The Heroes on the Hill 5K took place on May 2 followed by a daylong carnival that included fun for everyone — face painting, bounce houses and a photo booth. The bright sunshine and warm weather added to the enjoyment.
Students in CHC’s sports management event planning course planned and carried out the entire event, putting classroom knowledge to the test. For the second year, all proceeds were donated to two charities, Make-A-Wish and Our Mother of Sorrows/St. Ignatius of Loyola.
— Photos and text by Danielle Gehring ’17
Walking for Lily's Hope
Dozens walked around campus one April day to raise money for Lily’s Hope Foundation. For the sixth year, The Council for Exceptional Children of Chestnut Hill College sponsored the walk to help babies, children and families with unexpected and urgent needs arising from premature births. The foundation supports these individuals by providing them with items such as clothes and diapers for preemies, car seats or car seat beds, bassinets and gift cards for use toward transportation to a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).
Lily’s Hope Foundation was started by the family of Lilian Driscoll, the niece of Marie Bambrick, SSJ, coordinator for Philadelphia Teaching Fellows at the College. Lily was born seven weeks premature in 2007. She struggled to survive as she spent nearly a month in the NICU. Later, she went through speech and physical therapies and had gastrointestinal and pulmonary issues. She is doing well today. The Driscolls’ son, Aidan, also was born three weeks premature in 2013, has gastrointestinal and pulmonary issues and is going through physical and speech therapy as well.
The Driscolls felt compelled to give back and help other families who face issues that arise from premature births, and thus, Lily’s Hope Foundation was born.
For more information, contact Marie Bambrick at bambrick@chc.edu or 215.248.7014. Visit www.lilyshopefoundation.org to learn more about Lily’s Hope Foundation or to make a donation.
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Biomedical Lecture
The College’s 22nd Annual Biomedical Lecture Series, held in April, featured Gerald A. Isenberg, M.D., F.A.C.S., whose presentation was titled “Thinking Out of the Box and Into the Colon.”
Dr. Isenberg is a cancer a surgeon and professor at Thomas Jefferson University, specializing in colorectal cancer. Today, colon cancer is the third most common cancer diagnosed in the United States in both men and women. In 2013, the American Cancer Society reported that in this country, 143,000 people were diagnosed with colorectal cancer and about 51,000 died from it.
During his presentation, Dr. Isenberg highlighted various treatments for colon cancer, including newer technologies currently being developed. He also told the students in the room that hopefully one day, they would be able to develop more advanced treatments.
Dr. Isenberg has been in practice for 27 years and serves as vice president of the American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons, was recognized as one of Philadelphia Magazine’s top doctors in 2002, 2012, 2013 and 2014 and won Thomas Jefferson University’s Dean’s Award for faculty mentoring in 2010.
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In honor of poetry month
Frank Sherlock, 2014-2015 Poet Laureate of Philadelphia, was on campus April 23 to give a poetry reading. Sherlock has been quoted as saying of his work: “I approach poetry as a cartographer mapping and remapping your surroundings according to your personal memory and associations and histories that you’ve heard.” He is a 2013 Pew Fellow in the Arts for Literature.
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Spring Musical a Success
The CHC Music Department, in conjunction with Chestnut Hill Community Theater, presented the Gilbert and Sullivan classic musical, “The Pirates of Penzance,” directed by Randy Young with Kayla Harney ’16, as student director, in late May.
Pirates was the final musical that Randy Young directed with the Chestnut Hill Community Theater. “It’s really sad,” he said. “It’s just, I’m never home.” So this year, he wanted to go out with a bang.
“Pirates of Penzance is one of the funniest comedies that’s ever been put on stage,” said Randy Young, of his last directorial effort with the theater. “We wanted to do something with a little bit of history behind it, and something that we thought we could have a really good cast for, and we’ve got great students here, and alumni as well as community members.”
The show’s lead roles were played by Michael Yancey ’15 as the Pirate King, Brian Langdon ’16 as Frederic, Michelle Hildebrandt ’14 as Ruth, Thomas Morgan ’17 as Samuel, Caroline Oddo ’15 as Mabel, Brandon Rothenberg as Major General Stanley, Penelope Pucci ’16 as Edith, Gabrielle Sciortino ’17 as Isabel, Jackie Blade ’16 as Kate and Asia Bryant ’15 as Sergeant of Police.
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Presentations
Alumni from the Southeastern Pennsylvania Consortium for Higher Education (SEPCHE) institutions came out to share their work experiences and offer advice to chief academic officers, deans, faculty and career directors at the SEPCHE Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) event held at CHC in April. The panelists discussed skills needed in the STEM fields and how curriculum changes can assist students in acquiring those skills to be successful in their professional lives.
The panelists were (from left): Daren Metz, supervisor, quality assurance, technical training and development, Impax Laboratories and Cabrini College alum; Karen Leary, recently of The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, IT project leader and CHC alumna; Rashida Weathers, Mid-Atlantic lab director for the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and CHC alumna; and Jeanine Lubeck, who works at Strategic Consulting Services, Cerner, Inc. (formerly Siemens) and CHC alumna.
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Cecilia Cavanaugh, SSJ, Ph.D., dean of undergraduate studies and professor of Spanish, was the keynote speaker at the Undergraduate Research Symposium held April 9 at Penn State Lehigh Valley. Her presentation, “Poetic Imagination, Aesthetic Emotion and Building Bridges between the Sciences and Humanities: Lessons from Spain’s Residencia de Estudiantes,” included information about the principles inherent in the founding of the Residencia de Estudiantes in Madrid, Spain, and the philosophy at work in its day-to-day operations, which fostered important research and scholarship across the disciplines.
The program was part of the Penn State Faculty Invitational Lecture Series.
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Philip Clayton, Ph.D., Ingaham Professor Claremont School of Theology and Claremont Graduate University (California) spoke on “What Brains and Cognition Tell Us About Faith” on April 16. His presentation was based on the premise that contemporary discussions about the brain are split between two beliefs: reductionists and dualists.
“The reductionists work under the motto, as one put it: ‘wires and chemicals, that’s all we are, wires and chemicals.’ The dualist school defends an understanding of the human person that does not make our self or mind dependent on brain states at all,” said Dr. Clayton. The most interesting work done today involves both of these factions, he added.
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Steinway Artist Series Continues
World-renowned pianist and Steinway artist, Young-Ah Tak, performed as part of the College’s Steinway Master Artist Series on April 16.
Young-Ah Tak has played throughout the U.S., Canada, Austria, Germany, Italy, Korea and Japan. She has played with symphony orchestras in the U.S. such as Imperial, Lansing, North Arkansas, Roanoke and Venice, and overseas with Filharmonia Pomorska (Poland) and Oltenia Philharmonic (Romania). She has also performed with various orchestras in Korea that include the Busan, Seongnam and Ulsan philharmonic orchestras and Korean Symphony Orchestra. Other notable venues include Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, Boston’s Jordan Hall, and throughout New York City in the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts’ Alice Tully Hall and Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall.
Young-Ah Tak trained at the Julliard School, New England Conservatory and The Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University, where she earned a doctor of musical arts in 2013. Tak also became a faculty member of the Preparatory Division of the Peabody Institute and currently serves as artist-in-residence at Southeastern University in Lakeland, Fla. and teaches at Eastern University in St. Davids, Pa.
Chestnut Hill College was designated an “All-Steinway” school in 2011 and the Steinway Master Artist Series began in 2012, when Steinway artist Meral Guneyman, state artist of the Republic of Turkey, performed at the College.