November is Alumni-Assisted Job Fair Month

November 8, 2011Mark Your Calendar

Several successful KSC alums will be on hand throughout November to help students and other alums in the job search. Here’s the schedule:

Nov. 10–16, Resume Review
Call or stop by the Career Advising Office (603-358-2500) to set up ½ – ¾ hour appointments with one of these helpful alums: David Westover ’72, Sue Fortier ’86, Charles Owusu ’99, Gail Rowe ’79, Martha Curtis ’73, and Cathy Vollkommer ’80.

Nov. 16, Professionalism/Resume Presentation: Backpacks to Briefcases
(Gloria Lodge, advisor), 7 p.m., Pondside III, with David Westover ’72

Nov. 17, Tips for Career Success from a KSC Alum
10:30 a.m., Student Center, with Scott Ettl ’96

Nov. 17, Open Job Fair
1–4 p.m., Science Center Atrium, with Alan Hodsdon ’68, David Westover ’72, Gail Rowe ’79, Charles Owusu ’99, James Shaw ’07, and Sue Fortier ’86. Check out the Employer Directory on the Career Events page.

Nov. 28, How to Achieve Super Success after Graduation
4 p.m., Student Center, with Marc Pearlman ’90

Developing a High School Music Curriculum

November 8, 2011Mark Your Calendarmusic

Heidi J. Welch ’96 , director of music at Hillsboro-Deering High School

Music alum Heidi J. Welch ’96 will be on campus on Monday, November 28, from 10–11:30 a.m. in room 120 in the Redfern Arts Center as part of KSC’s Music Education Lecture Series. Her presentation, “Developing a High School General Music Curriculum” is free and open to the public and is sponsored by the KSC Music Department.

Mrs. Welch has been the director of music at Hillsboro-Deering High School for 14 years. In addition to chorus, a cappella choir, and concert band, she teaches courses in musical theater, music theory, American history through music, film music, and guitar. Prior to teaching in Hillsboro, she taught elementary general music, chorus, and beginner band in Claremont, NH. She has also musically directed a number of shows, and acts in the NH-based Not Your Mom’s Musical Theater company.

Alumni Gathering in California

November 8, 2011Mark Your Calendar, Uncategorizedalumni

2620 miles: That’s distance between Keene and the coast of California! But nothing separates KSC alums and their Alma Mater! Patty Farmer, director of Alumni and Parent Relations, will be hosting KSC Alumni Gatherings in the Long Beach and San Francisco areas on the following days during the first week of December:

Long Beach Evening Cocktail Social, December 6th
San Francisco lunch gatherings, December 8th and 9th
San Francisco Alumni Area Dinner, December 9th

She’d love to see you. Contact her at 358-2370 or pfarmer@keene.edu for more information or to register for one of these fun events.

Cohen Center Pilots “Echoes and Reflections” Workshops

November 7, 2011UncategorizedHolocaust & genocide

The Cohen Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies has been one of the centers/museums selected to pilot the Anti-Defamation League, USC Shoah Foundation Institute, and Yad Vashem’s Multimedia Curriculum on the Holocaust, Echoes and Reflections. Designed for middle and high school teachers, Echoes and Reflections examines the ways in which Jewish communities and culture throughout Europe were impacted by the Holocaust and provides works of literature, photographs, filmed Survivor testimonials, and other resources for educators to incorporate in their classrooms.

The Cohen Center is recognized as an “Echoes and Reflections Approved Training Center” and will deliver workshops to the New England region. Heading this pilot program will be Glenda McFadden, Cohen Center and Jewish Foundation for the Righteous Lerner Fellow, who received training in NYC. Ms. McFadden is a recipient of the Jewish Foundation for the Righteous‘ Goldman Award for Excellence in Holocaust Education and teaches at Nashua (NH) Catholic Junior High School.

Fr. Desbois’ Visit Featured in Yahad—In Unum

November 7, 2011UncategorizedHolocaust & genocide

Fr. Desbois speaking at KSC's 14th Annual Holocaust Memorial Lecture

Father Patrick Desbois‘ presentation at KSC’s 14th Annual Holocaust Memorial Lecture was featured in the latest edition of the newsletter from Yahad – In Unum, a research organization investigating the mass executions of 1.5 million Jews and Roma/Gypsy people in Eastern Europe between 1941 and 1944. While he was here, Fr. Desbois also met with Holocaust and Genocide Studies majors to discuss his book, “Holocaust by Bullets” and was interviewed on NH Public Radio’s All Things Considered.

President Giles-Gee Attends National Media Dinner

November 4, 2011Uncategorized

President Helen Giles-Gee was in New York City on November 9 attending a national media dinner on higher education. She was elbow-to-elbow with more than 20 national journalists, including those representing such news outlets as The New York Times, NBC national television, The Washington Post, The Christian Science Monitor, The Los Angeles Times, and Money magazine.
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KSC Hosts Largest COPLAC Conference Ever

November 3, 2011Uncategorized

On October 28–29, KSC hosted the prestigious Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges (COPLAC) Northeast Undergraduate Research Conference, which featured presentations, posters, and performances from over 180 student participants, making this the largest COPLAC Northeast conference to date. Thirty-four KSC students participated, presenting research that covered everything from the effects of toxins on frog embryos, to the effects of exposure to diesel versus biodiesel, and a comparative analysis of the Armenian genocide and the Holocaust.

The other students came from SUNY Geneseo, University of Maine Farmington, Eastern Connecticut State University, Ramapo College of New Jersey, and Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts.

More information. …

CD of Jewish Music Includes Prof. Ginsberg’s Arrangement of “Oseh Shalom”

November 3, 2011Uncategorizedfaculty, music

A newly released CD, Days of Awe and Rejoicing:  Radiant Gems of Jewish Music, includes KSC Music faculty member Elaine Broad Ginsberg’s choral arrangement of “Oseh Shalom” (“Let there be peace”), which she conducted at a recent Kristallnacht Remembrance. You can hear a clip from “Oseh Shalom” here.

Sam Massahos ’10 is Miss Capital Area

November 3, 2011UncategorizedAlumni achievers, Student Standouts

Sam Massahos ’10 receiving the Miss Capital Area crown

KSC alum, current grad student, and Campus Safety Parking Operations Coordinator Samantha (Sam) Massahos ’10 has been named Miss Capital Area, one of the Miss New Hampshire Scholarship Program pageants. Massahos graduated from KSC with a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a minor in music and is now working on her MEd in school counseling—and performing her duties in the Campus Safety office.
“It is an absolute honor and an exciting time to be representing our state’s capital,” said Massahos. “I feel very fortunate to have the opportunity to be competing with New Hampshire’s most dynamic women in the Miss New Hampshire Scholarship competition. I have won around $15,000 in scholarship through this program, which has helped me gain and continue my education.”
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Two Nights of Song for Hundred Nights

November 2, 2011Mark Your Calendarmusic

The KSC Chamber Singers have stepped up to support a different local organization each semester. This fall, they are partnering with the Hundred Nights homeless shelter, founded by Don Primrose ’07. The Chamber Singers have been preparing a repertoire based on the theme of “Songs from Sunlight to Twilight,” which they will present on Saturday, December 3, at 3 p.m. in the Redfern’s Alumni Recital Hall. Tickets for this event are $5 for students and $10 for adults. The Chamber Singers will donate twenty percent of the concert proceeds to the shelter, and they are requesting that attendees donate items for a food drive to benefit the shelter.
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Amy Augustine ’07, Reporting Live from Istanbul

October 27, 2011UncategorizedAlumni achievers

Amy Augustine ’07, Skyping in to WMUR on Oct. 24, 2011

If you were watching WMUR news (out of Manchester, NH) on Oct. 24, you probably saw Amy Augustine ’07, reporting live from Instanbul on the recent earthquake in Turkey. Augustine graduated from Keene State with a degree in journalism and political science and went to work at the Concord Monitor as a news intern. She rose from there to become a regional reporter and then became the editor of the Concord Insider, the Monitor’s weekly supplement.

She stayed at the Monitor about four years and just recently took a job writing and copy editing for Hurriyet Daily News and Economic Review, the oldest current English-language daily in Istanbul. “It’s a great paper and Istanbul is a fun city,” Augustine reports. “Turkey is an exciting place to be right now because it’s a growing regional power in the Middle East and a strategically important country. I’m doing my best to learn Turkish but the job can be very taxing. Anyway, I plan to stay here for about a year before I go back to the states to get married. My fiance, unfortunately, couldn’t join me because of his commitment to the family business, Grappone Automotive Group in Bow.”

Remember Amy? Drop her a line and make sure to invite her to campus when she gets stateside.

Where’d I See That?

October 26, 2011UncategorizedWhere'd I See That?

This one’s pretty easy—at least for some folks:

If you think you know where this is, please write your answer on a piece of paper and slip it inside a mint-condition copy of Big Brother & the Holding Company’s Cheap Thrills LP (in the original album cover with R Crumb illustrations) and mail it to Newsline, Alumni Center, 229 Main St., Keene, NH 03435. Or use the “comments” link, below.

Andrew Abeleira: the First KSC Student to Present at an International Scientific Conference

October 19, 2011Uncategorizedchemistry, Student Standouts

Andrew Abeleira with his poster presentation at the 23rd International Symposium of Polycyclic Aromatic Compounds (ISPAC) at the University of Munster

Who would have guessed that lichens are an effective biomonitor of the level of pollution around us? Well, it’s true, and senior chemistry major Andrew Abeleira has spent the past two years as an undergraduate research assistant with Chemistry Professor Jim Kraly, studying that. Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are chemicals that are produced whenever organic matter is heated. (That covers everything from roasting coffee to burning wood to combusting gasoline in an engine.) These pollutants accumulate in lichens, so lichens serve as important biomonitors of just how much of these PAHs are in our environment.

Last March, Andrew traveled with Dr. Kraly to present a poster on their findings at the Pittsburgh Conference on Analytical Chemistry and Applied Spectroscopy (PITTCON) in Atlanta, Ga., where they met the organizer of the 23rd International Symposium of Polycyclic Aromatic Compounds (ISPAC) at the University of Munster in Germany. The study of PAHs is big in Europe (where they’re called polycyclic aromatic compounds, or PACs), so the symposium organizer recommended that the team attend the Munster event, and they did.
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Dave Daly’s Wild Internship

October 18, 2011UncategorizedStudent Standouts

KSC geography major Dave Daly got back to campus for his senior year a little late this fall. Travel along the first leg of his journey home was a little iffy. He was returning from an internship with the Cook Inlet Aquaculture Association out of Kenai, Alaska, that he’d landed through the Student Conservation Association (SCA). He and an internship partner spent the summer camped along Alaska’s remote Susitna River, where they collected data on the adult sockeye salmon as they migrated upstream to spawn and die. A float plane brought them to camp, and delivered their supplies every two weeks. Their only contact with civilization came via a 20-minute satellite phone call they could make every other week, or mail that came in and out on the supply plane. They did have neighbors though—the furry, unwelcome kind who were only interested in the food supplies.
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Music Dept. Receives Gift of Vintage Bass

October 18, 2011Uncategorizedmusic

Don Baldini (left) receiving the bequest of Jerry Levine's vintage Kay bass from Jerry's son, Michael (right).

On behalf of the KSC Music Department, Artist in Residence Don Baldini has accepted the gift of an upright bass from the estate of Jerry Levine, who passed away earlier this year. Levine and his wife met Prof. Baldini a few years ago when Prof. Baldini was playing bass in a regular concert series at an inn in W. Dover, Vt. As a result of that acquaintance, the Levines also became regular attendees at KSC Jazz Band concerts.

Obviously, Jerry Levine was a music lover. He, like Prof. Baldini, was also a bass player. As a teenager in the 1930s, he played in local dance bands, earning enough to help support his family during the Depression. Family members say that he performed with such famous bandleaders of the era as Louis Prima and that the teen had to be snuck into nightclubs and burlesque joints so that he could play his Kay bass with the house band.

So when it became time to pass his beloved instrument on to those musicians who would follow in his footsteps, the Levine family decided that Don Baldini and the KSC music program would be the perfect recipients.
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Modern Poetry Collection Established at KSC

October 17, 2011Uncategorizedliterature, poetry

KSC’s Mason Library recently established the Modern Poetry Collection, a special collection of books, periodicals, and archival manuscripts of 20th century poetry. Three significant gifts are now, or soon will be, in the Collection. A bequest earlier this year of a 2100-volume modern-poetry library, valued near $89,000, from the family of Frank C. Shuffelton inspired the creation of the Collection. Frank Shuffelton, a long-time summer resident of Harrisville, N.H., was the chair of the English department at the University of Rochester. The Shuffelton family choose Keene State College over the University of Rochester because of Shuffelton’s love for the Mondanock area. The Shuffelton collection includes first and rare editions of works by John Ashbery, Elizabeth Bishop, Gwendolyn Brooks, Frank O’Hara, Stanley Kunitz, Robert Lowell, Allen Tate, William Carlos Williams, and many other poets—a who’s who of modern poetry.

Adding to the scope of the Modern Poetry Collection, the Zephyr Press (Brookline, Mass.) will soon be donating its editorial and publishing records, and those from its earlier incarnation as Aspect Magazine. The records span the years from the 1960s to 1997. Zephyr Press is best known for publishing the works of all the major Eastern European and Chinese poets.
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