St. Olaf College

Alison Curry ’19 (left) is spending six weeks in an intensive language program at Peking University.

St. Olaf College student Alison Curry ’19 is spending more than a month conducting air quality research and gaining insight from local residents in Beijing, China, with the support of a scholarship from the Henry Luce Foundation.

The Luce Scholars Program is a nationally competitive fellowship program. It was launched by the Henry Luce Foundation in 1974 to enhance the understanding of Asia among potential leaders in American society.

Curry, a social work major, is spending six weeks in an intensive language program to better her Chinese language abilities at Peking University.

“I’m really excited to go back to Beijing because I was there in January of 2017 for a study abroad trip but we were only able to spend three days there at the time, so I want to explore more of Beijing,” Curry says.

Each day Alison Curry ’19 records the air quality index in Beijing (left), and fellow St. Olaf student Megan Skelly ’17 provides her with a comparison photo of Minneapolis (right). Curry will present her findings on campus this fall.

Each day Curry will record the air quality index (AQI) in Minneapolis and Beijing with the help of Megan Skelly ’17, who will be staying in Minnesota. Curry and Skelly will also collect a visual representation of the AQI through photos of the two cities.

“AQI has always interested me,” Curry says. “I will also hopefully talk to some of the native people of Beijing and ask how the air has affected their lives.”

Upon her return to St. Olaf this fall, Curry will present a poster including the AQI findings, photos, and the stories shared by the locals.

“I thought that Chinese would be a really beneficial language to learn, as they are a booming economy in the world. So I gave it a try! I have loved learning the language — although it is a challenge, the professors are so helpful and make learning it really fun,” Curry says. “I love all of the people that I have met from taking Chinese classes. Plus, there is small group of us that take Chinese classes so it’s like a little family and I really enjoy that.”

Olivia Snover ’19 (left) and Claire Mumford ’18 at the Jeffers Petroglyphs, a North American indigenous rock-art site located in southwestern Minnesota.

Two St. Olaf College students are preserving a 7,000 year old story told by ancient rock carvings at Jeffers Petroglyphs.

Claire Mumford ’18 and Olivia Snover ’19, with the guidance of St. Olaf Professor of History Tim Howe, have spent the summer in Comfrey, Minnesota, using Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI)  to record half a mile of Dakota religious carvings.

“RTI is a type of computational photography that captures images that you might not necessarily be able to see with the naked eye,” Mumford says. “We have a fixed camera pointing down at the petroglyphs and then we move a mobile light source around the petroglyph to capture how the light picks up surface detail from every angle. Using this method, we take about 55 photographs per petroglyph.”

Olivia Snover ’19 and Professor of History Tim Howe work set up the Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI) equipment at the Jeffers Petroglyphs.

These photos are later processed through RTI Builder and RTI Viewer to allow an image of each petroglyphs to be viewed on a computer from every angle and with different lighting options.

“Jeffers Petroglyphs is a spiritual site for the Dakota people,” Snover says. “A lot of the petroglyphs represent something more. For example, there are a lot of buffalo carvings and often times they represent vitality and life as they are are historically a sacred animal to the Dakota people.”

Mumford and Snover are completing this work as part of the St. Olaf Collaborative Undergraduate Research and Inquiry (CURI) program.

A photograph that Claire Mumford ’18 and Olivia Snover ’19 took while working at the Jeffers Petroglyphs.

The St. Olaf CURI program provides opportunities for St. Olaf students from all academic disciplines to gain an in-depth understanding of a particular subject by working closely with a St. Olaf faculty member in a research framework.

“With our CURI project we are looking at Dakota myths and comparing how those myths have changed throughout the years according to political climates and changing ideas,” Mumford says.

Mumford and Snover will continue their work this fall, when they will collaborate with computer science students at St. Olaf to develop a website for the Historical Society that will allow the petroglyphs to be viewed interactively.

“The idea that we can be working on this project for the next year and it can become something a lot bigger is exciting,” says Mumford. “We can pass down this data to future students and researchers so they can use it, along with the Historical Society.”

Shannon Moore ’19 stands in front of the NOAA sign at the staff quarters on Saint Paul Island, where she is working with the agency to research northern fur seals.

St. Olaf College student Shannon Moore ’19 is spending this month researching northern fur seals in Alaska as part of an internship with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

“One of the main factors that drew me to this internship was, of course, the fact that it provides me with an opportunity to assist in conducting research for a scientific agency within the United States government,” says Moore. “I have an interest in polar ecosystems, and I am considering research as a potential career path. What better place to engage in research in the field as an undergrad than with NOAA?”

Shannon Moore ’19 photographed this seal pup taking a snooze on a pile of washed-up debris along a rookery.

NOAA’s mission places emphasis on science, service, and stewardship. To fulfill this mission, NOAA strives to understand and predict changes in climate, weather, oceans, and coasts; share that knowledge and information with others; and conserve and manage coastal and marine ecosystems and resources.

Moore, a biology major at St. Olaf, is working for the Alaska Fisheries Science Center in the National Marine Mammal Laboratory on Saint Paul Island, where she is conducting research on northern fur seal populations.

Saint Paul Island —  with a land area of just 40 square miles and only one residential area — is the largest of the Pribilof Islands, a group of four Alaskan volcanic islands located in the Bering Sea between the United States and Russia.

Shannon Moore ’19 took this photo as she was working along the coast of Polovina Rookery. The structures are called blinds, and they protect researchers from the elements as well as from bulls (male seals).

Moore’s research on the island is focused on ecology and behavior, population dynamics, life history, and status and trends.

The data collected will be provided to various domestic and international organizations to assist in developing rational and appropriate management systems for marine resources under NOAA’s jurisdiction. Along with NOAA, Moore will determine movements and migrations, critical feeding areas and depths, and other behavioral data.

Her work focuses on re-sighting flipper-tagged fur seals, making observations on rookeries (breeding sites), entering data on computers, and assisting in the management of the summer database.

Shannon Moore ’19 photographs the tags she is re-sighting at a rookery. “We do this to make sure we record the correct tag number,” she says.

Another one of Moore’s tasks is monitoring fur seal numbers at index sites within some of St. Paul’s rookeries. This data provides a repeatable and highly precise estimate of mean numbers visible on shore, enabling the detection of interannual changes and trends.

Her final task is to use a number of VHF radio-tags on adult females at six different rookeries on St. Paul to estimate migration rates between rookeries, which biases estimates on survival.

“I have always had a fascination with northern ecosystems,” says Moore. “I was born and raised in Minnesota, and I have always enjoyed spending time outside in various locations across Minnesota exploring the flora and fauna in my surroundings and learning about the natural history of the places I visit.”

In June, Moore worked as an animal care intern for the Wildlife Science Center in Wyoming, Minnesota, providing her with a wealth of information concerning wolves, lynx, and red fox.

“I am excited to continue my hands-on learning, assisting with research for NOAA through this amazing Alaskan opportunity,” says Moore.

St. Olaf College has been named a “Best Buy” school in the 2018 edition of Fiske Guide to Colleges.

For more than 30 years, Fiske Guide to Colleges has chosen a select group of schools, noted for quality academic offerings and affordable cost, for its annual “Best Buy” list.

St. Olaf is one of 18 private colleges and universities in the U.S., Canada, and the UK named to this year’s “Best Buy” list.

As this CNBC story notes, the schools on the list “combine affordable costs and solid academics.” In addition to being one of the nation’s leading liberal arts colleges, St. Olaf has a long tradition of meeting the demonstrated need of all admitted students.

The Fiske Guide to Colleges, created by a former education editor for The New York Times, Edward Fiske, provides profiles of “more than 300 of the best and most interesting institutions in the nation.”

“Nursing allows me to nurture passions I explored at TPT: a passion for science and research, a passion for health as an instrument to empower, a passion for teaching, and a passion for solving complex issues in a team setting,” says Pearl Faldet ’17.

Many students receive vocational guidance from professors, supervisors, and other mentors — but Pearl Faldet ’17 found inspiration from PBS characters.

As a Social Entrepreneur Scholar through the St. Olaf College Piper Center for Vocation and Career, Faldet secured an internship with Twin Cities PBS as the Minnesota Productions and Partnerships Intern. At PBS, Faldet spent many days visiting children’s hospitals with characters from the organization’s shows.

Faldet also worked with the SciGirls program, a show that features stories about women in STEM careers. This program “helps curb the stigma that it’s not cool for girls to do science,” says Faldet.

Faldet, who majored in biology at St. Olaf, has experienced this stigma firsthand. “There’s a stereotype that female scientists wear huge glasses and are super nerdy, and it’s not that way at all,” she says.

For Faldet, helping young girls do experiments and encouraging them to explore their potential as scientists was immensely rewarding.

In addition to the time that she spent with SciGirls, Faldet’s internship involved work at ECHO, an organization that partners with PBS to provide public health information for refugees and recent immigrants in Minnesota.

Faldet found redesigning ECHO’s website just as rewarding as her work with SciGirls, knowing that her internship would benefit others.

Pearl Faldet ’17 (center) with her coworkers at Twin Cities Public Television.

And she became passionate about the public health sector through this part of her internship: “The two best ways to improve a person’s life are through education and health, and public health does both,” she says.

On campus, Faldet was a member of the Board of Regents Student Committee, where she served as a liaison between members of the administration and the student body. In addition, her student work enriched her time at St. Olaf, from maintaining water levels in carnivorous plants as a greenhouse worker to teaching evolutionary phylogeny concepts as a lab assistant to facilitating vocational discussions as a Peer Advisor in the Piper Center.

Faldet, who plans to attend graduate school to pursue an advanced nursing degree, says that it was her experience at PBS that solidified her commitment to establishing a career as a nurse practitioner.

“Nursing allows me to nurture passions I explored at TPT: a passion for science and research, a passion for health as an instrument to empower, a passion for teaching, and a passion for solving complex issues in a team setting,” she says.

“Nursing allows me to nurture passions I explored at TPT: a passion for science and research, a passion for health as an instrument to empower, a passion for teaching, and a passion for solving complex issues in a team setting,” says Pearl Faldet ’17.

Many students receive vocational guidance from professors, supervisors, and other mentors — but Pearl Faldet ’17 found inspiration from PBS characters.

As a Social Entrepreneur Scholar through the St. Olaf College Piper Center for Vocation and Career, Faldet secured an internship with Twin Cities PBS as the Minnesota Productions and Partnerships Intern. At PBS, Faldet spent many days visiting children’s hospitals with characters from the organization’s shows.

Faldet also worked with the SciGirls program, a show that features stories about women in STEM careers. This program “helps curb the stigma that it’s not cool for girls to do science,” says Faldet.

Faldet, who majored in biology at St. Olaf, has experienced this stigma firsthand. “There’s a stereotype that female scientists wear huge glasses and are super nerdy, and it’s not that way at all,” she says.

For Faldet, helping young girls do experiments and encouraging them to explore their potential as scientists was immensely rewarding.

In addition to the time that she spent with SciGirls, Faldet’s internship involved work at ECHO, an organization that partners with PBS to provide public health information for refugees and recent immigrants in Minnesota.

Faldet found redesigning ECHO’s website just as rewarding as her work with SciGirls, knowing that her internship would benefit others.

Pearl Faldet ’17 (center) with her coworkers at Twin Cities Public Television.

And she became passionate about the public health sector through this part of her internship: “The two best ways to improve a person’s life are through education and health, and public health does both,” she says.

On campus, Faldet was a member of the Board of Regents Student Committee, where she served as a liaison between members of the administration and the student body. In addition, her student work enriched her time at St. Olaf, from maintaining water levels in carnivorous plants as a greenhouse worker to teaching evolutionary phylogeny concepts as a lab assistant to facilitating vocational discussions as a Peer Advisor in the Piper Center.

Faldet, who plans to attend graduate school to pursue an advanced nursing degree, says that it was her experience at PBS that solidified her commitment to establishing a career as a nurse practitioner.

“Nursing allows me to nurture passions I explored at TPT: a passion for science and research, a passion for health as an instrument to empower, a passion for teaching, and a passion for solving complex issues in a team setting,” she says.

Associate Professor of English and Director of Race and Ethnic Studies Jennifer Kwon Dobbs has a new poetry book, “Interrogation Room,” forthcoming in spring 2018 from White Pine Press.

St. Olaf College Associate Professor of English and Director of Race and Ethnic Studies Jennifer Kwon Dobbs received a Metropolitan Regional Arts Council “Next Step Fund” grant to promote her poetry book, Interrogation Room, forthcoming in spring 2018 from White Pine Press.

The Next Step Fund, funded by The McKnight Foundation, provides project grants up to $5,000 to professional artists in any discipline for the purpose of career development and artistic achievement.

After her first book, Paper Pavilion, received the 2007 White Pine Press Poetry Prize and the New England Poetry Club’s 2009 Sheila Motton Book Award, Kwon Dobbs is looking to re-engage and extend her readership’s national reach.

After eight years of research and writing, including travel in northeastern China and across the Korean peninsula, Kwon Dobbs responds to South Korea’s National Security Law (NSL), which prohibits “praising North Korea,” through her poetry in Interrogation Room.

“In practice, South Korea’s enforcement of this law has meant the silencing of writers deemed ‘critical of the state’ and the deadening of the senses to picture what reunification could look like,” Kwon Dobbs says. “I write from my position as a Korean diasporic adoptee to imagine what kind of body might contain all directions — north, south, and the diaspora.”

The Metropolitan Regional Arts Council Next Step Fund provides project grants up to $5,000 to professional artists for career development and artistic achievement.

Original artwork by Korean Danish artist Jane Jin Kaisen punctuates the collection, which thematically aims to remove red.

“This color represents red baiting and a discoloration of sight enforced by the NSL. Juxtaposed alongside these poems, other work in the collection looks at refugees and outlaw kinships beyond a Korean context,” Kwon Dobbs says.

Next, Kwon Dobbs will complete a book tour and additional readings of her poetry.

“Thematically, my poetry seeks to bring feeling and knowing to Korean diasporic pasts that have been erased due to displacement by unending war, gendered poverty, militarisms, and overseas adoption,” Kwon Dobbs says. “These contested histories necessitate border crossings, cultural transgressions, and (mis)translations to stage tentative moments of family reunion and Korean reunification.”

Associate Professor of English and Director of Race and Ethnic Studies Jennifer Kwon Dobbs has a new poetry book, “Interrogation Room,” forthcoming in spring 2018 from White Pine Press.

St. Olaf College Associate Professor of English and Director of Race and Ethnic Studies Jennifer Kwon Dobbs received a Metropolitan Regional Arts Council “Next Step Fund” grant to promote her poetry book, Interrogation Room, forthcoming in spring 2018 from White Pine Press.

The Next Step Fund, funded by The McKnight Foundation, provides project grants up to $5,000 to professional artists in any discipline for the purpose of career development and artistic achievement.

After her first book, Paper Pavilion, received the 2007 White Pine Press Poetry Prize and the New England Poetry Club’s 2009 Sheila Motton Book Award, Kwon Dobbs is looking to re-engage and extend her readership’s national reach.

After eight years of research and writing, including travel in northeastern China and across the Korean peninsula, Kwon Dobbs responds to South Korea’s National Security Law (NSL), which prohibits “praising North Korea,” through her poetry in Interrogation Room.

“In practice, South Korea’s enforcement of this law has meant the silencing of writers deemed ‘critical of the state’ and the deadening of the senses to picture what reunification could look like,” Kwon Dobbs says. “I write from my position as a Korean diasporic adoptee to imagine what kind of body might contain all directions — north, south, and the diaspora.”

The Metropolitan Regional Arts Council Next Step Fund provides project grants up to $5,000 to professional artists for career development and artistic achievement.

Original artwork by Korean Danish artist Jane Jin Kaisen punctuates the collection, which thematically aims to remove red.

“This color represents red baiting and a discoloration of sight enforced by the NSL. Juxtaposed alongside these poems, other work in the collection looks at refugees and outlaw kinships beyond a Korean context,” Kwon Dobbs says.

Next, Kwon Dobbs will complete a book tour and additional readings of her poetry.

“Thematically, my poetry seeks to bring feeling and knowing to Korean diasporic pasts that have been erased due to displacement by unending war, gendered poverty, militarisms, and overseas adoption,” Kwon Dobbs says. “These contested histories necessitate border crossings, cultural transgressions, and (mis)translations to stage tentative moments of family reunion and Korean reunification.”

“I’m passionate about helping first-generation and low-income students get the education I got and being a role model for them,” says Sonam Palmo ’19. “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t get help from other people — I want to pass it on.”

For St. Olaf College student Sonam Palmo ’19, education has always been a priority.

At the age of eight, Palmo and her family left Tibet in search of better schooling in India. After a few months in a refugee camp in Nepal and three years in India, Palmo’s family moved to the U.S.

Today, Palmo is a pre-med chemistry major at St. Olaf.

“I know I want to be a doctor because I’m very passionate about medicine and helping other people,” says Palmo.

As a McNair Scholar, Palmo is conducting research this summer alongside St. Olaf Assistant Professor of Chemistry Dipannita Kalyani.

Funded by the U.S. Department of Education and sponsored by St. Olaf College, the TRIO McNair Program aims to increase the number of low-income, first-generation, and underrepresented students who participate in undergraduate research, graduate with a B.A., and encourage them to pursue graduate studies and Ph.D.s.

“After completing my research, I will be shadowing the doctors of Delek Hospital, a Tibetan hospital in one of the largest Tibetan refugee settlement camps in northern India,” says Palmo.

Palmo attributes her success to the people and organizations who supported her along the way to where she is now, such as St. Olaf TRIO Student Support Services (SSS) Academic Advisor Tenzin Choerap ’10. Her parents and uncle have always been advocates for her education and her cousin, Choyang Yangkyi ’18, introduced her to the Hill.

“I’m very happy I came to St. Olaf. The community here is so supportive and caring. In Tibet, I was also raised in a very close community where people help each other out,” says Palmo. “One of the reasons why I feel like I’m doing well in this school is because of the support I have.”

Palmo is the treasurer for Team Tibet, a mentor for St. Olaf TRIO Educational Talent Search (ETS), and a member of the St. Olaf TRIO Student Support Services (SSS).

Team Tibet is a St. Olaf student organization that strives to spread awareness about issues pertaining to Tibet. It is a platform to discuss the political, social, and cultural scenarios of Tibet and share the knowledge with the St. Olaf community. Additionally, the members also help out at Lamton, a tutoring and mentoring program for Tibetan students in the Twin Cities.

“I was in Lamton when I was in high school and I found it really helpful,” says Palmo. “Students from St. Olaf, Carleton, and other colleges helped you with your homework and sometimes when it was near the application deadlines they helped you with applications and also revising essays.”

ETS is a college preparatory program funded by the U.S. Department of Education’s TRIO Programs with St. Olaf sponsorship. The goal of ETS is to increase the likelihood that the 700 participating youth complete high school and gain admission to postsecondary programs, learn about financial aid, and re-enter secondary and postsecondary educational programs.

“When I came here I didn’t know English that well,” says Palmo. “Even though all of your classmates are in a fifth grade level and you’re in the same class, you’re at a kindergarten level and you have to catch up to them. I feel like it took me until ninth grade to really catch up. Some people give up on the way. I want to show them that it is possible.”

SSS is a federally funded TRIO college retention program. Part of this organization is the Summer Bridge Program, which gives highly motivated students a solid foundation for their college experience through a mix of academic and social activities.

“I participated in the Summer Bridge program the month before my first year at St. Olaf. Through the program, we were able to take a chemistry course and a writing course while also taking part in different activities and workshops designed to help students prepare for college. It was like a precollege before you actually start college,” Palmo says.

Palmo wanted to give back to this program and last summer she returned to the Summer Bridge Program as a science TA.

“Right now I have the ability to help people who are first generation and are younger than me,” says Palmo. “That’s my passion because I know when I go into medicine I can help them medically, so right now I’m more passionate about helping first-generation and low-income students get the education I got and being a role model for them. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t get help from other people — I want to pass it on.”

“I’m passionate about helping first-generation and low-income students get the education I got and being a role model for them,” says Sonam Palmo ’19. “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t get help from other people — I want to pass it on.”

For St. Olaf College student Sonam Palmo ’19, education has always been a priority.

At the age of eight, Palmo and her family left Tibet in search of better schooling in India. After a few months in a refugee camp in Nepal and three years in India, Palmo’s family moved to the U.S.

Today, Palmo is a pre-med chemistry major at St. Olaf.

“I know I want to be a doctor because I’m very passionate about medicine and helping other people,” says Palmo.

As a McNair Scholar, Palmo is conducting research this summer alongside St. Olaf Assistant Professor of Chemistry Dipannita Kalyani.

Funded by the U.S. Department of Education and sponsored by St. Olaf College, the TRIO McNair Program aims to increase the number of low-income, first-generation, and underrepresented students who participate in undergraduate research, graduate with a B.A., and encourage them to pursue graduate studies and Ph.D.s.

“After completing my research, I will be shadowing the doctors of Delek Hospital, a Tibetan hospital in one of the largest Tibetan refugee settlement camps in northern India,” says Palmo.

Palmo attributes her success to the people and organizations who supported her along the way to where she is now, such as St. Olaf TRIO Student Support Services (SSS) Academic Advisor Tenzin Choerap ’10. Her parents and uncle have always been advocates for her education and her cousin, Choyang Yangkyi ’18, introduced her to the Hill.

“I’m very happy I came to St. Olaf. The community here is so supportive and caring. In Tibet, I was also raised in a very close community where people help each other out,” says Palmo. “One of the reasons why I feel like I’m doing well in this school is because of the support I have.”

Palmo is the treasurer for Team Tibet, a mentor for St. Olaf TRIO Educational Talent Search (ETS), and a member of the St. Olaf TRIO Student Support Services (SSS).

Team Tibet is a St. Olaf student organization that strives to spread awareness about issues pertaining to Tibet. It is a platform to discuss the political, social, and cultural scenarios of Tibet and share the knowledge with the St. Olaf community. Additionally, the members also help out at Lamton, a tutoring and mentoring program for Tibetan students in the Twin Cities.

“I was in Lamton when I was in high school and I found it really helpful,” says Palmo. “Students from St. Olaf, Carleton, and other colleges helped you with your homework and sometimes when it was near the application deadlines they helped you with applications and also revising essays.”

ETS is a college preparatory program funded by the U.S. Department of Education’s TRIO Programs with St. Olaf sponsorship. The goal of ETS is to increase the likelihood that the 700 participating youth complete high school and gain admission to postsecondary programs, learn about financial aid, and re-enter secondary and postsecondary educational programs.

“When I came here I didn’t know English that well,” says Palmo. “Even though all of your classmates are in a fifth grade level and you’re in the same class, you’re at a kindergarten level and you have to catch up to them. I feel like it took me until ninth grade to really catch up. Some people give up on the way. I want to show them that it is possible.”

SSS is a federally funded TRIO college retention program. Part of this organization is the Summer Bridge Program, which gives highly motivated students a solid foundation for their college experience through a mix of academic and social activities.

“I participated in the Summer Bridge program the month before my first year at St. Olaf. Through the program, we were able to take a chemistry course and a writing course while also taking part in different activities and workshops designed to help students prepare for college. It was like a precollege before you actually start college,” Palmo says.

Palmo wanted to give back to this program and last summer she returned to the Summer Bridge Program as a science TA.

“Right now I have the ability to help people who are first generation and are younger than me,” says Palmo. “That’s my passion because I know when I go into medicine I can help them medically, so right now I’m more passionate about helping first-generation and low-income students get the education I got and being a role model for them. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t get help from other people — I want to pass it on.”