mentors: It’s a challenge to find a mix of respect and empathy. Be open enough to treat them like the human beings they are, but respectful enough to keep some emotional distance. They have a right to teach you the way they think is best, and you will ultimately stretch yourself by seeing yourself through their eyes. “Be brave and take chances! If your teacher urges you to do something, do it 20 times bigger than you think you should. Apply the principle to different situations. Have the courage to shake yourself out of your old habits. You may not know where you’re going, but trust them to guide you to a new place. “Discover the difference between ego and a sense of self. The first can build walls of suspicion and fear, the second allows for change. “Be willing to go wildly outside of yourself. If you see something on the other side of the stream that looks like fun, leap over the water to get to it. If you get wet, you’ll dry off on safe land. Then try again. “Watch funny TV shows. Pet a dog. Endear yourself to a baby. Zumba. Watch really sad movies. Listen to Maggie Smith talk about her career. Be human, and bring it all to your field of endeavor, whatever that might be. “Don’t be afraid to be alone—with your work, with your thoughts, with your emotions. Create a quiet environment (and you can do this even in the midst of cacophony) for your work space. If we just show up with a sense of humility and openness, we will be rewarded with fresh insight. “A few final words of wisdom: “Keep working at your craft. Conquering your technique—whether it’s singing, playing, writing, collecting data, or moving through space—enables a wider range of expression. In evaluating yourself on a daily basis, understand the difference between being critical and discerning, and be thankful that the process never ends. . . . “Don’t be afraid to make gigantic progress over a short period of time. The trick is to have new challenges ready for when you’ve conquered something and ‘have nothing to do.’ “Be nonjudgmental of yourself as you move into the larger world. You deserve to be there by your own virtues, and you’ll learn as you go. “Keep your curiosity alive.”

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LUTHER COLLEGE PHOTO BUREAU PHOTOS

A professor emerita’s words of wisdom

Campus News

COMMENCEMENT 2016

Lisa (Schneider) Strube ’87 (right) presented the Young Alumni Award to Dan Christenson ’02. He is director of federal government relations and regulatory affairs for PepsiCo.

The class of 2016 voted to name Student Senate president Jesus Lucero the Jenson Medal recipient for his service to students and the community.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Left to right, Drew Pellett, Cheryl Pellett, President Paula J. Carlson, Dick Meade, Paulette (Engel) Barnes ’74, and Steve Barnes ’74

President’s Council recognizes new life members New President’s Council life members Dick Meade, Cheryl and Drew Pellett, and Steve ’74 and Paulette (Engel) Barnes ’74—who achieved life membership in 2014—were honored for their exemplary giving during the council’s annual recognition event May 7. Also achieving this level of support were new life members Jonathan ’90 and Dawn Doering, George Kuh ’68, Brett Reese ’81, Michele (Wylder) Reese ’81, Susan Sorlien ’73 and Thomas Jones, James ’81 and Jodi (Palma) Young ’81, and the estate of Klareen Nottestad ’56. Special acknowledgment was given to the life members of President’s Council who advanced to a new cumulative recognition level—to Larsen Circle: Dennis’64 and Suzanne Birkestrand, Weston Noble ’43, and the Margaret A. Cargill Foundation; to Preus Circle: Bruening Rock Products Inc.; to Ylvisaker Circle: Richard’64 and Barbara (Moen) Amundson’65, Helen (Rowe) ’48 and +Edward Furst, and Joseph ’80 and Greer Whitters. Membership in the President’s Council honors those who have provided financial support to Luther of $1,500 or more—or $750 or more for alumni in their first decade after graduation—in the past calendar year. Life membership honors those whose cumulative outright gifts total $100,000 or more, those who have established irrevocable planned gifts with remainder interest present values of $100,000 or more, those who have made irrevocable gifts of life insurance policies with cash values of $100,000 or more, or those who have contributed combinations thereof. +Deceased

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ANN SPONBERG PETERSON PHOTO

LUTHER PHOTO BUREAU

Campus News

Brudos, Nordness awards. Alan Brudos ’55, Isak Swanson ’17, Brianna Shelly ’16, and Sally Brudos gathered for this shot after Shelly presented the 2016 Brudos Recital in April as the recipient of the Alan R. and Sally J. Brudos Family Prize for Opera Performance at Luther College for the past academic year. Luigi Enriquez ’17 was named the Brudos prize winner for 2016–17. The Brudos prize ($5,000) is an auditioned scholarship award that is presented each year to an outstanding junior voice student who intends to pursue a career in opera. Swanson, a music, management, and classics major, is the recipient of the Emery O. Nordness Memorial Award for Business, also established by the Brudoses, which is awarded to an outstanding senior Luigi Enriquez majoring in accounting, business, economics, or management.

“Positively Luther” Award goes to Iloria Phoenix ’18 Iloria Phoenix ’18 of Pella, Iowa, received the Kuh Family “Positively Luther” Award for the 2015–16 academic year. The $5,000 award is given each year to a student whose character, leadership, and participation in co-curricular and other educationally purposeful activities enhance the quality of campus life. To apply for the award, students submit their resume and a statement about a new or revised policy, practice, or opportunity the college should consider to further enrich student experience. Phoenix, a music and psychology major, wrote that she loves being a student at Luther but knows that she and other students could benefit if Luther faculty and staff were better prepared to work with and welcome students from diverse backgrounds. The Kuh Family “Positively Luther” Award was established in 2015 by George D. Kuh ’68 of Bonita Springs, Fla.; Warren R. Kuh ’74 of Austin, Texas; and Kristian R. Kuh ’97 of San Diego, Calif.

MEGAN OLIVER '19 PHOTO COURTESY OF JON AILABOUNI '10

Nearly 60 student scholarship recipients gathered at the Legacy Trust scholarship recognition luncheon held on campus May 7, 2016. The Legacy Trust recognizes donors who have made gifts to Luther’s endowed scholarship program, with membership offered to donors who establish endowed scholarships of $25,000 or more. Each year more than 1,000 Luther students receive endowed scholarship support from more than 600 endowed scholarship funds. A list of scholarship donors can be found on the Luther website at luther.edu/giving/recognition/legacy_trust.

Jazz Orchestra tours Brazil. Luther’s Jazz Orchestra traveled to Brazil, May 25 to June 14, 2016, for a three-week immersion in the musical cultures of Rio de Janeiro and the northeastern states of Paraíba, Pernambuco, and Rio Grande do Norte. The tour featured 13 performances, workshops in Brazilian percussion, dance, choral singing, and frevo, live performances on Brazilian public radio and television, exchanges with amateur and professional ensembles, and several trips to the beach. In this photo, the orchestra’s trumpet section, faculty member Jon Ailabouni ’10, and members of the Banda Philharmônica de Cruzeta joined forces for a combined rehearsal of music for symphonic band written in the Forró style, the folk music of the northeastern Brazilian state Rio Grande do Norte.

SHERRY (BRAUN) ALCOCK '82

Left: Jazz Orchestra celebrated its return to the United States with a tour homecoming concert at the Lake Harriet Band Shell in Minneapolis. About 1,000 Luther alumni, parents, students, and friends attended the Lake Harriet performance, which was preceded by an alumni picnic.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Campus News ATHLETICS BASEBALL

Mitch Knippenberg ’16

The American Baseball Coaches Association named Luther head baseball coach Bryan Nikkel the 2016 ABCA/Diamond Central Region Coach of the Year. Nikkel led the Norse to a school record 34 wins and 14 losses. Luther posted a league record of 17-11 and finished third. At the Iowa Conference six-team double elimination tournament, Nikkel’s squad went 4-0 and secured a trip to the NCAA III National Tournament. At the Midwest Regional, the Norse posted a record of 2-2 and were eliminated by St. John’s University (Minn.) 5-4. Junior Nate Beckman was named the league’s Pitcher of the Year, and catcher Mitch Knippenberg ’16 was named a thirdteam ABCA/Rawlings All-American. He is the second Luther player to be named an All-American in baseball. The first was pitcher Jay Kamin ’85 in 1985. This past season, Knippenberg led the team in batting average (.390), slugging percentage (.623), hits (62), doubles (23), home runs (4), RBI (48), and total bases (99). Defensively, he was credited with 236 putouts, 21 assists, and five errors for a fielding percentage of .981. His 23 doubles was a single-season school record.

Late spring highlights GOLF

Luther men’s golf shot a four-round total of 1,215 and captured the 2016 Iowa Conference championship. The title was the first for the Norse since 2008 and the 10th in school history. With the league title, Luther also qualified for the NCAA III National Tournament, May 10–13, in Rochester, N.Y. The Norse finished tied for 33rd in a 41-team field. MORE AWARDS FOR GRADUATES

Luther seniors Clare Slagel ’16 (swimming), Tricia Serres ’16 (cross country and track), and Drew Van Anrooy ’16 (wrestling) have been named College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) Academic All-Americans. Slagel is the first Luther student-athlete to be named a first-team honoree for a third time. She is also the Iowa Conference’s nominee for the 2016 NCAA Woman of the Year Award. Van Anrooy wrapped up his two-year Luther wrestling career claiming the 141st

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Men’s golf team participants in the NCAA III National Tournament (left to right): Joe Fewer ’19, Andrew Betts ’17, Adam Turner ’16, Elliot Horst ’16, Peter Kephart ’17, and coach Scott Fjelstul ’83.

national championship at the 2016 NCAA III National Tournament. He finished the year with a record of 25-0. During his junior year he was the national runner-up at this same weight category. He tallied a career record of 50-3. Serres completed her remarkable career with an eighth-place finish in the finals of the 1,500 at the NCAA III National Outdoor Track and Field Championships on May 28,

earning All-American honors in the 1,500 for a fourth time. She is the most decorated track and cross country athlete in Luther history, with 11 All-American honors: four during the indoor track season, five for the outdoor season, and two in cross country. In July, she received an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship, one of only 29 awarded to women in spring sports.

Campus News

SOFTBALL

Miranda McCay ’16

Luther’s softball team captured the Iowa Conference Championship—its fourth in six years—and earned a 17th appearance in the NCAA III National Tournament. They were no. 10 in the final National Fastpitch Coaches Association (NFCA) national rankings. Miranda McCay ’16 was named a third-team NFCA All-American in softball at second base. McCay, who played every position during her Luther career except pitcher and first base, finished her senior campaign batting .364 with 41 RBI. She posted a slugging percentage of .510 that included 12 doubles, three triples, and one home run, all from the lead-off slot in the Norse batting lineup. She led the team with 30 walks and struck out just eight times in 143 at-bats. Defensively, she was credited with 68 put outs, 70 assists, and seven errors for a fielding percentage of .952.

• Follow Luther athletics results at luther.edu/sports. • Stream events live and on-demand at stream.luther.edu/sports. • Sign up for eScores, a free Norse athletics results program at luther.edu/sports-information.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Engage with the Extraordinary!

Series

Center 2016 17

Stage

facebook.com/CenterStageSeries

tickets.luther.edu

SEPT Reduced Shakespeare Co.: 10 The Complete History of America TIX AUG 29

(Abridged): Election Edition! Comedic rendition of 600 years of American history

TIX SEPT 8

The Aca-Perfect Concert Experience

High-energy a cappella celebration

Dance OCT 21 Versa-Style Company TIX SEPT 22

Hip-hop inspiration for everyone

2016

OCT 7 Vocalosity:

NOV 3 L.A. Theatre Works: TIX OCT 6

Judgment at Nuremberg

World War II drama explores loyalty, compassion, and law

NOV 12 Rosanne Cash Duo: TIX SEPT 13

The River & the Thread Grammy-winning Americana

Pick up a brochure, visit tickets.luther.edu, or contact us at (563) 387-1357 or tickets@luther.edu.

2016–17 Center Stage Series Major Sponsors Luther College Diversity Council

We thank these incredible community sponsors who make this amazing art possible in northeast Iowa!

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Jed Jackson, Tomorrowland, 2016, gouache For more information, visit www.luther.edu/ galleries. Dates and shows subject to change.

2016–17 Gallery Schedule Who Do You Trust? KRISTIN WIGLEY-FLEMING FINE ARTS GALLERY Sept 7—Oct 14

Art faculty show, mixed media

Oct 25—Dec 9

Jordan Acker Anderson and Josh Anderson, Things We Do Not Say, mixed media

Feb 7—Mar 17

Michael Hopkins, The X-Ray Series, white ink on slate

Mar 30—Apr 29

Luke Severson, Winn CO OP, clay installation

May 6—21 Senior show, mixed media

2013

2014

2015

2016

Luther College

Annual Fund Your Gift. Every Year. Put to work right away, where it is needed most. givenow.luther.edu

PREUS LIBRARY Sept 5—Oct 13

Alumni reunion show (featuring work from the Luther College Fine Arts Collection), mixed media

Oct 22—Dec 11

Tiberiu Chelcea, Trigonopoetry, text and image

Feb 3—Mar 15

Jed Jackson, Who Do You Trust, gauche paintings

April 5—May 21

Bob Modersohn, Click by Click, sequential photography

CENTER FOR FAITH AND LIFE Aug 31—Oct 13

EMily Lynch Victory ’06, Alternate Bases, math-inspired paintings

Oct 21—Dec 5

Transfer of Memory, photographs and stories of Minnesota survivors of the Holocaust

Feb 3—Mar 15

Dena Tollefson, Corn Portraits from Biblical Times to Present, paintings

Mar 30—May 21

Skip McKinstry, Before the Foundations, manipulated digital imagery

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

The

GIFTS AT WORK: FACULTY ENDOWMENTS

Luther Alumni Magazine

hen Dennis ’64 and Suzanne Birkestrand gave $1.5 million to Luther to endow the Birkestrand Economics and Management Chair in spring 2016, it was a big deal, and we wanted to know more about the effect their gift would have. How, exactly, do endowed chairs and professorships work at Luther? And how do they affect the education that students get? To learn, we went to the experts—faculty who hold or have recently held endowed positions. First of all, these funds, given by individuals or groups, provide recognition. They recognize the value of an academic subject, the faculty member who is named to the chair or professorship, and the person or persons for whom the endowment is named—a past professor or the donors themselves. Classics professor Philip Freeman says, “Fundamentally, it’s a recognition by the college that a particular subject is important enough to be permanent.”

difference endowments make by Ellen Modersohn Alumni have used endowments to honor professors whom they especially respected. For instance, since 2007 Freeman has held the Orlando W. Qualley Chair of Classical Languages, created by a group of former students to honor “Pip” Qualley, who served at Luther for 60 years as a professor, administrator, and coach. “I meet students of Qualley—mostly retired people now—and they tell such stories of this man. They have a great fondness for him, and that’s why they endowed the chair,” Freeman says. Endowments help pay the salary of the person who holds the position, which frees up college funds for other purposes. And as Robert Christman, the Kermit O. and Jane E.

Hanson Professor of History 2013–16, points out, they also enhance the academic excellence of the institution by bringing distinction to whoever holds them, acknowledging that person’s achievement. Endowments also bring what’s called programming money, which the faculty often put toward research expenses. Christman says this added ability to conduct research “further allows individuals who already have a profile in their discipline to continue to be leaders in their field.” In addition to the obvious benefits of having academic leaders teaching in Luther’s classrooms, professors who are wellconnected and widely known scholars write graduate school letters of recommendation

that carry weight. Ultimately, students benefit in many ways from the additional resources that endowments make possible. Endowed faculty often use funds to allow students and other faculty to attend scholarly conferences and obtain specific skills training, purchase classroom resources, bring speakers to campus, and more. Endowment funds also make it possible for professors to partner with students in conducting research. Kirk Larsen, the Russell R. Rulon Endowed Chair in Biology 2013–16, says, “I extensively involve students in my research and do very little research without a student next to me.”

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Luther faculty have recently used endowment funds in the following ways.

Larsen bought three honeybee hives and placed them in Roslien Woodlands for use with his entomology students. The hives are a learning tool at a time when honeybees are encountering environmental trouble, and they give students hands-on experience. Students learn how to maintain the hives, for instance, and extract honey from them. To further his development as a professor, Larsen attended an insect macro-photography workshop in Belize. “Because I teach about insects and they’re so small, I need to have photographs in the classroom so students can visualize what I’m talking about,” Larsen says. This summer, when some of his research students were doing a butterfly survey, he was able to photography butterflies in the field that they can use in their presentations.

Another training trip took Larsen to Mexico to the overwintering sites of monarch butterflies, which he lectured on when he got back. He is involved with the Iowa Monarch Conservation Consortium, and his students are doing a project on plants that are nectar sources for monarchs. “Some of the information I learned from that trip . . . has really influenced my work with students this summer,” he says.

Luther Alumni Magazine

Christman’s endowment-funded research is providing a unique primary-source experience for his students. “As a result of my research, I have translated 500-year-old historical documents into English and assigned them in my classes. Students are always excited to realize that no one else in the English-speaking world has access to these sources,” he says. He is also working on a case study of the first two people executed for their beliefs during the Protestant Reformation, which he has designed for students: “The entire project is designed as an attractive and thought-provoking introduction to the Reformation, one that will spark the students’ imagination and inspire a desire to learn more.”

Collaboration is at the heart of how Steve Holland, the Bert M. and Mildred O. Dahl Chair in Economics and Business 2011–16, has tried to use his funds. “Economics is a core social science, and having a pot of money like this allows us to integrate with the larger community better than we might otherwise. It allows us to promote economic thinking in lots of different contexts,” he says. Holland has put his endowment funds together with money from other departments to bring in speakers in marketing, ethics and public life, environmental studies, and more. This summer he hired a student researcher for a project focusing on what makes a community healthy. Ultimately, the results will be shared with the broader Decorah and Winneshiek communities.

Lise Kildegaard turned the spotlight on art in small packages as the Dennis M. Jones Distinguished Teaching Professorship in the Humanities 2013–16. “My special project is to work on things that are short shorts,” Kildegaard told Chips in fall 2015. “I am interested in literary flash fiction, micro fiction, short lyrics, poems, and art works that are small and quickly seen.” Through an array of projects, students learned to make prints, create art to illustrate short literature, design and create videos that express poems, produce and act in a play of 57 short scenes, and more.

Freeman’s research on ancient manuscripts at the national library of Ireland in Dublin each summer fuels his teaching each fall in the course The World of St. Patrick. “I’m always bringing in my own research, my own work, photographs of manuscripts,” he says. “It feeds directly into my teaching.” This summer he also used some of the funds to scout a future January Term trip to Ireland with students.

Marylin Roverud Endowed Fellowship

Perceptions of risk and well-being among youth in Ukraine was the focus of research by Maryna Bazylevych during her Nena Amundson ’56 Distinguished Professorship 2014–16. She involved a student in all steps of the research process, she says, “from the design part of it to fieldwork experience and analysis of data and writing a report to presenting it at the conference.” Bazlevych’s student assistant, Brittany Anderson ’16, accompanied her to Ukraine, helped conduct focus groups with Bazylevych, and conducted some interviews and ethnographic encounters on her own.

Back at Luther, Bazylevych trained two other students, who received academic administrative assistantships from the Dean’s Office, to transcribe the conversations. In spring 2016, as Bazylevych and Anderson were boarding a plane to go present their research findings at a Society for Applied Anthropology meeting, Anderson got an email saying she’d been accepted into the anthropology program at Iowa State University with a full tuition waiver and a generous stipend. Needless to say, both were thrilled!

In 2014, the Roverud family established the Marilyn Roverud Endowed Fellowship in Lutheran Studies in honor of Marilyn (Haugen) Roverud ’66. The family intends the fellowship to serve as a catalyst for lively and informed discussion about what it means to be a college of the church. This is the first academic year in which the fellowship has been awarded, going to composer-in-residence Brooke Joyce.

New Appointments Nena Amundson Distinguished Professor Anita Carrasco, assistant professor of anthropology, 2016–18 Bert M. & Mildred O. Dahl Chair in Economics Ramona (Feller) Nelson ’75, professor of accounting and management, 2016–21 Weston Noble Endowed Chair in Music To be announced. Held by Allen Hightower, former professor of music, 2013–16 Orlando W. Qualley Chair Professor in Classics Philip Freeman, professor of classics, since 2007 Russell R. Rulon Chair in Biology Eric Baack, associate professor of biology, 2016–19

Suzanne (center) and Dennis Birkestrand ’64, shown here with President Paula J. Carlson, were on campus in spring 2015 to speak and lead discussions on business and management. RECOGNIZING LUTHER’S INFLUENCE “We believe in Luther College, in the quality of its academic programs, and in supporting the talented faculty who dedicate their lives to empowering undergraduates to achieve. May this endowed chair be a lasting remembrance of the profound impact Luther College has had on our lives.” —Dennis Birkestrand ’64 In creating the endowed chair in economics and business, Dennis ’64 and Suzanne Birkestrand say they hope to encourage and recognize the importance of free market– friendly perspectives on economic theory, private enterprise, and good business prac-

tices in classroom discussions. Dennis spent 22 years in marketing and sales with the Maytag Corporation. In 1988, he and Suzanne started a distribution business for the Jenn-Air brand of appliances, headquartered in Kansas City. They then founded Factory Direct Appliance in 1993 and for 21 years offered a range of appliances to homebuilders and remodelers. They sold the business in 2014. Appointments to the Birkestrand chair will be for three years and may be renewed at the discretion of the academic dean and president of the college. The first chair, announced at Opening Convocation on Sept. 1, is Tim Schweizer ’80.

To learn more about endowed chairs and professorships at Luther, visit luther.edu/academics/dean/ faculty/endowed-chairs and luther.edu/giving/gift-types.

Dennis M. Jones Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Humanities Nancy Barry, professor of English, 2016–18 The Kermit O. and Jane E. Hanson Professorship in History Richard Mtisi, associate professor of Africana studies and history, 2016–19 Marilyn Roverud Endowed Fellowship in Lutheran Studies Brooke Joyce, composer-in-residence, 2016–17 Birkestrand Economics and Management Chair Tim Schweizer ’80, professor of management, 2016–19 Director of the Center for Ethics and Public Engagement Victoria Christman, associate professor of history Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

SENIOR

SNAPSHOTS 2016 graduates talk about the ideas and experiences that inspired them at Luther, and where they’re headed now

Luther Alumni Magazine

PHOTO BY MADELINE MILLER ’19

“Philosophy makes me see through things, see myself and understand myself, but by understanding myself, I get to understand others.” —Pema Lama

Asking “why” leads Lama from isolation to global education Pema Lama left home at seven years old. “All I knew back then was that the only way to escape getting married at 12 was to become a nun,” she says. Lama grew up in the mountain region of Nepal, in a farming village with no electricity or running water, where food was scarce, literacy was rare, and arranged and kidnapped marriages were common. Her mother gave birth to 13 children, eight of whom died. Between herself and her older sister, seven died in a row. When Lama, the 12th child, was six years old, her eldest brother visited the village after 15 years of living as a reincarnated monk. “I’d never seen him, only heard of him, and then he came for three months,” she recalls. “I was really surprised that all the villagers were coming to visit him and bringing fruits and all these delicious things that us kids would have to steal sometimes, like walnuts. He was so clean, and everything looked so new, and people were so happy to be around him. And I was like, why are people not treating me the same?” And so began Lama’s lifetime of questioning. She continues, “If I asked, Can I eat rice tonight? my parents would start giving me this long lecture about how rice is so hard to get, while he, without asking, would get all these special things that we would wait for. And I was like, is it just because he’s a guy? I was asking all these questions, like why is my rice so limited? And I thought at that time, If I just follow the rules, I will never be satisfied.” For a year after her brother’s visit, Lama badgered her parents constantly to let her join a nunnery. “Buddhism was the only thing I could imagine at the time to escape from the life I knew I would live if didn’t choose a different path,” she says. Finally, her parents relented and sent her down the mountain, to Kathmandu. “I made that almost two-week journey without family members, just a friend of my father’s whom I had met two or three times. I was so happy I don’t even remember crying. I was like, Finally, I get what I wanted!” she smiles. The duo walked eight or nine hours a day down a steep mountain trail, and when they arrived in Kathmandu, Lama saw her first bicycle, first bus. “At that time, the only place I knew was the mountain,” she says. The founder of the nunnery, Thrangu Rinpoche, took one look at Lama and said, “Uh-uh—it’s a lifetime commitment, and you’re too young to make that choice now.” But he offered her an alternative: attend his Shree Mangal Dvip (SMD) School instead. At the SMD School, Lama learned in Tibetan, Nepali, and English (she speaks these languages as well as Hindi and her native dialect of Tibetan). She took classes from nuns, monks, and a cadre of visiting global volunteers. After graduating, she became one of the six or seven students asked to stay on for a year of service and, if things went well, earn a chance to attend high school abroad.

During her year of service, Lama took on the formidable task of teaching sex ed—a taboo subject in Buddhism—to area nunneries, monasteries, and schools. Lama had volunteered in the SMD health clinic for years, so she was used to dealing straightforwardly with bodies—but that doesn’t mean teaching sex ed was easy. “The first few days no one spoke,” she says. “The other teachers and I were like, This is called this—but it’s not us talking, it’s the book! But by the end of the week, everyone was shouting and having fun. That was eyeopening,” she reflects, “and I started questioning: Why do I just follow whatever my religion says without even questioning whether it’s right or wrong?” After her year of service, Lama was selected to attend a United World Colleges school in Norway, where she had her first encounter with philosophy. She walked into the classroom 20 minutes late on the first day of class, and the professor asked, “Who are you?” “I’m Pema. I’m from Nepal,” she answered. “No, who are you? What makes you who you are?” “And I was stuck,” Lama recalls. “Since then, I’ve been reflecting: Who am I? What makes me me? When I react to certain things, what makes me react that way? What has formed me to do that thing? That class really blew me up.” It’s no surprise that when Lama came to Luther, she majored in philosophy. “You decide things every day, and it’s important to know where your decision-making is coming from and where your ideas come from and why you have those ideas,” she says. “Philosophy makes me see through things, see myself and understand myself, but by understanding myself, I get to understand others.” Lama starts a master’s program in Buddhist studies at Naropa University in Boulder, Colo., this fall. “Every time I look back,” she says, “somehow my thoughts are guided by Buddhist ideals, but I still don’t know much about it. I want to see why I have those ideas, why I stand by what Buddha says.” She’s also interested in learning more about gender in Buddhism. “It hurts me how some Buddhists say you have to be born as a man to become enlightened,” she says. “Why do men become the reincarnated one and women don’t? Where do I stand, and why do I follow that?” Lama would like to return to Nepal someday and raise these questions with girls and women there. “If you don’t talk about it, you will never learn beyond it,” she says. “That’s one of my goals, to go back and tell people: Take initiative. Explore why you have certain values. Where are they coming from?” —Kate Frentzel

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Johnson learns to love research—and the little worm that makes it possible

PHOTO BY MADELINE MILLER ’19

“Knowing that I am contributing to the body of scientific knowledge— and that at any moment in time I may be the only person in the world that knows this one particular thing—is very much a driving force for me.” —Jenna Johnson

Jenna Johnson can’t stop singing the praises of the tiny, transparent, E. coli–loving roundworms known officially as Caenorhabditis elegans. “It’s an ideal model organism for doing research in developmental biology and neurology,” she says. “C. elegans has a very short life span, a lot of progeny, and a surprisingly similar genome to humans. They’re fascinating organisms.” Johnson, a biology and history double major, was introduced to the microscopic worms while conducting research on the toxic gas hydrogen sulfide through the Amgen Scholars Program at the University of Washington in Seattle the summer after her sophomore year. It was a life-changing experience for the Stillwater, Minn., native and Phi Beta Kappa member, who also found time while at Luther to volunteer as a Spanish interpreter for the Decorah Free Clinic and a care companion with St. Croix Hospice. “I had no clue that I wanted to do research, but, after spending that summer at UW, I felt really drawn to it,” she says. “I learned how to troubleshoot problems—because most of the time what you do in the research lab doesn’t work—and how to fail gracefully. I also experienced the joy of success in the lab, and that’s a pretty cool feeling.” Johnson continued doing research with C. elegans when she returned to Luther, joining the lab of Stephanie Fretham ’05, Luther assistant professor of biology, in fall 2014. There she used the microscopic organism to examine the connection between iron and disrupted protein homeostasis in Alzheimer’s and other neurodegenerative diseases. Johnson presented her work—which was supported by an R.J. McElroy Grant—at the National Conferences on Undergraduate Research (NCUR) last April. “I never expected to love the research process so much, but knowing that I am contributing to the body of scientific knowledge—and that at any moment in time I may be the only person in the world that knows this one particular thing—is very much a driving force for me,” says Johnson, who also spent the summer after her junior year conducting research, that time on protein and DNA interactions at the University of Iowa. This summer Johnson moved to the East Coast, where she will spend the next year (or two) conducting research at the National Cancer Institute in Frederick, Md., as the recipient of a highly competitive Post-baccaulaureate Cancer Research Training Award. It’s the next step toward her ultimate goal—earning a joint M.D./Ph.D. degree and working as an academic physician at a large university. “During the summer I spent at the University of Iowa, I shadowed doctors who had the joint degree and realized that this is the career I wanted,” she says. “I love the idea that my experience as a doctor will inform my research, and I’m willing to put in the time—eight or nine more years of school—to make that happen.” —Sara Friedl-Putnam

Luther Alumni Magazine

Proescholdt connects issues of environment and social change Nearly 10 years later, Laura Proescholdt recalls the exact moment she decided to pursue environmental studies. “I was in seventh grade and had just finished watching the documentary An Inconvenient Truth,” she says. “It may sound cliché, but I felt compelled then and there to learn all I could about climate change, because I saw it as the defining issue my generation would have to tackle.” Proescholdt did just that at Luther. In addition to earning induction into the Phi Beta Kappa academic honor society for excelling in her studies, she served as an academic research assistant for the college’s Environmental Studies Department. (A talented writer, Proescholdt wrote for Chips and the Luther Sustainability Office as well.) Her studies culminated in a yearlong senior honors research project on the Anthropocene, a term coined in 2000 to denote the period when human activities started to affect Earth’s geology and ecosystem significantly. “I examined why making the Anthropocene official matters to the scientific community and to academia more broadly and how it creates a dynamic space for rethinking relationships among science, politics, and activism,” says Proescholdt, who presented her research at the 2016 National Conferences on Undergraduate Research. “My main takeaway was that the Anthropocene is a fascinating tool to reimagine the human relationship with Earth.” Her natural curiosity also led the Cumberland, Wis., native—sister of Anne Proescholdt ’12— far beyond Decorah. She spent January of her junior year in Hong Kong and Shanghai, China, studying street photography and the summer of her sophomore year working as an expressive arts intern with Northwest Passage, a Wisconsin-based organization that helps troubled teens through the arts and nature-based therapy. “That experience opened my eyes to the importance of nature as a healing force, because the time the teens spent outside connecting with nature was very healing for them,” she says. “It also inspired me to use my major less to address climate change or biodiversity directly but to work on solving systemic social problems, because I believe environmental problems have to be addressed in those efforts.” Proescholdt put her words to action this summer when she began a yearlong Lutheran Volunteer Corps stint with the Minnesota Housing Partnership, a Twin Cities–based organization that works to build sustainable communities. “I’ve spent a lot of time learning about issues,” she says enthusiastically. “Now I’m ready to use that knowledge to make positive change.”

“My main takeaway was that the Anthropocene is a fascinating tool to reimagine the human relationship with Earth.” —Laura Proescholdt

—Sara Friedl-Putnam

PHOTO BY MADELINE MILLER ’19

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

“It was inspiring to see the joy that music can bring to so many, including some who may not have much else in their lives.” —Fred Scaife

Scaife documents the transformative power of music Saturday mornings would have been an ideal time for Fred Scaife to catch up on sleep after a virtually non-stop weekday schedule. But the Rushford, Minn., native decided to pursue a very different kind of rejuvenation, rising early every Saturday from October through December 2015 to engage elderly residents of the Gundersen Harmony Care Center in song. “The main goal of the Voices in Harmony Memory Choir was to inspire seniors through music and instill a love of lifelong learning,” says Scaife, a music education major and former Nordic Choir president who now serves as the middle and high school choral director for Wapsie Valley Schools in Fairbank, Iowa. “It was inspiring to see the joy that music can bring to so many, including some who may not have much else in their lives.” Randi Spencer-Berg ’87—longtime music lover and Harmony-based physician—got it all started when she asked Luther faculty member Jill Wilson if she knew any music education students who might be interested in working with a group of seniors, some with memory loss. Scaife jumped at the chance. “Nursing homes and assisted living communities were familiar environments for me because, growing up, I visited them with my dad when he was doing pastoral work,” he says. “I knew I would enjoy being around—and learning from—the seniors at the care center in Harmony.” The feeling was mutual. More than two dozen residents joined Scaife (and sometimes other music education students) each week for hour-long sessions during which they would sing familiar folk songs such as “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad” and play jingle bells, chimes, and other simple percussion instruments. The sessions also inspired Scaife’s senior research project, conducted with Sarah Bowman ’16, which investigated the transformative power of music among the elderly. “We filmed the sessions and then analyzed the film for behavioral changes in the participants from the beginning to the end of the program,” he says. Their conclusion: The more engaged the residents were in the music, the more responsive and lively they became over the course of the program. “It was amazing to see that transformation, to see how music positively impacts both the body and the mind, no matter one’s age,” Scaife says. “To be there and to witness that reminded me that a career in music education was, without a doubt, my calling.” ——Sara Friedl-Putnam

PHOTO BY WILL HELLER ’16

Luther Alumni Magazine

Schaeffer turns ideas into action, from helping a food pantry to an IBM project Blaise Schaeffer learned early in life that Decorah is home to many people in need. “I grew up across the street from the food pantry operated by First Lutheran Church so I saw how many people came there for help,” he says. “I’m very fortunate that I’ve never had to worry about where my next meal is coming from, but there are lots of people in and around Decorah who face hunger every day.” That realization inspired him to create Dining Dollars for Decorah as his service project for the Launching Luther Leaders program. To turn his idea into reality, Schaeffer—son of Scot Schaeffer, Luther vice president for enrollment management—sought out the expertise of Wayne Tudor, dining services general manager. The two devised a plan to encourage Luther students to donate any excess dining dollars in their accounts to buy food that the pantry desperately needed. “We raised nearly $3,000, which bought two six-foot-tall pallets of rice, beans, oats, and pasta,” says Schaeffer, a computer science major and four-year member (goalie) of the Norse soccer team. “It was mind-blowing to realize that one simple idea could make such a big difference for so many people.” That can-do attitude translated to success well beyond Luther (and Decorah) as well. Following his junior year, Schaeffer was one of five college students—including Michael Moore ’16—chosen by the Rochester (Minn.) office of IBM to develop an administrators’ console for its Watson Oncology Advisor program. “The console will help hospital administrators better understand how physicians are using the program in their clinics,” he says. Schaeffer spearheaded the project’s “back end” development, writing the source code needed for delivery of data to its “front end.” The project took top honors in IBM’s national summer intern competition in August 2015. “We were confident in the work we had done, but there were a lot of other cool projects—including imagerecognition projects created by graduate students—in the running,” he says. “We were a bit shocked to win the award.” Not surprisingly, IBM extended Schaeffer a formal job offer to work as a software engineer on its Watson Health Project following graduation. He began his job—at the company’s Raleigh, N.C., site—in August after returning from a 3,900-mile summer cycling adventure that took him across the United States, from Anacortes, Wash., to Bar Harbor, Maine. “It’s a pretty nerdy thing to say, but I love computer programming,” he says with a smile. “I’ve had an interest in technology for as long as I can remember, and I love the challenge of designing algorithms to solve real-world problems.”

PHOTO BY WILL HELLER ’16

“I’ve had an interest in techology for as long as I can remember, and I love the challenge of designing algorithms to solve real world problems” —Blaise Schaeffer

—Sara Friedl-Putnam

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Lewis explores how dance alumni use movement in their careers

PHOTO BY WILL HELLER ’16

“The MF curriculum is producing really important individuals. It’s producing professional dancers, but also people who are going into health or healing.” —Catherine Lewis

Catherine Lewis has explored a few careers, but it’s her dance practice that’s shaping how she’d like to help people. “I’ve always known I wanted to be a helper or a healer or some profession in that realm,” says the amiable Minnesotan. “But I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out: if my fit’s not in nursing, where is it?” As a first-year student, Lewis was drawn to nursing because it offered a guaranteed career, but her embodied experience—what she learned in her dance and yoga practices—left her, she says, “searching for ways to communicate what I practice and feel in my body.” Lewis changed her major from nursing to psychology and dance, where she felt at home with professor Jane Hawley ’87 and the Movement Fundamentals (MF) curriculum, which teaches somatic practices rather than specific styles of dance. Still interested in health work, however, she spent the summer of 2015 interning in Minnesota at Northfield Hospital & Clinics, where she got to job shadow in every field, including occupational therapy. “A lot of what they were doing felt similar to one of the paired principles of MF, which is range and efficiency,” Lewis says. “One patient broke both arms, and she had to learn to use her nondominant hand and regain mobility in her shoulder. The occupational therapist’s job was to give her tools to live comfortably until her range changed again. That creativity is compelling to me.” Still, Lewis felt disheartened by the idea that the work was reactive rather than preventive. “You’re waiting until someone has a reason to come see you, and I think if we trained people to use their bodies more effectively in the first place, then a lot of rehabilitation work wouldn’t be needed,” she says. “And unfortunately, only a small percentage of the population can afford to receive occupational therapy, and that’s a problem for me too.” Unclear about how she could use her embodiment practices in a future career, Lewis devised an ambitious project. She applied for and received a grant from Luther’s Career Center, funded by an anonymous donor, to invite back to campus six graduates of the MF program who use the concepts in their professional lives. The graduates, who range from a chiropractor to a freelance dancer to a cook, shared their stories with the Luther community last semester. “The MF curriculum is producing really important individuals. It’s producing professional dancers, but also people who are going into health or healing,” she says. “I saw each of the alumni using the MF curriculum in a way that’s meaningful for them; they transfer what they’ve learned and help people live in their bodies physically, or use the body in a counseling practice. It was really comforting and affirming to see that.” Lewis started an occupational therapy master’s program at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee this fall. —Kate Frentzel

Luther Alumni Magazine

“That’s where I can be most beneficial. That’s where I can make the most happen. That’s where I can help.” —Sheldon Smith

For Smith, sports serve to connect with kids, define his path in life Sheldon Smith lights up when he talks about wrestling. “What made me really get engaged in it was that I’m a fan of close-combat movies, and the moves and the flow, getting in the groove—I see it almost as a set of dance moves,” he says. He took up the sport in high school in Sunrise, Fla., and was recruited to Luther’s wrestling team after a friend sent in a tape of his matches. One thing that Smith loves about the sport is the chance to hold himself accountable and improve on his mistakes, and that’s a lesson he carried into his academic life when he decided to join the TRIO program during J-term his first year at Luther. “I struggled with a couple of things, and my mindset wasn’t really ready for that collegelevel learning,” he says. “They were offering help, and they gave me the academic tools I needed for class. It really made me hold myself more accountable.” Smith is the first person in his family to attend college, and it’s important to him to set an example for his siblings, in particular his younger sister. “She asks a lot of questions about college, and it’s cool to see she’s at least thinking about it at 15,” he says. After deciding on a social work major his freshman year, Smith did two externships at the federal courthouse in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, once shadowing a court marshal and once a probation officer. But he approaches his future career much like a wrestler sizing up an opponent: with great care and deliberation. During his summers at Luther, Smith worked as a counselor at Luther’s wrestling camps for middle and high school students. “The first year, I didn’t know what to expect or if kids would like me, but it turned out really well,” he says. “I had a good time, they had a good time, and after thinking some more, I decided that I wanted to work with kids, maybe troubled youth.” So for his in-field practicum his senior year, Smith decided to work with Girls in the Game, a nonprofit that empowers girls in Chicago to lead healthy, positive, confident lives. Smith worked with an afterschool program on Chicago’s South Side, coordinating sports and other activities and leading conversations about health and leadership. The experience reinforced that he’d like to work with kids in middle or early high school. “That age group strikes me because they’re beginning to think on their own,” he says. “I see the changes that they make while being involved in the program. It’s an awesome experience just observing some of those changes, and that’s where I can be most beneficial. That’s where I can make the most happen. That’s where I can help.” Smith plans to spend a year gaining experience in a youth-oriented program before starting a master’s program in social work.

PHOTO BY WILL HELLER ’16

—Kate Frentzel

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

“The only medals I have from childhood are three math competition medals. Especially when you have a household of eight siblings, you try to find the things that make you unique.” —Jesse Hitz Graff

Hitz Graff credits family with helping to develop his strengths Jesse Hitz Graff grew up with seven siblings across three households, and he gives credit to his family for setting him on the path to Luther and beyond. “You feel loved when you come home,” he says. “All the siblings mob you at the door. I’d much rather have three houses where I’m accepted than one where I’m not. My family’s built me into the person I am.” It’s easy to see how Hitz Graff’s family dynamics have influenced his Luther career. For one thing, it was his older brother, Isaac ’14, an Ultimate Frisbee player, who brought Jesse to Luther. “St. Olaf and Carleton didn’t have Isaac, and they didn’t have Isaac on an Ultimate team,” he jokes. He describes getting involved with Luther’s Ultimate B-team, Pound, which he captained for two years, as “the best decision I made at Luther. My first home here was Pound.” It was because he missed his younger siblings that Hitz Graff became a buddy in Luther’s PALS program, where he acted as a role model for an area student. “You take a lot of what you do in college for granted, you get tired often, so it’s cool to have the young, vibrant enthusiasm and the wonder of a child in your life,” he says. You could say, too, that family dynamics helped Hitz Graff excel in math and science. “The only medals I have from childhood are three math competition medals. Especially when you have a household of eight siblings, you try to find the things that make you unique,” he says. Last summer, Hitz Graff worked in the lab of Erin Flater ’01, associate professor of physics, to study the durability and longevity of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) devices, which are found in everything from cell phones to airbags. He focused on how silicon oxide wears on aluminum oxide, two common MEMS materials, to try to determine whether laws that govern the wear of surfaces of large objects also apply at the microscale (he concluded that they do not). Hitz Graff presented his research at the Midstates Consortium for Math and Science in Chicago last fall. This fall, he begins a Ph.D. program in electrical engineering at the University of Minnesota. Growing up, his dad would have “lamp hours,” when the family would turn off overhead lights, so environmentalism was already in Hitz Graff’s mind when he took Luther’s J-term class Green Germany and Norway in 2015. Most of the renewable-energy experts the class learned from were working in electrical engineering, and that sealed the deal. “I don’t see myself as a volunteer or nonprofit worker,” he says, “but I can use whatever tools I get as an engineer to improve renewable energy and give back that way.” —Kate Frentzel

PHOTO BY WILL HELLER ’16

Luther Alumni Magazine

AFTER THE D.C. SEMESTER Program Grads Offer Insight on Politics and Service

by Kate Frentzel

uther’s Washington Semester—a study-away program with a fourday-a-week internship at its core— offers many students their first real taste of working in government. Through interning with members of Congress, the D.C. Office of the Attorney General, the U.S. Department of Education, the Senate Agriculture Committee, and scores of other agencies, students get to try on a political career—and sometimes it fits. Over the past few decades, the Washington Semester has turned out graduates working at the local, state, and federal levels, as assistant attorney generals, as policy analysts and researchers, as location scouts for presidential candidates, and even as the secretary of the Senate. The Washington Semester, which Luther offers in collaboration with 12 other Lutheran colleges, isn’t limited to politics; students can intern in communications, the arts, history and museum studies, economics and business, environmental studies, and more. But just ahead of the 2016 presidential election, it seemed a good time to check in with graduates of the program who are working in politics, policy, or public service to see what they could tell us about working in the political system that—love it or hate it— we call our own.

HEATHER ADAMS ’91, assistant attorney general, Iowa Office of the Attorney General Interned in the D.C. Office of the Corporation Counsel (now the D.C. Office of the Attorney General) What are your job responsibilities? I am the lead counsel for the Iowa Department of Public Health, a state agency employing 375 people with a budget of over $250 million. I advise on all areas of public health law—from immunizations to disease outbreaks to environmental health to maternal and child health issues—and I represent the department in administrative, district court, and appellate matters. What was your most memorable day on the job? The day the Iowa Supreme Court issued the Varnum decision, which ruled that denying same sex couples the right to marry in Iowa was unconstitutional, and the weeks following the issuance of that decision. I advised the department and county recorders on implementing Varnum to ensure marriage applications and certificates complied with the landmark decision. What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received? A former boss once told me that the least interesting thing I worked on that day was more interesting than the most interesting thing I would work on in a private law practice. Not to disparage private practice attorneys, who do excellent work and can of course have intriguing cases, but my advice for people hoping to work in government, politics, or policy would be to let that desire to effectuate change and help others be the driving force in your decision making, even if you won’t always have the paycheck those in the private sector might bring home. As the quote from [law professor] Minor Myers says: Go into the world and do well; but more importantly, go into the world and do good. What happens behind the scenes that would surprise people who don’t work in politics? What I see behind the scenes in Iowa is that people from both political parties really can work together to do good things for Iowans. The national dialogue is rife with incivility and dissention, but I work every day with people from both parties who share an interest in making Iowa a healthier and more just state and who strive to make it so. Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

JULIE STROM ’93

JULIE ADAMS ’99, secretary of the Senate Interned at the Children’s Defense Fund

JOSH STRAKA ’97, district director for Minnesota Congresswoman Betty McCollum Interned as a production assistant on Washington Week in Review What are your current job responsibilities? Day-to-day I manage Congresswoman McCollum’s Minnesota office operations, including casework and outreach staff, and serve as a liaison between the public and federal agencies. Additionally, I develop policy objectives, strategies and operating plans, and direct activities of the office in support of the congresswoman and her constituents. Describe one or two accomplishments that make you proud. The completion of the Union Depot renovation and the opening of the Green Line Light Rail in the Twin Cities are by no means my accomplishments, but I’m incredibly proud of the small role I played while working for Congresswoman McCollum. Thousands of workers were put to work to complete these projects during the depths of the recession. Now that they are open for business, tens of thousands of people depend on them every day to get to work, school, and medical appointments, not to mention Vikings, Twins, and St. Paul Saints games! Do you have any advice for people hoping to work in politics? Listen before you speak and remember whom you work for. What would you change about the U.S. political system? I’d definitely dial back the vitriol in Washington and politics across the country. There’s too much vilification and exploitation of division in national politics, which is also bleeding into state houses. Debate is vital and healthy for our country, but rage, fury, and hateful rhetoric is not debate. It forces voices out of the process. We need to remember what brings us together as Americans.

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What are your job responsibilities? I am the chief legislative, financial, and administrative officer of the United States Senate. As an elected officer, I supervise an extensive array of offices (26 departments with nearly 250 employees) to expedite the day-to-day operations of the Senate. What was your most memorable day on the job? Certainly the day I was sworn in (January 6, 2015) by the president pro tempore, Senator Orrin Hatch, in the Senate chamber will forever be etched in my mind. What’s the most frustrating aspect of your job? It is not so much frustrating as it is just the reality that my schedule is not my own—whenever the Senate is in session, I am here. And when the Senate is not in session, I’m catching up on everything on my desk I couldn’t get to when the Senate was in session. Do you have any advice for people hoping to work in politics? Be open to opportunities. I never dreamed I would have any of the jobs I’ve had in the legislative and executive branches of the federal government. If I had planned my career in politics I know I would not be in the position I am today. What happens behind the scenes that would surprise people who don’t work in politics? Folks really do get along despite their political differences. Washington is not nearly as divisive as some make it out to be.

MARK BAILEY ’00, senior assistant attorney general, Colorado Office of the Attorney General Interned with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia What are your job responsibilities? I work in the Consumer Fraud Unit, where I lead investigations and conduct civil law enforcement actions against people and companies that violate the Colorado Consumer Protection Act. What has surprised you about working in politics? I suspected that I would find this work rewarding. I am surprised by how strongly I feel that way. What was your most memorable day on the job? Probably my first trial. On our side, we had two lawyers at counsel table. Defendants had at least four, and up to six or seven lawyers, at counsel table at any given time. Having previously worked at a law firm, I learned quickly that government lawyers sometimes have to get by with less. What’s the most frustrating aspect of your job? The fact that our jurisdiction is generally limited to Colorado. Thus, if we shut down a scam here, we are limited in our ability to keep the bad guys from setting up shop in another state. Describe one or two accomplishments that make you proud. I’m most proud of the work I’ve done to shut down telemarketers who trick consumers—often elderly or otherwise at risk—into exorbitant “contracts” for magazine subscriptions. These “contracts” were often valued at more than $1,000, and it was normal for consumers to be bombarded by several different companies and tricked into multiple “contracts.” . . . I’ve shut down about 50 such companies (most of which were owned by the same seven or eight individuals) in my time here and secured millions of dollars in judgments. What would you change about the U.S. political system? Every voter would set aside a few hours a month to learn about the issues, and part of this time would be dedicated to respectfully listening to the arguments of people they disagree with.

MITCH SCHABEN ’10, policy and budget analyst for the Office of the Senate President, Illinois Senate Democratic Caucus Interned in Senator Tom Harkin’s legislative office and with the Senate Agriculture Committee What are your job responsibilities? The policy silo I work in is higher education. My primary responsibility is to write a detailed summary for every piece of legislation introduced that is categorized as impacting higher education . . . essentially, I write CliffsNotes for our caucus membership. Describe one or two accomplishments that make you proud. Two years ago, I worked on a proposal that would make it easier for students taking AP classes to gain college credit for the scores they received on the AP exam. The state’s public universities opposed the bill, and education interest groups supported the bill. I spent months engaging in a back-and-forth struggle with the two sides. Four redrafts and five amendments later, we had a bill that neither was happy with, so I knew we landed on a compromise. What would you change about the U.S. political system? Public financing of campaigns. Money is access, which is why your average citizen never gets to meet or speak with their elected officials. What happens behind the scenes that would surprise people who don’t work in politics? The amount of back and forth that goes on behind the scenes with legislative proposals. Countless hours are spent by lawmakers, stakeholders, and staff making small tweaks to the language of a bill before it’s soup. If I didn’t work in politics . . . I would open a dive shop in Mexico and name it Norse Diving.

I love my job when . . . I stand up in court and say, “Mark Bailey, on behalf of the state of Colorado.” Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

JULIE STROM ’93

ALI TOAL ’13, legislative assistant for Colorado Senator Cory Gardner MAGIE DARLING ’12, senior research assistant, Center for Health Policy Interned with the Department of Education What are your job responsibilities? I conduct literature reviews of relevant health care financing and health economics research, interview key health care stakeholders for background information and case studies, and write academic papers and blog posts. Our team also convenes private round tables and public events aimed at discussing the implementation of many of the policies about which we research and write. What was your most memorable day on the job? One of my most memorable days on the job was when I had the honor of presenting the PLEN Mentor Award to Senator Amy Klobuchar for her example of strong, collaborative leadership in public policy and for supporting future generations of women policymakers. What would you change about the U.S. political system? I’d require people of all different political stripes to socialize and interact more. Today, it’s simply too easy only to hear affirmations of our previously held beliefs, and interacting with real-life humans on the other side may challenge us to reconsider. What happens behind the scenes that would surprise people who don’t work in politics? I think most people would be surprised—and, I hope, comforted—by the extent to which many policy proposals are circulated, vetted, considered, and reconsidered among a variety of stakeholders before being made public.

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Interned for Ohio Congressman Jim Renacci What are your job responsibilities? I serve as a liaison for the senator to constituents, organizations, and federal and state agencies in the policy areas in my portfolio including health care policy, social security disability insurance, education policy, veteran health, global health, foster care, and adoption. I actively work with committee staff, Senate colleagues, and various stakeholder groups to craft and progress legislation. I author floor speeches, vote recommendations, talking points, questions for the record, letters to federal agencies, and policy memorandums. What was your most memorable day on the job? The most memorable day on the job was probably the day I received a hand-written card from Senator Elizabeth Warren thanking me for my work on an amendment to the Every Student Succeeds Act we passed earlier this year. I couldn’t believe that she took the time to write that hand-written letter, and it meant a lot to me. I still need to get it framed. Other notable days were being able to see the prime minister of Israel speak to a joint session of Congress on the Iran deal, getting to see Pope Francis when he came to Washington D.C., and watching the prime minister of India, Narenda Modi, speak to a joint session of Congress. What would you change about the U.S. political system? Criminal justice reform and mental health reform. What happens behind the scenes that would surprise people who don’t work in politics? It’s not as serious and formal as most people would think. It’s a lot less House of Cards and a lot more Veep. We do have quite a bit of fun in our office and joke around.

JULIE STROM ’93

RICH VICKERS ’14, political advance staff for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign Interned for Iowa Senator Tom Harkin What are your job responsibilities? Political advance is basically any time a candidate goes somewhere for a trip, whether it’s a campaign stop or a speech, a team of three to four people go ahead of them scope out the location and facilitate the event. July 4 was my first trip in New Hampshire, and then I spent four months in Iowa. I was in charge of the event at the Hotel Winneshiek. I was what’s called a site lead. Basically, site leads go in and scope out different speaking options and compile a report of what might be benefits to certain locations. Then they work with the production crew and the vendors to figure out how the room’s going to be set up, where the stage is going to go, what kind of lighting and audio will be used, where the people will fit in. And then when the candidate is on site, the site leads provide context for her, where the stage is, what’s next after the speech, where the interview room is, things like that. I was in Iowa for three or four months. At the end of January, when the caucus was over, I came back to D.C. and had 24 hours in D.C., and then they sent me to Las Vegas for another caucus. I was there for two or three weeks, and from there I traveled around primary states: North Carolina, then Pennsylvania, Ohio, San Francisco, Oregon, New Jersey, Kentucky, Wisconsin, New York, Florida—basically anywhere there was a primary. What’s the most frustrating aspect of your job? Often you have a lot of competing interests with how you set up events, and it can be tough to make sure that you get every person into the building, that your media is happy, because you might have 100 cameras at an event, and you have to make sure that not only does the stage look good but the local politicians at an event are taken care of and have time. There are a lot of politics within politics. There’s a microcosm of politics. What would you change about the U.S. political system? Money in politics. It’s unfortunately a product of the times, and I think it’s clear to everyone that something needs to be done to limit the staggering amount of money required to win an election. If I didn’t work in politics . . . I would get a lot more sleep!

SAM WARD ’15, member outreach and D.C. finance assistant, Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) Interned for Iowa Congressman Bruce Braley What are your job responsibilities? My daily tasks involve working with members of Congress and their staff to facilitate their needs, fundraising for democratic campaigns around the country, and building and staffing D.C.-based events. In this role, I work for Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi and chairman of the DCCC, Congressman Ben Ray Luján. What has surprised you about working in politics? I think the most surprising thing is the people and how normal (albeit incredibly hardworking) they are. I think my affinity toward politics throughout my life glorified members and their staff, but as I’ve worked with them they’ve been humanized. As a random example, a senior Democratic member has an obsession for the entire McDonald’s food menu, and we actually send him milkshakes to his office whenever we need to send him a thank-you note. Knowing they are real people makes me hopeful for my career in politics. What would you change about the U.S. political system? Campaign finance reform. I love my job *most* [Ward’s addition] when . . . I’ve had an iced coffee and an easy commute.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

DANIEL A. SWALEC

Somewhere behind the rainbow Molly Goodwin ’02 keeps the show on the yellow brick road, touring across the country

Molly Goodwin ’02 is the production stage manager for the touring production of The Wizard of Oz, with a cast of 30, including Toto and his understudy.

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In the understatement of the year, Molly Goodwin ’02 says, “It’s not a little job.” As production stage manager for the touring production of The Wizard of Oz, Goodwin is responsible for calling out 466 lighting cues alone, not to mention cues that control audio or special effects or change the set or scenery. “It’s not the busiest show I’ve called,” Goodwin says casually. “I once called a show in which I was speaking more than any character on stage.” Goodwin describes the modern stage manager as a communications hub: “They’re responsible for making sure that everybody connected to the production is aware of what’s happening on a show-by-show basis. Unlike a lot of regional or community productions,” she says, “once we open, our director and choreographer depart,” leaving the running of operations to people like Goodwin. Goodwin performs her job from a call desk, or stage management console. “My call desk lives wherever I can fit,” she says. When

it doesn’t fit on stage, she sets up in an entirely different room—which sounds impossible, until you realize how connected the modern stage manager is. Goodwin uses five video monitors. One shows a diagonal slice of the stage and one an overhead shot. One shows the conductor, so that Goodwin can catch any musical cues. Two show front of house—what the audience sees. Of these last two, one is a color shot and the other is infrared, giving Goodwin night vision and the ability to make sure during dark set changes that things are where they need to be and people are safe. If she’s set up away from the stage, Goodwin leans more heavily on her headset system with four audio channels that connect her to carpenters, electricians, props crew, a spotlight operator, the audio engineer, the music director, and her assistant stage managers. Goodwin jokes that it’s like being an air-traffic controller. The stakes aren’t quite as high, but Goodwin contends with a lot more than traffic patterns. In addition to

Alumni News “They read me a laundry list of job responsibilities,” she recalls. “I said, ‘That’s . . . crazy! Sure!’”

By land, by sea, by Caesar’s Palace Goodwin first learned about stage management during a Making Theatre J-term her first year at Luther. While she’d done a lot of acting, singing, and dancing in high school, she embraces challenges and wanted to help design and build the set too. When emeritus professor Bob Larson and professor of theatre Jeff Dintaman asked whether she’d be interested in stage managing, she asked what it was. “They read me a laundry list of job responsibilities,” she recalls. “I said, ‘That’s . . . crazy! Sure!’” At Luther, Goodwin stage managed a show a semester, including a couple of operas. “I got a broad picture of what my job was and how it applied to musicals, dance, plays, and opera. Looking back,” she says, “that background, in addition to everything I did prior to Luther, gave me a really strong foundation for being a good communications hub and being able to talk to a multitude of people, making sure that we’re all on the same page. Nobody speaks the same language in theatre—musicians, dancers, technicians, and actors all have a different vernacular. It’s served me incred-

ibly well that I have a little bit of each one of them and can be a translator. For example, if they want to run a dance number in rehearsal, and they want to start at a particular point in the song, it’s easy for me to say, ‘That’s four measures before this lyric,’ which the orchestra can easily find. It helps things move more smoothly and quickly, and people get less frustrated.” Goodwin earned a master of fine arts degree in stage management from the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, where, among other school shows, she interned at Celine Dion’s A New Day at Caesar’s Palace. She then did a two-year stint with Holland America Line cruises. She describes her work on the cruise as an inverse, or negative, of her touring work: “On the cruise ship, I had one venue. Each day was a different show, but I knew what my stage could do. With touring, I’m taking one show and putting it into multiple venues. So, in one instance, I know my venue really well; in the other, I know my show really well.” And knowing your show well is a real advantage when you arrive at a stage that’s too small, or a venue with touchy smoke alarms, or a hundred other factors that Goodwin and her crew have to nimbly maneuver. A different city every week The Wizard of Oz is a very large show. Most of the shows Goodwin has toured tote three or four trucks’ worth of equipment. The Wizard of Oz has seven. The tour, which opened in December, plays each city for a week. On Monday, the crew starts what’s called pre-rig, installing lighting, audio, and backdrops and

starting to put in the deck system, an 80-by40-foot platform that stands four inches above the existing stage and houses some of the show’s automated and mechanical systems. Installation continues into Tuesday, which is the first show of the week. Evening performances run nightly through Sunday, with matinees as well on the weekend. Sunday night, the crew tears the show down in about six hours and heads to the next city. It sounds brutal, but Goodwin promises it’s gentler than what she calls “one-nighter” tours, which do the same thing on a 24-hour cycle. Traveling is one of the things Goodwin loves about her work. The Wizard of Oz tour took her to 23 cities. On one-nighters, she’s seen as many as 96. “It’s fun to see what one city will laugh at that another city won’t; what lands with an audience in the South versus an audience in the Midwest; the difference between audiences that get on their feet right away during bows and those who wait until Dorothy appears,” she says. But what Goodwin, who has also toured Legally Blonde, Blast, West Side Story, Ghost, and Sister Act, loves most about her work is taking stories to people. “Most of the shows that tour come from New York, and touring them allows us to take those stories to people who might not be able to get there,” she says. And though she watches the shows’ standing ovations from a monitor, sometimes in another room, she says, “I’ve always felt that the applause is for all of us. We all helped put the magic together.” —Kate Frentzel

DANIEL A. SWALEC

motorized systems that move set pieces on the ground, the show has two automated systems overhead, one that flies scenery and another that flies people. And on top of the lighting and audio changes she cues, there are about 20 backdrops, 10 automation tracks, and special effects, from haze, fog, and smoke, to pyrotechnics, to projections that play while the crew completes set changes. Oh, and two live dogs (even Toto needs an understudy).

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

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“ PHOTO COURTESY LARS-ERIK LARSON

It’s intentionally very simple music. It’s what the inside of my head sounds like.”

Lars-Erik Larson ’10: Authentic and midwestern Anyone’s first question to jazz drummer Lars-Erik Larson ’10 might be: Why is your jazz quartet called Mancrush? Answer: It’s the name you give to a group of serious professional musicians as a joke; sometimes that joke sticks. Next question: How would you describe Mancrush’s music? Well, that’s harder. Listening to Mancrush, the Twin Cities–based group Larson started in 2013 to play his original compositions, you hear warm saxophone melding with ruddy keyboard, glossy jazz guitar, and rich, oscillating drums. It sends your mind to jazz country, but once there you can make out frontiers that blend into indie rock, contemporary classical, and folk music. Mancrush even has a jazz interpretation of a 1930 Béla Bartók piano concerto, just to keep you guessing. “It’s intentionally very simple music,” says Larson, who writes every note for each member. “It’s what the inside of my head sounds like.”

—Lars-Erik Larson ’10

In March of 2016, Larson released his debut album, Authentic Midwestern, with Mancrush in St. Paul, Minn., at the Vieux Carré, a legendary subterranean jazz club formerly known as the Artists’ Quarter. Met with high acclaim from the Twin Cities music community, Mancrush is growing in popularity. But Larson is not the type to let his success go to his head. True to the name of his latest album, he remains authentic and Midwestern—eager to point out the people that helped him get where he is today as a professional drummer. A fourth-generation graduate of Luther, Larson credits its music program for shaping him into a multidimensional musician. In college, he played drums in every capacity available to him: Symphony Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra, Concert Band, Jazz Orchestra, Percussion Ensemble—the list goes on. The exposure to such breadth of music served Larson well as he discerned what style of drumming allowed him to best express himself. “Because of Luther, I had a really strong understanding of music as a whole,” he says. “And while there I was exposed to modern jazz, which I related to more than the traditional jazz I was familiar with.” His discerned love of jazz led Larson to earn a master’s degree in jazz studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign in 2012. From there, he moved to the Twin Cities and dove headlong into the life of a working musician, taking on as many gigs as possible and working odd jobs until he landed his current full-time position as an apprentice restoring grand pianos, all the while spearheading Mancrush. “The goal for me has always been to create my art, to support myself through this creative passion of mine,” Larson says. “But it’s a juggling act, a leap of faith. It takes a lot of hard work to get yourself to a point where you can do that.” Fortunately for Larson (and anyone crushing on Mancrush), he’s reached that point. —Kelli Billstein ’07

Luther alum became founding leader of Concordia-Moorhead 125 years ago Ingebrikt Fretheim F. Grose, class of 1885 (B.A.) and 1890 (M.A.), became the first leader of Concordia College— Moorhead in 1891, at age 29. Concordia opened as an academy with 12 students, three

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instructors, and courses in English literature, natural sciences, mathematics, and piano. Grose was principal until 1893 and continued to serve Concordia in roles such as treasurer and instructor until 1896. According to the June 1890 issue of Chips, Grose was a professor at St. Olaf College, where he taught English, when he received the master of arts degree from Luther. Grose was

listed among the Chips editors in 1884–85. Grose returned to St. Olaf College after his time at Concordia to continue teaching and administration activities for the rest of his career. He wrote a history of St. Olaf College for the school’s 50th anniversary celebration in 1925. Grose died in 1939, and Grose Hall at Concordia College is named for him.

Alumni News

Nominate alumni for honors Luther is seeking nominations for Distinguished Service Awards, Athletic Hall of Fame induction, Young Alumni Awards, and Spirit of Luther Awards. Please consider the following criteria when nominating individuals for these honors. Distinguished Service Award Criteria to consider for DSA candidates include meritorious service to society in areas such as education, government, the arts, business, church, labor, industry, agriculture, research, medicine, and community affairs; loyalty and service to Luther; fidelity to the ideals of Luther; and timeliness of the award. Though individuals nominated for DSAs typically have a strong Luther connection, they do not have to be alumni. Alumni recipients should have graduated at least 20 years ago; they typically receive the award at Homecoming during an anniversary year of their graduation. For the fall of 2016, for example, Luther is seeking nominees from classes ending in a 1 or 6. Athletic Hall of Fame Individuals nominated for the Athletic Hall of Fame must have been outstanding athletes or

coaches at Luther; have demonstrated strong contributions to family, community, and career; and have graduated from college at least 10 years prior to the induction year. Nominees may be living or dead. Luther also considers additional factors, such as the nominee’s service to Luther and service to athletics after graduation. Inductees are typically honored at Homecoming during an anniversary year of their graduation. For the fall of 2016, for example, Luther is seeking nominees from classes ending in a 1 or 6. Young Alumni Award The Young Alumni Award recognizes Luther alumni who have graduated in the last 15 years for outstanding achievement in their vocation or avocation. Criteria considered for award candidates include early significant professional achievement, demonstrated leadership abilities, and distinctive service to Luther or society-at-large. Nominees’ lives should exemplify the college mission statement. Award nominations are received by the Luther Alumni Office; recipients are selected by the Alumni Council. The award is given at Commencement each spring.

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Spirit of Luther Award The Spirit of Luther Award recognizes individuals who have provided significant, sustained service to the college. Nominees should be persons who have demonstrated a personal commitment to Luther’s mission, quality, and character. Current faculty and staff are not eligible. A maximum of three awards are given each year. To submit nominations Send DSA and Spirit of Luther Award nominations with as much supporting documentation as possible to the Office of the President, Luther College, 700 College Drive, Decorah, IA 52101; email bullerma@luther.edu; phone (563) 387-1001. Please submit your Athletic Hall of Fame nominations with supporting documentation to Dave Blanchard, sports information director, Luther College, 700 College Drive, Decorah, IA 52101; email blanchda@luther.edu; phone (563) 387-1586. Please submit your Young Alumni Award nominations with supporting documentation to Kirk Johnson ’82, associate director of alumni relations, Luther College, 700 College Drive, Decorah, IA 52101; email johnsonk@ luther.edu; phone (563) 387-1659.

Pharez K. Monney ’17, Accra, Ghana, Biology Erica Drake ’17, Maquoketa, Iowa, Biology

(563) 387-1036 (888) 521-5039 lutherbookshop.com

Your source for Norse apparel Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

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Class of 2016 graduates 62 children of alumni

Coralville Reed Johnson, son of Jone (McDonald) ’82 and Terry Johnson ’81

(Chafee) ’89 and Brad Lunning Jessica Tan, daughter of Tammy Lawson ’83 and Camille and Andrew Tan ’85, Tampa, Fla. Brooklyn Park Ashley Meyers, daughter of Ruth (Ives) ’89 and Jim Meyers ’89

Dahinda Erik Hahn, son of Dianne (Vikdal) ’84 and Steve Rasmus and Michelle and Michael Hahn ’85, Bettendorf, Iowa

Decorah Gabriel Eide, son of Beth (Cooper) ’88 and Greg Eide ’87 Marea Holkesvik, daughter of Molly (Williams) ’97 and Bob Holkesvik ’96 Aaron Larson, son of Maureen Larson ’06 and Ken Larson, Decorah Peter Lillibridge, son of Renee and Jim Lillibridge ’80 Blake Moen, son of Judy (Finanger) ’83 and Larry Moen Breanne Pierce, daughter of Lori (Phipps) ’87 and Scott Pierce ’88 Andrew Storlie, son of Rhonda (Volden) ’84 and Chris Storlie ’84

Lombard Megan Wachholz, daughter of Jill (Voss) Wachholz ’89 and Mark Wachholz, Chicago, Ill.

Iowa City Bryn Hedlund, daughter of Diane (Gruenhaupt) ’87 and Shawn Hedlund

Mundelein Zenen Davismckennie, son of Denise ’82 and Willie Davismckennie ’84

Pilot Mound Solveig Orngard, daughter of Sarah Austrheim ’79 and Andy Orngard

COLORADO

Colorado Springs Erika Balk, daughter of Karla (Nelson) ’83 and John Balk ’83 ILLINOIS

Chicago Gretchen Elizabeth Strube, daughter of Lisa (Schneider) Strube ’87 and Rob Strube ’86, Lisle, Ill.

Sterling Paige Lobdell, daughter of Lisa (Schrader) ’88 and Brian Lobdell Woodridge Stephen Shatzer, son of Kari (Nottleson) ’82 and Bruce Shatzer ’82 IOWA

Ankeny Jenna Dengler, daughter of Chris and James Dengler ’85 Bellevue Drew Anderson, son of Donna (Reinke) ’90 and Rick Anderson ’89 Bettendorf Blake Letney, son of Robin and Todd Letney ’87 Cedar Falls Hannah Dailey, daughter of Lisa (Palmquist) ’87 and Alan Dailey Cedar Rapids Abigail Carpenter, daughter of Stacie (Olson) ’90 and Kevin Carpenter ’87 Jenna Myers, daughter of Sheila and Steve Myers ’82

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Prairie City Andrew McCarthy, son of Mindy and Timothy McCarthy ’84 Ridgeway Leyton Bohr, son of Becky (Butikofer) ’07 and Dennis Bohr Stratford Brennen Reysack, son of Amy Larson ’87 and James Reysack, Ankeny, Iowa

Cannon Falls Jesslyn Hendrickson, daughter of Debby and Joel Hendrickson ’76 Cottage Grove Julia Reimann, daughter of Mary (Vaaler) ’87 and Tim Reimann Eden Prairie McKenna Campbell-Potter, daughter of Deb Campbell ’75 and Ken Potter ’75 Fergus Falls Ethan Taylor, son of Anne (Lysne) ’88 and Sean Taylor ’84 Hastings Isaac Johnson, son of Camille (Clapp) ’87 and Kirk Johnson ’86 (deceased) Hayfield Micah Thorson, son of Kathy (Miller) ’78 and Mark Thorson La Crescent Katelyn Evenson, daughter of Rachel Fishel and Matt Evenson ’91, Winona, Minn. Mankato Britta Petersen, daughter of Joanna (Swiggum) ’77 and Norman Petersen ’77 Minnetonka Sarah Eckhert, daughter of Sheri Brenden ’81 and Phil Eckhert

Swea City Alex Brandt, son of Mary (Henriksen) ’83 and Lennon Brandt

Owatonna Rachel Wiebke, daughter of Polly (Anderson) ’86 and Dave Wiebke ’85

Waverly Hannah Mick, daughter of Lore and Jeff Mick ’80

Plymouth Benjamin Joppa, son of Sandee (Neitzel) ’87 and Jon Joppa ’85

Windsor Heights Carly Rusek, daughter of Kathy Tenges ’82 and Ray Rusek ’81

Rochester Kelsey Hansen, daughter of Teri (Palmquist) ’86 and Jim Hansen ’86

MINNESOTA

St. Paul Amanda Jenkins, daughter of Becky Lynch ’78 and David Jenkins

Arden Hills Ryan Vijums, son of Judy (Johnson) ’88 and Paul Vijums Austin Matthew Lunning, son of Janene

Woodbury Erika Storvick, daughter of Sarah and Jon Storvick ’78

NEW JERSEY

Maplewood Moran Lonning, daughter of Kealy Connor and Greg Lonning ’83 SOUTH DAKOTA

Sioux Falls Benjamin Selbo, son of Lorrie and Tim Selbo ’84 WISCONSIN

Eau Claire Matthew Boelter, son of Roxanne and Eric Holey ’78 and Phillip Boelter, Minneapolis, Minn. Fort Atkinson Brittany Engstrom, daughter of Denise and Craig Engstrom ’88 Friendship Megan Feltes, daughter of Andrea (Swenson) ’89 and Eric Feltes Hudson Ehren Kluge, son of Linda (Larson) ’84 and Todd Kluge La Crosse Hailee Feig, daughter of Stacey and Erik Feig ’87 Karin Hecht, daughter of Kristin Swanson ’80 and Alan Hecht ’80 Lars Johnson, son of Lee (Knoernschild) ’85 and Kent Johnson ’83 Onalaska Erik Ohlrogge, son of Sarah (Connell) ’74 and Dennis Ohlrogge ’74 Platteville Tricia Serres, daughter of Heidi and Rob Serres ’82 Stoughton Kai Hedstrom, son of Janet Boothroyd and Alan Hedstrom ’74 Wascott Sarah Hermeier, daughter of Julie and John Hermeier ’85 Wild Rose Jonathan Cochrane, son of Carole (Meyer) ’81 and David Cochrane WYOMING

Big Piney Alayna Nelson, daughter of Beth and Stephen Nelson ’85

Alumni News

Paula (Hermeier) Meyer ’76, cofounder of Friends of Ngong Road, gathers with students who have been through the program and work for Karibu Loo.

Portable loos prove profitable Friends of Ngong Road finds innovative way to support education and care of Kenyan children Road Children Association (NRCA), a registered Kenyan nongovernmental organization, or NGO. They share a mission to provide education and support for impoverished children in Nairobi whose families have been affected by HIV/AIDS. The organization has succeeded, with many children being sponsored by Luther alumni and friends, in fact. But its board of directors wanted to ensure its sustainability and said the organizations needed to generate revenue in Kenya so that they were not entirely dependent on U.S. philanthropy. That’s where the portable restrooms—or, as they say in former British colonies, loos—come in. A friend of Meyer’s, Todd Hilde, who owns restroom supplier Satellite Industries in Minnesota, urged her to consider starting a portable loo business. She was intrigued, she says, and looked into it. “I visited the largest providers in Nairobi, and the data point that stuck in my mind is that Nairobi and the Twin Cities area are approximately the same size—about four million people. In Minneapolis, every day, between 12,000 and 15,000 portable restrooms are deployed at construction sites, parks, and events. And in Nairobi there are fewer than 1,000 portable restrooms available to rent. Also, only about 40 percent of Nairobi’s population has access on a daily basis to improved sanitation.” Hilde said he’d contribute 10 loos, and the Ngong Road groups decided to a pilot project in 2015 for a business to be called Karibu Loo. Michael accepted Meyer’s offer to run the pilot, and the Braeburn International School in Nairobi hired Leah to teach kindergarten. Her students were a global mix, with 15 countries represented in her class of 20 students. The school turned out to be close to the NRCA

Leah (Jensen) ’11 and Michael Switzer ’10

PHOTOS COURTESY OF FRIENDS OF NGONG ROAD

Heading out the door for a run one evening in 2014, Michael Switzer ’10 called to wife Leah (Jensen) Switzer ’11, “I think we should move to Africa.” “I thought, What? Get back in here, you can’t leave now,” Leah recalls. She had already been to Africa twice. When she was in high school she traveled to Nairobi, Kenya, with her mother, Kari (Hermeier) Jensen ’83, and aunt Paula (Hermeier) Meyer ’76, former chair of Luther’s Board of Regents. Meyer and Keith Kale ’76 were founding an organization called Friends of Ngong Road, to provide education and support for children affected by HIV/AIDS in Nairobi, Kenya. Leah returned to the continent her junior year at Luther to student teach in Uganda. Since that first trip, she had dreamed of living in Africa, and she and Michael had discussed it but, he says, “I never thought it would happen.” Now he was ready. He was working in financial investing in Minneapolis but wanted a job that would challenge him in different ways. Leah was happy in her elementary school teaching position but immediately started looking for teaching jobs in Africa. Michael thought he would find a job or volunteer position after Leah found a spot. But Paula Meyer had a better idea. Michael remembers: “She said, ‘Michael, you’re going to move to Nairobi and you’re going to start up a portable toilet company, and this thing is going to make money to support the mission of Friends of Ngong Road.’” And that’s just what happened. But it wasn’t so simple. Backing up about nine years, Friends of Ngong Road was founded as a Minnesota-based 501(c)(3) organization, partnering with Ngong

Steven Njoki and Faith Mumo both work for Karibu Loo. He is the sales and operations manager and she is a receptionist. Mumo is a graduate of the NRCA program and is now doing post-graduate studies.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

offices and even provided their apartment. Now all Michael had to do was completely set up the portable loo business. The economics major had never run a business, but he learned fast.

“I am such a proponent of a liberal arts education now. The problem-solving, critical thinking, and analytical skills saved me more times than I can count,” he says. Sixteen more loos, for a total of 26, and an exhauster to clean them had been ordered from Germany. A truck to move the loos around was on its way from Japan. Michael figured out how to take delivery of the equipment at the port of Mombasa, transport it to Nairobi, and find storage. He worked with an attorney to set up the business’s legal framework; hired office staff, drivers, and more; sourced supplies such as tissue paper, soap, and hand sanitizer; researched the market; learned accounting practices; and started lining up customers. As it happens, the market for portable loos in Nairobi is different than in Minneapolis. Middle- and upper-class events such as long-distance running races, weddings, and private parties are where most of the demand is. To be competitive for those events, Karibu Loo needed very nice loos, so each had to be retrofitted with flushing mechanisms, which also had to be shipped in. Karibu Loo also attracts business because of its philanthropic mission—each loo reads: “Helping educate children.” Attendants hired by Karibu Loo—children who have been through the NRCA program—are on hand at each event to explain the motto. For many, this is their first job. They receive wages, get experience at holding down a job—in a city with 40 percent unemployment—and build references for future jobs. Michael and Leah got to know many of the children in the NRCA program on Saturday afternoons. The NRCA rented a field where children could gather for games, reading instruction, art projects, and a healthful lunch, something many of them were unlikely to get on weekends. It was a time for the couple to meet with the young girl they were sponsoring and for Leah to work with students on their reading skills. The pilot ended in early 2016 and was determined a success. A Kenyan man was hired to take over Michael’s job, as he and Leah were returning home in July at the end of her teaching contract. Now Karibu Loo is run entirely by Kenyans. Back in Minnesota, Leah is teaching at Earl Brown Elementary, an international baccalaureate school in Brooklyn Center, Minn., and Michael is working on his M.B.A. at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Business, Skyping regularly with Karibu Loo’s new manager during his transition. Karibu Loo is scaling up and now has 87 restrooms, including a VIP trailer with electricity and running water. By 2020, Meyer says, about a third of Ngong Road’s operating budget should come from Karibu Loo. “The board of Friends of Ngong Road believes that with the addition of earned income in Kenya through Karibu Loo, our mission of educating some of the world’s poorest children will become much more sustainable,” she adds. —Ellen Modersohn For more information about Friends of Ngong Road or Karibu Loo, contact Paula Meyer at paula@ngongroad.org.

Luther Alumni Magazine

Note A column in the spring 2016 issue of the Luther Alumni Magazine listed Jerry Moe ’49 as the first director of Hothorpe Hall, a Lutheran youth and conference center in England. But the winter/Ephipany 2012 issue of The Forum, the newsletter of the Lutheran Church in Great Britain, cites Lloyd Swantz ’49 as the first director of Hothorpe Hall.

CLASS NOTES Compiled by Emily Markee ’17, Gabrielle Meirick ’17, and Annalise Johnson ’18

1938 Minnard “Dusty”

Hanson recently celebrated his 101st birthday in Burr Ridge, Ill. He sold his retail business of 44 years and has been retired for 12 years.

is a certified master ceramist and ceramics teacher.

1960 Gerald Anderson of

Boone, Iowa, retired last March as president of Woodward Youth Corporation (WYC). He continues to serve on the WYC Board of Directors as chairman. Kathy (Fjone) Richardson of Cincinnati is retired. She is active in OLLI, a learning-in-retirement program at the University of Cincinnati. She teaches courses in novels and poetry and takes classes, including how to play the harmonica. She also enjoys plays, concerts, and operas and writes poetry. Gale “Tex” Vathing of Vienna, Va., translates poems and plays from French, Farsi, and Norwegian.

1963 Carson Ode has

published the third and final book of his Iowa book series, Iowa Culture— Past and Present, featuring Iowa museums. The volume is available in Iowa book stores and online at carsonode.com.

1967 Rosanne Bliss of

Minneapolis recently compiled a PowerPoint presentation consisting of vintage postcards and photos of her maternal grandmother’s first 20 years in America after emigrating from Hedmark, Norway, in 1905.

1958 Felice (Hahn) Bastian

received the 2016 Wisconsin Conference Love in Action Award from Tom Rossmiller, the Conference Disaster Committee chair. Bastian has participated in 114 trips with Volunteers in Mission (VIM) for the United Methodist Church and Wisconsin Conference since 1989. She has also served on the National VIM committee.

1959 Louis “Lou” Accola of

Mesa, Ariz., retired following the 50th anniversary of his ordination and 50 years of continuous ministry in the TALC and the ELCA. He

Terry (Thiele) Rasmussen of Fort Collins, Colo., has completed half marathons in 30 states in the past six years. She hopes to run half marathons in all 50 states before turning 75 in 2021. She has also run in Washington, D.C., and in one international race in Cancun, Mexico.

Alumni News

1968 Tom Carlisle was named

chief legal counsel of the Illinois Department of Historic Preservation in Springfield, Ill. Carl Rowe is a professional fine arts painter in Boise, Idaho. He was a professional choreographer for 40 years and earned many awards, including three fellowships in dance from the Idaho Commission on the Arts, the Mayor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts (Boise), and the Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts from the state of Idaho.

Ken Varland of New Ulm, Minn., retired as regional wildlife manager for the southern region of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources after 39 years as a wildlife biologist.

1971 Jackee (Larsen)

Gonzalez of Lake in the Hills, Ill., works part time for Dundee Park School District in early childhood and an afterschool program. She studies Alive and Well Immanuel Prayer lifestyle skill training with her husband, Ramon. Neal Skaar of Hayward, Minn., was inducted into the Albert Lea High School Wrestling Hall of Fame last July. He taught mathematics and English at Albert Lea High School (his alma mater) and also served as head wrestling coach from 1979 until 2004, after serving 11 years as assistant coach. Retired from teaching, Skaar continues to serve as assistant wrestling coach at Albert Lea.

1969 David Ellingson of

Edmonds, Wash., retired as a professor of children, youth, and family studies at Trinity Lutheran College and was granted professor emeritus status. This fall he intends to kayak the Erie Canal/Hudson River to the Statue of Liberty. Myrna Petersen-Konajeski is director of corporate and foundation relations in the Office of Development and Alumni Affairs at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy in Baltimore.

1970 Bruce Hansen of Racine, Wis., retired from Gemini Inc.

William Kobler was reelected to his second term with the American Medical Association Board of Trustees. He is a board-certified family physician in Rockford, Ill. Judith (Johnson) Olsen teaches English online at Villanova (Pa.) University.

Members and friends of the fraternity Zeta Rho Tau gathered in Decorah in the spring of 2015 for the funeral of fraternity brother Tom Williams ’71. Some are pictured (left to right): Kevin Laabs ’72, Ron Petersen ’72, Lee Olson ’72, Jane (Greene) Hildebrand ’74, Steve Hildebrand ’73, Linda (Porter) Martinat ’71, Brian Martinat ’71, Jim Hinrichs ’71, Diane (Vlahovich) Hinrichs ’71, Larry Swalheim ’72, and Steve Andrukaitis ’11.

Roger Larson is owner of A Writer’s Touch in Westminster, Md. Becky (Linnevold) Shaw is assistant professor for the Department of Specialty Medicine at Des Moines (Iowa) University.

1972 Amy (Christian) and

Daryl Dodd live in Anaconda, Mont. Amy is owner and operator of Beyond Necessity Gifts. Daryl retired after 41 years as rehab department director and physical therapist at Community Hospital of Anaconda.

Phil Holtan retired as pastor of Calvary Lutheran Church in Perham, Minn., after 40 years of service in ministry. He led the church in various missions, including packing one million meals for Feed My Starving Children, raising $200,000 in Perham, and many other missions around the world. Joan (Heusel) Rowney of Marseilles, Ill., is a retired teacher and works with standardbred horses.

Mike Knudson ’76 of Bloomington, Minn., recently had a statue cast at Art Castings of Colorado in Loveland. While the patina (color) was being applied to the statue, Knudson met with a technician who turned out to be a fellow Luther alumnus, Chad Quam ’96. The pair had fun dropping names and telling stories. The statue itself is titled Two Generations One Song. It will be placed outside assisted living apartments in Omaha, Neb.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

Steven Sorenson is a shareholder with von Briesen and Roper, S.C., in Oshkosh, Wis. Steve was elected as president-elect of the Senior Lawyers Division of the State Bar of Wisconsin.

1973 Colleen (Fiebiger)

Carlson is retired after 25 years of working for the Harmony (Minn.) School District. Mary (Runningen) Monsted of Metairie, La., published a children’s interactive musical CD called Miss Mary’s Musical Gumbo. The CD can be purchased at the Luther Book Shop.

1974 Randy Keehn was

awarded a master of arts in ministry degree at the Nashotah House Seminary in May. In June, members of St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church in Cartwright, N.D., welcomed him to the ministry.

committee for the Association of the United States Army.

1975 Paula Stuart of

Steilacoom, Wash., retired as a radiologist at Group Health Permanente. Cary (Shaffer) Tuckey retired from Fontbonne University in St. Louis after serving as an adjunct professor and director of student teaching.

1976 Beverly (Brandt)

Bachelder is principal of Douglas (Mass.) Middle School. Jamie (Christie) Christensen of Emmetsburg, Iowa, is professor emerita at Iowa Lakes Community College. Steven Grandgeorge of Goffstown, N.H., is retired. Marty (Monson) Keck is an advanced practice nurse for Erickson Medical Group in Pompton Plains, N.J. Mary Kessens is president and CEO at Riverfront Inc. in La Crosse, Wis. Lynn Paulson of Madison, Wis., is retired.

Solveig (Sperati) Korte is an instructor at the University of South Dakota Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders in Vermillion. She received the 2016 Outstanding Instructor Award. The award is given annually to a faculty member in the College of Arts and Sciences who demonstrates outstanding classroom teaching and mentoring of students.

Joel Mjolsness is retired from the military. He is regional director of the communications industry vertical at Mirantis in Mountain View, Calif. He is also a tenor in the Santa Clara Chorale at Santa Clara University, he serves on the board of directors of Lutheran Social Services of Northern California, and he is on the executive

Luther Alumni Magazine

Joan Pederson of Chicago is retired and serves as president of the First Unitarian Church of Chicago. Kathy (Lund) Sedlet is education coordinator at Nurtur in Dallas.

1978 Yuri (Mizuno) Ando

is pastor at Bellport (N.Y.) United Methodist Church. Julie Dahlen is an economic support specialist for the Dane County Department of Human Services in Madison, Wis. John Mueller of Saginaw, Mich., earned a doctor of ministry degree from Concordia Seminary in St. Louis. Linda Short is on the staff at Habitat for Humanity Restore in Hot Springs, Ark.

1979 Andrew Strandjord is

assistant professor of chemistry at Augustana University in Sioux Falls, S.D. He received the Augustana Student Association Faculty Recognition Award for 2015–16. The award recognizes outstanding teaching and contributions to the Augustana community by a faculty member. John Twedt is a teacher, adviser, and coach for Cranbrook Schools in Bloomfield Hills, Mich.

1980 Greg Braatz retired

from a 30-year marketing career at Kimberly-Clark and now serves as associate pastor at the Memorial Presbyterian Church in Appleton, Wis. Rod Dir is president and CEO at nTelos Wireless in Waynesboro, Va.

1977 Melinda (Morris) and Luther Berkeland ’76 of Lake City, Minn., are retired.

Jeff Kelly of Bloomington, Minn., was inducted into the Austin High School Music Hall of Fame. He is a member of the American Choral Directors Association, Minnesota Education Association, and the National Education Association and director of Honor Choir for the Southeast Minnesota Conference.

center at the historic Künstlerhaus, headquarters of the art organization Salzburger Künstverein, which was founded in 1844 and is the leading organization in central Europe for producing and exhibiting international and Austrian contemporary art. Bill Musser of Decorah delivered the sixth Annual Knut Gjerset Lecture, “Life in the Freezer: From Seed Savers to Svalbard,” at Luther. He is the librarian at Seed Savers Exchange. He is also the treasurer of the Board of the National Council on Botanical and Horticultural Libraries. Darrel Posegate earned a master’s degree in banking and financial services management from Boston University and is chief operation officer and chief financial officer of Heritage Bank in Sioux Falls, S.D.

1981 Dawn (Canfield)

Bremer of Knoxville, Iowa, is retired from teaching. She is writing children’s stories with hopes of publishing children’s books. She substitute teaches, writes, and enjoys travel with her husband, Jeff. Jim Chamness is a physician at Lakeshore Allergy PC in Holland, Mich. Barbara (Henn) Clausen retired from teaching third grade at the Decorah Community Schools. Roxanne (Gunderson) Heinrichs teaches elementary physical education for West Delaware Community Schools in Manchester, Iowa. Marty Hertel is a passenger service assistant at Prospect Airport Services in Las Vegas, Nev.

Barb (Perry) Lutz of Waverly, Iowa, was inducted into the Association of Home Office Underwriters Hall of Fame last spring. She is assistant vice president and chief underwriter for Fidelity & Guaranty Life. Tom Maakestad is owner and artist of Maakestad Studio in Marine on Saint Croix, Minn. He was invited to be artist in residence for the city of Salzburg, Austria, last summer through an exchange program organized by the Anderson Center in Red Wing, Minn. He stayed in the city

Carol (Gustafson) Hetrick is a companion, homemaker, and PCA at Community Companions and Homemakers in Willimantic, Conn. Laurie Heyer is executive vice president of healthcare operations and IT at Blue Cross of Idaho in Boise. Becky (Leschensky) Hoffman is a behavioral health specialist and licensed marriage and family therapist at Step By Step in Milton, Wash.

Alumni News

Rufus Glasper ’74 finding new ways to spur student success For nearly three decades, Rufus Glasper ’74 has held the catbird seat on evolving higher education trends in this country. As chancellor emeritus of Arizona’s Maricopa Community Colleges, one of the country’s largest community college systems, Glasper has witnessed many changes in the business of education. Challenges facing students today are much different than those he faced as a student at Luther, he notes. “Life has gotten more complicated,” he says with a knowing chuckle. “When I enrolled at Luther more than 40 years ago, the cost of education was around $2,100 per year and there was no question I would finish my degree in four years. These days, the average time to a bachelor’s degree nationally is six years* and the cost of an education is much, much higher. The financial commitment to education on the part of federal, state, and local governments has diminished and there are myriad demands on people’s time. In short, getting an education isn’t as easy as it once was.” Glasper speaks from a place of deep experience, having spent his entire professional career in this sector. He came to Luther from the Chicago area with the goal of becoming a high school teacher, but soon realized that his heart was in business and finance. After completing his bachelor’s in business administration, he earned a master’s and certificate of advanced study in school business administration from Northern Illinois University and a doctorate in higher education finance from the University of Arizona. Glasper is also a certified public accountant. In 1986, he joined Maricopa Community Colleges as director of finance and associate vice chancellor. After nearly a decade in that position he advanced to vice chancellor for business and CFO, and in May of 2003, he stepped into the role of chancellor, leading the institution until February of this year. From the outset of his time at Maricopa, Glasper says, he was thinking about the end game. “Because I was on the finance side of the house for so long, I kept a close eye on funding trends. I realized that the legislative statutes were changing and the state was slowly

my focus has, of necessity, been more heavily weighted toward politics and fundraising than student outcomes,” he says. “My new role at the League offers me the opportunity to step back from the day-to-day activities of an administrator and focus on leadership development and student success, which I love.” Glasper’s voice rises with enthusiasm as he discusses what community colleges bring to the table. “Maricopa Community Colleges are the largest provider of job training in the state of Arizona,” he says. “They help students of every persuasion, from those seeking a twoyear degree to those looking to amass credits and transfer to a four-year institution.” Indeed, he notes, Maricopa educates 60 percent of the juniors entering Arizona State University’s system, and the majority have higher grade point averages than students who started out at the university. During the recession in 2008, he continues, Maricopa also saw many students with bachelor’s degrees returning to community college for certifications because they couldn’t find jobs in their degree fields. “The average age of our students dropped from 32 to 26 and these incoming students found a level of quality they didn’t anticipate,” he says proudly. Glasper is equally enthusiastic about ways in which the League for Innovation can assist community colleges by sharing and scaling best practices across the nation through sponsored research; hosting of an annual Innovations Conference, a Learning Summit and a STEMtech Conference; and management of an Executive Leadership Institute dedicated to training the next generation of community college leaders. “My role is to identify what works well in community college education and then share those findings in conferences, publications, and presentations,” he says. “The Lumina Foundation established Goal 2025, which states that by 2025, 60 percent of Americans will hold a degree, certificate or other high-quality postsecondary credential,” Glasper concludes. “It’s a laudable goal and I know that community colleges can play a vital role in meeting the challenge.”

“My role is to identify what works well in community college education and then share those findings in conferences, publications, and presentations.” disinvesting in education. In fact, the percentage of our budget from the state went from 29 percent in 1980 to zero today.” So Glasper concentrated on structuring Maricopa for self-reliance. “We started looking at ourselves differently and running Maricopa more like a business, taking steps such as establishing the largest two-year online educational institution in the country and setting up incubator services for small businesses, with Maricopa as a shareholder should they go public.” Glasper’s efforts paid off handsomely. Maricopa made it through the 2008 recession without imposing a single furlough day; the school earned a Triple A bond rating; the budget remained stable, ranging from $1.5 billion to $1.7 billion; and operating reserves rose to more than $400 million, up from $13 million when he took over. In March, Glasper embraced a new challenge, assuming the office of president and CEO of the League for Innovation in the Community College, an international nonprofit whose raison d’être is catalyzing the community college movement, a goal that falls right in this seasoned veteran’s sweet spot. “As chancellor at Maricopa for the past 13 years,

—Lori Ferguson * At Luther over the past five years, approximately 70 percent of students earned their degree within four years. luther.edu/ir/enrollment Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

1986 Laura Dotseth is

Elaine (Olsen) and Gary Johnson ’82 live in Andover, Minn. She is owner and director of Sounds and Praise and director of children’s ministries at Faith Lutheran Church in Coon Rapids, Minn. He is a network architect at MedNet Solutions Inc. in Minnetonka, Minn.

practice director of the enterprise transformation and strategy national practice at Trissential in Minneapolis. Teri (Palmquist) Hansen is a nursing education specialist at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

Jim Knutson teaches music at Cotter High School in Winona, Minn.

Dan Kuester published his book Green Wave, a murder mystery, in June. The book can be purchased in bookstores and online at the Apple iTunes store, Amazon, or Barnes and Noble.

BJ Larson earned a master’s degree in organizational leadership from St. Catherine University. She is spiritual health service director and systematic strategic head for SHS at Fairview Health Services in Burnsville, Minn.

Anne (Mattson) McAnallen is investor reporting manager at Ditech Financial LLC in Tempe, Ariz.

Miri (Peterson) Mattson is an office professional at Thrivent Financial in Decorah. Chuck Mueller of Nisswa, Minn., is founder and president of Solution Tactics. Pam (Norris) Phillips is retired in Alexandria, Minn. Curt Tryggestad is superintendent at Eden Prairie (Minn.) Schools and president-elect for the Minnesota Association of School Administrators. He will serve a three-year term. Cathy (Miner) Weber is a nurse case manager at Mercy Medical Center in Dubuque, Iowa.

1982 Deanna Barth is a

librarian at Washington Middle School in Kenosha, Wis. Donalee (Rima) Burns of Decorah has been costumer for New Minowa Players for 41 years. She costumed 59 people in the theater company’s summer musical, Fiddler on the Roof, last June. Nancy (Hermeier) Hershfield is director of advancement and assistant dean at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Sisters Kim (Christensen) Mahlum ’83, Pam (Christensen) Nelson ’84, and Jenny (Christensen) Boswell ’86 reunited in Lanesboro, Minn., last summer and took a road trip to Luther and Decorah to see the changes on and off campus.

Tony Awards presented by Carnegie Mellon University, she was one of 20 to earn honorable mention for excellence in theatre education.

Luther Alumni Magazine

Sean Taylor is professor of history at Minnesota State University– Moorhead.

1985 Jana Christen Albers of Hiawatha, Iowa, is a social worker at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, and in the Child Health Specialty Clinic in Decorah.

Jim Biedermann is plant manager for Sparboe Foods in New Hampton, Iowa.

Gina Sauer is volunteer coordinator for Lyric Arts Main Street Stage in Anoka, Minn.

1987 Bruce Dir is owner and

president of Tighthead Brewing Company in Mundelein, Ill. Dir and his business were featured in the Chicago Tribune in June. Lisa (Minske) Klever of West Des Moines, Iowa, is a pharmacy accountant for the Hy-Vee Inc. corporate office. Phil Meirick is a premier onebranch manager for Wells Fargo Home Mortgage in Des Moines, Iowa. This year marks his 26th working for Wells Fargo.

Andrea Urice is senior lecturer in drama at Washington University in St. Louis.

1983 Sandra (Bergstrom)

Dawson earned a master’s degree from St. Xavier University. She teaches special education at Rockford (Ill.) Public Schools. Kim (Christensen) Mahlum of Ettrick, Wis., is a district nurse for the La Crosse School District.

1984 Julie (Roehl) Coffin

is executive editor for DoubleInk Publishing Services based in Dublin, Ireland. She works from her home in Spencer, Ind., developing, writing, and editing educational materials for elementary and middle school reading and language arts.

Nancy (Nickerson) Lee is director of arts programming at Washburn High School in Minneapolis. Out of the 1,100 teachers nominated for

Kay Rathjen-Tulppo is a reading specialist and literacy coach at Sheboygan (Wis.) North High School.

Luther graduates attended the Iowa Campus Compact Annual Meeting and Upper Midwest Civic Engagement in Iowa City, Iowa. Among those who were recognized was Erin VanLaningham ’96 of Dubuque, Iowa, earning the Emerging Innovation Award. Brothers Paul Pribbenow ’78 and Dean Pribbenow ’87 presented “Brotherly Love: Reflections on Leadership and Community Engagement.” Pictured (left to right) are Anna (Haug) Pena ’05, Paul Pribbenow ’78, Justin Ellis ’06, and Erin VanLaningham ’96. Those in attendance but not pictured include Karen (Antons) Sindelar ’85 and Dean Pribbenow ’87.

Alumni News

Sissel Schroeder ’83, professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, combines classroom instruction with a summer field school. Each summer students work with her on a dig at mounds constructed by Native people near Lake Mills, Wis.

PHOTO BY SISSEL SCHROEDER ’83

Those teachers are in luck, since Schroeder and a colleague are partnering with a local school district to develop curricular materials for middle school students based on the Aztalan site. The materials will draw together geology, the scientific process, journaling and writing, the mathematics of laying out excavation units and analyzing cultural material, some zoology related to investigating animal bones, and art—the ability to draw artifacts and make maps or to illustrate what students think the community looked like when people were living there. That last bit is something that Schroeder’s excavations are calling into question. “We are rewriting the understanding that we have of life at Aztalan,” she says. “What we’re finding is that the history of activities at this site was incredibly dynamic. Walls were built and dismantled, the occupied area expanded and contracted. The internal organization of the site really needs to be reassessed. For the students, it’s really exciting to be a part of a project that’s revealing new information, things that weren’t expected by the professional community.” —Kate Frentzel

PHOTO BY KELLY TYRRELL

This summer, like the three summers before it, Sissel Schroeder ’83 found herself digging trenches—methodical, razor-straight trenches from which dirt was excavated by shovel and Marshalltown trowel. Schroeder, professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, has been digging in Aztalan State Park near Lake Mills, Wis., since 2013 to learn more about the Native peoples who lived there a millennium ago. The confluence of cultures at the site is of great interest to Schroeder, who studies the social and political systems of complex nonstate societies that archaeologists call Mississippian. “Judging from the pottery,” Schroeder says, “this was a site where people from at least two different cultural traditions lived together. We see evidence that there was a peaceful relationship between these people, and we want to understand how they forged and maintained this kind of relationship through daily practices. It’s an issue that’s really resonant today when we’re seeing a backlash against immigrants in many parts of the world.” Schroeder doesn’t excavate by herself, of course. Each summer, along with one or two grad students, she brings six to eight undergraduates with her. She explains, “We’re working on helping them develop the physical skills of excavating carefully, but we’re also training them to see subtle differences in the color and texture of soil that might indicate that they are starting to encounter a trash pit or something else that happened at the site. And those subtle differences in soil color and texture are not something that students are trained for in the classroom—you can only learn this through experience.” Because the group excavates in a state park that’s open to the public, the site gets a lot of visitors—more than 100 some days. “We’re very transparent about what we’re doing. We want to engage visitors to help them understand some of the heritage that’s in their own backyard,” Schroeder says. “The middle school teachers who visited the site this summer were so excited to see that it was an active learning process and that it integrated knowledge that is typically taught in a very segmented way in K–12 settings.”

PHOTO BY SARAH MORTON

Sissel Schroeder ’83 digs into social systems we could learn from today

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

Mark Heninger is president of 11 Amps, a digital marketing and consulting agency in Venice, Calif.

James Tegtmeier is regional counsel and manager on the Midwest Enforce Team for the Federal Aviation Administration in Des Plaines, Ill.

Nancy (Watson) and Eugene Kreiter ’89 live in Davenport, Iowa. She is an accountant and payroll clerk, and he is a teacher and coach for North Scott Community Schools.

1988 Callista (Bisek)

Gingrich earned a place in the top 25 of Newsmax’s 50 Most Influential Female Republicans. She is president of Gingrich Productions and author of several New York Times’ bestseller children’s books. Jon Wee is a juggler and comedian. He and his partner, Owen Morse, are a corporate entertainment team known as The Passing Zone. They appeared on NBC’s America’s Got Talent last summer. The Passing Zone has been awarded five Guinness World Records and 18 gold medals from the International Juggler’s Association.

1989 Ray DeWalt Jr. is a

workers’ compensation representative at Aegis Corporation, Brookfield, Wis.

Sarah (Fromong) Lee earned a bachelor’s degree in human service administration from Kaplan University. She works in medical research for human resources at IICHA in Decorah. In March, soprano soloist Caroline Worra ’91 was the guest artist in the La Crosse Symphony’s performance of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony and Richard Strauss’s Four Last Songs. Several Luther faculty and alumni were also involved in the performance. Pictured (left to right) are percussionist and former Luther Jazz Band director Jim Knutson ’81, clarinetist and Luther professor of clarinet and saxophone Michael Chesher, bassoonist and former Luther saxophone and bassoon instructor Harry Hindson ’70, Worra, piccolo player and flutist Rachel Haug Root ’10, and Luther professor of flute and music theory Carol Hester.

1991 Sue (Vongroven) and

Don Baker ’92 live in Mazeppa, Minn. She works in surgery scheduling at Olmsted Medical Center Hospital in Rochester, Minn. He is a manager for Kwik Trip. Herman Jass is the owner of Snap Fitness in Eden Prairie, Minn. An extremely dedicated rugby player and supporter, he received the “Flash” Korman Award for Rugby Excellence from the Luther Old Boys in 2015. Lindsay Jordan earned a doctor of ministry degree in congregational mission and leadership from Luther Seminary. He is pastor at Christ the King Lutheran Church in Delafield, Wis., and was also a prospective nominee for bishop of the Milwaukee Synod last spring. Vicki Weidenbacher-Hoper is assistant director for external and pipeline programs at the University of Illinois in Rockford.

1990 Kelly (Bjugan) Hudson

is assistant professor of music at Concord University in Athens, W.Va. Mike Japenga is pastor at Chandler (Ariz.) Presbyterian Church. Pete Lawrence of Brighton, Colo., is master trooper and lead firearms coordinator for the Colorado State Patrol.

Luther Alumni Magazine

Melissa Bevis is a school psychologist at Rum River Special Education Cooperative and Cambridge-Isanti Schools in Cambridge, Minn. Brett Cloninger-West was named one of Washingtonian magazine’s Best 100 Realtors in Washington, D.C. He is a realtor for McEnearney Realtors.

Carol (Edwards) Denekas of Dyersville, Iowa, recently released her second novel, Seeds of Hope (inspirational fiction), which can be purchased on Amazon as a paperback or for Amazon Kindle. Paul Eckheart of Spring Valley, Minn., teaches sixth grade and coaches for the Kingsland Public School District.

Michelle McLain-Kruse of Decorah is executive director of Thunder Rode Inc. and a registered instructor through the Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship International. She is also a member of the United Way of Winneshiek County Board and owner and operator of McLain Farms Trailriding Inc.

Ben Fincham of Iowa City, Iowa, is a clinical specialist for Medtronic.

Eric Muller of Urbandale, Iowa, is vice president of internal audit for Federal Home Loan Bank of Des Moines.

Soren Flessen earned a doctor of ministry degree at Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago and is chaplain of Presence Health in Aurora, Ill.

Kirstin (Hanson) Norby is a grade-level counselor and school social worker for Austin (Minn.) Public Schools.

Heather (Henschel) Hasstedt is a substitute teacher for the Boone (Iowa) Community School District.

Elke Norwig Eastaugh is a grants administrator at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.

Dean Haugen is senior vice president for Wells Fargo Bank in Minneapolis.

Mary (Wallestad) Oyebade is a missionary and teacher for the ELCA in Jos, Nigeria.

Mark Lovelace ’96 hit a hole in one at Oneota Golf and Country Club’s 11th hole in Decorah during the Luther Norse Athletic Association Benefit Golf Tournament in June to win a Buick Cascada. He is pictured with his playing partners, David Lester, Mike Huinker, and Mark Donhowe ’70; President Paula Carlson; and Jerry Weis and Jeff Weis from Weis Buick in Decorah.

Alumni News

1993 Kris Alwin Begay of

Bellevue, Wash., earned a Ph.D. in educational psychology from the University of Washington. She works at the University of Washington Autism Center.

Last March, several Luther graduates posed with a future Luther grad at the Association for Music in International Schools High School Honor Choir in Luxembourg. The choir is an opportunity for which talented high school men and women singers from international schools audition to perform in three separate choirs with world-class guest conductors. Pictured (left to right) are Luther Rauk ’98, athletic and activities director at the American International School of Muscat; Steven Nurre ’78, assistant head of school at Concordia International School Shanghai; Adrienne (Moyer) Gerst ’00, vocal music director at the American School of Dubai; Martha Jensen-Miller ’05, vocal music director at the American Community School of Abu Dhabi; and current Luther student Laura Bianchi ’20.

Kristin (Anderson) Ranum is a social worker at Columbia County CSP in Portage, Wis. Sven Schulte is a global delivery manager consulting for Intelligence AG in Bielefeld, Germany.

Wahneta Tonn Dimmer is a licensed massage therapist and president of Hands in Harmony Inc. in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Tom Voute of Midlevels, Hong Kong, is an equity arbitrage at Algorithmic Trading Group Ltd. Bill Weiss teaches social studies and is head football coach at Chisago Lakes High School in Lindstrom, Minn. Doug Zars of Rochester, Minn., earned a certificate of advanced study from Winona State University.

1992 Eric Dodd of Rock Island, Ill., was inducted into the Thrivent Financial Hall of Fame at Thrivent’s annual conference in Nashville, Tenn.

Cindy Marlow McClenagan is vice president for academic affairs at Wayland Baptist University. Dean Rossow is team lead at Infor in St. Paul, Minn.

Dawn (Schlatter) Spies is interim pastor at Calvary Lutheran Church in Brookfield, Wis.

1996 Erik Berry of Two

Harbors, Minn., plays with the band Trampled by Turtles. The band played at Bayfront Festival Park in Duluth, Minn., last summer and toured through Alaska, Colorado, Utah, and Washington. David Schifsky graduated from the FBI National Academy in June. Schifsky was chosen by his department to complete the 10-week course among 234 other graduates from 47 states, the District of Columbia, 21 countries, four military organizations, and eight federal civilian agencies. Those selected represent less than 1 percent of the country’s law enforcement officers. David works for the National Park Service at Point Reyes National Seashore in Calif.

Kristi (Lenning) Dean of Greensboro, N.C., is a network analyst for Guilford Metro 911. Zack Durlam is assistant professor of music and director of choral activities at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. His article “Glimpses of Handel in the Choral-Orchestral Psalms of Medelssohn” was published in the May issue of the Choral Journal.

1994 Drew Moorcroft is owner and director of ChiChi Wacha Corporation in Timnath, Colo. Anne (Potter) Walters was named senior fiduciary officer at Wells Fargo in Minneapolis.

Daniel Stout is a web software developer for UW Health in Madison, Wis. Jaime Schultz is associate professor of kinesiology at Penn State University in State College. She was a 2016 recipient of the George W. Atherton Award for Excellence in Teaching and recognized as one of the best teachers among Penn State’s faculty.

PHOTO BY SARAH STRANDBERG

Dean Southern is on the voice faculty and head of the voice and opera division at Cleveland (Ohio) Institute of Music.

Calif., and was recently honored as the 2016 Faithful Leader by the Northwest Arkansas Workers’ Justice Center for his support and empowerment of workers.

Kelli (Dunne) Winchester is the new owner of Margaret’s Boutique in Decorah. Longtime business owner Margaret Walter is selling her business to Winchester, who worked for Walter while attending Luther. Winchester asked Walter two years ago if she’d be interested in selling her the business. Walter said she would, as long as Winchester committed to two years of training and learning the ropes, including accompanying Walter on buying trips and working at store events. Winchester put in the time, commuting from Des Moines, and Walter is confident the new owner will “hit the ground running.” Winchester moved to Decorah last summer.

1995 Shannon (Miller) Duval is president and chief development officer of the National Catholic Health Initiatives Foundation in Denver.

Andrew Olson is global project manager for Mercury Marine/Brunswick Corporation in Oshkosh, Wis. Clint Schnekloth is pastor of Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Fayetteville, Ark. He serves on the board of Augsburg Fortress, the publishing house of the ELCA. He also teaches as adjunct faculty at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena,

1997 Becky (Bixby) and

Marshall Anderson ’96 live in Mansfield, Texas. She is director of clinical services for Shady Shores Communities. He is the head athletic trainer at Grand Prairie High School. Jodi (Nelsen) Dettmann of Rochester, Minn., is assistant director of admissions for the Rochester campus of Augsburg College.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

2001 Dan Bellrichard of

Decorah is Grass Run Farms brand manager for Jack Link’s Protein Snacks.

KIRK JOHNSON ’82 PHOTO

Katie Marske is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

The Lutheran Summer Music Academy was in residency on the Luther campus this past summer and featured four Luther grads leading the four main ensembles at the academy. Left to right: Andrew Last ’97, concert choir; Jon Strommen Campbell ’98, chapel choir; David Upham ’92, orchestra; and Jeff Doebler ’82, concert band. Nikki Colsch and Michael Elsbernd live in Waukee, Iowa. She teaches English at Waukee Public Schools. He is director of worship and music at St. John’s Lutheran Church in Des Moines. He published a composition, “Four Short Reflections on SLANE,” with Alliance Publications.

1998 Jen Follstad-Popp

earned a graduate degree in art education from the University of Minnesota and teaches art at Waseca (Minn.) High School. She is also art team coach and a board member at the Waseca Art Center. Nicole (Voss) and George Hawkinson Jr. ’97 live in Leawood, Kan. She is a pediatric dentist for Pediatric Dental Specialists. He is vice president of business development at Connexx Energy Inc. Jason Lage is vice president for Wells Fargo in West Des Moines, Iowa. Sarah (Kipling) Lightner is dean of students for Bloomington (Minn.) Public Schools. She earned her education specialist degree from Minnesota State University–Mankato. Kyra (Rusch) McCool is a school counselor at Hilltop Elementary School in Mendham Borough, N.J. Lakshmi Ramjattan is purchasing analyst at AMD Solutions in Miramar, Fla.

Luther Alumni Magazine

John Smedstad earned a master of music degree in choral conducting from Oklahoma State University. He is upper school choral director at St. Paul’s Independent Day School in Lutherville, Md. Karen (Knutson) Wain is assistant professor at Geisinger Autism and Developmental Medicine Institute in Lewisburg, Pa.

1999 Sarika Bajoria is senior project designer and architect of Perkins+Will in New York. She is also a meditation teacher for the Kadampa Mediation Center.

Shelley (Jennings) Bumpus earned an early childhood endorsement from Northwestern College and is a preschool teacher at Trinity Lane Preschool in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Jen (Solomonson) Doty earned a master of technology management degree from the University of St. Thomas. She is a business analyst for Digital Cinema Implementation Partners in Edina, Minn. Mustafa Ozer of Minneapolis is chief medical physicist at Minnesota Hematology-Oncology.

Richard Winkels of Red Wing, Minn., relinquished command of the 1st Armored Division Band in March. He is spending nine months in the Middle East, where he will serve as the theater music liaison officer for Forward U.S. Army Central and Coalition Forces Land Component Command. After his deployment, he will become deputy commander for the U.S. Military Academy Band in West Point, N.Y.

Matt Mills is an IT program manager for USAID in Arlington, Va. Heather (Ciernia) Nelson is choral director at Christ the King Lutheran Church in New Brighton, Minn., and vocal director for the Mounds View Community Theatre.

2002 Tucker Hansen is

abstractor for Lake County Abstract in Madison, S.D. Jenn (Smith) and Peter Hoesing ’03 live in Sioux Falls, S.D. She earned a master’s degree in arts administration at Florida State University and is executive director of Stockyards Ag Experience. He is visiting assistant professor of ethnomusicology at Grinnell College and recently received the 2016 United Methodist Church Board of Higher Education and Ministry Exemplary Teacher Award, as well as the 2015– 16 UNCF Henry C. McBay Research Fellowship. Arijit Mazumdar of Roseville, Minn., is associate professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of St. Thomas. Peter Oyloe of Chicago is an actor, singer, and songwriter. He recently released an EP of original material, When the Wide World Roars.

Karen (Erceg) Schock is a pharmacist at St. Mary’s Hospital and Regional Medical Center in Grand Junction, Colo.

2000 Erin (Meyer) BockovenTroll of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, is an intermediate accountant for Transamerica Life Insurance.

Norah Bringer and Dave Wake live in Washington, D.C. She is an appellate attorney at the U.S. Department of Justice. He is an attorney adviser at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Tyler Christiansen earned a doctor of ministry degree from Garret Seminary. He is executive pastor at Riverchase United Methodist Church in Hoover, Ala.

Last May, alumni Joni Walton ’00, Trevor Whitney ’00, John Mason ’00, Jared Bosch ’02, Jake Eastman ’99, and Becky Springer ’00 gathered together in Portland, Ore., to watch John Mason’s band perform.

Alumni News

Erica (Dencer) Weisgram of Plover, Wis., was invited to the White House to participate in the Conference on Helping Children Explore, Learn, and Dream without Limits: Breaking Down Gender Stereotypes in Media and Toys. Jane (McDermott) and Kenny Wheeler II ’00 live in Bettendorf, Iowa. She teaches physical education and is the girls’ track and cross country coach at Pleasant Valley Community High School. Her cross country team earned state runner-up in 2015. He is an academic adviser at Western Illinois University and co–head coach, with Jane, of Pleasant Valley Community High School girls’ track and field. Their track team earned state runner-up in 2016.

2003 Julie Bauch is a nursing supervisor for Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis.

and coaches girls’ cross country in the Collier County School District in Naples, Fla. Shannon (Johnson) Gravelle earned a doctor of musical arts degree in choral conducting from the University of Iowa. She is director of choral activities at Meredith College in Raleigh, N.C.

Erik Sherard ’04 and Terry Blessing III ’05 are members of a barbershop group called Switchback Quartet. They competed at the International Quartet Contest at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tenn., last summer.

2004 Bradley Carlton is

Care and Specialty Pharmacy annual meeting. Leann is a PGY-1 pharmacy resident for HealthPartners in Bloomington, Minn.

Sara (Johnson) D’Abreo is an attorney for the Law Office of Sara D’Abreo PLLC in Lewisville, Texas.

Karen (Elliot) Thompson of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, was the recipient of the 2015 University of Iowa D.C. Spriestersbach Dissertation Award in Biological and Life Sciences.

business manager for School Management Services in Austin, Minn.

Janelle (Feine) and Charlie Dahl ’03 are traveling the country in a fifth-wheel camper. She works as a travel nurse, and he cares for their children.

Peter Hoyem of Stillwater, Minn., completed the fall 2015 New York Marathon with a time of 2:44:46. He placed 164 out of 29,999 male entrants, 182 out of 50,000 entrants overall. Ryan Kling-Punt is community outreach manager for Rochester (Minn.) Area Habitat for Humanity. Andrew Nelson is pastor for the children, youth, and family ministry at St. Mark Lutheran Church in Sioux City, Iowa, and serves as president of the Mary J. Treglia House Board of Directors. Katie (Hendrickson) Thompson teaches middle school math at Ave Maria Catholic School in Parker, Colo. Arvid von Taube is an associate attorney with Ropes and Gray LLP in Boston. He was elected chairman of the Wellesley Historical Commission, which is in charge of preserving the architectural, political, and social history of Wellesley, Mass.

Ben Druffel earned a doctorate from Rutgers University and is assistant director of bands for Eastern Illinois University in Charleston.

Bergen (Papka) and Jake Torgerson ’05 live in St. Paul, Minn. She is a communications consultant at HealthEast Care System. He is director of real estate portfolio at Target Corporation.

Sarah (Braun) Ekenberg is public relations manager at Proto Labs in Maple Plain, Minn.

Katie Konrath is an inbound marketing and sales strategist at Media Junction in St. Paul, Minn.

Jason Ketelsen earned a juris doctor degree, magna cum laude, from the Villanova University School of Law. He is an associate for DrinkerBiddle’s Litigation Practice Group in Philadelphia. Lindsey Koele-Schmidt is a neonatologist at Blank Children’s Hospital in Des Moines, Iowa. Lauren Mayfield is senior associate relations specialist for Edward Jones in Tempe, Ariz. Erik Olson is principal at Hamline Elementary School in Chicago. Brad Paulsrud of Hutchinson, Kan., is director of USA product sales for Les Mills. Susie Pettinger of Burnsville, Minn., earned a bachelor of arts degree in elementary education from Upper Iowa University.

Amy Frye is owner and operator of Boldly Grown Farm in Skagit Valley, Wash. Jerry Koering is an owner of Group Benefit Partners in Fort Madison, Iowa, and recently became co-owner of Midwest Group Benefits in Decorah.

Kate Ingber is a certified professional with the Society for Human Resource Management and is a talent acquisition partner for Starkey Hearing Technologies in Eden Prairie, Minn.

Zach Wigle was named the 2016 Iowa Secondary Principal of the Year by the School Administrators of Iowa. Zach was principal of Keokuk High School last year and was recently named activities director for the Solon Community School District for 2016–17.

Ryan Luhrs is assistant professor of music and director of choral activities at Lenoir-Rhyne University in Hickory, N.C.

2005 Laura Chaney is director

Leann McDowell earned a doctor of pharmacy degree from the University of California–San Francisco and received the Bowl of Hygeia Award, which is the highest honor given to a graduating student in the School of Pharmacy at UCSF. She was also awarded the Best Student Pharmacist Poster Award at the AMCP Managed

Anna Cigrand earned a master of health administration degree from Saint Louis University. She is administrative fellow at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in Iowa City.

of international student and scholar services at the University of San Francisco.

Melissa (Garbrecht) and Justin Pieper ’04 live in Fort Madison, Iowa. She is a homemaker. He is an owner of Group Benefit Partners in Fort Madison, Iowa, and recently became co-owner of Midwest Group Benefits in Decorah. Aaron Richards is producer relations project manager at Cigna Behavioral Health in Eden Prairie, Minn. Jen Stoa is a registered nurse at Saint Luke’s East Hospital in Lee’s Summit, Mo.

2006 Erik Bies earned a

physical therapy doctorate from the University of Washington. He is a doctor of physical therapy at Movement Systems Physical Therapy in Seattle.

Ashley (Reiman) Doddridge teaches seventh-grade language arts

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

Tara (Huinker) Brown of Murrieta, Calif., is a stay-at-home mom. Heather Carlson earned a master’s degree in differentiated instruction from Concordia College. She teaches seventh-grade special education for the Waconia (Minn.) School District. Laura Chapin earned a Ph.D. in oncological sciences from the University of Utah. She is a research assistant at Covenant Clinic in Waterloo, Iowa. Sonja Chi is sales operations specialist at Proto Labs Inc. in Maple Plain, Minn. Lyn Curry is choir director at Regis Middle School in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Abbey Dibble is procurement coordinator and liaison to the Holden Mine Remediation Project for Holden Village in Chelan, Wash. Anna (Sill) Engelhart is a clinical development specialist at Fairview Southdale Hospital in Edina, Minn.

versity and a postdoctoral degree in chemical engineering from Stanford University. She is a scientist with Theranos Inc. in Palo Alto, Calif. Nick Kelley is assistant public health administrator for the city of Bloomington, Minn.

Jill (Knutson) Gierok of Prior Lake, Minn., is a registered nurse in peri-operative services at University Hospital of Minneapolis Fairview.

Rachel Kibler is a software test analyst for Zions Bancorporation in Salt Lake City.

Eric Hahn teaches social studies and is athletic director at Pinnacle High School in Thornton, Colo.

Bethany (Peterson) Kracl earned a master’s degree in school counseling from the University of Nebraska– Omaha. She is a school counselor for the Omaha (Neb.) Public Schools.

Kathryn Hobson is assistant professor of communication studies at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Va. She received the honor of top dissertation from the National Communication Association GLBTQ Division.

Rachel (Swenson) Miller is a quality improvement specialist with Gundersen Health System Inc. in La Crosse, Wis.

Andy Hoegh earned a Ph.D. in statistics from Virginia Tech. He is assistant professor of statistics at Montana State University in Bozeman, Mont.

Al Onkka earned a master’s degree in evaluation studies from the University of Minnesota. He is a senior consultant at Aurora Consulting in Minneapolis.

Kara (Kulzer) Jordahl is a mental health therapist for Lifeworks Inc. in Des Moines, Iowa.

Lynnea Pfohl earned a master’s degree in environmental law and policy from Vermont Law School. She is a policy program organizer for the Land Stewardship Project in Lewiston, Minn., until the conclusion of the Frac Sand Ban Campaign in Winona County.

Sheil Kee earned a Ph.D. in biophysics from Johns Hopkins Uni-

PHOTO COURTESY OF BEN ZAMORA-WEISS ’10

Laura Fristad is a speech language pathologist for the Anoka-Hennepin School District in Coon Rapids, Minn.

Kristi (Millmann) Garcia earned a bachelor of science degree in nursing from St. Catherine University. She is a registered nurse at Summit Orthopedics in St. Paul, Minn.

Ben Zamora-Weiss ’10 traveled to Kerala, India, in December 2015 to learn about coconut oil producers who sell their product through the agricultural collective Fair Trade Alliance Kerala. A Minnesota retailer where Zamora-Weiss worked until recently sold chocolates made with the oil. He interviewed farmers to ask how fair trade has affected their lives and found that a common theme was now being able to send their children to school. In a blog post about his trip, Zamora-Weiss called his experience transformative. Most inspiring, he says, “was coming home with a deeper understanding of our global food system, and a real appreciation for the small but important role each of my fair trade purchases makes in the lives of farmers around the world.” Zamora-Wiess left retail this past summer to put his newly minted master of library science degree to work at Aldis Systems in Minneapolis, where he is a digital media librarian.

Luther Alumni Magazine

Nicole (Bontrager) Rediger is a registered nurse of pediatric intensive care for Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota in St. Paul. She and her husband, Ryan, have also started a business, 4TK Consulting.

Matthew Hagen earned a master’s degree in psychology from Harvard University. He is a senior product line manager and IBM thought leader: strategy with IBM Commerce in Bedford, N.H. Mindi (Scott) and Josh Johnson live in Frisco, Texas. She is a registered nurse. He is a specialty market account executive at MetLife Insurance. Leah Kinnaird of Des Moines, Iowa, received the Early Achievement in Outreach Award from the College of Human Sciences at Iowa State University. She is a human services specialist III and domestic violence response coordinator for the Iowa Department of Human Services. Morgan (Sterzel) Lentino is a music teacher at School District U-46 in Elgin, Ill. Troy Peterson is controller at Prime West Companies in Denver. Mark Strohbehn earned a master’s degree in international security studies from Georgetown University. He is program manager at Development Transformations in Washington, D.C. Stacy (Myhre) Twite is legislative director of continuing care administration for the Minnesota Department of Human Services in St. Paul. Morgan (Waterstraat) Woods is associate doctor of chiropractic at Brennan Family Chiropractic and Nutrition Center in Rochester, Minn.

Emily (Anderson) Shockley is a communications specialist at Mesa County Valley School District 51 in Grand Junction, Colo. Andrew Steward is dean of students and teaches at Kansai Christian School in Heguri Cho, Japan.

2007 Hemie Collier is assistant director of intercultural life at Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa.

Liz (Rasmus) Drayton is elementary music specialist for the Altoona (Wis.) School District. Megan (Manthey) Ellingson is a certified nurse practitioner at St. Paul (Minn.) Radiology. Adam Frye is head coach for the cross country and track and field programs at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Wash.

Danny Young of Nashville, Tenn., is a drummer, background singer, and music director for the Church Sisters, who were recently signed by Big Machine Label Group. He also drums and sings full time with Mary Sarah from the last season of The Voice.

2008 Katie Benedix is

constituent manager at Brucemore in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Nina Catterall earned a master’s degree in sustainability leadership

Alumni News

Kathie (Palmersheim) Whitt completed three years of residency at Grant Medical Center in Columbus, Ohio, and has joined Family Foot Health Care PLC in Waterloo, Iowa, as a foot and ankle specialist.

from Edgewood College. She is a human resources specialist with Nordic Consulting in Madison, Wis. Stefanie (Tow) Cooper is a nurse at Iowa Methodist Medical Center in Des Moines.

2010 Tom Blattner is

Eric Crawford of Decorah is head coach of Decorah Swim Club. He was named head coach for Team Iowa at the 2016 Mega Zone Championship meet in Indianapolis last summer.

Luther alumnae Kelsey Leppert ’11, Amy Johnson ’94, and Richelle Johnson ’13 graduated from Drake University Law School in Des Moines, Iowa, last spring.

Haley Douglass is staff attorney for Professional Contract Services Inc. in Austin, Texas.

Godson Sowah is advisory senior manager and CPA for Ernst & Young in Minneapolis.

Jake Hunerdosse works at Hormel Foods in Austin, Minn.

Kaitlyn Vaske-Wright is a boardcertified women’s health nurse practitioner at Planned Parenthood of Illinois in Chicago.

Josh Leinen is a sound engineer in Ames, Iowa.

2009 Kate (Westby) and

Abe Campos ’10 live in Bellevue, Neb. She is a stay-at-home mom and reviews books for Booklist magazine. He is an emergency medicine resident at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha. Mischa Fleishman is a grants administrator for the Legal Assistance Foundation in Chicago. Laurie Meinholz is a doctor of chiropractic at Nordic Chiropractic LLC in Decorah. She received an Iowa Chiropractic Society District Star Award for her dedication and leadership in the Northeast Iowa District of the ICS. Aaron Nyquist is an attorney at DLA Piper LLP (US) in Minneapolis. Tim Peterson earned his paramedic certificate at Ridgewater College/Hennepin County Medical Center. He is a paramedic for North Memorial Ambulance Service as well as an on-call firefighter for the city of Maple Grove, Minn. Kaycee (Green) Rogers earned a master’s degree in education–professional development at the University of Wisconsin–La Crosse. She is director of teacher education programs at the Rochester (Minn.) campus of Augsburg College. Allison (Bouslog) Seeley is a business negotiations consultant in the Shareholder Services Department at Wells Fargo in Minneapolis. Amber (Holzl) Sorenson teaches fifth grade at Woodland Elementary School in Brooklyn Park, Minn.

Kelly Gaul of Davenport, Iowa, earned the adult CCRN certification and attended the National Teaching Institute and Critical Care Exposition in New Orleans last spring. She is a nurse at Trinity Medical Center. Melissa (Munks) and Andy Gisleson ’08 live in Glenwood Springs, Colo. She is an associate veterinarian at Alpine Animal Hospital. He is a family medicine physician for Roaring Fork Family Practice.

accountant II at InfoSync Services in Wichita, Kan.

Justin Madsen is senior manager of negotiations finance and lead accountant of corporate financial reporting for Target Corporation in Minneapolis. Nelao Nengola Alexander is a certified personal trainer at Virgin Active in Windhoek, Namibia. She is also a corporate wellness consultant for Power Poise Wellness. Jenna Pulkowski Huntsberger earned a master’s degree in divinity from the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago. She is pastor at Peace Lutheran Church in Fargo, N.D. Cody Ryberg earned a higher education administration degree from St. Cloud State (Minn.) University. Dan Summerfield earned a master’s degree in materials science and engineering from Johns Hopkins University and a doctor of medicine and a master of science in applied anatomy dual degree from Case Western Reserve University. He is a pathology resident at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

Anna Bullard earned a master’s degree in teacher preparation K–12: English as a second language from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minn. Mike Byrd earned a juris doctor degree from New York University School of Law. He is an associate at White & Case in London, United Kingdom. Phuong Dau of Westminster, Calif., is a scientist at Avrio Biopharmaceuticals LLC. Alysa Davis earned a doctor of osteopathic medicine degree from Midwestern University Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine. She is an emergency medicine resident physician at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in Iowa City. Sarah Frana is a technical recruiter at NextGen Global Resources in San Diego. Vickie Harper-Halverson is an administrative assistant at Des Moines (Iowa) University.

Sara (Walters) Graverson is a registered nurse in orthopedics at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She received the 2016 UW Health Nursing Excellence Award. Brie (Kunkel) Iverson of Chussell, Mich., is a part-time director of youth and education at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, where her husband, Joseph, serves as pastor.

Marquise Jefferson ’18, Artaisha Herred ’19, Rakia Woods ’20, Michael Elliott ’02, and Michael Reed ’88 welcome Woods to Luther. Woods is the latest student from North Lawndale College Prep, in Chicago, to enroll at Luther.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

Bob Kemp is a financial representative at Northwestern Mutual and a broker for Aflac in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho.

pathologist for Anoka-Hennepin School District 11 in Anoka, Minn., and a Zumba instructor in the Minneapolis area.

Amanda Kloser earned a master’s degree in teaching secondary English from the University of Iowa and received a Fulbright U.S. Student Program grant to teach English at Kastamonu University in Turkey.

Kelly Hyland is historical researcher and digitization specialist at Musco Lighting in Oskaloosa, Iowa.

Nana Kwapong earned a master of business administration degree with a focus in digital marketing from the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis. She is a marketing researcher and consultant at the university. Marie Maguina Heller is an immigration case specialist at BI Incorporated, a GEO Group company in Phoenix, Ariz. Dustin Meriwether earned a Ph.D. in cognitive psychology from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. Katie Prichard earned a master’s degree in museum and artifact studies from Durham University in Durham, England. She is assistant registrar at the University of Michigan Museum of Art in Ann Arbor. Victoria (Blanco) Tapia of New York City earned her bachelor’s degree in nursing from Columbia University. Reid Wilson is founder and chief pursuit officer of Second Shot, a 501(c)(3) company creating adaptive outdoor opportunities in Iowa City, Iowa.

2011 Alex Anderson is assistant city attorney for the city of Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Sabrina (Hawkinson) Arredondo teaches fourth grade at Greenleaf Elementary in Apple Valley, Minn. Camille (Welter) and Peter Burleson ’11 live in Plymouth, Minn. She is a training technician at Allianz Global Corporate and Specialty. He is an aquatics and kids’ activities manager at Lifetime Fitness. Kate (Schaefer) Gerhardinger is a sustainable process solutions consultant for U.S. Bank in Minneapolis. J. Scott Harrison is director of operations for Northwestern Mutual Financial Network in Edina, Minn.

Luther Alumni Magazine

Matthew Wettach ’12, Dani Meirick ’12, and Brian Darling ’12 earned doctor of dental surgery degrees from the University of Iowa College of Dentistry. They are shown with Brian Howe ’02, D.M.D., M.S. (second from left) visiting assistant professor, Department of Family Dentistry at University of Iowa. Wettach is a general practitioner at Family Dental Health Services in Mount Pleasant, Iowa. Meirick is a general practitioner at Artisan Dental in Madison, Wis. Darling is undergoing a pediatric dental residency in Providence, R.I., for two years.

Ryan Nord Kitchen of Johns Island, S.C., was featured in the New York Times in a review of his solo painting debut at Nicelle Beauchene Gallery in New York City. Art critic Roberta Smith wrote: “Now the field has a brilliant newcomer: Ryan Nord Kitchen, 28, born in Minnesota; educated in Iowa and Baltimore; and making his New York solo debut at Nicelle Beauchene with ‘Winter Paintings,’ a show of 25 works measuring either 15 inches by 12 inches or 24 inches by 21 inches. As I’ve said before: Art you can take home in a taxi dissents from the big scale and site specificity that, regardless of medium, are so highly favored if not fetishized by the current system of huge spaces, museum commissions and sprawling international exhibitions. . . . The works in this quietly stunning show have a kind of perfection that can make you wonder where Mr. Kitchen will go next.” Jordan Lang is territory sales manager for Deere and Company in Miami. Charlie Rasmussen is cello and Suzuki faculty for the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music in Milwaukee. Liz (Cox) and Jeff Rose Jr. live in Moline, Ill. She is marketing manager of Vibrant Credit Union. He is strength and conditioning coach for Augustana College in Rock Island, Ill. Rachel Rudeen is admissions coordinator at University of Minnesota Medical School in Minneapolis.

Kirsten Strandjord and Jay Dewitt live in Boulder, Colo. She earned a master’s degree in aerospace engineering from Purdue University and is a doctoral student in aerospace engineering at the University of Colorado–Boulder. He earned a juris doctor degree from Washington University and is a law clerk for the Colorado Court of Appeals in Denver. Jenny (St. Clair) Tomesch of Iowa City, Iowa, earned a master of business administration degree from the University of Iowa. She is a project manager for Modern Woodmen of America.

2012 Peter Beierwaltes of

Burnsville, Minn., earned a master’s degree in public policy from the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey School of Public Affairs. He is a policy specialist for the Minnesota Department of Human Services and serves on the board of directors for the Arc Greater Twin Cities.

Danielle Koch is program specialist for Disaster Services and Camp Noah at Lutheran Social Service of Minnesota in St. Paul. Jenn (Winder) and Benj Kost live in Bettendorf, Iowa. She teaches Spanish in the Eddyville-Blakesburg Fremont Community School District. He is completing Summer Vocology Institute training through the University of Utah. Joanna Lee is a paraprofessional at Mammoth Lakes (Calif.) Elementary School. Thato Masire of Little Rock, Ark., earned a dual master’s degree in business administration and public service from the University of Arkansas. He was also named the 2016 Kathryn Davis Fellow for Peace, which enabled him to participate in the Summer Intensive Language Program at Middlebury College, learning a year’s worth of French in six weeks. Meghan McCall earned a master’s degree in nonproliferation and terrorism studies with an emphasis in Russian at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey, Calif. She is a legal assistant at Google.

Bailey Cahlander is communications coordinator at Hennepin Theatre Trust in Minneapolis. Kelly Dotseth of Boulder, Colo., is founder and chief experience officer of Brandzooka, a video marketing platform that makes it possible for anyone to execute video ad campaigns online. Caroline Feeney is associate editor for Inman News and a freelance writer for Influence and Co. in West Des Moines, Iowa. Erin (McWilliams) Hart earned a master’s degree in communication sciences and disorders from St. Cloud University. She is a speech language

Teresa Procter is an active artist in the Da Camera Young Artist Program in Houston, Texas, where she performs for underrepresented communities and presents music to children in the greater Houston community school district. She works in a musical residency at the Monarch School, a therapeutic day school for children with neurological disorders, and serves as the Singer-Songwriter Fellow at Texas Children’s Hospital. Its Purple Songs Can Fly is a music studio that positively impacts pediatric can-

Alumni News

cer patients and their families through the writing, recording, and sharing of original songs. As an artist with Houston Grand Opera’s community and collaboration initiative, HGOco, she recently performed as the mezzo-soprano in Opera to Go!’s performance of The Velveteen Rabbit, and she sang in the world premiere of the chamber opera O Columbia.

Mary Ferrian is environmental health and safety technician at the Institute for Environmental Assessment Inc. in Minneapolis. Tyler Hagy is a graduate assistant at the University of Cincinnati (Ohio) College–Conservatory of Music.

Maren Quanbeck earned a master’s degree in music from the University of Nevada–Las Vegas. She is music production coordinator for the Aspen (Colo.) Music Festival and School.

Cassie Seebart is a senior sea turtle biologist for Clearwater (Fla.) Marine Aquarium. Katie (Etter) Sheets earned a doctor of chiropractic degree from Palmer College. She is opening Sheets Chiropractic and Wellness Inc. in Sigourney, Iowa. Marcus Turen is accounting control and brokerage escheatment operations manager for U.S. Bancorp Investments Inc. in St. Paul, Minn. Andrew Weckwerth earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Oregon State University. He is a business analyst consultant at Genesis10 in Eden Prairie, Minn.

Kayla Hatting is head softball coach at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn. Kaylee Helgemoe is a registered nurse at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. Phoebe Jan-McMahon is a graduate student in painting and a teaching assistant at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. Rachel Jungwirth was awarded the David LeClair Award for her active volunteering on the Professional Development Committee of Minnesota Association of Health Underwriters and continued professional representation of the health insurance industry. She is a sales representative with the Principal Financial Group in Minnetonka, Minn.

Kristi Wietecha earned a master’s degree in teaching and learning from St. Mary’s University. She teaches eighth-grade English for the Pine Island (Minn.) School District. Dan Wilcox is an activist with the Green Party in St. Paul, Minn., and candidate for the juris doctor degree at Vermont Law School. Lisa Yahr teaches social studies at the Lionsgate Academy in Minnetonka, Minn.

2013 Anna DiCecco is Play

Ball liaison for the Miami Marlins in Miami. Play Ball is an initiative designed to boost youth participation in baseball and softball. Kelsey (Krall) Dralle is absence management team lead for Sedgwick CMS in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Dan Fernelius is individual giving manager at Hennepin Theatre Trust in Minneapolis.

KIRK JOHNSON’ 82 PHOTO

Inga Rohde is community coordinator at L’Arche Tahoma Hope in Tacoma, Wash.

Matt Key performed “The StarSpangled Banner” at the opening of the Battle of Midway remembrance ceremony in June. RADM John Alexander, commander, Battle Force 7th Fleet; Capt. Buzz Donnelly, Ronald Reagan’s commanding officer; and IS2 class Matt Key from Oshkosh, Wis., pose for a photo during a Battle of Midway remembrance ceremony in the ship’s aft mess decks. Shannon Koenders is a doctoral student in optometry at the University of the Incarnate Word Rosenberg School of Optometry in San Anto-

Last spring, Andy Hageman, Luther assistant professor of English, and his young daughter were in the Minneapolis airport on their way to a vacation in Iceland when they met a gentleman and his little granddaughter. They got to talking, and Hageman told the man he taught at Luther. The grandfather also had a connection to Luther—his Aunt Agnes, a native of Iceland, met and married Warren Baukol ’42 on the island in 1944. After the war, Agnes traveled alone by ship and train to Warren’s hometown of Starbuck, Minn., bringing with her a collection of books that were her most important possessions. The airport acquaintance invited Hageman to a family gathering in Iceland where Hageman met Warren and Agnes’s son Marcus. Hageman invited him to visit Luther, and in August Marcus did, shown above with his wife, Debby, and Hageman. Marcus was in Ankeny, Iowa, for a wedding and pushed on to Decorah, bringing along Agnes’s prized books. The family knew that Luther offers Nordic studies and decided to donate the books to Warren’s alma mater. The collection, which Agnes added to over the years, includes sagas of Norse myth, poetry, history, and volumes about artists, many with beautiful artwork. Several of the books will be added to Luther’s Special Collections.

nio, Texas. She won one of 21 national tuition grants for her submission of an original case report. Kelsey Moler earned a master of social work degree from Colorado State University. She is a behavioral health clinician for SummitStone Health Partners in Fort Collins, Colo. Emily Ramos is a visitor services associate at the Toledo Museum of Art in Ohio. Amy Shishilla is assistant cheese maker at the Lone Grazer Creamery in Minneapolis.

Kelsey (Rohs) Spohn is a veterinary technician for Twin Cities Animal Rehabilitation in Burnsville, Minn. Sarah Thell earned a master’s degree in library and information science at St. Catherine University. She is marketing coordinator at KeyStone Search in Minneapolis. Niki Tryggestad is administrative assistant of legal and outside sales for Marvin Windows and Doors in Eagan, Minn.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

Isaac van Bruggen earned a master’s degree in public administration from Hamline University. He is a tenant services coordinator for Zeller Realty Group in Minneapolis. Nick Vondrashek is an IT analyst and programmer at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. Ashley Wright earned an MFA degree in theatre management from Florida State University in Tallahassee.

2014 Benjamin Anderson is a teaching assistant at Minnesota State University in Mankato. Ingrid Baudler is a law student and legal research assistant at the University of Colorado Law School. She works as a law clerk at Grease Monkey International in Denver. Eve Christensen is IELTS administrator at ELS Educational Services Inc. in St. Paul, Minn.

Luke Hanson is a development officer at Concordia University in St. Paul, Minn.

Kyrie Dailey is a professional research assistant at the University of Colorado–Denver.

2016 Blake Moen is a business

Dane Huinker is a landmanagement district technician at the Jackson Soil and Water Conversation District in Lakefield, Minn.

Carly Ellefsen is associate designer at Design Center Inc. in St. Paul, Minn.

Christine Morrow is a registered nurse at UnityPoint Health in Des Moines, Iowa.

Charles Martin-Stanley II earned a master’s degree in student affairs administration from the University of Wisconsin–La Crosse. He is a doctoral student in higher education student affairs at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. Sam Matheson is relationship manager at Alliance Benefit Group in Albert Lea, Minn. Lauren Maze earned a master’s degree in kinesiology from Iowa State University. She is a graduate student in physical therapy at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. Scott Mittman is a graduate student and teaching assistant in mathematics at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff. Cody Orr is a purchasing engineer co-op at True Manufacturing in O’Fallon, Mo. Michelle Schieber is a material planner at Trane Company in Memphis, Tenn.

Michael Crocker is a freelance videographer in Half Moon Bay, Calif. He tells people’s entrepreneurial and personal brand stories through video. Madeline Davidson earned a master’s degree in architectural engineering from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. She is an acoustician at HDR in Minneapolis. Becca Dugdale is a certified public accountant at Deloitte in Minneapolis. Paul Esker of Brooklyn, N.Y., is a press assistant for Hillary for America. Daniel Gallagher earned a master’s degree in flute performance from Illinois State University. He is a doctoral student at Ohio State University in Columbus. Allison Gieswein teaches fourth grade at Lincoln Elementary School in Washington, Iowa.

Luther Alumni Magazine

Marissa Schuh earned a master’s degree in entomology from Michigan State University. She is an extension educator specializing in assisting commercial vegetable producers at MSU Extension in Adrian, Mich. Rachel Selvig is a funded programs coordinator for Girl Scouts River Valleys in St. Paul, Minn. Sam Wettach is a natural resource specialist for the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources in Madison.

2015 Tyler Anderson is

communication assistant for Data Communication Solutions in Eden Prairie, Minn. Emily Betts is project manager at Polaris Industries Inc. in Plymouth, Minn. Claudia Calderon Machicado is a consultant at World Bank in Washington, D.C.

development representative at Infor in St. Paul, Minn.

Michona Johns is an English lecturer at Université de Bretagne Occidentale in Brest, France. Amanda Johnson teaches special education at Gage Elementary School in Rochester, Minn. Julia Joseph is a page designer at Lee Enterprises in Madison, Wis.

MARRIAGES As of August 2016

1983 Jerry Johnson and Larry Montan, Aug. 23, 2014

Connor Mattison is a sales associate for DSW in Bloomington, Minn.

1990 Laurie Kjome and Steve

Thandokazi May is a research assistant in molecular biology and human genetics at Stellenbosch University in Cape Town, South Africa.

1991 Katherine Vertanen and

Corey Miller is an account executive at Robert Half Technology in Oklahoma City.

Zumbahlen, Nov. 22, 2014

Ben Nordquist is a DJ for Instant Request and is also on-call retreat staff and a communications intern at Youth Frontiers in Minneapolis.

2004 Sarah Braun and Randy

Alex Odette is accounts payable specialist at Entrust Datacard in Shakopee, Minn. Meghan Owens is clinical interventionist I at Southwest Autism Research and Resource Center in Phoenix, Ariz. Lydia Petersen teaches elementary music for the Hood River Valley School District in Hood River, Ore. Hannah Scholbrock is a billing specialist for LSM Chiropractic Clinics in Oregon, Wis. Andrew Sharot is an analytics consultant for Deloitte in Minneapolis.

Willis, July 23, 2016

Neil Garity, April 9, 2016

2002 Sarah Belz and Rick 2003 Erin Clark and Nick Benedict, Feb. 27, 2016

Ekenberg, Nov. 22, 2014

Cindy Tudor and Matthew Verdick, May 28, 2016

2005 Gabrielle Atwood and Brian Ites, May 14, 2016

Nicole Warnke and Kevin Fultz, July 2, 2016

2006 Tania Connolly and

Michael Hultengren, Aug. 16, 2014 Erik Larson and Morgan Ellis, June 10, 2016 Dana Strandjord and Jeff Talsness, Aug. 23, 2014

2007 Meg Craft and Perry Numedahl, July 30, 2015

Alli (Kephart) Tjossem teaches elementary music at Riffenburgh IB World Elementary School in Fort Collins, Colo.

Mark Strohbehn and Aaron Jost, Sept. 19, 2015

Andrew Withers teaches sixthgrade math at South Middle School in Waukee, Iowa.

2008 Ali Blenka and Chris

Luke Wright is territory underwriter for Nationwide Insurance in Des Moines, Iowa.

Anna Fergesen and Brian Klaus, Aug. 8, 2015

Dara Stull and Adam Clifford, June 25, 2016 Froisland, April 9, 2016

Beth Goskesen and Kendall Christensen, May 6, 2016

Alumni News

Stefanie Tow and Ray Cooper, April 24, 2015

Tori Serra and Dan Schoess, May 7, 2016

2009 Siri Dove and Duane

Amanda Wiger and Brandon Leisinger, June 25, 2016

Suzy Grimstad and Drew Pierson, July 3, 2015

2014 Megan Nading and Mike

Matt Orth and Amanda Evans, July 2, 2016

2015 Holly Harris and John

Miranda Peterson and Kevin Prahl, Nov. 7, 2015

Krista Konrad and Casey Liveringhouse, June 25, 2016

Jenna Pulkowski and Alex Huntsberger, Aug. 3, 2015

Mytty, June 25, 2016

Stewig, Sept. 24, 2015

de la Chapelle, April 2, 2016

1999 Jen (Solomonson) and

Shawn Doty, twin sons, Andrew and Parker, Sept. 2015

Sara (Andrus) Bowman and Sean Andrus, a son, Barrett Michael, Dec. 2015

Ann Okoneski and Anders Lund, June 11, 2016

Sara and Jon Zora, a daughter, Opal Lucille, June 2015

Sara (Johnson) and Craig D’abreo, a son, Kipp, Feb. 2016

Isaac Salwolke and Rachel Krause, June 18, 2016

Chelsey Vickerman and Nick Clark ’13, Oct. 10, 2015

2001 Laura (Caulum) and Paul

Janelle (Feine) and Charlie Dahl ’03, a son, Connor, Sept. 2015

Jacob Waddle and Hillary Reed, Aug. 15, 2015

2016 Emily Clay and Jacob

2011 Andrea Berven and Jason

Secor, June 20, 2015

Gratton, a daughter, Everleigh Joy, Jan. 2015 Kirstin (Larson) and Eric Larson, a son, Dominic Brixton, Jan. 2016

Engelmann, Oct. 24, 2015

Shayla De Jong and Adam Van Hal, July 15, 2016

Liz Cox and Jeff Rose Jr., Sept. 12, 2015

Janele Holt and Casey Waterman ’15, Dec. 28, 2015

Jessica (Young) and Daniel Le Mon, a daughter, Charlotte Elizabeth, Aug. 2015

Chelsea Hartwig and Cameron Fitzgerald, July 25, 2015

Shelby Oelschlager and Dan Bowman, June 18, 2016

Emily and Matt Mills, a daughter, Cecilia Grace, July 2014

Sabrina Hawkinson and Jefferson Arredondo Andrade, July 3, 2015 Mari Henderson and Josh Sharpe, May 21, 2016

2002 Kari (Koch) and Nolan

Gilbertson, a daughter, Maia Grace, Nov. 2015 BIRTHS AND ADOPTIONS

Karina Koschmeder and Kristopher Hearn, Sept. 19, 2015

As of August 2016

Jenny St. Clair and Alex Tomesch ’12, June 4, 2016

Guillen, a son, Marco Antionio, born April 2015, adopted, Nov. 2015

Camille Welter and Peter Burleson, Oct. 18, 2014

2012 Katie Etter and Tyler Sheets, Dec. 5, 2015

1991 Amy (Olson) and Marco 1995 Christa (Gutenberger) and Wayne Tollefson, a daughter, Adalyn Mira, Sept. 2015

1996 Carrie (Reeser) and

Alyssa (Erickson) and Kwame Owusu-Acheampong ’03, a daughter, Adoma Linnea, May 2016 Elizabeth (Nicklay) and Jordan Stadheim ’05, a daughter, Grace Elizabeth, March 2016

2003 Amanda and Ryan

Hollenbeck, a daughter, Piper Kay, Feb. 2016

Sarah (Braun) and Randy Ekenberg, a son, Henry Patrick, Feb. 2016 Carrie (Morris) and Jon Miller, a daughter, Josephine Mae, Nov. 2015

2005 Becky (Weaver) and

Jeromy Carlson, a daughter, Britta Alice, July 2015 Shannon (Johnson) and John Gravelle, a son, Julian Arthur, March 2016 Katie (Knutson) and Pedro Jacques, a daughter, Nayeli, April 2016 Elise (Bieri) and Jeff Patzke, a son, Luke Evan, July 2016 Paige and Aaron Richards, a son, Gibson Reynolds, Feb. 2016 Jen Stoa and Adam Joyce, a daughter, Freyja Jane, Jan. 2016 Bri (Olson) and Jim Wilson, a daughter, Macy, Sept. 2015

Sarah Limper and Peter Gifford, Oct. 16, 2015

Chuck McGee, a son, Charlie, July 2015

Kelly (Have) and Josh Jansen ’02, a son, Crawford Elias, March 2016

Molly Ternus and Tyler Hackman, June 11, 2016

Theresa (Nelson) and Scott Williams ’97, a son, Scott Marcus Franklin, May 2016

Amber (Kobler) and Ryan Lynch, a daughter, Hailey Pearle, Oct. 2015

Abbey and Clint Ambroson, a daughter, Emery Ann, Jan. 2016

1997 Amy (Boncher) and Josh

Heather and Jeffrey Schuman, twins, a daughter, Aubree Joy, a son, Caden William, May 2016

Tara (Huinker) and Tony Brown, daughters, Quinn Rosen, July 2014, and Alexa Louise, May 2016

Jodi (Nelsen) and Dave Dettmann, a daughter, Geneva Mae, Feb. 2016

Katie (Hendrickson) and Jason Thompson, a son, Dean Robert, April 2016

Rachel (Ware) and Kevin Carlton, a son, Andrew Russell, March 2016

1998 Kelly and Jason Lage, a

2004 Amy (Colony) and Jeff

2013 Elise Allen and Tyler Zinnecker, June 4, 2016

Kelsey Krall and Andy Dralle, Jan. 23, 2016 Kim Malek and Keith Langum, Nov. 21, 2015 Trevor Maloney and Ellie Brunner, July 29, 2016 Kelsey Rohs and Clinton Spohn, Aug. 29, 2015

Berman, a son, Paul Joseph, May 2016

son, Ray Michael, Feb. 2016

Black, a son, Jax, Dec. 2014

2006 Lynn and Ryan Ahlers, a daughter, August, March 2016

Katie (Hopp) and Michael Caterino, a son, Jonah Michael, May 2016 Karen (Egan) and Eddie Frick, a son, Carver Bradley, April 2016 Lisa and Adam Gauslow, a son, Anders Mark, March 2016

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Alumni News

Emma (Hatcher) and Andy Hoegh, a daughter, Georgiana Otelia, March 2016 Kara (Kulzer) and Matt Jordahl, a son, James, Dec. 2015 Nikki (Gamez) and Josh Kuhn, a daughter, Ellissondra Lucille Gamez, April 2016

Kaycee (Green) and Robert Rogers, a daughter, Liberty Kay, Feb. 2016 Amber (Holzl) and Greg Sorenson, a son, Olsen Gregory, Oct. 2015

2009 Kate (Westby) and Abe Campos ’10, a daughter, Liliana Grace, March 2016

IN MEMORIAM

1936 Huber D. Lennon of Decorah died June 18, 2016, age 99. George A. Thompson of Torrance, Calif., died Sept. 25, 2015, age 101.

Amanda (Tryggestad) and Ryan Nelson ’07, a daughter, Bryony Linda Michelle, Jan. 2015

Lorraine Marguerite Jacobson Willia of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, died June 2, 2016, age 96.

Roland M. “Torgie” Torgerson of Mabel, Minn., died Oct. 28, 2015, age 94.

1939

Kirsten (Boettner) and Reese Shanahan, a son, Drew, July 2015

Kelly (Wendler) and Danny Wing, sons, Jackson, Nov. 2014, and Mason, March 2016

Robert “Bob” Schlinkert of Mobridge, S.D., died Feb. 29, 2016, age 93.

Obituary notices through July 28, 2016. Read full obituaries at luther.edu/in-memoriam.

Katelyn (Kampfe) and Thad Lane ’00, a daughter, Joanna Grace, Jan. 2016

Anne (Thielke) and Kevin Veldhuisen, a son, August Ray, March 2016

1947

Meg (Berven) and Culynn Curtis ’10, a son, Oliver, Sept. 2015 Jessica (Ryan) and Blair Everman, a daughter, Rosalie Kay, May 2016

1950 LeRoy G. Peterson of Fennimore, Wis., died May 29, 2016, age 93.

1941 Evelyn Margaret (Henderson) Costley of Andover, Minn., died Feb. 5, 2016, age 95.

Joee and Jordan Winter, a daughter, Signe Rose, March 2016

1953 Alfred Lien “Al” Knudson of Burnsville, Minn., died May 31, 2016, age 85.

2007 Amy and Ray Bissen, a son, Isaac John, June 2015

Earl “Bud” Fritsch of Montague, Mich., died June 5, 2016, age 96.

Megan (Manthey) and Eric Ellingson ’06, a son, Finn Lund, Aug. 2015 Jenny (Jefferson) and Hans Gustaf ’06, a son, William Hayes, April 2015 Allison (Kruger) and Daniel Herman ’06, a daughter, Amelia Grace, May 2016 Katie and Scott Marx, a daughter, Elliette Mae, June 2016 Ashley (Darland) and Kirby VandeWalker, a daughter, Liza James, June 2016

2008 Laurie (Fritz) and Casey

1944

Brie (Kunkel) and Joe Iverson, a daughter, Mary Anna-Mette, Aug. 2015 Michelle and Jerry Jaeger, a daughter, Emery Mae, May 2016 Emma and Josh Jorstad, a daughter, Ingrid Joan, Feb. 2016

Lauren (Henrikson) and Nate Gendron, a son, Ethan David, June 2016

Stefanie (Tow) and Ray Cooper, a son, Grant, July 2014

Kailey and Bob Kemp, a daughter, Leighton, Feb. 2016

Katie (Meyer) and Jake Hunerdosse, a son, Jonas William, Dec. 2015

2011 Tatum (Norton) and T.J.

Iverson, a son, Levi Milton, July 2016

Kayla (Malek) and Craig Meirick, a daughter, Amelia Joan, May 2016

Ellie (Neubauer) and Bobby Kuennen ’10, a daughter, Evelyn Grace, March 2016

Nissa and Tim Peterson, a son, Philipp Eli, April 2016

Nicole (Olson) and Justin Payne, a son, Cameron Scott, Aug. 2014

Luther Alumni Magazine

Norma Alice (Opdahl) Jones of Freeborn, Minn., died Feb. 28, 2016, age 93.

Britton, a son, Levi, April 2016

Larry H. Seim of Decorah died May 15, 2016, age 86.

1955

1945

2010 Maggie (Fons) and Jason

Bouska ’07, a son, Bennett, April 2016

Barbara Jean (Rygh) Crawford of West Des Moines, Iowa, died April 23, 2015, age 92.

Jean Marie and Reid Henderson, a son, Avery Wayne, March 2016

1946 Mildred Jean (Kroener) Gardner of Stoughton, Wis., died July 4, 2016, age 92.

Luther P. “Lewie” Lewer of Brookfield, Wis., died June 14, 2016, age 86.

JoAnne (Bales) Ohlhaber of Lakewood, Colo., died March 31, 2016, age 81. John F. Spicuzza of Hernando, Fla., died April 20, 2016, age 81. Jon A. Vine of Decorah died May 1, 2016, age 82.

Alumni News

1956

1963

1977

Thomas Brendsel of Coral Springs, Fla., died Nov. 30, 2015, age 81.

Bonnie (Skaar) Johnson of Charles City, Iowa, died May 31, 2016, age 74.

Stanley Gerhard Jungck of Big Rapids, Mich., died March 5, 2016, age 81.

David LeRoy Osheim of Slater, Iowa, died July 6, 2016, age 76.

Truman Lewis of Urbandale, Iowa, died May 3, 2016, age 83.

Jim Ricketts of Virginia Beach, Va., died March 23, 2016, age 75.

Dennis L. Mair of Nashotah, Wis., died May 21, 2016, age 84.

Harvard W. “Mac” McLean of Oxford, Ohio, died March 22, 2016, age 86.

Peder Jan Angvall of Plano, Texas, died Feb. 12, 2016.

1967 Doug Blair of Palatine, Ill., formerly of Decorah, died July 4, 2016, age 70.

Daniel Eugene Sorenson of Rice Lake, Wis., died June 8, 2016, age 79.

1962 Gary Lewis Jacobson of Pensacola, Fla., died May 11, 2016, age 76.

1971 Barbara Ruth (Sorensen) Lebetsamer of Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif., died Nov. 12, 2015, age 67.

1974 Joyce Elaine (Hopkins) Hart of Decorah, formerly of Elma, Iowa, died March 16, 2016, age 85. Roger Paul Sportsman of Chicago died Feb. 17, 2016, age 64.

Harold “Dean” Wallestad of Moorland, Iowa, died Aug. 23, 2015, age 79.

Robert W. Nebergall of Tulsa, Okla., died May 9, 2015, age 60.

Michael William Amundson of Menomonie, Wis., died Dec. 24, 2015, age 55.

1987 David James Thorson of Evanston, Ill., died April 21, 2016, age 51.

Professor emeritus Williams dies; he endowed Luther’s MLK lecture fund

1964

1958

1983

Lawrence Henry Williams of Louisville, Ky., Luther professor emeritus of Africana studies and history, died July 21, 2016, at age 72. Williams held a bachelor’s degree from Kentucky State University, a master of divinity degree from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and a master’s and doctoral degree in American studies from the University of Iowa. He taught at Luther for 25 years—in Africana studies, history, and Paideia—and retired in 2010. Williams was a nationally recognized authority on the black church and the civil rights movement of the 1960s, in which he participated and worked with many of the best-known leaders of the movement. He was the author of numerous monographs, articles, and book chapters on the role of the black church in the civil rights struggle. Luther’s African and African American studies program established the Martin Luther King Jr. Lecture in 1987 to provide an ongoing scholarly conversation about the struggle for human rights in the United States. Williams planned and solicited funding for more than 20 of these lectures throughout his Luther career. His dedication to the lecture series reflected a commitment to expanding civil rights that went beyond academic study. Williams’s personal experiences with the civil rights movement and its protests allowed him to help students relive the moment, and his acquaintance with civil rights leaders brought extraordinary people to campus to share their lives and stories with a new generation. In 2010, he retired to his hometown of Louisville, Ky., where he actively taught at Simmons College of Kentucky and served as historian-in-residence. Williams is survived by his wife, Queen Williams (Jackson); sons, Lawrence Jr., Martin D.; daughter, Shari; daughter-in-law, Danita; aunt, Willie Cunningham; uncle, James Williams; grandchildren; nieces, nephews, cousins; in-laws; colleagues; students; and friends worldwide. The family requests memorials in Lawrence’s name be made to the Williams Endowment Fund for the Martin Luther King Jr. Lecture or the Cultural and Racial Diversity Scholarship at Luther.

Fall 2016 Luther Alumni Magazine

Perry Halse and Noah Amundson ’19 plant the cutting in October 2015.

ctober marks one year since a cutting of central campus’s giant cottonwood tree was planted. Luther grounds workers Perry Halse and Paul Frana spearheaded the plan to propagate the old tree. It was planted in about 1909 when landscape artist Jens Jensen, who was hired to redesign the campus grounds in time for the college’s 50th anniversary, directed the tree be located in that prominent spot. Jenson saw the cottonwood as a symbol of the plains. Several years ago, with the tree nearing the end of its lifespan, Halse began trying to get cuttings to grow. At first there was no success. Finally, a tree service took cuttings from the very top of the cottonwood. Some were nurtured on campus and some were sent to Powell Gardens in Kansas City as part of its heritage tree project. Five clippings survived at Luther, and one was straight enough to be planted. The Powell Gardens clippings were available as backups if the current sapling didn’t take. So far, the young cottonwood is doing well, surrounded by fencing to keep omnipresent campus deer from nibbling its tender branches.

Luther Alumni Magazine

WIILL HELLER ‘16

Endpage

Calendar Alumni Council and Class Agent Meetings Friday, September 30 Luther College

Homecoming Friday, September 30– Sunday, October 2 Luther College

Des Moines Area Lunch Connection Friday, October 7 Windsor Heights Community Center Windsor Heights, Iowa

Dante’s Italy Tour Monday, October 17– Saturday, October 29 Hosted by professors emeriti Ruth Caldwell and Uwe Rudolf

Chicago Area Bus Trip to Decorah—Luther vs. Coe Football Game Friday, October 21— Saturday, October 22 Hosted by Michael Elliott ’02 Schaumburg to Decorah

Twin Cities Lunch Connection Friday, October 28 Center for Changing Lives Minneapolis

Des Moines Area Lunch Connection Friday, November 11 Windsor Heights Community Center Windsor Heights, Iowa

Volunteer Event Saturday, November 19 Minneapolis

Christmas at Luther Thursday, December 1— Sunday, December 4 Luther College

Golfers, start your engines! Golfers at the Twin Cities Norse Athletic Association Benefit Golf Tournament on June 27 get ready. Fifty-six alumni, parents, and friends joined us at the Medina (Minn.) Golf and Country Club for the tournament and reception afterward.

Community Day Men’s and Women’s Basketball vs. Nebraska Wesleyan Saturday, January 28, 2017 Luther

Des Moines Area Lunch Connection Friday, February 17, 2017 Windsor Heights Community Center Windsor Heights, Iowa

Twin Cities Lunch Connection Friday, February 24, 2017 Center for Changing Lives Minneapolis

Luther Evening Prayer Service Friday, March 3, 2017 Tuscany Falls Golf Club at Pebble Creek Goodyear, Arizona

12th Annual Kent Finanger ’54 Golf Classic

Des Moines Area Lunch Connection

Saturday, March 4, 2017 Tuscany Falls Golf Club at Pebble Creek Goodyear, Arizona

Friday, April 21, 2017 Windsor Heights Community Center Windsor Heights, Iowa

Giving Day

Twin Cities Lunch Connection

Thursday, March 9, 2017 Luther

J.S. Bach’s Mass in B minor Saturday, April 1, 2017 Luther and Sunday, April 2, 2017 Orchestra Hall Minneapolis

Dinner preceding J.S. Bach’s Mass in B minor at Orchestra Hall Sunday, April 2, 2017 Hilton Minneapolis

Friday, April 28, 2017 Center for Changing Lives Minneapolis

Senior Sendoff! Thursday, May 18, 2017 Hotel Winneshiek Decorah

Commencement Sunday, May 21, 2017 Luther

NAA Decorah Golf Tournament Monday, June 5, 2017 Oneota Golf and Country Club Decorah

Luther alumni events are open to all alumni and friends of the college, including parents and other family members of graduates and students. Please note that some dates listed are tentative; specific information about upcoming events will be mailed or emailed to alumni, friends, and parents who live near the event sites. If you need more information or if you’re interested in planning an event in your area, call the Alumni Office at (800) 225-8664. We’d love to hear from you!

Nonprofit Org. U.S. Postage PAID Cedar Rapids, IA Permit No. 214

Luther College, 700 College Drive, Decorah, Iowa 52101-1045