Archive for month: October, 2020
Alumni News
Virtual Engagement
Need a new Zoom background? The Alumni Association is offering downloadable campus photos on their virtual engagement page to keep your Monday meetings interesting and keep you more connected to Clemson. And the virtual opportunities don’t stop there.
Explore painting classes, read alouds of children’s books, dance breaks with DJ Sha, question-and-answer sessions with alumni and Clemson experts on topics ranging from NASCAR to the economic impacts of the pandemic, and more. The Alumni Association has also listed online resources available to alumni, including an online job search and online mentorship opportunities.
Affinity Groups Update
On the Alumni Association’s contact update form, alumni can now self-identify with various affinity groups they’d like to be part of, including the Hispanic & Latinx Alumni Council, the Women’s Alumni Council, the LGBTQ+ Alumni Council and the Black Alumni Council. Visit alumni.clemson.edu/contactupdate to access the form.
Made to Order
This spring, bright orange signs emblazoned with “Tigertown Bound Class of ’24” could be seen in front yards all over the state and country. It’s a proud moment for future students and their families, showing their neighbors and friends where they’re going to college.
Normally, the Alumni Association provides these signs for student send-off parties and other events. COVID-19 made that impossible this year, so the Alumni Association created an online order form at signs.com/tigertown-bound, where students can order their own signs and enjoy the tradition.
2020 Welcome Back Festival Canceled
For the last 35 years, the Alumni Association and the Student Alumni Council have sponsored the Welcome Back Festival in downtown Clemson, with local vendors offering a variety of merchandise and food. The event raises approximately $18,000 each year for student scholarships through the Student Alumni Council Scholarship Endowment Fund.
Due to COVID-19, the Alumni Association and the Student Alumni Council made the difficult decision to postpone this year’s Welcome Back Festival in the hope of hosting a similar event in the spring of 2021.
To support the Student Alumni Council Scholarship Endowment Fund, visit iamatiger.clemson.edu/giving and use the “Search for a Fund” feature to search “Student Alumni Council (S.A.C.) Scholarship Endowment.” A gift of any amount can make a difference in the lives of Clemson students.
When in Leiden, Netherlands
Welcome to Leiden, Netherlands! My name is Katie Sweeney, and I graduated from Clemson in 2000 with a marketing degree. Now, I’m a freelance advertising copywriter living in Leiden. A university town and the birthplace of Rembrandt, Leiden is located near the coast between Amsterdam and The Hague. Let me show you around:
1 | Pieterskerk
President George H.W. Bush visited Leiden in 1989 and gave a speech at the Pieterskerk, a stunning church that served as the Pilgrims’ original house of worship. Visit Leiden’s quaint and quirky Leiden American Pilgrim Museum (pictured) to learn more about the Dutch connection to the Pilgrims who arrived in America on the Mayflower.
2 | The Burcht
Just around the corner from the Pilgrim museum is another important remnant of Leiden history. Look for the iron gates with Leiden’s lion and keys symbol. Straight ahead and up the stairs, you’ll discover the remains of an 11th-century castle.
3 | Naturalis Biodiversity Center
This stunning natural history museum reopened in 2019 and is a short walk from the train station. Its nine floors are divided into different themes, covering the varied eras and stages of life on Earth. The dinosaur exhibit never gets old, and my daughter loves the activity rooms, where she can look through microscopes and identify bones.
4 | Outdoor Market
Wednesday and Saturday are outdoor market days in Leiden. Walk along De Rijn canal and pick out fresh meats, cheeses, fish, fruits, veggies and souvenirs from the vendors. During tulip season, I can grab two bunches (10 purple, 10 orange) for 5€.
5 | Canal Tour
If it’s sunny, the Dutch will be outdoors soaking up vitamin D. Whether you rent a boat on your own or take a guided tour, seeing Leiden from the water is a great experience.
Interested in sharing the best eats and secret spots of your own city with fellow Tigers? Email shutto@clemson.edu for more information.
Alumni Profile: Elton Potts ’86
Like many kids, Cullen Harper played a lot of sports growing up: baseball, football, basketball.
A Rare Bird
Drew Lanham receives national acclaim for his memoir
This spring, Clemson Alumni Distinguished Professor of Wildlife Ecology J. Drew Lanham ’88, M ’90, Ph.D. ’97 has been quoted widely in the national media in publications ranging from The Atlantic and Vanity Fair to Garden and Gun magazine and The Bitter Southerner. He’s also been on NPR podcasts and in Newsweek.
Much of his visibility has been in response to the Central Park birdwatching confrontation in May between Black birdwatcher Christian Cooper and Amy Cooper, a white woman whose dog was unleashed.
A nationally known birder and proponent of increasing diversity among the ranks of birders, Lanham has had his own confrontations with those who see a Black man with binoculars as a threat rather than as another human exploring the world of flight. “My binoculars have become heavier now,” he said during his NPR interview. “It’s become harder for me now to pick up my binoculars and singularly focus on birds.”
Lanham also was lauded in the national media this spring for his memoir, The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man’s Love Affair with Nature, which was named by The Chronicle of Higher Education among “The Best Scholarly Books of the Decade” and by Literary Hub among “The 10 Best Memoirs of the Decade and Then Some.”
“To have a work of creative nonfiction — of nature writing — recognized in a way that puts it in a scholarly realm is personally important because it validates your personal story, your personal struggles,” Lanham said.
The memoir takes readers back to the origins of the titular love story — to Edgefield County, South Carolina, where generations of Lanham’s ancestors, dating to slavery, called home and where Lanham began to fall in love with the natural world around him. Through his journey, Lanham never loses sight of the significance of his identity as a Black man in the Deep South and eventually as “the rare bird, the oddity” of a Black man in the conservation sciences.
“Lanham explains how much he wishes there were other Black scientists at the ornithology meetings he attends,” wrote Anna Tsing in The Chronicle of Higher Education. “Too often, our ideas of what it means to be Black are contained within the life of the city. The countryside is banished; it can only be known for its violence and bad memories. Yet many African Americans continue to live in the countryside, and many in cities are proud, not ashamed, of their rural roots. Lanham’s memoir makes it possible to imagine a confident Black embrace of nature.”
Lanham called the recognition for his book “a great honor,” not least because he says some in academia view such personal, creative endeavors as antithetical to serious scientific pursuits. “That validation from the outside is important for any of us at a university. We don’t just want the acceptance of those people we work with — we all know that’s important — but what we strive to do is get the science out and get the words out to the world.”
Listen to a podcast on Threshold with Lanham.
Listen to a Yale Podcast with Lanham.
CNN: The realities of being a black birdwatcher
Students Shine On National Stage
Clemson students won record numbers of prestigious national awards this year, ranging from the highly competitive Fulbright awards to the National Science Foundation, Goldwater, Astronaut and Hollings fellowships, which focus on STEM fields, and the Truman, Udall and Knight-Hennessy awards, which are service oriented.
1 | Charles Dove ’20 majored in electrical engineering and received the Fulbright Program’s Switzerland Study-Research Award. He received an Honorable Mention from the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship in 2020, a 2019 Astronaut Scholarship and was the recipient of the 2019 W.M. Riggs Award, given to the top student in electrical engineering.
2 | Jessica Baron is a Ph.D. student in computer science, visual computing, and received the Fulbright Program’s Switzerland Study-Research Award. She is currently a graduate research assistant in 2D and 3D facial analysis and a graduate teacher of record for digital production arts. Additionally, she has interned at TH Köln in Germany, Weta Digital in New Zealand and Pixar RenderMan.
3 | Jonathan Vogel ’20 majored in mechanical engineering and received the Aston Martin Coventry University Automotive Award. This is the first year this award has been offered by Fulbright, and Vogel was selected as the single recipient. It covers the first year of his master’s degree program and includes an industry placement with Aston Martin upon completion.
4 | McKinnon Reece ’20 majored in mechanical engineering and minored in Mandarin Chinese. He received the Taiwan English Teaching Assistantship from the Fulbright Program. He was previously selected for the Critical Language Scholarship from the U.S. State Department to study Chinese. He will be a teaching assistant and will work with local English teachers in elementary, middle or high schools.
5 | Madison Butler ’15 majored in language and international health. She received a Spain English Teaching Assistantship from the Fulbright Program. As a teaching assistant, she will be teaching English in elementary, middle or high schools. She previously served as a teacher with Teach for America.
6 | Mary Lyons ’19 majored in English and political science. She received a Serbia English Teaching Assistantship from the Fulbright Program. Lyons previously studied abroad in Serbia and will be returning to teach English to K-12 students.
In addition to Fulbright awards, three seniors and four graduate students received Graduate Research Fellowships from the National Science Foundation; three undergraduates received 2020 Barry M. Goldwater Scholarships; one undergraduate is the third Clemson student ever to receive the Truman Scholarship; and an undergraduate is Clemson’s second-ever Udall Scholar.
In addition, Clemson students and recent graduates received the 1897 Phi Kappa Phi Fellowship, the Knight-Hennessy Scholarship to Stanford Law School, the University’s first Madison Fellowship and the Astronaut Scholarship, as well as two Hollings Scholarships and 23 Gilman Scholarships.
More about Clemson students on the national stage:
Tyler McDougald awarded Point Foundation Scholarship
Journey to the Ice
Todd Anderson travels to the Allan Hills of Antarctica to conduct fieldwork as part of the National Science Foundation Antarctic Artists and Writers Program
Celebrating Optimism, Renewal and Generosity in a Changing World
Greetings from Clemson!
The beginning of the academic year is always a time of optimism and renewal for me. The class of 2024 joins us this year — most of these incoming students were born just after 9/11, and now, they are beginning college in the midst of a pandemic. They are part of our country’s most racially and ethnically diverse generation, digital natives who have little or no memory of a world without smartphones. And they join us on campus this fall, excited to be part of the Clemson Family and eager to prepare for lives of significance in our rapidly changing world.
This fall, we also celebrate the incredible generosity of Billy and Ann Powers.
Their gift of $60 million, the largest in Clemson’s history, will transform the future of our College of Business — now the Wilbur O. and Ann Powers College of Business. The significance of a gift like this cannot be overstated; it will further elevate our College of Business toward national prominence. Billy and Ann have lived lives of generosity, and we are grateful that Clemson is an institution in which they have chosen to invest. You can read more about the Powers family and their incredible commitment to helping others beginning on page 28.
This fall will be a very different one on campus, and every member of the Clemson Family — students, faculty, staff and alumni — has a critical role to play in making this a successful year both in and out of the classroom.
I can’t stress enough how important it is for every member of our community to do their part to mitigate the spread of this virus, especially among those most vulnerable. It’s a time when we need to publicly demonstrate that a family takes care of its own. By being united as Tigers, we will emerge from this pandemic strong.
Thank you for all you do as part of the Clemson Family to help keep
Clemson moving forward.
Order of the Oak: Clemson Announces Philanthropic Ambassadors
More than 100 years ago, under a majestic oak tree on the grounds of Fort Hill, Thomas Green Clemson met with the original trustees in whom he entrusted his vision for a high seminary of learning. With one small meeting and one big idea, Clemson College was established.
Inspired by that moment, the Clemson University Foundation has established the Order of the Oak, ambassadors who will provide wisdom, guidance and momentum as the University charges forward into the 21st century. “It is an honor and privilege to serve as a founding member of the Order of the Oak,” said Gerald Glenn, who will serve as chair of Order of the Oak. “It will be our task to work with University leadership to move Clemson forward, well-prepared to take on global initiatives.”
The founding members will aid the University’s fundraising efforts and provide leadership in philanthropic giving. They will collaborate with the Development and Alumni Relations division of the University and the CUF Fiduciary Board. “The CUF Board of Directors understood the tremendous opportunity to grow philanthropic support for Clemson, and with its restructuring, embraced the creation of the Order of the Oak,” said Ken Smith, chair of the CUF Board of Directors. “Driven by the leadership of many of Clemson’s most trusted supporters and advocates, the Order of the Oak will help enable Clemson to meet the needs and challenges of the future.”
The University’s designated fundraising goals will help guide the Order’s mission and strategy. Founding members will be announced in January 2021.