By Menachem Wecker
From repairing roofs in neighborhoods for fixed-income seniors to helping organize the British Barbecue Championships, members of the GW community participated in a wide range of activities—some recreational, some service-oriented—over the summer. Here are some of the highlights.
Chaucer and Prosecco
Jeffrey Cohen, professor of English and director of the GW Medieval and Early Modern Studies Institute, spent part of his summer in Siena, Italy, at a meeting of the New Chaucer Society. (Chaucer had ties to Italy, Dr. Cohen notes.) “Who doesn’t want to go to Tuscany in the summer?” asks Dr. Cohen, who made the trip with colleague Jonathan Hsy, assistant professor of English. Although the captions to an album on Facebook of photos from the trip celebrate Prosecco more than Chaucer, Dr. Cohen’s trip was certainly a work one. He organized two panels on “Touching the Past” and presented in the first ever New Chaucer Society panel on blogging.
Backpacking in the Philippines
A post-graduate student in the strategic public relations program in the Graduate School of Political Management, Nathalie Atalla writes in that she is one of the few international students enrolled in the program living in Cairo, Egypt. “I took some time off from my job over the summer holidays and went backpacking in the Philippines with some friends from Wharton and from my old high school, the German School in Cairo,” says Ms. Atalla, who is head of marketing communications for a leading software development firm called LINK Development, part of Orascom Telecom Holding.
Volunteer roof repairman
Atlanta native, sophomore Thomas MacDonald spent a week repairing roofs of houses in downtown Atlanta that belong to fixed-income seniors. Mr. MacDonald, who was part of a group called Metro Atlanta Project, re-roofed 15 homes. “During the week, one thermometer on the roof read 110 degrees,” he says. And we thought summers in Foggy Bottom were rough.
From the Indy 500 to barbecue championships to the World Cup
After helping his brother, a race car driver, at the Indy 500, Hugo Scheckter returned to England to work on his parents’ organic farm. If that wasn’t enough to assure Mr. Scheckter the most interesting summer experience of all, he then served as an assistant events manager and helped organize the British Barbecue Championships, which drew 7,000 people over two days.
After that, he had the opportunity to attend the semi final game between the Netherlands and Uruguay at the World Cup. “My dad had business in South Africa and asked me to come with him,” he says. “Then, he said, ‘Oh by the way, I have World Cup tickets if you’re interested!’”
After the World Cup, Mr. Scheckter helped his parents launch two ice cream parlors in two leading department stores in the U.K. And to avoid having any time to rest, he is taking on another challenge. “I’m about to start on my National D License soccer coaching course!
Representing the United States in Vancouver
After completing his freshman year at GW, Sean England spent a week of his summer in Vancouver as one of nine students representing the United States in the G8/G20. Two other students (of the nine) happened to also be GW students: Sloan Dickey and Kevin Norchi.
Make no mistake. This was a working vacation for the students—up to six or seven hours a day in committee meetings, Mr. England says. “My role was the Sherpa,” he says. “I was supposed to facilitate intergroup discussions and make sure there were no discrepancies between a nation’s policy in one area and another.” Conference delegates worked together to produce a final report—which was more than 40 pages long. “It was a great experience and really developed my global perspective on some of the most pressing global issues of the day,” says Mr. England.
Serving as counselor at a very special camp
Calder Stembel, a senior and executive co-chair of Camp Kesem GW, says 31 campers, all from families coping with cancer, 23 counselors and six staff members came to camp this summer. The entire group spent a week at Camp Letts in Edgewater, Md., and then assembled at GW for a farewell picnic on Aug. 27.
“At Camp Kesem, everyone goes by a camp name—mine’s Scuba Steve––and our campers and counselors happen to be particularly fond of food-inspired names,” says Mr. Stembel. “We have a Snack Pack, Pizza, Cupcake, Pancake, Mac & Cheese, Apple Juice and Pasta, just to name a few.”
This summer, the camp canoed on Pirates Day, navigated a ropes course and participated in a gold rush on Frontier Day and competed in color war, says Mr. Stembel. It also launched two innovative programs this summer. A program for teenagers (ages 14 to 16) now allows campers who had outgrown the regular camp to stay on for three more years, and each of the five teenaged campers was given a video camera to document her or his camp experience. “Who knows, maybe in a few years those videos will be part of an application to GW!” says Mr. Stembel.
Discussing safety of navigation in Taiwan
Part-time security policy student, Shauna Hunt, works by day as an international desk officer at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency’s Officer of International Affairs and Policy. The NGA is federally mandated to ensure that the U.S. government’s aeronautical and maritime maps and charts are up to date, which is why Ms. Hunt wound up on a work trip to Taiwan to discuss international safety of navigation issues. “Pretty awesome!” she says, in the understatement of the day.
Interning to help elect Paul Loscocco
Edward Dooley spent his summer as a senior intern at the Cahill/Loscocco campaign for governor in Mass. “Good times,” says the sophomore who, according to his LinkedIn page, also spent his summer serving as a master sandwich maker at Foggy Bottom Grocery and a wardrobe consultant at The Men’s Wearhouse.
An artful summer
Faculty and students at the Columbian College of Arts and Sciences kept very busy over the summer, particularly in the arts. Dean Kessmann, chair of the Department of Fine Arts and Art History, showed his work in the Orlando Museum of Art solo exhibit Architectural Intersections. Art therapy students joined Heidi Bardot, director of the Art Therapy Program, on a trip to Chennai, India and accompanied Elizabeth Warson, assistant professor of art therapy, on a trip to a Native American reservation. Students also joined Eric Cline, chair of the Department of Classical and Semitic Languages and Literature, on an architectural dig in Megiddo, Israel.
Berta Rojas, adjunct professor of music, performed at the Taxco Guitar Festival in Mexico over the summer, after which she traveled to Paraguay and then England, where she performed at the West Dean Festival organized by Classical Guitar Magazine.