printer-friendly

take note

• (Above) Arnold Wedel ’47, North Newton, left, stands with Roy D. Unruh ’57, Cedar Falls, Iowa, and Hesston, and Wedel’s daughter, Suzanne Wedel ’76, Marblehead, Mass., at Bethel’s STEM Symposium, held in part to honor Arnold Wedel, professor emeritus of mathematics. Planners Dwight Krehbiel ’69, professor of psychology, and Richard Zerger ’69, professor of chemistry, hope to make the STEM Symposium an annual event.


• Bethel College hosted its first-ever STEM Symposium Oct. 5. STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, a grouping used by the U.S. National Science Foundation. At Bethel, STEM covers biology, chemistry, computer science, mathematics, pre-engineering, physics and psychology. About 150 Bethel students, alumni and visitors participated.


• Bethel is the highest ranked Kansas College in the national liberal arts category of the 2008 edition of “America’s Best Colleges” published by U.S. News & World Report.


• The Bethel College Library received two grants totaling $5,300 from the Kansas Library Network Board to help enhance the library’s interlibrary loan services. This is the 16th consecutive year the library has received one or more of these grants.


• Bethel graduates took the two top prizes in the undergraduate category of the 2007 John Horsch Mennonite Historical Essay Contest, sponsored by the Mennonite Church USA Historical Committee. Braden Hiebner ’07 took first place, and Robert Weaver ’07 took second.


• The Great Plains Consensus Council, a program of the Kansas Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution at Bethel College that focuses on public policy conflict and decision-making, was awarded a competitive, two-year contract by the Kansas Office of Judicial Administration to work with every Kansas judicial district in the state to help key players in child-in-need-of-care cases better understand how a juvenile permanency process might best work. The Consensus Council has developed a state-wide team for this work and will coordinate the entire project.


• The Student Life offices at Bethel College and Hesston College collaborated to bring Trent Wagler and the Steel Wheels to Bethel’s campus Oct. 1 in a concert planned as a fund-raiser for Greensburg tornado relief. The event raised $1,174.


• Adjunct music faculty member Kay Buskirk, a violist, received the first Daniel J. Sevart Award for Community Service from the Wichita Symphony Orchestra, with which she is beginning her 25th season. In 1994, Buskirk founded the Northeast Area Strings Academy of Wichita to work with less-privileged strings students of all ages. She has taught at Bethel since 2003.


• Brandon Kaufman, senior defensive back from Moundridge, finished the year ranked first in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for interceptions and second for both passes defended and punts returned, and was named KCAC Player of the Year. Kaufman, with 1.1 interceptions per game and a Bethel record of 9 interceptions for the season, was also named to the American Football Association-NAIA 2007 All-America Team.