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Discimus ut serviamus: We learn so that we may serve.
#48
What’s News
Administration members, student athletes, and of course the donor—who was the captain of the women’s swim team during her time at QC—made a big splash with the dedication of the Dina Axelrad Perry Swimming Pool in FitzGerald Gymnasium on Wednesday, April 10. The upgraded pool was part of an extended overhaul that included renovated shower and locker rooms as well as new starting blocks, benches, and exercise equipment. Foreground (l to r) President Félix V. Matos Rodríguez, Laurie Dorf, Dina Axelrad Perry, and Rob Twible.
Students and faculty filled Kiely 270 on April 10, creating an excellent environment for panelists when the Department of Urban Studies presented “The Green New Deal & New York City.” The speakers—Andres Bernal, Urban Studies adjunct and advisor to Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez; City Councilmember and QC alumnus Costa Constantinides, chair of the council’s Environmental Protection Committee; Leslie Cagan, coordinator of Peoples Climate Movement NY; and Annel Hernandez, associate director of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance—discussed the federal Green New Deal resolution and the proposed New York State Climate and Community Protection Act, among other topics.
This semester, Alexander Bauer (Anthropology) teamed up with Malcolm MacDougall, who teaches bronze casting, to offer a course in ancient metallurgy. Among the class projects: making a full-size cast bronze replica of the bronze shield of King Pharnakes I, who ruled the Turkish Black Sea region in the second century BCE. On Friday, April 5, the class poured almost 200 pounds of molten brass into molds based on copies of the original. A week later, the molds were opened. Bauer, who has been leading archeological teams at Sinop—a coastal city where Pharnakes made his residence—hopes to offer the finished shield to the Sinop Museum.
After more than two decades at Buildings and Grounds, Timothy Gibbons (center, holding plaque) retired, and colleagues from across campus gathered to salute him. QC thanks Tim for his years of service and wishes him well.
Turnout was terrific at the New York City Tech Festival, held last week. Charusmita Madan (middle of last seated row, in glasses), who spearheaded the four-day event, adds that the projects were unusually sophisticated.
QC Students Win Watson Fellowships
QC students Serena Burton and Marlyn Paulino are among the 15 undergraduates at New York City colleges from over 600 applicants who have been named Jeannette K. Watson Fellows this year. The program, now celebrating its 20th anniversary, places fellows in three years of paid summer internships at leading organizations in the city and around the world. "The new class of Jeannette K. Watson Fellows represents the diversity, creativity, openness, and ambition of New York City's finest students," says Chris Kasabach, executive director of the Watson Foundation.
Serena Burton
Marlyn Paulino
Con Edison Lecture Series Shows STEEM Power
QC alumnus Jonathan Pershing—program director of Environment at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, formerly a special envoy for climate change the U.S. State Department and lead U.S. negotiator to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change—addressed campus on April 10 as part of the Con Edison STEEM (Science, Technology, Energy, Environment, and Math) Lecture Series presented by the Division of Math and Natural Sciences and the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences. Con Edison's Carol Conslato, director of public affairs, and Frances Resheske, senior vice president of public affairs, shared a table at the event with President Felix V. Matos Rodriguez.

James Hansen, director of the Program on Climate Science, Awareness and Solutions at Columbia University’s Earth Institute, will deliver the next talk in the series, taking place this Wednesday, April 17, from 12:15 to 1:30 pm in Rosenthal 230. Hansen was the director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies for more than 30 years. He is celebrated for his research in climatology and his efforts to promote awareness of global warming.
Autism Awareness Event This Week

Since April is National Autism Awareness Month, the Student Association will host its annual autism awareness fundraiser, as well as its Relay for Life fundraiser, on April 17 during free hour on the Quad. A variety of items will be sold for suggested donations of $1 (for key chains) to $5 (for T-shirts). Some of the proceeds will go to the advocacy organization Autism Speaks and a local autism foundation. 
Poetry Month, Continued

In honor of Poetry Month, this week’s work, by Ramandeep Kaur, comes from the current issue of Visions and Voices, a journal created by the Percy E. Sutton SEEK Program at Queens College Publications & Communications Committee.

Where Am I From?
Where am I from?
Sometimes I ask myself and laugh.
Life has taken me far and near.
Now, I don’t know where I’m from.
I started in India . . . born and raised,
From day one to age 11.
Life then took me to Italy
Learned the language and called it home.
Began to feel like home but change was near,
Life then brought me to America
This life is strange,
When something feels right,
Change comes again
Now this is my new home and new world.
So where am I from you ask?
All I can say is that . . .
I’m from this world.
Observing Asian Pacific American Heritage Month

May is Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, and the campus will take note of it on the earliest date possible: the Asian/American Center of Queens College will host a celebration on May 1 from 12:15 to 2 pm in the Q-Side Lounge Dining Hall.  

Carl Takei, senior staff attorney at American Civil Liberties Union’s Trone Center for Justice and Equality, will be on hand to address issues related to Asian Americans, people of color, race, and white supremacy.

The center will announce the recipients of student scholarships and present recognition awards to David and Eugenia Ames and Yunzhong Shu (Classical, Middle Eastern, and Asian Languages and Cultures). In addition, A/AC Student Council members will share their reflections on being Asian American.
Come celebrate with students, faculty, and staff while enjoying Asian cuisine. Admission is free; please RSVP to qc.aac@qc.cuny.edu by April 29.
Book the Date

To celebrate the publication of titles by two Comparative Literature professors, their department is throwing a launch party on Thursday, May 2, at 12:15 to 1:30 pm in the Godwin-Ternbach Museum—and the college community is invited.

In Exiles in a Global City: The Irish and Early Modern Rome, 1609-1783 (Brill), Clare Carroll explores the ways Irish migrants in the Eternal City represented their cultural identities in relation to world-wide Spanish and Roman institutions. This study draws on sources in Roman archives not previously considered by Irish historians.

Gaso, Ganuun iyo Gasiin (Laashin Publishers), by Ali Jimale Ahmed, is a new form of storytelling not seen before in the short history of the Somali-language novel. The title translates to Kraal, Milk, Sustenance.

Speaking of which, food will be served at the party.
Building Futures Profile: Kathryn Cox
By pursuing higher education close to home, Queens College Macaulay Honors graduate and Fulbright English Teaching Assistant Kathryn Cox has been able to help many young students here and overseas.
 
Raised in Glendale, Cox chose QC over other CUNY schools because she loved the campus. “I had been to some other CUNY campuses, but they were too urban,” she says. “I liked that Queens College had a quad that you could go to when it was sunny.”
 
Learning about the Macaulay Honors College—a highly selective college within CUNY—she applied and was accepted. The program opened up a lot of opportunities for her that would not have been available otherwise. Thanks to funding from Macaulay, she was able to study in Spain and spend six weeks teaching English in Peru.
 
Cox was just about to graduate with degrees in both mathematics and elementary education when her advisor suggested she apply for a Fulbright program in which she would teach English in Cyprus for a full academic year. She was reluctant to stay in an unfamiliar country for that length of time, but her professor encouraged her, and to Cox’s surprise, she was accepted.
 
Fall 2015 found her in Nicosia, Cyprus, teaching English to elementary school students. On top of acclimating to a new culture,she faced numerous challenges in the classroom; she knew very little Greek and had to come up with creative ways to communicate with the students. But Cox adjusted as the year went on, and she and her students gained confidence and learned from each other. She used visuals, exaggerated her body language, and sang many songs to help her students understand her teachings.
 
Upon returning from Cyprus, Cox decided to further her education by getting a master’s degree in literacy education. Since she enjoyed her time at Queens College so much, it was an easy decision to return to QC for graduate school. She completed her master’s in December 2018.
 
During her two years in grad school, Cox was also teaching elementary school in Queens. Eventually, she plans to become a literacy specialist who will work with students struggling to read. Her long-term goal is to get an educational leadership degree and go into school administration.
Yet More Hot Summer Classes

Summer is a great time to examine issues that are always in the news. Crime and Migration will take a close look at how race, class, and law/legality contribute to the way immigration and crime are viewed and experienced in society. This Sociology class will also survey the ways immigrants undergo criminalization in different areas of their lives. Another Sociology course, Data and Society, covers topics such as privacy and ethics, artificial intelligence, and interpersonal communication. To learn about these and other courses, click on www.qc.cuny.edu/summer. 
Heard Around Campus
Ali Jimale Ahmed (Comparative Literature) was recently interviewed by Mike Rosenwald at the Washington Post . Ahmed’s short story “Shrinkology” was published this week in  Warscapes   . . . . Yurie Amma , a history major, won a $10,000 Japanese American Association Honjo Foundation Award . . . . Katherine Antonova (History) won an American Councils Title VIII Research Scholar award to conduct research in St. Petersburg, Russia . . . . Rua Hamid was accepted to a 10-week summer program run by Texas A&M on its campus and at its research center in Costa Rica, while Chelsea Meir and Lauren Schmahl  received berths aboard the Visions’ 19 research expedition ; all three are SEES students . . . . Félix V. Matos Rodríguez was included in City and State's Higher Education Power 50 list ; the write-up noted that the Chronicle of Higher Education ranked QC 11th out of all U.S. colleges for upward social and economic mobility . . . . Morris Rossabi (History) went to Washington, D.C., to brief the next U.S. ambassador to Mongolia . . . . Diana Schoenbrun won a gold medal in the Special Format category at this year's MoCCA Arts Festival, held by the Society of Illustrators . . . . the VITA (volunteer income tax assistance) clinic on campus served 130 clients as of the April 15 filing deadline . . . .
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