Faculty, Staff & Student Achievements
ACADEMIC YEAR 2009 - 2010
August 2009
August 25, 2009
Book
Shows Service in
African Mission Work
 A new book produced by the A.C. Van Raalte Institute at HopeCollege
provides insights into the foreign-mission experience through the writings
and correspondence of long-time medical missionary Tena A. Huizenga.
The book, "Aunt Tena, Called to Serve: Journals and Letters of
Tena A. Huizenga, Missionary Nurse to Nigeria," focuses on Huizenga's
service in remote Lupwe, Nigeria, through the Christian Reformed Church
from 1937 to 1954. The volume has been published by the William B. Eerdmans
Company of Grand Rapids, Mich., and Cambridge, United Kingdom, as part
of the Historical Series of the Reformed Church in America.
"This intensely human volume guides us through 17 memorable years
of Nigerian mission history," said Eugene Rubingh, former executive
secretary of Christian Reformed World Missions. "Drawn from Tena
Huizenga's own letters, the events are sketched through the lens of joy
and tears, of small victories and unimaginable obstacles. Both candor
and love transform mundane facts into a warm and lively account of a
life poured out for God."
The book's managing editor is Dr. Jacob E. Nyenhuis, who is director
of the A.C. Van Raalte Institute and provost emeritus and professor emeritus
of classics at Hope. Serving as co-editors were Dr. Robert P. Swierenga,
who is the A.C. Van Raalte Research Professor at the Van Raalte Institute
and professor of history emeritus at Kent State University, and Lauren
M. Berka, a 2008 Hope graduate who was a student research assistant at
the institute and is now a graduate fellow in history at Arizona State
University.
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THE PRESS RELEASE
August 21, 2009
College
Guides Include
Hope Among Top Schools
 Hope College has been included in several college-guide listings in
recent months.
Hope is among the approximately 330 of "the country's best
and most interesting colleges and universities" featured in the
new 2010 edition of the "Fiske Guide to Colleges."
The annual rankings compiled by "U.S. News & World Report" have
once again included Hope College among the 100 best liberal arts colleges
in the nation. The college is 92nd out of the 249 institutions that are
considered national liberal arts colleges. In addition, Hope also continues
to be included among the institutions that the publication recognizes
for providing outstanding undergraduate research/creative projects opportunities.
The September/October 2009 issue of "Mother Jones" includes
Hope as one of "10 cool schools that will blow your mind, not your
budget," describing the college as a best value for artists with
a spiritual side.
The Princeton Review selected Hope as one of 158 institutions
it profiles in its "Best in the Midwest" section of its Web
site feature "2010 Best Colleges: Region by Region".
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THE PRESS RELEASE
August 19, 2009
Hope
a "Cool School"
According to Mother Jones
 Mother
Jones magazine (September/October 2009 issue) has included Hope College
in a listing of "cool schools that will blow your mind, not your
budget".
Hope is one of 10 schools listed as a Best Value for different reasons.
Hope is recognized as a Best Value for artists with a spiritual side.
The editor said the list was created to recognize schools that "may
not bother to juke their stats to make (the) U.S. News (and World Report)
short list, but they still have plenty to offer -- for alot less dough."
About Hope: This creative Christian college is known for its dance,
theater, art, music and visiting writers programs. Indie rocker Sufjan
Stevens is an alum."
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THE PRESS RELEASE
August 18, 2009
Poems Capture World
of High School Basketball
 Basketball
has been described by some as "poetry in motion." The world of
high school basketball is shared through poetry itself in the latest collection
by nationally-recognized poet Jack Ridl, professor emeritus of English
at Hope College.
Ridl's collection "Losing Season," being released in September
by CavanKerry Press, follows a fictional, small-town high school team
and its community in an experience lived out annually for decades across
the country. Capturing the perspective of a mix of participants - coach,
players, family, fans - and chronicling highs and lows along the way,
the individual poems together create a composite view of a year of
hope and defeat both on and off the basketball court.
Poet Conrad Hilberry has called the volume "unmatched, I believe,
anywhere in American poetry."
"I've never seen a poetry book as clearly focused as this one,
as though a smart documentary filmmaker had hung around the gym all season
filming until we can see and feel every hole and knot in the sad fabric
of that failed year," he said. "These poems are so compelling,
so varied, so familiar to anyone who has felt the impact of high school
sports that they may well introduce a new genre."
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August 18, 2009
Hope
Mortar Board Chapter
Earns National Awards
The
Hope College chapter of Mortar Board received multiple awards during
the national organization's annual summer conference.
The event's awards program recognized activities during the preceding
school year. Hope received a "Golden Torch Award" and eight "Project
Excellence" awards during the conference, which ran Friday-Sunday,
July 24-26, in Chicago, Ill.
Hope's chapter was one of 32 recipients of the "Golden Torch Award," which
honors chapters that have excelled in the areas of scholarship, leadership
and service. For the third year in a row, the Hope chapter was also one
of the top five "Golden Torch Award" recipients and a finalist
for the national "Ruth Weimer Mount Chapter Excellence Award."
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THE PRESS RELEASE
Hope is making a difference in its hometown
of Holland as researchers at the
college contribute to understanding of the Lake Macatawa watershed. From left
to right
are seniors Alex Behm and Morgan Willming, and area high school teachers
Jennifer Soukhome and Carl Van Faasen ’91, who visited the
Outdoor Discovery Center to collect mud samples from a pond for testing.
August 12, 2009
Watershed
Research Leads
to High School Lab Manual
Collaborative research by a team of educators studying the local watershed
has led to the publication of a lab manual that will enable high school
students to conduct explorations of their own.
 The National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) Press of Arlington,
Va., has published "Watershed Investigations: 12 Labs for High School
Students." The book is co-authored by Dr. Graham Peaslee of the
Hope College faculty; area teachers Jennifer Soukhome and Carl Van Faasen;
and William Statema, a recent Hope graduate now teaching in the Chicago
area.
The lab manual's exercises have been inspired by the authors' experiences
working together to understand the Macatawa Watershed, but are designed
to be used in any high school experiment-based environmental science
curriculum. The projects are designed to be open ended, with students
tasked with developing hypotheses and designing experiments to test the
problems presented. The approach is intended to teach both about issues
related to watersheds and the methodology of scientific inquiry.
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THE PRESS RELEASE
August 7, 2009
Aaron Lawrence Honored
as Volunteer Mentor
Aaron Lawrence, a Hope College junior from Grand Rapids, has been chosen
to receive this month's "Senator's Award for Men in Mentoring" by
State Senator Wayne Kuipers (R-Holland).
Lawrence, who has been a volunteer mentor with the "Heights of
Hope" program in Holland Heights since the fall of his freshman
year, will receive the award during a ceremony at Zeeland's Huizenga
Park on Monday, Aug. 10.
Becky Midgley, a youth worker with "Heights of Hope," praised
Lawrence for his consistent dedication, describing him as a model for
others. "We as the mentoring program are hiring him in the fall
to recruit more mentors because he does such a good job with it," she
said.
Midgley noted that the presentation was made at the park because it
is a favorite place to go for Lawrence and the student he mentors. The
award consists of a framed certificate signed by Kuipers and Governor
Jennifer Granholm, and a $50 gift card to the BoatWerks Restaurant courtesy
of Paul Kuiper. In addition, the award's recipients are listed on a plaque
created by Superior Sports in Holland and on display in the restaurant's
lobby.
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THE PRESS RELEASE
July 31, 2009
Princeton
Review Names
Hope
among “Best in the Midwest”
 Hope College is one of the best colleges and universities in the Midwest
according to The Princeton Review.
The education services company selected Hope as one of 158 institutions
it profiles in its "Best in the Midwest" section of its Web
site feature "2010 Best Colleges: Region by Region" that posted
July 27, 2009 and is located at www.PrincetonReview.com.
Said Robert Franek, Princeton Review's vice president for publishing, "We
chose Hope and the other terrific schools we recommend as our 'regional
best' colleges primarily for their excellent academic programs. We also
work to have our roster of 'regional best' colleges feature a range of
institutions by size, selectivity, character and locale. We choose the
schools based on institutional data we collect from several hundred schools
in each region, our visits to schools over the years, and the opinions
of independent and high school-based college advisors whose recommendations
we invite. We also take into account what each school's customers - their
students - report to us about their campus experiences at them on our
80-question student survey."
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THE PRESS RELEASE
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