Category: Events
December 14, 2011|Events
In a back pew of the nearly deserted Hammerschmidt Memorial Chapel one afternoon last week, the Reverend H. Scott Matheney was watching and listening, an audience of one.
Matheney is the College’s chaplain, a job that ordinarily requires him to work from the front of the room. But this afternoon, he was rehearsing readers for the College’s annual Festival of Lessons and Carols. One by one, Elmhurst students and staff were taking turns stepping up to the chapel’s lectern, now flanked for the season by ribboned Christmas trees, to read through the Bible texts they had been assigned for the holiday service. After each reading, Matheney’s voice echoed from the rear of the church: “Thanks be to God!” Then he offered the same advice again and again: “Slow down!”
December on a college campus is not a propitious time for slowing down. Final exams loom. Long-procrastinated papers come due. Malls beckon. Stress levels soar.
More »
November 14, 2011|Events
If all goes according to Matthew O’Malley’s plans, by the end of January he and a few dozen friends will be sequestered in a room somewhere on campus, living out a computer-game enthusiast’s ultimate dream: Forty-eight hours of nonstop videogaming.
But O’Malley and company won’t be playing games. They’ll be creating them.
More »
October 31, 2011|Events
Miriam Montes is the editor-in-chief of Elmhurst’s much-lauded student newspaper, the Leader, which means her journalistic beat extends not much beyond the fringes of campus. But in the lobby of Cureton Hall last week, Montes was talking about her chance to change that.
Montes and the rest of the Leader staff were excited about a recently announced partnership between Elmhurst and the Washington, D.C.-based Pulitzer Center for Crisis Reporting, which offers fellowships for student-journalists who want to report from global news hot spots. Montes plans to apply.
“It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” she said.
More »
September 16, 2011|Events
Jaclyn Pearson was in her second hour of work in the basement of New Mount Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church on Chicago’s West Side, and she had long since lost count of how many shopping bags she had stuffed with green beans and sweet corn and apples.
Pearson, a first-year from Freeport, Illinois, was one of about 100 Elmhurst students who had made the brief bus ride from campus on September 11 to pass out produce to some of the neediest residents of West Garfield Park. On long folding tables set up in the lower level of the church were piles of carrots, peppers and greens. The display of plenty belied the fact that on most other days in the neighborhood, it’s not so easy to find decent produce. The mom-and-pop corner stores that line Madison Street and Cicero Avenue are bulging with snacks and sodas, but fruits and vegetables remain scarce.
More »
August 30, 2011|Events
Having just spent several sweaty hours helping newly arrived first-year students lug their personal possessions up residence-hall stairs during Elmhurst’s annual move-in day on August 25, Ryan Maguire had earned the right to speak as an expert on the dangers of dorm-room overpacking. So he took a break from lifting mini-fridges and big-screen TVs outside Niebuhr Hall to suggest that there was something new students could do without.
“You really don’t need all those cleaning supplies,” Maguire said. “You never use them.”
Maguire, a junior from Gurnee, was one of 30 members of Elmhurst’s football team lending their muscle power to the Class of 2015’s big move last week. About 300 new first-years were laying claim to their new campus quarters. They began arriving early on what would prove to be a steamy 90-degree day, pulling up in vehicles packed nearly to the roof with snacks and clothes and consumer electronics. Maguire and his teammates were waiting for them, ready to help with the heavy lifting.
More »
April 28, 2011|Events
Two summers ago, Danielle Littrell was working at a medical clinic in Guayaquil, Ecuador, when a family from a remote village on the banks of the Amazon River walked in. The parents were looking for help for their six-year old son, who seemed to be growing more ill by the minute.
Littrell, now a senior biology major at Elmhurst, was spending three months at the clinic as part of an International Partnership for Service Learning posting. Her job was to check patients in, record their blood pressure and other basic medical information, and make them as comfortable as possible—if comfort is at all possible in a crowded, un-air conditioned clinic in 110-degree heat.
More »
April 13, 2011|Events
After a couple hours spent presenting her research at the Associated Colleges of the Chicago Area student symposium at Elmhurst last week, Kortney Wendt had reached a conclusion.
“Doing the work is one thing, but talking about your work is a lot more difficult,” she said.
Wendt, a senior speech pathology major, had just packed up a display poster that summarized the research she had been conducting over the past year or so with Assistant Professor Michael Fraas. Her poster was one of several dozen on display in the Frick Center Saturday, each representing the work of student-researchers from one of the 15 colleges of the ACCA. The large type across the top of Wendt’s poster read: EEG Neurofeedback to Treat Cognitive-Emotional Defects Following TBI.
“People would come up and look at that title, and I could see their eyes sort of glaze over,” she said. “They’d be, like, ‘Neurofeedback? What’s that?’ But I think I did a pretty good job of explaining it.”
More »
March 2, 2011|Events
Officially, the event that draws jazz lovers from around the country to Hammerschmidt Memorial Chapel each February is called the Elmhurst College Jazz Festival. But to the College’s student-musicians, it’s simply the Weekend of No Sleep.
It’s not just that the excess of rehearsals, performances and clinics leaves little time for rest. There’s also the excitement of being in the presence of some of the world’s best players. Who can sleep after you’ve just spent a few hours rehearsing with some of the same jazz greats you grew up listening to?
More »
February 23, 2011|Events
Even Don Romano is never sure what sort of crowd will turn up for one of Elmhurst College’s Classic Film Society screenings. Romano, a senior psychology major, helped start the society two years ago, partly because he wanted to share his love of old movies. But he gets to share more love at some screenings than at others.
Earlier this year, seven people showed up to watch Citizen Kane, which is widely considered one of the greatest American films ever made. But nearly 70 came for a showing of The Ghost and Mister Chicken, which isn’t.
Spreading the gospel of classic cinema on a college campus is an unpredictable business. Romano belongs to a generation that knows more about Jack Black than Jimmy Stewart, so part of his mission is to give fellow students the chance to see great old films for the first time. When he wins a convert, he is thrilled.
“It’s not always easy to get college kids to come, because sometimes they have these preconceived ideas that the movies are going to be boring or irrelevant. But every once in a while, someone will come up to me after a film and say “That was great,” and want to know more.” Romano said. “That’s an awesome feeling.”
More »
February 2, 2011|Events
In the Frick Center last week, the Wild Things were roaring their terrible roars and gnashing their terrible teeth.
“I’m made of feathers and I’ve got, like, a million pointy teeth!” one of them announced. He was one of 45 third-graders from schools in nearby Villa Park who had come to the College for a one-day drama workshop run by Elmhurst students. He was rehearsing for his role in a short dramatization of Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are by stomping around in a circle and doing his best to appear menacing.
More »