Category: Spring 2024

Distinctive Hope: Blue-Chip Experience

Members of the men’s and women’s basketball teams represented Hope at the epicenter of the business world on Wednesday, Dec. 27, with a once-in-a-lifetime chance to ring the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange. They were joined for the iconic opportunity by head coaches Greg Mitchell ’89 and Brian Morehouse ’91, and President… Continue Reading →

From the President: Matthew A. Scogin ʼ02

Dear Friends and Family of Hope College, Why does Hope College exist? It may sound like an obvious question, but it is one worth revisiting from time to time. From the college’s inception, our founders believed this institution was called by God to be a beacon of HOPE for the world. Starting a tiny new… Continue Reading →

Quote Unquote: Civil Rights Lecture 2024

This year’s Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Civil Rights Lecture not only commemorated the revered leader but also highlighted an institutional milestone, launching the year-long 40th anniversary celebration of the college’s Center for Diversity and Inclusion. CDI traces its origins to 1984, when Alfredo Gonzales ’75, director of the college’s TRIO Upward Bound program for… Continue Reading →

Campus Scene

ORIGINAL PRODUCTION RECEIVES SPECIAL RECOGNITION The Department of Theatre was invited to perform the original production The Boy Who Hates Everything during the Region III Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival (KCACTF), hosted by the University of Michigan-Flint on Tuesday-Sunday, Jan. 9-14. The Boy Who Hates Everything during the Region III Kennedy Center American College… Continue Reading →

Building the Beloved Community

A community might be imagined as a mosaic — each part distinctive, yet existing in relation with others to create something more. But what does that mosaic become? For 25 years, the Phelps Scholars Program has helped students not only shape the “what” during their time at the college but develop an understanding of “how”… Continue Reading →

A Phelps Scholar Forevermore

Good morning, everyone! My name is Kylea Canada, and I am a senior here at Hope and a proud Phelps Scholar alumni. I began my freshman year at Hope College at a time that was inconvenient, to say the least. I started in August 2020. As if the first year of college isn’t daunting enough,… Continue Reading →

Faithful & Excellent

Before Dr. Stacy Jackson shifted his roles in business and higher education into specifically Christian higher education more than 20 years ago, he had a particular, memorable conversation with his wife. “I’m mad,” he told her. “It’s not okay that you can get an average economics and business education at a faithful school, but to… Continue Reading →

Anchors of Hope

The words penned by the Rev. Albertus C. Van Raalte when establishing the Pioneer School from which Hope grew are among the college’s most foundational: education as an “anchor of hope” for the future. Through all the decades since, that promise has been shepherded by generations of faculty mentors who have not only been at… Continue Reading →

ICYMI (In Case You Missed It)

Kirk Cousins @KirkCousins8“Two students stopped me after my PT session @ Hope…told me they’d getextra credit if I showed up to the class so I had to stop by. Professor Gentile, thanks for having me, but now I’m holding you to that extra credit!” “Attending Hope was one of the best opportunities my daughter has… Continue Reading →

A Winter Season of Joy

In March, junior swimmer Greta Gidley led the Flying Dutch’s charge to a 15th-place finish at the NCAA Division III Championships in Greensboro, N.C., and a fourth consecutive MIAA title at the Holland Aquatic Center in February. Gidley, the MIAA’s Most Valuable Women’s Swimmer, placed second in the nation in the 200-yard individual medley for… Continue Reading →

Delving Deep into Zebrafish Brains for Clues about the Sense of Smell and Adaptation to Climate Change

To Dr. Erika Calvo-Ochoa, science is about storytelling. Diminutive zebrafish, with their perpetually surprised expressions and uncannily keen sense of smell, are her striped protagonists. Small though they are, it’s their even tinier neurons that are the focus in Calvo-Ochoa’s laboratory. With student researchers, the molecular neuroscientist is studying olfaction and neural recovery in this… Continue Reading →

A Duet of Music and Computer Programming Brings a Concerto, and a Dream, to Life

Dr. Matt DeJongh laps up languages: computer, verbal, musical. So when it came time to begin his 2022–2023 sabbatical research project, there were many directions he could’ve taken. There was, however, one especially compelling aspiration DeJongh believed a computer could make a reality if it were programmed just right. “My project stems from a very… Continue Reading →

The Gift of Creation

Unless you’re plugged into the French intellectual and philosophical scene, you’ve almost certainly never heard of Fabrice Hadjadj. One Hope College professor is working to change that. Hadjadj (b. 1971) is a contemporary philosopher and writer, and “a rising star in the French Catholic intellectual firmament,” says Dr. Joshua Kraut, associate professor of French in… Continue Reading →

2023 Hope College Faculty Books

Writing Imperial History: Tacitus from Agricola to Annales Dr. Bram ten Berge, Associate Professor of Classics The late first- and early second-century Roman senator and historian Tacitus produced a collection of works widely recognized as offering the most authoritative account of Rome’s early imperial history. Tracing many of the enduring themes and concerns that Tacitus… Continue Reading →

From Apathy to All-in

In some ways, I’m a model of Orange and Blue: I’m an alumnus (’88), married to an alumna (’87); we’re parents of two Hope graduates; and I’ve worked at the college for 35 years, currently as director of process and innovation. Hope College has been a large part of my life, and I’m enthusiastically better… Continue Reading →

Journeys through Hope: History and Memoir

Barbara Walvoord ’63 It was 1962. My Hope College Old Testament professor, the Rev. Dr. Simon DeVries, had asked me to come into his office. Yikes! Had I done something wrong? I loved the class, had gotten A’s on tests and papers, and had eagerly searched out extra reading. Daughter and granddaughter of Reformed Church… Continue Reading →