First-Ever Spring Storm Madness A Huge Success

Published March 20 at 3:05 p.m. by John Boccacino.

The first-ever Spring Storm Madness pep rally occurred Tuesday night as Keuka’s winter sports teams were recognized for their accomplishments while the eight spring sports teams were introduced to the community.

Tuesday night saw a number of firsts for the Keuka College athletics department.

First, the men’s volleyball team picked up its first-ever North Eastern Athletic Conference (NEAC) victory with a four-set win over Wells College.

Then, the Weed Physical Arts Center was transformed into a massive pep rally as students, coaches, faculty, staff and administrators packed the gym for Keuka’s first-ever Spring Storm Madness.

Decked out in green, these participants eagerly cheered on the Storm’s winter sports teams and their many accomplishments while giving a warm welcome to Keuka’s eight spring sports teams.

The event was organized and run by senior Nate Smith (Hilton, NY/Hilton), a men’s soccer standout who was extremely pleased with the turnout and the support shown to the Storm’s student-athletes. The event was also organized by Keuka’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) with assistance from the Student Senate.

During this pep rally-style celebration, members of Keuka College and the surrounding community got the chance to meet these student-athletes and participate in school spirit activities.

For senior Montana McDonald (Romulus, NY/Romulus), a member of Keuka’s women’s basketball and soccer squads, the highlight of the evening was towards the end of the festivities, when hundreds of Keuka student-athletes, coaches and administrators participate in the Storm’s version of the viral “Harlem Shake” video.

“Having the ‘Harlem Shake’ costume competition among the teams was exciting because we all were dressed up and we really got the crowd excited,” said McDonald, who along with the members of the women’s basketball team dressed up in 1980s-style apparel for the video.

“With our video, we wanted to show that our school is full of high-spirited, intense athletes as well as a student body that is 100 percent supportive of us. We want other NEAC schools to see that off the floor we are a bunch of crazy college students that love to dress up and have fun. It was really exciting and such a fun way to kick off the spring sports season.”

Among the games that occurred during the pep rally: a tug-of-war contest amongst the classes, a sack race featuring members of the SAAC and a paper airplane contest.

Additionally, there was a dance-off and assorted costume contests. Assorted prizes and Keuka paraphernalia were given away during the Spring Storm Madness.

The men’s and women’s basketball teams and their coaching staffs were honored for successful seasons that saw the women post a 20-4 overall mark (16-1 in the NEAC) and claim the school’s fourth NEAC North Division championship in seven years.

The men’s basketball team went 10-13 and 8-7 in NEAC play and won the most games since the 2008-09 season.

Among the highlights: seniors Teddy Tuggles (Rochester, NY/Gates Chili) and Mariah Mouzon (Elmira, NY/Elmira Free Academy) each surpassed 1,000 career points during the season, while five student-athletes earned All-NEAC honors.

For the women, juniors Jessica Bandrowski (Center Moriches, NY/Center Moriches) and Danielle Gravel (Sidney, NY/Sidney) earned first-team All-NEAC, while Mouzon was named third-team All-NEAC.

For the men, Tuggles garnered second-team All-NEAC while sophomore Trevor Healey (Wethersfield, CT/Wethersfield) was named third-team All-NEAC.

While Storm Madness has always honored the fall sports teams while introducing Keuka’s basketball teams and its men’s volleyball squad, this unique pep rally gave fans their first look at the Storm’s lacrosse, baseball, softball, tennis and golf teams.

“It was really exciting because the spring sports never really have the chance to be recognized and we have some of the most successful teams on campus,” McDonald said. “All the athletes were really excited and absolutely loved being announced, along with getting the chance to throw items out to the crowd.”

Math and Munitions, the Business of the Military

Published Nov. 5, 2012 at 9:07 a.m. by Rachel E. Dewey.

How does a Keuka degree fit into daily military life?

Just ask U.S. Air Force Capt. Ryan Maddox ’07, who graduated with a B.A. in math and a B.S. in business management, and now serves as operations officer for the U.S. Air Force 52nd Equipment Maintenance Squadron, which includes four officers and 461 enlisted airmen at Spangdahlem Air Base in Germany. Maddox is second-in-command to the squadron commander.

“I handle operations and she handles the personnel—the pats on the back and the kicks in the butt, so to speak,” he said. “We provide munitions support and we do maintenance. Let’s say after flying, a part gets damaged and needs repair. We repair it through metal fabrication.”

In addition, the squadron handles what Maddox calls “deep tissue maintenance,” such that after every 400 flight hours logged by a particular plane, it will spend from 7-20 days in the base hangar getting stripped down for  more intensive analysis or repairs.

“As far as business is concerned, maintenance and munitions is pretty much like any other business. We have a product, a process, customers, logistics, and a supply chain. I market my product to my customers – other squadrons – so they get what they want and I’m able to supply it. It’s almost a direct correlation [to business].” (more…)

SIFE Out, Enactus In

Published Oct. 26, 2012 at 2:23 p.m. by Doug Lippincott.

SIFE, a familiar acronym on the Keuka College campus since the advent of the 21^st century, no longer exists.

In a move designed to reaffirm its “long-standing commitment to using entrepreneurial action as a catalyst for progress,” the international organization Students in Free Enterprise has changed its name to Enactus.

“We needed a name that captured the entrepreneurial spirit that fuels everything we do,” said Alvin Rohrs, CEO. “We were also eager to create a name that reflected how global this organization has become.”

Some 57,000 students are members of Enactus clubs in 1,600 colleges and universities in 39 countries.

“Entrepreneurial action is not something that is relevant to a single culture or nationality,” said Rohrs. “What we do is just as powerful in Shanghai as it is in Sao Paulo, just as transformative whether we are in San Francisco or Sydney.”

Or in Keuka Park, N.Y., where the Keuka College SIFE  team has enhanced the quality of life in the region while qualifying for nine SIFE national competitions in the past 11 years. (more…)

Modern Politics and the Constitution

Published Sept. 17, 2012 at 4:43 p.m. by Rachel E. Dewey.

Thanks to Constitution Day, students in Julie VanDusky-Allen’s World Politics class at Keuka College got a little break from regular coursework. Instead, VanDusky-Allen informed them that in honor of Constitution Day, she was treating them to a U.S. history lesson relative to voting and representation.

Introduced was Article 1, Section 2, which sets parameters for the U.S. House of Representatives,  whose 435 members are divided proportionally among the states, with more populous states sending more representatives to Congress. By contrast, each of the 50 states has two seats in the U.S. Senate.

Within a brief review of the guidelines for House members, such as a 25-year minimum age limit, residency and two-year terms, VanDusky-Allen presented students with a number – 246 percent – which signifies the increase in population from 1913, when each member of the House represented approximately 223,506 people to 2012, when each one represents approximately 722,704.

A brief debate on the pros and cons of maintaining the 435 representatives as established historically, versus increasing the number of representatives, was followed by a discussion on redistricting, gerrymandering, and minority representation.

In the 2010 U.S. Census, government workers were not allowed to ask respondents if they were legal or illegal immigrants, VanDusky-Allen told students. But as seen on a census map, with darker colors illustrating states whose populations rose, it would appear illegals – also known as “undocumented” or “unauthorized” immigrants – have helped increase the respective number of Congressional seats in states such as California, Texas and Florida, she said.

“So how is that fair that New York loses representation while another state gains due to this issue of illegal immigration?” asked Nicole King, a senior political science and history major.
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Meet New Faculty: Dr. Bill Brown

Published Oct. 5, 2011 at 3:34 p.m. by Rachel E. Dewey.

Editor’s Note: This is the third in a series of profiles on new, full-time faculty members.

Bill Brown is eager for spring semester and the opportunity to get his biology and ecology students outdoors, to look for salamanders under rocks, go bird-watching, and collect scores of data on “critters” in the wild.

“We’ll get outside every day possible,” said Brown, who specializes in ornithology (birds), but also has training in entomology (insects), general ecology (the environment), bio-statistics and applied statistics. A visiting professor last year, the Penn Yan resident joined the Keuka faculty full-time this year, taking over several environmental courses formerly taught by Tim Sellers, who became an associate vice-president for academic programs last year.

As an undergraduate at Cornell University, Brown worked at the Finger Lakes National Forest identifying birds. Later, he worked as a field tech studying birds literally across the country, before completing master’s and doctoral work on the wood thrush, a migratory forest songbird, at the University of Delaware.

“We put bands on them, tracked who they mated with, what tree species they nested in, how high, etc. It piqued my interest in statistics,” he said.

As such, Brown is eager to offer an ornithology course, which he will teach this coming spring. While students are snowbound indoors, he’ll get them up to speed on taxonomy, the relationships of bird groups, their biology and ecology, and by the time the snow melts, students can get outside to put that knowledge to work.

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Admissions Counselor Aids Families After Irene

Published Sept. 2, 2011 at 5:53 p.m. by Rachel E. Dewey.

Charles Ackley Jr. of Walworth comes to the rescue on a regular basis.

Often, Ackley, an assistant director of admissions counseling, helps answer questions for high school students and their families as they consider whether Keuka may be the college where they want to earn their degree. He’ll visit high schools, malls hosting college fairs, and so on, offering information on courses of study, campus life and walking the student and family through the entire admissions process.

So when Ackley’s Army National Guard air aviation unit was called up for a service mission to aid victims of Hurricane/Tropical Storm Irene earlier this week, the coincidence was not lost that his unit was sent to aid the same region where Ackley’s college recruiting takes place.

Prattsville, N.Y., a town of about 700 people, lies south of Albany in the Catskill Mountains, Greene County, and was one of the state’s hardest hit by Irene’s heavy rains and wind, suffering massive flooding that swept away homes, obliterated bridges and nearly wiped the town off the map. Flooding was so severe that the Schoharie Creek, which runs through Prattsville, rose nearly 20 feet over several hours Sunday. The national news spotlight hit the tiny town when the U.S. National Guard rescued 21 people trapped on the second floor of a small motel amid rising floodwaters.

Ackley’s crew, part of the Fox Company, 1^st Division 169^th regiment, was stationed out of the Albany airport, logging 14-hour shifts to aid storm victims in Prattsville. His crew flew Black Hawk helicopters from Rochester to Albany, arriving Sunday to begin serving.

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Technology Collaborative Sparked by College Donations

Published June 21, 2011 at 12:12 p.m. by Rachel E. Dewey.

Without functional computers, it’s been tough for Rochester’s Freedom School to provide literacy, tutoring and life skills assistance to the 100 youth ages 5 – 18 utilizing its North Goodman Street center each week.

However, computer labs and classrooms at the Freedom School recently got an extreme makeover – a technology makeover. Thanks to a new partnership forged with Keuka College, some 55 miles to the south, students in the inner-city school program received 13 new or refurbished machines, and some of the technical support they need to succeed. When summer programs begin July 11, Freedom School students will get their first opportunities to begin putting the “new-to-them” machines to use.

Re-born in 1993 from a 60s-era Children’s Defense Fund project, Freedom Schools nationwide provide summer and after-school programming to boost literacy and student motivation to read, foster positive attitudes toward learning, and connect the needs of children and families to resources in their own communities. Each Freedom School has a five-fold focus: academic enrichment, leadership development through mentoring, nutritional and mental health, social action and civic engagement, and parent and family involvement. Rochester’s Freedom School opened in 2003 and is part of the city’s North East Development Project. It is the only Freedom School in central or upstate New York.

“They are very much in need in need of equipment and expertise,” said Martha French, associate professor of education at Keuka College and a doctoral student at the University of Rochester’s Warner School of Education. In a doctoral class last fall, French and classmates Nicole Fingland and Lisa Barton had to develop a project that met literacy learning needs and provided social justice. Because their professor, Joanne Larson, knew of the Freedom School, French and her classmates made a visit to see what needs the center might have. What they saw compelled them.

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