Academics

Over Spring Term, Professor Brigid Vance’s History 203 class, Joshua Altshuler (Visiting Reference Instruction Librarian) and Claire Cannell (University Archivist and Assistant Professor) researched and put together an exhibit on “What is First-Year Studies” in Seeley G. Mudd Library! You can still see the exhibit for yourself through Friday, June 14.

Professor Vance shared: “This term, students researched different aspects of the First-Year Studies program at Lawrence. They chose the focal points of their essays and the exhibition based on archival research and also through conversation with former directors, professors, and students.”

Monday, May 20 | 3:10-4:30 p.m.
Warch 204 – Cinema

Dr. Robert Mitchell from UW-Oshkosh will give a talk titled: Love, lies, and lures: Understanding the ecology and evolution of pheromones in beetles.

The Mitchell lab explores the chemical ecology of beetles and the evolution of smell and taste. Recent projects have focused on pheromone discovery, the ecological networks mediated by pheromones, and identifying pheromone receptors, especially within the large family of longhorned beetles.

Friday, May 24 | 4:30-6:30 P.M.
Wriston Art Galleries

An exhibition of selected works by Lawrence University’s 2024 senior studio art majors:

• Juli Clarkson
• Kiara Didier
• Bella Goland
• Tyler Johnson
• Ellie Kane
• Chloe Lamb
• Tiago Leite
• Alana Melvin
• Blake Sadusk
• Miranda Whitaker

Refreshments will be provided!

Gallery Hours

• Monday-Friday | 10 a.m.-4 p.m.
• Saturday | Noon-4 p.m.
• Sunday | Closed
• Open also after the Commencement Ceremony on Sunday, June 9

Wednesday, May 15 | 3:30-5 p.m.
Steitz Atrium

Please join students who participated in Field Experience in The Gambia as they share their research and volunteer projects through poster presentations. The projects reflect the research interests of the students and cover topics related to politics, international relations, environmental studies, business, sports, food security, religion, and culture. Students who participated in a KidsGive project at a local school will present about their volunteer experience.

This even is free and open to all Lawrence community members and the public.

Friday, May 17 | 10 a.m.-7 p.m.
Warch 324 – Somerset Room

Biofest is culmination of the Biology Senior Experience at Lawrence. At this event, senior biology, biochemistry, and neuroscience students will present their self-designed Senior Experience projects to the Lawrence University community.

This is a come-and-go event where you can drop in and attend for as long as you are able. Students will be presenting posters as well as other products to display their senior experience projects.

Saturday, May 18 | 9 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
Main Hall

Celebrate and recognize over 30 outstanding student research projects.

Student presenters have been nominated by faculty sponsors and are being recognized for outstanding work in humanities or social science disciplines. Each year, one project receives the Richard A. Harrison Award.

Read more about the Symposium

Schedule of Events

• 8-9 a.m. | Welcome Reception | Steitz Atrium
• 8:30 a.m. | Remarks by Provost Blitstein | Steitz Atrium
• 9-10:30 a.m. | Session 1
• 10:45 a.m.-12:15 p.m. | Session 2
• 12:15 p.m. | Lunch | Andrew Commons
  Guests and participants who wish to eat in the Commons will receive a voucher to cover the cost of their meal.

Session 1 | 9-10:30 a.m.

Room 104 | Moderator: Sara Ceballos (Musicology)

• Dana Abbo: “Reading with the Ear: A Sonic and Musical Analysis of Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway”
• Evan Ney: “Poetic Soundscapes: Linking Sound and Meaning in Dickinson’s Civil War Poetry”
• Charlotte Trumble: “Freistadt: Soundscapes and Poetry”

Room 201 | Moderator: Gustavo Fares (Spanish)

• Linnea Morris: “Mujeres en mariachi: La presencia permanente de mariacheras en el scenario del mariachi”
• Riley Winebrenner: “El uso de bananas en el arte brasileño: de antropofagia a tropicalismo”
• Elena Yank: “Todo sobre la apariencia: La mirada masculina, la autenticidad de género y el monólogo de Agrado en Todo sobre mi madre de Pedro Almodóvar”

Room 211 | Moderator: Garth Bond (English)

• Owen Davies: “Technology and the Body in the Films of David Cronenberg”
• Patience Garcia: “’The Skeleton Behind the Man’: Skeletal Metaphors in Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles”
• Katarina Stanley: “What is AI anyhow? What am I? and What are You?: A Response to Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass from a Contemporary Perspective”

Room 216 | Moderator: Linnea Ng (Psychology)

• Grace Fox: “Can Caregivers Accurately Report on their Child’s Rumination?”
• Finneas Frawley: “From Identity to Intimacy: Exploring Transgender People’s Dating Attitudes towards Gender Experience”
• Nell Rudoff: “The Observer Perspective in Music Performance Anxiety among College Students”
• Caleb Yuan: “Leaning Strategies: Motivation and COVID Stress”

Room 401 | Moderator: Jason Brozek (Government)

• Rain Orsi: “Democracy’s Downfall?: Investigating a Second Wave of Electorate Shift in South America”
• Noah Stevenson: “A Light in the Darkness?: The Role of Italy in a Worsening Crisis of Irregular Migration in the Mediterranean Sea”
• Gabrielle Wood: “Untangling the Afghani Puzzle: Pashtun Culture, Taliban Totalitarianism, and Women’s Rights”

Room 404 | Moderator: Brigid Vance (History)

• Madeleine Tevonian: “Synethetic Symbolism: Community Engagement with the Sacred at Buddhist Stupas” (winner of the 2023 Richard A. Harrison Award for Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences”

Session 2 | 10:45 a.m.-12:15 p.m.

Room 104 | Moderator: Mark Jenike (Anthropology)

• William Brenneman, Katie Costanzo, and Megan Graffagna: “Evaluating the Food to Grow Initiative: Exploring Children’s Food and Nutrition Knowledge and Educational Programming at the Building for Kids”

Room 201 | Moderator: Madera Allan (Spanish)

• Grace Hanson: “El sonido y la definición de comunidad en Carmen y Lola de Arantxa Echevarría”
• Reese Pike: “Carne asada y casas de muerte: El narcocorrido en Dreamland”

Room 211 | Moderator: Victoria Kononova (Russian)

• Lorcan Baxter: “You Can’t Go Home Again: Nostalgia and Modernity in Rachmaninoff’s Trois Chansons Russes”
• Lydia LeMoine: “An Analysis of the Historical and Political Influences on Gender Based Violence in Kyrgyzstan”
• Noah Stevenson: “Love as Faith: Finding Inspiration and Beauty in Soloviev’s ‘The Meaning of Love’”

Room 216 | Moderator: Claire Kervin (English)

• Dana Abbo: “Perfect Sum of Perfect Parts: Disability and Deformity as the Foundation of Utopia in Sarah Scott’s Millenium Hall”
• Lauren Dahl: “The Pen as Power: Evelina’s Epistolary Form and Narrative Control”
• Lainie Yank: “‘I Still Need Her With Me’: Motherhood, Loss, and Lack in Joan Didion’s Blue Nights”

Room 401 | Moderator: Sigma Colón (Environmental Studies & Ethnic Studies)

• Hannah Amell: “The Wellbeing of Trans Youth through the Lens of Policy: A Review of American Literature”
• Anders Hanhan: “A Bird’s Eye View of Food Insecurity: Using Mapping Methodology to Assess Risks and Resiliency Connected to Urban Food Access”
• Ashley Tang: “Boulder’s Housing Affordability Crisis: An Analysis of the Convergence of Airbnb-Driven Gentrification, Urban Growth Regulations, and Tourism Development in Boulder, Colorado”

Room 404 | Moderator: Jake Frederick (History)

• Nora Briddell: “Leslie Feinberg (1949-2014): Remembering a Revolutionary Communist”
• Chris Dakich: “The Alchemy of Coffee: Penetrating Insights into the Relation between Coffee, Libido, and the Rise of Modernity in Late Seventeenth Century England”
• Samuel Schuler: “Brutality at Waxhaws and Exhaustion at Cowpens: How Banastre Tarleton Lost the Battle of Cowpens”

Vote for your favorite photos!

The study abroad photo gallery will be on display in the Warch Gallery (outside Somerset) until May 12. Stop by and vote for your first and second place choices.

The votes will be tallied by May 12, and the winner will be announced May 13.

The 2024 Off-Campus Programs Photo Contest is open to any student who studied abroad Spring 2023-Winter 2024 and is a current LU student! Please complete this form and submit up to three photos. 

Photos will be printed and displayed in a gallery format the week of May 6 in Warch Campus Center. Additionally, a virtual online gallery will be available. Students, faculty, staff, visitors, and the community will be able to vote on photos the entire week of May 6.  

A winner and runner-up will be announced May 13. In the event of a tie, a winner and runner-up will be chosen at random.

A first prize and a runner-up will be awarded in the amount of $40 and $25 Viking Gold respectively. If you have any questions, please email OffCampusPrograms@lawrenc.edu.

The deadline to enter is April 29!

Lakes in our landscape: perspectives from a large-scale sampling program 

Monday, May 6 | 3:10 p.m.
Warch Cinema

While there are many local and regional sampling efforts in lakes across the U.S., it is often difficult to compile this information into a cohesive framework to make national-scale conclusions. To address this gap, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency partners with States and Tribes to implement the National Lakes Assessment, which is a national-scale, coordinated lake sampling program. The resulting data include colocated biological, chemical, habitat, and human use measures that are available to the scientific community.

Dr. Amina Pollard, Lawrence class of 1995, will provide a brief overview of the project and discuss some of the ways the results have been used to better understand lakes.

Wednesday, May 1 | 12-1 p.m.
Wriston Art Galleries

Artist Jan Serr will discuss her exhibition, Face It, which explores her substantial body of work in self-portraiture in painting, drawing, and print mediums from different moments in her prolific career. In addition to demonstrating Serr’s deft touch and command of visual forms, the self-portraits reveal her ability to convey multiple aspects of her own personality and a wide range of emotional responses.