“I want to share my story. I want others to not struggle, and to have the support that I didn’t have” — that’s how Rocio Diaz describes her work at Goshen College.  Diaz is the director of community engagement and adult outreach, working for the school’s Center for Community Engagement (CCE).  Her job description is extensive and has evolved significantly over the past few years. After moving from Texas, Diaz began working for GC as an administrative assistant for the Center of Intercultural and International Education on Feb. 13, 2008 — an important date to Diaz. “I have it written...

By Daniel James • March 30, 2023 • Features

When they came to Goshen College, Arleth Martinez and Manny Villanueva were not expecting to be involved with advocacy. They have since created One Circle, a group of GC students invested in spreading awareness and developing action plans around injustices within Indigenous communities.  “The name ‘One Circle’ comes from an Apache prayer,” Villanueva said, “one drum, one prayer, one circle.” He said the name is “cohesive” and applies to everyone: “No matter our origin, we are all united and brought together.” Martinez and Villanueva’s inspiration to start the group came from their experience in Arizona last summer, where they visited...

By Simon Hertzler Gascho • March 30, 2023 • Features

Before the orchestra pulls out their sheet music and the actors start putting on their makeup, a very different kind of pre-show routine is taking place behind the curtain at Umble Center: the stage crew presets props and costumes, tests lighting and sound and otherwise prepares for a run of “Into the Woods.” Sarah Bailey, a junior theater major and stage manager for “Into the Woods,” said her job “is really to make sure the ship is running smoothly.” Specifically, Bailey takes notes on blocking, organizes schedules, oversees the other crew members and calls cues from the booth during the...

By Lukas Bontrager-Waite • March 30, 2023 • Features

In September of 2021, Alyssa H. McDonald visited Goshen College for the first time. While chatting with Duane Stoltzfus in the Newcomer Center, she met Alyssa M. McDonald.  Alyssa H. didn’t think much of it at the time, but now, a year and a half later, having two Alyssa McDonalds in the same school is causing more than a little confusion. Not only do they attend the same college, both of the McDonalds are in the communications department.  Alyssa H. McDonald is a freshman journalism major, mother and works independently for a nonprofit. To her, the best part of the...

By Lydia Stauffer • March 23, 2023 • Features

At Goshen College, Gilberto Pérez Jr. serves as the vice president for student life and the dean of students, but outside of the college, he seeks to make an impact in as many ways as he can. In the larger Goshen community, Pérez has served as a city council member for the city’s fifth district since 2020. “That work has really placed me in a lot of different settings across the community,” Pérez said. “It’s looking at ways that the city is helping residents who have issues with traffic, issues with trash pickup, issues with how well streets are [maintained],...

By Lukas Bontrager-Waite • March 23, 2023 • Features

Just over two years ago, Goshen College librarians Erin Milanese, Abby Nafziger and Tillie Yoder started their first podcast, “Just Plain Wrong.”  In it, the three discuss different areas of Amish culture and depictions of Amish and Mennonite life in the media.  Although they first began discussing strictly Amish romance novels, they have recently found more enriching areas including the presentation of Amish and Mennonites in movies, novels, comics and nonfiction stories, as well as research on Amish life.  One of their more recent episodes featured Dirk Eitzen, the author of “Fooling With the Amish: Amish Mafia, Entertaining Fakery, and...

By Sadie Brenneman • March 23, 2023 • Features

How hard is it to get five college students together in the same room at the same time for band practice? Extremely, according to the members of Potential Novelty.  Tonight, buried deep within the Orchestra room inside the Goshen College Music Center, all five members have managed to get together and rehearse. Potential Novelty is a band started at GC by juniors Meredith Blossom and Jocsan Barahona Rosales, sophomores Dontaye Albert and Fatima Rhana and freshman Matthew Dyck.  “If we say a time, we actually mean 20 minutes later,” Rhana says. “Unless it’s a performance that’s upcoming,” Albert adds, sitting...

By Dante Stanton • March 16, 2023 • Features

When Kyla Moffitt arrived at GC in the fall of 2022, she didn’t think that music would be so important to her college experience. Now, a couple months away from the end of the school year, it has become something people know her for across campus. Moffit is a freshman film production major who sings in the Queen Singers, a group of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) women. She has also performed individually at open mic nights and convocation — most recently at the Black Student Union convocation in February, where she sang “I Know Where I’ve Been” by...

By Sadie Brenneman • March 16, 2023 • Features

At Goshen College volleyball and basketball games, there is a man who sits at the scorers’ table, typing at light-speed and often muttering something along the lines of “assist 3, block 14, kill 7.” At baseball and softball games, he’s in the press box. And at soccer games, he’s at the pitch-side table. His name is Tony Miller, GC’s athletic department statistician, and it is part of his job to keep track of games’ stats. “I had a fifteen minute conversation several years ago with the mom of our catcher at the time,” Miller said. “She said, ‘wait, there’s somebody...

By Daniel James • March 16, 2023 • Features

If you attend guest speaker events, concerts, sports games and everything in between at Goshen College, you may have noticed mysterious people dressed in black pushing buttons in the background. It’s not as scary as it seems. They are trained professionals, making sure all of the audio and visual (AV) elements in the events are running smoothly. ITSMedia, the AV extension of ITS (Information Technology Services), has several key functions on campus, including the operation of Campus Post and classroom technology. What takes up most of their time, though, is the AV and systems support for events and event centers....

By Lukas Bontrager-Waite • February 23, 2023 • Features

Goshen College’s 135 acre campus is filled with courtyards, sidewalks, athletic fields and over a dozen buildings. The quick but often silent engine that keeps it all up and running is Physical Plant. The department has a wide range of duties, including wiring, plumbing, cleaning, painting and consists of four different areas: general maintenance, custodial, systems and grounds. These four areas bring a lot of responsibilities, so they rarely struggle to keep  busy.  This is especially true for grounds, which is naturally the department most affected by changes in season. Not only do they have different tasks during different times...

By Gabe Martinez • February 23, 2023 • Features

Tucked away on East Washington Street is the unofficial caffeine supplier for the city of Goshen, The Electric Brew.  A hodgepodge of decor along with various places to hide away and forget the outside world for a while greets you. To enter the shop is to wait in line and be given a chance to look around. A 1920s vintage bicycle divides the seating section from the front counter, a large painting of Earth as seen from space encompassing half of the wall, thrifted furniture of oak and pine wood that could only mesh well together in this setting, a...

By Faith Fegley • February 23, 2023 • Features

“I volunteered one day and put my arm in and I got a severe allergic reaction that lasted like three days on my whole arm. Never again. Lesson learned.” That’s new Goshen College biology professor Raquel Montañez-González explaining a challenge of mosquito research she became well-acquainted with while obtaining her doctorate: their need for blood — on that day, her blood — in order to reproduce. Montañez-González was hired last year to fill an open spot in the biology department after Jody Saylor moved to an administrative role on campus. She earned her doctorate in genetics at the University of...

By Amelia Witmer-Rich • February 16, 2023 • Features

On Jan. 26, I wrote an article on behalf of the student organization, Discrimination Student Caucus, that included issues of accessibility on campus.  In the published article there were phrasings that The Record staff changed, presumably in order to be more palatable to the GC administration and to the GC donors.  Listed below are the changes in vocabulary that diminished the severity of inaccessibility on campus.  Original words:  – All of Umble Center (Specifically the lack of a functional ramp, as there are only stairs to the other levels and there is no accessible seating)   –  The RFC’s “elevator” is...

By Robin Chico • February 16, 2023 • Features

By the time orientation week wraps up every year and classes get underway, there’s one person that every freshman on campus knows: Adela Hufford. Hufford is Goshen College’s director of orientation, transition and retention. She works in a wide variety of roles — and she’s held just as many positions at GC — but the one she’s most widely known for is the biggest part of her job: orientation. “Being a part of orientation didn’t happen for me until I was at the tail end of admissions and enrollment,” Hufford said. “It intrigued me. I love event planning and I...

By Daniel James • February 16, 2023 • Features