Features
March 21, 2024
Advocates empowers and unifies students
Earlier this year, music from Beyoncé to Lady Gaga filled the Umble Center for the annual drag show. Behind the music and glamor was a group working to make it happen. Advocates is an on-campus club that strives to create a safe community for LGBTQ+ individuals through events, advocacy work and education. Leaders this year include Karen Guerrero, a senior social work major, Lydia Esh, a junior social work major, Drew Smoker, a senior engineering physics major and Aiden Schloneger, a senior environmental science major. In 2022, Schloneger became president but recently passed the role onto Peace Muhagachi, a junior...
March 21, 2024
PIN encourages healthy dialogue
PIN, or the Prevention-Intervention Network, is a student-led organization that educates and trains other students on becoming empowered to prevent and intervene against interpersonal violence. This year, the group has been led by Brianne Brenneman, a professor who directs the undergrad program in public health. In 2015, PIN began with the support and work of students and Kendra Yoder, a sociology professor. Although PIN has been active since its inception, many people still are unaware of what PIN is or what they do: “The organization focuses on prevention of sexual violence and its many forms. It gives people the attitudes...
March 14, 2024
Hufford works with Youth Olympians
Earlier this semester, Kyle Hufford, professor of communication at Goshen College, spent three weeks working as part of a team to lead film workshops at the Winter Youth Olympics in Gangwon, South Korea. The Youth Olympics are for athletes 15-18 years old, and the games occur on the same year as the adult Olympics — albeit with opposite Games. For instance, the Winter Youth Olympics were this year, and the Summer Olympics are in Paris later this year. Given the age range, participants in the Youth Olympic Games only get to partake in this event once. The young athletes participated...
March 14, 2024
Queen Singers share identity: ‘That girl.’
The feminine experience is something that cannot be summed up in words, or confined to general concepts. The feminine experience is a human life lived, in all its different cultures, contexts and colors: an identity that is made by the individual who lives it. This is a subject that the Queen Singers of Goshen College, a group made up of BIPOC women singers, have discussed. How do they want to convey the feminine experience? It may be through songs of empowerment like Alicia Keys’ “Girl is Fire,” or through songs about heartbreak and vulnerability like Yebba’s “Evergreen.” In these interview...
March 14, 2024
Hernandez finds fulfillment in helping students
Isacc Hernandez is in his third year as an academic coach for the Academic Success Center. As a coach, he meets one-on-one with students at all different levels of their college career every day. He also juggles being a professor for Academic Success and Identity, Culture and Community and an administrative faculty member, as well as being part of the Hispanic Serving Institution committee. “At Goshen, you end up doing multiple things. I try to do most … opportunities, but sometimes when your plate is too full you have to say no,” he said. “I try to grow and connect...
March 14, 2024
Wanting to live
“I’ve thought about dying, a few times.” As the monologue continued, it became harder and harder to breathe. That’s something really special about Goshen Monologues. Now, I’m a male, and I can’t say that I identify with — or fully understand — the feminine experience, and not all of the stories speak to me. And that’s OK! I am not the reason this is happening, and it’s not something made for me. But some of the stories, the emotions, the experiences that were expressed in Monologues on Sunday night really rang true to me — and are the reasons for...
February 22, 2024
From woman to woman
A mass email was sent out to many women on the Goshen College campus. They were asked to provide the best piece of advice they have received. Women of all ages, races and cultural backgrounds were asked the same question, but the common denominator was the same: sharing the feminine experience. “In the journey of womanhood, I’ve discovered that change is inevitable and s—- happens. That’s right, SHIFT happens! Life presents challenges, but with each shift, we adapt and rise. Throughout our transformative journeys, my advice is to establish boundaries, identify your support system, embrace vulnerability, and navigate each...
February 15, 2024
Music, together
For three afternoons a week, for an hour and a half (and two hours on Mondays), I forget about everything else going on in my life and walk into the Music Center, pull out my black folder, and start my vocal warmups. I’ve sung in GC’s low voice choir, Vox Profundi, every year of my college career. Now, over my time at this school, I’ve been a part of a good number of clubs, groups and extracurriculars. Don’t get me wrong: I love, love, love my work with The Record; I talk constantly about how much joy I get from...
February 15, 2024
‘Amazing musicians, incredibly resilient’
With Brian Mast taking over the Goshen College Symphony Orchestra just days before the Concerto-Aria concert, students in the GCSO are experiencing a wide range of emotions after Richard Brunson’s firing. The Record interviewed six orchestra students (and Mast) and asked them the following questions. These are their answers. What was your reaction when you first heard about Brunson’s actions? “Initially it was numbness and then I felt very sad, a lot of grief … I felt for the students that were close to him, I felt for the professors, our whole music department, I felt for the community as...
February 15, 2024
Letter to the editor: Keep progress coming
Dear editors, As the Director of Interpersonal Violence Prevention, Education, and Advocacy at Goshen College, I find myself grappling with many thoughts and questions in light of the recent events involving Richard Brunson over the past week and a half. First, I commend Goshen College for its swift and thorough investigation, as well as its decisive action in response to the situation. I also affirm the institution’s commitment to reevaluating our systems to enhance our prevention and response capabilities moving forward, as stated in the email from HR on Monday. It is crucial, however, for Goshen College to recognize the...
February 15, 2024
Education department adds online option
The education department on campus has been working to identify ways in which more people can get involved within the educational field. Suzanne Ehst, director of secondary education and core director, commented on the switch from primarily offering the grad programs in-person to now switching to virtual. Ehst said, “We have two post-graduate programs. One is the Transition to Teaching program for people who have a bachelor’s degree but no teaching license, and the other is the English Learners licensure addition program for teachers already licensed in one area who are coming back to add EL to their certification.” “This...
February 1, 2024
Reclaiming my essence
For most of us, grief means reminiscing on the memory of a grandmother, a sibling or a pet, longing to bring something to life that cannot be brought back. We yearn for their presence to return to our lives. But how do you grieve for yourself — your very own essence? In my first years at Goshen College, I began to explore who I was, and I wanted to blossom into my new role as an adult. During that time, I was secure in who I was and what I wanted for my life. Isis was certain she was destined...
February 1, 2024
Public relations for community
Last fall, Billy Gene Easton, a member of the communication degree-completion program at Goshen College, undertook a PR project in the course Principles of Public Relations. Easton focused his project on Importin’ Joe’s, an Ethiopian coffee importation business based in Mishawaka, Indiana. After the initial assignment, Easton expanded his hypothetical marketing plan beyond the classroom. He began interning at Importin’ Joe’s at the request of the owner and continued his course-based PR, servicing the company itself. Easton, raised in South Bend, has been invested in marketing for a while. A musician himself, he worked with several other independent musical artists,...
February 1, 2024
‘Music is a social art’
H. Roz Woll has been an assistant professor of music at Goshen College for three years. Some of her duties include giving private voice lessons, directing Voices of the Earth, teaching a Music and Social Change class, and being faculty adviser for the Queen Singers. Her involvement at GC has revolved around voice and performance, with an emphasis on social justice and change. Woll grew up in Chicago in Hyde Park, a diverse neighborhood which made her “more conscious of race than … a white person who grows up in a more typically … white town,” she said. “I’m a...
February 1, 2024
Letter to the editor: Honors program
Dear editors, Thank you for publishing the opinion piece “An Honors Program Is Not What We Need Most” by Jakyra Green and Mariela Esparza. As the recently-appointed director of the new Honors Program, I was glad to see that the program is getting attention from thoughtful students who care about this college and about the education of all GC students. It should come as no surprise that my take on the program and its ability to serve our students is different than that expressed by Green and Esparza in the piece, but I want to be clear that I respect...