Research is a day at the beach as Hope scientists explore the ecology of Lake Michigan’s spectacular coastal sand dunes in the new Summer ’22 News from Hope College, now available online and en route to mailboxes near and far.
The issue’s cover story leads off Spera, a new section highlighting the breadth and depth of the groundbreaking faculty scholarship taking place campus wide (and regularly conducted collaboratively with students). Spera — from the college’s motto, Spera in Deo (“Hope in God”) — was a limited-run, stand-alone journal published annually from 2017 through 2021, but will now be a regular part of the thrice-a-year NfHC so that we can share the work more frequently and with the entire Hope family. It continues this time with kinesiology (“What Makes Athletes Tick?”) and economics (“Do High Rates of Homicide Slow Imports and Exports?”) along with geological and environmental science, with entirely different mixes of departments and topics planned for December and April — and more beyond.
Spera, of course, is just part of what you’ll find within! We wrap up 2021-22 with insights from the Baccalaureate and Commencement addresses, overviews of student and faculty awards, and a review of the historic multi-championship year in athletics. As the 2022-23 school year approaches, we look at the unique challenges faced by first-generation college students, and visit a new chapel developed especially with Hope’s Catholic community in mind. We focus on the arts with a celebration of Hope Summer Repertory Theatre’s first 50 years, and a preview of the new studio space that is on deck for Hope’s thriving Department of Dance. See, too, how a creative alumni couple is helping shape the future through a distinctive way of supporting Hope Forward, and enjoy a new collection of posters featuring beloved campus landmarks in the iconic style of national park posters of the 1930s and 1940s. (Stay tuned to this space in the days ahead for more about how those posters came to be, the creative role that students played and how to acquire prints through the Hope College Bookstore.)