Articles Written By: emae2021@pomona.edu

Creating Answers

May 9, 2019 by Staff Comments Off

Most of the research projects undertaken by students at Pomona, with the support of or in collaboration with faculty members, are of the kind known as “pure research”—that is, their aim is to add new knowledge to a field of study, not to pursue a specific application. Occasionally, however, those projects cross over into “applied research,” aimed at solving a specific problem in the real world. The following are illustrations of three such projects, all aimed at finding new solutions to problems in medicine or mental health.

Diagnosis by Breath

View the full, two-page Diagnosis by Breath infographic as it appeared in the print edition.

For centuries, medical practitioners have been able to diagnose certain ailments simply by smelling the patient’s breath. That, says Professor of Chemistry Chuck Taylor, is due to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that, when breathed out, provide an identifiable signature of the guilty pathogen. That’s what led Taylor to think about the problem of hospital-acquired pneumonia, which is particularly deadly among intubated patients. Would it be possible, he wondered, to create a diagnostic tool that uses those VOCs to detect infections—and to identify the specific bacteria involved—so that they can be treated in a timely fashion? Since then, Taylor and students in his lab have been hard at work creating the knowledge base for developing such a tool. Eric Garcia ’19 is one of the many students who, in recent years, have helped move this research project forward. Eric’s role has been to try to understand the properties of certain lens-coating polymers that also happen to be very good at absorbing airborne VOCs so that they can be released for testing. There’s a lot of work still to be done, but here’s how Taylor and his students hope it might eventually work:

A bacterium such as Staphylococcus aureus infects the lungs of an intubated patient and begins to release signature VOCs.

Some of those VOCs are trapped in a filter in the patient’s breathing line.

The filter is replaced daily and taken for testing.

The VOCs are released from the filter and tested in a Raman spectrometer, revealing the VOC signature for S. aureus.

A doctor gives the patient an antibiotic known to be effective against the identified bacterial strain in time to save a life.

From left: Eric Garcia ’19 and Professor Chuck Taylor

Autism and Virtual Reality

View the full, two-page Autism and Virtual Reality infographic as it appeared in the print edition.

With a sister on the autism spectrum, neuroscience major Cynthia Nyongesa ’19 has a long-held interest in the widespread neurological condition, which affects the way a person interacts with the world. So when she read about the effectiveness of virtual reality (VR) therapy in a range of other conditions, she wondered if autism could be added to the list. Working with the Center for Autism and Neurodevelopmental Disorders in Santa Ana, California, and with the support of Neuroscience Professor Richard Lewis, she has developed a pilot study to find out. The advantage of VR therapy, Nyongesa says, is that its totally immersive environment can be used to simulate realistic scenarios that couldn’t be used in the real world. “Like going through airport security, for example,” she says. “You couldn’t physically take a subject through TSA—you couldn’t get approval for something like that—but you can simulate it in VR.” And to determine whether the therapy is working, she plans to use before-and-after brain scans to show whether key parts of the brain are more active. Here’s how the study might work:

The subject undergoes an evaluation, including brain imaging, to measure brain activity in key areas of the brain associated with autism.

Over the course of several sessions, the subject dons VR equipment programmed to provide an immersive, simulated experience.

Each VR experience requires the subject to interact in realistic situations that challenge the parts of the brain dealing with such functions as social interaction and emotion recognition.

A final brain scan, along with behavioral testing, measures whether the therapy has resulted in increased activity in those key areas of the brain.

From Left: Cynthia Nyongesa ’19 and Professor Richard Lewis

Depression and Social Media

View the full, two-page Depression and Social Media infographic as it appeared in the print edition.

Caroline Chou, a Claremont McKenna College senior completing her major in Pomona’s computer science program, knew she wanted to do her senior thesis on a subject that incorporated health and computer science. Based on prior research showing a connection between certain indicators in social media and an episode of depression, Chou wondered if she could use social media to create an app-based support tool for therapists, psychiatrists and other health professionals who are working with people suffering from depressive disorder. With the support of Pomona College Assistant Professor of Computer Science Alexandra Papoutsaki, Chou spent the last semester designing the various interfaces of an app that would, when completed, provide an analysis of public portions of a patient’s Twitter usage, giving the clinician a heads-up to possible depressive episodes. Here’s a fictitious scenario showing how it might work:

Dr. Kay recommends that his patient, Josie, use the app to analyze depression-related patterns in her Twitter usage.

Dr. Kay logs in to look at the patient’s monthly report for January and sees a spike in depression-related indicators during the second week of the month.

During Josie’s regular therapy session, Dr. Kay uses the report to jog the patient’s memory about significant events of that particular week.

Josie tears up as she remembers that week, when her dog was seriously ill, and as a result, her therapy session becomes more productive.

From left: Professor Alexandra Papoutsaki and Caroline Chou (CMC ’19)

New Athletics Center

May 9, 2019 by Staff Comments Off

Pomona College has also announced plans for a new athletics and recreation facility to replace the Rains Center for Sport and Recreation, with construction to begin in 2020.

The new center will be 15,000 square feet larger than the existing one, expanding it to 94,000 square feet. More than half of the rebuilt facility will be new construction, and other parts of the structure will be updated and reconfigured to enhance the building’s usability.

Two principal gifts of $10 million each kick off the major fundraising campaign to raise a minimum of $29 million that will offset a total project cost estimated at $55 million.

Preliminary designs for the building by the architectural firm SCB include expansive use of glass throughout, with multiple outdoor patios. “This new athletic center will reflect our ongoing commitment to athletic excellence,” says Interim Athletic Director and Chair of Physical Education Jennifer Scanlon, “but just as importantly, it will also signal in a very visible way our dedication to the physical education program and to health and wellness across this campus community.”

The Rains Center has been home to Pomona-Pitzer’s athletic programs and served as the campus recreation and fitness center since it was built in 1989, but in recent years the program has outgrown its home, as more people than ever are using its facilities.

With 21 varsity sports, Pomona-Pitzer fields three more teams than it did when Rains opened. In recent years, the program has seen an unprecedented level of success, finishing in the top 40 of the Division III Learfield Directors’ Cup each of the past three years and winning the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference men’s all-sports trophy in 2017–18 for the first time in program history.

In addition to supporting 450 varsity athletes, the building’s expanded spaces will serve more than 900 intramural athletes, 550 club athletes and student physical education classes, as well as provide fitness and recreation opportunities for students, faculty and staff.

The plans call for a new and larger recreational fitness area, including additional space for cardio workouts. The studio space available for fitness classes will be doubled. In addition to a general-use weight room, there will be a strength and conditioning center, and locker rooms will be “right-sized” to provide sufficient space for the groups that use them, with separate facilities for faculty and staff in addition to varsity teams.

The men’s and women’s varsity basketball teams and women’s varsity volleyball team will continue to play in the new facility, once complete, with Voelkel Gym remaining largely intact and a new two-court practice and recreational gym added above the fitness area.

“This will truly be a transformational building for our community,” Scanlon says. “In addition to providing an up-to-date home for our fine varsity teams, it will be a draw for health-minded students, faculty and staff and reflect the College’s deep commitment to promoting health and wellness all across our campus.”

New Museum, New Name: The Benton

May 9, 2019 by Staff Comments Off

The Benton The Pomona College Museum of Art has a new building under construction, and now it also has a new name, in honor of Janet Inskeep Benton ’79, whose lead gift of $15 million is helping to fund the new structure.

Opening in fall 2020, Benton Museum of Art at Pomona College or, more simply, The Benton, will provide a space for some of SoCal’s most compelling and experimental exhibitions. The 33,000-square-foot facility is under construction where the campus meets the lively Claremont Village and the city’s civic center.

For decades, Pomona College has played a key part in shaping innovative artists on the edge of L.A., including Helen Pashgian ’56, James Turrell ’65, Peter Shelton ’73, the late Marcia Hafif ’51 and the late Chris Burden ’69. The Benton’s collection will include pieces from all of these alumni, and future exhibitions will carry forward the College’s emphasis on cutting-edge art in the Los Angeles region.

“The Benton will be a rewarding visit for all who seek to venture beyond the expected and to explore the diversity of California,” said Pomona College President G. Gabrielle Starr. “This new museum will benefit our students, our community and the SoCal art scene in which our campus has long played an important role.”

Designed by Machado Silvetti Associates and Gensler, the new structure with cast-in-place concrete walls is accented with wood, glass and a distinctive sloping roofline. Built to LEED gold standards of sustainability, the U-shaped museum will define a central courtyard, with a pavilion for events.

Construction of the $44 million facility, located on the west side of College Avenue between Bonita Avenue and Second Street in Claremont, is set to be completed by fall 2019, launching the yearlong process of moving the museum’s extensive collection to the new facility and installing opening exhibitions.

The new building replaces the existing Pomona College Museum of Art. Housed in a ’50s-era facility, PCMA continues to operate across the street from the ongoing construction. Exhibitions there will continue through May 2020, with the new museum set to open later that same year.

The Benton will continue the current museum’s Project Series, focused on contemporary SoCal artists, which has included exhibitions from Andrea Bowers, Mark Bradford, Charles Gaines, Ken Gonzales-Day, Amanda Ross-Ho and many others. The museum also has been part of the Getty Foundation’s celebrated Pacific Standard Time projects in collaboration with institutions across Los Angeles.

Built on three levels, the new building is conceived and designed as a teaching museum, fostering instruction within collection areas and exhibition spaces, creating opportunities for active encounters with original works of art.The Benton will provide state-of-the-art storage and ease of access for a growing permanent collection of over 14,000 objects.

“Pomona College has long been at the center of artistic excellence and experimentation for Southern California,” said Museum Director and Professor of Art Kathleen Howe. “The Benton continues our commitment to presenting vibrant contemporary art, intimately engaged with the issues of our day, while bringing the art of the past into an ongoing dialogue with the present.”

The Benton will house an extraordinary collection of Native American art; the Kress Collection of Renaissance panel paintings; significant collections of photographs, prints and drawings; and a growing contemporary collection. Four complete series of etchings by Francisco Goya, as well as works by historically important regional and international artists such as Karl Benjamin, Rico Lebrun and José Clemente Orozco, are included in the collection.

A longtime supporter of the museum’s programming, Janet Inskeep Benton is also a member of the Pomona College Board of Trustees. A history major at Pomona, Benton went on to earn an M.B.A. at Harvard Business School. After working in product management at General Foods Corporation in the mid-1980s, she left the workforce to raise her family and serve on various not-for-profit boards in her Westchester County, New York, community.

She is currently board chair of the Jacob Burns Film Center, a not-for-profit art-house theatre complex and media-arts education center. In 2000, Benton founded the Frog Rock Foundation, a philanthropy focused on improving outcomes for underserved children.

Benton is most excited about the new museum as a gathering spot on campus where both intellectually and personally enriching experiences happen. “Art is a powerful force, opening up the mind to so many possibilities—new ideas, varied perspectives, interesting questions, emotional responses, reconsidered thinking,” said Benton. “My hope is that the new museum creates a stimulating environment for students to explore and engage with art in a deeply meaningful way.”

Only blocks from the Claremont Metrolink train station, The Benton will be a focal point for artistic expression on a campus that is also home to a Turrell Skyspace, “Dividing the Light” (2007), which draws visitors from near and far, and muralist José Clemente Orozco’s “Prometheus,” widely regarded as a masterpiece. Nearby are the Claremont Museum of Art and galleries at Scripps and Pitzer colleges, as well as in the Claremont Village.

“The new museum will serve as a lasting connection point between the College and community, and also with the entire region,” said President Starr. “Southern California is known as a place of boundless artistic innovation. Pomona College is part of that unfolding story, and we plan to continue to help shape it.”

Letter Box

May 9, 2019 by Staff Comments Off

Revelle and Gore

I read with some dismay your editorial introducing the article about Roger Revelle. While I am glad you appreciate the immense impact that Roger had in his scientific career, you have perpetuated a myth that Roger was “somehow persuaded to lend his name to an article he reportedly had no hand in authoring.” This myth was created and propagated by Al Gore, who was upset that Roger, whom he had heard lecture in Ashok Khosla’s introductory science class that Gore took at Harvard, about carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas, was not supporting Gore’s political position. Gore received a D in that class, one of only two science classes he ever took in college (he received a C– in the other one). Fred Singer was co-author on the referenced paper published by the Cosmos Club in April 1991. I have attached his account of the incident, including the libel suit which he filed successfully against Dr. Justin Lancaster for suggesting, as you have, that Roger was not mentally alert during his last years and that Singer had “used” him.

I am a graduate of Pomona’s Department of Geology, as was Roger. I, like Roger, went into oceanography, and I knew him pretty well both professionally and through geology alumni activities. You can see my website for additional information on my scientific qualifications. I have worked on these ocean-atmosphere systems most of my professional life and believe I have, after a lifetime at sea, gained some understanding of how they work. I can assure you that nothing in nature is as simple as Mr. Gore seems to think it is. He is, after all, a politician, not a scientist. His entire academic background in science amounts to the two required science courses he took at Harvard. He likes to say, in his book and in his movie, that anyone who disagrees with his simplistic assessment of climate change is just like the “scientists” who killed his sister. His sister was a smoker and died of lung cancer, but the “scientists” who denied the connection killed his sister. Never mind that he—and his father before him—gew tobacco for decades in Tennessee. He says that anyone who questions his overly simplistic views about climate change is just like those scientists who killed his sister.

For the record, I still sail to the Arctic, as I have since 1967, and have personally observed that the ice is indeed melting due to the Arctic amplification, which is causing the Arctic to warm four times faster than the rest of the Northern Hemisphere. This does not explain why sea ice in Antarctica is increasing at about the same rate that we are losing ice in the Arctic. Perhaps you or Mr. Gore can explain that and the other myriad examples of complexity in the ocean-atmosphere system. Your quotes from Dr. Lancaster that say, “You had what was an insidious example of what I would call a lack of ethics in science and the use of scientists as hired guns by the industry” would seem to conflict with his statement, dated April 29,1994, which resulted from his losing Dr. Singer’s defamation suit. There he says, “I fully and unequivocally retract and disclaim those statements and their implications about the conduct, character and ethics of Professor Singer…” It was Gore who tried to use Roger as a “hired gun,” not Fred Singer.

—Jim Kelley ’63
Loyalton, CA

EDITOR’S NOTE: I guess in cases like these we all must decide whom to believe. I’ve chosen to believe Roger’s family and close associates. As for the libel settlement, in my experience, lawsuits aren’t a dependable barometer for truth. They’re often won by those with the deepest pockets.

Aspirants, Not Victims

I read the letter titled “Korematsu in Context,” in the Winter 2019 PCM, with deep personal interest. Four now-young men, former high school students of mine, came over the border “uninvited.” I have been deeply involved with them for eight years. Two I adopted as adults; the other two are “mine” by affection.

The letter describes people like them as “victims,” but I would not. They are aspirants. They all came here for many of the reasons our forefathers came: for safety and opportunity. The letter’s author would describe them as “illegals.” Is that how we would describe our forefathers? (Note: Those seeking asylum are engaged in a legal activity.)

The “crisis” the letter refers to is political theatre. The real crisis is with our values: Are we no longer a destination of hope, the hope that brought our families here?

—David Lyman, ’66
South Pasadena, CA

No More Plastic, Please

I truly enjoy Pomona College Magazine, but was disheartened to find the latest edition arrived wrapped in plastic. With all of the programs and policies being implemented worldwide to reduce plastic usage, both to reduce fossil fuel use and to reduce plastic pollution, why, oh, why wrap the magazine? Was this only so that you could enclose the letter asking for monetary support? Not acceptable. It would be far better to communicate with the target audience by email, and to make an online-only edition of PCM an option to reduce paper use/waste as well.

But seriously: no more plastic!

—Mary Stanton-Anderson ’75
University Place, WA

Dear PCM Reader

Your “Dear PCM Reader” letter prompted lots of Pomona conversation and reminiscences between my wife (Marilyn Hendrickson ’55) and me. We appreciate your letter’s approach to the reality of cost vs. your mission of connecting and a sense of pride as part of the college family. Your mission succeeded with us—many fond and proud memories.

Thank you for reminding us of the many good things Pomona College has contributed to our lives, both in the past and continuing today. The Winter 2019 issue was impressive and especially connected with us, since we are Southern California natives and lived in fire-prone Ventura three times and in the Sierra foothills for about 20 years.

—Dave Holton ’53
Pleasanton, CA

Kudos for PCM

I just want to thank you for this magazine [PCM Winter 2019]. I love geology! About 30 years ago I wrote a fictional story about the Cambrian and the Burgess Shale incident—for children and their parents and grandparents. I never got around to publishing it, but my family are now anxious to visit the exhibit in B.C.

—Barbara J. Sanders ’54
Santa Barbara, CA

PCM is an outstanding magazine, and the “Fire and Water” issue was an ideal fundraiser.

—Helena Zinkham ’75
Arlington, VA

Bravo, PCM Winter edition. The cover should be framed on a wall at MOMA.

—Marshall Hutchason ’52
Glen Head, NY

Alumni, parents and friends are invited to email letters to pcm@pomona.edu or “snail-mail” them to Pomona College Magazine, 550 North College Ave., Claremont, CA 91711. Letters may be edited for length, style and clarity.

A Mystery with a Name

May 9, 2019 by Mark Wood Comments Off

About a dozen years ago, on an ordinary workday morning, as I was following my ordinary workday routine, something inexplicable happened. My wife, a teacher, had already left for school. After dressing, I felt a bit odd, so instead of going straight to work, I sat down for a moment and opened my laptop. And discovered that I no longer knew how to open a file.

My mind had become a hopeless jumble. I couldn’t recall the names of the people I worked with, couldn’t formulate a clear thought or even hold a murky one in my head for more than a few seconds at a time. Out of all that confusion, one terrible conviction emerged. This must be what it feels like to have a stroke.

It never occurred to me to dial 911. All I could think of was phoning my wife, but I couldn’t remember the name of the school where she worked. I pawed through our file cabinet, searching through drawers for old pay stubs. Finding a number for the school’s front office, I left what must have been a strange and alarming message for my wife.

I don’t remember how long it took her to come to my rescue or what I did in the meantime or what she said to me when she arrived. All of my recollections from that day are sketchy and disjointed. I remember the emergency room and the neurologist questioning me. I vaguely remember various tests and scans. I recall becoming fixated on the initials “TIA,” which stand for “transient ischemic attack”—a kind of mini-stroke that my father had suffered on a couple of occasions—telling my wife about them over and over, each time the first for my muddled brain.

And I remember the comic relief of the day—the man in the next bed, who looked and sounded like a character right out of The Godfather, asking me what was wrong. I said I was having trouble remembering things, to which he replied with a wise-guy grin, “Well, do you remember the $200 you owe me?”

Eventually, the neurologist returned with a diagnosis and a smile. I hadn’t had a stroke. All my results were normal. The diagnosis: a rare and poorly understood condition with no known cause, called “transient global amnesia.” (I thought at the time—and still think—that “transient global amnesia” sounds like something invented for a soap opera plot. “Now we know why Bryan disappeared. He was suffering from transient global amnesia.”)

The good news, the doctor said, was that I would almost certainly be back to my usual self within a day and never have a relapse. And he was right. By lunchtime, I felt better, and by the time I left the emergency room, mid-afternoon, I was back to normal. And I’ve stayed that way, more or less—so far, anyway.

But I doubt that I’ll ever again have quite the same confidence in my own “normal” cognitive functioning. Since that day, whenever I feel a bit odd or have trouble remembering a word or a name, I go through a careful litany of friends’ and family members’ names and phone numbers in my mind, just to reassure myself that it’s not happening again.

It would be comforting to believe that everything that can go wrong with us has both a label and a clear explanation, but what I learned that day—something every doctor knows, I suppose—is that a disorder can have a name and still be a mystery.

Medical mysteries abound, and not just in the headlines about emerging diseases like Ebola. As you’ll read in Kate Becker’s “The Face of a Pandemic,” a century after the Spanish flu swept away something like 5 percent of the total world population, we’re still trying to figure out why it was so lethal. And almost everyone knows someone suffering from some chronic illness that seems to defy diagnosis and effective treatment.

As I learned later, my own diagnosis that day was made purely by process of elimination. It wasn’t a stroke or a tumor or anything else the doctors could pinpoint, so it must be transient global amnesia—a mystery with a name, but no less a mystery for that.

Alumni Profiles

May 9, 2019 by Staff Comments Off

Scott Kratz ’92
Spanning the Divide

Scott Kratz ’92 was having breakfast with a good friend, who at the time was director of D.C.’s Office of Planning, when he asked an offhand question about all the construction going on with an old bridge over the Anacostia River. To his surprise, Harriet Tregoning began to lay out her dream for transforming that old span into a park.

“You want to help?,” she asked.

That was six years ago. Kratz, a history major in his Pomona days, eventually quit his job at D.C.’s National Building Museum to lead an effort that now employs nine full-time staffers and has set a $139 million goal that includes bricks and mortar as well as investments in nearby neighborhoods to ensure local residents can thrive in place by the time it opens in 2023.

Along with lots of good press, the project has drawn financial backing from the city, foundations and corporations as well, with Building Bridges Across the River, (a nonprofit where Kratz is vice president), so far securing $85 million of the needed funding while engaging the community in a positive vision for the future.

Ambitions for the 11th Street Bridge Project were big from the start. Take an abandoned bridge connecting the well-off Capitol Hill and Navy Yard neighborhoods to low-income and often overlooked Anacostia. Turn it into a vibrant park devoted to recreation, environmental education and the arts. And, in some way, help bring the city together.

Plans soon grew even more ambitious. During one of the 1,000 community meetings held to date, one thing became clear: there were much greater needs in Anacostia—for wealth creation, housing, jobs and more. The effort shifted toward the concept of equitable development, with the aim of getting ahead of gentrification and potential displacement. The key question: “Who is this for?” asks Kratz, noting the massive disparity in household incomes between the mostly white area west of the river and mostly black Anacostia to the east.

Some of the answers: launch workforce development efforts to help people get jobs in fields such as construction, start a homebuyers club and a community land trust, a mechanism that allows people with limited incomes to become homeowners. (Simply put, buyers purchase the house, but the trust owns the land beneath it, which reduces the price. Deed restrictions limit buyers to those within a certain level of income.) Already, 71 renters have become homeowners. Long-term plans call for 1,000 units of affordable housing. Kratz recently piloted 5-to-1 matched savings accounts for 110 east-of-the-river families to support access to college.

Of course, economic justice isn’t the only aim of the project. Everything from urban agriculture to an environmental education center to public art and performance space are part of the plan.

This may sound like a lot for one span to hold, but for Kratz it’s not so much about the bridge as the communities it will connect. Kratz notes how D.C. is booming, with a growing population, but areas such as Anacostia have been left behind.

“It’s really tempting to think, ‘This isn’t our job,’” says Kratz. But “if we don’t get this right, then we’re probably not going to get it right in this city.”

—Mark Kendall

Mike Budenholzer ’92

Coach of the Year—Again

AP Photo/Aaron Gash

Milwaukee Bucks Head Coach Mike Budenholzer ’92 was already the talk of the NBA before his selection in April by a vote of his fellow NBA coaches to receive their Coach of the Year award for 2019.

“In less than a year since taking over as head coach,” Matt Velazquez in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel wrote the day the award was announced, “Budenholzer has totally transformed the Bucks. They went from being one of the worst defensive teams to the best in the NBA. They rebound at a high level, they don’t foul and they punish opponents with a potent offensive attack built on points in the paint and letting three-pointers fly. After years of up-and-down play, the Bucks were consistent on their way to recording the best record in the league this season. They lost two games in a row just one time and won the season series against every Eastern Conference foe. Budenholzer’s schemes, love of efficiency in all aspects of life and individual development— known as ‘vitamins’— are hallmarks of his philosophy that have paid dividends since the day he arrived in Milwaukee last spring.”

In his first year with the Bucks, Budenholzer guided his team to a league-best record of 60-22 and the top seed in the playoffs. The last time Milwaukee had 60 regular season wins was almost 40 years ago, in 1980–81, the era of Marques Johnson, Bob Lanier and Sidney Moncrief. This year’s record was a 16-victory improvement over last season and gave the Bucks their first divisional title since 2000–01. The Bucks were the only team to rank in the top four in both offensive and defensive ratings, and had the best net rating in the NBA.

Still described occasionally as a “disciple” or “acolyte” of the legendary Coach Pop—Gregg Popovich of the San Antonio Spurs (and previously the Pomona-Pitzer Sagehens)—under whom he served as assistant coach for almost two decades before getting his first head coaching opportunity with the Atlanta Spurs, today Budenholzer has earned his own three-letter nickname—“Bud”—and has emerged as a coaching force in his own right, though he still attributes much of his success to learning at the feet of the master.

Of course, all he did in Atlanta was lead the Hawks to four playoffs and record the team’s first 60-win season while being named 2015 Coach of the Year. Last year, however, with the Hawks in a rebuilding mode, Budenholzer decided that the time was right to move on—and the offer from the Bucks was the perfect next step.

As with Coach Pop, Budenholzer brings to the team not only a deep understanding of the game, but also a host of intangibles that sports writers struggle to describe. Take, for instance, his reputation for making strange faces in the heat of the moment.

“Though friendly with the media, Budenholzer has long eschewed the spotlight, as Pop always taught his staff to do,” reports Chris Ballard ’95 in Sports Illustrated. “Fairly or not, what Bud may be best known for—outside his coaching—are his facial expressions. The cameras started picking them up in San Antonio. His greatest hits include: Disappointed Dad; Dude-Cut-Me-Off-on-the-Merge; Man-Trying-to-Decipher-Legal-Document; and Just-Watched-a-Bull-Gore-Someone. Observers delight in captioning them on Twitter. An example, from Rob Perez of the Action Network: ‘I swear every time Mike Budenholzer is on camera he looks like he just watched the stampede scene from The Lion King.’”

At the same time, however, that naked authenticity seems to be one of the keys to his success as a coach. Ballard quotes Utah Jazz guard Kyle Korver, who played for Budenholzer in Atlanta: “One of the best parts about playing for him is watching him in the film sessions. But that’s how his heart feels, man! He cares so much and he’s just so disgusted with what’s going on in the court, but it’s so genuine. He’s just someone you want to follow because he’s not just a good person, but he’s great at his craft.”

Personally, Budenholzer had previously expressed his hope that the Coach of the Year award this year would go to his former assistant, Kenny Atkinson, for the job he’s done as head coach of the Brooklyn Nets.

“It is an incredible honor to be recognized by your peers, and that makes this award truly special,” Budenholzer said after the award was announced. “Thank you to my colleagues across the NBA, and most importantly thank you to our players and staff in Milwaukee. The players’ and staffs’ work this year has given our team and our fans a very special season.”

—Mark Wood

Bulletin Board

May 9, 2019 by Staff Comments Off

Ideas@Pomona Summit

With featured speaker: Ari Shapiro, host of NPR’s All Things Considered

Ari Shapiro, host of NPR’s All Things Considered

The Ideas@Pomona Summit, Pomona’s premier lifetime learning event, is an energetic, day-and-a-half conference dedicated to bringing together Pomona College alumni, parents and friends for a weekend of meaningful connection and active dialogue around timely, newsworthy and captivating ideas. It will take place Oct. 25–26, 2019, at the Hyatt Centric Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco.

“Liberal Arts NOW and NEXT” will serve as the weekend’s theme. What does cutting-edge research tell us about the NOW and the NEXT, about who we are and where we are going? How are liberal arts values such as critical thinking and creative learning being brought to bear on today’s unique challenges and opportunities?

Featured speakers will include Ari Shapiro, host of NPR’s All Things Considered; Laszlo Bock ’93; Martina Vandenberg ’90; Liz Fosslien ’09; professors Kevin Dettmar and Nicholas Ball; and more.

The Ideas@Pomona Summit promises to curate the best content from around campus and the greater Pomona community to ignite discussion, share ideas and highlight exciting research and trends.

Registration opens spring 2019 at Ideas@Pomona Summit.

4/7 #SagehenImpact

Orange County Sagehens at a 4/7 event at the Back to Natives Nursery

Sagehens turned out across the globe to celebrate Pomona’s 4/7 Celebration of Sagehen Impact. Volunteer service events as near as Claremont and as far as Hong Kong brought enthusiastic alumni and parents to the Food Bank of the Rockies, the Sacred Heart Community Service Food Pantry, Teach4HK, Special Olympics and other impactful organizations. Others chirped across Sagehen social media about the ways they are changing their communities for the better.

Start planning your #SagehenImpact for next year’s 4/7.

Alumni Travel Program

Andalucía: The Enduring Legacy of Islam
April 4 to 12, 2020

The real charm of Andalucía lies in its countryside, featuring blindingly white mountain villages (the so-called pueblos blancos) and endless olive and almond groves. Infamous for its scalding summers, Andalucía is equally renowned for its mild springs, the perfect season for enjoying the countryside the way it is meant to be enjoyed: on foot. The southernmost tip of Andalucía greets its visitors with whitewashed splashes on its craggy hillsides and minarets reshaped into Christian bell towers. Herds of wild bulls roam the upland pastures, pigs root for acorns under isolated oak trees, and Egyptian vultures soar overhead. Hike by day and enjoy village life by night in the midst of a week-long festival leading up to holiest of Christian holidays: Easter. What better way to appreciate the uniqueness of the southwesternmost corner of Europe?

For complete tour information, please visit Alumni Travel Program.

Mentor Current Students with SagePost47

Have you checked out SagePost47, Pomona’s online platform that bridges the gap between students and alumni by fostering one-on-one connections and mentorships? Founded by an alumnus and a student in 2014, SagePost47 has grown to feature 100-plus alumni mentors, blogs, panel events and mock interviews. Learn more and sign up today at SagePost47

Alumni Service Awards

47 Chirps to our Alumni Distinguished Service Award Winners

The 2019 Alumni Distinguished Service Award winners, selected by a committee of past Alumni Association presidents, are:

Phelps

Lisa Prestwich Phelps ’79 P’12, who initiated the growing tradition of regional service events for 4/7 with the first-ever such event in Seattle and has served on the Alumni Association Board and class reunion committees.

Garvey

Susanne Garvey ’74, who has served as a regional leader for Washington, D.C, an admissions volunteer over many years, and former Alumni Association president.

Epps

Faye Epps, the first to receive a special honorary Alumni Distinguished Service Award in recognition of her tenure as the administrator for Pomona’s alumni programs over four decades.

Blaisdell Awards

The 2019 Blaisdell Distinguished Alumni Award winners, selected by a committee of Alumni Association Board members for their contributions and achievements in their profession or community, are:

Maize

Earl Maize ’72, manager of the Cassini Program, a mission that began exploring the Saturn system in 2004 and concluded operations in 2017 with a spectacular plunge into Saturn’s atmosphere.

Ramenofsky

Marilyn Ramenofsky ’69, Olympic medalist and former world-record holder in swimming, and researcher into the physiology and behavior of migratory birds.

Schatz

Brian Schatz ’94, senior United States senator from Hawai’i, focusing on climate change, access to higher education, privacy and consumer rights, and health care.

Cleaver

Debra Cleaver ’99, founder and CEO of Vote.org, the leading nonpartisan, nonprofit organization increasing voter turnout.

Obst

Lynda Obst ’72, one of Hollywood’s most successful film and television producers, known for Interstellar, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, Sleepless in Seattle, The Fisher King, and Good Girls Revolt, among many others.

Pomona College Book Club

Seeking your next spring novel and a way to connect with fellow Sagehens? Join the Pomona College Book Club on Goodreads to chat with alumni, professors, students, parents and staff around a common love of reading. Visit Pomona College Book Club or attend an in-person discussion in your city. This spring, we will be reading Madeline Miller’s Circe, described by The New York Times as “a bold and subversive retelling of the goddess’s story that manages to be both epic and intimate in its scope, recasting the most infamous female figure from the Odyssey as a hero in her own right” and named one of the best books of the year by NPR, The Washington Post, Time, The Boston Globe and many others.

Pomona College Book Club of Chicago

Book Club Events Near You

Honolulu, HI – Saturday, May 18 | 2 p.m.
Los Angeles, CA – Sunday, May 19 | 2 p.m.
Chicago, IL – Saturday, May 25 | 2 p.m.
Shenzhen, China – Sunday, May 26 | 2 p.m.
Austin, TX – Sunday, June 2 | 2 p.m.
Seattle, WA – Sunday, June 2 | 2 p.m.
Denver, CO – Monday, June 3 | 6 p.m.
Washington, DC – Thursday, June 13 | 7 p.m.
Pittsburgh, PA – Saturday, June 22 | 2 p.m.
St. Paul, MN – Saturday, June 22 | 7 p.m.

New Knowledge

May 9, 2019 by Staff Comments Off

Leanchoiliid fossil from the Qingjiang biota —Photo by X. Zhang

Geology: Back to the Cambrian

These days, whenever there’s a truly earthshaking development in the world of Cambrian fossils, Professor of Geology Robert Gaines seems to find himself squarely in the middle of it. Last year, it was an article in Science called “Cracking the Cambrian,” about the latest discoveries in the fossil-rich sites that Gaines and his team unearthed in Canada’s Kootenay National Park back in 2012—considered one of the most important geological finds in recent history. This year, it’s something that may be even bigger: a 518-million-year-old fossil site unearthed in the Yangtze Gorges area of South China that may turn out to be even more important, according to a new article, also published in Science.

The new site—dubbed the Qingjiang biota—was discovered by a team of Chinese researchers in South China. It’s home to a nearly pristine and diverse 500-million-year-old fossil record that has not been impacted by metamorphosis or weathering. The diversity of its fossils may rival that of the Burgess Shale of British Columbia and the Chengjiang fossil site in China’s Yunnan province, which are considered two of the most important fossil finds of the 20th century, according to Gaines, the only American on the team that is studying the site. The new site is more than 600 miles from Chengjiang.

In addition to their high taxonomic diversity, Qingjiang fossils are characterized by near-pristine preservation of soft-bodied organisms—including juvenile or larval forms, arthropod and worm cuticles and jellyfishes—and soft-tissue features that are rarely seen in the fossil record. More than 4,000 specimens have already been collected, with 101 species identified. Of these species, 53 are so new to science that names have to yet to be assigned to them.

“This finding enriches our view of the early animal world and offers us really remarkable views of the simplest animals,” says Gaines. “One of the most incredible things about this finding is the pristine condition of many of these specimens—fossils that haven’t been substantially affected by impacts of time, and in them you can clearly see soft tissues like eyes, tentacles and gills.”

Biology: Olson Wins NSF Grant for Nematode Research

Pomona College Biology Professor Sara Olson has been awarded a prestigious Faculty Early Career Development Award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to explore the process of embryo development in roundworms. The five-year award of $827,962 will fund her study, as well as research opportunities for Pomona College biology and molecular biology students and rising high school seniors in the Pomona College Academy for Youth Success (PAYS) program.

Using fluorescence microscopy, biochemistry, molecular biology and genetic approaches, Olson’s research focuses on the nematode worm C. elegans, a roundworm, as a model organism to explore how protective barriers form around embryos. Findings from this study could shed light on early embryonic development in other species, including mammals.

“The idea of building a protective barrier around an embryo is common throughout the animal kingdom,” says Olson. “From worms to flies to fish to mammals, all of these animals build protective barriers around their embryos. We study how that barrier forms over the egg during early development. Before fertilization, it has to be porous so the egg is accessible to the sperm, but after fertilization it has to get remodeled and be closed off for protection.”

Another goal is to identify new drug targets to fight parasitic roundworm infection in humans, plants and animals. “These parasitic worms affect people in developing countries in Africa, Central and South America and Southeast Asia,” says Olson. “Parasitic nematode infections are a major burden that cause loss in agriculture, sickness in humans and loss of productivity. If we can figure out how the worm’s eggshell is built, we can also figure out how to destroy it in the parasitic worms.”

How to Excel in Both Ballet & Chemistry

May 9, 2019 by Carla Guerrero ’06 Comments Off

Lawrence Chen ’20

Lawrence Chen ’20 knows how to raise the barre. A ballet dancer since the age of 13, Chen is able to balance his professional dancing career while also being a full-time student majoring in chemistry. This April, Chen saw his first co-authored academic article published in a prestigious chemistry journal—a major achievement for any undergraduate student. The publication of the article is the grand finale for Chen, who spent two years doing research with Professor of Chemistry Roberto Garza-López. To understand how Chen is able to rehearse for 15-plus hours (sometimes up to 40 hours a week during performance season) and do graduate-level computational chemistry research, put yourself in his ballet slippers…

Grow up listening to your mother share stories of studying ballet in Hong Kong—and how she had to give up a career in dance to support her family.

Own a DVD of the American Ballet Theatre’s 1977 production of “The Nutcracker” starring Mikhail Baryshnikov and Gelsey Kirkland and watch it over and over.

Begin to study ballet at age 13—an “extremely late” start. Decide to be home-schooled for high school courses in order to allow time to study ballet intensely at a small ballet academy.

In addition to home-schooling, attend your local community college part time and take almost enough math classes to get an associate’s degree in the subject.

Participate in large competitions, like the International Ballet Competition and Prix de Lausanne, to have a chance at scholarships to ballet companies with international prestige. Learn from both your successes and your losses to work even harder.

Get accepted to a number of colleges—including the University of Southern California for its dance program—but choose Pomona for its small classes and close-knit community.

In your first year, enroll in a ballet class taught by Victoria Koenig, director of the Inland Pacific Ballet dance company. Get invited to audition and dance in productions of “The Nutcracker” two years in a row.

Take general chemistry courses and find a supportive mentor in Professor of Chemistry Roberto Garza-López, who attends a performance of “The Nutcracker” to see you dance.

Spend your first two summers on campus, thanks to grants from Pomona and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), conducting computational chemistry research for Garza-López.

As a co-author, see your data published in Chemical Physics Letters: X, a peer-reviewed chemistry journal, during your junior year while starting rehearsals for a production of “The Little Mermaid.”

—Photo by Siggul/VAM

Last Look

May 9, 2019 by Staff Comments Off

4/7 Day

As Sagehens around the globe—from Claremont to Hong Kong—volunteered for community service projects in honor of 4/7 Day, the campus celebration was designed for a lighter purpose—to give current students a chance to shed some of their mid-term stress. For a day—Sunday, April 7—Marston Quad took on a carnival atmosphere with everything from a zipline and a rock-climbing wall to a petting zoo and a range of food trucks—all in honor of Cecil’s favorite number, 47.

Photos by Kristopher Vargas and Jeremy Snyder ’19

4/7 Day 4/7 Day