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Pepperdine Graduates Awarded California Capital Fellowships
The prestigious California Capital Fellows Program accepts fewer than 20 fellows annually to its four programs, and this fall two of those spaces will be taken by Pepperdine graduates Andrea Lane and Grant Lea. Lane (MA '08, GSEP) will work with a California State Senator during her 11-month Senate Fellowship, while Lea (B '08, SC) has been selected for the Executive Fellowship. Fellows work full-time in public policy as members of a legislative, executive, or judicial branch office.
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Alumnus Jerry Golphenee Brings Solace to Suffering Children in Kathmandu
Judy and Jerry Golphenee (B '62, GPC) planned to spend two years in Nepal on a dentistry assignment. Eleven years later, they remain living and working in the country, running a flourishing nonprofit agency called Children of Kathmandu. The organization sponsors 54 children, providing tuition, books, uniforms, food, lodging, medicine, clothing, and most importantly, love and support.
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Fantastic Five: Meet Pepperdine's Recently Recognized Fulbright Scholars
A record number of Pepperdine students have been awarded a Fulbright U.S. Student scholarship this year, leading five recent Seaver College graduates to teach or study overseas for the 2008 to 2009 academic year. Here's look at the five recipients.
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Seaver College Graduates Teach for America
Of the 13 million American children growing up in poverty, about half will graduate from high school. They will perform, on average, at an eighth-grade level. Twelve graduates of the Seaver College Class of 2008 are doing something to change this through Teach for America, an organization dedicated to addressing educational inequality in the United States.
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A Pioneer in the Certified Organic Fair-trade Industry
Every great plan begins with the seed of an idea. In Jeremy Black's case, it all started with a berry. After becoming aware of an unknown Amazon superfruit called açaí in the late 1990s, Black (B '96, SC) left his job as a top-producing, registered investment advisor to cofound Sambazon, or Sustainable Management of the Brazilian Amazon.
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Alumni Chris Detert and Guy Jordan Bring New Energy to the PR World
"I set up a tent in my backyard," remembers Chris Detert (SC '01), "and filled it with shoes. I'd take people to my car or meet them in an alley or parking lot - anything I could do to talk about those shoes." Detert tirelessly hit the streets to promote his first client Osiris Shoes. He set up a home office and saved capital for a business space. From these humble beginnings grew American Rebel PR.
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Regan Schaffer Leads American Humanics Scholars
By the time Gabriella Neumann graduated from Seaver College, she had logged more than 900 hours of volunteer service and joined a thriving community dedicated to nonprofit management: the American Humanics Scholars. The national alliance of colleges, universities, and nonprofit organizations is dedicated to preparing future generations of nonprofit leaders. Now in its 60th year, the organization partners with nearly 75 universities nationwide.
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Pepperdine Biologist Receives Robert Foster Cherry Award for Great Teaching
Dr. Stephen D. Davis, Distinguished Professor of Biology at Pepperdine University, has been named by Baylor University as the 2008 recipient of the Robert Foster Cherry Award for Great Teaching, the only national teaching award - with the single largest monetary reward of $200,000 - presented by a college or university to an individual for exceptional teaching.
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Student Spotlight: Thomas Lambert
Thomas Lambert approaches life with a pen in hand and politics in mind. The Seaver College sophomore contributes articles and op-eds to the Connecticut Post and recently completed a semester in Pepperdine's Washington, D.C. internship program. Before heading off to his next adventure (a semester in Pepperdine's London program), Lambert took some time to describe how his time in Washington impacted his life, and how he's taking the reins in his education.
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From California to South Africa: Alumna Anna Jacobsen Shares Her Passion for Science
When Anna Jacobsen (B '03, SC) was in the fourth grade, she began her first leaf collection to fulfill a class project. Nature became more than just "a sea of uniform green" to Jacobsen after that experience. Today Jacobsen is a professor in the Department of Biology at California State University (CSU) Bakersfield.
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Baseball Coach Steve Rodriguez Honored for Contributions to the Community
For his contributions to the City of Malibu, the Malibu City Council recently presented Rodriguez with the Jake Kuredjian Memorial Citizenship Award. Named in honor of a Los Angeles County Sheriff's deputy who was killed in the line of duty, the award was created to honor outstanding individuals like Rodriguez who give their time for the youth, families, and seniors of Malibu.
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Waves Water Polo: All Eyes on the Prize
For college athletes, each season brings a new chance for victory and another shot at the NCAA Championships. The Pepperdine men's water polo team is no exception.
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Stella Erbes Reflects on Honduras Medical Mission
On May 5, 2007, seven Pepperdine students and I began our journey to Honduras to practice our Spanish skills and serve in hospitals, medical clinics, and schools. The Honduras Medical Mission Program attracts pre-med students from Seaver College (and the former pre-med major in me) who are interested in serving others by using their Spanish skills and medical knowledge.
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Pepperdine Athlete Reflects on Coaching Soccer Camps in Uganda
Waves women's soccer players had never traveled so far for an away match. We stood in the middle of a dusty soccer field in Uganda as throngs of school children rushed the field, barefoot and ecstatic. My teammates Mckenzie Hill, Emily Wynne, and I were about to spend several days coaching soccer camps for African children. Faraway from the plush, green carpet of our home field at Pepperdine, we were ready to share our skills, camaraderie, and faith on Ugandan terrain.
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Pepperdine Student Reflects on Service Trip to Tanzania
It was just after 6 a.m. on Thursday morning and I saw my first glimpse of real Africa. We were driving on a rickety, old shuttle bus through the Kenyan countryside on our way to Tanzania. After nearly one year of preparation—including University approval, grant writing, individual fundraising, and team preparation—my travel companions and I were now experiencing Project Hope: Tanzania.
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Robert Lloyd Observes Elections in Nigeria
In April 2007, Robert Lloyd, associate professor of international relations and chair of the Seaver College International Studies and Languages Division, participated in an election observation mission in Nigeria with the International Republic Institute. Here Lloyd describes the trip in his own words.
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La Vita Musicale: Carlo Corrieri Enchants as a Gifted Classical Guitarist
Winner of 19 international classical guitar competitions, Carlo Corrieri is now completing his freshman year at Seaver College, where he studies under classical guitar master Christopher Parkening, Distinguished Professor of Music at Pepperdine University, and eponymous inspiration for the Parkening International Guitar Competition.
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Yuan Fang Brings Chinese Student Group and New Year Celebration to Pepperdine
Seaver College junior Yuan Fang commemorated Chinese New Year in a special way this year—by hosting, along with Pepperdine's new Chinese Student Union, a New Year's celebration on campus.
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Seaver College Student Wrenn Yennie: Education Gone Global
The youth of America don't care about foreign culture, the stereotype goes. They neglect to learn other languages, travel to distant countries, or appreciate the art, history, and nuanced identities of people outside the United States. Wrenn Yennie, Seaver College senior, is proving the stereotype wrong.
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Every Job is an Adventure for Executive MBA Graduate
Some people thrive on a routine. And then there's Jac Meacham. A man of many careers, Meacham (GSBM '74) has flown as a pilot in the United States Marine Corps, written organizational handbooks in New York, opened a fish market in San Diego, consulted the Crow Indian tribe in Montana, and created a "historic village" in rural Missouri, just to name a few.
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Soprano Kathleen Roland-Silverstein Helps Revive Swedish Art Song
It was serendipitous, really. In 1999, Dr. Merril Silverstein pursued studies in gerontology as a Fulbright Scholar in Residence at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. Traveling with him was his wife Kathleen, a striking soprano and frequent performer. After finding work with a Swedish pianist, she began learning the language and discovered a genre of music that would ultimately transform her career: Swedish art song.
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Born to Ride: Female Jockey Takes to the Track
It is hard to imagine a college student who would voluntarily rise at 4:30 a.m. every morning. But one recent Pepperdine graduate did just that. Anne Sanguinetti (B '04, SC) began taking weekly riding lessons with her mother when she was six years old.
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Q & A with Julie Rousseau, Head Coach of the Pepperdine Women's Basketball Team
The Pepperdine women's basketball team hosted the inaugural Time-Out 4 HIV/AIDS Classic four-game tournament last month to raise money and awareness of HIV/AIDS. Pepperdine welcomed three top collegiate women's basketball teams for the event: University of Florida; University of California, Berkeley; and Rutgers University. We sat down with head coach Julie Rousseau to learn more about the tournament and the team's 2006-07 season.
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Doing Her Homework: Alumna Finds Professional Success in an Unlikely Place - At Home
Like most graduates, Joy Miura Koerte (B '00, SC) expected to get her diploma and then get her first job - she just didn't expect that job to be running her own business. Nor did she expect to find herself at the forefront of a new trend: home-based businesses.
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Willie Returns! Pepperdine Welcomes Back an Old Friend
After an absence of ten years, the beloved Pepperdine University mascot, Willie the Wave, returned to Firestone Fieldhouse on Friday, Oct. 13. A standing-room-only crowd of students, faculty, staff, and alumni cheered as representatives of Pepperdine's National Championship teams "Court of Champions" spanning seven decades, welcomed Willie back to campus.
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Lauren Treinen Makes Waves on the Women's Soccer Team
They call it the beautiful game. Combining sheer athleticism, strategic intelligence, and poetic grace, soccer attracts players and enthusiasts of all ages worldwide. One such devotee is Seaver College senior Lauren Treinen, defensive midfielder on the No. 20 Pepperdine women's soccer team.
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Defogging the Windows: My Journey to Israel to Comprehend Modern Terrorism
The two-inch-thick bulletproof glass windows obscured my view of the ancient city. Stepping off the bus and observing Bethlehem from afar, I was struck by the realization that before traveling to Israel and the West Bank in August 2006 as an Undergraduate Fellow with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, my view of the Middle East and modern terrorism was every bit as blurry as my examination of the city from behind that thick glass.
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Adam Steinberg: Coach of Tennis Champions
Adam Steinberg started small. As a first-time head coach, he trained a collegiate tennis program on a meager $13,000 budget and courts alongside a major highway in Queens, New York. From those humble beginnings, Steinberg has become the voice, wisdom, and spirit behind the first-ever NCAA Division 1 Men's Tennis Champions at Pepperdine University.
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Christopher Parkening Book: Grace Like a River
Grace Like a River details Christopher Parkening's rise to fame as one of the world's premier classical guitarists—and everything it cost him to get there. In spite of his enormous success, he discovered that without true meaning and purpose, all his worldly accomplishments were empty and unsatisfying. It is also the story of how God pursued Christopher Parkening in order to give him eternal hope.
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Kimberly Lowe Earns Top Marks as 2006 Seaver College Valedictorian
Kimberly Lowe deserves a vacation. Within days of her April graduation from Pepperdine University, the hard-working West Hills native jumped instead into a full-time summer job with the Humanities and Teacher Education Division. But Kim has never been one to take it easy. As the 2006 Seaver College valedictorian, Kim graduated summa cum laude and earned the highest cumulative grade point average in her class.
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YIFTU: Acting on AIDS – Raising Awareness About HIV/AIDS
Taking initiative to help others in need is oftentimes a daunting task many people are not willing to undertake. This is not the case for a group of Pepperdine University Seaver College students like Lindsay Joiner (Seaver '07), who formed the organization You and I For The Universe (YIFTU): Acting on AIDS. Nor is this the case for many people in the Pepperdine community who donated money and food points to offer much needed assistance to people tragically affected by HIV/AIDS.
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Provost Tippens' New Book: Jesus in Everyday Life
Pepperdine University Provost Darryl Tippens is publishing a new book titled Pilgrim Heart: The Way of Jesus in Everyday Life. The 224-page work examines discipleship as a particular way of life, guided by a set of simple, but powerful, daily practices known to the earliest disciples and the saints through the ages. Dr. Tippens delves into such topics as friendship, confession, forgiveness, and discernment, while inviting the reader to "consider afresh the way of Jesus."
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