Campus Life
April 4, 2019
Who Needs Shoes Anyways?
As temperatures rise, so do the amount of students choosing to forgo shoes this spring. Not only outdoors or in their dorms, but also in classes and campus buildings. As spring emerges, barefoot season is upon us. From students to faculty, from the Kratz dorms to the Octavio Romero apartments, there is an established “free the toes” community at Goshen College and anybody can join. It begins with slipping your sandals off in class and progresses to picking up your laundry barefoot until, eventually, you too are a fully-fledged member of the “free the toes” gang. It...
February 23, 2019
Housing policy faces changes
Housing policies at Goshen College are getting a makeover — but not quite yet. Ken Newbold, provost, Gilberto Perez, dean of students and Chad Coleman, director of housing operations, sent an email to residential students Friday afternoon addressing announcements made at the housing information night on Wednesday. The email came in response to student feedback following the meeting. There will be no changes to the housing policies for the 2019-2020 school year. In the email, Newbold, Perez and Coleman acknowledge that they need to have “additional discussion with student senate and a greater number of students before a final decision...
October 31, 2018
The squirrel whisperer
Jo-Ann Brant, currently an adjunct professor at Goshen College, has worked at GC as a professor and academic dean since 1993. She is also known for her unexpected friendship with a squirrel named Patch. They can often be seen sharing acorns on Patch’s stomping grounds, the grassy area between the Administration Building and Westlawn Dining Hall. Brant has a relationship with the woodland creature that would normally be held exclusively by Disney princesses. Patch always comes running at the sound of her voice, and the story of when they first met sounds very much like a fairytale. One day, about...
October 12, 2018
Open Space: Gender Inclusive Housing
Goshen College Student Senate hosted an Open Space on gender inclusive housing (GIH) on Wednesday, Oct. 24. Open Space, a time and space where students can have discussions around a variety of subjects relevant to campus life, is relatively new to campus and has covered a myriad of topics since its conception such as President Stoltzfus’ strategic two-year plan, safety issues and immigration. All students were invited to attend with the intent of having Student Senate and Student Life listen to students’ ideas on what GIH should look like. The event took place from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., a...
October 10, 2018
Miller Residence Hall reopens like ‘a new shiny car’
For several years, Miller Residence Hall was the quietest place on campus. There were no students, floor events or last-minute studying; just pure peace and quiet. But halfway through its first semester back in action, Miller Hall is bustling once again. Due to a decline in enrollment, Goshen College closed the doors to the Miller Hall in 2014. It had remained in the same state of silence until this fall when the incoming class was too large to fit in the two open dorms, Kratz and Yoder Residence Halls. When word started to flow about the reopening of Miller Hall...
October 10, 2018
You’ve Got Mail – Just No Mailbox
If a student goes to the mailboxes in the Union Building to look for a letter from home or a favorite magazine, they might end up waiting forever. After decades spent serving as one of the most important communication channels on campus, the student mailboxes in the Union Building are closed for business. Beginning this semester, students will get their postal mail the way they get their packages. “A notice of delivery will come from Campus Post Office alerting students of the arrival of a U.S. Postal Service delivery,” said Kim Snyder, audiovisual officer supervisor for ITS Media. “The notice includes the Monday...
September 19, 2018
‘#InThisTogether’
After one semester as co-campus pastors, LaKendra Hardware and Gwen Gustafson-Zook, are not done teaming up — but this time, the job titles are shifted. When Bob Yoder, the previous campus pastor, left in December to work at Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart, the college brought in two interim pastors, Hardware (who is widely known as Dr. LaKendra) and Gustafson-Zook. Over the summer, Hardware took on a new role in Student Life, becoming the associate director for diversity, equity and inclusion. While Hardware will continue to aid in chapel planning and other pastoral work, Gustafson-Zook is assuming more direct...
September 19, 2018
Residence Assistants find a home in student apartments
Starting this school year, Goshen College’s Residence Life has decided to place Resident Assistants in the Octavio Romero Student Apartments. Alongside these additions, other aspects of Residence Life have changed as well. The implementation of RAs in the student apartments began as a response to concerns of students that lived in the apartments who felt they were cut off from the rest of campus. Students felt that Goshen College stressed the importance of community but, when it came to living in the apartments, there was no such initiative. This concern ignited discussion and eventually the idea to place RAs within...
September 6, 2018
New campus counselors hope to be valuable resource to students
Goshen College is partnering with Oaklawn Psychiatric Center and welcoming two new counselors, Rick Eby and Jennifer Miller, to their staff for the 2018-19 academic year. Eby, an Eastern Mennonite University graduate, taught for many years before getting his master’s in counseling at Grace College. He has counseled at many places including Bowling Green State University, a juvenile justice center and received his current position at Oaklawn Psychiatric Center in Goshen just over a year ago. Goshen College is a familiar place for Jennifer Miller, a 1992 GC graduate. Miller, who grew up in Germany, recalled memories of living in Goshen’s...
April 12, 2018
Intercultural Coalition of Goshen College hold town hall meeting
The Intercultural Coalition of Goshen College (ICGC) organized a town hall meeting on Wednesday, April 11. The event took place at the Fellowship Hall in College Mennonite Church in front of students, faculty, staff and community members. The meeting was held following a student lead walk out on March 21, that saw students head to President Stoltzfus’s office and present her with the stories of racism on campus, the coalition's mission statement and a summary of resolutions. The panel consisted of President Stoltzfus, Ken Newbold, Jo-Ann Brant, Linda VandenBosch, Dr Mitch Mitchell, Gilberto Perez, and Duane Stoltzfus. Along with ICGC...
March 22, 2018
Miller Hall to reopen Fall of 2018
The dorm building named after the co-founder of Mennonite Central Committee and former Goshen professor Orie O. Miller is slated to to open for use in the 2018-2019 school year. After being closed for four years, the Miller dormitory will be opened, joining the Kratz and Yoder dormitories as the housing used primarily for first-year and sophomore students. The Miller dormitory will be opened due to the projected increase of students on campus next year. Chad Coleman, Director of Campus Safety and Campus Housing Operations, said that this year the school’s KMY dorms were very near capacity. Some sophomores even...
March 15, 2018
Students participate in walkout
Goshen College students, faculty and staff showed their support for the 17 victims of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school shooting and protested against the lack of gun control in the United States by participating in the national walkout on Wednesday morning. The walkout wasn’t necessarily a walkout, as it took place at 10 a.m. when no classes are scheduled on the GC campus. Instead, students gathered around the peace pole across from the Union building. Campus Pastor Gwen Gustafson-Zook began the walkout by reading Deuteronomy 30:19: “I have set before you life and death, therefore choose life, that you...
November 16, 2017
‘Turkeypalooza’ continues a GC annual tradition
What happens when students are unable to go home for the Thanksgiving holiday, or are staying in Goshen but don’t have any plans? This is a the question that Jason Samuel, professor and WGCS General Manager, along with his family, have answered by hosting a Thanksgiving meal open to any and all students. Samuel is entering his 14th year of hosting this meal, and the average number of guests has grown to over 30 people. He said, “The table has gotten so long that we’ve had to turn it into an L-shape and it just fills up the whole bottom...
September 21, 2017
Glenn: big dog on campus
There’s a new face around campus, and it belongs to someone that’s a bit closer to the ground and has more fur than the average Goshen College student. It’s Glenn, your campus service dog. Glenn, a Belgian Malinois, is a companion to Em Brewer, a second-year at Goshen College. They are together nearly all the time: in class, walking to the dining hall, and starting and finishing the day together in Kulp. I met up with Brewer and Glenn in the Kulp basement, where Glenn quickly stretched out beside the table, lazy but attentive. “When he first started working with...
March 23, 2017
A place for gamers
This year, Goshen College added a new and relatively unique club to its roster of growing groups on campus: The League of Legends Video Game Club. At the beginning of the year, James Garcia and ByeongChan Lim, seniors, and Bryan Nguyen, junior decided there was enough interest on campus to put together their own competitive team, and the club was born. “We had always wanted to [create a club] since our sophomore year, but we didn’t think there was enough interest,” said Garcia. “Last semester we realized there was enough interest, so we asked Chad to be our club leader...