Jama Yoder (left) and Ariel Ropp work on a spring 2013 issue of The Record.

Goshen College students recently received awards during a state competition for their involvement with campus publications.

The Indiana Collegiate Press Association (ICPA) presented awards at its annual conference on April 13 at Indiana University at Bloomington. Among the winners were staff members of The Record, the student newspaper, and Red Cents, a student arts journal.

Three staff members of The Record received individual awards.

Twila Albrecht took second place in best news feature reporting for a profile of Marvin Graber, a piano tuner from Goshen who is blind. Kate Stoltzfus received second place for her op-ed entitled “A book is not a Nook,” a tribute to the significance of printed books. Phil Scott was awarded third place for best editorial cartoon.

The Record also received several team awards. The spring 2012 Reporting for the Public Good class earned third place in the special issue category for their series of articles on race and culture in Goshen. The fall 2012 Writing for Media class received second place for best pullout section with their coverage on the municipal, regional and national election races.

The awards cover the calendar year 2012, during which time Matthew Amstutz served as editor during the spring semester and Becca Kraybill during the fall semester. Duane Stoltzfus, professor of communications, serves as the paper’s advisor.

In addition, a second-place award for best themed issue went to Kraybill and her staff for their Oct. 11 anniversary package on the death of James Miller, the biology professor who was murdered in 2011.

Red Cents, a literary and arts journal edited and published by students, took several honors for its 2012 edition. In group awards, the journal won first place for best single issue, third place for the best overall design and third place for best literary journal of the year.

In individual awards, Kate Stoltzfus won first place for best free verse poem with her poem “Oracle.” Mary Roth won second in the same category for her poem “Elder Song.” Sophie Lapp won third place in the category of best photographic art.

The editoral team for the 2012 issue included Annie Martens (’12), Kate Stoltzfus, Lauren Stoltzfus and Natasha Weisenbeck. Ann Hostetler and Jessica Baldanzi, professors of English, co-advised the magazine.

The association’s annual contest recognizes the best student work in Indiana college newspapers and other publications. Goshen College is entered in Division III, for colleges with a non-daily publication and an enrollment of 2,000 or fewer full-time students.

-By Becca Kraybill
Duane Stoltzfus contributed to this press release

Maple Scholars gives students the opportunity to participate in independent research projects alongside Goshen College faculty of various disciplines. Each scholar is paired with a faculty member who serves as both colleague and supervisor.

Paul Keim & Marcelle Al-Zoughbi

Marcelle Al-Zoughbi, an elementary education/special education and TESOL double major from Bethlehem, Palestine worked with Professor of Bible and Religion Paul Keim on a project to envision, develop and institute a program of Arabic Studies that embodies the unique ethos of our Anabaptist heritage and equips students for further study and service in the Arab world.

David Housman & Philip Bontrager

Philip Bontrager, a junior informatics major from Goshen, Ind., worked with Professor of Mathematics David Housman on a project developing visualizations to assist in better understanding notions of fairness and their interrelationships in resource allocation problems.

Lisa Horst & Deb Brubaker

Lisa Horst, a 2012 graduate who majored in music education from Goshen, Ind., worked with Professor of Music Debra Brubaker on a project archiving and digitizing field recordings that Professor Emeritus Mary Oyer recorded between 1969 and 1987.

Caleb Hostetler & Kent Palmer

Caleb Hostetler, a senior informatics major from Souderton, Pa., worked with Professor of Informatics Kent Palmer on developing a higher education application for mobile technology.

Rhiannon Jones, a senior biology major from Lafayette, Ind., worked with Professor of Physics Carl Helrich on a project attempting to establish the form of cholesterol structures on phospholipid (biological) membranes experimentally.

Jenna Nofziger & Stan Grove & Nathaniel Tann

Jenna Nofziger, a junior molecular biology/biochemistry major from Archbold, Ohio, and Nathaniel Tann, a 2012 graduate with majors in biology and psychology from East Petersburg, Pa., worked with Professor of Biology Stan Grove on a project generating algal biomass inexpensively enough to allow the derived biofuel to compete with petroleum-based fuels.

Beth Martin Birky & Grace Parker

Grace Parker, a senior English and Bible and religion double major from Wichita, Kan., worked with Professor of English Beth Martin Birky on researching the theme of social justice in the work of Virginia Woolf.

Rebecca Weaver & Lauren Stoltzfus

Lauren Stoltzfus, a senior English writing major from Lancaster, Pa., and Rebecca Weaver, a 2012 graduate with a major in psychology from Harleysville, Pa., worked with Professor of English Ann Hostetler on a project collecting research data on the pedagogy of multicultural literature studied at the college level.

Mara Swartzendruber & Andy Ammons

Mara Swartzendruber, a senior biology major from Albuquerque, N.M., worked with Assistant Professor of Biology Andrew Ammons studied stress on honeybees.

Bob Yoder & Leanna Teodosio

Leanna Teodosio, a junior sociology and Bible and religion major from Lima, Ohio, worked with Campus Pastor Bob Yoder on a project exploring how Goshen College can better support the faith development of students.

Emily Trapp & Bev Lapp

Emily Trapp, a senior music and communications major from Canby, Ore., worked with Professor of Music Beverly K. Lapp on a project analyzing the content of several popular piano methods to determine the balance of creative work and effectiveness of these within the curriculum for developing pianists, with hopes of producing an online resource that summarizes this research to aid piano teachers.

John D. Roth & Kate Yoder

Kate Yoder, a junior art and English writing major from Elkhart, Ind., worked with Professor of History John D. Roth on a project compiling an in-depth bibliography of sources related to Christian martyrdom, the “Martyrs Mirror,” and costly discipleship in the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition in preparation for an August international consultation called “Bearing Witness: A New ‘Martyrs Mirror’ for the 21st Century?”

The college’s Maple Scholars program began in 1998. Unlike undergraduate research projects at many larger universities where students work only with graduate students, students in Maple Scholars work with professors who can answer their questions and guide them in their research and learning. Students also get the chance to share their work together in a colloquium each Friday and engage other students across disciplines.

– By Anna Ruth

Editors: For more information about this release, to arrange an interview or request a photo, contact Goshen College News Bureau Director Jodi H. Beyeler at (574) 535-7572 or jodihb@goshen.edu.

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Goshen College, established in 1894, is a residential Christian liberal arts college rooted in the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition. The college’s Christ-centered core values – passionate learning, global citizenship, compassionate peacemaking and servant-leadership – prepare students as leaders for the church and world. Recognized for its unique Study-Service Term program, Goshen has earned citations of excellence in Barron’s Best Buys in Education, “Colleges of Distinction,” “Making a Difference College Guide” and U.S. News & World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges” edition, which named Goshen a “least debt college.” Visit www.goshen.edu.

Goshen professor’s sonnets reflect on Amish school tragedy

GOSHEN, Ind. — A Goshen College English professor and poet has taken the shock and horror of the Oct. 2 Amish school shootings and transformed it into an evocative, deeply affecting work of reflection.

Ann Hostetler, professor of English and chair of the English Department, recently completed a cycle of four “Sonnets for the Amish Girls of Nickel Mines.”

Hostetler – whose father, the late sociologist John A. Hostetler, was raised Amish – said news of the shootings came as a great shock to her last year. “I found it kind of unbelievable at first,” Hostetler said in an interview. “It was the same kind of shock as when one of my friends called me (on Sept. 11, 2001) and said one of the towers just went down.”

On hearing the news, Hostetler said, her mind quickly went to a visit she had made to an Amish school the year before with fellow poet B.H. Fairchild, who had been moved by the school’s “sacred” environment. “It was just an unthinkably violent act,” Hostetler said of the shootings. “And to see how a stranger, an intruder came in and just violated that sacred space . . . I just kept thinking of those little girls standing in front of that blackboard.”

During the incident, which claimed the lives of five Amish schoolgirls in Bart Township, Pa., milk truck driver Charles Carl Roberts IV bound 10 Amish girls and lined them up at the front of their classroom. When Pennsylvania State Police attempted to storm the one-room building, which the gunman had barricaded, Roberts opened fire on the children. He committed suicide when state troopers, eluding a final blast from his shotgun, forced their way in.

Killed were Naomi Rose Ebersole, 7; Anna Mae Stoltzfus, 12; Marian Fisher, 13; Mary Liz Miller, 8; and her sister, Lena Miller, 7. The five surviving children, all of them seriously wounded, face years of recovery and rehabilitation.

In her poems, Hostetler evokes the scene of fear in the schoolroom and the chaos the shootings brought into the quietly ordered Amish world. “The poems come out of a deep inner place,” Hostetler said. “A good poem can provide a space where you can put your complicated thoughts and not feel like you have to come up with a platitude.”

By using the form of a sonnet, with its precise rhyme scheme and meter, Hostetler said she hoped to bring her own kind of order to the subject. “Maybe there’s a kind of formality to processing it this way,” she said. “Maybe the sonnet is a form that can deal with this.”

Hostetler also alludes to the forgiveness the Amish publicly offered to Roberts and the comfort extended to his widow and three small children. “I think there are many people in our world who can’t understand that forgiveness at all,” Hostetler said. “But it’s actually a radical act, the forgiveness there. Their witness is profoundly needed in this world.”

Hostetler has a bachelor’s degree from Kenyon College, a master’s degree from Pennsylvania State and a doctorate degree from the University of Pennsylvania. She began teaching at Goshen College in 1998 and the courses she teaches include introduction to creative writing, poetry writing and creative nonfiction.

She is the author of “Empty Room with Light: Poems” (2002, Dreamseeker Books) and editor of the anthology “A Cappella: Mennonite Voices in Poetry” (2003, University of Iowa Press). She has published articles in the Mennonite Quarterly Review, PMLA and the Emerson Studies Quarterly. Hostetler also has published poetry in “The American Scholar,” “The Cream City Review,” “Mankato Poetry Review” and other literary journals.

— By Robert Rhodes for Mennonite Weekly Review

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Sonnets for the Amish Girls of Nickel Mines

By Ann Hostetler

I.

He tied their legs together, made them face

the blackboard, released their brothers, mothers,

teachers, then barred the doors with two-by-fours.

Ten pairs of toes lined up in place.

Ten pairs of arms could not erase

a moment set in motion by such error.

Ten starched white caps could not conceal their terror

as ten heads bowed in simple grace.

Where once they took their turns to stand apart

and write a sum or sentence they had learned,

(the unprepared might feel some mild concern),

they now could hear each others’ beating hearts

as his handgun called the roll—Mary,

Lena, Marian, Anna Mae, Naomi Rose.

II.

Naomi Rose, Mary, Lena, Marian

and Anna Mae – dressed in white by family

and placed in wooden caskets on display

for last loving looks from friends and kin –

now ride in somber carriages again

past the home of him who took their life away

leaving a family puzzled and betrayed

of all they thought he could be as a man.

Their last journey protected by patrol

– even reporters must have a pass –

they move on to church and grave. We are left

without a verse or story to console

us on an autumn day whose shining grass

reflects the sun, a blue sky of clouds bereft.

III.

A blue sky of clouds bereft, wide open

to receive the innocent. But those who live

must have their explanation; the other five

girls recover in intensive care – again

they’ll have to live the moments of their pain

even as their families struggle to forgive

the gunman, receive his widow, kids.

For us or them, life will never be the same.

We wait to gather crumbs of consolation

from what they can remember or will tell

of what’s unspeakable: the oldest girl

offering to be shot in lieu of others,

her slumped body found beneath chalked letters:

unexpected visitors bring sunshine.

IV.

Unexpected visitors bring sunshine:

the covered casserole still oven-warm,

gleaming jars of produce from the farm

home-preserved: peaches, cucumbers in brine,

blackberry jam, hard-boiled eggs stained with wine

of red-beet juice. This red will do no harm.

This giver’s knock brings blessing, not alarm,

an offering to those who’ve lost in kind.

The scattered toys, the silent house awash

in grief that stunned a family unable

to believe what had been done. The Amish

givers ease the unlocked door ajar and rest

the box of food on the empty kitchen table.

Forgiveness is the unexpected guest.

© 2006 by Ann Hostetler. All rights reserved.

Editors: For more information about this release, to arrange an interview or request a photo, contact Goshen College News Bureau Director Jodi H. Beyeler at (574) 535-7572 or jodihb@goshen.edu.

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Goshen College, established in 1894, is a residential Christian liberal arts college rooted in the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition. The college’s Christ-centered core values – passionate learning, global citizenship, compassionate peacemaking and servant-leadership – prepare students as leaders for the church and world. Recognized for its unique Study-Service Term program, Goshen has earned citations of excellence in Barron’s Best Buys in Education, “Colleges of Distinction,” “Making a Difference College Guide” and U.S. News & World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges” edition, which named Goshen a “least debt college.” Visit www.goshen.edu.

GOSHEN, Ind. — The arched rafters of Goshen College’s Rieth Recital Hall reverberated with life, laughter and hope as seven Mennonite poets gathered Jan. 13 to celebrate the newly published anthology of Mennonite poetry, A Cappella: Mennonite Voices in Poetry.

The poets — Di Brandt, Jessica Smucker Falcon, Jeff Gundy, Carmen Horst, Shari Miller Wagner and David Wright — joined Goshen College Associate Professor of English and editor of A Cappella Ann Hostetler in reading works to a capacity crowd from the new anthology.

Gundy, professor of English at Bluffton College, read his “The Cookie Poem” to great acclaim and appreciated the opportunity to engage the audience directly and interact with the other poets. “It’s really fun to hear these voices overlap in a setting like this,” said Gundy. “There’s so much diversity, and yet a lot of commonality.”

Before reading his own poems, Wright noted that the audience was avidly following along in their copies of A Cappella like Mennonites follow along in their hymnals. He also shared the story about meeting Hostetler at the Goshen College Mennonite/s Writing conference and being requested to submit poems for the anthology, but at that time Wright wasn’t Mennonite. To much laughter, Wright related how Hostetler had jokingly said that poetry was a fine reason to join the church.

Buffy Garber, a 1999 Goshen College graduate and Goshen resident, felt a strong connection to Wright’s poetry themes. “As a new Mennonite myself, I strongly identify with his themes of being a newcomer to the community,” she said. “The poem he read about needing a hymnal while everyone else sings from memory was a fitting metaphor.” Wright is a visiting assistant professor of English at Wheaton College.

During the reading, the poets commented in jest that the order of the poems in the anthology is based on birthdate. For Smucker-Falcon, the youngest poet in the anthology, it was a surprise and honor to be included. “For a long time I didn’t even realize that I was writing Mennonite poems. I thought I was writing my way out of my Mennonite history, but it turns out I was writing my way into it,” said Smucker-Falcon. “I have to say, now it feels great to be next to all these writers I studied in school.”

Horst, a student at the Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary, read several of her poems and found the evening of sharing a special time. “Place has always been important to me, because in some places poems can find you more easily than in others,” she said. “Tonight was a very special place.”

Junior English major Sara Wakefield from Harrisonburg, Va., found it “exciting to be this close to these people I’ve always read,” she said. “For the first time I felt part of a writing community.”

Bertha Beachy, a Goshen resident and event attender, concurred. “I love that Mennonites are finally getting into poetry!” she said. “Poetry is like living in another culture: you can’t understand it unless you know who you are. And it can help you in that process.”

The anthology, published by the University of Iowa Press in the fall of 2003, features 24 poets, including seven Goshen College alumni. Their poems explore issues of identity, sexuality, religious doctrine, cross-cultural experiences, memory, family and individuality, sometimes with doubt and sorrow but always with candor and urgency. Often, their struggle to break free of rigid patterns, to maintain the integrity of individual experience while honouring the will of the community, bespeaks an earnest desire to marry change with a respect for tradition.

– by Sasha Dyck

Editors: For more information about this release, to arrange an interview or request a photo, contact Goshen College News Bureau Director Jodi H. Beyeler at (574) 535-7572 or jodihb@goshen.edu.

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Goshen College, established in 1894, is a residential Christian liberal arts college rooted in the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition. The college’s Christ-centered core values – passionate learning, global citizenship, compassionate peacemaking and servant-leadership – prepare students as leaders for the church and world. Recognized for its unique Study-Service Term program, Goshen has earned citations of excellence in Barron’s Best Buys in Education, “Colleges of Distinction,” “Making a Difference College Guide” and U.S. News & World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges” edition, which named Goshen a “least debt college.” Visit www.goshen.edu.