March 19, 2007

The DigestWhat’s Happening at KVCC

What’s below in this edition New Kidjo date (Page 1) Clean hands (Pages 11/12) Auto talk off (Pages 1/2) How Kzoo grew (Pages 12/13) Hometown KAFI team (Pages 2/3) Russia, with love (Page 13) 8 Gore showings (Pages 3-5) Global education (Page 13) ‘Truth’ talk (Pages 5/6) Surf flic (Pages 13/14) Any Portage photos? (Pages 6/7) Screenwriting (Pages 14/15) Festival of Health (Pages 7/8) Piano in 1 day (Pages 15/16) Scholarship fundraiser (Pages 8/9) Recycling facts (Page 16) Pickin’ ‘n’ singin’ (Pages 9/10) Clay workshop (Pages 16/17) Wellness checks (Pages 10/11) Blood drive (Page 17)

And finally (Page 17)

☻☻☻☻☻☻Kidjo concert rescheduled

Because of scheduling conflicts, the Artists Forum concert of Angelique Kidjo on Friday, March 23, has been cancelled and rescheduled for Saturday, April 28.

David Posther, who organizes the concert series for KVCC, was notified of the cancellation in midweek, requiring some last-minute, crisis-control reactions, including a renegotiating of the contract, redoing posters and advertisements, reprinting tickets, contacting as many ticket purchasers as possible, and notifying news outlets.

Barring another glitch, the African-born singer will perform at 7:30 p.m. in the Dale Lake Auditorium on the Texas Township Campus in late April.

Posther said the refunds will be offered, while all previously purchased tickets for the original date will be honored at the April 28 performance.

Automotive presentation postponedA presentation about careers in various aspects of the automotive industry by the

publisher of Hot Rod Magazine, scheduled for Tuesday (March 20) at KVCC, has been postponed.

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Jerry Pitts’ remarks were to be part of his publication’s promotion of this summer’s 12th annual Hot Rod Magazine Power Tour that will include a stop in Kalamazoo. His appearance will be rescheduled for a date in April.

When he comes, Pitt will speak in the Student Commons Theater about careers in automotive technology as well as the spinoff employment possibilities in manufacturing, sales, distribution, customizing, education, publishing and marketing.

Billed as the largest traveling car show in the world, the Hot Rod Magazine Power Tour will be launched on Saturday, June 2, in Cleveland, Ohio, with the second stop being at the Kalamazoo County Fairgrounds on that Sunday. Other destinations are: Racine, Wis.; Springfield, Ill.; Evansville, Ind.; Memphis, Tenn.; and the wrapup on Friday, June 8, in Little Rock, Ark.

More than 3,500 hot rods, street machines and two-wheel-drive trucks take part in the yearly 1,500-mile trek. The caravan includes some of the nation’s most unique classic cars and late-model performance vehicles.

“It is easily considered one of the best automotive tours in the world and is a rolling testament to what Hot Rod Magazine is all about,” Pitt said. “Those who take part take pleasure in the joys of the open road, camaraderie, and organized stops in each community on the tour. Many, who we call ‘long haulers,’ travel the entire route.”

Hosting the still-to-be scheduled presentation and the tour stop in June is the KVCC program in automotive technology. For more information, contact Doug Martin at extension 4322 or dmartin@kvcc.edu.

KVCC team makes ‘Cartoon Challenge’ tournamentTen teams from animation programs spanning the United States, including

KVCC’s Center for New Media, will engage in a “24/4” cartoon-creating competition prior to the convening of the fourth Kalamazoo Animation Festival International (KAFI) scheduled for May 17-20 in the downtown.

In addition to the KVCC squad, entered in the 2007 “Cartoon Challenge” are four- and five-person teams from:

● San Jose State University in California.● College for Creative Studies in Detroit.● The Art Institute of Houston in Texas. ● Kendall College of Art and Design of Ferris State University in Grand Rapids.● University of St. Francis in Fort Wayne, Ind.● Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, N. Y.● Laguna College of Art and Design in Laguna Beach, Calif.● Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia.● Bowling Green State University in Ohio.Three of the teams are past “Cartoon Challenge” winners – the College for

Creative Studies at the first festival, the San Jose entry in the second, and the defending champions from the 2005 competition, the Kendall College of Art and Design. The teams from Houston, Fort Wayne, Brooklyn, Savannah and Laguna are first-time finalists.

Shaun Moore, Nick Link, Michael Griffioen, Joseph Marc, and Jason Byrne are members of the Center for New Media team. Their adviser is faculty member Jeffery Woods.

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The 10 teams will arrive at the Center for New Media on the Sunday preceding festival week and bivouac there. Beginning on the morning of Monday, May 14, their objective will be to conceive, script, design and produce up to a 30-second animated feature on a public-service topic over the next four days with the competition ending at 5 p.m. that Thursday as the festival begins

The teams won’t know the topic until the competition begins. All of the materials, computers, software programs, and production equipment will be furnished at the Center for New Media. KVCC will provide sleeping accommodations and food to the teams that will choose their own work schedules to produce their 30-second animated spot.

The 10 spots will be shown at a screening in the State Theater on Saturday night of festival week. The audience that evening will vote on which team should receive the “People’s Choice Award” while professional animators will pick the recipient of the “Cartoon Challenge” championship, the “Judges’ Choice Award,” that also brings scholarship funds for the school’s animation program. In 2005, the Kendall entry won both.

The “Cartoon Challenge” winners for 2007 will be announced at Sunday’s festival-concluding event in the historic State Theater in downtown Kalamazoo. That’s also when the festival’s seventh and final screening will show all of the division winners in the film competition for $15,000 in prize money.

The 10 finalists were chosen from schools from across North America. The entries selected their own team and produced a demo reel that illustrated the quality and creativity of the members’ animation skills.

KAFI will feature themed and programmed screenings of the nearly 100 finalist films that were weaned from more than 500 entries from 35 countries. A panel of professional animators is selecting the finalists.

One of the keynote speakers will be a comedy writer who has been involved with “The Simpsons” for more than half of its 20-year run.

Mike Reiss, a four-time Emmy-winning humorists who has co-produced more than 200 episodes and penned a dozen “Simpson” scripts, will be featured on Friday, May 18, at 7 p.m. in the State Theater.

“An Evening with Mike Reiss” will be one of many ticketed events open to the public. His participation is being sponsored by the Arcus Gay and Lesbian Fund of Kalamazoo. One of Reiss’ creations, “Queer Duck: The Movie,” will be another ticketed event later that evening at the State.

For the fourth time, Kalamazoo’s Irving S. Gilmore Foundation is one of the prime sponsors of the salute to animated films and the art of animation.

Nuts-and-bolts information about the KAFI events and activities, prizes and awards, and other details is available at this webpage -- http://kafi.kvcc.edu -- or by calling the festival office at (269) 373-7883.

Showings of ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ addedEight more free showings of “An Inconvenient Truth,” the Academy Award-

winning documentary about global warming featuring former Vice President Al Gore, have been booked for Kalamazoo Valley Community College and the Kalamazoo Valley Museum over the next three weeks.

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The showings, open to the public, come on the heels of a report by the 113-nation Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that concludes it is “very likely” global warming, as dramatically evidenced by the growing shrinkage of glaciers and polar ice caps, is primarily caused by human activity.

Based on Gore’s best-selling book of the same title, “An Inconvenient Truth” will be show in the Student Commons Theater on the Texas Township Campus:

Monday (March 19) at 2 p.m. Wednesday (March 21) at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 27, at 2 p.m. Tuesday, April 10, at 2 p.m.Here is the schedule at KVCC’s downtown-Kalamazoo locations: Wednesday, March 28, at 1 p.m. in the Kalamazoo Valley Museum’s Mary Jane

Stryker Theater. Thursday, March 29, at 9 a.m. in the Stryker Theater Sunday, April 1, at 2 p.m. in Anna Whitten Hall. Tuesday, April 3, at 7 p.m. in Whitten Hall. The college scheduled five showings in February, but one – in the evening – had

to be cancelled because of misinformation about screening rights.The 90-minute film was directed by Davis Guggenheim. It is based largely on a

multimedia presentation that Gore developed over many years as part of an educational campaign on global warming. It premiered at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival and, fueled by glamorous openings in New York City and Los Angeles, has become the third-highest-grossing documentary in film history.

Gore’s book, “An Inconvenient Truth,” reached No. 1 on the New York Times’ best-seller list in July and August of 2006, Gore said he became intrigued by global warming when he enrolled in a course at Harvard taught by Roger Revelle, one of the first scientists to measure carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

When Gore was first elected to U. S. House of Representatives, he initiated the first congressional hearings on the topic. That eventually led to his first book, “Earth in the Balance,” in 1992 that broached a number of environmental topics. As a political figure, he began incurring the wrath of conservatives and scientific nay-sayers.

As vice president, Gore pushed for the implementation of a carbon tax to modify incentives to reduce fossil-fuel consumptions and decrease the emission of greenhouse gases. He helped broker the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, an international treaty designed to curb the production of carbon dioxide. The United States never ratified the agreement and Gore again became the target of diatribes.

All of this comes into play as background in Guggenheim’s film that is more of a personal account in a moral context than an array of facts and statistics. In the wake of the 2000 presidential election, Gore comes to grips with his life’s purpose and rededicates himself to the struggle against global warming.

He creates “a slide show” for worldwide consumption in which he reviews the scientific evidence of the new millennium, discusses the political and economic consequences of global warming, and prognosticates on the serious impact that climate change could produce if human-generated greenhouse gases are not significantly reduced in the relative near future.

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Global warming in spotlight April 11Following the eight additional free showings of “An Inconvenient Truth,” one of

the production’s designated representatives in Michigan will make a presentation at KVCC on Wednesday, April 11.

Kathryn Savoie, an ecologist with special interests in global warming and environmental justice, will show slides and lead a discussion at 6:30 p.m. in the Student Commons Theater. The program is free and open to the public.

Among the first trained to spread the message of “Inconvenient Truth” as an official presenter of The Climate Project, the 35-year-old Savoie is director of the environmental program at the Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services in Dearborn. It is described as a human-service organization committed to the development of the Arab-American community in all aspects of economic and social life.

As a “foot soldier” in former Vice President Al Gore's battle against global warming, Savoie steps forward to speak at schools, universities and community groups to share statistics and evidence of the problem and explain what each person can do to help solve it.

Whether called global warming or "climatic change,” it is caused by increases in carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases in the earth's atmosphere that trap heat and cause the planet’s air, land and water temperatures to rise. The resulting increase in the average annual temperature is causing glaciers to melt, plant and animal life to change migratory patterns, hurricanes, typhoons and tornados to increase in strength, and other disruptions in the environment, scientists say.

"There's a message in this and it is worldwide," Gore says in the film. "Ultimately, this is really not as much a political issue as a moral issue. If we allow this to happen, it is deeply unethical."

While some U.S. policymakers and scientists have been slow to accept and respond to the threat, the mainstream scientific community is convinced. According to a Science magazine review of 928 peer-reviewed papers published in academic journals from 1993 to 2003, "none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position" that earth's climate is being affected by human activity, specifically that most of the warming during the last 50 years was likely due to an increase in pollution.

They reported the level of carbon dioxide has increased from 280 parts per million in 1750 to 380 parts per million now. That's well above its natural variation for the past 650,000 years, according to ice-core data. The carbon dioxide mostly comes from burning fossil fuels, such as coal, fuel oil and gasoline.

Savoie was one of the first 50 people to be trained as part of The Climate Project, a grassroots educational effort associated with the documentary that chronicles the growing problem of global warming and Gore's efforts to combat it. Those with the project plan to eventually train 1,000 people to get its message out nationwide.

For Savoie, watching “An Inconvenient Truth” was a wake-up call. She started reliving some of her graduate-school lectures during the 1980s at the University of Michigan where she earned a doctorate in ecology. "A lot of scientists were talking about it then. It was a pretty new thing," she says. "It all sounded very far off in the future and something I didn't have to worry about immediately."

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But as she finished school and began working at the Arab center, personal observations began to confirm her professors' warnings: Winter doesn't seem as harsh, air quality is questionable, water levels in the Great Lakes are down.

"As time went on, I felt like I started to see some of the things scientists were predicting," she says. Then, while discussing “An Inconvenient Truth” with a friend at the National Wildlife Federation, she learned about the trainings. Her application to be trained was accepted.

Savoie joined people from around the country near Nashville, Tenn., for three days of workshops and discussions, beginning with a reception at the Gores' house. The Gores "were so grateful,” she said. “I felt a sense of gratitude from them that people had come on their own accord and their own expense.”

The trainees stood along the Caney Fork River as it flowed through the Gore family farm in Carthage, about 55 miles east of Nashville, and listened to the 2000 presidential candidate talk about growing up there, becoming aware of environmental issues and how stopping along the riverbank could remind him of the importance of his work.

Other trainees included country singer Kathy Mattea and Oregon Secretary of State Bill Bradbury. They practiced with Gore’s slide show and learned how to localize it to fit issues in their home regions.

For Michigan, Savoie includes data about heat-related deaths and illnesses, the reduction of water levels in the Great Lakes, and the threat of mosquito-borne diseases that can come as the insect population increases when colder temperatures don't exist to regulate them. By 2100, summer here will feel like summers now in Mississippi and that the levels of lakes Michigan and Huron could drop by 5 feet.

Savoie, mother of a 10-year-old daughter, includes three recommendations for action to her audiences:

(1) “Talk to somebody" about the issue with a sense of urgency.(2) Ask people to become aware of their own impact on the environment and

provide a few actions to limit it - reduce use of hot water, electricity, gas or oil for heating and fuel for their cars; drive more fuel-efficient cars and limit airline travel.

(3) Contact politicians at every level to urge them to do something about the environmental issues.

Savoie said the presentation “explains the science of global warming very clearly and makes plain the urgency of the situation, while at the same time indicating that there is hope -- provided we all become part of the solution. He (Gore) told us he'd been waiting for 30 years for the cavalry to come and we're the cavalry. It felt historic."

"Ice is melting everywhere," she said. "You don't even need science to tell you that."

In search of Portage photosPeople with photographs of the growth and development of the Portage

community are invited to share them on Saturday, March 31, with the prospects that they might become part of a museum exhibition.

Representatives from the Kalamazoo Valley Museum and the Portage District Library will be at the library from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. in an effort to collect photographs

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and images that could become part of the downtown-Kalamazoo museum’s exhibition on the development of Portage in the 1960s and 1970s.

“The project is part of the renovation of the Kalamazoo Valley Museum's history galley that will feature a section on the development of Portage in the 1960s and 1970s,” said Tom Dietz, the museum’s curator of research.

“We are looking for any photographs of Portage businesses, homes, neighborhoods, streets, or events,” Dietz said. “The goal is to help document Portage's emergence from a basically rural township in the 1940s to a bustling city in the 1980s.

“While both the Portage library and the museum are looking to add such images to our permanent collections,” Dietz said, “we will have scanners available so that those with photographs who do not wish to donate them can have them scanned as an alternative method of preserving those images for historical purposes”

For further information, contact Dietz at 373-7984 or tdietz@kvcc.edu) at the Kalamazoo Valley Museum or Steve Rossio at 329-4542, extension 608 or srossio@pdl.lib.mi.us ) for further information.

Fun, games and habits in the name of healthKeeping oneself in peak physical shape, keys to having healthy families, how to

establish personal habits that boost wellbeing, alternative methods of health care, and tips for personal sanitation that can ward off disease will be among the attractions at the sixth annual Festival of Health on Saturday (March 17) at the Kalamazoo Valley Museum.

From noon to 4 p.m., the free event will feature professionals and representatives from local health organizations presenting information, conducting demonstrations, and providing hands-on activities and health-related games for children that promote healthy habits.

The Mary Jane Stryker Theater will host two dance performances of the book “The Rainbow Fish” by the Kalamazoo Junior Dance Company, two showings of “Healthy Happy Kids” that deal with the importance of nutrition in children, and a pair of Elite Tae Kwon Do demonstrations that build self-confidence through a knowledge of self-defense.

Harry “Hap” Haasch, executive director of the Community Access Center, will talk about an upcoming media-literacy project, funded by a grant from the Kalamazoo Community Foundation, that will include a lecture on “The Selling of Addiction” and the production of a video on how the manufacturers of alcohol and tobacco products target young people.

The Festival of Health will offer a full compendium of programs that teach people of all ages the ways and means for achieving optimum health throughout the body, including:

spinal screenings and posture evaluations. brain awareness, its healing power, and the brain’s involvement in sensation and perception. how fruits and vegetables aid nutrition and ward off diseases. the bad habit of smoking. dental safety and cavity prevention. massage therapy.

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how nontechnology patches can strengthen or interfere with a body’s functions and how they can reduce or eliminate pain, boost stamina, aid deep sleep, and improve complexion. how vitamins and supplements can be useful in losing or gaining weight, in nutrition, in skin care and in hair care. the life-saving equipment in ambulances. the importance of rest and sleep in children’s health poison prevention in the home as taught by puppets. what constitutes correct portions of certain kinds of foods. vision screenings and the basics of eye care. the black-light technology that can demonstrate how proper hand washing can reduce the spread of bacteria and infectious diseases. therapeutic massages of the head and shoulders.Among the other organizations that will be participating in the Festival of Health

– Healthy Habits are the Life EMS Ambulance Service, the Kalamazoo County SAFE KIDS Coalition, the Bronson Children’s Hospital, the Kalamazoo Center for the Healing Arts, the Michigan State University Cooperative Extension Service, Wellness Plus -- Juice Plus, the Milwood Spine Center, Great Lakes Health Plan, Nature’s Dance, Healing Touch, Bio-Resonator.com, Herbalife International, Blue Heron Academy, Portage Northern High School, the Western Michigan University Department of Psychology, Rx Optical, and the museum.

For more information about the Festival of Health, contact Annette Hoppenworth at the Kalamazoo Valley Museum, at extension 7990.

Haenicke’s humor part of fundraiserCircle Wednesday, May 23, on your social calendar.That’s the date of the KVCC Foundation’s third annual Opportunities for

Education event to raise scholarship dollars.The guest speaker will be Diether Haenicke, the acting president of Western

Michigan University who in his earlier retirement evolved into a thought-provoking, humorous and satirical columnist for The Kalamazoo Gazette.

His storytelling can range from remembering being strafed by a British Spitfire as he rode a train to school in her home country of Germany during World War II to the humor he encountered during a pair of open-heart surgeries.

The dinner and speech in the Grand Ballroom of the Radisson Plaza Hotel & Suites will begin at 6 p.m. Individual tickets will be $95.

Haenicke was named interim president of WMU by a unanimous vote of Western’s board of trustees on Aug. 15, 2006. The university’s fifth president from 1985 to 1998, he was brought back from retirement when Judith Bailey was asked to resign. She had been WMU president since 2003.

Prior to coming to Kalamazoo, Haenicke served as academic vice president and provost at both Wayne State University and Ohio State University. He has been a faculty member, department chair, and dean during a career that has spanned more than four decades.

Haenicke began writing a weekly column for The Gazette in 2000. About 100 have been republished in book form.

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Born and raised in Germany, Haenicke came to the United States twice as a Fulbright lecturer in the early 1960s. He immigrated to this country and became a naturalized citizen 10 years later.

His academic credentials include a magna-cum-laude doctorate from the University of Munich. His major fields of study have been German and comparative literature, history and philosophy.

He and his wife, Carole, are the parents of two.Reservations can be made by contacting Diane Kurtz at extension 4200.

Fretboard Festival comes into play March 24The second Kalamazoo Fretboard Festival, the Kalamazoo Valley Museum’s

salute to the local legacy of “pickin’ ‘n’ singin’,” is booked for Saturday, March 24, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Free to the public and nothing to fret about, the six-hour gathering in downtown Kalamazoo will feature workshops and lectures by highly skilled luthiers (makers of stringed instruments), performances by combos who make music on these instruments, and displays by vendors.

Among the performers will be:

♫ The Royal Garden Trio from Ann Arbor that performs gypsy jazz.

♫ Kalamazoo’s Third Coast Guitar Ensemble that plays classical, baroque and chamber music.

♫ Great Lakes Grass, a Kalamazoo group that specializes in traditional bluegrass.

♫ The Fabulous Heftones from Lansing that plays music of the 1920s.

♫ Another Kalamazoo-based duo, Rendal Wall and Richard Butler, with its renditions of country swing and blues.

In the works are workshops on how to play a variety of instruments and styles of music, exhibits and demonstrations by manufacturers of guitars, banjos and mandolins, and lectures about this area’s musical legacy. Some of the workshops will be offered in Anna Whitten Hall adjacent to the museum.

The first festival in May of 2006 attracted about 800, according to Jay Gavan, the museum’s special-events coordinator. It was switched to a March date because of this May’s Kalamazoo Animation International Festival in downtown Kalamazoo and to avoid future conflicts with the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival.

“Ever since the Gibson company began making guitars here in 1894,” said Gavan, who has worked for Heritage Guitar that is now based in the former Gibson woodshop, “Kalamazoo has been famous for its luthiers. It is like a mecca. People from all over the world know Kalamazoo for its guitars.”

Workshop presenters and lecturers will include: Mark Sahlgren, Joel Mabus, Patricia Pettinga, Bill Wilging, Miles Kusik, Jackie Zito, Joe Gross, Nathan Durham, John Riemer, Brian Delaney, Brian Hefferman, Lynn Hershberger-Hefferman, and Tom Dietz, the museum’s curator of research who will offer his perspectives on Orville Gibson and the company he established.

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In between, visitors will be able to view exhibits and works by the makers of stringed instruments in Southwest Michigan. Among those sharing their knowledge and their wares will be representatives from Heritage Guitars Inc., Robinson Guitars, Kingslight Guitars, Ry Charters, Wechter Guitars, Broughton Music Center, and Big Bends LLC in Plainwell.

Gavan said the festival is devoted to guitars, banjos, mandolins, upright bass, and “anything that is considered an acoustic stringed instrument or even an electric stringed instrument that was or still is designed and produced here.”

For more information about the second Kalamazoo Fretboard Festival, contact Gavan at (269) 373-7990 or jgavan@kvcc.edu.

Sign up for wellness screeningsA representative of Holtyn and Associates will be conducting free, confidential

wellness screenings from through April 13 for full-time KVCC employees and their spouses who are both new to the college’s program or continuing participants.

The one-on-one appointments with Linda Howard will include a glucose analysis, an HDL and cholesterol evaluation, a blood-pressure check, a body-composition reading, an assessment of cardio-respiratory fitness, an overall health survey, an individual fitness assessment, and a personal consultation.

With the Anna Whitten Hall phase now completed, all future screenings will be held in Room 6044 in the Student Commons on the Texas Township Campus.

Here’s the remaining schedule: Tuesday (March 20); Wednesday (March 21); Thursday (March 22); Monday, March 26; Wednesday, March 28; Thursday, March 29; Monday, April 9; Tuesday, April 10; Wednesday, April 11; Thursday, April 12; and Friday, April 13 -- from 9 a.m. to 2:40 p.m. (None available from noon to 1.) Monday (March 19) and Tuesday, March 27 from 1 to 6:40 p.m.

For more information and to schedule an appointment, call Teresa Fornoff between 8 a.m. and noon Monday through Friday at extension 4492; or call Jim Turcott at 4113, or Blake Glass at 4177 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. during the week.

All full-time staff, faculty and administrators – and their spouses -- are encouraged to sign up for this college-sponsored program, even if previous screenings had not identified any health risks.

Participants should wear comfortable, loosely fitting clothing. Short-sleeve tops are recommended. Fasting is not required, but it is advised not to consume caffeinated beverages two hours prior to the assessment and to refrain from smoking.

The testing is paid for by the college.“All participants must complete a health survey prior to their screening

appointment.” Turcott said. “This step is taken each year and is essential to the overall program as well as your individual wellness profile.”

KVCC’ers can access the survey by going to the Holtyn website, http://www.holtyn.com and following the step-by-step instructions.

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“If this approach does not work well for you,” Turcott said, “please come to my office 15 minutes prior to your appointment time and complete the health survey. A computer will be available in my office to help facilitate this process.”

“Our employee-wellness program achieved a 70-percent participation rate during the fall semester,” he said. “Our challenge is to consolidate our successes and continue to grow the program that has been a great resource in helping the college to control health-care costs as it enhances personal wellness.”

As in the past, spouses of full-time employees can make arrangements to use the college’s fitness center in the Student Commons. The cost is half of an in-district, one-credit class, or $30.50. There are several steps to take, including procuring an identification card to gain access to the center, if the spouse has not used the center before.

● Gain admittance to the college via online, mail, fax or in person.● Contact the KVCC Office for Human Resources at 488-4228 about the spouse’s

intentions to use the center. The office will authorize the spouse to register for the one-credit course. This registration must be done in person at either the Texas Township or the Arcadia Commons campus

● The fee can be paid in person at either campus or via credit card over the web.● Get a KVCC identification card at the Student Service Center at either campus.

The spouse must present another photo ID or a driver’s license.

Do us all a favor – wash your handsAs the nation girds up for a potential influenza pandemic that some feel is on the

horizon, pro-action looms as a better antidote than re-action, according to KVCC safety coordinator Amy Louallen.

She suggests that KVCC personnel tap into the following website for the latest in news, plans and information: http://home.kvcc.edu/hrmain/Safety/Safety%20Page/PandemicPlanning.htm

Louallen and a college committee are “making some headway as far as networking with state and local organizations and ‘preparing,’” she said. “My main focus right now is how I can ramp up prevention, mainly by hand hygiene and hand washing.”

Washing one’s hands is the simplest way to incase your body in a hygienic suit of armor.

It requires minimal training and no special equipment. Soap and warm water or an alcohol-based hand sanitizer - a cleanser that doesn't require water – will do the job. Antimicrobial wipes or towelettes are just as effective

Despite the proven health benefits of hand washing, many people don't practice this habit as often as they should - even after visiting the bathroom.

Throughout the day people accumulate germs on their hands from a variety of sources, such as direct contact with people, contaminated surfaces, foods, even animals and animal waste.

“If you don't wash your hands frequently enough,” Louallen said, “you can infect yourself with these germs by touching your eyes, nose or mouth. And you can spread these germs to others by touching them or by touching surfaces that they also touch, such as doorknobs.”

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Infectious diseases commonly spread through hand-to-hand contact include the common cold, flu and several gastrointestinal disorders, such as infectious diarrhea.

“While most people will get over a cold,” she said, “the flu is much more serious. Some people with the flu, particularly older adults and people with chronic medical problems, can develop pneumonia. The combination of the flu and pneumonia, in fact, is the seventh leading cause of death among Americans.”Inadequate hand hygiene also contributes to food-related illnesses, such as salmonella and E. coli infection.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as many as 76 million Americans contract a food-borne illness each year. Of these, about 5,000 die as a result of their illness. Others experience the annoying symptoms of nausea, vomiting and diarrhea.

‘Sunday Series’ examines 19th century Kalamazoo “Economic Development in 19th Century Kalamazoo” is the “Sunday Series”

installment on March 18 at the Kalamazoo Valley Museum.Curator Tom Dietz will provide a historical overview of the myriad of industrial

enterprises that helped the village of Kalamazoo prosper from its founding to the dawn of the 1900s.

Businesses were established, rose, fell and were reborn in other modalities to make the Kalamazoo area an economic force and industrial center for Southwest Michigan.

The slide-enhanced presentation will begin at 1:30 p.m. in the Mary Jane Stryker Theater. There is no admission charge.

Dietz will examine the industries and business leaders who contributed to the transformation of Kalamazoo, from a pioneer outpost and land office in the mid-1830s to an urbanized industrial center in the mid-1880s, and then, spurred by such entrepreneurs as Dr. William E. Upjohn and “Mint King” A. M. Todd, into a place that produced goods that made Kalamazoo a recognizable name in the global market.

“When frontier areas like Southwest Michigan were settled in the early 19th century,” Dietz said, “there is an image of a self-sufficient, homesteading farmer as the typical pioneer, carving out a living for his family. There is much truth to this image, but it is often incomplete and Kalamazoo was no exception.

“Just as the town founder, Titus Bronson, bought land in 1829 and platted his village as a business venture,” Dietz said, “so, too, did the first residents of Kalamazoo focus on commerce and manufacturing even as others cleared the land for agriculture.”

Kalamazoo emerged as the commercial center of the region, supplying manufactured goods to farmers while processing and shipping farm products to eastern markets.

Within 20 years of Bronson's claim shack near Arcadia Creek, town leaders were urging the development of businesses ranging from beet-sugar refineries to paper mills.

“By the early 1850s,” Dietz said, “J. P. Woodbury and Allen Potter were operating the largest bog-iron foundry in Michigan and laying the basis for a metalworking industry.

Within another 25 years, Kalamazoo products would be shipped around the world. Carriages and carts, agricultural implements, and windmills were among the items

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turned out in the factories and workshops of Kalamazoo in the decades after the Civil War.”

Dietz will trace how, by the end of the century, Kalamazoo was on its way to becoming “The Paper City," leaving in its wake a designation as “The Windmill City" and a reputation that could have earned the name of “The Carriage City.”

These industrial eras set the stage and provided a vital economic base from which The Upjohn Co. and the A. M. Todd Co. would travel to a new level.

Upcoming “Sunday Series” topics are: ● “Play Ball! Baseball in Kalamazoo” on April 1.● “The Kalamazoo River and the Settlement of Kalamazoo” on April 22.● “Horse Racing and Race Horses in Kalamazoo” on May 6.For more information, contact Dietz at extension 7984.

A look at RussiaA remnant country from the former Soviet Union is next in the winter-semester

itinerary of the KVCC International Studies Program’s series of presentations.Free and open to the public, the series continues on Monday (March 19) at 3:30

p.m. in room 4380 on the Texas Township Campus, when Theo Sypris, director of the program, will talk about what he saw and perceived on a recent visit to Russia.

Among the destinations in April will be Ecuador, South Africa, The Czech Republic, and Afghanistan.

International-education meet attracts 9 from KVCCNine KVCC faculty members will be taking part in the Midwest Institute for

International/Intercultural Education’s yearly gathering on April 13-14 on the campus of Kirkwood Community College in Marion, Iowa.

Attending the institute’s 14th annual conference that weekend are Michael Keller, Fran Kubicek, Gloria Larrieu, Helen Palleschi, Linda Rzoska, Arleigh Smyrnios, J. P. Talwar, Jonnie Wilhite, and Theo Sypris, who is the director of the KVCC-based institute.

Sessions will explore how to infuse such issues as the global environment, Russia, global dimensions, the Chinese visual arts and music, global ethics and human rights, transcultural health care, international trade and finance, foreign languages, the socio-cultural aspects of Africa and Latin America, and religion and ethics into a variety of courses and curriculums.

Presenters will also discuss Chinese-United States relations on security and trade, how to organize overseas study experiences for students and faculty, how to internationalize math and science courses, global service-learning projects, and the good, the bad and the ugly of globalizing the campus environment

Surf’s up at the museumAn award-winning Norwegian movie about searching for the perfect wave to surf

and with a real storyline is the next billing in the Kalamazoo Valley Museum’s movie series in the Mary Jane Stryker Theater.

“Monster Thursday,” produced in Norway in 2004), is the attraction on March 31-April 1.

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Through spring, the museum is showing classic motion pictures, legendary silent films, movies targeted for family audiences, and five-star, independent productions from the international scene.

They are shown on weekends in the Stryker Theater. Tickets are $3. The Hollywood classics, the silents, and the independent productions are booked

for Saturdays at 7 p.m. and Sundays at 3 p.m. The matinees for families are set for 1 p.m. on Saturdays. “Monster Thursday” is about a hot-shot “hang-10’er” searching for the perfect wave while stuck in the middle of a love triangle. It was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize in World Cinema-Dramatic at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival, and was an official selection at the Bergen Film Festival, Cleveland International Film Festival and the Iceland International Film Festival

The storyline goes like this:"Even" leads a directionless life. "Tord," his best friend, is the opposite. He’s a

great surfer with a prestigious job and beautiful "Karen" as his bride. When Tord asks Even to look after Karen while he is out of town, Even decides to clean up his act and master the waves to impress her. At first he's a prime candidate for drowning, but a local surfing legend becomes his mentor, and Even, Tord and Karen end up on a collision course with the monster wave. : Here are the Stryker Theater attractions through spring:

♦ “Faust” (Germany, 1926) – April 14-15.♦ “A Hard Day’s Night” (1964) – April 21-22.♦ “Be With Me” (Singapore, 2005) – April 28-29.♦ “The Graduate” (1967) – May 5-6.♦ “Something Like Happiness” (The Czech Republic, 2006) – May 26-27.A special event is slated for Saturday, April 7, when the musical group Blue

Dahlia performs its original score as part of a pair of showings of Buster Keaton’s silent 1924 comedy, “The Navigator.” The showings are set for 1 and 4 p.m.

Continuing its recent programming initiative of showing award-winning documentaries, the museum has scheduled HBO’s “Band of Brothers” and the equally honored PBS series, “New York City.”

The 10-episode “Band of Brothers” is the attraction on Sundays at 1:30 p.m. through May 27. “New York City,” the story of “The City That Never Sleeps” from the early 1600s through the dawning of the new millennium, is booked for the Stryker Theater on Saturdays at 4 p.m. through May 26. There is no admission charge.

How to write a screenplaySo you think you are a budding Oliver Stone, Robert Altman, Billy Bob

Thornton, Matt Damon or Ben Affleck?You can learn if you have what it takes to be a future Academy Award winner for

your way with words like these five by signing up for “Screenwriting for Motion Pictures: Understanding the Art of Writing for Film.”

The six-week course runs on consecutive Thursdays from April 12 through May 17 from 6 to 9:30 p.m. in Room 128 of Anna Whitten Hall on the Arcadia Commons Campus.

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The fee for the instructions, to be provided by professional screenwriter Dick Eichhorst, is $86.

The magic of motion-picture film aside, what makes “Rocky” an Oscar-winning movie is its story and the crafting of the words needed to tell that story. This course, designed for the both those interested in personal enrichment and for those with an eye on a career in the profession, will focus on the components needed for producing an effective screenplay.

Eichhorst, wit experience as a producer, director, actor, cinematographer, and film editor, has been involved in both commercial motion pictures and independent video projects in the United States, Great Britain, Israel and Africa. He is the founder and former president of Cumberland Media Ministries that specializes in the production of promotional videos for nonprofits.

The instructor will cover the essential principles for a screenplay, forms of drama, the philosophies of writing, and techniques for developing a professional manuscript.

“This is not a cinema-appreciation course,” said KVCC training coordinator Ron Campbell, who is based at the Arcadia Commons Campus in downtown Kalamazoo. “It focuses on the importance of screenplay structure – the elements of the craft, dramatic forms, openings, what is called ‘point of attack’ in the profession, and endings.”

A solid screenplay develops incidents that incite, a premise, hero/heroine, conflict, subplot and other elements. While not a move-appreciation course, several films will be analyzed and discussed in the course to serve as examples and to prove certain principles..

For more information or to register, call (269) 373-7800.Combine this with the learn-how-to-play-the-piano-in-one-day course slated for

Anna Whitten Hall for Tuesday, March 27, and who knows – there might be a Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Alan Lerner, Cole Porter or Johnny Mercer in our midst.

Are you a latent Liberace, a prospective ‘piano man?’Like teaching a person how to fish will feed him/her for a lifetime, learning to

play the piano can provide personal entertainment ‘til death do us part.While intensive piano lessons over a long period of time are the key to a

professional concert career, it doesn’t take all that much to learn how to play for purely personal enjoyment and entertainment.

KVCC is offering a one-evening workshop to unlock a person’s latent musical talent enough to play something more than “Chopsticks.”

The “Instant Piano” system, which was featured in a PBS television special, “Piano in a Flash,” will be used in the three-hour-plus session that is scheduled for Tuesday, March 27, from 6 to 9:30 p.m. in Anna Whitten Hall’s Room 128. The fee, which includes a self-study CD and instructional textbook, is $89.

Enrollees will learn all the chords needed to play almost any contemporary song. Robert Laughlin, the creator of “Instant Piano,” will be the instructor.

“While most piano teachers stress precision and discipline in playing,” said Laughlin, who lives in Chico, Calif., “ I stress having fun. And while precision is vital for classical music, my method is most suitable for playing pop music of all kinds.”

Enrollees need only a bare minimum of musical background as they learn how to use chords instead of the traditional note-for-note music reading.

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“They will learn to use sheet music in a completely new and simple way,” Laughlin said. “They’ll discover many of the magical shortcuts that the pros use to enhance their playing.”

He promises that, after the three-hour workshop, each student will be able to play any pop tune with both hands.

Call (269) 373-7802 to register for his “Instant Piano for Hopelessly Busy People.”

You really can’t throw anything awayAs thoughts of spring cleaning and de-winterizing the garage start to enter one’s

cranium, ponder these considerations: Throwing away a single aluminum can, versus recycling it, is

like pouring out six ounces of gasoline. Last year, Americans recycledenough aluminum cans to conserve the energy equivalent of more than15million barrels of oil.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that 75 percent of what Americans throw in the trash could actually be recycled. Currently, only 25 percent is.

Incinerating 10,000 tons of waste creates one job; landfilling10,000 tons of waste creates six jobs; recycling 10,000 tons of wastecreates 36 jobs. The national recycling rate of 30 percent saves the equivalentof more than five billion gallons of gasoline, reducing dependence onforeign oil by 114 million barrels. This could be even higher.

The aluminum can is 100-percent recyclable and can be used tomake new beverage cans indefinitely - demonstrating recycling at isfinest. "Every can, every time!"

According to the EPA, recycling, including composting, diverted68 million tons of material away from landfills and incinerators in2001, up from 34 million tons in 1990.

Recycling 35 percent of a home’s trash reduces global-warmingemissions equivalent to taking 36 million cars of the road.

Every Sunday 500,000 trees could be saved if everyone recycledtheir newspapers.

Think recycling is expensive? Consider this: aluminum cans are the most valuable item in your bin. Aluminum-can recycling helps fund the entire curbside collection. It's the only packaging material that more than covers the cost of collection and re-processing for itself.

‘He took a hundred pounds of clay. . .’A clay workshop featuring Mark Williams, owner of Blue Star Pottery near South

Haven, is scheduled for Wednesday, April 4, in the KVCC ceramics lab on the Texas Township Campus.

The Valley Student Artist Group is sponsoring the session that will run from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.

“Mark is well known for his beautiful, functional, handmade stoneware including platters, casseroles, bowls, and vases,” says Brenda Terburg-Fawley, a part-time

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ceramics instructor at KVCC. “His leaf and other natural patterns adorn strong, beautiful pieces of pottery in shades of brown, blue and green. His work has elegant textured designs, which he creates by uniquely combining the pottery techniques of textured slab and throwing on the pottery wheel.”

Part of the workshop will include watching Williams, a member of Blue Coast Artists, as he creates an original work of art.

His clay creations can be viewed at www.bluecoastartists.com.For more information or to reserve a spot in the workshop, call 488-4373.

Blood-drive resultsSome 71 prospective donors stepped forward for last week’s blood clinic staged

in the Student Commons Theater and sponsored by the college’s Phi Theta Kappa chapter.

The Kalamazoo County Chapter of the American Red Cross reported that the driven netted 57 pints of usable blood.

And finally. . . There are moments when a person’s patience is pushed to the

limit. Here are just a few of those moments:

There’s always a car riding your tail when you’re slowing down to find an address. You open a can of soup and the lid falls in.

There’s a dog in the neighborhood that barks at EVERYTHING. You can never put anything back in a box the way it came out. You slice your tongue licking an envelope. You realize that after hours of assembly, there is one part missing. Your tire gauge lets out half the air while you’re trying to get a reading. You wash a garment with a tissue in the pocket and your entire load comes out covered with lint. The driver behind you blasts his car’s horn because you let a pedestrian finish crossing. A piece of foil candy- wrapper makes electrical contact with your filling. You set the alarm on your digital clock for 7 p.m. instead of 7 a.m. People behind you in a supermarket line dash ahead of you to a counter just opening up. You can’t look up the correct spelling of a word in the dictionary because you don’t know how to spell it. You have to inform five different sales people in the same store that you’re just browsing. You had that pen in your hand only a second ago and now you can’t find it.

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☻☻☻☻☻☻

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