common good

Hats Off to Honorary Degrees

by Roy Greim ’14
T. Alexander Aleinikoff ’74
A man with glasses speaks at a microphone
Aleinikoff ’74, a leading immigration and refugee law scholar, has helped direct policy at both the national and international levels. He co-chaired the Immigration Task Force for President Barack Obama’s transition team in 2008 and served as the United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees from 2010 to 2015. He was the executive associate commissioner before becoming general counsel for programs in the U.S. Department of Justice’s Immigration and Naturalization Service. Aleinikoff has deep experience within higher education. He teaches at The New School in New York City and is director of the school’s Zolberg Institute on Migration and Mobility.
Marshall Curry ’92
A man with gray hair and beard smiles with closed mouth
Curry ’92 is an Academy Award-winning director, producer, cinematographer, writer, and editor. He received an Oscar in 2020, winning in the category Best Live Action Short for The Neighbors’ Window. Curry wrote, directed, and edited the film, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and won more than 20 other festival awards before winning the Oscar. Curry has been nominated for an Academy Award on three other occasions. In 2019, A Night at The Garden received the nomination for Best Documentary Short. The film looks at the power of demagoguery and anti-Semitism in the United States through a 1939 Nazi rally that drew more than 20,000 people to Madison Square Garden.
Josh Green ’92
A man smiles in front of a state symbol sign
Green ’92 has been serving the public interest for over 20 years as an emergency room physician and elected official in Hawaii, where he is currently lieutenant governor and is considered a leading candidate in the state’s gubernatorial election this November. After earning his M.D. from Penn State University, Green joined the National Health Service Corps and began practicing at rural hospitals and clinics on the Big Island Hawaii in 2000. In 2004, he was elected to the Hawaii State House of Representatives. He led a movement to provide affordable and accessible health care for all Hawaii citizens. In 2008, Green was elected to the State Senate for the Kona and Ka’u districts.
Virginia Johnson
A woman with a serious expression has short hair and purple shirt
Johnson is a renowned and trailblazing ballerina who has shaped her field as a performer, editor, and director. She graduated from the Academy of the Washington School of Ballet in 1968 and moved to New York City where she became a founding member of the Dance Theatre of Harlem under the direction of co-founder Arthur Mitchell. Drawing inspiration from the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights movement, Mitchell’s vision was a company that emphasized aspects of democracy and diversity rarely seen in dance. She serves on the Advisory Board of The Center for Ballet and the Arts at NYU and the Board of Works & Process.
MORE: bit.ly/HonoraryDegrees2022

Celebration of a First at the 3rd U.S. Court of Appeals

Arianna Freeman ’01 has been nominated to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where she would be the first Black woman to sit on an appellate bench that oversees cases for Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and the Virgin Islands. Freeman has served as a managing attorney with the Federal Community Defender Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania since 2016. At Swarthmore, she graduated with high honors while majoring in political science and minoring in economics. Freeman went on to earn her J.D. from Yale Law School in 2007 and began working at the Federal Community Defender Office in 2009 as the unit’s research and writing specialist.

Campus Quickly

Campus Quickly

Mock Trial Awards

Scout Hayashi ’22, Kilin Tang ’25, and Blaine Thomas ’24 of the Swarthmore Mock Trial team won awards at an intense, two-day American Mock Trial Association regional tournament in February. Hayashi and Tang earned outstanding attorney awards for the defense and prosecution, respectively, and Thomas earned an outstanding witness award. Hayashi and Veronica Yabloko ‘22 founded the team as first-year students and serve as co-presidents. Mock trial tournaments consist of four three-hour trials that mimic the real thing within an abbreviated timeframe. As part of the preparation, each college program receives a written case packet, “then we spend months writing out scripts for directs, crosses, and statements,” says Hayashi, a biochemistry special major from Chapel Hill, N.C.
Young people on a raft in a creek hold flags and smile.
natavan werbock

AHOY MATEYS! For the first time in two years, one of the College’s most beloved traditions returned this spring. Lauded for its unique brand of silliness, the Crum Regatta drew students equipped with paddles and creatively engineered vessels to the Crum Creek in April. The 500-meter race is notable for the variety of handmade boats students design to navigate the shallow waters of Crum Creek.

The ‘Rhodes of STEM’

Sarah Weinshel ’22 has been named a Churchill Scholar. She is the first Swarthmore student to earn the “Rhodes of STEM” in 20 years and only the sixth ever. “I woke up to the email when I checked my phone and was in disbelief about the news until I was fully awake,” says Weinshel, an honors biology major from Minnetonka, Minn., who heard the news over winter break. As a Churchill Scholar for 2022–2023, Weinshel will receive full tuition for one year of master’s study at Churchill College in the University of Cambridge, as well as a living stipend, travel costs, and the opportunity to apply for a $4,000 special research grant. With the scholarship, Weinshel will complete a master of philosophy in genetics in the lab of Professor Daniel St Johnston, researching the mechanisms of epithelial cell polarization in Drosophila fruit flies.

Responsible AI

Associate Dean of Faculty Ameet Soni regularly receives emails from the National Humanities Council about projects supporting program or faculty development. But a few months ago, one stood out.

The NHC was announcing a new program, the Responsible Artificial Intelligence Curriculum Design Project, aiming to help 15 colleges and universities develop courses confronting ethical questions of artificial intelligence.

Soni, who taught computer science at the College before joining the Provost’s Office, was eager to participate. After discussing it with faculty members and Provost Sarah Willie-LeBreton, Soni put Swarthmore’s application together and submitted it.

Thanks to his efforts, Swarthmore has been selected as one of a diverse set of research universities, historically Black colleges and universities, and liberal arts colleges to participate in the NHC program this summer.

“It can often be difficult to understand what artificial intelligence agents are doing,” says Soni.

“We need to have important discussions about the ethical requirements, how we think about fairness and bias and transparency, and how artificial intelligence interacts with society.”

The Healing Power of Poetry

“It’s good to be back at the mothership,” joked poet Daisy Fried ’89 as she greeted her audience in McCabe Library in March. Students, faculty, and community members gathered to hear the Swarthmore alumna share selections from her most recent book, The Year the City Emptied: After Baudelaire, a collection of translations of French poet Charles Baudelaire.

After an introduction from William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of English Literature Peter Schmidt, Fried explained the story behind her latest collection.

When COVID-19 shook the world in the spring of 2020, and as her husband was dying from a long illness, Fried resolved to read at least two poems each day from her poetry library, in alphabetical order.

— MADELEINE PALDEN ’22

Two adults sit on a desk wearing masks. The woman with glasses reads from a book.
laurence kesterson

Bidding farewell: Faculty & instructional staff retirements

A woman with pink shirt and tinted glasses smiles at the
Syd Carpenter
Professor of art and Peggy Chan Professorship in Black Studies, Carpenter has been a faculty member since 1991. Her ceramics are in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and The Smithsonian.
A bald man with white beard and glasses wears a green shirt.
Erik A. Cheever ’82
As the Edward Hicks Magill Professor of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, Cheever ’82 has taught a variety of courses, from electric circuits to control theory.
A smiling woman with gold shirt stands in library stacks
Allison Dorsey
Dorsey, professor of history, studies and teaches the history of the Black experience with an emphasis on Reconstruction and the Civil Rights Movement, is author of To Build Our Lives Together: Community Formation in Black Atlanta, 1875-1906.
A woman with glasses and long brown hair smiles.
Amy Graves
Graves is the Walter Kemp Professor in the Natural Sciences, professor of physics, and a fellow of the American Physical Society.
A woman with goggles and curly hair is in a lab.
Donna Halley
Halley was a senior laboratory instructor for chemistry, came to Swarthmore in 1996, and has taught laboratory courses in the organic, inorganic, physical, analytical, and general chemistry laboratories.
An older man with white hair squints in the sunlight.
Jim Heller
Heller was named the 2012 and 2017 Centennial Conference Coach of the Year, and awarded the Golf Coaches Association of America Service Award in 2019.
An older man with white beard wears a tan jacket.
Allen J. Kuharski
Kuharski is a widely published and translated authority on Polish theater, contemporary theater directors, and devised theater, and his translations of plays from French and Polish have been performed nationally and internationally.
A woman with brown hair and bangs smiles.
Jocelyne Noveral
Noveral, a laboratory instructor for biology, taught courses at the College ranging from labs in Organismal and Population Biology and Cellular and Molecular Biology to a course in aerobics.
A concerned looking man with beard has goggles on his neck.
Robert Paley
Paley, who joined Swarthmore’s faculty in 1989, is known for developing one of the few sustained research programs in synthetic organic chemistry at a liberal arts college.
An older man with glasses smiles.
Rick Valelly ’75
Claude C. Smith ’14 Professor of Political Science Rick Valelly taught at Swarthmore since 1993. He previously taught at MIT and the College of the Holy Cross and has authored three books.
A woman with black hair and red turtle neck smiles.
Amy Cheng Vollmer
Vollmer, who taught at Swarthmore for 33 years, is the Isaac H. Clothier Jr. Professor of Biology, chaired the department of biology twice, and was director of the College’s Summer Scholars Program from 2017 to 2021.
read full tributes: bit.ly/SwarthmoreRetirements2022

Bidding farewell: Faculty & instructional staff retirements

A woman with pink shirt and tinted glasses smiles at the
Syd Carpenter
Professor of art and Peggy Chan Professorship in Black Studies, Carpenter has been a faculty member since 1991. Her ceramics are in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and The Smithsonian.
A bald man with white beard and glasses wears a green shirt.
Erik A. Cheever ’82
As the Edward Hicks Magill Professor of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, Cheever ’82 has taught a variety of courses, from electric circuits to control theory.
A smiling woman with gold shirt stands in library stacks
Allison Dorsey
Dorsey, professor of history, studies and teaches the history of the Black experience with an emphasis on Reconstruction and the Civil Rights Movement, is author of To Build Our Lives Together: Community Formation in Black Atlanta, 1875-1906.
A woman with glasses and long brown hair smiles.
Amy Graves
Graves is the Walter Kemp Professor in the Natural Sciences, professor of physics, and a fellow of the American Physical Society.
A woman with goggles and curly hair is in a lab.
Donna Halley
Halley was a senior laboratory instructor for chemistry, came to Swarthmore in 1996, and has taught laboratory courses in the organic, inorganic, physical, analytical, and general chemistry laboratories.
An older man with white hair squints in the sunlight.
Jim Heller
Heller was named the 2012 and 2017 Centennial Conference Coach of the Year, and awarded the Golf Coaches Association of America Service Award in 2019.
An older man with white beard wears a tan jacket.
Allen J. Kuharski
Kuharski is a widely published and translated authority on Polish theater, contemporary theater directors, and devised theater, and his translations of plays from French and Polish have been performed nationally and internationally.
A woman with brown hair and bangs smiles.
Jocelyne Noveral
Noveral, a laboratory instructor for biology, taught courses at the College ranging from labs in Organismal and Population Biology and Cellular and Molecular Biology to a course in aerobics.
A concerned looking man with beard has goggles on his neck.
Robert Paley
Paley, who joined Swarthmore’s faculty in 1989, is known for developing one of the few sustained research programs in synthetic organic chemistry at a liberal arts college.
An older man with glasses smiles.
Rick Valelly ’75
Claude C. Smith ’14 Professor of Political Science Rick Valelly taught at Swarthmore since 1993. He previously taught at MIT and the College of the Holy Cross and has authored three books.
A woman with black hair and red turtle neck smiles.
Amy Cheng Vollmer
Vollmer, who taught at Swarthmore for 33 years, is the Isaac H. Clothier Jr. Professor of Biology, chaired the department of biology twice, and was director of the College’s Summer Scholars Program from 2017 to 2021.
read full tributes: bit.ly/SwarthmoreRetirements2022

Lives Well Lived: Honoring Emeritus English Literature Professor Chuck L. James and Political Science Professor Richard L. Rubin

Swarthmore lost a dedicated scholar and mentor when Charles L. James, the Sara Lawrence Lightfoot Professor Emeritus of English Literature, died on March 15, at age 87. The College’s first Black tenured faculty member and first Black department and division chair, James tirelessly served the Swarthmore community with compassion and integrity. Colleagues extolled James’ brilliance, scholarship, and leadership as well as his kindness , thoughtfulness, and passion for mentoring students and junior faculty.

Born and raised in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., James served two years in the Army before earning a B.S. at the State University of New York at New Paltz. He taught elementary and high school English, earned an M.S. at SUNY Albany, and was a tenured associate professor of English at SUNY Oneonta.

An older man with glasses wearing a black shirt.
courtesy of james family

Chuck L. James

Following a period of research and study at Yale University where he met and befriended the Harlem Renaissance writer Arna Bontemps, he arrived at Swarthmore in 1973 to join the English Literature Department and teach in the recently established Black Studies Program. James, whose own scholarship centered on Bontemps, published the critical anthology From the Roots: Short Stories by Black Americans (1975) to expose students to these works. He also introduced a wide range of courses on Black literature, wanting Black Studies students in particular, “to get a feel for the imagination and creativity that’s involved, and see how it relates to the American experience overall.” James was committed to ensuring the survival of the Black Studies Program and established and championed the what is now the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program.Professor of History Timothy Burke noted Chuck’s “richly complex mixture of humane appreciation of his colleagues, students, and academia as a whole, his wide-ranging intellect and curiosity, and his tough but pragmatic insistence that the College could and must do better at meeting its obligations to faculty and students of color.”

James was a lifelong jazz aficionado and a strong advocate of the arts at Swarthmore. He and his wife Jane, who retired from the College’s ITS Department in 2005, hosted students in their home and were “quiet, consistent, stalwart, and unequivocal supporters” of Black Studies and many other programs, said Provost and Dean of the Faculty Sarah Willie-LeBreton. Students chose the Jameses to receive the Black Cultural Center’s 1996-97 Kathryn L. Morgan Award in honor of their contributions to the College’s Black community. In 2005, the BCC established the Chuck James Literary Prize. In his Baccalaureate address, James enjoined students to “engage the virtues of ethical intelligence” to address ongoing inequities. “Chuck possessed a set of quieter strengths whose value grew over time,” says Philip Weinstein, the Alexander Griswold Cummins Professor Emeritus of English Literature.

MORE: bit.ly/HonoringChuckJames
An older man with white hair wearing a tan sweater.
laurence kesterson

Richard L. Rubin

Richard L. Rubin died Jan. 25, at his home in Purchase, N.Y. He was 92. Rubin joined Swarthmore’s political science faculty in 1979 and taught mass media and American politics; the intersection of race, ethnicity, and public policy; and the political culture of American Jews. He served for 10 years as the first director of the College’s Public Policy Program, as well as on the Committee of Minority and Black Affairs. His published works included Party Dynamics: The Democratic Coalition and the Politics of Change (1976) and Press, Party, and Presidency (1981). Over his nearly 30-year tenure, his generosity, friendship, and guidance changed the lives of countless students, spurred by a concept in Judaism to “repair the world.” One of Rubin’s students, Professor of Political Science Keith Reeves ’88, described the political science concept of leveraging social capital, the mechanisms that allow a person to get ahead. “He lived out his belief that it was his responsibility to move society forward and to embrace pluralism and diversity,” says Reeves.
MORE: bit.ly/HonoringRichardRubin
Back to Full Issue
Table of Contents