HOJ – The Hilltop Monitor

Humans of Jewell

Sofia Arthurs-Schoppe — Fri, 16 Feb 2018 14:00:51 +0000

Mackenna Kemp, sophomore nursing major and Spanish minor, shares with us how she manages to balance her passions despite obstacles.

“Whenever I was looking at Jewell for the first time I immediately took interest in the Oxbridge program because it offered a whole bunch of things that I was interested in: studying abroad, working with professors, that kind of stuff. I even interviewed thinking I was going to do Molecular Biology. That didn’t happen, they shot me down pretty quick. Then I decided to do the Institutions and Policy major and took political sciences courses during my first semester. I hated it and realized that I didn’t want to spend my entire life arguing. So in the second semester [of my first year] I decided to do something that I really love and major in music. It was great, but some things happened and the program didn’t end up working out. But, I still wanted to be able to graduate in three years, to support myself, help other people and have the potential to travel. The major which allows me to do that is nursing, through the three year track, so I’m currently doing that.”

Kemp added a Spanish minor to her degree, which she says has opened her eyes to an entirely new culture and way of thinking. To Kemp, Jewell’s language program has been an opportunity for her to connect with an entirely different population.

“I think the reason that I really like Spanish is that it allows me to communicate and connect with a whole other group of people that I wouldn’t be able to if I only spoke English. I think it’s such a missed opportunity, especially in the United States, that we don’t teach more children second and third languages right off the bat.”

She intends to continue learning the Spanish language and to use this skill when working as a nurse in the future. She is not wasting time in achieving these goals and has recently been accepted to the SOL Education Study Abroad Program to spend three weeks in Oaxaca de Juarez, México this December.

Outside of her academic life, Kemp makes sure she has time to fulfill her passion: music.

“Music in general, but choir in particular, gave me a place where my contributions—as good or as mediocre as they may be—did make the whole better. When I’m singing in a group it doesn’t feel like I’m doing anything for myself. I like contributing to something greater. I am giving up a part of myself and my identity to be a part of this collective whole and this collective whole really can influence and inspire people.”

“It’s okay to not be the best at something. It’s okay to be the worst in the room at something. It’s okay to take advice from others, to admit fault and to recognize that all people are fallible.”

Photos by Sofia Arthurs-Schoppe.

Humans of Jewell

Edward Townsend — Fri, 15 Sep 2017 17:39:27 +0000

The Hilltop Monitor spoke with Chuck Curtis, one of William Jewell College’s technology wizards. His official capacity is the campus’ Network and Telecommunications Administrator. As his work is ubiquitous on the Hill yet seldom discussed, it seemed prudent to enlighten the community as to how Curtis spends his busy days and to offer him the opportunity to ponder the larger questions of emerging technologies.

As a final obligatory note, this reporter should mention that while Curtis’ words here are certainly brimming with the brand of candor and insight characteristic of the man, they in no way encapsulate the comprehensive quality of his person.

On his daily routine…

“When we get in, first we make sure everything is operating correctly. If there’s something down, then I want to try and get that addressed before class starts, before students start waking up, before there are issues. The piece that I do is the internal infrastructure. It’s the network. It’s the wireless. It’s the firewall. It’s the phone system. That kind of thing. What everything runs on top of, if you will.”

“We address these major concerns first, make sure everything is up and running. Then we start going through the tickets, addressing individual issues and go from there.”

“And I like to be engaged with students. It’s good to be around students, see what’s going on with them, see what we can do to make things better for them and make their experiences with technology easier. That’s one of the things I see with most of the staff. People do care about the kids and what kind of experience that they have here.”

“And our department is very small. I’m the network guy. We’ve got a developer guy. We’ve got a server guy. We’ve got a PC guy. And that’s about it. We’ve got another programmer/analyst, but that’s about it. You know you are the first and last line of defense for your area. But the folks here have been around for a while, and are really good at what they do. Things are pretty solid right now. We’ve got some good people with some good skill sets.”

Sage advice surrounding technology on the Hill…

“I think there are a lot of resources and people available to help that students aren’t necessarily aware of, especially first year students. The hub over at PLC is a good place to start, because of course it can be stressful around mid-terms and finals when things aren’t working right. The main piece of advice I would give is keep your machines patched with antivirus, and keep things backed up.”

On the peril and promise of future technologies…

“Probably the ‘internet of things’ and artificial intelligence, would be something that I would embrace and be afraid of at the same time. The reason [these] concern me is we continue to yield personal privacy by allowing the use of those kind of technologies. I mean when you’re online—and let’s say you’re shopping for a computer online—you go to Amazon, you go to Best Buy, you’re looking at options. Then, for days after that, you get ads for computers in your browser. There’s geo-cashing involved there, where people are building analytics to track the types of things that you are looking at, so they can put ads in front you of you to sell their product.

Humans of Jewell

Zoe Spangler — Fri, 10 Mar 2017 16:00:23 +0000

I had the chance to talk with Heather Wolfram in Semple kitchen while she made boba tea.

“I grew up in Blue Springs, Mo. I loved high school.” She added comically, “High school was my peak.” Not believing her, I pressed her for more info. She discussed her journey through finding a career she was passionate about.

“My entire life up until high school, I wanted to be a doctor. I used to study anatomy books when I was little; I aced anatomy in high school. And then when I started taking art classes―and I had taken art classes all my life but this time in high school― I took it seriously. I started to take art classes in my junior and senior year in high school, and I just loved it so much. My parents really supported me to be an artist. It was when everyone in my class and I would work on art projects for class and mine was obviously superior in every way to everyone else’s. Now I study studio art at Jewell. I just changed my second major from IDM [Interactive Digital Media] because I’ve found that I am really bad at computer stuff.”

Photo by Sydney Georges

She says her favorite mediums are ink and markers but she also enjoys photography.

“I declared psychology as my second major. I have two different halves, like there’s the creative side and then the scientific side. I’ve always been really intrigued by the subject of psychology, I find it very fascinating. I’m going to be taking a child and adolescent psychology class to see how children develop behaviors. I’m pretty excited about that.”

Additionally, she reflected on some of the things she has learned at Jewell outside of the classroom.

“People may surprise you sometimes, you might go into a situation with a certain mindset and then people can influence you to like open your mind more. When I first came here, I was pretty stuck on being a popular athlete kind of thing and then I realized it’s not all about that and finding your true friends is. You really want to treasure the people who take care of you and help you grow. No matter how bad things get there’s always like that glimmer that gives you hope that things can get better. As cliché as that sounds, it’s been very true in my life lately. When the worst things happen, the best memories or friendships come out of it. That glimmer of hope for me is my friends and my cat, Ronnie.”

08Photo by Sydney GeorgesHeather also shared her life goals and the kind of legacy she plans to leave behind.

“I really want to be in the Peace Corps. I also really like the idea of using my skills to be a war photographer. I don’t want to plan that far into the future because I’m very spontaneous. But I just really want to do something with a strong emphasis on people. I want to use my talents/abilities to help other people, especially in our country, in order for everyone to see the other side of things like transgender issues. I guess everyone deserves a chance to figure themselves out. It’s very hard for someone else to tell you how to think and how to behave or what your sexual orientation is or how you should talk and act if you’re a certain color. Nobody should ever be limited to a stereotype.”

Humans of Jewell

Amy Mullen — Fri, 16 Sep 2016 15:00:51 +0000

I got the opportunity to talk to Lydia Hanman, a junior nursing student and French minor, about some of the things that make life interesting. Hanman is involved in multiple organizations on campus. To name few, she is in concert choir, Zeta Tau Alpha and theater arts. In the style of the blog Humans of New York, I was able to ask her questions about her life and where she is right now.

What is your biggest struggle right now?

“Do I want to be a nurse? I really like nursing, but I don’t think I will be happy in a hospital. Nursing is a very, very open field and you can learn so much in different areas, like traveling nurses, Doctors Without Borders or the Peace Corps. Most of those things are sectional, so they take up two or three years, but don’t have anything after that. If I wanted to have a family, I know nursing would be stable and I could still support people, but would I be fulfilled as a person if I did that? … Maybe it’s because we [as nursing students] only know so much, and once we get into the field we’ll see it’s huge and we can do so many things. Maybe nursing school is a step I have to take, but for me I’m not sure being a nurse in a hospital is what I want to do. I talked to my dad and we talked about this question: what if I want to go off to clown school and be a clown? It’s a real question, am I courageous enough to take the risk?”

What gives you energy back? What gives you hope?

“I thrive on personal relationships and hearing people’s stories. That’s something that I run into everyday, and I know that if I were to go to a commuter college where I didn’t have interaction, and I had to live in an apartment by myself I would hate it. Jewell time is great for William Jewell because we get to spend time with each other. I love that. Also, sunshine.”

Name a place in the world you would go right now if you had no obligations, limits or language barriers.

“A lot of places. New Zealand, Austria, India… I want to go to Madagascar before it sinks. Probably India, because my grandpa grew up in India. He went to boarding school in what is now Pakistan, when England still colonized India as the British India Empire. When he was 18, India gained their independence which lead to the sovereign state of the Dominion of Pakistan, meaning that my grandpa was trapped. He then had to smuggle himself and other students, ranging from six to 18, back into India in order for them to be reunited with their families. So, I would love to see where he grew up and try to understand a little bit more about my ancestry.”