Phantastic Phling

Philander’s Phebruary Phling brought the heat to thaw the winter blues and, for over two decades, took its place among Kenyon’s epic parties—only to be undone by fading student support and the rigors of pre-partying.

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Tuning into Childhood

Musician, tunesmith, and pied piper, Justin Roberts ’92 enchants children and hooks their parents.

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Time Out

Sabbaticals for a semester or a year keep Kenyon’s tenured faculty energized, engaged, and immersed in their fields. But critics claim that the breaks may do little more than take professors out of classrooms on subsidized vacations.

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Also In This Edition

"Renaissance Man" by Charles Gagnon, donated to Kenyon anonymously in 1972, finds a permanent home in the garden below Ascension Hall.

Hitting the Right Notes

For Jane Symmes ’16, there is no offseason and no time to waste. Symmes of Concord, New Hampshire, carries the title “student/athlete/musician”—and she’s a two-sport athlete. When she isn’t lifting weights, throwing or kicking round objects, or studying for the next exam, this international studies major and recording artist is penning notes, striking strings, and belting out harmonies. Her family’s passion for music lifts her heart and comes to life in the form of her lyrics and scores. Symmes also patrols the midfield for the Ladies soccer and lacrosse teams. An injury-shortened soccer season takes little luster off her success in all three phases of her life. —Ryan Gasser

Treasures in Glass

For the College’s book on the literary windows of Peirce Hall, Professor of English Jennifer C. Clarvoe wrote about making sense of nonsense in Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll:

"It is wonderful to find Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland in a series of windows with Paradise Lost and Pilgrim’s Progress; like the first, it concerns itself with a fall, albeit down a rabbit hole; like the second, it concerns itself with the education of its main character by allegorical figures. ... In Carroll’s brilliant, subversive work, it is the child-heroine Alice herself who is supremely sane, debunking, pragmatic—and yet, through her, we enter a world of infinitely entertaining marvels."

Margin of Error

55: Percentage of Kenyon students who think it’s more likely that hell will freeze over before Congress finds a plan for the solvency of Social Security.

70: Percentage of Kenyon students who find their coursework more challenging than expected.

62: Percentage of Kenyon students who have read a book in The Hunger Games series.

Bookstore Olympiad

As the Sochi games were winding down, the Kenyon Bookstore got into the Olympic spirit by sponsoring its own Winter Olympiad, featuring a book-balancing relay (with books balanced on competitors’ heads), a literary trivia quiz, and tabletop bagel curling (“all the excitement of real curling, with Bookstore bagels, sand, and toothbrushes”).

A three-student team competing for the United Kingdom took home the gold.

Class Notes

Recent Class Notes
’63

“In late August, our children made us an amazing 60th-anniversary party. All 12 grandchildren took part, alongside old and new friends. President Biden and Jill Biden sent us an engraved congratulation card.” After a fall cruise and then a family Thanksgiving in Atlanta, Neal was headed to Belize in late January. “Grandson Kio’s high school graduation in mid-May, the Kenyon Bicentennial Celebration in Gambier, and our grandson Max’s graduation in June and our grandson Max’s graduation in June at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. It is good to have so much to look forward to.”

— Neal M. Mayer, Millsboro, Delaware
’15

Drew A. Hogan continues “his floundering crusade against the real world” in his Ph.D. program in political science at the University of Minnesota. In October, he was awarded a second master’s degree for his efforts.

’10

Michelle A. von Hirschberg, West Chester, Ohio, enjoyed visits with family and friends, “including a fantastic Chamber Singers reunion weekend and a week in Bamberg, Germany!” she notes. “Daughter Ellie turned 4 in August, and we had so much fun celebrating.”

Past Editions