Author Archives: Ann Aubry

Alumni to Appear on The Oprah Winfrey Show

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – A group of Illinois Wesleyan alumni will have the unique opportunity to appear on the farewell season of The Oprah Winfrey Show, performing with members of their choir on an episode airing Tuesday, Sept. 14.

The four alumni: Mark Tomasino ’06, Joan (Teitelman) Cinquegrani ’06, Hilary Barry ’06, and Angela Latkowski ’07 are part of Wicker Park Choral Singers (WPCS), which will perform behind the Grammy award-winning duo, The Judds.

Tomasino founded WPCS in 2008, but never dreamed it would land them a spot on America’s longest-running daytime television talk show. The group got their chance when a member of WPCS jokingly offered the choir’s services to a friend who is an assistant executive producer of The Oprah Winfrey Show. “He called us literally the next day and said, ‘You’re never going to believe this, but we need singers for the show,’ ” said Tomasino.

Alumnus Rings Opening Bell at Stock Exchange

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – Illinois Wesleyan University alum Sung Jin Hong proudly stepped onto the podium at the New York Stock Exchange Friday, September 10 at 9:30 a.m. to ring the opening bell, signifying the start of another day of trading on Wall Street.

The ’97 graduate is the founder and current composer and conductor of New York’s One World Symphony. Hong was invited to ring the bell in honor of the symphony’s service to and presence in the community.

One World Symphony (OWS), created by Hong in 2000, is a not-for-profit organization composed of 70 musicians, 81 vocalists and 13 staff members. The symphony performs concerts throughout the NYC area, selling tickets for a fraction of the cost of many New York concert halls.

Kopan Named Outstanding Nursing Alumna

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – Illinois Wesleyan University alumna Karen Kopan will be honored with the School of Nursing Distinguished Alumni Award during Homecoming activities in October. Kopan will receive the award during the School of Nursing festivities which will begin at 9 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 9 with a coffee hour in the in the Commons of the Center for Natural Science (201 E. Beecher St., Bloomington). Kopan’s presentation, titled “Trailblazers: Nurse Practitioners in Acute Care Settings,” will begin at 10 a.m. The event continues the celebration of the 50th anniversary of awarding four-year bachelor’s of science in nursing degrees at Illinois Wesleyan.

Kopan, a 1986 alumna, has worked for the past 13 years with the Critical Care Consult Team at NorthShore University HealthSystem’s Evanston Hospital in Evanston, Ill. As a nurse practitioner hired into the intensive care unit in 1997, Kopan blazed the trail for future advanced practice nurses in acute care settings. She streamlined the entry process for nurse practitioner students entering the organization for a clinical rotation, and received a certificate of achievement from the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners for her work creating a corporate-wide resource packet for all new hire inpatient and outpatient nurse practitioners.

Choice Isn’t ‘Monk or Merchant,’ Says No Impact Man Colin Beavan

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – Author Colin Beavan had a message for the students of Illinois Wesleyan University on Wednesday at the President’s Convocation: No one has to make a choice between helping the planet and helping themselves.

“We have this idea in our culture that you can help, or you can take care of yourself. You can be a monk or a merchant, but you can’t be both,” said Beavan, who is famed for chronicling a year he and his family spent trying to live without negatively impacting the environment. Addressing the audience in Westbrook Auditorium, Beavan explained people give themselves the “false choice” of either following their passion to help others, or thinking they need to be “realistic” and care only for themselves. “There is more than this ‘you can do good or you can make money’ concept. The idea that you have to choose between doing for yourself and doing for others comes from a supreme lack of creativity.”

Creativity is something Beavan does not lack. He is known for his adventurous No Impact Project, during which Beavan, his wife and their daughter spent a year trying to produce no trash, going without electricity, riding in no cars or taxis, eating only locally produced food, and avoiding all paper products while living in New York City. He wrote of their efforts in his blog and book No Impact Man: The Adventures of a Guilty Liberal Who Attempts to Save the Planet and Discoveries He Makes About Himself and Our Way of Life in the Process (Picador, 2009). “I responded to the world’s problems in a way that aligned with my own passions and talents,” he said.

Russian Scholars to Explore Childhood Around the Globe

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – Illinois Wesleyan University will welcome a delegation of scholars from Russia as part of “Childhood & Globalization: An International Colloquium” from Sept. 13-17.

The colloquium will consist of readings and discussions with scholars principally from Illinois Wesleyan, Illinois State University (ISU) and the Russian State University for the Humanities (RGGU) in Moscow. Several sessions are free and open to the public. The event is sponsored by Illinois Wesleyan’s Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures Department (MCLL), the International Studies program at IWU, the Isaac Funk Foundation and the ISU Department of English.

Altogether, eight scholars from Russia will take part in the colloquium, which will focus on children’s literature and politics of childhood around the globe. The Russian scholars are from RGGU and St. Petersburg State University of Culture and Arts. Co-organizers for the colloquium are Illinois Wesleyan faculty members Isaac Funk Professor of Russian Studies Marina Balina and Associate Professor of French and Italian Scott Sheridan.

“United by a desire to investigate such a multifaceted subject as childhood around the globe, our colloquium attempts to address many different aspects of this issue – from the politics of childhood and its historical context, to literary production and various cultural practices and depictions of children in different forms of media,” said Balina.

Wesleyan Celebrates Hispanic Heritage Month

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – Events at Illinois Wesleyan University will help celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month.

Hispanic Heritage Month runs from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 and is the anniversary of independence for five Latin American countries – Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. In addition, Mexico declared its independence on Sept. 16 and Chile on Sept. 18.

The Illinois Wesleyan Office of Multicultural Student Affairs is sponsoring an Immigration Reform Forum on Thursday, Sept. 9 at 7 p.m. in the Hansen Student Center (300 E. Beecher, St, Bloomington). The keynote speaker will be Marti Jones, the executive director of the Immigration Project, which offers immigration legal services throughout downstate Illinois. Jones will then join a discussion forum at Hansen. The event, also sponsored by the Spanish and Latino Student Association, is free and open to the public.

The public can enjoy an evening of salsa lessons on Oct. 2. The event is a fundraiser for Radio Latino, a Spanish-language program heard on Illinois Wesleyan’s student-run radio station WESN 88.1, and is one of only two Spanish-speaking programs in Bloomington-Normal. Lessons will be from 7-8 p.m. in the Young Main Lounge of Memorial Center (104 E. University St., Bloomington), with a time for “free dance” following. Tickets for the event are $5 for the public and $3 for students, and can be purchased at the door.

Illinois Wesleyan students, faculty and staff will also participate in activities to celebrate the month, from a “Salsa Throwdown” cook-off of salsa recipes, to a group trip to visit the Hispanic Families Workgroup, which works to improve and create opportunities for Hispanic and Latino families in McLean County.

Outstanding Alumni to be Honored at Homecoming

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – Three Illinois Wesleyan University alumni will be honored this year at the annual Alumni Homecoming Lunch on Saturday, Oct. 9, at noon in the Shirk Center (302 E. Emerson St., Bloomington), as part of the 2010 Homecoming and All That Jazz activities.

Ron Ford, a 1978 Illinois Wesleyan graduate, will receive the Distinguished Alumni Award. Ford is a highly respected reconstructive hand surgeon with the Hand & Plastic Surgery Center.

Rod Adams, a 1995 Illinois Wesleyan graduate, will receive the Robert M. Montgomery Outstanding Young Alumnus Award. A national experienced recruiting leader for PriceWaterhouse-Cooper, Adams was formerly their National Director of Diversity Recruiting.

Jerry Philpott, a 1959 Illinois Wesleyan graduate, will receive the Loyalty Award. In 2002, he started a scholarship for students with financial need named in honor of his father. A resident of Mesa, Ariz., Philpott is a Hole Sponsor at the IWU Alumni Golf Outing every year and acts as the “connector” for alumni and current FIJI’s. Philpott has assisted with class reunions since his 20th reunion.

Homecoming and All That Jazz

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. — It will be a weekend of music, memories, fireworks, football and tributes as alumni and friends gather for Illinois Wesleyan University’s Homecoming Oct. 8-10, with a theme of Homecoming and All That Jazz.

Highlights of Homecoming weekend activities include two 40th anniversary celebrations. The IWU Jazz Program will celebrate four decades with the Jazz Band Reunion concert on Friday, Oct. 8, comprised of four bands of alumni spanning the four decades. The concert will take place at 9 p.m. in Hansen Student Center (300 E. Beecher St., Bloomington), and will be led by Professor Tom Streeter, who founded the Jazz Program at IWU in 1970, and plans to retire at the end of the academic year. Dancing is encouraged.

The Mark Evans Observatory will also celebrate 40 years on campus with tours of the observatory from 9-11 a.m. on Saturday, Oct. 9, with a reception from 4:30-6 p.m. in the Commons of the Center for Natural Science Learning and Research (CNS) (201 E. Beecher St., Bloomington), honoring University Professors Ray Wilson and Lew Detweiler.

Also celebrating an anniversary will be the Hispanic Studies Program, founded in the 1999-2000 school year. There will be a reception for alumni, current and former faculty, and friends from 4:30-6 p.m. Saturday at the Joslin Atrium in the Memorial Center (104 E. University St., Bloomington).

New Program Engages Diversity at IWU

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. –The class of 2014 at Illinois Wesleyan University is one of the largest classes in recent years for the University. The class, comprised of 620 students, has 24 transfer students, 17 international students, 95 African-American, Latino-American, Asian-American and Native-American (ALANA) students and 76 out-of-state students. While it’s easy to divide the class into subgroups, the IWU Engaging Diversity Program attempted to do just the opposite.

Associate Professor of Psychology Kira Hudson Banks and Assistant Professor of Sociology Meghan Burke co-directed this program, which brought 14 randomly selected first-year Caucasian students to campus three days early to participate in meetings and activities about diversity.

Merwin and Wakeley Galleries to Feature Paintings and Ceramics

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – Illinois Wesleyan University’s Merwin and Wakeley Galleries (6 Ames Plaza West, Bloomington) will feature the artwork of Michiko Itatani, as well as the ceramic work of Lou Pierozzi, from Thursday, Sept. 2 through Thursday, Sept. 30.

All exhibits are free and open to the public. The opening reception for both exhibitions will take place on Thursday, Sept. 2 from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.

Itatani’s display, consisting of eight works from 2002-2010, is centered around the theme of “Cosmic Wanderlust” and will be shown in the Merwin Gallery. “I am presenting my personal fiction based on the human desire to reach out into the mental and physical space beyond our grasp,” said Itatani. A professor at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, she is the recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, Marie Sharp Walsh New York Studio Grant and John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, among others. Her paintings have been shown nationally and internationally. Itatani received her master’s degree in fine arts at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1976.

Pierozzi’s ceramic display, Rediscovering America, will be featured in the Wakeley Gallery.

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