Eastern Mennonite University

Rachel Brenneman earned the Peer Tutor of the Year Award. She was recognized for "combining the qualities of excellent technical skills, helping students with the structure and mechanics of writing, as well as excellent perceptions of what students want to say and how to say it better, and all the while she honors tremendous vulnerability that students can feel when they come for writing consultations," according to Steve Yoder, coordinator of academic success.

Ten graduating seniors are the 2021 Cords of Distinction recipients. They will receive blue and gold cords signifying their achievement to wear with other academic regalia to the Cords of Distinction ceremony and during the 2021 Commencement Walk.

Five education students from Eastern Mennonite University (EMU) were chosen to attend the 2021 Teachers of Promise Institute, which was held virtually on March 20. The annual event provides professional development, mentor discussions, and networking opportunities for 100 of the best and brightest pre-service teachers in Virginia.

Eastern Mennonite University is pleased to recognize 336 students who were named to the Fall 2020 Dean's List. The Dean's List, compiled at the end of each term, includes degree-seeking students who achieve a semester GPA of at least 3.75 with no withdrawn, incomplete, or failing grades for 12 semester hours of standard grades.

More than 300 EMU students have participated in the Ministry Inquiry Program, a partnership of the student's respective Mennonite college, home and host congregations and conferences, and Mennonite Church USA. Students interested in ministry within other denominations are also supported by EMU.

The Eastern Mennonite University community gathered to celebrate student successes of the 2019 spring semester and special end-of-the-academic-year recognitions.

Graduate students in Eastern Mennonite University's Master of Arts in Counseling (MAC) program are gaining real-world experience - and providing needed counseling services at the Harrisonburg-Rockingham Free Clinic in Harrisonburg. The community placements are part of EMU's Expansion of Counseling in Underserved and Rural Areas (ECURA) program. It is funded by a $1.2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that aims to increase behavioral health treatment and counseling to underserved populations in the Shenandoah Valley region of western Virginia and beyond.

Two EMU students, Christy Kauffman and Riley Swartzendruber, will be climbing and documenting the Kilimanjaro trek of family, friends, and others moved by the life and sacrifice of murdered United Nations ared group expert and peacebuilder Michael J. Sharp '05. The March 4-15, 2019, expedition will raise funds for the Michael J. Sharp Endowed Peace and Justice Scholarship at Eastern Mennonite University, his alma mater. Trekkers each hope to raise $10,000 for the scholarship. The scholarship, started by friends and family shortly after Sharp's death, is currently supporting its first recipient. David M. Nyiringabo, a peacebuilder in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), began studies this fall in the two-year MA in Conflict Transformation program at EMU's Center for Justice and Peacebuilding (CJP). The scholarship is specially designated to support Congolese peacebuilders.

EMU senior Grant Amoateng (Bristow, Va./Patriot) has earned his first trip to the NCAA Indoor Track & Field Championships. Amoateng heads to the national meet in the triple jump after already being a two-time participant in the national outdoor meet. The championships are this Friday and Saturday at the Reggie Lewis Track and Athletic Center in Boston, Massachusetts, with the University of Massachusetts, Boston serving as host. He also earned a spot on the All-South/Southeast Region Team, as named by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA). It was his third time earning All-Region for indoor triple jump. Amoateng is also a two-time All-Region honoree for outdoor triple jump and has an additional All-Region medal from indoor long jump in 2018. To be named All-Region, an athlete must be ranked in the top-5 of an individual event in the region according to the final TFRRS data.

Eight Center for Justice and Peacebuilding graduate students collaborated to plan and lead an arts-based peacebuilding workshop for local refugee and immigrant students last weekend. More than 30 students from Harrisonburg High School's Peer Leaders club participated. The club, which offers support, activities and fellowship to students transitioning into a new culture, is a collaborative effort between EMU, James Madison University and Church World Service. Drumming, drama, writing and art activities helped students learn more about and express themselves, preparing them to be change agents in their school and community context, said Kajungu Mturi, a 2018 CJP alumnus who had helped to facilitate the afterschool club since it began three years ago.

Students were recognized for fall semester achievements and accomplishments during a special gathering in Lehman Auditorium.

Eastern Mennonite University's nursing program held a white coat ceremony for its newest class of nursing students. Students participate in this ceremony at the beginning of their first semester in the clinical level of the nursing program. Each ceremony includes the sharing of the Hippocratic Oath and the acknowledgement and understanding of EMU's Sacred Covenant model for nursing. By taking the oath before clinical healthcare training begins, students - and the community that supports them - formally acknowledge their entry into the service of new professional responsibilities and ethical concerns.

Luella Kaufman Glanzer, a 2006 graduate of Eastern Mennonite University and a current graduate student in the MSN program, was recognized by the Virginia Nursing Association in an annual award spotlighting 40 exceptional rising nursing leaders under age 40. Since 2017, Glanzer has been UVA Health System's first nursing retention program coordinator.

Twelve Eastern Mennonite University seniors presented their research at the 2018 Virginia Association for Psychological Science annual convention. Original research projects is an added strength of the psychology program at EMU an opportunity for students to conduct individual research on a topic related to their unique interests.

Seniors Dan Lutz (Greencastle, Pa./Greencastle-Antrim) and Emily Augsburger (Lancaster, Pa./Lancaster Mennonite) were awarded the President's Awards, the highest athletic award presented by Eastern Mennonite University.

Second-year master's degree candidates in the conflict transformation and restorative justiceprograms at Eastern Mennonite University's Center for Justice and Peacebuilding are required to fulfill a practicum or research project.

More than 130 students were honored during Eastern Mennonite University's spring recognition chapel for leadership and contribution to the community in athletics and academics, student government, residence life, campus ministries and more.

Alexa Weeks, senior education major at Eastern Mennonite University, reflects on her student-teaching experience. After graduation, Weeks has accepted a third grade lead teaching position at Smithland Elementary School in Harrisonburg, Virginia.

Thirty-three seniors and graduate students participated in Wednesday's Donning of the Kente ceremony at Eastern Mennonite University. Each graduate received a special stole of their choice, symbolizing their heritage and roots, to wear at the May 6 Commencement ceremony. The wearing of stoles is a special tradition at EMU and the formal presentation of these stoles celebrates the accomplishments of graduating students of color as well as the history of black students' and students of color achievements at the university.

Eastern Mennonite Seminary students present Master of Divinity (MDiv) capstone projects that touch on both the personal formation experienced within the students' seminary journeys, and the transformation they hope to bring about as leaders in ministry. The capstone requirement helps seminarians synthesize and integrate into their unique ministry setting the four guiding curricular principles that have formed the rich foundation of their learning: wise interpretation, mature practice, discerning communication and transformational leadership.

Three students from EMU Lancaster's RN-BS in Nursing program were selected to present their research at the annual Wellspan Health Collaborative Evidence-Based Practice and Nursing Research Conference April 19, 2018, in York, Pa.

Eastern Mennonite University students won the annual Kryptos cryptoanalysis competition hosted since 2011 by the mathematics department at Central Washington University in Ellensburg and sponsored by the Pacific Northwest Section of the Mathematical Association of America. Only four teams solved all three puzzles within the five-day contest window, with EMU's winning trio submitting correct answers first and in less than 20 hours.

Students competed in the C. Henry Smith Oratorical Contest at Eastern Mennonite University, an annual contest, established in 1974 by the directors of the C. Henry Smith Trust. The contest offers students an opportunity to discuss the application of the Christian peace position to contemporary concerns in an 8-10-minute speech. The winner of the school contest will go on to compete at the bi-national level against winners from other Mennonite-related colleges in the US and Canada.

Ten graduating seniors will be honored as Cords of Distinction recipients in a ceremony Saturday afternoon, May 5. They will wear gold and blue cords during the graduation ceremony on Sunday, May 6, as recognition for their significant and verifiable impact on the university and on student life; for their contributions to developing the institution's positive image; for substantial contributions to the Harrisonburg/Rockingham County area and beyond; for their high academic and social standing; and their embodiment of EMU's shared values of Christian discipleship, community, service and peacebuilding.

Eastern Mennonite University biomedicine graduate students presented and defended theses in December 2017.

Four Eastern Mennonite University students received second-place in the pitch contest at the Nov. 2-4, 2017, convention of Mennonite Economic Development Associates (MEDA). The EMU team took second place with "Better Health, Better Wealth," a proposal to train Liberian community members to address mental health concerns using methods based on the "direct connection" of mental health to agricultural output in rural Africa.

Lebanese native Myriam Aziz MA '17 returns to Eastern Mennonite University as a teaching fellow at the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding. She has significant work experience with Syrian refugees, some of whom are featured in a documentary she produced with funding from CJP's Arts in Peacebuilding grant program.

Sabrina L. Burress, a graduate student in the MA in Counseling program at Eastern Mennonite University, is one of 30 students to be awarded an NBCC Minority Fellowship Program-Youth by the National Board for Certified Counselors Foundation.

When Gregory Winship begins teaching a new course of conflict transformation training at a minimum-security prison in Kansas, he will use his personal story and master's degree in restorative justice to implement a new vision of justice. The MA in Restorative Justice program of the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding is the first of its kind in North America.

Senior photography major Lila Marks presents "The Ignored," featuring 75 frescos of Hawaii's natural beauty and its homeless people. The exhibit runs from Oct. 2-6 in the Margaret Martin Gehman Gallery. An artist's talk and reception with light refreshments will take place at 6 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 6.