final-summer-2018

AGGIES 

GO GLOBAL 

Student-run news analysis website decodes 

a crazy world. 

PG 12 

SUMMER 2018 

freedom to think, discover, and create 

liberalis-spring-2018.indd 1 

7/5/18 11:56 AM

Fast-tracking the future 

A letter from the dean 

Dear Alumni, 

Commencement is a great opportunity to 

appreciate the wonderful students in the 

College of Humanities and Social Sciences. 

I am deeply grateful for the many conversations 

with new graduates and their families 

I had during May’s Commencement. I 

fully appreciate the significant achievement 

represented by a college diploma, and I 

also understand the many sacrifices – in 

time, energy and money – that it takes to 

graduate from college. 

Some of this year’s cohort of graduates 

are choosing to continue their education 

by pursuing graduate and/or professional 

degrees. Others are entering the workforce 

at a hopeful time with low rates of 

unemployment and high numbers of job 

Joseph P. Ward, Dean 

vacancies. Whatever path they choose, 

CHaSS graduates are well positioned 

to become leaders in their careers and 

communities because of the broad-based 

skills they developed while at USU. We 

are proud of what they accomplished as 

students, and we are confident that they 

will make positive contributions to society 

throughout their lives. 

One advantage that USU graduates have 

as their lives unfold is relatively low levels 

of educational debt. A recent report 

from the Federal Reserve found that 

many Americans are struggling to achieve 

financial security. One source of financial 

anxiety is high levels of educational debt. 

At USU, we strive to keep our tuition as 

low as possible while giving students access 

to a high-quality educational opportunity 

precisely to keep college affordable and to 

help students avoid debt. 

That said, you too play an important role 

in helping students through your contributions 

to our scholarship program. 

The students in the photo at the top of 

this page were among the 20 recipients 

of $1,000 scholarships from CHaSS at 

this spring’s college awards ceremony. 

These scholarships were funded through 

the combined gifts of varying sizes from 

college alumni. 

Please consider contributing to the next 

round of scholarships: 

chass.usu.edu/giving 

Above: Thanks to alumni donations 

to CHaSS scholarship 

programs, 20 new scholarship 

recipients crowded the stage 

to be recognized by Dean Joe 

Ward at the March 28 CHaSS 

awards ceremony. 

Photo credit: 

Tyson Bybee 


7/5/18 11:56 AM

Advancement Board 

James E. Ackerman 

’75 Journalism & Communication 

Nathan D. Alder 

’91 History 

Steve T. Barth 

’91 Political Science 

Cecelia H. Foxley 

’64 English 

Catherine A. Goodman 

’90 English 

Robert C. Gross 


Mehdi Heravi 


Sylvia M. Jones 

’87 Economics 

Ret. Lt. Gen. James C. King 


Kathie Miller 

’71 English 

John L. Needham 

’97 American Studies 

Jessie Richards 

’04 English 

Christopher I. Seibert 

’75 English 

Tim S. Stewart 


Ret. Maj. Gen. Brian L. Tarbet 


Roger O. Tew 


Liberalis is published 

bi-annually by the Dean’s 

Office of the College of 

Humanities and Social 

Sciences and is distributed 

to alumni and friends free of 

charge. 

COLLEGE OF HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES 

Utah State University | 0700 Old Main Hill | Logan, UT 84322-0700 

435-797-1195 | www.chass.usu.edu 

CHaSS Dean/Publisher 

Joseph P. Ward 

Editor/Writer 

Janelle Hyatt 

Graphic Designer 

Simon Bergholtz 

The publication and 

additional content are 

available online at 

chass.usu.edu/liberalis 

Contact us by email at: 

Liberalis@usu.edu 

Liberalis was derived from 

the Latin word pertaining 

to freedom, generosity, and 

honor. These words reflect 

the values of the College 

of Humanities and Social 

Sciences. We seek to cultivate 

in ourselves and our students 

the freedom and eagerness to 

explore new ideas and cultures 

and to affirm the dignity and 

honor of all people. 


7/5/18 11:56 AM

ON THE HILL 

Utah’s legislature would stall 

without USU interns’ efforts 

PG 5 

Legacy of ALISON BERG 

‘I have bigger dreams’ 

PG 8 

UNTANGLING THE WORLD 

Student news analysts tell it as 

they see it 

PG 12 

VIRAL VISION 

Forbes magazine recognizes JCOM 

alum in ‘30 Under 30’ recognition 

PG 16 

Outstanding in HIS field 

Soccer taught Spanish professor 

life’s lessons 

PG 18 


7/5/18 11:56 AM

Anthropologist: 

Leave it better 

PG 29 

INQUIRING 

MINDS 

The very 

modern Emily 

Dickinson 

PG 33 

Branching 

Out 

PG 36 

Court Date 

TABLE OF CONTENTS 

PG 5 – On the Hill: Lessons in governing 

PG 8 – Meet the newsie who is our Legacy awardee 

PG 12 – Poly sci students untangle the world 

PG 16 – JCOM alumnus among Forbes ‘30 under 30’ 

PG 18 – Pro soccer players vs college students 

PG 21 – Today’s youth reflect children in history 

PG 24 – Tenants of Ray B. West: a feature, not a bug 

PG 27 – A path to understanding Logan’s best-known 

poet 

PG 29 – Inquiring minds: Molly Cannon: Love it , and 

leave it 

PG 31 – Joyce Kinkead: Research champion 

PG 33 – Bookshelf: Paul Crumbley - On the mind of 

Emily Dickinson 

PG 36 – Branching Out: A supreme event 

PG 37 – CHaSS Awards for 2018 

PG 38 – Distinguished Professors recognized 

PG 39 – Giraffe awardee: is spreading the news 

PG 40 – Friends of CHaSS for 2018 

PG 41 – Briefs from around the college 

PG 42 – Paying tuition: What were your college 

hacks? 


7/5/18 11:56 AM

ON THE HILL 

USU interns keep gears at Utah Legislature moving 

“‘ 

You can ask 500 stupid questions. 

That’s your limit.’” 

The day was Jan. 22. The Utah 

State Legislature had just convened its 

2018 session. 

“‘I’ll tell you when you’re getting close.’” 

But new boss, Sen. Lyle Hillyard (R-Logan), 

wasn’t quite done. “‘If you make a 

mistake, I’ll take all the blame for it. But 

don’t make a mistake in the first place.’” 

And with that guidance, Katie Miner 

began her first day as a student intern on 

Capitol Hill. 

A lifetime later (OK, actually 45 days), 

20-year-old Miner, a political science 

major and news junkie, smiles at only 

fond memories. She agrees with another 

(former) Hillyard intern who told her that 

his “entire career has been shaped” by his 

experience in Hillyard’s office. 

Miner was one of 15 USU interns who 

were the gears behind the work churned 

5 Legislative Internships 

out during Utah’s most recent 45-day 

legislative session. According to Political 

Science professor Damon Cann, the Utah 

Legislature “would have a very hard time 

operating as successfully as it does if it 

weren’t for the interns that Utah State and 

other universities provide.” 

About a third of USU’s intern corps is 

Political Science students, but there’s also a 

healthy representation from History, Journalism 

and Communication and English. 

Most, like Miner, are the only staff 

members – usually unpaid – in the offices 

of the politicians who make the vital 

laws and course correction that affect all 

Utahns. All of the student interns gain 

lasting lessons from their time in the 

political sphere. All, said Cann, leave their 

mark on the Legislature in helpful and 

thoughtful ways. 

For Matilyn (Mattie) Mortensen, that 

meant being the public smile of a public 

figure, Rep. John Knotwell, who represents 

her hometown of Herriman, Utah, and 

serves as the majority assistant whip in 

Utah’s House of Representatives. The 

22-year-old JCOM major tracked her 

boss’s email, set schedules and triaged the 

needs of constituents wanting to speak with 

Knotwell. “I did the logistics thinking so he 

could do the decision making,” she says. 

USU also sends plenty of interns to Washington, 

D.C. There, as in Utah, it’s about 

the opportunity, not the politics. “USU 

places students in Democratic offices and 

Republican offices,” said Cann. “I know 

whatever side of an issue they’re advocating 

for, that they will be smart, they will be 

thoughtful, that they’ve been well trained 

and they will do the very best they can on 

behalf of our state and country.” 

In addition to the Utah Legislature, USU 

this year has placed 45 interns in Washington, 

D.C. – in congressional offices, federal 

agencies and politically focused businesses. 

About a dozen more work with local cam- 


7/5/18 11:56 AM

Sen. Lyle Hillyard of Logan gives a tour of the Utah Capitol to Cache Valley youngsters during the 

2018 Legislative session. He is accompanied by Katie Miner (to his right), who was his right-hand 

intern throughout the 45-day session. She is a Political Science major. (Courtesy Photo) 

“ 

One thing all 

of our interns 

learn is that 

governing is 

hard. 

“ 

paigns or law firms, said Neil Abercrombie, 

USU vice president for federal and state 

relations and director of the Institute for 

Government and Politics, which works to 

pair students with meaningful and purposeful 

internships. 

Miner interned last summer for the Larrison 

Group, a political consulting firm 

located near the White House that counts 

among its clients senators Orrin Hatch 

of Utah, David Perdue of Georgia and 

Ohio’s Rob Portman. 

Political campaigns may be exciting, but 

Miner admits she leans more toward lesssexy 

policy issues. She played a significant 

role in drafting Utah’s 2018 SB1, the Public 

Education Base Budget. The budget is Hillyard’s 

responsibility as head of the Senate 

Education Appropriations Committee. 

“One thing that all of our interns learn is 

that governing is hard,” said Cann. 

“An internship opportunity really helps 

students to get in and have a better understanding 

of how significant the challenges 

we face really are, how difficult it is to 

identify solutions — and yet, how rewarding 

it can be to participate in a process that 

generates progress on some of the concerns 

that people in our state are facing,” he said. 

A number of students, like Miner, seek 

internships both in Washington D.C. and 

here in Utah. But they’re very different 

experiences, said Cann. 

Washington, D.C., he said, has “an energy 

that doesn’t exist anywhere else because it 

is the seat of government for our country.” 

Matilyn Mortensen, a JCOM major, took time 

from her job as a news reporter at Utah Public 

Radio to intern with Rep. John Knotwell, who 

represents her hometown of Herriman, Utah. 

Looking for an internship? 

Internships are open to all 

college students, regardless 

of major. Contact Damon 

Cann (Damon.Cann@usu. 

edu), or visit USU’s Institute of 

Government and Politics at 

https://www.usu.edu/iogp/ 

Experience isn’t necessarily 

required, said Cann. “Someone 

who demonstrates an 

interest, a willingness to learn 

and a willingness to work will 

have an opportunity to do 

some interesting things.” 

Legislative Internships 

6 


7/5/18 11:56 AM

Political Science major and Capitol Hill intern Katie Miner is flanked by Rep. Dan Johnson of Logan 

and Sen. Lyle Hillyard, whom she worked for during the 2018 Utah Legislature. 

The capital city, he adds, “is teeming with 

young professionals. There are incredible 

networking opportunities, and everywhere 

you go in D.C., just about anyone you 

talk to will have some interest or desire to 

engage with politics.” 

Cann chuckles. “They say that even the 

cab drivers in Washington, D.C., know 

what’s going on in Congress on a given 

day. It’s consuming because there’s so 

much – and it’s so consequential.” 

Whatever an intern’s role in Washington, 

D.C., though, they are “a fairly small part 

in a pretty big machine,” says Cann. 

“Our students who go to D.C. have some 

really exciting experiences, but they are 

also more routine experiences,” he said. 

“They’ll work on phones, help with constituent 

mail or gives tours of the Capitol 

and engage with constituents as they come 

into the office,” he said. “They’ll attend 

hearings and do policy research.” 

Meanwhile, back in Utah, the landscape is 

very different. Elected officials on Utah’s 

Capitol Hill rely much more on the help 

of their unpaid interns/office staff. 

“It may be a smaller machine,” said 

Cann. “But the intern in Salt Lake City is 

a bigger piece in that machine – and has a 

very significant role.” 

Both Miner and Mortensen are quick to 

list what they’ve learned. Mortensen was 

7 Legislative Internships 

pleased to “learn the process” of the Legislature, 

she said, and see “good people try 

to make hard decisions.” She continues to 

focus on politics as a reporting intern for 

Utah Public Radio. 

Miner, a graduate of Olympus High in Salt 

Lake City, has plans to study law at Georgetown 

University. She now understands, 

she says, “what it means to have complete 

integrity in the face of making really difficult 

decisions that other people don’t agree 

with. That’s something I never would have 

learned without this” internship. 

If you’ve ever watched national news and 

wondered at the sheer number of young 

people scurrying behind politicians, carrying 

their clipboards, there is a good reason for 

their energetic presence. The key word here 

is young. Otherwise, said Mortensen, “I 

don’t think your body could handle it. The 

pace is what makes it so exciting, but I was 

grateful it (the Utah legislative session) was 

only 45 days.” 

In fact, said Cann, legislative government in 

D.C. is largely handled by staffers between 

the ages of 20 and 35 or so. “Most of the 

individuals working in the congressional 

offices are people 10 years or less removed 

from their college education,” he said. 

Some in the hinterlands, he adds, “may 

scratch their heads and wonder how it 

is that those individuals without more 

experience have been selected for these 

positions. 

“On the flip side, it gives me great confidence. 

I see students with incredible 

talents who are going out and doing these 

internships,” he said. “I know how well 

they will do the job, I know how seriously 

they take it, how devoted they are to 

making good decisions.” 

Alumni helping 

student interns 

The alumni of CHaSS are instrumental 

in placing students in 

internships that have consequence 

and provide useful experience, 

said Political Science professor 

Damon Cann. 

“Our alums who are working in 

government are very friendly, very 

helpful, very open,” he says. “And 

it’s great to make connections 

between the current generation 

of Aggies and generations past. 

They’ve have always been gracious 

and willing to reach out to 

our students and help us to find 

positions for interns and increase 

the number of opportunities.” 


7/5/18 11:56 AM

JCOM major Alison Berg received the CHaSS Legacy Award for 

courage in her student journalism career and personal life. 

Meet 

Alison Berg 

CHaSS Legacy Award winner is changing 

the world one news story at a time 

In honor of the winner’s achievements, the College of 

Humanities and Social Sciences announces its 2018 Legacy 

Award Winner in classic newspaper pyramid style, with 

whos, whats, wheres and whens. 

Alison Berg, a junior majoring in Journalism and Communication, 

was awarded the prize March 28 for her fearless and 

powerful news reporting on issues important to USU students. 

Berg was also recognized for her passage from fearful and 

humiliated sexual-assault victim to courageous, outspoken 

advocate for other abused women. 

At the end of 2017, the 21-year-old recapped her momentous year 

in a Dec. 19 tweet: “This semester I got a 3.8, testified in a rape case 

in court, worked two jobs, broke two big stories and I’m proud of 

myself and I think it’s important to be proud of ourselves.” 

Others are proud of her as well. Matthew LaPlante, Journalism 

and Communication assistant professor, echoed that following 

her acceptance of the Legacy Award, which recognizes a student 

who represents and emphasizes the heart and soul of CHaSS. 

“Alison leads with empathy,” he said. “It’s really what drives 

her passion for this work. And it’s why she has become such an 

important voice on our campus and increasingly beyond it, too. 

She listens intently. She hears things others might not.” 

Berg, along with fellow Utah Statesman reporter and JCOM 

student Carter Moore, broke the news in November 2017 that 

another USU college was not transparent about its uses of some 

differential student tuition. 

The news report brought an apology from the business college and 

resulted in public meetings where students spoke of their concerns. 

The ripples extended well beyond the campus, prompting 

the Washington, D.C.-based Student Press Law Center to tweet, 

“Great example of the tangible impact of student journalism.” 

For Berg, it was a professional, and very satisfying, triumph. 

More personal, however, was her decision to be identified as a 

victim of rape in a Deseret News story. 

Journalists refrain from naming sexual-assault victims. But Berg, 

an intern at the Deseret News in summer 2017, made the decision 

to speak with a reporter and to reveal all – insult and humiliation, 

and the subsequent strength and resolve – about the rape she 

endured on campus just two weeks into her first semester. 

The story was so affecting and provoking it was picked up by TV 

Legacy Award Winner 

8 


7/5/18 11:56 AM

Two friends who are partners in many a JCOM class. Alison Berg said of her friend Allison Allred, “We have a class name tag that says Al(l)isons” 

(Photo courtesy Alison Berg.) 

news programs and newspapers statewide. 

By the next day, Berg found herself going 

from one TV station to another. Television 

was “probably the hardest,” she remembers. 

“I didn’t watch any of it.” 

Berg will face her alleged attacker during 

an August 2018 1st District Court trial 

where he faces a first-degree felony charge 

of rape and a second-degree felony charge 

of forcible sex abuse. 

“The main thing was,” she says now, “I 

didn’t want to hide behind an anonymous 

name. I wanted to tell the world, ‘This is 

me. This is what happened to me and I’m 

stronger than this.’” 

She’s surprised and pleased at the number 

of woman who have contacted her in recent 

months for support. “I had someone 

reach out to me last week and tell me that 

she had been through something similar 

and wanted some help,” said Berg. “So we 

are going to the police next week. I’ll help 

her get through this.” 

Berg traveled to USU from her hometown 

of Brentwood, Calif., right out 

of high school. Immediately at home in 

Logan, she remembers, “I felt there was 

something special about Utah State. I felt 

this was where I needed to be.” 

As a freshman, she told the admissions 

office she was a psychology major. After a 

couple years of classes, however, she discovered 

she liked the “idea” of psychology 

rather than the actual doing of it. 

By happy chance, she ended up in JCOM. 

9 Legacy Award Winner 

“ 

History and 

philosophy majors 

are my favorite 

people because 

they’re the only 

ones who I can 

100% of the time 

count on not 

saying ‘How do you 

plan to get a job 

with that degree? 

after I tell them 

I’m studying print 

journalism.’ 

“ 

- Alison Berg, Twitter, April 21, 2018 

She laughs now that she doesn’t regret, 

much, the extra year the change in major 

has added to her college career. 

Like psychology, journalism allows her to 

learn people’s stories. What’s more, she can 

share them. “I’ve realized that I can tell 

other people’s stories in creative ways,” she 

says. “I get to tell the story of someone else 

through the lens of their life.” 

Berg has already shown that journalism 

is a formidable way, as she says, “to give 

a voice to the voiceless and tell stories of 

power and truth.” 

With intensity in her voice she explains 

further. “I want to do something big. I feel like 

you should have big aspirations,”she says. 

“If it’s your dream to stay at a small town 

newspaper, then absolute power to you. 

But I have bigger dreams than that,” she 

says. “I want to make a difference in the 

world. I want to be the person who publishes 

the Pentagon Papers. I want to tell 

the stories that people don’t want told.” 

Like this story? Want to read 

more? Go online, and share. 

In an online transcript of our interview, Berg 

offers her articulate and fascinating insights 

on what it was like as a student journalist to 

face down official sources at an influential 

institution. She also explains more about her 

experience as a rape victim and her ongoing 

advocacy for fellow sufferers. 

chass.usu.edu/liberalis/ 


7/5/18 11:56 AM

What’s college without Twitter? Lonely 

In the tweets of college students you’ll find humor, pathos, unpopular opinions, and flat-out wisdom. And for fledgling 

journalists like Alison Berg, the social-media platform is a fact of life. Berg’s early 2018 tweets give us insight into her busy 

and complicated life. She’s spending the summer as an intern at the East Bay Times in San Jose, Calif. 

Legacy Award Winner 

10 


7/5/18 11:56 AM


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Untangling 

the 

WORLD 

Aggies GO student analysts offer tools 

for making sense of crazy world events 

Student analysts who write 

for Aggies GO are, from left, 

Kennen Sparks, Madeleine 

Waddoups, Tyler Whitney, 

Professor Colin Flint, Sarah 

Porter, Katie Miner and 

Hannah Penner. 

(Donna Barry photo) 

In her high school in Clearfield, Utah, Hannah Penner recalls the labels thrown 

about the hallways: jocks, student-body officers, dancers. “We were often labeled as 

the Penner twins,” she says now. “We have the same face, so I didn’t have a lot of 

people who would try to get to know me.” 

Now, as a writer for a new student-run website dedicated to understanding the web of 

international forces and events, and sharing their insights with readers, she’s influenced 

by that perspective. Labels like “terrorist,” like “patriot,” can take a complex idea and 

make it simple – simple-minded, that is, she says. 

“I understand first-hand what a label can take away from understanding the actual 

issue at hand,” she said. 

Aggies GO 

12 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

‘ 

When you use a 

label – one word – 

it simplifies 

everything, and 

you lose out. It’s 

looking at the 

world through one 

color instead of a 

myriad of colors. 

13 Aggies GO 

Political Science Professor Colin Flint chats with student Aggies GO writers Sarah Porter and Hannah Penner. (Donna Barry photo) 

‘ 

– Kennen Sparks 

If your goal is to observe the world, 

really see it, taking in its complexity, its 

muddiness, its sublimity, its pettiness, you 

must reject labels. 

“Labels are a big deal,” says political science 

junior Kennen Sparks of Kaysville. 

“When you use a label – one word – it 

simplifies everything, and you lose out. It’s 

looking at the world through one color 

instead of a myriad of colors.” 

The goal of the new Geopolitical Observatory 

– or Aggies GO – is to address that 

spectrum by offering that rarest of news 

commodities: clarity and context. It seeks, 

in other words, to move beyond labels. 

Aggies GO, a website featuring ongoing 

analysis of current global events, was the 

idea of Colin Flint, a professor of Political 

Science. He’s long provided his International 

Studies students what he calls a 

“geopolitical toolkit.” Flint’s students are 

now offering those same tools to readers 

and learners, of all stripes, perplexed by 

the craziness of world events. 

The term “geopolitics” itself may seem 

academic and a tad humdrum. But it’s not 

an overstatement to say it’s the underpinning 

of everything we know. In short, a 

country is identified by – and its citizens 

identify with – its geographic position on 

the face of the globe. 

According to Sparks “Geopolotics says, 

‘Hey, we’re all the same, yet we’re different 

in our own ways’, because of these 

processes, like national myths.” 

National pride is just one of the conceptual 

tools in that “geopolitical toolkit.” 

Others include “geographic entities” and 

the “codes” that make up, for example, a 

country’s friends and enemies list. 

The tools may be conceptual, says Sparks, 

but they work like the real thing. “You 

wouldn’t work on random boards lying 

around. You’d use a table and tools,” he 

explains. “Instead of having these separate 

pieces of information from all over the 

world, using these tools helps bring them 

together, gives them greater context and 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

lets us see things as a bigger picture.” 

A recent analysis by Penner, a junior in 

International Studies and web master for 

Aggies GO, looks at how women in Iran 

have, in extreme cases, worn fake beards 

to move about more freely. 

Penner stresses that the analyses published 

regularly on the site are apolitical and academic 

in nature, rather than from a political 

point of view. The site offers definitions 

of geopolitical concepts, then uses them to 

frame and interpret world events, she said. 

“Readers can first read the definition, then 

read the articles and connect them back to 

the definition – so they can better understand 

the world through these definitions,” she said. 

Flint left a position five years ago as a 

geography professor at the University 

of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign to join 

USU, where he is now a CHaSS Distinguished 

Professor. His books on geopolitics 

and his articles – he’s editor of the 

journal Geopolitics and co-editor of the 

Indian Ocean Economic and Political Review – 

have been published in eight languages. 

A textbook, Political Geography, was recently 

translated into Mandarin. 

After 20 years of teaching, he says, it’s 

only been at USU that he’s encountered 

students he believed could undertake such 

a large task of ongoing global analysis. 

“There has consistently been such a high 

level of great interactions with students 

here,” he said. “I’m so proud of my students, 

especially the Aggies GO team.” 

“Professionalizing” these students is just 

one of two purposes Flint sees for Aggies 

GO. The second follows the university’s 

land-grant mission and “the role we have 

to reach out and communicate with the 

general public,” he said. 

Flint anticipates that potential followers of 

Aggies GO will be students as well as members 

of the general public who may want to 

get a taste of university discussion and get in 

some solid news analysis at the same time. 

Student analyst Tyler Whitney, a sophomore, 

agrees. He adds, though, that the 

site will also attract readers who are feeling 

“stressed” about world events. “We want to 

give people a clearer mind about the things 

they’re reading and about the things that 

are going on,” he said. “Aggies GO lets 

them be aware of things they never thought 

about, and helps them disregard things that 

“ 

We want to give 

people a clearer 

mind about the 

things they’re 

reading and about 

the things that are 

going on. 

– Tyler Whitney 

actually aren’t important.” 

Others on the staff of six analysts are 

Katie Miner of Salt Lake City, Sarah 

Porter of Clinton,Utah and Madeleine 

Waddoups of Logan. 

Follow Aggies GO at: 

chass.usu.edu/aggiesGO 

“ 

Find more online 

Watch responses from interviews with a 

few students from the Aggies GO initiative. 

Find this and other CHaSS 

videos on YouTube at: 

bit.ly/2lf1o25 

Share with friends 

View or share this article online at 

chass.usu.edu/Liberalis 

Aggies GO 

14 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

VIRAL VISION 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Viral-video creator 

Travis Chambers, JCOM 

grad, named in Forbes 

‘30 Under 30’ young 

innovators 

Travis Chambers (front), JCOM 2011, with Dillon Ellefson (rear) and Stefan 

Van De Graaff (right), a partner at Chamber.Media, at its studio in American 

Fork, Utah. (Photo: Ryan Chambers, courtesy Travis Chambers) 

Viral videos are so six months ago. 

That’s the update from a guy who made his 

name creating these small-screen snippets 

that are so contagious viewers share them with all their 

friends. 

The thing these days is not whether the video is viral, 

but whether it seems viral. 

And, says Travis Chambers, a Jorunalsim and Communications 

grad and the owner of a busy video production 

company, you can quote him on this. 

Chambers is indeed a reliable source on just about 

anything relating to social media and creating popular 

videos. 

He’s been recognized as one of Forbes magazine’s “30 

Under 30,” an annual list that highlights on a national 

level what the magazine calls “the impressive, the 

inspiring and the (genuinely) enviable.” 

The Forbes recognition, released in the magazine’s 

December 2017 issue, identifies 30 “young stars” in 

20 different industries. Chambers was included in the 

marketing and advertising category. 

The award is impressive — “My wife was way more 

excited than I was. She said, ‘So I didn’t marry a 

loser after all’,’’ he jokes. But perhaps Chambers’ 

special gift is his nose for change. He never grows 

too fond of a fad or format, and he can shift into 

reverse without braking. 

“In the media world, whatever your model is becomes 

irrelevant every six months,” he says. “It’s crazy!” 

You may have been among the 146 million 

people who chuckled at the viral video of basketball’s 

Kobe Bryant and soccer star Lionel Messi 

competing in an epic battle of selfies. Or the energetic 

video of 50 exercisers frolicking on Nordic Track 

units. (Quick! YouTube break.) 

Chambers was the creative genius behind those 

videos. Forbes magazine cited Chambers’ production 

company, chamber.media, with reported revenue of 

$2 million in the last year, as well as the “super-viral” 

video ad for Turkish Airlines featuring Bryant 

Travis Chambers 

16 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

and Messi, for which Chambers oversaw 

content strategy and distribution while at 

Crispin Porter + Bogus, an international 

advertising company. 

That is just one line item on the 29-yearold’s 

impressive resume. At the time he left 

to establish his own video and advertising 

company, he was director of social media 

at 20th Century Fox. 

Chambers graduated from USU in 2011, 

the year the word “social” gave up flirting 

and finally married the word “media.” 

Snapchat and Instagram were introduced 

that same year. 

And during his months as a young intern 

in an ad agency, companies were spending 

less than 2 percent on social media. Now, 

he says, social media makes up more than 

50 percent of ad budgets that once went to 

television, magazines and other formats. 

“I think it’s Moore’s law of technology, 

whereas things evolve not incrementally but 

exponentially,” he said. “Because of technology 

and the pace that people are communicating 

now, it continues to be exponential.” 

The same thing goes for media and entertainment. 

For one visible example, he says, 

consider Netflix. It’s only been about eight 

years since the video-streaming service was 

mailing DVDs. “Now,” he says, “they’re 

going to soon be the largest single media 

entertainment outlet in the world.” 

“ 

In the media 

world, whatever 

your model is becomes 

irrelevant 

every six months. 

It’s crazy. 

“ 

Chambers said he knew at an early age 

that he was headed for a career in 

advertising, and by age 12 he was carrying 

a video camera making “funny home videos.” 

He was drawn to advertising rather 

than, say, independent film making, he 

said, because he liked advertising’s mix of 

creativity and business. 

He grew up in Oregon and Washington, 

enrolling at USU at the urging of his parents, 

both former Aggies. His father David 

Chambers now lives in Smithfield. 

As a student in JCOM’s public relations 

track, Chambers created his own “catered 

program.” 

“I decided I was going to take advantage 

of all the resources that were available to 

me,” he said. “I combined my education 

with internships and clubs and fraternity 

– trying to get all the experience I could.” 

Among those experiences was a year as a 

USU Ambassador. 

Chambers was in Los Angeles employed 

by 20th Century Fox, his disenchantment 

with the Hollywood culture growing, when 

his daughter was born. That changed 

Travis Chambers and his crew of creative people that make up chamber.media, recognized by Forbes 

magazine for its innovative videos. (Photo courtesy Travis Chambers) 

pretty much everything, he says now. He 

took the “terrifying” leap of leaving a 

regular paycheck and founding his own 

company. He describes his decision in an 

essay, https://tinyurl.com/y96whe5w 

The crew at Chamber, LLC, numbers 

about 20 people at its American Forkbased 

studio, and the company brings in a 

constant stream of contract writers and actors. 

The studio specializes in what Chambers 

calls “scalable” videos. These big-money videos 

made specifically to go viral, he says, are 

the next evolution in an industry that relies on 

consumers who love to share videos. 

Chambers has given himself the job title of 

“chief media hacker,” which describes his 

multiple roles as writer, producer and, in 

the end, the most important job: distributing 

the video on social media channels to 

reach as receptive an audience as possible. 

“I do all of this in a way that’s focused on 

being able to sell (products) as effectively 

as possible — and entertain and delight 

people,” he said. The job doesn’t end 

there. It continues on with the complex 

task of distributing the content on social 

media to target predetermined audiences. 

“We dive into the data and the quantitative 

side,” he said. 

“The only way I could really sum up 

the whole thing is that I’m not just the 

creative director or ad buyer or producer 

– I’m a media hacker.” 

Related Links 

Forbes 30 Under 30 feature: 

https://www.forbes.com/profile/travis-chambers/ 

See Chambers’ videos and 

other creative work: 

http://chamber.media/ 

Read the full interview with 

Travis Chambers at chass.usu. 

edu/Liberalis 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

A student 

Foreground - J.P. Spicer-Escalante lives a double 

life as a Spanish professor and as a professional 

referee for U.S. Soccer. 

(Photo courtesy J.P. Spicer- Escalante) 

of the game 

He’s both a pro-soccer referee and Spanish lit professor. 

The same skills apply. 

He’s a professor of Latin literature 

and author of two books and a 

host of journal articles. But J.P. 

Spicer-Escalante has already settled on the 

title of his next book: Everything I’ve Learned 

in Life I Learned on a Soccer Field. 

Theoretically, that is. If anyone ever 

invents 25-hour days. 

Spicer-Escalante’s summer months will be 

a blur of domestic and international travel, 

thanks to his moonlighting job as a worldclass 

professional soccer referee. This fall 

semester, though, he’ll settle in to teach a 

capstone class on those soccer-field lessons 

and what they say about the world at large. 

The new course, Soccer and Culture in the 

Hispanic World, is designed for Spanish 

majors. It’s a fitting – and first of its kind 

– endeavor for an academic who’s long 

lived a double life. Some know him as Dr. 

Spicer-Escalante, a popular college professor 

who in 2015 was named the top undergraduate 

mentor for the College of Humanities 

and Social Sciences. Others see him in strictly 

black-and-white terms, as a referee and 

trainer for the U.S. Soccer Federation. 

The new course, he says, allows him to 

“make this passion for the game part of 

my passion for teaching and for research.” 

He wants students to understand the 

role soccer plays in our American culture 

and internationally. It’s become the 

No.1 participation sport in suburbia – 

eclipsing football, baseball and basketball 

– in part because of the opportunities 

it opens for girl players. 

Yet, the sport is so much more than a 

Saturday-morning ritual. A soccer game, 

he says, is “like a baroque spectacle. It’s orchestrated 

as theater – a big stadium where 

you’ve got colors and sounds and songs and 

chanting and movement and people.” 

Dual lives: a playbook 

On the soccer field, you’ll encounter 

Soccer Lesson 

18 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

RCM (right center midfield), CAM (center 

attacking midfield), even a GK(goal 

keeper). You won’t, however, find a Ph.D. 

When Spicer-Escalante is asked how 

many other university literature professors 

are among the referees, he leans 

back in his chair. “None,” he says. 

He pauses contemplatively. “None,” he 

confirms. 

Spicer-Escalante began playing soccer as a 

4-year-old in Wichita, Kansas. By his teen 

years, he was reffing youth soccer games 

and considering a job at McDonald’s. Then 

came the epiphany: “I realized I could 

make $10 for a 40-minute soccer game,” he 

says. His teen career plans were set. 

In the late 1980s and early ‘90s, Kansas 

State University didn’t have a program for 

soccer. (Major league soccer wasn’t even 

played until 1993.) The young KSU student 

made the cut for the club team. But, 

Spicer-Escalante says now, studying took up 

the time he should have been at practice. 

He took up for single-game refereeing gigs. 

It paid off. As a grad student at the University 

of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, “my 

career as a referee really took off,” he says. 

“I worked my way up all the way to major 

league soccer,” he says. “I did my first 

international matches in Illinois and made 

my way up into the professional ranks” – 

as in, FIFA and U.S. Soccer. 

(Perhaps coincidentally? It was also at the 

University of Illinois that he met his wife, 

Maria Luisa Spicer-Escalante, a professor 

of Spanish and linguistics at USU.) 

Spicer-Escalante brought this professional 

duality with him when he began at USU 

in 2003, retiring from active refereeing and 

moving into the role of “coaching” top-level 

referees. At USU, his teaching and research 

focus on Latin American literature. He’s also 

the founder and co-director of Decimononica, 

an online journal in Spanish on 19th-century 

“Hispanic cultural production.” 

There’s not much difference, he says, between 

how he approaches a soccer game or a 

literary text. “It’s all analysis,” he says. “When 

I watch a game, I analyze it like I analyze a 

book. A soccer match is a text I read.” 

The building of a referee ‘coach’ 

These days, professional soccer asks a lot 

more from its referees then it did from 

history’s stereotype of the gentleman 

umpire who directed action “much like 

a headmaster,” Spicer-Escalante says. 

“The people who worked the highest-level 

matches actually weren’t very athletic – 

they even wore blazers.” 

Today, says Spicer-Escalante, a referee 

must be as much an athlete as any player. 

Consider this: A center referee can run as 

much as 8 miles during a single game. 

Spicer-Escalante is a driver in the global 

movement to promote the professionalism 

of soccer referees. His official employer, the 

Professional Referee Association, “now has 

a whole crew of support scientists,” he says. 

Only in the 1990s, said Spicer-Escalante, 

did refs begin to train like athletes – weight 

training, careful diets, restful sleep. But, he 

says, “there wasn’t a support network.” 

Today, he adds, “all pro-soccer referees 

wear a watch that monitors every time 

we exercise, when sleeping, before games 

and during games. You’re always going to 

have 18-year-old players, but you’re not 

always going to be 18.” 

We can thank technology for the ever-rising 

bar for referees. “The speed of 

play, the technical aspect of play,” he 

explains, “the strategies have all changed 

and become much more sophisticated.” 

Indeed, professional soccer in 2017 

introduced a fifth “referee”– a video 

camera that sees 17 different angles. 

And, we can thank big money. Miss one 

instance of a player handling the ball, and 

you’re on the hook for slumps in fortunes, 

fans’ hope and careers. 

Spicer-Escalante’s own role has grown into 

what you might call a coach for professional 

refs on a global scale. Plus, he’s now translating 

FIFA-related material into Spanish. 

In addition to the need for athleticism, 

today’s professional ref has to know more 

than rules of the game. There’s also psychology, 

personnel management, research. 

“Now on the FIFA level, I work specifically 

with ‘How do you eat?’ How do you 

sleep?’ ‘How do you exercise?’ ‘How do 

J.P. Spicer-Escalante, a professor of Spanish culture, at his office in Old Main. 

19 Soccer Lesson 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

you prepare for a game?’,” he said. “Mentally, 

physically, psychologically. We work 

on all those factors now.” 

You might agree those same skills of psychological 

insights and crowd management 

would be valuable to school teachers – or 

college professors. Spicer-Escalante does. 

Pro soccer players and college students 

“ 

When I watch a 

game, I analyze 

it like I analyze 

a book. A soccer 

match is a text 

I read. 

“ 

share much in common, he says. “An 

effective student is a learner. An effective 

player or referee or coach is a learner. 

They’re all learners.” 

He encourages soccer players to be “students 

of the game.” The same advice goes 

for actual students, too, he says. 

“I see this in class. The best students I’ve 

had at USU were people who said, ‘Oh, I 

see where I screwed that up.’ They learn 

to listen. If you can’t learn from mistakes 

you won’t go anywhere.” 

The class itself 

Spicer-Escalante’s new soccer-culture 

course will look at the soccer universe in 

terms of cultural productions, one of his 

research focuses. He’ll also explore the 

sport’s fascinating history. 

Soccer in the United States is in a sorry 

last place when it comes to assessing its 

popularity among international nations. 

Yes, you can’t drive through a Cache Valley 

neighborhood without passing parks 

where kids in knee highs and oversized 

jerseys kick balls around. 

Soccer, though, is actually a legacy of 

America’s immigrant populations. The 

game was something all newcomers 

shared when they arrived on U.S. shores. 

“In a lot of countries soccer is a working-class 

sport,” he says. 

“The backbone of soccer in this country 

were the immigrants who brought it here.” 

he said. “All these people came here for a 

better life, but they brought their culture 

with them, and that was soccer.” 

When he was a young referee, Spicer-Escalante 

says, “I cut my teeth refereeing in 

Chicago. On any given day I could have 

Serbians verses Croatians, or multiple 

Polish teams against Albanians or German 

clubs.” Down in Miami, he adds, a soccer 

game may match Jamaicans against Hondurans 

or Colombians. 

Soccer became a true American success 

story when it moved into the suburbs, 

“partly because of soccer moms, partly 

because Title 9 allowed girls to play. 

But also,” he adds, “because many of 

those immigrants bettered their lives and 

moved to the suburbs.” 

Students in Spicer-Escalante’s fall course 

will focus on soccer as a socio-cultural 

product, he said, “because it’s a product 

of who we are as societies and cultures.” 

That includes hooligans, a term that’s 

become linked with violence in sports. 

“Manchester’s big,” he adds, referring to 

the U.K. city’s battling and bloody fans. 

“I think everybody in the college class will 

go, ‘Wow! I never thought about the fact 

that sports – like literature, like art – reacts, 

responds and creates the society and 

culture in which we live,’” he said. 

OK, now back to that hypothetical book, 

Everything I’ve Learned in Life I Learned on a 

Soccer Field. Here is the big lesson. 

“I learned how to deal with people, how 

to manage people and your own self,” 

he says. “I learned how you set limits for 

yourself and others, and how you engage 

in the society of the game, which is, ‘I’m 

going to follow the rules, or I’m going to 

get kicked out.’” 

Share with friends 

Liberalis is now online and easy to 

share on social media. Check it out at: 


The professor on famous 

soccer stars he’s met: 

David Beckham, celebrity soccer 

star: 

“A very, very gifted, talented, smart 

player who I hope will continue in 

terms of coaching. In many ways 

he’s very gentlemanly, but he’s also a 

soccer player, which means you don’t 

always have to be a gentleman. “ 

Mia Hamm, two-time Olympic 

gold medalist and two-time FIFA 

women’s World Cup champion, 

whom he’s refereed: 

“One of the most talented players 

I’ve ever seen play — hard-nosed, 

unforgiving. She’d let you know if she 

disagreed with your decision on the 

field, but she’s a true professional in 

every sense of the word. “ 

Pele, considered the world’s 

greatest soccer player, whom 

JP encountered in 1982 at an 

international airport in Brazil: 

“I see this smaller African-Brazilian 

guy get out of a car, wearing this 

beautiful white suit. He’s standing 

there, looking around, waiting. I say, 

‘That’s Pele!’ And my friends go, 

‘That’s not Pele.’ 

“I went up to him and, speaking in 

English, I said, ‘Please excuse me, sir. 

I don’t want to bother you, I just want 

to shake your hand.’ He said, ‘Oh, 

my friend, you’re American.’ I said, 

‘I watched you play for the Cosmos. 

You were one of the people who 

gave the sport a heart and soul in our 

country because of the passion you 

brought to the game.’ 

“We spoke for three or four minutes. 

Finally he said, ‘Well, my friend, I 

have to go catch my flight. It’s been 

wonderful talking to you.’ At that 

point, we shook hands, he walked off. 

I didn’t have a pen and paper, or a 

camera or anything. 

“He was just a very human person. It 

was a wonderful experience. “ 

Soccer Lesson 

20 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

FROM THE MOUTH OF BABES 

Those skeptical about children’s influence 

in the past need only read today’s 

headlines, says historian 

“ 

The child is the father of the man.” 

William Wordsworth wrote those words in 1802 as a wish that he, the man, 

would always experience his younger self ’s sense of wonder and thrill at, for 

instance, a luminous rainbow. The phrase, however, is truer in more ways than the poet 

imagined – or, well, perhaps he did. 

For Julia M Gossard, modern civilization’s younger self – the world that historians like 

Gossard write about – is our own era’s parent. 

Other scholars would agree. But here’s a funny quirk: Gossard’s historical specialty is 

children. 

Gossard, an assistant professor of history, is an expert on the lives of youngsters who 

lived more than two centuries ago. We hear very little about the lives of these children 

in history. (Although her research does indeed point to the fact that they did exist.) 

“They’re in the shadows,” she says of children. “We usually think about the adults 

because they’re the ones creating the documents.” 

Children, however, she says, were more influential than we citizens of the modern 

world – or even history in general – give them credit for. 

Think of your own household, she nudges, “and how about sometimes children rule the 

roost.” 

Isn’t it often their ideas, she adds, that “dictate what you’re going to do?” 

We in America have seen just in recent months children take a larger and more vocal 

role in society. Think of the teenaged Parkland, Fla., shooting survivors sharing their 

message on national media and in marches at Washington, D.C.’s National Mall. Gossard 

sees in these headlines the growing pains and the fight against the adult world in 

which children have always engaged. 

“I want to use this moment in the present day as an example to talk about their history,” 

she said. 

And indeed, Gossard has reached international and national forums to talk about the 

little-known impact of history’s children. 

She shared her research recently on the popular podcast, “15 Minute History.” Self-described 

as a source for educators, students and history buffs, the podcast airs weekly from the 

University of Texas at Austin. During the Feb. 21 episode, Gossard discusses a little-known 

episode in French history: In the 17th and 18th centuries, the country sent children to serve 

as ambassadors in the Ottoman Empire. 

Gossard was also an invited guest on the BBC 4 radio show, “When Greeks Flew 

21 Sharing History 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Sharing 

history through 

Twitter, podcasts 

and more. 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Kites,” hosted by Sarah Dunant, author 

of such renowned historical novels as The 

Birth of Venus (2003) and In the Name of 

the Family, a 2018 novel about the Borgia 

family of 15th-century Rome. 

From a microphone in the studio of Utah 

Public Radio, Gossard joined an international 

conversation between scholars 

about the historical underpinnings of our 

current resurgence of youth activism. 

Not only was she thrilled at this taste of 

NPR notoriety, she says, “I thought it was 

beautiful piece that demonstrated youth 

activism in these moments in history that 

people might not know about.”(see the 

link at the end of the story.) 

Gossard has focused her research on a 

favorite historical period, 18th-century 

France. Her upcoming book, under contract 

with McGill-Queen’s University Press, 

is Coercing Children: State-Building and Social 

Reform in the Eighteenth-Century. She’s also 

collecting research for a book project to be 

called Little Republicans, which describes how 

the architects of the French Revolution “inculcated” 

youth into the movement. “They 

looked at Athens and Greece and said, ‘We 

can’t go down that same route. (Without 

young people) their revolutions died after 

a generation’,” she said. As an undergraduate 

at Southern Methodist University in 

Dallas, Gossard’s original interest in the 

history of education opened her eyes to 

the long invisible role of children. “I started 

thinking, children have probably held 

roles in their own families that we haven’t 

recognized before,” she said. 

Within that field of study, she found surprising 

intersections with other avenues of historical 

research – gender roles, for instance, 

“ 

I want to use this 

moment in the 

present day as an 

example to talk 

about (children’s) 

history. 

“ 

or social and family culture. “Plus, children 

are rather quiet in the historical literature,” 

she added. 

Gossard hopes her research will also 

temper the historical myth that parents in 

earlier times somehow loved their children 

less. We still hear the rational that mothers 

didn’t want to bond with babies that were 

likely to die. Or another habit that seems 

to discomfit us modern types: giving babies 

the names of their dead older siblings. 

“That’s a big strain of historical thought,” 

she says, recalling that she heard it from her 

own mother. “Historians now are pushing 

back and saying ‘You are really just looking 

at mortality rates and naming practices,’” 

she said. “These things aren’t necessarily 

indicative of people’s emotions.” 

She adds, “I think they experienced death 

and loss in a way we can’t imagine – it was 

very public, omnipresent. They bound their 

emotions together in a different way. To feel 

is a human characteristic, and that attachment 

they have, there’s something there.” 

To listen to Gossard’s 

online work, visit: 

http://15minutehistory.org/2018/02/21/episode- 

103-french-child-ambassadors-in-the-east/ 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09wr9qc 

Some other novelties in the teaching toy box of Julia M Gossard, 

assistant professor of history: 

The UnEssay 

Some history students simply ace the 

research paper. Others, Gossard has 

found, “are kinesthetic learners who 

have to take things apart and play 

with them.” The UnEssay allows young 

historians to approach topics in any 

format that fits them. When she introduced 

it, students created magazine 

spreads, produced documentaries and 

recorded podcasts. “It’s just giving them 

a different presentation space using all 

the same components,” she said. 

Twitter history conference 

This social media platform requires 

users to boil concepts down to their 

essence. And so it was with a 2017 

conference hosted by the Canadian 

History Association — all via Twitter. 

“It’s incredibly difficult to get a 15- 

23 Sharing History 

page paper down to 15 tweets,” she 

says now. “It was a great exercise to 

think about what’s important about 

my research and the key points I 

need to communicate.” 

Gossard shared via Twitter research 

she conducted with former student 

Arie French as part of the Summer 

Mentorship Grant program. They 

documented the journey of young 

French women forcibly transported 

to Canada in the 1700s (see Liberalis 

winter 2017 issue online for more). 

“I connected with more people virtually 

than I ever would have taking this to 

a physical conference,” she says. “I feel 

like more people read it, more people 

asked me questions. There was a really 

engaging virtual presence happening.” 

Follow Julia’s newest endeavor at 

#twitterstorians and @jmgossard. 

Food timelines 

Gossard authored an American History 

Association blog article detailing 

the use of a digital timeline create 

with TimelineJS as an approach to 

history through its stomach. Students 

in a Foundations of Western Civilizations 

class researched their chosen 

era through food trends. What does 

canned Spam tell us about World 

War II? What role did corn play in 

Khrushchev’s Cold War policies? 

The approach helps students think 

historically and critically about how 

food — and access to it — has been a 

mobilizing factor in history, Gossard 

said. One student’s research on the 

role of wine in the French Revolution 

touched on sanitation, culture and 

business practices. 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Makensey Swanson, an English Education major, conducted 

research that revealed the English Department’s 

home of Ray B. West celebrates its centennial in 2018. 

It’s 

Feature, Not 

Bug 

Generations of students in Ray B. West come to terms with 

boxelder bugs, maybe even grow to love them and the building 

It’s only thanks to the little guy in the 

magician’s cape that Ray B. West got a 

birthday cake. 

In fact, no one would even have known 

Ray B. West’s secret if it hadn’t been for 

that student chased from a restroom. 

So, happy birthday and kazoo greetings 

to the building that houses the English 

Department. Never ones to pass up a 

party opportunity, English students and 

faculty taped up cheery letters reading 

“HAPPY 100TH” and sat down for 

some serious cake. 

No boxelder bugs were invited. 

Here’s the back story. 

Makensey Swanson, a junior studying 

English Education with a Creative 

Writing composite, was pondering an 

appropriate topic for a semester-long 

research project when a bug buzzed lazily 

through her line of vision. 

OK, maybe it didn’t happen exactly 

that way. But, it is true that few students 

who’ve taken classes in Ray B. West have 

not encountered the building’s uninvited 

and unloved tenants: boxelder bugs. 

These little devils alight on hats, wave antennae 

from behind books, swoosh by at eye 

level. “They were crawling in and out of the 

electronics and computers where it’s warm, 

coming out all over the place,” says Annie 

Nielson, the department’s finance officer. 

Birthday for Ray B. West building 

24 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Photo courtesy Evelyn Funda 

No boxelder bugs were present at the English Department’s April birthday party to recognize Ray B. West Building’s 100th. At least, they weren’t invited. 

“The bathroom really scared me,” remembers 

Swanson. “I vowed to never use 

that bathroom again because there were 

so many bugs in it.” 

Well, the light bulb of inspiration clicked 

on – how about a study of the boxelder 

bug ball in Ray B. West? – and Swanson, 

too, drifted toward its warmth. 

Swanson presented the idea to her faculty 

research adviser. Well, she was told, an 

entire project on Ray B. West’s boxelder 

bugs may be a bit shallow, but perhaps she 

could discuss the myriad of distractions 

presented by a century-old building. (This 

is probably the time to bring up the clanking 

radiator in the Ray B. West dungeon.) 

Swanson’s initial research soon morphed 

into a curiosity-fueled trip through the 

history of the Ray B. West Building. She 

came upon a fact that the building had 

either been hiding for decades, or no 

“ 

The distractions 

in the building 

lessen the 

longer you’re 

here. 

“ 

one cared to remember: It was built in 

1918 as a barracks for World War I soldiers-in-training. 

2018 is its centennial. 

Along the way, Swanson realized that she, 

well, loved Ray B. West. In fact, she found 

that affection to be a common theme in a 

survey she conducted among more than 

70 students and faculty. 

“Many of them said the distractions in the 

building lessen the longer you’re here,” said 

Swanson. “The bugs don’t bother me any 

more just because I’ve been in it so long.” 

And that goes to validate the point made by 

CHaSS Dean Joe Ward. The boxelder bug, 

he explains, “is not a bug, it’s a feature.” 

The U.S. Army may have originally built 

Barracks No. 1 and the mess hall, as it 

was called, but it was sold to the university 

within a couple of years, according 

to Swanson’s research. Engineering was 

its first non-military resident; later, the 

Department of Education moved in. No 

one is sure when it became home to the 

English Department. Annie Strickland 

believes it was some time in that forgotten 

decade, the 1980s. 

The boxelder bugs seemed to have arrived 

25 Birthday for Ray B. West building 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

with the installation, in the building’s 

early decades, of box elder trees along the 

sunny southern side. Things got pretty 

crowded for a long time as boxelder bugs 

flocked to the box elder trees and sunned 

upon Ray B. West’s warm bricks. 

Conditions improved 100 percent when, 

in 2009, the university installed new, tighter 

windows and removed the offending 

trees, said Nielson. 

Over the years, the English Department 

has taken a “laugh-to-keepfrom-crying” 

attitude. In 2002, the 

Order of the Boxelder was formed by 

an accidental advocate: visiting scholar 

Robert Michael Pyle, who holds a Ph.D. 

from the Yale School of Forestry and 

Environmental Studies. 

Although a lepidopterist – an expert on 

butterflies and moths – Pyle was at USU 

to study nature writing. In the years since 

then, he’s written Butterflies of the Pacific 

Northwest, a 2018 Timber Press Field Guide. 

Sky Time in Gray’s River: Living for Keeps in a 

Forgotten Place (Houghton Mifflin), won the 

2008 National Outdoor Book Award. 

Pyle gave his English Department 

colleagues, who were conflicted about 

the insects’ presence, his word that the 

boxelder bug was nothing more than a 

nuisance, (though, one faculty member 

who responded to Swanson’s survey swore 

“ 

I don’t want these 

things to define 

Ray B. West. All 

these things bind 

us together and 

help us become 

more of a unit 

as an English 

department. 

he’d been bitten by one). 

“ 

“Boxelder bugs are native insects here,” he 

said in an email at the time. “These bugs 

are not plant pests of any significance, 

they do not transmit disease, bite, sting, or 

otherwise harm humans. … In short, they 

do no real harm.” 

On the upside, he added, “if you look at them 

closely, they are quite beautiful, especially when 

they fly, revealing their fire-red abdomens.” 

The birthday celebration included this cake honoring an earlier incarnation of Ray B. West. 

Photo courtesy Evelyn Funda 

Swanson, too, has settled into a tenderness 

for the building and its bugs … um, 

endearing quirks. 

“I don’t want this to define Ray B. West,” 

she said. “All these things bind us together 

and help us become more of a unit as an 

English department.” 

(This summer, Ray B. West is closed 

for renovation of its roof and heating 

system. It will reopen before the fall 

semester begins.) 

Just who was 

Ray B. West? 

The name harks back to 

the building’s years as 

home of the Engineering 

Department. Ray 

Benedict West Sr. was an 

engineer, teacher and 

administrator from 1912 

to 1936. Interestingly, Ray 

B. West Jr. (1908-1990) 

became a USU English 

professor. His papers and 

research are archived in 

the Merrill-Cazier Library, 

Special Collections and 

Archives Division. 

Bugged at Ray B. West 

26 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

A walk in her shoes: May Swenson Poetry Path maps 

Swenson sites in Logan and beyond 

One way to enter an author’s world 

is to open a book. 

Other gates exist, like this one 

into the landscape of famed poet May 

Swenson. Open and cross through, step, 

and step. Catch your breath at the sudden 

beauty that lies below. 

Swenson, too, stood here on this mountain 

crest off Logan Canyon’s Highway 89 

overlooking Bear Lake. 

Her eyes, your eyes, fix on the “every 

colored Rocky Mountain flowers,” glance 

up at “slashes of sky.” 

This stop on the May Swenson Poetry 

Path “brings us directly into her path,” 

says fellow poet Star Coulbrooke. “We 

stand on the very ground she remembered 

and was inspired by.” 

Stop, see. Shiver at the sudden gooseflesh 

on forearms. “ … below we see the whole, / the 

whale of it,” she wrote of Bear Lake, “deep enormous 

blue— / that widens, while the sky slants 

back to pale / behind a watercolored mountain.” 

27 Poetry Walk 

Or you could enter her life at the end of it, 

resting on the bench that is her grave stone 

in the Logan Cemetery. The stanzas on the 

marker itself remind us she’s returned to 

the very same earth that formed her life. 

“It is for you to find me,” she whispers to the 

lonely wayfarer. “Read me. Read my mind.” 

Specific sites like these offer a kind of 

bridge to Swenson, one of the most 

famous and respected American poets of 

the 20th century. She was born in 1913, 

the oldest of a boisterous clan of 10 

children who spoke their parents’ native 

Swedish at home. She died in 1989 after 

a life lived mostly at a distance from her 

large Mormon family. 

Still, says English professor Joyce Kinkead, 

“There are many sites here in Logan that 

connect us to her.” 

Kinkead, along with fellow professor Paul 

Crumbley and undergraduate researcher 

Marissa Shirley Allen, have gathered information 

about Swenson’s life path into a 

literary map that guides us to sites throughout 

the Cache Valley that were important 

in the poet’s life. 

The May Swenson Poetry Path map is available 

as a brochure from the Cache Valley 

Visitors Bureau and is downloadable online. 

The map pinpoints nine sites that can be 

visited individually or as an automobile tour. 

Coulbrooke, who in addition to directing 

USU’s Writing Center is also the poet 

laureate for Logan City, says Swenson inspired 

her own younger self, allowing her 

to find her voice through poetry. 

And, even though the buildings and the 

people Swenson knew then are mostly 

gone, adds Coulbrooke, “it is still the original 

place of her poetry and is, therefore, 

the inspiration for our own writing.” 

As Kinkead explains, “Knowing the geography 

of a literary figure is very important.” 

Kinkead is herself a pioneer of sorts 

when it comes to the phenomenon 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

To download a map of the May Swenson Poetry Path, as well as a copy of the state 

wide author map of ‘Literary Utah’, visit CHaSS.usu.edu/may-swenson. 

of literary maps. In 1990, she provided 

research for the first such map in Utah 

that placed many of the state’s famous 

authors in their hometowns. The illustration, 

“Literary Utah,” charts a route from 

Swenson in the north all the way south to 

Mountain Meadows massacre historian 

Juanita Brooks in St. George. 

Such maps are not only fascinating to us 

grown-up readers, but they can be used to 

great effect in K-12 schools where students 

are often surprised to learn these authors 

walked the same streets they do, Kinkead 

said in an article published in Teacher|Librarian, 

a journal for school library professionals. 

Allen, the student researcher, 

co-authored the article. 

The May Swenson Poetry Path includes 

several sites on the USU campus. For 

instance, the May Swenson Room in Ray 

B. West Building, home to the English 

Department (but temporarily closed for 

summer-time building renovations), is the 

closest Logan has to a Swenson museum. 

Visitors to the room can see and touch her 

aged oak desk and chair (rather hard by 

today’s standards), or view the medallion 

that commemorates the honorary degree 

conferred by USU in 1989. 

The fourth-floor May Swenson Study 

Room in the Merrill-Cazier Library hosts 

Swenson’s framed poems. Other stops 

include Logan High, where she edited the 

school newspaper; Willow Park Zoo; and 

the empty lot near 500 North and 500 

East where her family home once stood. 

“ 

Salinas, California, 

has John 

Steinbeck; Lenox, 

Massachusetts, has 

Edith Wharton; and 

Flat Rock, North 

Carolina, has Carl 

Sandburg. Logan, 

Utah, has May 

Swenson, a 20th 

century writer who 

has been called 

‘America’s Poet.’ 

“ 

Maps and literary trails,” said Kinkead, 

“really help us understand the author in 

their place and time.” 

And, in the words of a fellow poet, Coulbrooke, 

they inspire us. “To be in that very 

place, reading her work and writing our 

own poems from models she crafted creates 

a tangible and lasting appreciation for 

Swenson’s poetry and history,” she said. 

In her article in Teacher|Librarian, 

Kinkead offers this insight: “Salinas, 

California, has John Steinbeck; Lenox, 

Massachusetts, has Edith Wharton; and 

Flat Rock, North Carolina, has Carl 

Sandburg,” she wrote in the journal 

article. “Logan, Utah, has May Swenson, 

a 20th century writer who has been called 

‘America’s Poet.’” 

This writer from Logan, adds Kinkead, 

went on to have her first poem published in 

The New Yorker, earn a MacArthur Fellowship 

— also known as the “genius grant” 

— and was dubbed a Literary Lion by the 

New York Public Library. (Others inducted 

into this pride of Literary Lions include 

Isaac Asimov and Margaret Atwood.) 

“We just continue to try and get in front 

of the community what an influential 

person May Swenson is in the world,” said 

Kinkead, “and that she’s right here.” 

Poetry Walk 

28 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

INQUIRING 

MINDS 

A glimpse at the ongoing 

research CHaSS faculty 

undertake daily. 

Essay by 

Molly Cannon 

Love it, leave it 

That old sliver of purple 

glass? It’s an artifact, too 

We set off the other day, my 

husband and my two oldest 

children, for a reconnaissance, 

an assessment for a potential field project 

along the Transcontinental Railroad 

National Back Country Byway in Box 

Elder County, Utah, with snacks packed, 

grumpy dispositions stashed in the backseat, 

and a knowing sense of discovery in 

the front seats, leaving Logan and beginning 

our journey west. 

The Transcontinental Railroad National 

Back Country Byway is an amazing public 

resource dedicated to the preservation of 

a pivotal moment in American History 

when Euroamericans migrated West, 

disrupting indigenous communities and, 

with the help of American entrepreneurship, 

connecting a continent and setting a 

course for American expansionism. 

I enjoy visiting the archaeological sites 

along the byway – and so many places in 

Utah – because Utah’s past lives right on 

the surface. The archaeological record can 

be found at great depths in some locations, 

calling to mind the familiar scenes of 

massive excavations, screens, grids and the 

like and yet at other locations the archaeological 

record preserves the daily lives of 

many over thousands of years – just lying 

together on the surface. My profession has 

spent many decades studying this phenomena 

and how to extract information from 

this record of rather unassuming objects. 

It is easy to recognize an interest in 

the distant past for we have no written 

account of life of Utah’s first inhabitants, 

although Utah’s native communities 

preserve a story of their ancestors through 

their oral traditions, informing on their 

own distant past. But many of us struggle 

to see value in a more recent material 

record comprised of glass bottles, tin 

cans, broken tea cups and bowls of the 

past hundred or two hundred years. What 

could possibly be learned that is not found 

in diaries, newspaper articles and other 

written records? 

29 Inquiring Minds 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Protecting our past 

Anthropologist Molly Cannon loves to spend time with her children exploring the physical remains of 

Utah’s past. Opposite page, Cannon and her son. Above, Cannon’s children help with metal detection 

while she maps metal ‘hits’ at the Bear river Massacre Site in southeastern Idaho (Courtesy photos) 

Often the questions we ask and the answers 

we seek from the historic archaeological 

record do not differ from the 

archaeological record of the distant past. 

As anthropologists, we are interested in 

human experiences, relationships, problems 

and their solutions, compromises 

and conflicts – all observable through an 

intricate assessment of material objects 

preserved within the archaeological record 

– with the goal of seeking the voices 

of those individuals not found in our 

institutional archives. 

Many events contribute to, or disturb, 

the integrity of objects and their setting 

within the archaeological record. Natural 

events such as earthquakes, flooding, fire 

or simply the freezing and thawing of the 

ground cause changes in the distribution 

of objects under the ground, leading to 

preservation in some cases and complete 

loss of information in others. Natural 

agents such as grazing cattle, burrowing 

prairie dogs, shrews, badgers and even 

ants can displace artifacts. 

Natural agents, however, are not the only 

disruptors of the archaeological record. 

Rather enormous detriment to our shared 

past occurs through our recreational 

looting, shooting and scooting, resulting 

in decreased preservation and ultimately 

destruction of our public resource – the 

archaeological record. 

As with any scientific inquiry, the resolution 

of questions asked by archaeologists is 

dependent upon the richness of the data. 

For archaeology this means a contextual 

setting preserving spatial relationships 

between objects and a range of material 

and artifact types. When objects, 

features or entire classes of objects go 

missing from the archaeological record, 

the questions we ask must be softened 

and knowledge of the past and those with 

little or no voice are left behind. 

A shout rippled through the wind – 

“What’s this mom?”– as we searched for 

the remains of the now-deserted town of 

Lake. My son stood over a small, broken, 

white piece of porcelain and next to it, 

shining in the brilliant spring sun, a purple 

rim of a glass bottle. 

With excitement in his eyes and a sense of 

discovery, he continued searching, calling 

out enthusiastically at each new sighting. 

We sat our backpacks down, took photographs, 

I took a few notes, recorded the 

GPS locations of each concentration and 

returned home, fulfilled by a shared outdoor 

experience of northern Utah’s open 

landscape and historic past. 

If you are as thrilled by the sense of discovery, 

if the past places you in a moment of 

awe, I ask that you join us in our next field 

excursion or on your next hike. Record 

your discovery, take photographs, sketch, 

write of your experience but leave contextual 

information from the archaeological 

record, be it on deeply buried or lying on 

the surface, intact for the future researcher. 

About the Author 

Molly Cannon is a professional 

practice assistant professor of 

Anthropology and director and 

curator of the USU Museum of 

Anthropology. She also directs 

USU’s Spatial Data Collection, 

Analysis and Visualization Lab. 

According to data compiled by the 

Archeological Records Office at the 

Utah Division of State History, humans 

have taken a toll on Utah’s archaeological 

sites. 

More than 60,000 pre-contact sites 

(prior to the arrival of white explorers 

and settlers) have been identified; 

8,397 have been vandalized. 

Of more than 9,000 historical sites 

(pioneer, for instance), 753 have been 

vandalized. 

Explore! But be safe 

Archaeological sites can be dangerous. 

Sites such as old mines may have 

dangerous open shafts, and critters 

love to nest in rocks. Keep alert, and 

stay out of dangerous situations. 

Explore buildings and structures; 

however, if it looks unsafe, assume 

that is the case. Don’t climb on fragile 

walls or try to put rocks back in place. 

Look out for nails and other sharp 

objects. If you see a problem or want 

to report artifacts, contact the agency 

that manages the land where you find 

a site or damage. 

Measure, draw, photograph, 

but don’t take artifacts 

Staying on the trail protects buried artifacts, 

and camping in designated spots 

helps keep archaeological sites tidy. 

If you find something that might be 

an artifact, you can measure, draw, 

and take a picture of the artifact, if 

it’s safe. Just remember to put it back 

where you found it! When you take an 

artifact away from where you found 

it, archaeologists lose the chance to 

learn more about past people. 

Take pictures or drawings of rock art 

and historic inscription. If you want 

to make rock art “pop” in your photographs, 

try using different filters. 

-Utah Division of State 

History 

Inquiring Minds 

30 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Research’s champion 

English prof Joyce Kinkead earns USU’s top award for her 

scholarship and advocacy of student inquiry 

Words, whether swimming in our 

brain or inked on paper, are 

like air – invisible and everywhere 

at the same time. 

We may just scan the text of the wedding 

announcement for a friend’s daughter before 

tossing the card in the procrastination 

pile. But some of us, like one undergraduate 

student in English Professor Joyce 

Kinkead’s research methods class, actually 

stick our noses in that air. 

By the end of a semester-long research 

project, Deidra Hall had produced original 

research that teased out a whole range 

of social constructs illustrated in the wedding 

announcements of Utah newlyweds, 

touching on geography, religion, family 

dynamics, community values. 

A project like this illustrates the dual pillars 

of Kinkead’s academic career. First, her 

advocacy of undergraduate scholars who 

conduct significant research that adds to our 

community knowledge rather than deadends 

in a research paper for a class. Secondly, 

her own years-long research of the hows, 

whats and history of the act of writing itself. 

In recognition of her 36-year career at 

Utah State University nurturing writer-scholars 

and conducting her own research, 

Kinkead has earned the university’s 

most prestigious accolade, the D. Wynne 

Thorne Career Research Award for 2018. 

In presenting the award, USU President 

Noelle Cockett noted Kinkead’s 

“unmatched” impact on undergraduate 

research at USU and nationally. “She 

has worked for years to promote others’ 

research as well as her own,” Cockett said. 

“There is no one more deserving.” 

Indeed, USU remains a national leader 

in involving bachelors students in the 

high-quality research typically done by 

graduate students. USU’s Undergraduate 

Research Program, which launched just a 

few years before Kinkead’s arrival in Utah 

in 1982, is the second oldest in the nation, 

second only to the Massachusetts Institute 

of Technology. In fact, MIT’s Margaret 

MacVicar consulted on campus at the invitation 

of then-USU President Glen Taggart. 

Kinkead’s award provides another celebration 

point. Her husband, David Lancy, 

a professor emeritus of Anthropology, 

won the award in 2011, making the pair 

the first couple to receive the research 

award since it began in 1979. 

Kinkead, a native of Missouri, began 

her teaching career with a focus on 

composition studies. But English — writing, 

that is, not literary studies — has exploded 

as a popular academic field. There 

are now more than 100 degree programs 

in writing across the country, she says. 

And as a result, she’s refined her phrasing. 

She’s focused now on what’s called 

writing studies, specifically for those 

students seeking degrees in writing. 

Composition is what’s done in ENGL 

1010, the introduction-to-writing 

course required of all freshmen. 

Even fledging writers can benefit from her 

insight. “I want students to see that there’s this 

huge, huge world in writing studies,” she said. 

“It’s so much more than just school writing.” 

31 Joyce Kinkead 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

HOW TO “BOOK” a Trip 

English Professor Joyce Kinkead 

has an innovative way of combining 

her two passions of reading 

and traveling. She journeys to 

some fairly exotic ports of call, but 

before the bags are even packed, 

she’s selected a book list that 

gives her intimate insights into 

her destination and upgrades her 

status from vacationist to voyager. 

Fortunately for the rest of us, she 

blogs about “Reading for the Road” 

at her site, Road Works, at 

roadworksbooks.wordpress.com 

For those of us who crave book lists, 

here’s a sampling Kinkead created for 

a journey to the Galapagos Islands: 

Fiction 

Mr. Darwin’s Shooter, by Roger 

McDonald. “My favorite novel of 

the trip,” she says. 

English Professor Joyce Kinkead received the D. Wynne Thorne Career Research Award 

for 2018. Her husband, David Lancy, a professor emeritus of Anthropology, won the 

award in 2011, making the pair the first couple to receive the research award since it 

began in 1979. (Donna Barry Photo) 

Her course on research methods introduces 

English students to a track of writing 

very different from the “humanist” writing 

they’ve been assigned back to their junior-high 

days, she said. “I’m asking them 

to write in a social-scientific way and to 

use quantitative information and data to 

support their research,” she said. “It can 

be very uncomfortable for them.” 

By the end of the semester, students in the 

research methods class have conducted 

interviews, written textual analysis or case 

studies, developed surveys, and created posters 

and lightning talks for dissemination. 

“It’s a wonderful class that marries my 

interest in writing studies and undergraduate 

research,” she said. “Undergraduate 

research can be transformative in a 

student’s education.” 

Kinkead’s current book project looks at 

writing studies from a global perspective. 

A Writing Studies Primer is expected to be 

completed in fall of 2019 at the conclusion 

of her sabbatical leave. She’s researching 

writing “writ large,” she says. So 

there will be chapters on printing presses, 

the history of paper, as well as writing 

implements from pencils to keyboards. 

“I went to Gutenberg’s Museum while in 

Germany in May,” she added. “And I plan 

to continue visiting venues important to 

the development of writing.” 

“I have to credit my husband David 

with getting me interested in the anthropology 

of writing and its archaeological 

origins – like oracle bones from China 

and Sumerian cuneiform,” she said. 

“Too often, we take writing for granted, 

and I want to make its history and development 

more visible.” 

Learn More 

To read about the many innovations 

of and positions held by Kinkead, visit 

rgsawards.usu.edu/d-wynne-thorne/ 

The Evolution of Jane, by Catherine 

Schine. “Beach read might be 

best description.” 

Galapagos, by Kurt Vonnegut. 

“Not really about Galapagos, but 

had to mention.” 

The Darwin Conspiracy, by John 

Darnton. “Was Darwin a fraud 

and murderer?” 

Nonfiction 

The Beak of the Finch, by Jonathan 

Weiner. “Pulitzer Prize-winning 

explanation of Darwin’s discovery.” 

Voyage of the Beagle, by Charles 

Darwin. 

Evolution’s Captain, by Peter 

Nichols “tells the story of why the 

Beagle’s captain made the unusual 

decision to invite Darwin along.” 

HMS Beagle: The Story of Darwin’s 

Ship, by Keith Stewart Thomson. 

Floreana, by Margret Wittmer. “A 

strange narrative” of murderous 

early dwellers on Floreana Island. 

Evolution’s Workshop: God 

and Science on the Galapagos 

Islands, by Edward J. Larson. 

Joyce Kinkead 

32 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

English prof edits 

two journals on 

Dickinson, the 

anti-celebrity and 

environmentalist 

We lose – because we win –” 

This first line of one of the 

shortest poems Emily Dickinson 

ever wrote electrified Paul Crumbley when 

he first encountered it in his early days as a 

young teacher at a private school in Seattle. 

Today, he easily recites the rest of the 

verse: “Gamblers – recollecting which – / Toss 

their dice again!” 

Until that moment years ago, he thought 

of Dickinson – when he did think of her – 

as the eccentric recluse as history unkindly 

portrays her. But a fellow teacher, Crumbley 

remembers, insisted that Emily Dickinson 

was “‘very misunderstood, that she’s 

considered a kind of self-effacing, reticent, 

unmarried spinster.’ He said, ‘That’s the 

wrong way to look at her.’ 

“So I began looking at her.” 

What he found, he says now, was the 

opposite of the languishing “maid of 

Amherst” from Massachusetts. 

“ ‘We lose – because we win –.’ That’s central 

to Dickinson,” Crumbley says. “It’s a 

refusal of complacency in any form.” 

Dickinson “is a poet who takes nothing at 

face value,” he said. “And she insists that every 

act we take, every move we make, be the 

product of self-examination on some level, 

so that what you do is truly you doing it.” 

Crumbley is an expert on another poet 

with the same perspective. Indeed, May 

Swenson was heavily influenced by 

Dickinson. He’s now writing a book about 

this Logan native and acclaimed American 

poet. “The main thing for me is the 

Swenson book,” he says. “I feel like it’s not 

something I can rush. It has to be done 

carefully, and it’s so close to home. I want 

it to be the ‘book’, if any book can, to 

English Professor Paul Crumbley was the special 

issue editor for two Emily Dickinson journals. 

trigger further scholarship” on Swenson 

Crumbley’s attention, however, was on Dickinson 

during a sabbatical in fall semester 

2017. Crumbley spent the months completing 

the unusual assignment of guest-editing 

two of the best-known academic journals 

featuring new research on Dickinson. 

The journals are focused on Dickinson’s 

perception of two very contemporary 

concerns: environment and celebrity. 

The latest issue of The Emily Dickinson Journal, 

published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 

is titled “Dickinson and Celebrity.” 

In addition, “Dickinson’s Environments” 

is the title of a special edition 

of ESQ: A Journal of Nineteenth-Century 

American Literature and Culture, published 

33 Bookshelf 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

y Washington State University. 

In her deliberate pursuit of life, said 

Crumbley, Dickinson assiduously avoided 

fame of any kind. She never sought 

publication during her lifetime, though ten 

of her poems were published without her 

permission while she was alive. Even her 

family was unaware she had composed 

nearly 1800 poems at her upstairs desk. 

Not marrying was a deliberate action 

as well, said Crumbley. Despite history’s 

easy assumptions, she wasn’t hysterical or 

motivated by love gone wrong. 

Dickinson created her poetry in a 

wallpapered, Victorian bedroom overlooking 

a sleepy neighborhood, but her 

art crisscrosses the world in subject, 

setting and sight. Dickinson’s poetry, 

of being one of the great masters of the 

English language”? 

Dickinson’s poetry was published after her 

death and immediately became “wildly 

popular,” he said. That limelight lasted 

only for about a decade, however. She 

wasn’t rediscovered until the 1930s or so. 

Interestingly, the first complete collection 

of all her poetry didn’t appear until 1955. 

The 1930s had introduced the New Criticism 

movement, which guided the way Crumbley 

himself learned to interpret poems. 

“It’s a way of viewing literature without 

connection to historical context,” he 

explains. “Poetry was supposed to function 

with a kind of crystalline perfection, so 

that each part contributed to an essential, 

highly polished gem-like structure.” 

She took 

‘nothing at 

face value.’ 

adds Crumbley, “is cosmic in scope.” 

The poet, though not a hermit, cherished 

her seclusion because, in part, she had 

seen the consequences of celebrity in the 

lives of such writers as the Brontë sisters 

and poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 

“She didn’t want her life disrupted,” 

Crumbley said. “One of the dangers of 

fame is if you produce something that 

wins the approbation of the public, then 

there’s a lot of pressure to repeat it.” 

What’s more, he adds, “she didn’t want 

to make her family’s home the pilgrimage 

point for curiosity seekers,” said Crumbley. 

(Inescapably, however, the family’s home 

in Amherst, which is named the Homestead, 

is now a museum. May Swenson 

herself toured the dignified brick home, 

writing about it in a poem.) 

So how did this quiet soul gain a reputation 

that, according to some scholars, said 

Crumbley, “rivals Shakespeare in terms 

During the 1890s, Dickinson was frequently 

cast as a morbidly shy, eccentric 

recluse known for poems that “were 

scandalous in their implication,” said 

Crumbley. “She played right into the 

notion of a mad woman in the attic. That 

colored a lot of the early response.” The 

New Critics of the 1930s drew attention 

to her linguistic artistry but did not alter 

the public view of her private life. 

Indeed, it’s only been since the 1980s and ‘90s 

that scholars have begun to see how much she 

was, indeed, “of ” the world, Crumbley says. 

“In the last 20 years a lot of scholarship has 

explored the way in which her poems were a 

direct response to the world.” 

That is, in part, why she’s become a darling 

of a new movement in environmental 

studies called ecocriticism, which Crumbley 

describes as literature “that discusses the 

ways in which human beings engage with 

the ecological systems that surround us.” 

Dickinson was an active botanist, says 

Crumbley, and understood much of the 

world through nature. “She understood 

the world through plants,” he said. “She 

could find her way to the far reaches of the 

universe through the particulars of botany.” 

The poet herself described that internal 

journey this way: “My flowers are near 

and foreign, and I have but to cross the 

floor to stand in the Spice Isles.” 

More online! 

This and other Liberalis features are 

online at: 


Emily Dickinson foreshadowed today’s environmental 

movement. 

Want to read further? 

To read the issue of The Emily Dickinson 

Journal guest-edited by Crumbley, 

see: 

muse.jhu.edu/issue/37709 

For the “Dickinson’s Environments” 

issue of ESQ: A Journal of Nineteenth-century 

American Literature 

and Culture, see: 

muse.jhu.edu/issue/37401 

Bookshelf 

34 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

The Utah Supreme Court conducted an entire court 

session at USU’s Logan campus on March 19. It was 

the first opportunity for Michael Petersen, political 

science lecturer at USU Tooele, to see his daughter 

Paige Petersen (center) in action as the newest 

justice on Utah’s highest court. Tanner Petersen of 

Logan, Paige Petersen’s cousin and CHaSS student, 

also attended the event. (Donna Barry photo) 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Branching Out 

CHaSS at regional campuses statewide 

Court date 

Utah Supreme Court’s visit to Logan campus allows USU Tooele 

lecturer to see his daughter, the newest justice, at work 

Theory is all well and good. Reality, 

however, can be a different beast 

all together. 

For Michael Petersen, theory first crashed 

into reality when, as a struggling young 

Political Science professor, he managed 

the campaign for Democrat Victoria 

Shapard, who in that 1978 Congressional 

race in Georgia lost to Newt Gingrich. 

Gingrich made his entrance into Washington, 

D.C., and in 1994 introduced the 

Contract with America, the blueprint for 

the Republican-held Congress. America 

would never be the same again. 

“I’ve thought a lot about that,” Petersen 

says now. 

Petersen was in the audience March 19 for 

another, happier type of theory vs. reality 

history making: The Utah Supreme Court 

conducted an actual appeals court session 

on the Utah State University campus. 

For Petersen, a lecturer in Political Science 

at USU Tooele, the satisfaction was not 

in the Supreme Court’s first-ever visit 

to Logan, but in the introduction of his 

daughter, Paige Petersen, as the newest 

justice on the Utah Supreme Court. 

Paige Petersen was sworn in as a justice in 

early January – filling the seat left by retiring 

Chief Justice Christine Durham. 

Not only was this his first chance to observe 

his daughter on the bench, it was the 

first time he’d ever sat in the audience for 

any higher court hearing. 

His reaction? “I loved it,” he said. “I’ve 

been a political scientist for a long time,” 

he said, “and I’ve never seen a Supreme 

Court argument before.” 

Two appeals were argued before the 

court, presenting a “thoroughly educational 

experience for students, faculty, 

and staff who may be unfamiliar with 

just how the actual world of litigation 

works,” said Anthony Peacock, department 

head of Political Science. 

“What’s particularly valuable about the 

justices’ willingness to sit and hear appeals 

at USU is that it gave students and others 

the opportunity to see two real lawsuits 

being argued,” he said. 

Petersen, a native of Castle Dale, Utah, 

completed his graduate work at Ohio 

State University and taught for about 

eight years at Georgia’s Clayton State 

University. Paige, the oldest of three children, 

was born while her dad was working 

on his doctoral dissertation at the Library 

of Congress in Washington, D.C. 

An offer to teach at the then-College of 

Eastern Utah in Price – now USU Eastern 

– brought the young family back to east- 

“ 

I’ve been a 

political scientist 

for a long time, 

and I’ve never 

seen a Supreme 

Court argument 

before. 

“ 

ern Utah. Paige went on to graduate from 

CEU before heading off to Yale University 

for her law degree. 

Michael Petersen’s career at CEU 

included service as the college’s president 

from 1985 to 1996. He left CEU to 

serve as associate commissioner of the 

Utah System of Higher Education, and 

in 2001 he was named as the executive 

director of the Utah Education Network 

(UEN). Under his leadership, UEN began 

its mission of interactive video conferencing 

that connected public schools 

statewide – a service that has facilitated 

USU’s ability to offer classes at its 33 

regional campuses and centers. 

A teacher at heart, though, Peterson 

returned to the classroom in 2012 to 

teach political-science classes at USU’s 

Tooele campus. 

CEU became part of the USU family in 

2010 with its transition to USU Eastern. 

So, while Paige Petersen’s pre-2010 associate’s 

degree says CEU, the Department 

of Political Science has laid claim. “She’s 

officially an Aggie,” says Peacock. 

Paige Petersen brings to Utah’s highest 

court a diversity of unique experience, 

including eight years as a federal prosecutor 

in The Hague, Netherlands, followed 

by three years on the United National 

Yugoslavian War Crimes Tribunal. 

“Paige has experience that none of the 

other justices have. I think it helps to 

have the perspective she brings out,” 

said Michael Petersen. 

The Utah Supreme Court’s visit to Logan 

was hopefully the beginning of a tradition 

for USU, said Peacock. The justices regularly 

travel for court sessions to the University 

of Utah and Brigham Young University, 

which both have law schools and mock court 

rooms. At USU, the justices heard testimony 

from a makeshift bench on the stage of the 

Russell/Wanlass Performance Hall. 

“To me, the thing that was so great 

about today is that the students got a 

live demonstration of one of the important 

parts of the Supreme Court role,” 

said Michael Petersen. 

Branching Out 

36 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

2018 CHaSS Award Winners 

True Blue Award 

Daniel Mathews | Advising 

Light of Old Main Award 

Joann Wade | Aerospace Studies 

Ed Glatfelter Faculty Service 

David Richter | LPCS 

Ross Peterson Distinguished 

Lifetime Service | Mary Leavitt 

Graduate Faculty Mentor 

Jared Colton | English 

Undergraduate Faculty Mentor 

Harrison Kleiner | LPCS 

Undergraduate Research Mentor 

Crescencio LÓpez Gonzàlez | LPCS 

Lecturer of the Year 

Atsuko Neely | LPCS and Asian Languages 

Researcher of the Year 

Rebecca Walton | English 

37 CHaSS Awards 

Teacher of the Year 

Norman L. Jones | History 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Colin Flint | International Studies 

Joyce Kinkead | English Education 

Richard Krannich | Sociology 

Patricia Lambert | Anthropology 

Tammy Proctor | History 

Frances Titchener | Classics 

CHaSS Distinguished Professors 

In what he hopes will be a new tradition in 

the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, 

Dean Joseph Ward has announced 

that six members of the college faculty will 

be granted the honorary title of Distinguished 

Professor. 

The award is “a way of recognizing that 

these are colleagues who have continued 

to perform at a very high level in all areas 

of a faculty member’s responsibilities – 

teaching, research and service ,” he said. 

The Distinguished Professor title is 

an award, not a promotion, for senior 

faculty members who continue to work 

fulltime, he said. 

Ward said he was reluctant to limit the 

number of awardees “because we have 

many more than six who are highly professional 

and accomplished.” 

“This is the beginning,” he added, “of 

what we hope will grow into a longer-term 

program to recognize faculty,” he added. 

Distinguished Professors awardees: 

Colin Flint, an expert in how geography 

impacts politics, is professor of political 

science. He’s been at USU since 2013, 

relocating from the University of Illinois 

at Urbana-Champaign where he was a 

professor of geography. Flint, author of 

the popular textbook Introduction to Geopolitics 

(Routledge, 2012), is also the director 

of the International Studies major. 

Joyce Kinkead, professor of English, 

joined the USU faculty in 1982. She was 

named Professor the Year by the Carnegie 

Foundation in 2013 and, between 2000 

and 2011, served as USU’s associate vice 

president for research. 

Richard Krannich, professor of Sociology, 

joined the USU faculty in 1980. He 

served as the head of the Department of 

Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology 

from 2002 to 2011, and he has directed 

the Center for Society, Economy and the 

Environment at USU since 2012. 

Patricia Lambert, professor of anthropology, 

joined the USU faculty in 1996. She 

directed the Anthropology Program from 

2004 to 2009, and in 2010 served a six-year 

assignment as the associate dean of Research 

and Graduate Studies for CHaSS. 

Tammy Proctor, head of USU’s Department 

of History, earned the rank 

of professor at Wittenberg University in 

2008, where she became the H. O. Hirt 

Endowed Professor in 2010. She joined 

the USU faculty as in 2013, also serving 

as the interim department head of the 

Department of Journalism and Communication 

in 2015-2016. 

Frances Titchener, professor of History 

and Classics, joined the USU faculty in 

1987 and in the years since has taught 

Latin, ancient Greek and many courses 

in classical history. She has co-edited 

Ploutarchos, the journal of the International 

Plutarch Society, since 1987. She’s directed 

the USU Undergraduate Teaching 

Fellows program since 2014. 

For more information and to read faculty 

bios, visit chass.usu.edu. 

CHaSS Awards 

38 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

New degrees at CHaSS 

Among Utah State University’s nine college, the College of Humanities and Social Studies ranks No. 2 in number of students (largest 

is, unsurprisingly, the Emma Eccles Jones College of Education and Human Services). But CHaSS is No. 1 in its variety of course offerings 

and number of majors. Right now, CHaSS offers 28 undergraduate majors, nine master’s degrees and two doctoral programs. 

Here is what’s new or coming in the near future: 

Criminal Justice minor 

Portuguese bachelor’s of art (beginning fall 2018) 

Social Work minor 

Communication Studies master’s (beginning fall 2018) 

Native American Studies minor 

Chinese bachelor’s of art (expected fall 2019) 

Interfaith Leadership Certificate (Anthropology) 

Giraffe Award 

Tom Liljegren 

The Giraffe Award is perhaps the 

most coveted recognition offered 

by the College of Humanities and 

Social Sciences. It’s given annually to the 

faculty or staff member who sticks his or 

her neck out into the unknown to innovate 

or elevate the educational lives of CHaSS 

students. 

The 2018 recipient’s focus is, to be precise, 

future students. Tom Liljegren, director 

of academic advising for CHaSS, this 

year organized the first-ever CHaSS High 

School Day to bring high school seniors 

together on campus to meet with faculty 

and students and discover the many opportunities 

offered in CHaSS. 

The main goal was to establish, in the 

view of these young people, CHaSS’s 

status as a college with degrees that lead 

to purposeful, fulfilling careers throughout 

the world. 

The successful Jan. 4 event required a 

large undertaking that began in mid-2016. 

Liljegren and his advising staff worked with 

area high schools, department heads, USU 

Admissions, concurrent-enrollment faculty 

and CHaSS Ambassadors. And it all came 

off without a hitch. Nearly 50 students from 

Cache Valley and beyond attended to learn 

about history and journalism, archaeology 

and social work, and so much more. 

This was just the kickoff of what is sure to 

become a great CHaSS tradition. 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

William L. Furlong 

Political Science 

Professor William L. Furlong has positively influenced the lives of thousands of 

students in his 50-year career at Utah State University. Bill and his wife Juanita, 

as well as dozens of appreciative former students, have generously endowed 

the Furlong Excellence in Politics and Government Scholarship. The endowment 

will ensure his remarkable legacy at USU into the future. 

Furlong earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Utah 

and a Ph.D. from the University of Florida. He joined USU in 1968 and taught for 

47 years in Political Science. He specializes in Latin American studies and politics, 

international relations and U.S. foreign policy. 

Among his many awards are USU Professor of the Year (1983) and College of 

Humanities, Arts, and Social Science (HASS) Researcher of the Year (1988). He 

guided the National Political Science Honor Society, Pi Sigma Alpha, for more than 

25 years and was named the PSA National Advisor of the Year in 1996. Under his 

direction, the USU PSA Chapter was chosen as the National Best Chapter nine 

times between 1996 and 2014. 

Internationally, he taught political administration in Peru, Iran and the Dominican 

Republic. Over his career, he received five Fulbright teaching awards to Costa Rica, 

Panama, Honduras, and the Dominican Republic. He led international workshops 

and lecture tours for the U.S. State Department. 

Professor Furlong’s greatest rewards, he feels, are friendships with his many students. 

2018 Friends of CHaSS 

Jack Fleming and Susan Thomas 

John (Jack) Fleming fulfilled his decades-long dream with the founding in 2013 

of Therapy in Motion (TiM), a residential substance abuse-treatment facility. 

Establishing the facility was a labor of love, born from Jack’s own difficult 

process to become clean and sober. The TiM Scholarship Endowment, generously 

created in 2017 by Fleming and his wife, Susan Thomas, shows their commitment 

to preparing future treatment professionals. 

Fleming is dedicated to helping others break the addiction cycle. While serving 

a prison sentence, Fleming began taking USU Extension courses and eventually 

earned credentials as a licensed clinical social worker (LCSW). 

Susan Thomas is just as committed to promoting addiction-treatment services after 

having lived through 20 years of a roller-coaster family life with an addict. Her MBA 

with an emphasis in healthcare, certification as a yoga instructor, and decades of 

culinary practice allowed her to take on the role of administrator and cook at TiM. 

TiM’s holistic program heals mind, body and soul with treatments ranging from 

challenging therapy sessions to yoga and nourishing meals. Fleming and Thomas 

liken their creation of TiM to a child who began walking at just 9 months of age. In 

January 2015 they expanded their “family” with an additional facility. Today, Road to 

Recovery leases and runs the residential-treatment facility in Lava Hot Springs, Idaho. 

Fleming and Thomas remain engaged in informal treatment activities. The 

endowment supports students who are pursuing a minor in Equine-Assisted 

Activities and Therapy. 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Briefs 

Concurrent enrollment to bring the 

jocunditas of Latin to high schools 

that college-level writing has outgrown 

the “old school forms of essay writing 

and reports.” 

To see all winning entries, visit 

english.usu.edu/film/chassy-awards-2018 

print journalism, broadcast journalism 

and public relations. The department is 

now expanding into one of society’s most 

popular forms of communication with 

the introduction of a fourth career track: 

social media. see journalism.usu.edu 

Always seeking bright minds and 

deep-thinkers of any age, the Department 

of History’s Classics program has earned 

state approval to offer concurrent enrollment 

in Latin. Concurrent enrollment 

allows these young students to take specialized 

classes in high school that earn them 

university credit at no cost to them. The 

program will use an online curriculum developed 

by Classics Professor Mark Damen. 

The program will only be offered through 

high school Latin programs, which number 

about 10, primarily in northern Utah. 

Courses in classics and Latin are often 

taught by USU alumni who have earned 

the Classics minor with an emphasis in 

Latin teaching. 

Embassy reception recognizes 

CHaSS connections with Peru 

The College of Humanities and Social 

Sciences has many ties to Peru that include 

research and volunteer work in the 

South American nation. That was the focus 

of a reception April 26 at the Embassy 

of Peru in Washington, D.C. 

Dean Joe Ward and professors including 

anthropologist Bonnie Glass-Coffin joined 

many CHaSS alumni, as well as Peruvian 

Ambassador Carlos Pareja and U.S. Rep. 

Chris Stewart (R-Utah). 

To view a photo gallery of the event, visit 

chass.usu.edu/news/general-news/peru 

CHaSSy Video Awards recognize 

our culture’s new uses for writing 

Audience members munched popcorn 

and winners walked along a red carpet at 

the first-ever Check Out This Video! Film 

Festival, which featured student-made short 

videos and introduced the CHaSSy Awards. 

The competition was hosted by the 

English Department and sponsored by 

the College of Humanities and Social 

Sciences. Judged as top winner among the 

20 entries in four categories was Conner 

Bond for his video “Sonzai.” 

Assistant Professor of English Lynne 

McNeill said the new award recognizes 

Social Work doubles the size of its 

MSW program on Logan campus 

Social Work, housed in the Department 

of Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology, 

is doubling the number of students 

in its Logan-based Master of Social Work 

program to address what’s been a continuing 

and expanding need for social work 

professionals in the state. 

The program in Logan accepts new grad 

students as part of a master’s-level cohort 

every other year. Beginning this fall, a new 

cohort will start every year, in effect doubling 

the number of students, said Derrik 

Tollefson, head of the Department of 

Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology. 

Statewide, the program welcomes its largest-ever 

cohort on the regional campuses, 

said Tollefson. 

U.S. military just that much stronger 

with ROTC programs’ new grads 

USU’s two ROTC programs sent a 

combined crew of 17 new second 

lieutenants – and 2018 grads – into the 

field and the future. 

Nine cadets of the U.S. Army ROTC took 

the oath of office during commissioning 

ceremonies, where they made “a formal, 

public commitment to the defense of our 

Constitution and nation.” Speaking at a 

May 4 event was Col. Milada Copeland, 

an Aggie alumnus and chief of staff for the 

Utah Army National Guard. 

In addition, the U.S. Air Force ROTC 

commissioned eight new officers, who 

will head into such fields as intelligence, 

bioenvironmental engineering and security. 

The AFROTC ended the academic year in 

the top spot for cumulative GPA among the 

145 detachments in the Northwest Region. 

JCOM expands with new track 

of social media 

The Department of Journalism and 

Communication has long produced graduates 

who specialize in one of three tracks: 

Research grants to CHaSS faculty 

scholars double in last year 

CHaSS professional scholars have seen a 

significant increase in grants and awards, 

which, according to Associate Dean Eric 

Reither, testifies to the value of the academic 

work being produced. 

During the 2016-17 academic year, 

grants and other money equaled $2 million. 

So far in the 2017-2018 academic 

year, which ends June 30, scholars have 

received about $5 million. 

Among the larger grants was a $450,000 

award by the National Science Foundation 

to Jacob Freeman, an assistant professor 

of Anthropology, for research on the conflicts 

resulting from scarce resources, such 

as water in a desert community. 

Smaller grants are just as vital, Reither said, 

because they allow scholars to collect more 

data, remain in the field longer or travel 

internationally. “Relatively small awards can 

translate into big research output,” he said. 

CHaSS says a warm goodbye 

to six retiring professors 

The College of Humanities and Social 

Sciences bids a warm farewell to several 

professors who are retiring this spring and 

offers a big handshake of thanks for their 

many years of teaching and influence. Those 

retiring in June are: Brock Dethier, professor 

of English; Daniel McInerney, professor of 

History; Jim Bame, associate professor, International 

English Language Institute; Richard 

Krannich, professor of Sociology; and Steven 

Simms, professor of Anthropology. 

Philip Barlow, professor of Religious 

Studies and the Leonard J. Arrington 

Chair of Mormon History and Culture, 

has announced his retirement effective 

December 2018. 

New UPR app gives easy access 

to USU’s public radio station 

Utah Public Radio has introduced a new 

smartphone app that allows listeners to take 

UPR with them wherever they go. The app 

allows on-demand listening, bookmarking 

41 Briefs 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

and more. Visit the Apple or Android app 

store and search for Utah Public Radio. 

Successful Mentorship Grant 

Program enters its second year 

The Mentorship Grant Program, which 

provides scholarships to students to spend 

the summer months working with professors 

on their current research, enters Year 

Two with high expectations. 

In 2018, 10 students have been awarded 

the $2,000 grants that allow them to 

eschew a summer job to instead conduct 

original research with a professor. The program 

is funded by college donors, Friends 

of CHaSS and with a grant of $10,000 

from the Mariner Eccles Foundation. 

“The students’ identity starts to shift a bit,” 

Associate Dean Matt Sanders has observed. 

“They see themselves not just as passive 

students or helpers, but as scholars, thinkers 

and contributors.” 

More about this program in a previous 

issue of Liberalis at: 

chass.usu.edu/liberalis/fall-2017-main 

Enrollment doubles in 

Communication Studies major 

The number of students entering the 

Communication Studies program has 

exploded, thanks to its focus on a skill 

that transcends any vocation: successful re- 

lationships between people, said Bradford 

Hall, head of the Department of Languages, 

Philosophy and Communication Studies. 

In 2012, 99 students declared the Comm 

Studies major. That number has now more 

than doubled to 236 students, he said. 

Graduating students tell Hall in exit 

interviews that they value the program’s 

professors, “who are seen to really know 

and care about each individual student 

and who are very passionate about the 

material they teach and research.” 

Students also appreciate,” he adds, that 

“the material is very applicable to all aspects 

of life, from the workplace to a wide 

range of other settings.” 

A note from our development officer 

CHaSS Development Officer Justin Barton breaks a new Logan City ordinance that bans 

hammocks in city parks as he reminisces about his years as a student whose budget 

woes forced him to spend many a night sleeping in the park. 

Share how you made it through college 

The best part of my job is sharing 

with donors how their gifts makes 

a difference to a student in need. If 

you can remember your own college days, 

then you can appreciate how even a small 

scholarship can make an enormous difference 

to a student who is facing the choice 

between paying tuition or buying food. 

I’ve seen USU students save or earn 

money through pretty interesting ways – 

selling action figures on eBay, “donating” 

plasma and spending hours crouched in 

the bookstore’s aisles to read books they 

can’t afford to buy. 

As a student myself in the 2000s, I saved 

on rent in warm weather by sleeping in 

Logan’s Merlin Olsen Park and showering 

at the HPER. The bulk of my food 

came in the form of damaged cookies and 

goldfish crackers from my forklifting job at 

Pepperidge Farm in Richmond. I supplemented 

these rations by eating more than 

my fair share of free cheese samples at 

Gossner’s in Logan. 

When I received a small scholarship of 

$200 as a junior, I felt as if I had won 

the lottery! I know I’m not the only one 

to experience scholarship salvation. 

What about you? Did scholarships boost 

your college career? What hacks did you 

use to pay the bills? We’d like to hear 

your stories! 

– Justin Barton ‘11 Social Work 

Did you overcome 

hurdles to pay 

for college? 

Share your story 

What creative methods did you 

use to get through school? Did 

you benefit from any scholarships? 

I’d love to hear your story! 

Please email me at 

justin.barton@usu.edu to share. 

We will feature some highlights in 

the next issue of Liberalis. 

Development 

42 


7/5/18 11:57 AM

Office of the Dean 

0700 Old Main Hill 

Logan, UT 84322-0700 

Non-Profit Org 

US Postage 

PAID 

Utah State 

University 

Homecoming Reunion 

Save the date! Everyone is invited! Bring your family and friends 

to reconnect with fellow students, alumni, past and present 

faculty members and staff. 

Saturday Oct. 13 | 11:30 am - 2:00 pm 

Craig Aston Park 

1307 North 800 East, Logan 

Make sure your email is up to date at 

www.usu.edu/alumni/alumniupdate/ 

to receive important updates and information. 

Goes online 

Liberalis can now be read and shared online. 

Share articles you love with friends and family via 

email and social media. 

Visit: 



7/5/18 11:57 AM

final-summer-2018

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?