Collegian 3.2.2023

Bertram wins best faculty adviser

By Micah Hart

Circulation Manager

Radio Station General Manager Scot Bertram won best faculty adviser at the Intercollegiate Broadcast System awards Feb. 25.

Along with Bertram’s win, Elena Lanning (formerly Naborowski) ’22, won Most Creative/Innovative Show for her program “Five Minute Myths.”

Although none of the students present at the ceremony won awards, they were thrilled to watch Bertram take home first prize, junior and finalist Abigail Snyder said.

“It was such a special moment when Mr. Bertram won first place because we would not be here without him,” Snyder said.“He puts so much work into helping us improve our shows both from the production side and the writing and editing side.”

It seemed as if the students’ excitement for Bertram surpassed his own joy, said sophomore and finalist Lauren Smyth.

“When he won the award, the whole table of Hillsdale students screamed so loudly that it made him jump because we were all so excited for him,” Smyth said.

Bertram said he wished the students received the recognition and awards.

“I ended up winning for best faculty adviser, which is really just a reflection on the students, the work that they do, and the dedication and the hard work that they put in,” Bertram said. “I’m lucky to be here among talented students who are driven to succeed, improve, take some constructive criticism, and take some direction with their shows, features, and newscasts.”

Pence visits campus, speaks on faith

By Lauren Scott Assistant Editor

Faith is the most important virtue for young students — faith in the American people, founding principles, and most importantly, in the Lord — former Vice President Mike Pence said in a speech at Hillsdale College on March 1.

“Faith remains the antidote to the decline of America,” Pence said.

Hillsdale College invited Pence to speak as part of the Drummond Lectures in Christ Chapel series.

Pence said we live in a freedom-loving country full of hardworking and generous people who see the world clearly and value common sense.

“Our challenge is to make the American government as good as the American people,” Pence said.

Pence told students to resist the temptation to put what is popular before timeless values. To students interested in becoming public servants, he told them to always hold true to conservative values.

“If you hold the banner of freedom, limited government, and traditional values, the American people will rally to your cause,” Pence said.

Dale Jones, a supporter of Hillsdale College from Illinois, attended the talk.

“It was a reminder of the things that we all have been taught, at least in my generation,” Jones said. “My dad was a World War II veteran, and I grew up knowing many WWII veterans, and we really had faith in this country and faith in the Constitution.”

Pence said if America is not leading the free world, the free world is not being led. History teaches that weakness arouses evil, he said.

“At a time when Russia is on the move in Eastern Europe, and China is menacing across the Asian Pacific, be a voice of your generation,” Pence said.

We must work and pray to restore the sanctity of life in America, Pence said. Our nation was founded on the belief that all people are endowed by the Creator with inalienable rights, the first being the right to life, he said.

“Speak without apology about the institution of traditional marriage,” Pence said. “Above all else, never give up on the right to life.”

Senior Sam Quinones said it was inspiring to hear Pence encourage students to have faith in America.

“It meant a lot coming from someone who’s been in the belly of the beast,” Quinones said.

Pence said Americans need to have faith in the principles of the American founding.

“Like many of the founding generation, I believe our founding documents were founded on the notion that all rights come from a higher authority,” Pence said. “The United States Constitution is the greatest charge for freedom in American history.”

Pence said there was once a time when all Americans understood and appreciated the Constitution, but now the left is trying to rewrite it and take away the First and Second Amendments.

“I encourage each one of you in this rising generation to take this time in your life to wrap your heart and your

Campus regains power after state-wide ice storm

By Lauren Scott Assistant Editor

Hillsdale College stu-

dents returned to classes Monday after a Feb. 22 ice storm caused power outages and canceled classes two consecutive days last week.

Kari Coupland, staff nurse at the Ambler Health and Wellness Center, was without power at her home for six days starting the evening of Feb. 22. She lives outside of Jonesville.

mind around the founding documents,” Pence said. “The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are not just your heritage, they’re the cornerstone of the greatest nation in the history of the world.”

Pence challenged students to become men and women of integrity. Despite a common misconception in the young generation that claims adversity creates character, Pence said adversity reveals character.

“I liked his emphasis on having faith in the American people and God,” sophomore Caleb Bigler said. “Faith is a hard thing to have right now, given the political climate, but he was really encouraging.”

According to Pence, it is easy to lose sight of faith in challenging times. He said the most important thing for Americans to remember is Proverbs 9:10: “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”

“Even when it doesn’t look like it, God is working in your life and mine and in the nation.”

Coupland said the power outage has not affected her work life, aside from the fact she is more tired from loading her wood-burning stove every five hours. She said her family put mattresses in front of the wood burning stove to stay warm throughout the night.

Vice President for Student Affairs Diane Philipp said the college waited to officially cancel classes until it became clear that power and heat would remain down for a significant amount of time.

“We knew there was a storm coming, but it was predicted to hit north of us,” Philipp said. “It is difficult to realize the outcome of bad weather as the disruption is happening, which is why we wait until we know more before canceling.”

The college made the decision to cancel classes early on the morning of Feb. 23 because the entire city was without power except buildings with generators, Philipp said. Classes were also canceled Feb. 24 as classroom buildings remained without power early Friday.

By Christian Peck-Dimit Associate Editor

Head coach John Tharp was honored for his 500th career win before the Hillsdale men’s basketball team buried the Cedarville Yellow Jackets, 87-57, in the quarterfinals of the G-MAC Tournament.

Tharp was given a painted game ball and a surprise tribute video from former players played on the big screen in Dawn Tibbetts Potter Arena.

“It was very emotional for me, a lot of those guys up on that screen have meant a great deal to me, those guys are like family to me,” Tharp said. “My wife and two of my three kids were there, so there’s a lot of people who have sacrificed a great deal to be a coach’s wife and a coach’s kid and stuff like that.”

Tharp remains the winningest coach in program history, and became the 17th active D2 men’s basketball coach to reach 500 wins.

“It’s an absolute blessing and honor to play for coach Tharp as a coach, but it’s also an incredible blessing to have him as a mentor and a leader and a friend, and to be a part of the family that he’s worked so hard and given so much for,” fifth year forward Kalthoff said.

After suffering backto-back losses to end their regular season, the Chargers dropped to the No.3 seed in the conference tournament, where they matched up with the Yellow Jackets for the second straight year.

During last year’s semi-finals game, a costly Charger turnover with five seconds left led to a last-second upset that knocked Hillsdale out of the tournament.

This year, however, balanced scoring and a strong second half helped the Chargers win only their second G-MAC tournament game in the last four years.

“I think we did a really good job, especially starting in the second half, guarding the three-point line,” fifth-year guard Jack Gohlke said. “In the first half they hit seven threes on us, which is what they do, they’re a very good shooting team, but in the second half we did a much better job of limiting their strengths in that regard.”

The team’s two starting fifth-years, Gohlke and Kalthoff, led the team in scoring in what will likely be the final home game of their careers, with 19 and 18 points respectively.

Symphony orchestra debuts Maxfield piece in Christ Chapel performance

By Maggie Hroncich Editor-In-Chief

The Hillsdale College Symphony Orchestra rehearsed through a city-wide power outage to perform the world premiere of “Every Leap Is Faith” on Feb. 25.

“Every composer wants each piece to have a long life ahead of it,” Composer Andrew Maxfield said. “And I think the performance is great. I think the piece is good, and I’m excited for it to find its way forward.”

After meeting Professor of Music James Holleman at a conference in 2018, Maxfield first visited campus in October 2022 for a Choral Evensong service, which he was commissioned to write. He then worked with Holleman on a grant application through the Barlow Endowment for Music Composition at Brigham Young University to compose the symphony.

“I had early ideas for it at the beginning of 2022,” Maxfield said of the symphony piece. “And I had the

first movement sketched out by summertime and then I wrote the second and third movement in late 2022, finishing the whole thing by Dec. 31. In fact, I wrote part of the second movement at Hillsdale in October when I was visiting for evensong.”

Holleman said this semester’s performance was two weeks earlier than usual, giving students less time to prepare their parts.

See Symphony B1

“It is always a challenge for the college to make the decision to cancel, and we do not like to cancel,” Philipp said. “Our purposes are to teach and learn and our faculty prepare carefully for every hour they teach, and it is not easy to make up that precious face-toface time in the classroom.”

Associate Director of Security and Emergency Management Joe Kellam said the college prioritized the Grewcock Student Union and Christ Chapel with a few generators. Since many students were without power, it was important for them to have a warm place to go, Kellam said.

“The entire Student Affairs staff, at different points throughout Wednesday night, were on campus checking in with the dorms and the different houses just to make sure that they were inside and they were staying warm enough,” Kellam said.

Because the outage left dorms and residence halls without heat, the college brought in emergency generators.

“Executive Director of Facilities David Billington made the decision to purchase additional generators as the extent of the disruption of power was more extensive this time and the generators were needed,” Philipp said.

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Former Vice President Mike Pence spoke on campus Wednesday. Jack Cote | Collegian

Composer Andrew Maxfield and Professor of Music, Choirs, and Orchestra James Holleman pose at the Feb. 25 concert.

Courtesy | Hanna Thompson

Alumnus Nick Tabor publishes debut book on environmental racism

By Maddy Welsh News Editor

A town in Alabama, inhabited by descendents of the last slave ship to arrive in America, is poor, polluted, and an example of “environmental racism,” writes alumnus Nick Tabor ’09 in a new book.

“This story gives us an opportunity to see how one thing has led to another, how the legacy of not just slavery and the slave trade, but the legacy of Reconstruction, the legacy of the Jim Crow era, how they’re still with us, often in physical ways,” Tabor said.

Tabor’s first book, “Africatown: America’s Last Slave Ship and the Community it Created,” came out through St. Martin’s Press Feb. 21. In its earlier days, Tabor said, Africatown had been a thriving industrial community, but today, it’s poor and riddled with pollution, which Tabor said appears to have led to a cancer epidemic.

Tabor was the news editor of The Collegian and has worked in journalism since he graduated, writing for publications including the Oxford American and New York Magazine. In 2019, he left New York Magazine and temporarily moved to Mobile, Alabama, to research and write his first book, a journalistic look into the

history and environment of Africatown, a neighborhood near Mobile.

He became fascinated with the town and its history after being assigned to write about it for New York Magazine in 2018.

“There was this book coming out called ‘Barracoon’ by Zora Neale Hurston that she had written in 1928, maybe ’29, thereabouts,” Tabor said.

“It did not get published in her lifetime, it was published five years ago. We were running an excerpt of it in New York mag, and my editor said, ‘you know, it’d be really nice if we could have a story alongside the excerpt about what happened to the descendants of Cudjo Lewis,’ who was the last survivor of the last slave ship that ever came to the U.S.”

He said it was difficult to track down the descendants and talk to them.

“The descendants had never really made themselves known,” Tabor said. “But I eventually did get one of them on the phone and he said, ‘you don’t need to be writing about the descendants. You need to be writing about the neighborhood. When I was a kid, it was this thriving place. But now it looks like a war zone.’”

After he wrote that story, Tabor became fascinated with Africatown, which was founded by the people

brought to America in 1860 on the Clotilda, the last ship to transport slaves to America. Descendants of people on that ship still live there today.

According to Tabor, the town is an example of environmental racism. While there are digestible books on other topics of America’s racial history, Tabor said, he noticed a gap in the same on environmental racism.

“There are some academic books that lay it out in a pretty comprehensive way, but I felt like there wasn’t anything out there for the general public that explained how this had developed and how it continues to plague a lot of communities today,” Tabor said. “It’s an element of American history that I think had not been, and maybe still has not really been, examined to the extent that it needs to be. This book is an attempt to remedy that.”

Kirkus Reviews praised “Africatown” as “a sharp portrait of a unique American town.”

“I wanted to explain in a way that was not polarizing but in a way that was utterly convincing, if not irrefutable, how racism still plays a role in people’s lives today,” Tabor said. “Because it’s not just a question of people’s attitudes and what’s in their hearts. It’s a question of, in this case, how cities are built — what goes where, how the geog-

raphy has been shaped, and who owns what and who has power.”

Chair and Professor of English Justin Jackson, who taught Tabor during his time at Hillsdale, said he is looking forward to reading the book.

“I read his article on Africatown a few years ago in New York Magazine, and it made me want to learn more. That’s a sign of good journalism,” Jackson said. “I’ve talked to him about his project several times now, and I’m excited to see how his living in the South for a couple of years helped him to develop and craft the story.”

Dean of Humanities and Professor of English Stephen Smith also taught Tabor and said he is a skillful writer.

“Nick is insightful and thorough,” Smith said. “He has a fine eye for truly telling details about his subject and human character. I look forward to reading his new book. Knowing Nick, it will be the first of many.”

Despite its heavy subject matter, Tabor said “Africatown” is not wholly a sad story.

“I will say, it’s also a hopeful story,” Tabor said. “There are elements of this story that bring out some of the better, some of the best aspects of American culture, too, and I think it enriches our understanding of our country.”

Mock Trial teams advance to next competition

By Megan Williams Culture Editor

For the first time in its history, all three Hillsdale College Mock Trial teams earned a bid to the Opening Round Championship Series on March 10.

The American Mock Trial Association’s competitive season consists of three qualifying tournaments: Regionals, Opening Round Championship Series, and Nationals.

Teams must place in the top percentage of the tournament to earn a bid and advance to the next competition.

“Having three teams in a position to earn bids to ORCS is a sign of program strength and depth that is an accurate reflection of the time and effort that all of the program’s students put into the competition,” coach Jonathan Church said.

Teams 1077 and 1078 competed at the Regional tournament at Michigan State University on the weekend of Feb. 9-11. Both groups fin-

Junior Anna Bassols said it was very helpful that maintenance installed generators because it made it possible to keep in touch with parents.

Although class cancellation is a rare practice at Hillsdale, students said they were not surprised the college canceled classes.

“If you asked me Wednesday afternoon if I thought that class would get canceled the next day, I’d say that sounded absurd,” senior Rachel Warren said. “But by around 4 p.m., I could tell the conditions were not good and after the power outage that night, I wasn’t surprised to see the email Thursday morning that class was canceled.”

Because the power outage affected so many across southern Michigan, students knew the likelihood of canceling class was high.

“Everyone was really glad that classes were canceled,” Bassols said. “I know that Hillsdale waits until the last second to cancel classes, but with all the chaos and many professors commuting in from out of town, this was definitely

Shooting sports center to add new lodgings

By Logan Washburn City News Editor

The college will build eight new cottages for visitors of the John A. Halter Shooting Sports Center.

“We think of it as definitely mission-oriented,” Chief Administrative Officer Rich Péwé said. “Everybody that’s coming to the range, we’re certainly trying to expose them to the ideas of freedom and intelligent patriotism.”

The school has almost finished the first cottage, Péwé said, and it will be completed by May 1. Officials have secured funding for three more in the immediate future and are planning four more.

The first cottage will feature a common living room, surrounded by four bedrooms, according to Péwé. Each bedroom will have its own closet and bathroom, and a door opening onto an outdoor covered patio.

and Conference Center. She said the center will host CCA guests and members of the USA Shooting Olympic team.

“We have a large demand,” she said.

Péwé said the housing will allow the college to host more events at the center, potentially including concealed carry classes, Constitution courses, and global shooting competitions.

“I actually have a bid in for a grand prix next year, and a world cup,” Péwé said. “That would allow us to host international folks and sell beds for those competitions, as well.”

The first cottage cost the college around $685,000, Péwé said. Construction cost $635,000, and furnishings cost $50,000, but the shooting center’s next cottages may bring different costs.

ished with a record of 5-2-1, earning them honorable mentions at the award ceremony and top positions on the open bid list. Sophomores Abigail Wagoner, Natalie LeBlanc, and freshman Patrick McDonald all earned awards for their performances that weekend.

Church said the teams’ performances at this tournament were particularly impressive because of the number and quality of other teams competing in Lansing. With only 13 teams participating, there was a higher probability of facing some of the best mock trial programs in the country.

“With such a small field, teams 1077 and 1078 had to face off against teams like Michigan State and Case Western’s A squads that have been to nationals recently,” Church said.

Competing against highly-ranked teams, LeBlanc said the weekend was emotionally charged. The tournament’s high-level of skill made it

the safest option.”

While the college has canceled class for bad weather in the past, it is rare, and Philipp said this situation was unique.

“Typically the roads and sidewalks are a much bigger issue. This time it was the power lines and ice buildup in the trees, which can be dangerous on our campus where we enjoy so many large trees,” Philipp said. “It can take just seconds for a large limb to fall, which can be very dangerous.”

Kellam said security realized the danger of the falling limbs even before the power outage, and officers on duty encouraged students who were outside to find shelter.

“But the power outage changed things. We started looking at all the buildings and the facilities to make sure that the students were staying warm,” Kellam said. “From there, we were telling students to go inside.”

Philipp said the college was told a major city transformer blew, which interrupted power extensively across campus and throughout the city.

The multiple transformers that blew on campus were related to a supply line in Coldwater, Hillsdale’s main

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even more impressive for team 1078 to win a bid to ORCs for the first time.

“I don’t think team 1078 understood what they accomplished because it was the first time that our ‘B’ and ‘C’ teams have both gotten bids,” said LeBlanc, a member of the 1077 team. “So it was a really exciting experience. Very emotional, but super exciting.”

LeBlanc said camaraderie and trust amongst the teams led them to perform well all season, especially at competitive tournaments when the season was on the line.

“I was just thinking about all the seniors on our team,” LeBlanc said. “We have three: Gabriel Powell, Ethan Tong, and Johannah Freyenhagen. Our performance stopped being about ourselves and became about doing it for the seniors and the rest of our team.”

While the Hillsdale community was recovering from the power outages, team 1076 placed first at the Wheaton College Regional tournament

supply station, that went down, according to Kellam.

“That power surge then sent a series of transformers being blown all the way into this area,” Kellam said.

According to Kellam, security communicated with senior college staff throughout the night.

The ice on the power lines caused a number of poles and power lines to break. Replacing poles takes much longer when the ground is frozen, Kellam said.

On the night of Feb. 22, the sewer pump at the bottom of the hill by Slayton Arboretum also broke, Philipp said. The city had a crew for two days in that area to avoid a sewer back up at the college.

Students spent the days off in a variety of ways.

Warren said she saw many students remain calm Thursday, treating the day off as a fun snow day. She said her roommate brought out her Keurig so they could make coffee, and they hooked up their Wii and invited friends over to play Mario Kart.

“Noon Mass at St. Anthony’s was also memorable, because although they didn’t have power, Mass went on by candle-

from Feb. 25-26. Sophomore Abby Davis won an attorney award, and junior Caleb Sampson earned both an attorney and witness award for his performances this past weekend. Davis credited the program’s success to their hard work and love of the material.

“As a program this year, everyone on all three teams is unusually excited about working on mock trial,” Davis said. “People take their own initiative to go read case law on their own and run their material 18 times, which is part of the reason why we have three bids this year.”

The Opening Round Championship Series allows only two teams from each school to compete at the tournament. Teams 1076 and 1077 are using the next two weeks to prepare, hoping to get a bid to nationals.

“It’s going to be a lot of hard work, and it’s going to be exhausting, but I know it will be so rewarding, just like it is every time,” LeBlanc said.

light, and it was so quaint and lovely,” Warren said.

Junior Chris Dick said the Suites had a meat party where everyone brought their meat that would have expired and grilled it outside.

“Because our off-campus students and Greek houses had no power, and because there were no dining places or grocery stores open the first 24 plus hours, Metz prepared enough food to feed every student,” Philipp said. Dick said students had access to the cafeteria. He said the food on Thursday was not bad considering the power was lost.

“It was your average fried food and pizza,” Dick said. “It went quickly, as people who went closer to noon were only able to get burgers.”

Much credit and thanks belongs to the college’s maintenance crew and food service staff as they worked hard for hours keeping students safe, warm, and fed, Philipp said.

See

According to Barbie Keiser, the center’s manager of guest and event services, the college has begun excavations for the rest of the cottages, which will form a crescent behind the AccuSport Lodge.

“We have a lot of visitors that come to campus, and we only have 36 hotel beds,” Péwé said. “Primarily it will be tied in with the Halter Center’s schedule, to support the events that are taking place at Halter throughout the year. There’ll be a lot of programming that will ultimately be possible when we have housing out there.”

Kaiser said the project will offer 32 beds at the shooting center, nearly matching the capacity of the Dow Hotel

One trustee funded the cottage that is almost complete, and according to Péwé, three more trustees are funding the next three buildings. The college is currently taking bids from construction companies to work on this next phase of the project.

Head Shotgun Coach Jordan Hintz said he is unsure how the housing will immediately affect the team but is optimistic about its longterm benefits.

“Having extra housing available, especially on-site, should be massive for events at Halter. More and bigger events means better opportunities for prospectives to come visit,” Hintz said. “Hosting events of a higher caliber shows our commitment to the sport.”

Awards from A1

This trip to New York was the radio team’s since COVID-19 closures.

“It was our first time in New York since 2020, just before everything shut down due to the pandemic and in the last two conventions, in 2021 and 2022 were remote only, Zoom only,” Bertram said. “It was nice to reconnect with some people that we hadn’t seen in person for a couple of years, and then actually return to what turned out to be a better venue for the event.”

The group of finalists competed in seven different categories, Bertram said.

In two categories, Hillsdale College students secured two of the five finalist spots.

Smyth and Snyder rivaled

each other in the Best Specialty Show Non-Music category.

Snyder, who takes listeners through Israel in her show “Virtual Voyage,” said she enjoyed being in the city for the first time and learning from some of the best in the field.

“You’re getting to hear from top executives within these industries in New York City or from across the country,” Snyder said. Smyth said the awards show was surreal.

“It was just really cool to go on a trip to New York for an award ceremony,” Smyth said. “That’s something that I lie awake and think about doing sometimes at night, so to actually get to do it was really cool.”

Outage from A1

A6 for how outages affected Hillsdale county and B6 for how students spent the days off.

Courtesy | Rich Péwé

Hillsdale students and Scot Bertram traveled to New York for the IBS awards ceremony.

Courtesy | Alex Nester

Visiting speaker discusses foreign relations

By Tayte Christensen Collegian Freelancer

This past Tuesday, Hillsdale’s Alexander Hamilton society hosted a presentation about Japan, China, and the United States. Zach Cooper, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute specializing in U.S. strategy in Asia, was the visiting speaker.

His speech focused on the relationship between Japan and the United States and the importance of their alliance historically and in the present day.

“1990s literature framed Japan as the United States’s number one enemy,” Cooper said. “The worry was that Japan was jumping in front of the United States, and it was this increasingly adversarial relationship.”

Today, the relationship is different, said Cooper.

“Japan is the most important ally to the United States by quite a bit,” Cooper said, “they are the only country with the same interests and desires as the United States, and are equally as capable of committing to these things as the United States.”

He focused on Japan being the best ally for the U.S. in four categories: Security, Economics, Technology, and Global Government.

“There has been a pretty remarkable shift coming from Japan within the past two years when it comes to matters of security, trade, and values within the government,” Cooper noted, arguing that this makes them a good ally for the U.S.

Conner Bolanos, senior and president of the Alexander Hamilton Society said the Alexander Hamilton Society board was interested in bringing a new perspective to campus through Cooper.

“Japan is this kind of overshadowed, overlooked ally,” Bolanos said, “and Dr. Cooper really focuses on Japan and Asiatic strategy, and with China being, I think, the biggest geo-political challenge to the U.S. in the coming years, he provides Hillsdale with a different perspective and a different outlook than we usually get here on campus.”

For many students, the main take-away from the speech was the importance of Japan as an ally to the United States.

“I had never thought before about how essential Japan is to the U.S., but, like Dr. Cooper said, it is really clear that they are our biggest ally–even bigger than Britain, because they do not have the technological or, really, the military capacity that Japan now has,” freshman and Alexander Hamilton Society board member Marc Ayers said.

“This is an issue that I think a lot about, and I was interested in learning more,” said freshman Porter Jihaad, “it is interesting to consider how much of an important ally Japan is to the United States and our fight against China.”

Ultimately, Bolanos hopes that students walk away with a better idea of international relations and are better informed on the alliance between the United States and Japan.

“We focus a lot on NATO and on Europe, and we study Western Civilization and the classics, so that’s where our attention is drawn to,” he said, “but if the United States wants to deal with these regional threats–whether it be Russia, or, in this case, China–the United States needs to work with regional allies like Japan.”

Q&A: Outstanding senior man and woman

By Moira Gleason Collegian Reporter

Seniors Colton Duncan and Lucy Cuneo were nominated by their peers and selected by faculty as the Outstanding Senior Man and Woman of the class of 2023. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

Colton Duncan

Duncan is a double major in classics and international business studies from Cincinnati, Ohio.

What was your initial reaction to being named Outstanding Senior Man, and what does that mean for you?

I have been joking around that I think people heard “senior” and mistakenly thought, “Who’s the oldest undergrad I know?”

But really, I think it’s a testimony to my good friends that I have around campus.

Is there something that you were able to accomplish at Hillsdale that you never thought you would?

Learning how to do a backflip at age 29. Although, I did the backflip for mock rock and then got injured, so I guess I haven’t really learned that yet.

In what areas of your life has Hillsdale challenged you?

Hillsdale has definitely challenged me intellectually. I don’t mean just academically, but also my conversations with my friends. Getting these different perspectives from people who think through things very seriously and who might disagree with me. That’s been one of the challenging and beneficial things for me.

What has been your favorite tradition or event at Hillsdale?

After Niedfeldt won Mock Rock for the first time in 2021, we were all celebrating in the lobby and then we started inviting people over. It turned

out to be this massive party in the lobby of Niedfeldt to the point where we had to open up the space in the house director suite and in some areas to the side. So many people were there, and it was just such a fun celebration. Everyone was so stoked. We’ve continued doing that every year, and it’s been just a really wonderful follow up to the end of homecoming week.

Do you have any advice for underclassmen?

Just go on casual dates. Don’t make things complicated. Don’t try to exist in the realm of some weird and bizarre platonic friendship. Just ask her out on a casual date. Or alternatively, let him ask you out on a date. Just doing a first date, you’re not committing to marry them. You are just wanting to get to know them better and build that foundation of friendship which is the ground of every healthy relationship.

What is a piece of advice that you got at Hillsdale that sticks with you?

Mike Harner, toward the beginning of my time here said “don’t quit” in the most intense way that I have ever heard. And since then, I have not quit things that I’ve done simply because I’ve been afraid to quit them.

How do you cultivate dorm culture as an RA?

The first way to foster strong dorm culture is to live in Niedfeldt. Since that’s not possible for everyone, dorm culture is simply a matter of intentional presence to the people around you. You don’t have to do extra things for the dorm. You simply have to do the things you do but within the context of the community. It’s a matter of mindfully living together with other people.

Lucy Cuneo

Lucy Cuneo is a Classics major with a concentration in Classical Education.

What was your initial reaction to being named Outstanding Senior Woman, and what does that mean for you?

It’s a huge honor, to be sure. I know and love all the people who were nominated. I was just grateful to be numbered among such wonderful people.

What are some of your favorite memories at Hillsdale?

My friend group freshman year set what I think is the record for the most people around a Saga table: 18 people. We were that friend group.

What’s one thing that you accomplished at Hillsdale but didn’t plan to?

I came into Hillsdale really interested in helping out in the special education community because my sister has Down Syndrome and I wanted to give back. I wanted to hang out with kids with disabilities and help the community, but I didn’t anticipate taking a leadership role in GOAL volunteering. My junior year, I became the coordinator, and now I’m the director of GOAL. It’s been such a huge blessing to connect people with so many volunteering opportunities and really get involved and help the community both on the college campus and in the town.

What do you think you will miss the most about Hillsdale after you graduate?

I will miss the utter chaos that is AJ’s and trying to do homework there and being bombarded by friends. Also being in the library and seeing random friends here and there, even if it’s 1 a.m. and you’re frantically finishing an essay. There’s still sweet community there.

What was your favorite class at Hillsdale?

I took a summer class with Dr. Jackson called Reading Biblical Narratives. It’s only offered during the summer. It’s a fascinating look at the Hebrew Bible and the Old Testament, reading it as a piece of litera-

ture, not necessarily through a Christian lens. We looked at storytelling tropes, Hebrew poeticism, parallelism, and the Psalms. It changed how I read the Bible.

In what areas of your life has Hillsdale challenged you the most?

Hillsdale challenged me the most in my faith life. I’m Eastern Orthodox, and the Orthodox Christian Fellowship on campus is really strong and thriving. Coming from a very small Christian school to a bigger Christian school has opened up conversations between Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox, and challenged me to think more about what I believe.

What is one thing you want to say to other students at Hillsdale?

I want people to have an appreciation for the importance of service through volunteering your time because we’ve just received so many blessings throughout our time here. I think it’s really important to put our faith and our convictions in action and serve others in the community, whether at your church youth group, or through raking leaves for an elderly woman or hanging out with a girl with Down Syndrome and telling jokes for an hour. It’s really important to look outside yourself and act on your convictions.

How do you hope that people at Hillsdale will remember you?

I mean, that’s the goal of humankind, the transitory dream of humans to be remembered. Gilgamesh, all he wants is to be remembered by others. And I would say that I don’t expect to be remembered, and that’s OK. But maybe for my friends who are here, my goal is to just love them and make them laugh and make their day a little easier. So maybe for the next two classes I can be remembered for that.

Deans give fewer students off-campus permission

By Lauren Scott Assistant Editor

Fewer students than usual received permission to move off campus next school year, according to Dean of Women Rebekah Dell.

The Deans sent an email Feb. 20 to students granted off-campus permission. Most of the recipients will be seniors next school year. The number of Hillsdale students enrolled minus the campus beds determines the number of off-campus spots granted, said Dell.

“On the women’s side, we let a good chunk of juniors off campus, and it sounds like we will soon for the men,” Dell said.

The deans are unsure how many more juniors will receive off-campus permission since they do not know how many students will decline, Dell said. Students have until March 3 to accept or deny permission. Off-campus permission is granted based first on high school graduation year, and second on Hillsdale College credits.

CCA IV to cover Big Pharma, health

By Victoria Wagner Collegian Reporter

The rise of the modern pharmaceutical industry is the focus of next week’s Center for Constructive Alternatives lecture series. Big Pharma is the second and final CCA of the semester, running from Sunday, March. 5 to Wednesday, March 8.

According to the CCA website, the series of lectures will focus on topics spanning from the opioid epidemic to the COVID-19 pandemic response. It will present problems with American healthcare, as well as proposed reforms.

The lectures feature topics on American healthcare, Anthony Fauci, Pfizer, and the opioid epidemic. Featured speakers include John Abramson of Harvard Medical School and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., nephew of former U.S. President John F. Kennedy.

“I am looking forward to learning more about Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s knowledge on the corruption of Big Pharma

and Anthony Fauci,” freshman Victoria Rossmiller said.

Junior Aruna Harihara said she wants to learn about the relationship of healthcare and economics.

“I’m excited to learn more about how prices for various healthcare services have increased since the pandemic,” Harihara said. “I’m excited to learn how the economy and the medical industry go hand-in-hand to create a market and solutions to lower the costs of these services.”

Sophomore Abigail Gilreath said she looks forward to hearing expert opinions on Big Pharma.

“I’m looking forward to hearing different perspectives on big pharma,” Gilreath said. “I feel like so much information has come out since Covid and, as someone interested in going to medical school, I’m interested in hearing what different professionals have to say about it.”

Registration for the CCA is above maximum capacity.

“It preserves the ability for an older student to get off before a younger student,” Dell said. “One thing that we’ve always said is we’ll always be committed to making sure seniors get off campus, but beyond that those numbers are dependent on campus housing numbers and enrollment.”

Sophomore Daniel Molter applied for off-campus housing and was denied permission.

“I think the dorms are fantastic for freshmen and sophomores who want to get

to know more people,” Molter said. “ I just think it’s a little bit frustrating to not be granted the privilege to be off campus for my junior year.”

Dell said it is the deans’ responsibility to fill the campus beds because it is part of the business operations of the college.

“That’s what helps us maintain dorms,” Dell said.

Sophomore Clare Wildern received off-campus permission and said she is thrilled about it.

“It’ll allow me to do more for myself like cooking and

cleaning, and I’ll learn how to deal with leases, which is a real life lesson,” Wildern said. “I’m super surprised because I’m a rising junior, and I wasn’t expecting it.”

Junior Emily Swartz received off-campus permission after living on campus for three years. “Off campus living allows for fellowship among students and encourages responsibility for life after college,” Swartz said.

Federalist society to host Judge Duncan

By Jane Kitchen Assistant Editor

The Federalist Society will host its first event of the semester discussing the American legal system this evening at 7 p.m. in the Hoynack Room.

The event features two speakers with professional experience in courts of appeals. Judge Kyle Duncan serves on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and attorney Marc Ayers is a partner at Bradley, a national law firm.

The first portion of the event will be a casual conversation with Ayers and Duncan focused on the reasons they chose to enter the legal profession and the kind of work they do now. The second portion will be an audience Q&A.

The conversation will allow students to learn from distinguished professionals in the legal field, Professor of Philosophy and Religion and Director of the Pre-Law program Nathan Schlueter said.

“The Federal Circuit Courts of Appeal are the second highest level courts in the land, so that’s an extremely prestigious and

important legal position to be in – very influential, very consequential,” Schlueter said. “And Judge Duncan has a very distinguished career defending the sorts of things that we believe in here at Hillsdale, especially religious liberty and the rule of law.”

Junior Curtis Herbert, president of the Federalist Society, said appellate courts make significant contributions to the development of jurisprudence. He hoped the event would draw attention to the importance of their role in the legal system more broadly.

“In class, if we talk about a judicial opinion, it’s almost always from the Supreme Court,” Herbert said. “So we thought it’d be great to give people a chance to learn about the courts of appeals and the role that they play since a lot of the time they don’t quite get the attention they deserve.”

Herbert said he was looking forward to the different points of view Ayers and Duncan will be able to share.

“Part of why we’re so excited is we’ve got a judge and an attorney who are each going to offer different perspectives on what the appellate process is like,”

Herbert said.

Schlueter, who serves as the faculty adviser to the Federalist Society, said he met Ayers and Duncan by chance several semesters ago and invited them to speak in the future.

“I was standing in line for some parents’ event next to two very tall people, and we introduced ourselves to one another – they were together I was just there in line, and it turned out that they were two prospective parents, and one was a judge at the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, and one was a prominent appellate attorney,” Schlueter said. “And so that was very exciting, Hillsdale is really privileged to have parents of that kind of prominence.”

Ducan said he welcomed the opportunity to speak to students who might be interested in pursuing careers in law.

“I’m looking forward to talking to students about the important—though limited—role the federal judiciary plays in our constitutional republic,” Duncan said. “More than that, though, I’m looking forward to talking with the students, hearing their questions, and trying to answer them accurately.”

Lucy Cuneo and Colton Duncan pose together outside the president’s office. Courtesy | Lucy Cuneo

Opinions

Online : www.hillsdalecollegian.com

Editor-in-Chief | Maggie Hroncich

Associate Editor | Christian Peck-Dimit

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Outreach Director | Hannah Cote

News Editor | Maddy Welsh

Opinions Editor | Elyse Apel

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Sports Editor | Isaac Green

Culture Editor | Megan Williams

Features Editor | Meghan Schultz

Science & Tech Editor | Ally Hall

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Assistant Editors | Linnea Shively | Michaela Estruth | Lauren Scott

| Olivia Hajicek | Tess Owen | Olivia Pero | Thomas McKenna | Jane

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The editors welcome Letters to the Editor but reserve the right to edit submissions for clarity, length, and style. Send submissions to the Opinions

Editor at ehawkins@hillsdale.edu before Saturday at 3 p.m.

The Collegian Weekly

The opinion of The Collegian editorial staff

Everybody should participate in Lent

This spring, you should make the effort to sit down and commit to Lent. No matter what you believe, Lent can be a time of spiritual renewal and recommitment to living a purposeful and God-centered life.

Lent, the 40 days leading up to Easter, has been set aside by many different Christian denominations as a perennial time of joyful

sorrow and remembrance of Christ’s death and resurrection.

Whether you are Catholic, Anglican, non-denominational, or Orthodox, this Lent can be a perfect time for you to recenter your life on the things that really matter.

Unfortunately, many people take Lent as merely an opportunity to make a

dream list of New Year-type resolutions.

St. Seraphim of Sarov said, “Only good deeds done for the sake of Christ bear the fruit of the Holy Spirit.”

We shouldn’t just use this as a time to rack up a list of good deeds or habits formed, but instead turn our hearts outward towards others and God.

This Lent, we should approach it as a chance not solely for self-improvement or an opportunity to make ourselves better, but out of a genuine desire to spend these next few weeks seeking to deepen our relationship with God in an intentional and thoughtful way.

Christians should yearn for revival It is time for our money to follow our opinions

By Quinn Delamater

A phenomenon occurred at a small Christian college in Wilmore, Kentucky last month. What started out as a handful of students staying for prayer and worship after a chapel service progressed into what became ongoing worship for days on end, attracting over 50,000 visitors.

We cannot control or dictate when God invokes a revival, or what that should or will look like. While we may have preconceived notions or judgements toward what an ideal revival should be, our utmost concern should be examining our own hearts and praying in such a way that aligns our desires with that of the Lord’s.

Defined by Jonathan Edwards, the main proponent of the “Great Awakening” revival in early America, revival is “a glorious and wonderful working of God when the Spirit of God is poured out in a far greater and more glorious measure.”

On the evening of Feb. 8, Asbury University students flocked to the auditorium where a message was delivered by Zach Meerkreebs, a graduate of Asbury’s seminary program. Afterwards, some students stayed to worship. For the next 16 days, the university held consecutive worship services. Many students from other colleges in the Midwest arrived, as well as international visitors. Headlines such as “Did Asbury spark the next Great Awakening?” and “Hearts Strangely Warmed at Asbury” and even a title suggesting that what was happening at the school is the “‘Latter Rain’ before Jesus’ Return” began to surface. The idea of a “revival” going on at Asbury University caught popularity like wildfire.

NBC News wrote, “The set up inside the sanctuary was ‘simple.’ Rather than facilitating the use of a lot of technology, the worship atmosphere was very simplistic, involving many lifting up in their hands in praise and partaking in prayer.

According to The Week, Asbury ended the “public worship services” on Feb. 20, but continued to facilitate services for their students through Feb. 23. However, on Feb. 24, “no further public Outpouring services [would] be held on Asbury’s campus.”

Alexandra Presta, the editor for Asbury University’s newspaper, told Relevant Magazine, “We want to expand it, but it just isn’t sustainable for our university to keep hosting. We don’t

want to hoard it, because the Holy Spirit’s not limited to Hughes Auditorium. The Holy Spirit’s everywhere we go, and you can have a revival right in your living room if you’re willing to lean into His love and His grace.”

The so-called Asbury Revival has garnered great attention by believers and unbelievers throughout the nation. Many Hillsdale students have recognized some similarities between Hillsdale College and Asbury University, such as the number of students enrolled at both, and both schools identifying as private Christian institutions.

We should long to see revival. Revival is something that presents a unique opportunity through the simple means of reading and hearing the Word of God as well as worshiping that souls are won for his kingdom.

As Christians, we should desire to see God working in the hearts of people turning to Jesus. We are called as believers to be optimistic in hope and expectation that God is working in the lives of his children, and “that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father,” as Philippians 2:10-11 says.

Designed in God’s image, we are called as His children to seek the heart of God above all else. And when we do this, God promises us complete fulfillment and restoration in him, whatever that may look like. As Jeremiah 29:13 says, “You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.”

Privileged with a wonderful community of believers, insightful faculty, and a beautiful chapel all right here on campus, Hillsdale students are blessed with an environment that allows us to immerse ourselves in seeking the will of God rather than our own, and serve as an encouragement to the secular world to do so as well.

Whether we participate in week-long consecutive worship services attracting thousands or not, we are still called to ultimately pursue the heart of God, and to bring him glory by professing faith, waiting and ready for whatever he may ask of us.

Quinn Delamater is a freshman studying the liberal arts.

By Hannah Tully

Think of all the products you use on a typical day. From clothing to food to entertainment, you rely daily on a wide variety of companies for pleasure. While Starbucks, Amazon, and Nike in themselves seem harmless, the corporations support organizations that directly contradict the convictions of many students on campus.

When students choose to support companies that don’t align with their values, they are behaving inauthentically. The source of moral tension can arise from several different areas. Some students might disagree with Disney’s stance on LGBTQ+ issues and its donations to organizations that promote LGTBQ+ ideologies to children. Others might object to Starbucks’ promise to pay for their employees to travel out of state for abortions. Some might avoid Nike because of its alleged reliance on forced labor in China.

Objections like these hold merit. As humans, we can easily spot deficiencies in others and feel noble in pointing them out. But berating these companies without taking any other action is virtue signaling. It costs no effort or discomfort to talk badly about an unethical

business, and it makes one seem more righteous than others. Without a change in action, though, this condemnation lacks authenticity.

When a politician flies in a private jet to a conference on climate change, we quickly call him out for his hypocrisy. Yet Hillsdale students behave the same way when, unwilling to give up their comfort, they continue to benefit from companies that don’t align with their values. Such separation between belief and behavior shows the weakness of our conviction in the face of slight discomfort. Because we don’t take the time to research every single company or product we use, it’s easy to accidentally support a business whose values contradict ours. We could not boycott every immoral corporation unless we isolated ourselves from the world. But once we realize that a company supports organizations that directly oppose our values, we cannot morally continue to support their business. We can no longer claim ignorance but must instead take responsibility for our actions and decide whether we will live out our convictions. Ultimately, giving up a service or pleasure for the sake of conscience will bring greater peace than compromising our values.

Demonstrating our values through action, we can live honestly and faithfully in a world filled with insincerity and inconsistency.

Although Hillsdale has a reputation for equipping students to serve in political or advocacy work, not every student will choose this path. The wide range of talents and interests on campus contribute to the unique culture of Hillsdale and can be honed to fill a variety of needs in the world after college. For students who want to make an impact yet don’t want to pursue a career in politics or advocacy, conscientious spending can be a simple way of making a difference. Regardless of whether a boycott financially affects a corporation, it can be used to raise awareness. By refusing to spend money on a corporation that contradicts his values, a student can encourage those around him to think about their own lives and how their values and behaviors align.

While this sort of living might sound legalistic to some, it actually will benefit your everyday life. Being conscientious with where you spend your money will inevitably help you to avoid squandering it and to start saving it. Disney+ costs between $6 and $15 a month. If you chose to cancel your

subscription, you would save up to $180 a year. Consider how much you could save this year by boycotting even just five companies whose values you disagree with.

If the thought of giving up your subscription to Disney+ sounds miserable, first consider that people have lived for thousands of years without TV. But giving up Disney+ does not mean you have to forgo all entertainment. Subscription services such as Movies Plus and Pure Flix offer a wide variety of content for a similar price. Additionally, students can use the app PublicSq. to discover local businesses that support their values and offer conservative alternatives to the services of woke corporations.

As Hillsdale students, we all sign the Honor Code, in which we promise to be “honest in word and deed.” When we support companies that directly violate our highest values, we are not fulfilling that pledge to the college, to each other, or ourselves.

Hannah Tully is a freshman studying the liberal arts.

By Christian Peck-Dimit

As students begin their internship search, they face a key question: Is an unpaid internship worth it?

This is a question they should never have to answer. The department of labor should ban unpaid internships just like they banned child labor.

For college students, internships are a necessity. They have become so intertwined with the idea of employment that since 2013, at least 60% of each graduating class participated in some form of internship during their time in college, according to the National Association of Colleges and Employers

Because nearly 70% of employers later offer their interns full-time jobs, and students who completed an internship are 15% less likely to be unemployed in their first post-graduate years than those who did not, many students see internships as a worthwhile investment, even if they have to work for free.

With these pressures and opportunities weighing on them, as many as a million Americans work for nothing each year. In 2019, more than 43% of internships in America were unpaid.

Many students want so badly to fill out their resume that they pass up the estimated opportunity cost of $12,986 in order to work, quite literally, for free.

Some students, like me, are unable to afford such an

ployers know that many are desperate enough to work for nothing. This leaves students in a manipulative form of volunteering, where interns’ efforts earn them no income.

On top of this, unpaid internships are, on average, less likely to advance a student’s career. In 2019, paid internships were 34% more likely than unpaid ones to lead to at least one job offer after graduation.

opportunity cost, and end up taking a second job. My unpaid position forced me to take up a job at a local Qdoba, which pushed my total working hours north of 60 almost every week. These grueling weeks, however, were a necessity, as I couldn’t afford to lose the in-field experience I was receiving at my internship.

Most companies rely on student’s fears, like the ones I had, so that they can save a couple thousand dollars every summer. Stressed-out college students serve as the only demographic for unpaid internships because em-

There is no reason why the department of labor allows this kind of unpaid labor to exist under the guise of offering interns valuable experience. First, the majority of unpaid interns spend their days taking coffee orders, answering phones, and making copies. The Economic Policy Institute found that many top business internships offered “no explicit academic or training component.” This work, while shameless and, often, thankless, should not be made illegal.

Second, this should apply doubly to unpaid interns who are gaining real experience they desire in their field of study. If they are genuinely acquiring valuable experience, then they are also providing real labor for their employers, and bringing in real value to the company. This alone should be enough

reason to reward them monetarily for their efforts.

Personally, in the summer before my junior year, at my internship I found all of the real-world experience that I had hoped for, and much more.

While I was more than willing to put in the 60-plus hour work weeks that were required of my two jobs, there is no reason why this should have to be the reality for many students like me, when the solution lies, very simply, with offering a fair wage to your workers.

Interns, no matter how small their task, are still employees, and deserve the same right to pay as any fulltime worker. The department of labor should not allow employers to take advantage of free workers by offering to fill out a line on a resume.

Interns across the nation are more than aware that they hold no job security, and neither legal nor health benefits, don’t allow monetary gain to be taken off of the table too, and make unpaid internships illegal.

Christian Peck-Dimit is a senior studying history and journalism. He is associate editor at the Collegian.

“Unpaid internships are less likely to advance a student’s career”

Biden should advocate for the American people

By Erin Osborne

It is commendable for world leaders to visit a war zone. Winston Churchill walked the streets of London during the Blitz. Abraham Lincoln gave his Gettysburg Address mere months after one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War. These visits have something in common: the world leaders’ countries were at war with those responsible for the destruction.

President Joe Biden visited Ukraine on Feb. 20. According to the U.S. Department of Defense, the United States has committed $24.9 billion in military equipment, money, and training to Ukraine so far.

Biden has refused to visit the community of East Palestine, Ohio, which has been ravaged from the emission of dangerous chemicals into the atmosphere. Biden visited the U.S.-Mexico border more than two years after be-

coming president, and even then, he visited a sanitized version of the border, rather than a struggling community ravaged by drug cartels.

Three of the five paragraphs in Biden’s press statement about the tragic Michigan State University shooting on Feb. 13 express his own political agenda, rather than console the grieving families and communities involved.

Biden is no Lincoln speaking while surrounded by the graves of his men. He is not Churchill, walking in the ravaged streets of London, or Reagan, imploring the international community to seek peace and unity.

Biden chose to ignore the struggles of his own citizens, in favor of the adoration of the international community and thunderous applause. Every politician wants approval. But every politician must face the problems that his citizens suffer from. He cannot ignore his country in favor of stirring

Letter to the Editor:

Hillsdale should not stop classes for power outages

By Josiah Lippincott

Dear editor,

Liberal education is essential work. Indeed, the transmission of humane learning—which means the preservation of civilization—is, perhaps, the most essential work in our time.

Hillsdale College, in an age of vapid and vicious ideology, stands out as one of the last bastions of such education.

Therefore, we ought to take every precaution and make every effort that teaching and learning continue—regardless of external circumstances.

This last week, when campus lost power for two days, classes were shut down. This was not necessary. Plato did not need air conditioning to write “The Republic.” Locke did not need Wi-Fi to write “The Second Treatise.” Thomas Jefferson did not need the lightbulb to write “The

Declaration of Independence.”

Indeed, for the first decades of its existence, even Hillsdale College did not need electricity to transmit the higher learning it prizes so deeply. The first city gas company did not form until 1871 and the town only purchased the electric power generator from F.W. Stock in 1915.

Liberal education does not depend on modern technology to exist. It can make it easier or, at least, more comfortable. But ease and comfort are not necessarily the primary aims or conditions of learning. Strength, after all, rejoices in the challenge. Even when the power is out.

the pot with other nations.

America is not at war with Russia. American soldiers are not fighting under the American flag in Ukraine. Americans are not actively threatened by Russia.

And yet, Biden just visited Ukraine.

The floodgates are open. Biden’s diplomatic trip to Warsaw, Poland, took a detour.

Biden met once again with Zelensky, and gave a speech about the meeting the following day, back in Warsaw. According to the Department of Defense, Biden said “Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia.”

Those words are the words of someone who is engaging in war.

“The United States and the nations of Europe do not seek to control or destroy Russia,” Biden said.

But how is the Russian government meant to see American support for Ukraine

as peaceful and not antagonistic? Biden referred to Putin as having “craven lust for land and power,” according to the White House. How does that diction promote something

“Tear Down This Wall” speech to Soviet Union President Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987.

His visit did not increase support for “democracy,” which Biden touts throughout his speech. Biden did not de-escalate the situation between Ukraine and Russia. He did not advocate for a new era of peace.

whether the war continues, no matter how much he wishes to finance it at the expense of the American people.

other than the desire of the West to control Russia, or at least President Vladimir Putin?

Biden’s visit to Ukraine and subsequent speech in Warsaw was not Ronald Reagan’s

The speech was political, inherently so. While addressing Poland, Biden spoke of the courage of the Ukrainian soldiers. But Biden appears to have forgotten that he is the president of the United States of America, not Ukraine. He is not meant to be Zelensky’s cheerleader on the international stage, giving billions of American dollars to a cause that Americans are not threatened by. Biden claims that “President Putin chose this war. Every day the war continues is his choice.”

Indeed, Putin is the one who invaded Ukraine. But Biden is not in charge of

While being extolled for his courage in visiting Ukraine and touted for his support of a conflict that is far removed both geographically and militarily from Americans, Biden ignored his own people. Biden should assume a spot in the trenches. There is value in interacting with the international community, but the American president should remember the people that elected him into office. His role is to advocate for the American people, and American needs, above all else. He cannot hide behind the veil of international applause to avoid the disapproval of his own country.

Erin Osborne is a sophomore studying English and journalism.

Establish mental capacity tests for politicians over the age of 75

By Eleanor Whitaker

When the president of the United States, perhaps the most mentally taxing profession in the country, proudly announces that he has traveled to all 54 states, it is time to consider screening our older politicians for mental competency.

This is what Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and U.N. ambassador, is calling for in her new campaign for the Republican presidency. In a rally in Charleston, she made clear that her platform seeks to eliminate the problem of older politicians in America by establishing mental competency tests. “In the America I see, the permanent politician will finally retire,” Haley, 51, said on Feb. 15. “We’ll have term limits for Congress. And mandatory mental competency tests for politicians over 75 years old.”

Haley has picked up on an important issue for America in our current time. Our politicians are reaching their expiration dates. Joe Biden is the first octogenarian president, and if he seeks reelection, he will be 86 by the time he leaves office. If Donald

Trump is elected president in 2024, he will be 88 at the end of a four-year term. Many other politicians have reached an advanced age. There are currently 16 senators and 36 representatives over the age of 75, making the median age of the 118th Congress the highest ever.

As the age of our politicians increases, so does the likelihood that their mental capacities decline. According to the Population Reference Bureau, 10% of the population aged 80, and up to 25% of the population over 90, has dementia, a disease that would prevent the president from executing the functions of his job. Joe Biden seems to be evidence of such a politician whose mental capacity is declining. Last November, he made the fascinating yet totally inaccurate comment that “We have more chickens than anywhere in the nation in Delaware, but we don’t have turkeys.” While this type of language flub alone is not enough to provide evidence for a mental disorder, it is sufficient enough to justify a mental capacity test.

A mental capacity test is a short test designed to screen older citizens for cognitive disorders such as dementia and Alzheimer’s. One such

test is the Montreal Cognitive Assessment Assessment, a 10-minute long examination in which a subject completes basic tasks such as drawing a clock, repeating words, and identifying pictures of animals. These tests do not measure intelligence, only basic cognitive function. Most notably, former President Donald Trump scored a perfect 30 out of 30 on this test, which he took of his own free will, but Biden has yet to take any sort of cognitive exam.

However, implementing mental capacity tests will not be as easy as electing a president to do the job. Such restrictions on elections cannot be established through an executive order, they require a constitutional amendment, which would need to be ratified by three-fourths of all states. Haley is proposing that she act outside of the Constitution and the powers allowed by the presidency when she promises to establish mental competency tests. This is an issue that should not be solved by one person, but by bipartisan collaboration and tough discussions among politicians and the public.

If an amendment was passed to mandate mental capacity tests for all incoming

federal politicians over the age of 75, voters would be both informed about their politicians’ capabilities and reassured that they will be represented properly.

Having older leaders is not wrong, far from it. We need representatives with life experience, the more the better, to ground the radical ideas of the youth in reality. If mental competency tests are enacted, older representatives who are both mentally competent and wise beyond their years could continue to serve their country without fear of criticism or pressure to retire, for they proved their mental competency at the beginning of their term.

Interestingly, the Department of Defense requires that every person involved with the handling of nuclear weapons be evaluated for their mental capacity, except for the most important person, the one who is in charge of pushing the button, the president of the United States. Let’s repair this inconsistency and ensure that the safety of our country, and the safety of the world, is in the wisest of hands.

Eleanor Whitaker is a freshman studying the liberal arts.

Off-campus housing permission is given inconsistently

By Jillian Parks

Every day for the past three weeks, I’ve had a conversation with someone about the off-campus housing scramble. With the construction of a new dorm and the purchase of new properties, everyone was asserting that they had it on good authority that absolutely no rising juniors will be getting off campus this year. Widespread panic, especially among the current sophomore class, has become a part of second semester campus culture, as no one seems to be able to predict confidently who will be on or off campus the next year. The process for off-campus eligibility, while fair and transparent, is too inconsistent to continue as is. The threshold for being given permission should be clear and easy to count on, not based on ever-changing admission stats and numbers. And it should include juniors.

According to the deans, students who apply for off-campus permission are first ranked by high school graduation year, and then within the graduation year by Hillsdale College credits. Students are allowed to check where they fall in the rank-

ings when the list is released in February. The deans then send out emails to a number of students calculated by subtracting on-campus beds from student enrollment numbers. This year, with the construction of the Sohn Residence building and the purchase of multiple off-campus houses, off-campus housing spots decreased by 110 compared to last year.

While filling the dorms is necessary, students did not ask for more on-campus housing this year, and, therefore, cannot be expected to pay the price, both literally and figuratively, for that choice.

“I’m happy I got off campus, but, at the same time, I feel sad because I knew I was going to get it because I graduated in 2020,” sophomore Betsy Hook said.

“Everyone has their idiosyncrasies and differences and a house dynamic is much different than a dorm. It’s hard knowing that I have a spot off campus but at the same time not knowing who I will be living with. To me, that’s the most important and fun part of finally having a house off campus.”

Dean of Women Rebekah

Dell said the process is meant to ensure that seniors are able to get off campus.

Aaron Petersen, dean of men, said that off-campus permission as a whole is meant to preserve the on-campus community. Both agreed that it is their responsibility to fill on-campus beds as a part of the business operations of the college.

On-campus housing costs significantly more than off-campus housing, especially factoring in the meal plan. In the administration’s defense, the recently purchased houses at the corner of Hillsdale and Fayette streets will all qualify for the off-campus meal plan, but the ladies in the Sohn Residence and those relegated to dorm living during their junior year, will not.

“Off-campus permission is not something that is ever guaranteed, but it is something that’s kind of assumed and, before I was even a freshman, I was coming in with the assumption that pretty much all juniors and seniors will be off campus,” sophomore Kenda Showalter said. “I have financial plans depending on that. So now it’s a bit of a challenge since I wasn’t able to get off campus this year. And it’s about $3,500 more expensive on campus per year.”

Most students are incredibly financially privileged by

Hillsdale College scholarships. Nevertheless, the clear financial leap between living on campus and off is enough to make some students nervous about taking out more loans, or putting a heavier burden on their parents.

The college catalog currently says, “All students reside in college housing during their time at Hillsdale College unless residence hall capacities are exceeded.” There are no prior instances to point to in which the residence hall capacity has not been exceeded. Students are constantly told how much Hillsdale is growing and how the current sophomore class is the largest class the school has ever had. How were current sophomores meant to anticipate not being able to get off campus with conversations like that being central both years that we’ve been here? More broadly, how were students truly supposed to consider not getting off campus if only the year prior there were entire houses of sophomores allowed to live off campus? Pointing to the catalog doesn’t mean anything if everything else points to a different reality.

Community does not need to be orchestrated by the college once a student reaches upperclassmen status. There

is a distinct and empowering freedom that comes with being able to choose your community after two years of finding those people. Signing a lease, organizing utilities, gathering groups, and setting expectations for communal living is all a part of rising to self governance.

“Living off campus has allowed me to learn how to more fully self govern through a richer experience of freedom, the fourth pillar of the college and the foundation of a liberal arts education,” junior Merrit Pope said. “The larger responsibility, the more intentional community, and the opportunity to lead a truly independent lifestyle, have all compelled me to better understand the gravity of self-governance and to begin cultivating personal habits that will lead to a successful and more virtuous life post-grad.”

Basing permission on Hillsdale credits punishes students who took AP and dual-enrollment classes in high school in order to avoid a heavy class load in college. Not to mention, transfer students take a hit after paying for a semester and beyond at another institution.

Hillsdale is adamant about merit-based selection during the admissions process and

scholarship processes; the same should go for off-campus housing.

Give students an incentive for performing well by marking a specific GPA range that allows students automatic off-campus permission by their junior year. Make it the policy that upperclassmen can rely on getting off campus if they meet certain academic or campus involvement markers. Less specifically, draft a process that students can rely on and that pays homage to the two years that juniors have already spent living in and pouring into campus.

College students are far closer to making decisions about where they are, where they want to be, and what their communities look like than the phase of “making the most of where you are” that childhood and adolescence forces us to learn.

In pursuit of building an on-campus culture and filling beds, the college has created unneeded stress and financial burden for juniors who deserve a chance to move off campus.

Jillian Parks is a sophomore studying rhetoric and media and journalism. She is the social media manager.

Josiah Lippincott is a doctorate student at the Hillsdale Graduate School of Statesmanship.

“Biden is not in charge of whether the war continues, no matter how much he wishes to finance it”

City News

High school firefighter saves driver from creek

By Thomas McKenna Assistant Editor

Less than one month after his 18th birthday, Reading High School senior and Montgomery firefighter Miles McMinn jumped into a creek to save a man who had driven his car off the road on Jan. 25.

“It was my training instincts from learning everything Montgomery has taught me,” McMinn said.

The man was driving on McCallum Street, on the west side of Montgomery, when his car slid down the bank and landed with its front end in the creek, Montgomery Fire Chief Henry Snellenberger said. The driver has since died, according to the Hillsdale Daily News, but the cause has not been reported.

McMinn earned his full firefighter certification on Dec. 31, 2022. He said he was returning from breakfast with his parents in Coldwater when his father saw the car in the creek.

“My mom went to the fire station and picked up a rescue and had Julie Fish drive it back with my mom,” McMinn said. “Station 2 came, which is our mutual aid department in Camden. Jeff Firestone showed up with Logan Allwardt. A little bit after that, Station 2 took over mostly for getting the patient out. We assisted a bit, but mostly with medical care.”

Community comes together during blackout

By Maggie Hroncich Editor-in-Chief

As businesses opened their doors and donated meals to linemen and first responders, Hillsdale’s Board of Public Utilities and Mayor Adam Stockford thanked the community for its assistance during a near-total city blackout last week.

“Ice storms like that one are once in a score,” Stockford said. “It’s easy for us to take our BPU and our community advocates for granted when everything is working right, but we all walk away with a better appreciation for this city when those sorts of things happen. When it’s all hands on deck, Hillsdale finds out it has more hands than it knows.”

Market House Inc., Here’s to You Pub & Grub, Vested Risk Strategies, Cavoni’s Pizza and Grinders, El Cerrito Mexican Restaurant, Jerome Country Market, and Hungry Howie’s Pizza were among local businesses to donate meals and help feed linemen who were working to restore power. “The outpouring of generosity and kindness from the community was nothing short of amazing,” BPU Marketing & Developing Coordinator Sam Fry said. “We had so many people – Hillsdale residents, local businesses and BPU customers – who contacted us to thank our staff, or just let us know that they were thinking or praying for our crews’ safety. That means

the world to our linemen, who are out in the elements, performing a very dangerous and physically taxing job.”

Fry said the community’s response spoke to the character of the town and residents.

“Anyone who has lived in Hillsdale can tell you that it’s a really tight-knit community, and we have great folks that go above and beyond to help others out during times of need,” Fry said. “That’s what is so special about our city –there’s a spirit of neighborly cooperation and civic pride here that you don’t see in many other communities.”

Aaron Tracey, director of hospitality operations at Hillsdale College’s Dow Hotel and Conference Center,

said the hotel provided rooms last-minute for linemen who came in from out of town to help.

“The power went out on Wednesday, and the next day, on Thursday, we still didn’t have power at the hotel,” Tracey said.

Kelly LoPresto, a BPU customer service representative, asked Tracey on Thursday if the hotel had availability for the traveling linemen.

“I said, ‘We don’t have power but we are more than willing to accommodate,’” Tracey said.

The hotel reserved 10 rooms for the linemen the first night, and 18 rooms the next two nights, according to Tracey.

“We were happy to host

them, and thankfully we had availability. But it was a day-by-day situation,” Tracey said. “If you drive around town, you can see the amount of work they had to do. It took a lot of hands, so bringing in people from out of town to help was needed.”

Kevin Conant, owner of Here’s to You Pub & Grub, said he enjoyed meeting the linemen and first responders.

“We gave any linemen that came in a free cheeseburger basket, and then on Saturday night we went to BPU and did a full cook outside for all the linemen that were helping in the BPU service area,” Conant said. “About 50 guys were there and about 30 of them came in here, they were warming up and everything. It was nice.”

City restores power to most customers after outage

By Logan Washburn City News Editor

The Hillsdale Board of Public Utilities has restored power to most of its customers, as residents across Hillsdale County and the state have been facing a power outage since the night of Feb. 22. The city estimates the power restoration effort cost about $500,000, according to city councilman Joshua Paladino ‘18. A draft document showed the outage reached more than 90% of county residents.

The BPU had restored power to all but a handful of its customers by Sunday, according to a Facebook post. The agency asked customers still without power to call 517-437-6431 so crews could restore their energy.

“If there are any BPU customers who are still without power and did not call our special outage number yesterday, please do so as soon as possible,” the post said. “It worked extremely well, and allowed us to efficiently dispatch crews to customers.”

on Thursday and Friday due to the outage. The campus went mostly without power Thursday, according to an email from Vice President for Student Affairs Diane Philipp. Most buildings on campus had power by Thursday evening, Philipp said, but the library and main classroom buildings did not.

The outage came the same day cellular providers had restored service that went out Tuesday. The college lost power around 5:40 p.m. on Feb. 22, and according to the Detroit Free Press, the outage hit more than 700,000 homes and businesses across the state.

According to the Michigan State Police, the ice storm caused the worst outages in Hillsdale, Oakland, Macomb, and Jackson counties.

“We have quite a few customers that are out at the moment,” said City of Hillsdale Marketing and Development Coordinator Sam Fry on the night of the blackout. “It’s not just us, everyone is bearing the brunt of this weather.”

doing everything in their power to get our grid back up as soon as they can.”

BPU trucks and firefighters responded to downed limbs and transformers across the city on the night of the storm. When a transformer exploded at the intersection of Union Street and Barber Drive around 8:45 p.m., students in Benzing Residence evacuated as firefighters and BPU workers responded. Firefighters also responded to falling trees and limbs on Barber Drive near Hayden Park.

Around 10 p.m., flares surrounded a darkened City Hall so drivers would not hit the building. Most stop lights and street lights went dark. Linemen experienced so many hazards that at 12 a.m., they had to postpone repairs until daylight, according to a press release from the city.

“We ask that residents please stay off of the streets for their own safety,” BPU Director David Mackie said in a press release.

Fry said he is grateful no workers have been injured so far.

continued repairs through the night.

The BPU had restored power to nearly 50% of customers by Friday morning, Fry said, and officials hoped to restore power to 80% of their customers by the end of the day.

“We’d certainly like to get more people back on line, and we’re hopeful that we will, but that’s our best estimate,” Fry said. “Linemen are extremely selfless. A lot of them have been working back-to-back 16-hour days now, and they might not have power themselves at home.”

The communities of Grand Haven, Zeeland, Bryan, Lowell, and Napoleon sent resources to help the city recover, according to Fry. He said the crews stayed overnight Thursday, and Coldwater, Sturgis, and Bowling Green, Ohio, sent more crews Friday.

The force of water kept rescue crews from opening the car doors. First responders cut through the roof to reach the man, who could not exit the vehicle on his own due to a medical episode, according to Snellenberger.

Jeff Firestone, a medical first responder, arrived shortly after with other medical personnel.

“Our crew went into the water and into the car that was in the water, secured the patient, and got him up and out of the river,” Firestone said. “We helped load him into the Reading Emergency Unit ambulance and provided any kind of support care.”

Firestone said the department had yet to respond to a call for a car that had slid down a bank into flowing water.

“There will be a change of protocols as far as flowing water and stabilizing vehicles and such,” Firestone said. “We look forward to that training. When you get something in the water, the water pushes harder against everything. It’s all a learning experience.”

Firestone said he was impressed with how well the Montgomery and Camden departments worked together.

“Two departments can work so closely together with very few words,” Firestone said. “Everybody just falls into place, and they know what they’ve got to do to get the job done.”

McMinn was first on the scene but said the rescue was a team effort.

“It wasn’t all about me,” McMinn said. “It was everybody that was there.”

Hundreds of Consumers Energy customers, however, are still without power across the county, according to the energy company. The company has assigned crews to most affected areas and predicted it would restore power to these remaining customers soon.

The college canceled classes

Fry said the ice storm caused issues with power lines, which tripped a breaker at the power source. He said every BPU employee has been working to resolve the outage.

“We do ask folks for patience and understanding while our guys work out there in some pretty tough conditions,” Fry said. “But folks should know they’re

“I think it’s also a testament to our guys and the training they go through,” he said.

Nearly 75% of transmission lines to the city were offline as of 7 a.m. Thursday morning, a press release said. The BPU restored power to nearly 40% of its more than 6,000 customers by Thursday evening around 5 p.m., and

Verizon and AT&T restored cell service Feb. 22, the same day the ice storm caused the outage, after an outage across the Hillsdale area that started Feb. 21. Those with AT&T found their service had returned by morning, and those with Verizon found their service returned later that day.

“Service was restored overnight for wireless and home phone customers in the Hillsdale area following an equipment failure,” an AT&T spokesperson said. “We apologize for

the inconvenience and appreciate the patience of our customers.”

Freshman Elanor Balsbaugh said she had Cricket, and since she had a Samsung, she had been having issues contacting people with iPhones.

“My sister has an iPhone and I have Samsung, so I couldn’t text her, though it came back on today,” she said on Feb. 22. “She went to her house, and I was going to a church thing with her and couldn’t communicate.”

Freshman Autumn Visser said she has Verizon and used alternative ways to communicate with friends.

“It didn’t really affect any plans that I had, because we had Discord so we were able to kind of chat,” she said. “I couldn’t talk to my parents, which is kind of an issue because we texted frequently, but we had Marco Polo so that was fine.”

Visser said she lost service around noon Feb. 21, and her service returned around 9:30 or 10 p.m. Freshman Helen Rogers, however, said she didn’t find herself with service until noon the next day.

Sophomore Jason Lu, Junior Micah Miller and Senior Dan Harmon said they had service from T-Mobile and never lost reception.

The Collegian has updated this article since its power returned.

Long-time forester retires, wins award

By Maddy Welsh News Editor

After 17 years of service to the City of Hillsdale, city forester Gary Stachowicz has retired.

Angie Girdham, Hillsdale College horticulturist, said she has worked closely with Stachowicz over the years.

“Gary is incredibly knowledgeable and cared deeply for the wellbeing of the Hillsdale tree canopy,” Girdham said. “Hillsdale couldn’t have asked for a more dedicated city forester. He will certainly be missed by myself and many others.”

Stachowicz built his career in the Midwest for the United States Forest Service, then became the city’s forester in 2006. He retired from the city on Jan. 27.

A few days before his official retirement, the Michigan Chapter of the International Society of Arboriculture honored him with its professional service award, recognizing his years of service to the city and to general forestry in the Midwest.

“I was quite taken aback about how much I was noticed by certain people for the things I had done,”

Stachowicz said. “I guess it kind of goes with what they say: somebody’s always watching, and I guess the right people were watching and thought enough of me to nominate me for the award.

I feel quite privileged and honored to have gotten it, to be honest with you.”

Kevin Sayers, the Michigan Urban and Community Forestry program manager, nominated Stachowicz for the award.

“Gary has been an outstanding representative for the City of Hillsdale and the profession of urban and community forestry,”

Sayers said. “His dedication and passion for learning and sharing all he knows about trees, their care and management, is evident through his actions to improve the city’s urban forest and the quality of life for its citizens.”

Sayers said he and Stachowicz have worked together often in their respective jobs.

“Through Gary’s longterm and expert commitment to being a leader and manager for the city’s urban forests, it has helped the state achieve its goal of building healthy, resilient and sustainable urban forests for

Michigan’s citizens,” Sayers said. “Beyond the simple beauty and benefits from the trees he’s planted, I think his legacy will be reflected in the greater appreciation and importance of his work and his smiling, personable, and professional attitude.”

Without the people in Hillsdale he worked alongside, Stachowicz said, he would not have been able to accomplish what he did.

“Even though my name is on that award and geared toward me as a tree professional, I’d like to think that those guys had a minor hand and I think it’s partly their award too. You can’t go it alone,” Stachowicz said.

“When there are people helping you, I’m the kind of person that would rather throw some of the accolades out to the people I feel shared in the responsibility in me getting such an award.”

Stachowicz said he found the time he spent working for the city fulfilling.

“I think overall the city treated me well, and I tried to do the same for the city,” Stachowicz said. “I had never done city tree work before for any municipality until I came to Hillsdale and I found that it served me well. And

I’d like to think that I served the community well in my 17 years there. So it was a very positive experience.”

Stachowicz said some people retire to escape a bad situation, but that was not the case for him.

“It’s quite emotional to leave,” he said. “I don’t think you’re going to find too many people that retire going out on top of things and enjoying the people they worked with and the employer. A lot of people leave because they just don’t like doing what they do anymore. But that wasn’t the case for me. I rather enjoyed what I did and the people I worked with.”

He’s looking forward to retirement, though, and plans on using his time to travel, fish, hunt, camp, and spend time with family.

“Luckily I still have my health. I’m in pretty good shape, and I wanted to retire while I still have some good years left in me so I can just pretty much do whatever I want, whenever I want,” Stachowicz said. “I’m not on any timeframe anymore. So now when I wake up at four o’clock in the morning, I can just roll over and go back to bed.”

“They know what they’ve got to do to get the job done.”

Gary Stachowicz (right) with former city forester Bob Batt (left) after recieving the ISA Professional Service Award. Courtesy | Facebook

Businessman Perry Johnson announces presidential bid

By Cassandra DeVries Collegian Freelancer

Perry Johnson, a Republican Detroit businessman and selfdescribed “quality guru,” announced his 2024 presidential campaign on Feb. 9.

“Perry Johnson is running for president to save the nation from Joe Biden’s flailing economy and to put the bloated federal government on a diet,” said Johnson’s press secretary Elizabeth Stoddart.

Johnson, a 75-year-old businessman, made his money by promoting and implementing statistical controls and standardization

in the automotive industry. He founded the Perry Johnson Companies Group and wrote more than 15 manuals on quality management and statistical processes. He visited Hillsdale in March 2022.

“I am a problem solver, a quality guru, and I am ready to take on the biggest and most inefficient institution in the country – the federal government,” Johnson tweeted.

Johnson has never held political office, but ran for Michigan governor in 2022 and was disqualified with four other candidates due to fraudulent nominating petition signatures.

Johnson blamed the rising

costs of basic necessities on government borrowing and said he plans to put the government on a strict budget.

“He is currently the only candidate with a true plan about how to get America back on track and make everyday living affordable again,” Stoddart said.

Stoddart said Johnson believes suppliers will produce more goods and subsequently lower prices with a 2% reduction in discretionary government spending. To reach this goal, Johnson plans to award bonuses to bureaucratic agencies who make the proper budget reductions. He also wants to simplify

existing tax brackets and reduce current rates.

“I’ve spent my entire life as a problem solver,” Johnson tweeted. “I built my businesses on the premise of taking something that is imperfect, broken or inefficient, and through quality standards, making it as close to perfect as possible.”

Johnson started his campaign in Iowa, the first caucus state for the GOP.

“The Democrats gave Iowa the middle finger, but we are going to give Iowa the respect and attention it deserves in its historic role as the leadoff state for our Republican Party,” Johnson tweeted.

Johnson also spent

Airport receives $2.5 million grant

By Olivia Hajicek

Assistant Editor

The Hillsdale Municipal Airport has been awarded a $2.5 million grant from the Federal Aviation Administration to build a new terminal.

The FAA has awarded $1 billion in grants for airport terminal development projects across the country under the Bipartisan Infrastructure

Law, according to the administration’s website.

Airport Administrator Ginger Moore said she was shocked and excited to learn on Monday that Hillsdale’s airport was one of the recipients.

“We’ve been working on getting the grant for the new terminal for years,” she said.

The new terminal is still being designed, Moore said. She said the current terminal, built in 1963, will

be demolished to make room for the airport to complete its new parallel taxiway, which will decrease the chance of collisions.

“It’s a safety issue to have airplanes taxi on the runway, because someone could land on them or not see them or it,” Moore said. “It’s nice to have a parallel taxiway so that anytime they're moving on the ground, they’re out of the way of someone taking off or landing.”

Construction on the taxiway began in 2015, according to a press release from the City of Hillsdale.

The FAA also awarded grants to two other Michigan airports, Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport and Cherry Capital Airport in Traverse City. A total of 104 airports nationwide received grants, according to the FAA.

$192,000 to air a superbowl campaign ad in Iowa which portrayed Democratic officials as greedy and bloated, according to The Detroit News. Inflated images of Sen. Chuck Schumer, Sen. Bernie Sanders, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez waddled across the screen, asking for more money.

“That’s not the solution, that’s the problem. I’m Perry Johnson. I’ve written a book called ‘Two Cents to Save America.’ If Washington cuts the budget just 2% a year, problem solved,” Johnson said.

Johnson also offered a free copy of his book on his campaign website.

He hopes to take the

Legislator proposes bill to bring wolves back to Lower Peninsula

By Thomas McKenna Assistant Editor

A Michigan legislator introduced a bill Feb. 15 to move wolves from the Upper Peninsula to the Lower Peninsula.

House Bill 4102, introduced by state Rep. Greg Markkanen, R-Hancock, would direct the Michigan Department of Natural Resources to “reestablish a viable and self-sustaining wolf population in the Lower Peninsula,” according to the bill text.

“As a resident of the Upper Peninsula, I feel very strongly — and a lot of people up here feel very strongly — that if they’re encouraging us to do what we have to do, the Lower Peninsula should have a viable population of gray wolves as well,” Markkanen said.

Markkanen said the bill is an attempt to establish a fairer distribution of wolves, in which both peninsulas must deal with the effects. Wolves in the U.P. have killed or chased out deer, discouraging hunters from visiting, according to Markkanen.

“If there are areas in the Upper Peninsula that are almost devoid of deer, and the DNR has no response for it whatsoever, that’s troublesome,” Markkanen said.

The U.P. is currently home to around 630 wolves, according to the DNR. The

population has been holding steady since 2011.

“Rural Michigan is often forgotten by people who live in urban and suburban parts of the state,” state Rep. Andrew Fink, R-Hillsdale said. “There are many ways in which life can be more difficult in the countryside in ways that folks closer to our population centers don’t understand. The wolf issue is a good illustration of that larger phenomenon, but so are matters like school transportation, emergency response, and many more.”

The state’s Wolf Management Plan, updated by the DNR last September, mentioned 7,000 acres of suitable habitat for the gray wolf. Markkanen said the state should take advantage of this land but did not specify a habitat location.

“If we’re going to have a management plan, let’s implement it,” Markkanen said.

Rolf Peterson, a research professor at Michigan Technological University who has studied wolves for more than 40 years, said he opposes the bill.

“I would say it is political theater, pure and simple,” Peterson said. “Coming out with anti-wolf statements plays well in certain influential circles in the U.P.”

Dominic Parker, a professor of economics at University of Wisconsin-

Madison who spoke at a Hillsdale College Praxis event in November, said in an interview that any decline in hunters in the U.P. is likely due to a nationwide decline.

“Nationally, the number of hunters is on the decline and has been on the decline for a long time,” Parker said. “So I think the representative would have to account for that in his evaluation of the effects of wolves.”

David Johnson, president of the Upper Peninsula Sportsmens Alliance, said the organization did not have an official opinion on the bill but was in favor of removing wolves from the endangered species list.

“We do not want to see the gray wolf wiped out,” Johnson said. “We’re not at that at all. We just want to have the ability that when we need to control it, we can control it.”

Peterson said wolves could walk across the Mackinac Straits when the water freezes over in the winter, but haven’t settled as a viable population.

“If wolves are meant to be there, they will get there,” Peterson said. “There are U.P. wolves that moved to Lower Michigan. So far, they have not established themselves. There are wolves that go to the Lower Peninsula that don’t survive long.”

Parker said he is not sure the Lower Peninsula would be a suitable habitat for wolves.

“There’s forested area there,

but some of the ownership is fragmented,” Parker said. “There’s not a lot of connectivity in certain areas, so it’s not clear that if wolves were moved to the northern part of the Lower Peninsula they would successfully colonize it or not.”

Both professors agreed there would be a reduction in deer-vehicle collisions in the Lower Peninsula if there were more wolves.

“Where wolves have recolonized in Wisconsin, they’ve had economic effects, and one of them has been to decrease deer-vehicle collisions,” Parker said. “If they were to successfully re-colonize in this part of northern Michigan, one might expect them to also cause a reduction in deer-vehicle collisions.”

The bill has been referred to the House Committee on Natural Resources, Environment, Tourism and Outdoor Recreation. Committee Chair Rep. Laurie Pohutsky, D-Livonia, did not respond to requests for comment on the future of the bill.

The DNR did not respond to a request for comment. Markkanen said he had not spoken with DNR officials about the bill.

“I don’t think they think I’m serious,” Markkanen said. “I am very serious with this bill.”

principles of quality control that he used in the automotive industry and apply them to the federal government: cutting costs and increasing standardization.

“I’m serious. This isn’t rocket science. We can afford to live again,” Johnson said in the ad.

Three other major Republican candidates have formally launched presidential campaigns: former President Donald Trump, former United Nations Ambassador and South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, and entrepreneur and activist Vivek Ramaswamy.

Author, former reporter hosts book signing

By Josh Newhook Digital Editor

Local author Nancy Hastings held a book signing to celebrate the opening of the newlyrenovated Studio 42 last Saturday.

“What has meant the most to me is seeing the faces of the people who I have done stories about over the years,” she said. “I truly appreciate all the support.”

Hastings, a former Hillsdale Daily News reporter, featured her memoir “Mission Possible” at the event in Rough Draft.

The space was jampacked for all four hours of the event, Hastings said, and she sold around 35 books.

“It’s been constant since 10 a.m.,” she said.

The event featured a host of different foods, from bacon-wrapped water chestnuts to Brazilian chocolate fudge balls. Artworks of Hillsdale President Connie Sexton offered drinks, including red and white wines. These refreshments came in part from a Hillsdale County Community Foundation grant awarded to Artworks and its sister organization, the Hillsdale Heritage Association, Sexton said.

This was the first event in the studio since it was redone with the help of the same grant, awarded in January, according to Artworks board member Heather Tritchka.

Artworks first occupied the space when Tritchka asked the owner of Rough Draft if she could carve a bear statue in the space in 2019. She later began opening the room for the public to view and watch her work. She said they wanted a place to show higher-quality pieces of art.

“We started bringing in some art things over time,” she said. “We are trying to make it an inviting space to show nice pieces of art.”

Artworks of Hillsdale, founded in the 1990s, underwent a leadership shift in 2020 and has grown dramatically since then,

Tritchka said. The group now has more than 100 people involved.

“Artworks has become a very vibrant community,” she said.

Tritchka said they wanted to take the space in a new direction.

“We wanted to spruce it up a bit,” she said.

After receiving the grant last month, they made shelving, painted the space, and set up lights.

“Then we can buy some easels and backdrops,” Sexton said.

Artworks will display works of upcoming artists including Karen Mark, who specializes in watercolor, and David Youngman, who will be painting a mural of the town with a train coming to the station this fall.

John Castellese, who illustrated the cover of Hastings’ book, offered his art for sale during the book signing. He spoke about his artwork’s inspiration.

“I used to hunt, so I got a lot of it just being outdoors,” he said.

According to Castellese, he paints larger pieces on canvas and paints smaller pieces on hardwood panels to capture smaller details. Castellese said it takes 100 to 150 hours to paint the larger pieces.

“Some of the smaller ones take that long too,” he said.

Tritchka said Artworks is looking for a pottery or 3D artist to feature in the new shelf space.

“We would like to have some of the college artists as well, to mix college and community,” she said.

Ryan Sexton was visiting from Toledo and said he enjoyed the event.

“The art is amazing, and the food is great,” Ryan said.

Jane Chikkala, also visiting from Toledo, said she was impressed.

“I didn’t think this little town could have this big of an event,” Chikkala said. “The people are great.”

Nancy Hastings speaks with an event attendee. Josh Newhook | Collegian

Meijer is preparing to break ground on its new Hillsdale location.

Lauren Scott | Collegian

Chargers fall on the road, drop to 6-2 on the season

By Emily Schutte Collegian Reporter

The Hillsdale men’s tennis team lost to the Grand Valley State University Lakers while visiting its courts last Saturday.

The Lakers dominated the doubles matches winning all three. Hillsdale had two wins in singles, but Grand Valley won the rest and took home the victory 5-2.

Senior Tyler Conrad said that the away crowd was tough to deal with.

“We're not used to people cheering, like screaming for 15 seconds during one of our points. That's just not something that we're used to having,” Conrad said. “A yell here and there is what we're used to. But when it's consistent every couple points, it can get kind of

distracting.”

The Chargers failed to pick up any doubles victories.

“Overall, I think our doubles will be changing from now on. This has always been a struggle for us, and I think our coach realizes things need to change,”

junior Brennan Cimpeanu said. “He's got some plans for this week, and what we're going to change up and switch around so that'll be fun to watch and see how that plays out this weekend.”

Both the No. 1 doubles team, junior Sean Barstow and Cimpeanu, and the No.

2 doubles team, senior Brian Hackman and freshman Nik Wastcoat, lost 2-6. At No. 3 doubles, freshman Aidan Pack and Conrad lost 5-7.

“Doubles did not go well,” Barstow said. “Starting off with a loss like that in dou-

Women's Tennis

bles in all three spots didn't help, but I think we did a good job of bouncing back after that and playing good singles.”

No. 1 singles Cimpeanu and No. 5 singles Barstow claimed their points for the Chargers, scoring 6-2, 6-1 and 6-4, 6-4 respectively.

Cimpeanu said Pack fought hard at No. 2 singles for his point, taking the match to a tie-break game after scoring 5-7, 2-6, 6-4, but losing 4-7.

“We have our freshmen stepping up and filling in this void that we need or matching the team's environment, maybe even boosting us up a little bit when we see how much high energy he has,” Cimpeanu said.“We're watching him and we're like ‘this guy is good, and he's gonna help us throughout the rest of the

season.’”

No. 3 and No. 6 singles Hackman and Gilbert also took their matches to tiebreaks, but came up short, scoring 2-6, 6-4, 4-6 and 5-7, 6-2, 10-5 respectively. Conrad’s No. 4 singles ended in a 3-6, 4-6 loss.

Conrad and Cimpeanu both said the team was affected by the rowdy heckling of their opponents. “It motivated me because it was a minor attack on my character, so in a way it annoyed me and aggravated me which just made me play a lot better to kind of prove who I am,” Cimpeanu said.

The Chargers will head to Springfield, Illinois, March 4 to play against the University of Illinois at 1 p.m. before traveling to St. Louis, Missouri, March 5 to battle against the University of Missouri at 11 a.m.

Women’s tennis team moves to 3-4 after 6-1 loss to GVSU

By Isabella Helms Collegian Reporter

The Hillsdale women's tennis team fell short of grabbing its third match win in a row last weekend. On the road against the Grand Valley State Lakers, the Chargers lost with a final score line of 6-1.

Hillsdale started doubles with a win, as the No. 1 team, senior Sarah Hackman and junior Melanie Zampardo, earned the first victory of the day.

“Doubles was a highlight in the Grand Valley match,” Zampardo said. “Sarah and I came together and worked really well with each other to beat a nationally ranked team.”

Although the Chargers’ No. 2 and No. 3 teams played to narrow finishes,

Ultimate Frisbee

Hillsdale ultimate frisbee earns club sport status

By Isaac Green Sports Editor

The Hillsdale ultimate frisbee team officially earned the status of a club sport in December of 2022 under club president Allie Spaccarelli and head coach Nick Akers.

The team has been around for decades, but over the last five years, coaching and management have taken it to another level, according to Spaccarelli.

“Five years ago, Sebastian Pestritto, Henry Brink, and Dob Kintz founded the travel team aspect and really got the team off the ground, going from just recreationally throwing around to having practices consistently and actually being competitive in the Midwest,” Spaccarreli said.

According to Akers the club went to three tournaments last semester and won two of them.

“It was a lot of work to get to that point, because you have to show consistently that you're competing with other schools and that you're doing well,” Spaccarelli said. “It took about a year for them to accept that change.”

Akers said the recent success has been the result of time and dedication put into researching how ultimate frisbee teams are actually coached.

“One thing that I've really noticed at the college game is that teams usually just try and flaunt their athleticism a lot,” Akers said. “If you have a plan to attack that, it's not really that difficult to beat a lot of teams.”

Sophomore Gregory Moreno, vice president of the club, said he has also dedicated much of his time

to learning the sport.

“I just love the sport so I've made it a point to learn a lot about it,” Moreno said.

“One of my best friends graduated a couple years ago and he kind of taught me how to play and taught me some of the more nuanced details of the game that now I help teach newer players on our team.”

As the team continues to grow, it looks to establish itself within the Great Lakes region at the DIII level nationally, Moreno said.

“This semester we have conferences and if we do well there then we can go to regionals and if we do well there we go to Nationals, which would be after graduation,” Spaccarelli said.

Spaccarelli and Moreno work together to handle the club’s administrative responsibilities.

“I help Allie out with planning in tournaments, signing up for them, and making sure we have enough players to actually be able to compete,” Moreno said.

Moreno said that fundraising has also become increasingly important.

“We fundraised over $5,000 last semester through getting some small business sponsorships and things like that,” Moreno said. “You may have seen us selling Arnn discs in the Student Union. Tournaments and stuff cost money, jerseys cost money.”

The team practices three times a week and uses the first 10-15 minutes to work on the fundamentals of throwing before moving into drills.

“I think it's very important that everybody learns how to throw because, with most other sports, everybody kind of grows up and knows

what it is, but nobody really grows up throwing a Frisbee,” Akers said. “Then, just depending on what we want to work on, we’ll do maybe an hour of drills.”

After throwing and running through drills, the team usually scrimmages to finish off practice.

“I think it's really important to scrimmage at the end of practices just because it gets people more of a feel for how the game actually works and flows,” Akers said. Akers said the team will only continue to improve as young members develop.

Grand Valley State took both matches, and the doubles point.

The singles matches were equally competitive, with Libby McGivern at No. 4 singles securing a threeset victory over her Grand Valley State opponent. After dropping the first set 6-2, McGivern rallied back to take the second set 6-4, before ultimately winning the third-set tiebreak 10-7, and securing the Chargers’ only point of the day.

At No. 5 singles, senior Ellie Chawner pushed her opponent to a third set, but lost by a 10-6 margin.

“No one gave up in singles either, despite having a strange week of practice with the power going out and us not being able to use the Biermann and having to go up a day early to practice,”

Basketball from A1

“It was great to have all the fans there, it was a great atmosphere and so much support, I’m really honored to play for the community and the crowd,” Kalthoff said. “After the game, I was talking to some of my fellow seniors, and we were just saying ‘yeah, it’s super sad but we’re excited to keep playing and so thankful for the opportunity to play out in front of those people that were there.”

Both players did the bulk of their damage in the second half, scoring 25 of their combined 37 points after halftime.

Overall the team dropped 50 second-half points, nearly out-scoring Cedarville’s game total after halftime.

“Part of our style of play is we like to wear people down,” Tharp said. “We talk about wearing them down by making them guard. We’re hard to guard for an entire game if we’re running stuff that we’re supposed to be running and doing what we’re supposed to be doing.”

The win came after a 16-point loss to Hillsdale’s conference rival, Findlay, in the team’s season finale.

“I think our class had a lot to do with the team really growing and being able to have that trajectory but the freshman and sophomore classes have really been the biggest drivers of the path of the team lately,” Akers said. “I think that, even though it's gonna hurt my ego, they're gonna be even better next year.”

Spaccarelli said she encourages students to come out to Hayden Park on April 1 as the club is set to host a home tournament with championship and consolation games at 3 p.m.

Zampardo said. Despite the loss, senior Canela Luna said she believes that they have what it takes to compete against strong opponents, and is hopeful that the team will build on this performance as the season progresses.

“I think we had a bad combination of the power outage, not practicing very much, and many physical ailments like sickness and injury throughout the team,” Luna said.

The Chargers now have a season record of 3-4 and will be traveling to Detroit for their next match against Wayne State on March 4. “All in all, I am excited to see how we can bounce back from this, rally, and progress forward. This match just shows how much our team still can improve,” Luna said.

behind Walsh and Ashland. Ultimately, this took the Chargers out of contention to host the semifinals and final game of the conference tournament.

The day after the game, on Sunday, the team met to re-gather themselves and look back on the regular season, in which the team finished with a 22-5 record after losing first team All-American Patrick Cartier to graduation.

“We took a little bit of a deep breath on Sunday,” Tharp said. “We talked about the regular season year, and how good of a year it was, and then we showed them the ugliness of Saturday. We had to do that, we had to have honest conversations about how we played on Saturday, just our overall performance. That wasn’t pleasant for anyone, but they had to see it, and they handled that great.”

After taking down Cedarville on Tuesday, the stage is set for a monumental semifinal clash between Hillsdale and Ashland, who beat the Chargers in both regular season meetings, which cost the team a shot at the conference crown.

“Especially defensively, we just struggled,” Gohlke said. “We did a poor job of guarding the three-point line, they got going early on us, hitting a lot of threes. It wasn’t necessarily one guy, I think we were just worrying too much about our individual matchup that we were guarding, and not helping each other as much.”

The loss was the second in a row to end the Chargers’ regular season, following a, 80-67 loss in Ashland the week prior.

The game took Hillsdale out of the conference lead and into the third spot,

“We’re trying to get into the killer mindset and letting the desire for revenge fuel us,” Kalthoff said. “We’re super excited for an opportunity to face this team again.”

Ashland is the only team to beat Hillsdale at home this year, and accounts for two of the team’s three largest losses this season.

“We’ve played one good half of basketball against Ashland, that was the second half in Hillsdale,” Tharp said. “We have to be better defensively. Part of that is they’re really individually gifted as a basketball program, so we have work to do to try to guard them.”

Aidan Pack competed as the No. 2 singles player for the Chargers against GVSU.

Courtesy | Isabella s heehan

Libby McGivern took the sole singles victory for the Chargers against GVSU.

Courtesy | Isabella s heehan

Hillsdale ultimate frisbee coach, Nick Akers, tosses the disc upfield. Courtesy | al l I e s pa CC arell I

Baseball

Hillsdale shuts out Wayne State in sole weekend win

By Jillian Parks

Social Media Manager

The Hillsdale baseball team lost its series against Wayne State University this weekend, winning game one 11-0 but losing the last two 5-2 and 10-7.

After nine games, the Chargers now have a total of 56 runs, a .259 team batting average, and a .363 on-base percentage. This weekend alone, the team collected 18 runs and hit three home runs in a strong offensive showing.

“We are looking to improve on some situational stuff where we struggle to move runners or get a specific job done, but we keep having lots of scoring opportunities and it’s only a matter of time before we really start to convert them consistently,” senior

Shotgun

shortstop Aidan Brewer said.

“This weekend was a little bit of a setback but we still know what we can do and are excited to get back on it next weekend and keep improving.”

In game one, senior Will Gifford started on the mound and kept the Warriors scoreless for six innings. Junior pitcher Devin Murray closed out the game with another three scoreless innings. In four innings, Hillsdale scored seven runs on 11 hits against Wayne State All-American pitcher Ryan Korolden.

“Will Gifford had another excellent start for us on Saturday,” Brewer said. “He keeps giving us a great chance to win every time he's on the mound. At the plate, Jeff Landis and Jaekob Sallee had great weekends. It just seemed like they couldn’t miss this

Shotgun earns highest overall score on the road

By Carly Moran Assistant Editor

The Hillsdale shotgun team brought home the highest overall team score Feb. 26 at the Lindenwood Spring Open in Saint Charles, Missouri.

Besides Hillsdale, 13 schools attended, including Grand Valley State University, Simpson College, and William Penn University.

The Chargers earned a total score of 1,403, only one point ahead of former NCAA DI champion Lindenwood University. Hillsdale’s skeet and sporting clay divisions ranked second highest overall, as well as third in trap.

“The system they used benefits us because the average overall skill level of our athletes is high,” head coach Jordan Hintz said. “We have been training toward nationals and this was a great warm up.”

Many shooters experienced personal successes as well. Sophomore Josh Corbin received men’s highest overall across all disciplines, while senior Ida Brown earned second

place in women’s overall. Sophomore Kyle Fleck received men's third place. Brown also placed second in women’s trap and third in women’s sporting clays.

“The location was nice, the weather was good, it was just a little windy the first day and overcast for the second day,” Brown said. Sophomore Sophia Bultema said that shooting sports have allowed for travel and friendship.

“I saw this one kid who I shot bunker with a couple years ago,” Bultema said. “He was tiny and now I think he's in high school. St. Louis was fun. We did really well because six of our members shot 99 in skeet and we even outshot Lindenwood by a target. I think the shoot was a good launch to nationals.”

The team will compete again next weekend at their practice location, the John A. Halter Shooting Sports Center, for the Hillsdale Invitational.

“This was a great stepping stone on our way to Nationals in a few weeks,” Hintz said. “It’s hard to think of a better way to start that path.”

weekend. Seeing those guys keep rolling along with Joe Hardenbergh really starting to get hot is a great sign for us and makes us a really dangerous lineup to get through.”

Head coach Tom Vessella said the Chargers didn’t struggle to hit in game two; they just struggled to hit away from the outfielders. In game three, the Chargers put up seven runs, but were not able to emulate the Warriors’ ability to adjust to pitchers.

“We had a little adversity this weekend and it will be important to focus on how we bounce back this week,” Vessella said. “Sometimes, weekends like that can put a charge into a team, or it can bring them down for the next series. I guess we will have to see. This team is full of great leaders and I'm confident they

will come out ready to go this weekend against Missouri S&T.”

The Chargers will play Missouri University of Science and Technology March 3-4 in Rolla, Missouri, in a four game series.

"On Saturday, the team as a whole had probably one of the best combined performances since I’ve been here, everything was good hitting-wise and pitching-wise,” senior Jeff Landis said. “Sunday we just needed some more timely play. We were right in it in both games and a few moments could have heavily altered the outcomes. I’m pretty excited to play Missouri this weekend. I don't know much about their team, but it’s always fun to play against guys you have never played before.”

Women's Basketball

Chargers best Findlay, fall in quarterfinal

By Moira Gleason Collegian Reporter

After beating Findlay 8973 on the road Saturday, the Chargers forced second-seeded Kentucky Wesleyan into overtime on the Panther’s home court in the G-MAC quarterfinals on Tuesday but lost 73-74 in the final two minutes.

Hillsdale finished the season 17-14 overall and 10-10 in the G-MAC with their best record since the 2018-2019 season.

In the Charger’s first conference tournament game in four seasons, senior Grace Touchette played the best game of her five-year career with a career-high 33 points. She finished fifth in career points in the history of the program with over 1,600.

“When you’re a senior going into your potential last game, you want to leave everything out there,” head coach Charlie Averkamp said.

“I think you saw one of Grace Touchette’s best performances in the biggest game of the season. That’s how I’ll always remember her, as a big time player who wanted to play in big time games. She showed up, and she leaves here with her name all over the record books of everything that she’s done. I’m just lucky to have

gotten to coach her.”

The Chargers went 17-for26 from deep against Findlay to wrap up the regular season with their highest 3-point shooting percentage in a game since 2011 at 65.4% with five players scoring from beyond the arc.

“We ran our stuff. We weren’t focused on what Findlay was doing,” Averkamp said. “And I think we’ve got kids who can shoot the basketball. It was good to see Lauren taking another step forward. Caitlin and Carly have been consistent 3-point shooters for two years now. It was a full team win, but when our shooters were shooting that way, it was going to be tough to stop us.”

Sophomore Lauren McDonald went 6-of-7 from deep off of the bench against Findlay for a game-high 22 points. Sophomore Caitlin Splain went 4-for-6 from beyond the arc and scored 18 points for the Chargers.

Sophomore Carly Callahan finished with nine points, senior Sydney Mills added 11 points and eight rebounds, and Touchette scored 17 points in the contest. In the quarterfinal on Tuesday, seventh-seeded Hillsdale led against Kentucky Wesleyan for the majority of the contest, going into

halftime with a 34-31 edge. The Panthers surged ahead in the fourth quarter to lead 64-61 with only three seconds on the clock and Charger possession.

Mills went to the line after a Panther’s shooting foul and sank her first free throw to get the score within two. She missed the second shot, but Touchette grabbed the rebound and put it up to tie the game 64-64 as the clock ran out.

“You dream of plays like that when you’re a kid practicing your free throws,” senior Maverick Delp said. “Sydney missed it perfectly on purpose. Ari screened Grace’s box out girl, and Grace just came up for the layup to send us into overtime.”

Touchette and McDonald scored in overtime to put the Chargers up 68-64 with 3:30 left in overtime, but the Panthers got an 8-0 run in the next three minutes. McDonald scored from the free throw line, and Splain hit a 3-pointer with one second left to bring the score to 73-74, but the Panthers ran out the clock on their next possession.

“I think the extended minutes got to us a little bit and our focus started to edge out just because we were exhausted,” Touchette said. “They

were able to make some tough shots and come back.

Towards the end, though, we stuck with it and we were there battling the whole time.”

In addition to her careerhigh score, Touchette grabbed three rebounds and made three assists. Splain added 12 points for the Chargers, senior Arianna Sysum had 10 points and eight rebounds, and McDonald hit nine points and three rebounds. Mills chipped in three points and led with 10 rebounds.

Next season, the Chargers will lose key starter Sysum and substitutes Delp and senior Macy Berglund in addition to Touchette.

With Mills and Dani Salenbein returning as seniors and a junior class including Peighton Nelson, Splain, Callahan, Kendall McCormick, McDonald, and Ashley Konkle, Averkamp said that he is optimistic about the future of the program.

“My first year here, we lost 17 games,” Averkamp said. “To win 17 games less than two years later is a pretty great turnaround. I’m excited for everything that this team helped set the groundwork for. That senior group has been with me for all three of the years I’ve been here, and I think they set the tone of where the program is going.”

Charger Chatter

E d E n L itt LE , t rack and F i EL d

What do you do in your free time?

I watch a lot of TV shows and I hang out a lot with my teammates. We play a lot of board games too.

If you could play any other sport for Hillsdale, what would it be?

I would play Basketball. The only reason why I chose Track and Field over basketball is because track and field is more on an individual basis.

Do you prefer AJ’s or Penny’s, and what is your go - to order?

AJ’s, because it’s on campus and my go - to order is very basic. I just get a caramel or vanilla iced latte.

What is your major?

My major is financial management. I’m hoping to work for my family construction business after college.

Jeff Landis went four-for-four in the Chargers’

11-0 rout of Wayne State University.

Courtesy | James Gensterblum

c ompi LE d by E mma V E rrigni

C harger S port S

Men's Track

By Alex Deimel Collegian Reporter

The Hillsdale men’s track team finished sixth overall at the G-MAC indoor conference meet in Ashland, Ohio, Feb. 24-25, and will send two athletes to the National Championship meet.

Ben Haas became the weight throw G-MAC champion with a distance of 20.88m, now the third longest in DII nationwide. Haas hit a provisional mark, and will be competing in the NCAA DII national indoor championship meet in Virginia Beach, Virginia, March 10.

“It was a lot of fun to run that day. I had a feeling I’d get a PR but doing it by 1.2 seconds made it even better,” Brock said. “I feel really excited for the outdoor season now because if I can do that on an indoor track, I can’t wait to see how I do on an outdoor track.”

Brock also competed in the 4x400m relay, with teammates seniors Joseph Ritzer, Benu Meintjes, and freshman Colsen Conway. The relay team finished fifth with a time of 3:19.88.

at 1:52.97, which earned him fifth place.

Sophomore Cass Dobrowolski finished sixth and senior Charlie Andrews took seventh in the high jump event. Dobrowolski cleared 2m, while Andrews finished at 1.95m.

said. “We are now getting ready for outdoors and I feel this team can make a great run at the outdoor conference meet.”

Ben Haas recorded the third longest weight throw in DII nationwide at the conference meet.

Women's Track

Sophomore Maliq Brock set a personal best of 48.41 in the 400m sprint, placing fourth overall and beating his previous record by 1.2 seconds.

Also setting a personal best on the track was sophomore Richie Johnston, who finished fourth in the mile race at 4:08.58, which was also a provisional mark. Freshman Seth Jankowski also set a personal best in the 800m run

“It’s the experience that matters at the end of the day, not the height. It’s been a great experience with a great group of people,” Andrews said. “It’s been a great four years of indoor, and I’m excited to start my last outdoor season with this group.”

Also representing the jumps squad was sophomore Alfonso Garcia, who finished 10th in the triple jump event at 12.72m.

“Indoor season went well with some major PR’s,” Garcia

Junior John Baldwin had his best performance of the season in the heptathlon. His second place finish in the 60m hurdle event pushed him from eighth to fifth place overall, with 4,677 total points.

After Hass competes at nationals, the team will travel to Ceaderville, Ohio, to compete in the Yellow Jacket Collegiate Open March 25 for its first outdoor meet of the season.

The outdoor season will stretch from late March through May with G-MAC Outdoor Championships May 3-5 and NCAA DII Outdoor Championships May 25-27.

Hillsdale finishes as runner-up in G-MAC championships

By Tracy Wilson Design Editor

Following a second-place finish at the G-MAC Championships, the Chargers will now send several teammates onto the NCAA DII Indoor Track and Field Championships.

The athletes advancing to the final round of championships include the 4x400 relay team, the distance medley relay team, mile runners and juniors Meg Scheske and Gwynne Riley, sophomore Averi Parker in shot put, and weight throwers sophomore Katie Sayles and senior Nikita Maines.

“I was really proud of what we did,” head coach R.P. White said. “Day one was kind of a mixed bag. There were some things that didn’t go our way. Day two was our highlight. We really rallied and put together a good day.”

The women’s weight throw

team is still ranked first in the nation among DII teams, after six continuous weeks of holding the spot. The women’s track and field team is currently ranked second in the region.

“I feel very happy with how the race went and proud of the team’s performance overall,”

sophomore Liz Wamsley said.

“For the most part, everyone did what they were supposed to and in some cases exceeded expectations. There’s always something special about the atmosphere at the G-MACs, because all the event groups come together to support one another and do their best to show what we can do as a whole team.”

Wamsley took first place in the 3000m run with a time of 9:44.54, which broke her personal record.

“I think a challenging moment of the race was when I was about halfway and one

person took the lead. I was worried about whether or not I’d be able to have a stronger kick at the end than my competitors,” Wamsley said. “My favorite part of the race were the last two laps when I kicked into a final finishing gear and felt strong enough to take the lead. I loved knowing the whole time that I was getting to race with Natalie and Meg, since it’s probably the last time we’ll all be in the same race together.”

Other standout athletes from this weekend include mile runners Scheske and Riley, who took first and second with times of 4:56.77 and 4:56.34, respectively.

“The mile girls did a beautiful job,” White said. “They ran really fast and broke away from the entire field in a pretty competitive conference.” Scheske said her success in the mile was particularly meaningful to her as a senior.

“It was very rewarding, and I felt like all of the training that I’ve been doing for all these years has really bore fruit in my races,” Scheske said. “I had this moment of feeling like I had come to, as a runner, which is a really great feeling to experience when it’s your senior year, and you’re on your way out.”

Sophomore Shura Ermakov took second in the 400 meter dash with a finishing time of 55.68. In the pentathlon, sophomore Neva Polo took second with a cumulative score of 3267 points. Sophomore Reese Dragovich took second in the 800 meter run with a time of 2:10, which White said was her personal best.

Next weekend, certain members of the track and field team will advance to compete in the NCAA DII Championships in Virginia Beach March 10-11.

Softball Wallner, Russell win G-MAC awards, Chargers take three-of-five

By Olivia Pero Assistant Editor

The Hillsdale softball team left Columbus, Georgia, having won three-of-five games in the National Fastpitch Coaches Association Leadoff Classic held Feb. 24-26.

The Chargers won the first game 8-0 against Gannon University, the third game 4-1 against the University of Bridgeport, and the fifth game 5-1 against Southwestern University. They lost the second game 10-2 to California University of Pennsylvania as well as the fourth game 11-3 to the University of Charleston.

“Those were some of the top teams in the country,” head coach Kyle Gross said. “A lot of regional participant opponents — teams that are above 500 records. It was definitely a good showing for playing that level of competition early in the season.”

Junior infielder Grace Wallner and sophomore pitcher Joni Russell both received G-MAC softball awards for their performances this weekend. Wallner was named G-MAC Position Player of the Week, and Russell earned G-MAC Pitcher of the Week and was awarded a place on the NFCA Leadoff Classic All-Tournament team.

The Chargers won all three games that Russell pitched.

“I had 36 strikeouts out of all three games,” Russell said. “Last year, I had 160 strikeouts throughout the whole season, and now I had 36 just in this weekend which is huge.”

Wallner had a weekend average of .571, going 8-of14 with hits in all five games, including two home runs, one double, and multiple singles.

According to Wallner, her home run in the last game

was particularly exciting.

“We were up 1-0 and then I had a three run home run,” Wallner said. “So we were winning 4-0, and then Hannah Hoverman, who hit right after me, had a home run back-to-back with mine, so then we were winning five to nothing at that point.”

Russel said she believed that Gannon was not as tough of competition because it was its first game of the season.

“Pitching-wise, the two teams after that were really difficult because they were really aggressive hitters,” Russell said. “I really had to focus on hitting my spots, and if I didn't, then they would hit the ball.”

The Chargers will play four games at the University of Illinois Springfield for the UIS Classic March 4-5. They will play against regional competition, including Illinois-Springfield, Quincy University, and McKendree University.

“Depending on how we do this coming weekend can impact later in the season, like getting an at-large bid after the conference tournament,” Wallner said. “If we don't win the G-MAC conference outright, we can still get an at-large bid to go to regionals based on how we perform earlier in the season against regional opponents.”

Wallner said she is confident in the team going into this weekend despite struggles with injured players and some members deciding to step away from the team.

“I genuinely think the general consensus is that we feel confident moving forward, because we know we have depth,” Wallner said. “We have other people who can go in and fill those spots and get the job done. A lot of our freshmen have been doing a great job and are really stepping up and filling in roles.”

Courtesy | James Gensterblum

Meg Scheske took first place in the mile at the G-MAC indoor conference meet. Courtesy | James Gensterblum

Grace Wallner had a batting average of .571 over the course of five games.

Courtesy | James Gensterblum

Culture

Students travel to join Asbury’s revival

Driving six hours to Kentucky, students experienced the spontaneous worship service at Asbury University

By Carly Moran Assistant Editor

“It felt like the chorus of heaven,” senior Ashtyn Harms said.

Two weeks ago, several groups of Hillsdale College students made the pilgrimage to Asbury Theological Seminary for one of the largest spontaneous gatherings of Christians in years.

The event began when a group stayed after a mandatory chapel service on Feb. 8, continuing worship through the night. Word quickly spread on social media, predominantly on TikTok, which led to thousands from across the world flocking to the rural college campus. The service has been described as peaceful, lacking many contemporary worship elements.

While Asbury’s service officially ended on Feb. 21, similar movements have sprung up at colleges across the country, including Hillsdale’s campus. On the first day of Lent, a 24-hour worship service began in the Dow Chapel. It will finish at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, or until leaders feel called to end it. Before Asbury, The Grotto hosted a 24-hour adoration in preparation for Christmas.

Though the term “revival” has been debated, many students agree that this sudden outpouring of faith has been an influential moment for an otherwise irreligious generation. According to the Survey Center on American Life, more than a third of Generation Z Americans identify as religiously unaffiliated.

“You could tell there were people from every age there, but you could also tell that there was a significant number of college students,” Harms said. “There was an attitude and assumption that

it’s Gen Z’s turn to take on the Great Commission. We’re a very chaotic generation that has struggled to define ourselves, but this shows us that our identity is in Christ.”

Though on vacation, college chaplain Adam Rick quickly learned about Asbury.

“Whenever something like this happens, Christians ought to engage it with cautious optimism, weighing it by Scripture and the experience of the ages,” Rick said. “Asbury Seminary’s president Timothy Tennent, a former professor of mine as it happens, prefers to call it an ‘awakening’ instead of a ‘revival’ for reasons that are very well argued. It involves both a renewed sense of affection as well as personal repentance, healing, and reconciliation.”

Harms, like many other Hillsdale students, attended the event at Asbury on a whim.

“It was Wednesday afternoon. I was in A.J. ‘s before my 3 p.m. class, and Jake Studebaker texted me,” Harms said. “He said, ‘You wanna come to Kentucky with me?’ I was like, ‘What? Now?’ He was like, ‘Yeah, right now.’”

Later that afternoon, Studebaker and Harms hopped in the car to drive six hours to Kentucky. They spent three hours at Asbury from 9 p.m. to midnight on Wednesday. They drove through the night, returning to Hillsdale at 6:30 a.m.

Admitting that she was nervous about the emotions of the event, Harms explained how Studebaker encouraged her during their drive. Studebaker explained that feeling emotions about your love for Jesus is not a bad thing, and it also doesn’t

mean the Spirit of God isn’t there.

Because of the organic nature of the event, Harms said it was initially difficult to find the Hughes Memorial Auditorium.

“We walk into the building and it just kind of hits you,” Harms said. “It felt like something was sitting across the top of our chest and our shoulders. Jake likened it to a breastplate.”

granted. Of course, it may only turn out to be a local and short-lived phenomenon, but I hope not.”

According to Harms, it was comforting knowing all of the visitors were worshiping the same God.

“There were different ages, socioeconomic backgrounds, races, all worshiping together in one voice,” Harms said.

While some of his parishioners were away at Asbury

style of preaching, and (sadly in some cases) some forms of manipulation to garner certain results,” Cuthbert said. “In this way a revival becomes a noun, instead of a verb. It can accidentally focus on a short-term experience instead of a long-term result.”

Junior Charlie Miggins, like Harms, attended Asbury spontaneously.

“Being Catholic, I thought that this sounds a lot like adoration, and I don’t see anything wrong with it,” Miggins said.

On Saturday night, Miggins was invited by junior Fernando Bravo to join him in driving to Kentucky after his RA shift ended. Alongside sophomore Draevyn Spies, the three friends left Hillsdale at 2 a.m. Miggins attended mass Sunday morning, and went across town to Asbury afterward. The group stayed from 1-4:30 p.m. on Sunday.

“I found out on Valentine’s Day actually. The morning of, my parents both reached out,” Mitchell said. “My parents are not at all the type to be like, ‘You should go on a trip, forget about classes.’ But instead of trying to talk me down from a trip, they told me to pray and see about going.’”

When the two entered the chapel at sunset, it created what they described as an ethereal view.

“On the inside all their windows are stained glass,” Dilliner said. “It’s mostly cream colors like orange. We got inside there just as the sun was beginning to set, so the entire section was covered in golden sun beams. It was beautiful.”

Rick reflected upon the multiple ways God shows himself to his people.

The worship had an emphasis on hymns, with only acoustic guitars, a piano, and box drum as the instruments. A few times during Harm’s visit, a woman came to the altar to deliver a brief sermon on denominational unity.

“Revivals were recurrent throughout the 19th century and into the 20th,” Professor of Philosophy and Religion Thomas Burke said. “The Jesus Movement of the early 1970s brought many young people into the Christian faith. I have no doubt this is a genuine movement of the Holy Spirit, and would hope it would spread far and wide and help bring our country to affirm religious and moral principles once taken for

“I had all the scores and all the parts the first day of January when we came back to school so that we could start the rehearsal process. It was a very short rehearsal process for us,” Holleman said. “So that was a fast turnaround and it’s exciting.”

Maxfield’s work is reflective of ideas he hopes to teach his two children,

who are 8 and 10 years old. The three movements, titled “Seek,” “Winnow,” and “Leap,” are rooted in seeking truth, acquiring patience, and needing faith.

“Beyond my religious conviction and feelings, I think of faith as a principle of action: we wouldn’t act at all if we didn’t believe in the possibility of outcomes,” Maxfield wrote in his composer’s note.

“This idea eventually coalesced into the title of the work, which I hope is both encompassing

and encouraging: ‘Every Leap Is Faith.’”

After Maxfield’s symphony, the orchestra performed Howard Hanson’s Symphony No. 2., “Romantic.”

“This was Maxfield’s first symphony. Typically a symphony is a four movement work – this was a three movement work,” Holleman said. “And the Hanson we did is a three movement symphony. So it was kind of unique that we put the two together.”

Holleman said he could

this weekend, Hillsdale College Baptist Church pastor Benjamin Cuthbert took notice.

“Revival is a verb; and God is the one who does the action of reviving,” Cuthbert said. “In other words, humans can’t fabricate an authentic revival on their own. So, we can and should pray for such a wonderful work of God, but we can’t manufacture it.”

But, Cuthbert explained how revival can turn astray.

“Within the history of evangelicalism in America, well-meaning Christians sometimes attempted to create a revival by holding revival meetings—which were often marked by a certain type of music, a certain

tell students were excited because they prepared well for rehearsal and remained diligent despite last week’s power outage.

“They stuck to it. They were troopers. They were on campus and they didn’t have classes, so they came in and rehearsed,” Holleman said.

Backup generators in the chapel provided the orchestra with light, but not heat, during rehearsal on Wednesday. Holleman talked to college officials and waited for power to return

“Initially I went because I wanted that giant leap of faith– to sacrifice my day, sacrifice sleep,” Miggins said. “I thought it’d be awesome to travel to Jesus. I feel like that type of decision is pretty attractive to Gen Z, to go on spontaneous adventures with friends. Of course, there was also TikTok blowing it up. That was awesome. I definitely see the fire spreading to other campuses.”

Freshmen Tully Mitchell and Nathan Dilliner attended Asbury this past Saturday. They left at 6:30 a.m. and arrived at 12:30 p.m. They stayed until 8:30 p.m., but the majority of their visit was spent waiting in line to enter the chapel. Feb. 18 was the busiest day at Asbury, as many people waited for the weekend to make the pilgrimage to Kentucky.

instead of canceling the orchestra.

“I talked to maintenance, I talked to the deans, I talked to a lot of people,” Holleman said. “We had our Wednesday rehearsal, and during the rehearsal, we lost power. But the generators kicked on in the chapel. So we finished our full rehearsal on Wednesday.”

Freshman Izabella Sand, who played the harp for the piece, said she enjoyed watching all the parts of the symphony come together

“There is certainly a need in our age of hype and algorithm-fueled sensationalism to remember God’s normal work of daily devotion and quiet transformation, where his creative power is just as operative as in the mountain-top moments of revival,” Rick said. “On the other hand, the Spirit does sometimes move in unique ways designed to get the attention of people, and we should always be ready to receive him however he chooses to minister to us. All movements of the Spirit can be liable to human manipulation, and excess should be avoided.”

All of this activity lends itself to the question of how it will affect Hillsdale students, and the greater Gen Z community. Many believe it will have lasting effects upon the youngest adult generation.

“You don’t need to go to Asbury to find God,” Harms said.

and compliment each other.

“It was such an amazing experience to play a piece of music never before played, and to have a part in presenting Maxfield’s hard work to the public for the first time,” Sand said. “It is a big responsibility and honor to premiere someone’s original composition, and I think it’s a testament to the hard work of all the performers and Professor Holleman that we could come together to make it work so well.”

Symphony from A1

“There was an attitude and assumption that it’s Gen Z’s turn to take on the Great Commission. We’re a very chaotic generation that has struggled to define ourselves, but this shows us that our identity is in Christ.”

James Holleman and the Hillsdale College orchestra premiered Andrew Maxfield’s new symphony. Courtesy | Hanna Thompson

Tower Players premiere lighthearted musical

By Carly Moran Assistant Editor

Romance and dancing are key themes in this semester’s Tower Players musical “She Loves Me,” directed by theatre professor Tory Matsos.

The Tony nominee focuses on two tumultuous relationships: competitive coworkers Georg Nowack and Amalia Balash, who are unknowingly pen pals, and the on-and-off again Steven Kodaly and Ilona Ritter. The musical premiered on Broadway in 1963 as an adaptation of the 1937 Hungarian play “Parfumerie,” though today’s viewers may better recognize its modern counterpart, the 1998 romantic comedy “You’ve Got Mail.”

“This is the 75th anniversary season of Tower Players, and the full season was selected to celebrate the long tradition of producing theater on campus,” Matsos said. “As a Golden Age-era musical comedy, ‘She Loves Me’ is a nice balance to more dramatic works in the rest of the season.”

“She Loves Me” follows the everyday lives of parfumerie employees seeking love, set upon the background of 1930s Hungary. Despite the looming threat of World War II and the ongoing Great Depression, the musical does not center upon that.

“The economic, national, and international issues are just in the background,” sophomore Emily Griffith said. “Oftentimes people seem to forget in history that these people who are a part of these great big things were still people. They were still seeking friendship, seeking love. That’s what the show is about.” Griffith plays the role of Illona Ritter, who easily falls for the playboy Steven Kodaly.

“Ilona works in the parfumerie and she is definitely a person that is in love with love, and she often seeks it in places and specifically in one person that she probably shouldn’t,” Griffith said.

Kodaly is played by Kevin Pynes, one of two freshmen leads.

“Kodaly is a bit of a player, a bit of a sleazy character,” Pynes said.

“Now, he has this very likable persona, and I think the audience hopefully will get lulled into a sense of liking his character before they can come to realize just how much of a narcissist, how much of a good guy he ain’t.”

Pynes expressed his excitement over his family being able to watch his first Hillsdale show this Parents Weekend.

“My parents were really encouraging and my brother reviews theater back in Lincoln, Nebraska,” Pynes said. “My great-grandparents actually grew up in Bavaria and one in Switzerland, and they met during a show in Nebraska. So, the trope in my family is that none of us would exist without theater. I feel like it’s how I add back to the world.”

This semester’s musical features a largely freshman cast, an uncommon trait in most Hillsdale shows.

“We’re all so grateful to have the opportunity, because we’re learning so much being in the show with the upperclassmen,” freshman Grace Gainar said. “You can watch them and mimic that yourself. AJ Palubinskas, who is the lead, plays Georg in the show. He is so good about incorporating little motions and movements. They’re not scripted, but it helps him to develop his character that feels very natural to him at the moment.”

Gainar is a member of the ensemble, with a focus as a customer and dancer.

“It’s so great in the ensemble. You can make up any story you want about where your characters have been, or how you want to portray this character in the moment,” Gainar said. “There’s one part where I am an unhappy customer because I’ve gotten a jar of sour face cream, and it’s really great to be able to give the clerk a ton of attitude. We also spend a lot of time backstage when we’re not being needed, and it’s a great way to bond with each other and just have fun.”

Many cast members emphasized the lighthearted script.

“Especially for Hillsdale students who are so busy and always running around, I think they’ll see themselves in this show,” Griffith said. “Sometimes art is meant to challenge you, sometimes it’s meant to leave you feeling uncomfortable. That’s not what ‘She Loves Me’ is, it is to make you feel that warm feeling in your chest. I think that’s something that everybody could benefit from.”

Despite missing a few days of rehearsal due to the power outage, director Victoria Matsos believes the cast is prepared for an audience.

“We lost a couple days of rehearsal and technical work due to the ice storm, but I’ve been so impressed with how quickly our team made up for lost time,” Matsos said. “The cast and crew are absolutely ready to welcome an audience on opening night.”

Artist Q&A: Regina Veneklase

By Tracy Wilson Design Editor

Regina Veneklase is a senior majoring in art and minoring in music.

What was the first piece of art you did that made you see a future in art?

I don’t know if it was one specific piece. Freshman year, I had this pair of jeans that I had stained, and I decided I should paint them. I bought some clothing paint, and I spread them out on the inside courtyard of Mac. I sat there for hours and painted all these flowers down them. Once I did that, I thought, ‘That was really fun.’ Then I convinced Rachel, who was my roommate at the time, to let me paint her shoes. Then I got a couple of commissions.

Do you have any favorite memories related to art?

Even when my art wasn’t super good, as a kid, I just remember bringing it to my dad, and he’d say, ‘This is so good. You’re really talented.’ I kind of felt like I had that in my back pocket as a little bit of encouragement to use that as a way to express myself.

When did you first get involved in the art department at Hillsdale?

My first class here was Oil Painting I. That was second semester of my freshman year.

Did you know that you wanted to do art here?

I actually came in thinking I was going to be an English major, maybe an English and music double major. I knew I wanted to take art classes, and it’s always been a passion, but I wasn’t going to major in it.

By Christina Lewis Collegian Freelancer

After years of releasing music centered around the dark thoughts clouding his mind with songs titled “Outcast,” “Let You Down,” and “Paralyzed,” NF stuns listeners with the first track on his forthcoming album “HOPE.”

NF’s music video, “HOPE,” released Feb. 16 has garnered over 8 million views after surfacing on Youtube’s trending music list.

The music video begins with the camera scanning the ocean. “DRIFTING,” a song NF released in 2021, included the line “Aren’t these waters so deceivin’?” By drawing his viewers attention to the ocean, NF reminds them of all the times he has felt lost and hopeless in the past.

When the song crescendos and finally reaches its first peak, NF appears drifting on a raft in the middle of the ocean. In his past music videos, he has always donned dark clothing. For the first time, NF appears wearing something lighter. This symbolizes his attempt to turn away from his dark past and into the hope of a bright, new future.

While drifting on the raft, NF reflects on the past 30 years of his life. He thought his music would help him make progress with dealing with the demons in his life, but has come to realize that he needs something new. He needs hope.

NF’s full album releases on April 7. It will be something new and something very

What made you change your mind?

I kind of had a crisis junior year because eventually, I thought, ‘maybe I should do a music and art double major.’ But then, I realized that wasn’t possible, the way the classes were scheduled, so I decided to do a music major, art minor. I got to junior year and I realized, ‘This isn’t what I want to do with my life.’ I talked to Jack Golden, and he said, ‘Don’t let the work that you’ve put into one thing define whether you’re going to go into that. It doesn’t matter; it just matters where you’re going to go from here.’ So I just flipped my major and minor around. I was one class away from being a music major, and I’ve been scrambling ever since. But I think it was a good decision.

What are your favorite types of things to paint or draw?

Animals, nature, and portraits. I really enjoy doing sketches of womens’ bodies because I think women get judged a lot in society. I think it’s therapeutic to just sit down and draw out the things that I don’t like about my body, or that society criticizes, and just get it on paper and realize, ‘That’s really beautiful when I look at it outside of myself.’ I also really like doing telephone poles. Sometimes I’ll just be walking through a city, and there’s something about weird, kind of gross things that you’re not specifically attracted to want to be in that space, but when I walk around and see paint chipping off, I think, ‘That’s really cool, I could draw that.’

different from what his fans have become accustomed to. NF’s new album will feature him on his journey to establish a new mindset - one full of hope and optimism for the future.

This song and video is an introduction to NF’s anticipated album. When NF introduces his new album in the music video, there are competing voices fighting over whose album it will be. NF is partly in the ocean and partly on shore. The album will either be inspired by NF’s old self or his new one. In the end, NF’s new self wins and he declares that his new album is “HOPE.” This emblematic moment showcases him taking a step on solid ground where the future is promising, unlike the ocean which is ever-changing and oftentimes very dangerous.

Right after NF declares the name of his album, orchestral music starts playing, signifying the start of something new. In this section of the song, NF asks what his definition of success is and then defines it. In NF’s 2018 song “WHY,” NF asks this same question, except he does not know the answer. However, in this song, NF gives multiple definitions of success.

One of NF’s descriptions of a successful person is: “It’s a person that can see the bright side through the dark times when there ain’t one.” NF now knows what makes a successful person, and is working hard to be one. As he sings this line, viewers see the old NF sitting on a rock in dark clothing. This old version of

What’s your favorite medium to work with?

I really enjoy working with oil paints. I used to do a lot of watercolors at home. Lately, I’ve been more focused on digital art because of graphic design and getting commissions. I’ve been trying to teach myself to be able to paint digitally instead of physically.

What from your recent artwork stands out to you?

Last year, I did a big portrait of Reese Coker, which was really helpful for forcing myself to work on details. This past summer, I did a pet portrait of my now-boyfriend’s cat, who had passed away recently. That was really fulfilling because I gave it to him, and he wasn’t expecting it, and I could tell it really touched him.

What can you tell me about your senior show?

I have my senior show in April, which is exciting and also terrifying. Just today, I started working on a horse sculpture that I’m going to enter into the department competition. I kind of don’t know what I’m doing, but I was always the kid who would draw horses all the time. Also, I’m going to try to do a piece for the show that’s made of all different papers and textures.

Is there a theme connecting the senior pieces?

The theme of our show is going to be ‘common things,’ that we realize have beauty in them.

Is there a professor who has inspired you?

They’ve all encouraged me and helped me along in dif-

NF appears throughout the video and tries, albeit unsuccessfully, to take the new and hopeful NF off course.

NF starts to wander around the island while holding a sheet of parchment that serves as his map. However, after a few wrong turns, he ends up back to the place he startedthe shore. His old self is there to mock him and make fun of his efforts in trying to make sense of the map and reach his destination. All of a sudden, the old NF pushes the more hopeful NF into the sand. NF falls through the sand that suddenly turns into the roof of a mansion. In 2015, NF released “Mansion,” a song where he described his mind as a mansion he could neither escape nor let anyone into. After NF hits the floor of the mansion, the music from his song “HOPE” stops playing and the opening lines of his song “Mansion” start echoing through the walls of the place he finds himself in.

As NF journeys through the many rooms of the mansion, his song “HOPE” starts playing again and he sees his old self. Each door he opens leads him to a room that shows a version of his past self. Traversing through the mansion is like taking a trip to see his past. NF examines his past in light of his new self and says, “I’m a prime example of what happens when you choose to not accept defeat and face your demons.”

As NF walks through a hallway, his past self suddenly comes up behind NF and puts a dark cloth over his head. The music stops for a few seconds.

ferent ways. Recently, I had a conversation with Professor Suarez about struggling with perfectionism in my art, and where that came from in my life, and how it made me want to drop music. Now that I’m not doing music full-time, I am finding perfectionism in my art spaces as well. That was helpful to have someone who understood that and said, ‘Do art anyways. You just have to sit down and do it, and it doesn’t have to be good every time. You’re allowed to make pieces you don’t like.’

What are your plans for after graduation?

I’m going to be moving back home, and hopefully looking for a job in some art capacity, whether that’s working for a magazine in graphic design or a company with branding. I’m sure I’ll always be doing freelance stuff regardless of where I am.

What is one piece of advice you would like to give?

I would encourage people not to be discouraged by realizing that their heart isn’t in what they’re currently doing or shifting their plans. Don’t feel like that work is wasted because I still love everything I learned being a music major, and I’m still thankful that I did it. I think it contributes to who I am as a person. If you feel like you’re being called in a different direction, be open to it and see what happens, because you’ll probably be happier if you just go for it.

When it starts back up again, NF is seen stripping off the cloth from his head while on top of a mountain. It took 30 years for NF to get to where he is. Thirty years for him to climb the mountain that is his life.

NF credits this progress to his son, who was born in 2021. He describes the feelings that go through his head while holding his son in his arms. NF wants his son to have a different childhood than his own. He does not want his child to grow up questioning his worth and wondering if his dad will be there for him.

NF then begins a long series of statements where he describes the first 30 years that made up his life.

The song ends with a battle between NF and the demons trying to take over him. His demons say, “you’ll never evolve,” but NF says, “I know I can change.” NF’s final lines in his song are, “I’m the one in charge / I’m taking the, no / I’m taking the / Reigns.”

In his song, “LOST,” released in 2021, NF says, “I’d love to pack arenas and all / But what I really wanna do is learn to handle my thoughts / And put the reins on ‘em, show ‘em I’m the one that’s the boss.” NF’s latest song, “HOPE,” recounts the times in his life when he has felt inadequate and overcome with negative emotions. He presses on, despite the challenges, to take control of his thoughts and emotions and refuses to let them take control of him.

NF’s new music video, “HOPE,” is a brilliant representation of an overcomer.

‘HOPE’ reveals NF’s maturing message & sound

Regina Veneklase enjoys painting scenic landscapes. Courtesy | Regina Veneklase

Sophomore Emily Griffith sings onstage during “She Loves Me” the musical. Jack Cote | Collegian

Science & Technology

Professor feature: David C. Houghton, Biology Chair man

By Catherine Maxwell Collegian Reporter

Among biology circles, Hillsdale College is known for its caddisfly collection of over 300,000 specimens and the stream ecology expertise of the G. H. Gordon Biostation, both led by Professor and Chairman of Biology, David C. Houghton.

Houghton has been teaching biology at Hillsdale since 2005, but his interest in the field extends back to his childhood expeditions at the family cabin in northern Minnesota.

“My whole childhood was hunting and fishing and poking around in streams and catching frogs. I didn’t really want to stop doing that,” Houghton said.

Houghton majored in limnology fisheries management at Wisconsin University, but

found his passion after taking a class on aquatic insects.

“I thought, these are the coolest things I’ve ever seen,” he said. “I did my own senior thesis project on an exotic invasive crayfish and how its populations affect those of native aquatic insects.”

Students help Houghton with his research projects. Hillsdale pairs students with faculty advisors to aide them in their research, so

Houghton also works with students like Jaiden Frantz and Molly Williams on their own projects.

“Jaiden Frantz just got her senior thesis accepted for publication in a professional scientific journal, which is pretty rare for an undergrad,” Houghton said.

Williams is working on a project that Houghton expects will also be published.

“Molly Williams is doing

a really complex stream ecology project where she’s looking at the impact of what’s called the riparian corridor,” he said. “She looked at two streams, little first order creeks up in northern Michigan, both of them in agricultural watersheds, and found that that little 100 meter buffer does make a difference.”

When he’s not in the lab or poking around streams, Houghton’s favorite detail about being a professor is seeing his students published.

“The holy grail for me is to try to get students actual scientific credentials,” he said.

year, and our majors routinely score in the top 5% in the country,” Houghton said. But the hallmark isn’t the student publications or standardized test scores— it’s the caddisfly collection.

“For the last 15 years, my students and I have been driving around the Upper Midwest sampling caddisflies. We’ve hit over 800 different streams from Michigan, mostly Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana,” Houghton said.

The goal of the collection is to determine if the various streams have viable populations of organisms, according to Houghton.

“Not just jumping through a hoop for their credits, but actually getting something tangible that can never be taken away from them. Once you’re a professionally published scientist as part of the scientific record, you’re actually doing science, not just learning it.”

The biology department is the third most common major at Hillsdale and offers a myriad of classes from freshwater ecology to botany to microbiology. The students continually rank as some of the best in the United States.

“We take a nationwide standardized exam every

Because it’s the largest caddisfly collection in Michigan, the biology department is raising eyebrows.

“I just got invited to present a seminar at the Illinois Natural History Survey, which is the largest entomology program in the country,” Houghton said. “Because of all these students over the years and all their hard work, we’re amassing an incredible dataset that’s getting people’s attention.”

But Houghton doesn’t believe the book work is the most impactful part of his teaching. Instead, it’s the experience.

“These projects really get the students involved in big science,” he said. “Getting them involved in their own research projects is great, but this plugs them into something even bigger. That’s why I teach at college. I think it’s the coolest thing in the world. They come in as timid teenagers who leave confident grown-ups.”

Houghton’s work has led him to travel all over the country and experience the natural world applications of his work.

“The Huron Mountain Club has some of the most pristine, undisturbed streams anywhere,” he said. “Last year myself, two students, and another worker at the field station were actually sampling from a stream that, as far as I can tell, had never

been sampled from before.”

While he was on sabbatical in Alaska, Houghton was paddling on a glacial lake and found a spot where a tiny waterfall had created a patch of perfectly clear water amidst a murky lake.

“I poked around there, and I found all kinds of thingsincluding whatI think to be an undescribed species,” Houghton said. “It’s this environment no one’s ever seen before because nobody ever goes out there and looks for it.”

Biology is a promise to Houghton. “The fact that you can still paddle out and find new species of organisms in these unique habitats that nobody ever studies––that’s the kind of stuff I love,” he said. “It’s exploration and finding new things.”

Opinion: Genealogy technology provides false sense of connection to past

By Tracy Wilson Design Editor

When I found my 92-year-old grandmother’s high school yearbook picture online, she was taken aback—she said she thought it was one of the worst pictures ever taken of her. As it turns out, Hillsdale students have full access to records on Ancestry.com— including parents’ and grandparents’ awkward yearbook photos—through the library website.

Fortunately, that yearbook picture doesn’t tell the full story of who my grandmother is. I have seen scrapbooks full of other great pictures of her, and have heard her life’s stories. But I might have a different impression of her if all I had was that single picture.

Using genealogy websites can give you a false feeling of being close to your relatives and to your heritage. When using websites like Ancestry.com to build a picture of your heritage, approach your findings with mild skepticism— the little information that is available online does not tell you everything about who your ancestors were, let alone who you are.

Journalist Rob Brooks, in a 2021 article in The Guardian, explains that the more information you have about someone else, the closer you feel to that person. This is due to the fact that, psychologically, you are beginning to incorporate that information into the context of your own identity. He claims that this feeling can be synthetic.

“According to psychologists, as we grow closer to another person, we expand our sense of self to include

them. The closer we become to them, the more we tend to think of their identity as our identity, of our views as their views,” Brooks said. “Just as celebrities share small disclosures to build the illusion of intimacy with a fan, the processes that build friendship and love can be emulated by algorithmic processes too.”

Just as social media and online messaging can make users feel close to people they don’t know in real life, technology used to research and verify your heritage can produce a similar false feeling of connection and identity.

Ancestry.com, one of the most popular ancestry websites, is often used for two things: DNA testing and historical record-keeping.

Many people turn to DNA testing to learn not only about their genetic makeup and what illnesses they may be predisposed to, but also to gain a richer understanding of their identity.

Some DNA testing companies even offer the chance to connect with previously unknown relatives.

“Make personal discoveries with AncestryDNA,” Ancestry’s tagline says.

“It’s… the most comprehensive portrait of you yet,” says 23andMe’s website.

“Your DNA test offers you the powerful experience of discovering what makes you unique and learning where you really come from,” touts the MyHeritage webpage. These advertisements are worded in a way that appeals to the personal. It is presented not just as scientific and medical information, but information that offers the key to understanding who you are.

Ancestry.com offers customers what they call an “ethnicity estimate,” which is the breakdown of how a customer’s DNA compares to DNA taken from other living people. The DNA in Ancestry’s system comes from living people who have verified “deep ancestry” in a particular region, such as Spain or Wales. People with ancestors from the same region are put in a reference panel, or a set of data which customers’ DNA can then be compared with.

“When asked to trace familial origins, most people can only reliably go back one to five generations, making it difficult to find individuals with knowledge about more distant ancestry,” according to Ancestry’s ethnicity 2022 white paper. “Fortunately, knowing where someone’s recent ancestors were born is often a sufficient proxy for much deeper ancestry. In the recent past, it was much more difficult and thus less common for people to migrate long distances. Because of this, the birthplace of a person’s recent

ancestors often represents the location of that person’s deeper ancestral DNA.”

In other words, if 25% of a customer’s DNA shows as Irish, it’s not because their DNA has an “Irish” gene — it’s because 25% of the customer’s DNA is most similar to the DNA in that company’s “Irish” reference data set, which was taken from recently living

Because each company uses a different pool of DNA to compare with customers’ DNA, customers may get different ethnicity profiles based on which company they use, Ruth Padawer finds in a 2018 New York Times Magazine article.

“Customers’ results are based on inferences and are merely an estimate, often a very rough one — something many test takers don’t realize and testing companies play down,” Padawer said.

Even if an ethnicity estimate is highly accurate based on a given company’s data pool, it is still a best guess — it is not scientific verification of your family

history, as some people seem to think it is.

Padawer’s article followed then 62-year-old Sigrid Johnson, who used DNA testing to confirm her theory that she was partially Black. As it turned out, her ethnicity breakdowns differed greatly from company to company.

“In a matter of weeks, Johnson’s African roots had bounced from 27 percent to 45 percent African — and her Italian roots had been reported as 0 percent, 49 percent and 20 percent,” Padawer wrote. “Through it all, of course, Johnson’s true ancestry, whatever it actually is, never changed.”

The other side of genealogy companies, which consists of record-keeping and lineage tracking, also often lacks details surrounding your familial background. Ancestry offers digital access to birth and death certificates, draft cards, and census records.

When I logged into the Ancestry database from the library, I was excited to find more information about my great-grandfather Benjamin, who died in 1928 at the age of 32. He died when my grandfather was only a boy, and so much of his life story has always been a mystery. Family legend has it that Benjamin was an electric lineman, and I always had believed he died in a work-related incident.

His official death certificate, which I found on Ancestry, told another story: he died from spinal cancer.

Although it was initially shocking, the little information I found doesn’t really tell me much about Benjamin. It doesn’t tell me what he was like as a son, a hus -

band, and a father; it doesn’t tell me what kept him up at night, or what motivated him. I am grateful that I now know a little bit more about my family, but I’m not much closer to Benjamin’s memory than I was when I started my search.

The Ancestry library website also has a function called StoryScout, which uses information about your great-grandparents to generate a “story” about them. For example, using my great-grandfather’s World War I draft card, StoryScout says, “Millions of young men like your great-grandfather saw their lives change instantly. One veteran many years later remembered, ‘We saw this note under the door… for me to report [at] 6:00 a.m. in the morning. That was the next morning.’”

The program used to generate this text made me feel like I was reading a personal story. But it isn’t a personal story — thousands of other users have likely read the exact same StoryScout text about their great-grandfathers who entered the World War I draft. Like an ethnicity estimate, StoryScout offers only a best guess as to how a person’s ancestors might have lived.

Genealogical databases can seem like a way to prove our heritage and family history. In reality, these websites provide a picture that can be just as vague as the stories and records passed down through family legend. We shouldn’t stake our identities on our findings, because we will never know our long-gone ancestors personally, no matter how many government records we find or how much DNA we process.

“My whole childhood was hunting and fishing and poking around in streams and catching frogs. I didn’t really want to stop doing that.”

Brothers Robert and Benjamin Philips were teenagers during WWI. Courtesy | Tracy Wilson

David Houghton is the head of the Biology department. Courtesy | Hillsdale College

David Houghton and students at a bridge over Mountain Stream in the Huron Mountains. Courtesy | David Houghton

Big Tech, big potential problems: campus reacts to developing Supreme Court case

Section 230 raises controversy for tech companies

By Olivia Hajicek Assisstant

The United States Supreme Court recently heard a case that could allow technology companies like Google to be sued for content their algorithms recommend to users.

Family members of Nohemi Gonzalez, who was one of the 100 victims in the 2015 ISIS attack in Paris, are bringing the suit against Google. They argue that YouTube, a Google subsidiary, aided ISIS’s attack through its algorithm, which recommended the terrorist organization’s content to users.

Under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, services like Google are not held liable for content posted by third parties on their platforms, but they can remove content they consider objectionable as long as they are acting in good faith.

As technology has rapidly progressed since Section 230 was passed, it has come under scrutiny from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, according to the Wall Street Journal. Some people are concerned that the liability shield enables companies to ignore “false and dangerous” content, while others are concerned that companies use the “good faith” provision to justify political censorship.

Associate Professor of Politics Joseph Postell said modern internet technology has rendered Section 230 obsolete.

“In 1996, Congress really had no clue what the internet was going to become,” Postell said. “I think Congress needs to go back and rewrite Section 230 to deal with the realities of where we are now with the internet as opposed to where we were 25 years ago.”

Senior Gabriel Powell said, partly because

Research Spotlight: Mark Sprague

of Section 230’s liability shield, five tech companies have come to control more than 90% of the flow of information. In light of this situation, which is somewhat like a government-created monopoly, he said Associate Justice Clarence Thomas’s argument that Google ought to be treated like a “common carrier” makes sense.

The concept of a common carrier goes back to English Common Law and includes essential communication and transportation services. The Supreme Court has held that common carriers are “bound to serve all customers alike, without discrimination.”

Thomas argued in a 2021 concurring opinion that, “There is a fair argument that some digital platforms are sufficiently akin to common carriers or places of accommodation to be regulated in this manner.”

“In that case you would be applying just First Amendment government standards to them,” Powell said. “Limitations on what they could and couldn’t censor would be what the government could and couldn’t censor, which is a lot less than they can censor now.”

Powell said companies like Google should lose their liability shield when they go further in cen -

soring content than the government is permitted to do.

“Once they start to editorialize on these posts — banning, adding context — they’re no longer strictly a public platform,” Powell said. “Then they’re exerting their own control over what people are posting, so then Section 230’s liability protection shouldn’t apply.”

Junior Lucas Joyce also said tech companies should have to choose between protection from liability for their content and the right to censor it aside from general guidelines.

“I am in favor of tech companies choosing to be one or the other: either they should be able to censor whatever goes on there, in which case they can be liable for what is put on there, or apart from the basic guidelines they should not be able to censor what is on there,” Joyce said.

Postell said he thinks the best outcome in Gonzalez v. Google would be for the court either to issue a narrow ruling in favor of the plaintiffs or to rule in favor of Google.

“My fear would be that a broad ruling for the plaintiffs would actually revamp Section 230 in such a way that would cause a lot of harmful consequences, where a lot of things would be taken off of YouTube because Google would be too afraid to allow those things to remain on the platform,” Postell said.

He said that Congress should clarify companies’ responsibilities under Section 230, but that repealing the liability shield protections altogether could result in more censorship.

“Google would have to be very careful about what it allowed onto its platform,” Postell said, “and that actually might censor a lot of good free speech.”

Senior Mark Sprague recently conducted his own research: “Surface Effects on Staphylococcus aureus Biofilm Formation” using a dynamic flow growth model. Sprague did this on campus last summer for six weeks.

Can you describe your research?

Biofilm is essentially a collection of bacteria that layer on top of each other and grow in a unique way, different from just single cells. They form a “supercommunity” which helps them survive. In the healthcare community, bacterial infections often manifest in this way. They form in these layers that are harder to treat when they’re in a biofilm, and thus more deadly. The bacteria we used in the experiment was Staphylococcus, the bacteria that makes up MRSA, In the lab, there are two ways to grow biofilms, batch models and dynamic models. In the past at Hillsdale, we’ve used only batch models, which means “stagnant conditions.” With a batch model, everything you grow the biofilm with is put in a well at once, and it grows that way. My experiment used a dynamic model, something that had not been used at Hillsdale before. A dynamic model involves nutrients constantly being put in and filtered out. The advantage of this is that it is believed to

be more similar to the environment inside of a human, where conditions are always changing, not constant, and entering and leaving the systems. The machine we used to imitate this was a drip flow reactor, which grew biofilms on slides called “coupons.” The coupons can come in different surfaces made of different materials as opposed to batch models. This way, we could grow biofilms on different materials and see how the surface affects how the biofilm grows. We then used a confocal microscope to view the research, which can create really high-definition images of the biofilm.

What was the objective of your research?

This project was brainstormed by myself and Dr. Steiner, my research adviser. He had used the batch models in the past, and we really wanted to introduce a new form of growing biofilms at Hillsdale, so we saw this as a “pilot” kind of experiment. We wanted to see if the model was worth the time, and what its advantages and disadvantages were. It was a very microscaled project, but is going to aid and guide future research projects here that can build off what I discovered with my success of growing the biofilms with the dynamic model.

How has Hillsdale been central in aiding you in your research?

The small faculty to student ratio and Dr. Steiner. To have access to all of the different things

we have here at Hillsdale ws incredible, I had the confocal microscope all to myself, which is very expensive, and I probably would not have had the opportunity to use it on my own and on my own time at another school.

How did you enjoy your overall experience of working on this project?

I loved it. Working with the research, I wasn’t sure how much I was going to like it at first, but I really enjoyed being able to work independently. Everyday there was a fresh challenge, a new and fun problem to solve on a daily basis.

What are your future plans?

Attending medical school at Wayne State University in Detroit. What have you learned most about yourself in this process, or what’s one major takeaway?

Expect the unexpected when doing research. And, don’t stick to your plan too strictly, you have to be fluid and dynamic.

What has been most difficult and most rewarding?

Time management was difficult. I had to get everything done in six weeks, and I really felt like I was still wanting to do more at the end. It was also very exhausting, but also very rewarding when I developed my images and looked at my data, and saw things that would have never made sense to me before. It was also very neat to have my peers be interested in my work and get to share it with them as well.

This week’s topics:

Presenters:

Audrey Riley

Ceara Kerwin

Natalie Martinson

Jesse Westmeyer

This expo is for students interested in medical schools. Over 120 schools will be in attendance. Transportation is provided. Reach out to Career Services for more info.

- Finding the shape of Cadmium-106

- Measuring the magnetic moment of an electron

- Modifying the 1st Law of Thermodynamics

“Some people are concerned that the liability shield enables companies to ignore “false and dangerous content...”

Editor

Compiled by Quinn Delamater Collegian Freelancer

Sprague, his adviser Frank Steiner, and research partners conduct their reserach in a Strosacker lab. Courtesy | Mark Sprague

By Catherine Maxwell Collegian Freelancer

The beauty of the Heritage Room will now be matched by its brawn: a set of flintlock pistols and muskets dating back to the Revolutionary War.

Clinton Miller donated the weapons in the summer of 2020, shortly before his death, according to Lori Curtis, Hillsdale College archivist. Miller was an antiques collector and appraiser who belonged to multiple historical and weaponry-related organizations.

“There are 12 smoothbore, flintlock long guns dating from 1726 to 1779,” Curtis said. “There are 12 flintlock pistols, dating from 1738 to 1837. The collection also includes two bayonets, a sword, a cutlass, a holster for a pistol, and a powder horn.” Curtis has been researching the different types of firearms and their origins as part of the display.

“It’s been great fun to learn how you tell what year a particular firearm was made, and who made it and where they were,” she said.

FEATURES

tols are currently on display, and Curtis hopes to add the muskets within a week.

Charles Yost, assistant professor of medieval history, recently brought his American Heritage students to see and handle the collection.

“I think it’s very important that when students are studying history, they don’t think that they’re studying minds that exist in a vacuum,” Yost said. “It can help ground it in reality if you go and look at the stuff itself.”

According to Curtis, blacksmiths created the parts for each weapon separately and then assembled them. Many blacksmiths would scratch their initials and the date into their pieces as a way to identify them. This led Curtis to investigate one musket in particular.

“I had this lovely firearm,” Curtis said. “I thought, it definitely looked like a 1727 lock, matched all the criteria, and the stock looked like 1730. This all made sense up to that point.”

She realized something was wrong, however, when she examined the locksmith’s engraving.

“The locksmith’s name and date said ‘Farmer 1743,’” she said, “Why would he be signing this lock 20 years after the other pieces?”

Curtis contacted an expert of Colonial Williamsburg. He suggested that the original name had been sanded off and a different name engraved.

Curtis successfully took the gun apart to examine the pieces, the only way to identify the real locksmith, she said.

“I could see faint initials that were etched in and they didn’t look like J. F. for Joseph Farmer,” she said.

Instead, the initials were E. J. for Edward Jordan, a known locksmith in the 1730s.

“We solved that mystery, but we still don’t know why somebody tried to change that,” she said.

The collection also includes two pistols from the 1830s which were made for the Royal Mail coaches to fight off highwaymen. The barrel on one of the pistols from 1836 says ‘For His Majesty’s Mail Coaches” and the other made the following year says “For her Majesty’s Mail Coaches.”

“In 1837, Victoria became queen, so they made new pistols,” Curtis said.

Curtis said all of the weapons are of British origin.

“They are predominantly British military. Almost all of them are 18th-century British military firearms,” she said. There are also a few from the early 19th century.

Curtis said that Miller had wanted to put the weapons in the Heritage Room. The pis-

Intramural basketball team plays its best to lose

By Micah Hart Circulation Manager

Shot after shot, nothing.

Play after play, and no cigar. After 20 tries, freshman Nick Blatner scored his first basket, and his team erupted in celebration.

John Worachek, a student in Yost’s American Heritage class, said being able to see and hold the weapons deepened his appreciation of the course.

“Reading about and seeing pictures of those artifacts can only do so much for the student of history, but feeling, hearing, and smelling them brings us closer to understanding our own heritage than any book can,” Worachek said.

Curtis and Yost both shared their excitement for students to see the collection.

“Thinking about the American Revolution as a conflict of ideas is fine on a certain level,” Yost said. “But there’s something about picking up and holding the weapons that were quite likely used in this conflict that drives that home and underlines the seriousness of the struggle.”

Worachek agreed.

“Being able to hold a weapon that may have been used by or against my ancestors deepens my respect for their willingness to take up arms and fight for a cause they truly believed in,” he said.

This is the Sewer: an aptly-named intramural men’s basketball team with a singular mission of losing every game it plays. Each basketball season, the players crawl out of Simpson Residence with a renewed vigor for fun in failure.

“The goal is to lose, which this team does quite well,” Petersen said. “It’s a lot of fun because most of the guys haven’t played organized basketball. We don’t take ourselves too seriously.”

The team is composed of both upperclassmen and underclassmen residents. During a game, they look for opportunities to display their lack of skill — even going so far as to achieve a rare dishonor.

“We were once disqualified from a game due to the amount of half-court shots we were taking,” said senior Nathan Bly, a member of the team since his freshman year.

Former Sewer player and Hillsdale College admissions counselor Ben Strickland ’16 put it simply.

“We chose to be ridiculous,” he said.

With disqualification, many intentional losses, and a general inability to play basketball well, the Sewer has been largely successful at achieving its goal. According to Bly, the team only achieved one unfortunate victory in the last three years.

“It was over the Galloway Athletic Youth Squad, and one of the kids was so mad he yelled and chucked his backpack against the wall,” Bly said.

The team remains a mainstay in Simpson.

Season after season, Sewer continues to come back to-

gether to play, always doing the best to be the worst.

“We may not score double digits ever, but nobody will cheer louder than we do,” sophomore Nathan Stanish said.

The team originally formed due to a former student’s contradictory skills. The student couldn’t play the game of basketball, but he could dunk remarkably well.

“Like many Simpson traditions, the Sewer predated me, and it brings me joy that it has lived long after I’ve gone,” Strickland said. “I am just blessed to have been able to participate in it for my four years.”

Likewise, senior Luke Turnbow believes this team is worth keeping around as an integral piece of Simpson lore.

“This is already a tradition worth carrying on,” Turnbow said. “No man now on the team was on the first team of the Sewer, but we have taken up the mantle of some of the worst basketball players to ever try our hands at the game.”

Each year, the players seek to build up the strong foundation of community.

“Sewer allowed me to be a part of something bigger and older than myself and get to know some pretty legendary upperclassmen from all parts of campus,” Strickland said. “As I became an upperclassman, I was able to bring in those who were willing and able into the tradition.”

The Sewer is representative of both Simpson and the college as a whole, Strickland said.

“The Sewer itself wasn’t anything special, but it was a manifestation or offshoot of the great culture that Simpson already had,” Strickland said. “This was largely due to the men that were there, putting it under the stereotypical and true Hillsdale sentiment: ‘It’s the people.’”

Forty days of fasting, remembrance, and prayer

By Erin Osborne Collegian Reporter

It’s easy to tell that Lent has begun when students walk across campus with ashen crosses on their foreheads.

The religious season of Lent involves a variety of devotions, including alms-giving, fasting, and penitence. Practices vary widely by Christian denomination and church, and some Christians don’t observe Lent at all.

“Lent is one of the best times of the year to grow your connection to Christ,”

sophomore Anna Jackson, an Eastern Orthodox Christian, said. “It reminds you of him in a much deeper way than in the normal year because it’s more intentional.”

Orthodox Christians observe Lent through a rigorous fast. It begins with Meat Fare, which is the last week that

Orthodox Christians eat meat before Lent starts, and Cheese Fare, which is the last week that Orthodox Christians eat cheese. Orthodox Christians typically fast from meat, dairy

(including eggs), oils, and alcohol the two weeks before Lent and the following 40 days between the beginning of Lent and Pasca — the Orthodox word for Easter.

“We practice a very strict fast in order to remember to curb our passions, our bodies, and to remind ourselves to pray because unfortunately, we’re very weary creatures,” Jackson said. “We remember that sort of hunger and deprivation, which helps us to remember to pray and to trust in God’s help and mercy.”

Orthodox Christians also fast during Advent, the Dormition Fast, and various feast days such as the Beheading of John the Baptist. Orthodox Christians’s Lenten services culminate in an all-night Easter liturgy. Church members read the Psalter through the entire night, and Orthodox catechumens are chrismated or baptized into the Orthodox Church on Easter Sunday.

“I’ve heard Orthodox Christian fasting and Lent as

a one-size-fits-all experience, as though that’s a bad thing,” Jackson said. “It’s actually a form of subjecting yourself and giving something up. You have accountability and a standard that’s been set.”

Unlike Orthodox Christians, Catholics fast on Ash

the size of a full meal.”

Lutherans and Catholics also prioritize the individualized nature of personal fasts, such as avoiding social media throughout Lent.

“Lent is actually an exercise of freedom,”Lutheran and theology professor Jonathan

first Holy Communion at a cande-lit vigil Mass that concludes after midnight on Easter Sunday. For Mumme, Lent is a reminder of our own mortality.

“There is nothing that we are enjoying today, nothing that we are partaking of, including life itself as we know it, that we can keep forever,” Mumme said. “None of that may possess us. What possesses us is our hope in the resurrection.”

Some Christians don’t practice Lent at all, including many members of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.

Wednesday and Good Friday. Additionally, they fast and abstain from meat on Fridays during Lent.

“We have it very easy compared to the Orthodox,” Catholic and junior Ryan Bagley said. “The requirements for a fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday is one full meal and two smaller snacks that when added together are not

Mumme said. “We give things up because it can help your prayers.”

Catholics Holy Week services include Holy Thursday and Good Friday — the only day of the year when Catholic Mass is not celebrated. Similarly to the Orthodox service, catechumens entering the church will be baptized, confirmed, and take their

“We don’t follow any church calendar whatsoever,” Presbyterian and junior Lydia Hilton said. “We don’t recognize any church holidays, including Christmas or Easter.”

However, Hilton also has attended various Lenten services, which Lutheran sophomore Maya Toman advocates for.

“Even if you’re not Lutheran or Catholic, go to a mid-

week Lenten service in the area,” Toman said. “Get a little picture of what it’s like for liturgical churches to practice a church season.”

In Hilton’s view, Lent should not become an opportunity to practice pridefully for the sake of being observed by others.

“There is a scripture passage about not showing off that you’re fasting and the connection with pride,” Hilton said. “However, I think it’s also very important that if you don’t give something up for Lent to not be prideful about that, so like in the reverse, not being prideful either way.”

This is sophomore Ethan Graham’s first year practicing Lent.

“I didn’t really know that Lent was a thing until high school,” Graham said. “Something I’ve always respected about more traditional services is that there is a long preparation for the important things like Easter.”

This flintock pistol, made in 1836, holds the marking, “For His Majesty’s Mail Coaches,” around the barrel opening. Collegian | Catherine Maxwell

Due to a generous donation, Mossey Library adds a collection of Revolutionary War-era flintock pistols and muskets to the historical wealth of Mossey Library’s Heritage Room.

‘Holding a weapon used by my ancestors’

“We remember that sort of hunger and deprivation, which helps us to remember to pray and to trust in God’s help and mercy.”

“We have taken up the mantle of some of the worst basketball players to ever try our hands at the game.”

FEATURES

Quick Hits with Lorraine Murphy

In this Quick Hits interview, Associate Professor of English Lorraine Murphy talks baking bread, comparing Dante to “Star Wars,” and joking with her two-year-old.

By Sydney Green Collegian Freelancer

What is one piece of advice you would give to students?

Work hard but be creative and be yourself at the same time. Don’t try to be a cookie-cutter student. Find the approach to the work that really fires your interest and follow that.

What book are you reading right now?

I just finished “Double Cross: The True Story of the D-Day Spies” by Ben McIntyre. It was excellent.

What is an interesting fact about yourself?

I’m awfully boring!

What is one of the funniest moments you had while teaching?

One of my Great Books students made a comparison between Dante’s “Inferno” and “Star Wars” that had us all laughing. I love it when students make connections I never would have seen.

What is your favorite word and why? Discernment, because I love what it implies about careful attention and a thoughtful approach to reality.

Who is the person you look up to most?

My mother, because she raised four children and taught us to work hard and have fun. I have two of my own now, so I’m beginning to understand how hard that is. Do you have any hidden talents?

Murder on the quad

To conclude a game of spoon assassins organized by the cryptology club, the last two students standing dueled “to the death” with ladles, a heftier weapon

By Michael Bachmann

Features Editor

Spoons aren’t just for soup anymore.

From February 7-13, members of the cryptology club turned them into deadly weapons for a game of spoon assassins, which culminated in a duel on the quad on February 13.

“It seemed like a good excuse to engage in recreational paranoia and a little bit of espionage,” said senior Ryan Bagley, the president of cryptology club. “It’s very easy to take seriously even though you’re not fearing for your life.”

Spoon assassin is a game in which each player is assigned a target that they must “kill” by hitting them with their spoon. Once a player kills someone, they acquire their target.

Although not a puzzle game in the traditional sense, senior Lewis Degoffau, the winner of the game, said that it is an information gathering game.

“You are essentially playing Sherlock Holmes while attempting not to die,” Degoffau said. “If you are connected to a lot of people, you are able to gather a lot of information without putting yourself at risk because you are the only

oner said. “Starting from day one, I kept a running list of who was in and who had who.”

Both Degoffau and Wagoner said that they made it into the final two by playing a conservative game.

At President’s Ball, however, Degoffau said he went on the offensive, killing one person and preventatively killing two others. A preventative kill occurs when a player attacks in self-defense before they can be assassinated.

“There were more people that died that night than on any other day,” said Wagoner, who came to President’s Ball with a thigh holster for her spoon.

Although the event was a massacre, both players agreed that the Knorr Dining Hall was the most dangerous place to be. Degoffau said he avoided it for the entire week.

Because the dining hall was a prime location to kill victims, Wagoner said that is where she made her favorite assassination.

“The girl I had, knew I was the one hunting her, which made it a massive challenge. I had been stuck on her for about 24 hours,” Wagoner

had an encounter that almost ended the game early. “I saw him from the corner of the street. He asked me if I was still in, sprinted across the street, and I made it into my dorm with less than a millisecond to spare,” Wagoner said.

Rather than attempt to assassinate one another after that, the pair decided to wait to attempt to kill each other in a duel later that day. After setting aside their differences, the two enjoyed lunch together, which was Degoffau’ first time in the dining hall since the game began.

one who can get targeted. You can vicariously gain information through others.”

Senior Sarah Wagoner, the runner-up of the game, agreed.

“There’s definitely clues that you pick up along the way, like who you are after and who is after you,” Wag-

said. “I finally went to lunch and sat by the fireplace so I could watch the staircase leading down. I watched her come down, waited for her to find a table, waited for her to get food, and then darted out from the sizzle line.”

On the last morning of the game, Wagoner and Degoffau

“I never break deals that I make in games and I assumed that Sarah would also be honorable,” Degoffau said. “We actually had an enjoyable lunch in anticipation of our bloody duel.”

That afternoon, the two combatants donned sith caps and walked onto the quad to “Duel of the Fates.” Each had traded in their traditional spoons, for ladles, a heavier option with deadly reach. Degoffau chose senior

I’m a pretty good bread-baker. Or, getting my picky kids to eat — that’s an impressive talent.

If you were to write a book, what would it be about?

It would have something to do with metaphor, or the way literature represents the spiritual dimension, the unseen.

What never fails to make you laugh?

The jokes my 2-year-old makes up. They aren’t funny, which is why they’re so hilarious.

What do you wish you had learned sooner?

I’m still learning to remain calm and not get caught up in momentary worries. This is a lifelong project.

What trait most defines who you are?

I’m perpetually anxious, so that makes me a control freak. But it also means I try to encourage others because I know how easy it is to be unsure of ourselves.

How have your students influenced you as a teacher?

The energy and joy they bring to learning — specifically to reading and thinking about great books — inspires me every day.

What is a book that everyone should avoid?

Anything by Ayn Rand.

What do you enjoy most about teaching?

Exchanging ideas with students. It’s the best.

Making light of a power outage

By Meghan Schultz and Michael Bachmann Features Editor and Assistant Editor

The houses were dark, silent with the loss of electricity and internet. The students gathering outside, reveling in the absence of class and presence of good company, didn’t mind.

After much of southern Michigan lost power on Wednesday, Feb. 22, students left their unlit homes and gathered outside to enjoy the unlikely sun peeking through the ice-covered trees.

On Manning Street, students passed an afternoon on porches and in yards for the first time since the warmth of autumn. Neighbors cheered as a yard game concluded and wandered over to chat, drinks in hand.

Sophomore Cecelia Cummins joined classmate Mary-Ruth Oster on a porch swing and accepted an offer for a hot mug of tea.

playing childhood games. The power outage became a perfect environment for hiden-seek and sardines.

“Everything in the house was so dark. In the the living room, you couldn’t see someone standing six inches in front of you,” Schaefer said. “It was funny trying to fit seven guys in one closet and trying not to laugh, all while you can hear one person wandering around the house trying not to bump into things.”

On Thursday, freshman Aidan Christian’s band decided to make the most of an evening of canceled events and put on their own — a spontaneous concert at Penny’s.

“Around 2 p.m., our pianist Eric Tedder said, ‘I want to do an impromptu concert.’ Of course, with no class, we all woke up around noon, so the day had just started,” Christian said. “Over the next six hours, we got together a 45-minute set. The whole thing was a real rush job.”

Noah Parker as his second and Wagoner chose sophomore Anna Jackson, who had the highest kill count in the game. Bagley, who fenced in high school, refereed the duel.

“Both of our nerves were very high,” Degoffau said. “It was very tense.”

Wagoner and Degoffau circled each other for two minutes parrying and blocking strikes from their ladles before Degoffau made his fatal blow.

“I waited until she was off balance and went in and hit her opposite arms,” Degoffau said. I was very close to dying at least twice, so I was very happy to be left alive.”

Bagley hopes to make the duel a part of future spoon assassin games that the club hosts.

“I’m really glad that Sarah and Lewis decided to do the duel,” Bagley said. “They made it a way for everyone who played to get some closure and to provide a spectacle.”

“It felt like graduation weekend, because it’s spring semester and all of a sudden, we have nothing to do,” Cummins said. “When there’s no school to do, the Hillsdale community becomes so special because it really embraces the small-town feel — because we’re not just students anymore.”

She and Oster ate breakfast at the dining hall, partaking in what they termed “Doomsday brunch” and scavenging for water in case they had to ration their own.

“Some people were talking about not getting power until Monday,” Cummins said. “The only hot food Saga had at first was oatmeal, which ran out, so it was even more doomsday.”

Down the street from Cummins, senior Sam Schaefer and his housemates left the cold of their home, Graceland, to take advantage of the warmer weather, listening to the crackle of melting ice on the trees around them.

“Thankfully, there weren’t any branches that hit us or our neighbors,” Schaefer said. “It’s fun when everyone’s outside so you can use the entire street. That’s the fun of having a porch — just people-watching and people stopping by.”

Graceland lost power at 8:30 p.m. on Wednesday, and the house spent the night

Just before the concert began, an email from Diane Philipp officially canceled Friday classes. Drummer and junior Carter McNish announced the news, and the 70-some people listening burst into cheers.

“And that means we’re going ’til one!” McNish declared.

At the end of their performance, members of the student band “Schizmatics” found each other in the crowd and emerged for an unplanned set, borrowing instruments to play.

The performance only continued until 10 p.m., when New Dorm’s quiet hours meant the crowd had to disassemble.

While power returned to many off-campus homes in less than 24 hours, senior Beth Potwardowski’s home on North West Street lost power from Wednesday evening until late Sunday night.

Still, Potwardowski said she was never worried that the community wouldn’t take care of her. Over the course of her five days without power, she was welcomed to stay in several off-campus homes and the Kappa house.

“It really spoke to the strength of the community,” Potwardowski said. “It’s cliche, but it really is the people.”

Above, Lorraine Murphy smiles with her husband, Professor of Mathematics David Murphy, and their two children. Murphy recieved the Emily Daugherty Award for Teaching Excellence in 2014 and serves as faculty advisor for a Regency-Era Appreciation club. Courtesy | Lorraine Murphy

After deciding to wait to duel, Lewis Degoffau and Sarah Wagoner enjoyed a peaceful lunch in , a typically dangerous place for them. Courtesy | Lewis Degoffau

“You are essentially playing Sherlock Holmes while attempting not to die ... I was very close to dying at least twice, so I was very happy to be left alive.”