The Blue Jay Buffet

JHU Networks: The Strength of Alumni Connections

Name: Michelle Tellock

Graduation Year: 2007 (B.A., KSA&S)

Current Town: New Haven, Connecticut

Programs of Study: Cognitive Science & Sociology double major

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With the economy in not-so-fabulous shape and lots of Americans looking for work, one big piece of advice being repeated ad nauseum to recent graduates and career changers alike is something along the lines of “take advantage of your network!” While I’m lucky to be in the sheltered world of law school for another year and a half before braving the “real world” of paid legal work full-time, I’m happy to report that my relationships and connections with other JHU grads has helped me to build strong personal and professional networks that I can turn to at any time.

By getting involved in a bunch of different activities during my time at Hopkins (most notably, the Woodrow Wilson Debate Council, the Undergraduate Admissions office, and Residential Life), I was able to meet a lot of fellow students from really diverse backgrounds who had personal and career goals as varied as one can imagine. As we’re now graduated (or graduating soon!), my friends and I have spread far and wide across the globe: some are studying in England, others are working with the Peace Corps in Africa, and more still are just a train ride away as they continue their schooling or take jobs in Washington, DC, New York, or Boston. Everyone is doing such different things – working for think tanks, writing computer code, doing medical school clinical rotations – but we all have common experiences that bind us together.

When I lived in DC – a particularly popular post-graduation destination for Hopkins alums – I was always running into people I knew on the street, while riding Metro, or at galleries and sporting events. The JHU Office of Alumni Relations also sponsors a lot of events for DC-area alums to meet and mingle, such as happy hours and outdoor excursions. Those events were really great opportunities to see lots of familiar faces and also discover who was new to the city, when I hadn’t already seen the news on Facebook.

Now that I’m in law school relatively far away from Baltimore, I still find myself surrounded by Hopkins grads. Besides the two other former JHU students in law school with me, one of my Wolman Hall 4E floormates from freshman year is a student at the med school and we pass each other on the street all the time. Of course, I also try to convince my JHU friends to come visit me in New Haven (one of them even got engaged in a burrito joint just down the street!), and having friends in lots of different cities all across the country makes for fun and relatively inexpensive getaways. I’ve been to Chicago, New Orleans, Las Vegas, an Albuquerque to visit Hopkins friends, and others joke that I practically live in Boston with a group of other JHU grads.

As I’ve started to think seriously about what kind of job I might like after graduation from law school, the Hopkins network has again shown its strength. During my summer internship this year, I met some JHU graduates in Kansas City, Missouri, and one of them offered to help me find a permanent job there if I wanted to stay in the Midwest. Then, when I was interviewing for positions for next summer, a number of the attorneys I was meeting with happened to have graduated from Hopkins, too; almost every one of them told me they were surprised by just how much the Homewood campus has changed since their time in Baltimore. One law firm associate and I bonded over our shared love for the cream of crab soup at Gertrude’s, the restaurant in the Baltimore Museum of Art on campus. In fact, I’m happy to report that in just two short weeks I’ll be back on campus for the wedding of two of my friends…and I’m hoping a meal at Gertrude’s can squeeze into the schedule!

Being admitted to Hopkins and choosing to enroll provided me with four fabulous years on the Homewood campus. I feel truly blessed that my connections with Hopkins have continued to grow, even as my classmates and I have largely moved away from Baltimore in order to pursue our own goals. Having a strong alumni network has helped me to feel as though no matter where I go, I’ll have the support of my fellow Blue Jays!

*** If you enjoyed this alumni blog entry then we recommend you check out Michelle's other guest blog entries: Reflecting on the Application Process  and Greetings from Washington, D.C. -- and also her archived blog from her time as an undergraduate -- Not-Quite-Daily Ramblings.***

October at Hopkins

As fall weather comes upon Baltimore, so too does great recognition across all divisions of Johns Hopkins.  October brought the announcement of Hopkins’ newest Nobelist at the School of Medicine, a top-ranked women’s cross-country team, marking the 30th year of leading the country’s academic institutions in research and development, and great progress on the renovations of our beloved Gilman Hall at Homewood. 



NOBEL PRIZE AWARDED TO HOPKINS PROFESSOR


Carol Greider was folding her laundry when she learned she had been named co-winner of a Nobel Prize and had 45 minutes to get ready for the official announcement. “My heart just really started racing at that time,” said Greider, the Daniel Nathans Professor and director of Molecular Biology and Genetics in the Johns Hopkins Institute for Basic Biomedical Sciences.

Greider, 48, one of the world’s pioneering researchers on the structure of chromosome ends known as telomeres, was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on Monday, Oct. 5.

The academy recognized her for the 1984 discovery of telomerase, an enzyme that maintains the length and integrity of chromosome ends and is critical for the health and survival of all living cells and organisms.

She became the 33rd person associated with Johns Hopkins University to win a Nobel Prize and the 20th at the School of Medicine to receive the honor.

WOMEN’S CROSS-COUNTRY TOP-RATED IN COACHES’ POLL

The Johns Hopkins women’s cross-country team has been ranked No. 1 in the Division III national poll, marking the first time any Johns Hopkins women’s team, in any sport, has had such an honor. 

“Rankings are just a few coaches’ opinions,” Van Allen says. “So whether we are ranked No. 1 or No. 2, we know that we’re one of the top three teams in the country. All that really matters is what we do Nov. 21 [at the Division III Cross-Country Nationals]. Right now, we are focused on what we need to do between now and then. Still, I think our women’s team should be proud of that No. 1 ranking and proud of what they accomplished up to this point in the season."

JHU: TOP RESEARCH INSTITUION 30 YEARS RUNNING

The Johns Hopkins University performed $1.68 billion in medical, science and engineering research in fiscal 2008, making it the leading U.S. academic institution in total research and development spending for the 30th year in a row, according to a new National Science Foundation ranking.

The university also once again ranked first on the NSF’s separate list of federally funded research and development, spending $1.42 billion in FY2008 on research supported by NSF, NASA, the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Defense.

In FY2002, Johns Hopkins became the first university to reach the $1 billion mark on either list, recording $1.14 billion in total research and $1.023 billion in federally sponsored research that year. To date, no other institution has reached that mark. The University of California, San Francisco, ranked second in R&D spending in FY2008 at $885 million. The University of Washington was second in federally financed R&D at $614 million.


NATIONAL CANCER CENTER GRANT


The National Cancer Institute has awarded $10.4 million to Johns Hopkins and the University of Southern California to decipher epigenetic marks in the cancer genome. The joint five-year grant is expected to help scientists develop drugs and tests that target epigenetic changes in cancer cells.

Scientists at Johns Hopkins and at USC’s Epigenome Center will focus on all major cancers, including those of the breast, colon and lung. The data will be collected as part of the Cancer Genome Atlas, a program funded by the NCI and National Human Genome Research Institute to develop a molecular map of alterations in cancer.


PHYSICS OF BEER

Mark Denny’s new book, titled Froth! The Science of Beer, published by the Johns Hopkins University Press considers the visual appeal of a beer.

“First impressions are important,” Denny writes, “and so commercial brewers have spent a lot of time and effort to ensure that their beer froths, foams, bubbles, effervesces, sparkles or fizzes in the most appealing manner.”

Accomplished home-brewer and physicist Denny hazards that many folks, not just “beer-ophiles,” contemplate their pints. He certainly does, and now he’s given armchair physicists and beer lovers something to sip on.

In Froth!, his fourth book for the JHU Press, Denny provides a scientifically sound and often witty investigation of the physics and chemistry of beer. He recounts and explains the history of and key technological advances in brewing, provides basic instructions for making your own and then looks at the physical phenomena contained within a pint of beer. Along the way he defines the main concepts and terms involved in the beer-making process and shows how you can subject the technical aspects of brewing to scientific analysis.

UPDATE: GILMAN HALL RENOVATIONS


Crews — with the indispensable assistance of a 200-foot, 350-ton crane — last week completed the steel grid frame for the 60-by-60-foot glass skylight that will top Gilman Hall’s new atrium space. Designed, fabricated and installed by Novum Structures, the skylight will feature 154 square glass panels and span the entire courtyard without intermediate support. The arched structure, a precisely engineered combination of compression members and tension cables, will be less than 10 inches thick. The glass panels and cables will be installed in the coming weeks to shut out the elements and allow work to continue in the atrium below. Gilman, the oldest academic building on the Homewood campus, is scheduled to reopen for the fall 2010 semester.

Read more about the Gilman Hall Renovation at http://krieger.jhu.edu/gilman

September at Hopkins

The beginning of the new semester came with the installation of our new university president, the selection of a new provost, awards and accolades for members of the community, and overall, as you might see, a very strong start to the 2009-2010 academic year.



PRESIDENT DANIELS' INSTALLATION WEEKEND

On Sunday, Sept.13, Johns Hopkins officially welcomed Daniels to its family as he was installed as the university’s 14th president. The formal ceremony, held in Shriver Hall on the Homewood campus, capped off a busy inauguration weekend jam-packed with events that allowed the university and Baltimore to be reintroduced to the man who took office on March 2. Friends and colleagues old and new dubbed Ronald J. Daniels a man of passion, a man of wisdom, a man of ideas, a man of compassion, a man of ideals and a man of boundless energy who brings results. Then, once depleted of superlatives, they all wished him well as he begins the challenge and adventure of a lifetime.


Also check out a highlights video of the weekend’s events




For more information:
 http://jhu.edu/index_share-microsite.html

NEW PROVOST ASSUMES OFFICE

Lloyd Minor assumed the office of provost on September 1, though he has been a member of the Johns Hopkins faculty for 16 years, most recently as director of the Department of Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery in the School of Medicine.  He said he is humbled and honored to serve as the university’s 13th provost and as senior vice president for academic affairs, and that he looks forward to forming a close working partnership with President Ron Daniels and collaborating with faculty and staff members all across the university. 

FUN WITH LEGOS

Johns Hopkins engineers are using LEGO toys to help them visualize the behavior of particles, cells and molecules in environments too small to see with the naked eye. These researchers are arranging little LEGO pieces shaped like pegs to re-create microscopic activity taking place inside lab-on-a-chip devices at a scale they can more easily observe. 

Learn more and see pictures and a video at:
 http://tinyurl.com/jhulegos

MSE SYMPOSIUM BEGINS WITH DR. BEN CARSON

Pediatric neurosurgeon Benjamin Carson began the university’s annual Milton S. Eisenhower Symposium Tuesday, Sept. 15, in Homewood’s Shriver Hall Auditorium, followed by a meet and greet and book signing.  Carson’s lecture was the first of six events making up this year’s symposium, A Transition Between Generations in a Changing America.

Established in 1967 to honor the university’s eighth president, the MSE Symposium is an undergraduate-run lecture series that brings to campus renowned speakers with a variety of perspectives on issues of national importance.

For more information: http://www.jhu.edu/mse/carson.html 



JHU POLITIK GOES ONLINE

Johns Hopkins’ only weekly-published political newspaper is entirely student-run and has been hugely successful in its first full year.  At the start of its second year on campus, JHU Politik has a completely redesigned website and layout, including online issues of each week’s publication.

To view past issues of JHU Politik and learn more about the publication, please visit this link: http://www.jhupolitik.com/

EMMY WIN FOR HOPKINS GRADUATE

Jeffrey Blitz, a graduate of the Writing Seminars, won the 2008-2009 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing in a Comedy Series for an episode of "The Office."  The episode, entitled “Stress Relief” was an hour-long special that showed after the 2009 Super Bowl. Further details and links to clips from the winning episode can be found here: http://alumni.jhu.edu/news/jeffblitz.

STIMULUS FUNDS FOR RESEARCH

The university has won more than 250 research grants, totaling $114 million, through provisions in the federal stimulus package designed to advance scientific and medical knowledge while jump-starting the U.S. economy

The grants will underwrite investigations ranging from what strategies best motivate drug addicts coming out of in-patient rehabilitation to enroll in sobriety support programs, to the role that certain proteins play in the development of muscle-wasting diseases such as muscular dystrophy.



Equally as important, however, the grants are generating jobs at Johns Hopkins and fueling regional economic activity, as employees spend their paychecks and Johns Hopkins laboratories hire personnel and buy supplies.

LASKER AWARDS

Two Johns Hopkins alumni received prestigious awards from the Lasker Foundation.
Michael Bloomberg, mayor of New York and former chair of the Johns Hopkins University board of trustees, received the Mary Woodard Lasker Award for public service. The honor recognized Bloomberg “for employing sound science in political decision making, setting a world standard for the public’s health as an impetus for government action, leading the way to reduce the scourge of tobacco use and advancing public health through enlightened philanthropy.”

Charles L. Sawyers, a graduate of the School of Medicine, was one of three recipients of the Lasker-DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award. The scientists were recognized for “the development of molecularly targeted treatments for chronic myeloid leukemia, converting a fatal cancer into a manageable chronic condition.”

First given in 1945, the Lasker Awards, often dubbed the “American Nobels,” are considered by many the nation’s most prestigious honor for basic and clinical medical research, and for public service.

More information is available at http://www.laskerfoundation.org/awards/2009_p_description.htm

A Tale of Many T-shirts

Name: Rena Barch

Year: 2009

Hometown: Hillsborough, NJ

Current Residence: Baltimore, MD

Programs of Study: International Studies and Economics

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After saying good-bye to all of my friends and coming to terms with leaving Hopkins, perhaps the hardest part of graduation was packing up. Last month I finally moved out of my senior year apartment, and doing so required going through a lot of stuff that has accrued over the years. Since I’m spending the next year in London getting my master’s degree, I had to go through it all and decide which of it I definitely was going to take with me and what would stay behind. In the process, I discovered that my bottom drawer became home to every free t-shirt I’ve received over my time at Hopkins. These shirts sort of tell the story of my college experiences.

One of the best tips you’ll learn as the leader of an organization is that if you offer free stuff you’re likely to drastically increase the attendance to your event. From your first day on campus, you will receive dozens of shirts: orientation t-shirts, Dorm Wars t-shirts, service day t-shirts, HOP (Hopkins Organization for Programming) tshirts....and so on. I actually got rid of most of my Orientation and Dorm Wars t-shirts, and still had a whole drawer filled with Hopkins t-shirts.

I suppose, then, the best place to start would be with my debate team t-shirts. I was member and later on the board of the Woodrow Wilson Debate Council, the parliamentary debate team on campus. It was one of the most incredible and rewarding experiences I’ve had in college. The debate team was my greatest source of support during my first years here. Seniors on the team helped me select classes and navigate the Hopkins system. You’ll see on the shirt to the left is the painted face of Woodrow Wilson, a Hopkins alumnus. We first made those t-shirts my sophomore year in an effort to raise some money. By my senior year, we upgraded to a more professional t-shirt for the team (to the right).

Some of the shirts are reminder of some of the more random blips of activities in which I’ve participated. For instance, the summer after my sophomore year, in a desperate attempt to find something to do near campus, I took a job working for Hopkins IT. Far from a computer science or electrical engineering major, I often felt out of place helping punch ethernet jacks in the dorm rooms. Still, I learned some really valuable skills, as well as learning a lot about networking and how to make my Hopkins internet work. As a part of the job, I worked on the SWAT team during orientation, which helps freshman set up their laptops for the Hopkins network and make sure that everyone will have access to the internet in their rooms. That was actually a great way to meet some of the new freshman. To this day, I still have people come up to me and say, “You fixed my computer once!” Needless to say, I never had to take my computer to IT again after that summer.

Other shirts are reminders of events that I helped put on. For instance, in my sophomore year,  I was the Chair of UNESCO at the Johns Hopkins University Model United Nations Conference, a conference for high school students. I was also on the board of Hopkins Engaged in my senior year. Hopkins Engaged was a political festival of sorts. We spent the summer bringing together speakers, NGOs, political activists, and musicians. The festival was intended to promote political discussion before the presidential election in November 2008. Unfortunately, Hopkins saw some of the worst rainstorms we’d had since I’ve been here. My roommates were practically flooded into our apartment. Because of the weather, we had to move the event in doors, and we did not get quite the turn out we had hoped for. Still, I made some great friends in the process, and it was great to be apart of such a great cause. While I won’t be around, hopefully Hopkins Engaged will make a strong comeback in 2010 for the next round of House elections.

Next, I discovered some t-shirts I’ve received from friends trying to advertise their events. I have many shirts from the HOP, but chose what I thought was the cutest one. The “Cancer Sucks” t-shirt was an advertisement for the Hopkins 4K, a group of student who bike across the country for sponsorship. Each rider must raise $4,000, so needless to say they are able to contribute quite a bit of donations to the American Cancer Society. Over the years, I’ve had a number of friends who participated in the event, and truly loved the experience.

One of my closest friends, Sam, was the station manager of the radio station in our junior and senior years while my boyfriend, Matt, was the technical director, so as you can imagine I have quite a few WJHU shirts. WJHU puts on a lot of cool events around campus, from dance parties to bringing music groups to campus. They also offer DJs for other student groups, so when sororities need DJs for date parties or StuCo would like some music for a BBQ on the beach, they often turn to WJHU. In my senior year, Sam put on what I thought was one of the coolest events to hit Hopkins. It was called the Six-Day Jam Session. For six days straight, there was music coming from the Mattin Center. It was the longest continuous jam session in history. The entire session was recorded and sent to the Guinness Book of World Records, so we should find out soon whether Hopkins was able to break the world record!

Just this summer, I’ve accrued a couple of new shirts. One was from my boss at Cafe Q, the coffee cart in the Milton S. Eisenhower Library. I first started working at Cafe Q mid-sophomore year to earn some money after I quit my IT gig. You can learn more about Cafe Q in my previous blog post.  My boss, who I’ve become pretty close with over the years as he’s helped my juggle my coursework with my hours at Cafe Q, just left to pursue a MFA in San Francisco. I had been bugging him for a couple of years to get us Cafe Q t-shirts with the slogan I had come up with, “We’re the Crema of the Crop.” This is a joke that only select coffee snobs would understand, but I was really proud of how clever it is. As a departing present, he finally made me the t-shirt I asked for.

There is a bit of a downfall to all of these shirts. While they make great gym shirts and night shirts, there are an awful lot of them and they take up a ton of space (the equivalent of about a small box). Yet, as I go through all of my stuff trying to throw stuff out, I can’t bring myself to part with my box of Hopkins t-shirts because they remind me of all the things I’ve done here, all the friends I’ve made, and the experiences I’ve had. That may be worth lugging this box with me wherever I go after London.

Summer 2009 at Hopkins

Between the departure of the JHU Class of 2009 at the end of May and the arrival of the JHU Class of 2012 at the end of August, a lot has take place at Johns Hopkins. Let's take a look back at the top headlines of the Summer of 2009. (Click on each headline for further details.)

FAREWELL TO THE CLASS OF 2009
Commencement 2009 was once again a memorable event for all involved. Thousands of Johns Hopkins students completed their journey as President Ronald Daniels offered his first university wide commencement address. Degrees and certificates were conferred on a record-high 6,776 JHU scholars as the 133rd academic year in Johns Hopkins University history came to an end.

Click here to check out a photo slideshow of the Commencement festivities and enjoy this short video re-cap:

 

END OF THE SPRING SPORTS SEASON
A tremendous year in Hopkins sports history came to an end, with four teams winning bids to spring NCAA tournaments.  Men's tennis, women's tennis, men's lacrosse and baseball all capped off  outstanding seasons with strong performances in their tournaments.  Women's tennis made it to the sweet sixteen, having gone on a 13-game win streak (a school record).  Men's tennis lost in the regional championship, ending their season with a record of 16-4.  The baseball team made it to the regional finals, and men's lacrosse made it to the quarterfinals; all of the teams gave us Blue Jays something to be very proud of.

 

ROADMAP TO GREENER JHU AND BEYOND
The Johns Hopkins Task Force on Climate Change has released to President Daniels its final report, a landmark document that includes a series of major recommendations, prominent among which is that the university reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 51 percent by the year 2025.  The report also calls on the university to expand focus on the student experience--allowing students opportunities to get involved.

To read the Task Force's full report or to learn more about other projects on campus and in the community, check out Hopkins Sustainability's website.  

 

UNDERWATER EXPLORATION

Louis Whitcomb, a Whiting School professor of mechanical engineering, played a key role recently in guiding an underwater vehicle to one of the coldest, darkest, most remote places on Earth. Details of his work were part of a Baltimore Sun feature, linked above.

STUDENTS EMBED STEM CELLS IN SUTURES TO ENHANCE HEALING

Johns Hopkins undergraduate biomedical engineering students demonstrate a practical way to embed a patient's own adult stem cells in the surgical thread that doctors use to repair serious orthopedic injuries such as ruptured tendons.

 

JOHNS HOPKINS SCIENTISTS PICKED FOR CANCER DREAM TEAMS

A TV industry- and celebrity-driven cancer research project has chosen scientists at Johns Hopkins for two of five multi-institutional "dream teams" financed by Stand Up to Cancer grants totaling more than $6 million.

 

LLOYD B. MINOR APPOINTED PROVOST AND SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT FOR ACADEMIC AFFAIRS  

Lloyd Minor is an exceptional scholar, clinician and scientist with an outstanding record in academic leadership. He brings to university leadership a driving passion to make Johns Hopkins stronger in all its crucial dimensions: research, education and service. His passion is surpassed only by his ability to build consensus and implement ambitious, strategic priorities that are characterized by an uncompromising commitment to academic excellence.

 

 

Tales From the Student Activities Office

Name: Jillian Rickerd

Department: Office of Student Activities

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Hello there!

My name is Jillian Rickerd and I work in the Office of Student Activities, which is the hub for all student involvement on campus!  Our office is located in the Mattin Center right next to the large statue we call Dookie. Sometimes we dress Dookie up, we think he likes it.

- Dookie at Halloween -

So like I said, I work in the Office of Student Activities.  I sometimes call it the fish bowl because I literally work in a glass box in the middle of the office.

 
- My Office: The giant fish bowl -

 
- This is me! -

Our office works with over 300 student groups on campus.  There are student groups for just about anything you can imagine.  To read more about our student groups click here. We help to manage the group’s finances, offer training, help to negotiate contracts and advise students on how to run successful events.

The Student Activities Fair:

My favorite activity and biggest responsibility is organizing the Student Activities Fair.  It is the only time of year that all of our student groups get together to try and recruit new members.  The fair takes place during the first week of school every year.

Even if you are not interested in joining a new group, it’s an awesome way to meet new people.  The best thing about being a freshman at Hopkins is that everyone wants to make new friends, new connections, and new memories.  Therefore, you don’t have to feel awkward about putting yourself out there to meet new people.  In my opinion, it’s the best time of year!

 

- This is me at the 2007 Student Activities Fair -

Hopkins 100:

For those of you who do want to get involved and join a group -- Great!  We love meeting students who are excited to get involved with the campus.  We offer lots of fun activities for our group leaders.  One of the perks to being a student leader is that you can participate in a huge camping trip at the beginning of the school year with all of the other student group presidents and leaders.  We call this retreat Hopkins 100.

At Hopkins 100 student leaders will have the opportunity to meet other student group leaders, and attend various workshops that they are interested in.  Some of the workshops include Event Planning, Group Goal Setting, and Leadership for You Career.

We have tons of fun activities like roasting marshmallows by the camp fire, ropes courses, volleyball, and so much more.  This year we had 115 leaders from various organizations attend, and we had a great time.

 

- Apparently I become one of those people who can never get their Power Point to match up with the screen! -

 

- Group Shot -

 

- Team building exercises -

 

- Campfire! -

So those are just some of the things that our office does every year.  Hopkins has an energy that is infectious and just makes you want to get involved.  There are so many events happening every day, it’s impossible not to get involved.  I tend to venture out of the office and participate in other activities around campus after work.

Greek Life:

The past 2 years I have helped assist in Sorority Recruitment.  I was in a sorority in college (Alpha Phi!).  Our campus has over 1,000 students involved in Greek Life.  We have 13 fraternities and 5 sororities.  This year I brought my dog Pugsley to recruitment to help out.  Below is a pic of me, my dog Pugsley and Sarah Lloyd who is the Assistant Director of Housing (she’s the one involved in helping you find a roommate!).

 

- Sorority Recruitment Sign-In 2009 (I'm on the left, Sarah on the right, and Pugsley in the middle) -

Fun with Buddhism:

This week I went to an event at the Interfaith Center (which is the hub for all religious activity on campus) and made dragon flies with Buddhist Monks.  There were people from all different religions at the event, and I even met someone from Houston (which is where I used to live).

 

- Buddhist Dragon Fly making 2009 -

 

- Dragon Fly! -

I also participated in a workshop last week called FiSH!  The workshop was apart of the Leadership Certification Initiative, which is a program at Hopkins that facilitates leadership workshops that can be applied to any career, and actually gives our students recognition for being leaders on campus.  To read more about LCI click here.

During this workshop we watched a video about the Seattle Fish Market, which is world famous for their high amount of energy and productivity.  We are interested in capturing that energy and bringing it back to our campus so that our students can apply it to their everyday life. You can read more about the FiSH program here.

Lacrosse:

This past week I went to the JHU Lacrosse game, and it was so much fun!  I went with my friends from Michigan and another friend from New Zealand.  Being a girl from the south, I have come to expect that football is everyone’s college sport of choice.  But lacrosse is so much better!  I highly recommend anyone who visits the university to check out a lacrosse game.  The energy at the games is amazing, and the JHU team is awesome!

 

- Lacrosse game ... This is "The Nest" which is the student section -

 

- Our fierce team! -

From Hopkins To Africa

Name: Brian Fisher 

 

Year: Class of 2008

 

Hometown: Evanston, IL

 

Current Residence: Port Elizabeth, South Africa

 

Programs of Study: Economics major, minor in Entrepreneurship and Management

 

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Sure, I had a great time at Hopkins: played soccer, met distinctive new friends, contributed to many on-campus organizations, obtained an awesome internship at Smith Barney Inc. through the Center for Leadership Education. But it was the freedom of course selection that ultimately aided me during my African endeavor with the NGO Grassroot Soccer, an organization that uses the power of soccer to fight HIV/AIDS.

My primary concern and annoyance in high school was all the required classes I had to take that will never be personally applicable in the future. At JHU I was essentially able to pick and choose all the classes that tickled my interests, and who would have guessed how relevant some have already proven to be during my year in South Africa!

It’s hard to believe it was almost a year ago when I was officially placed in Port Elizabeth with little to no job-specific training, yet I was  expected to run and  expand a multifaceted program that was still in its nascent stage. Needless to say, I was apprehensive, but as time went on I realized that the myriad of diverse courses I took in the CLE program more than adequately prepared me to thrive in an unpredictable and unfamiliar working environment.

Here are a few examples of courses that kept me level headed and allowed me to contribute from day one:

 

-- Principles of Marketing:
Upon my arrival, I had no idea that I was to lead the marketing campaign for our annual “Kick ‘N’ Test” Voluntary Counseling and Testing tournament (V.C.T.). As my coworkers had no experience in marketing, I used my knowledge from the Principles of Marketing course I took to create my own innovative marketing campaign for the tournament. Using all the mediums of dissemination available to me  (radio advertisement, publicity events, designing flyers & posters, forming partnerships with other local NGOs, and on event day even hiring a car with loud speakers attached to the roof blaring the vital information about the tournament), I successfully promulgated the HIV testing event. Over 1,000 participants took part in the event and 150 were tested.

--Small Business Management:
Being assigned to Port Elizabeth, where  the only management was the site director, meant that the majority of programmatic and operational decisions were made by my fellow interns and me. This responsibility was greatly compounded when the director unexpectedly left after only a few months. Fortunately, the tools I obtained in Small Business Managments allowed me to seamlessly continue running my school programs in my designated township of New Brighton and even expand by recruiting new primary schools. With my knowledge of  business plans and insight into identifying potential problems from class, I was also able to form and launch two comprehensive street soccer leagues with over 160 kids. Here is the link to the video I made about one of the leagues: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LriTjvqUXCk

--Financial Accounting: 
Although it’s not the most imaginative class, it proved very helpful when working with the Port Elizabeth financials that had to be submitted to Cape Town each month and in the creation of monthly budgets. Extensive practice with Excel made developing these spreadsheets a breeze and the class content even came in handy when designing quarterly progress reports for stakeholders.

--Business Communication:
Proper business etiquette was essential when creating the aforementioned progress reports and letters for stakeholders, as they don’t want to give their institution’s money to an unprofessional organization. With no real business experience of my own, I relied heavily on what I learned in my Business Communications class when it came time to writing program summary reports or making presentations for donors.

--Introduction to Digital Photography:
This class inspired me to purchase a nice SLR camera for Africa and allowed me to have some fun as the resident photographer for Port Elizabeth. The Photoshop skills that I attained were invaluable in helping me create the  V.C.T. T-shirt design and logo.


It was my passion for helping others and love of soccer that led me to the Grassroot Soccer cause; my education at JHU that prepared me and helped enable my programs to flourish; and lastly, it was the sanguine smiles on the kids’ faces that motivated me on a daily basis.

A Recent Hopkins Grad's Journey to Landing a Job in London

Name: Allie Schnidman

Year: Class of 2008

Hometown: Ridgefield, CT

Current Residence: London, England

Programs of Study: International studies major, minor in Business (Entrepreneurship and Management)

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It was sometime in my fall semester as a junior at Johns Hopkins when I realized that, while I loved International Studies (the major involves Politics, History, Economics and French – or any language you choose), my first job out of college would not be related to the field. I had taken numerous marketing courses and had decided in my freshmen year that I would be a Business minor (actually named “Entrepreneurship and Management”). Every summer I found an internship to learn the ins and outs of the Public Relations industry in New York City, and by my senior year, I knew I would apply for full-time jobs in the marketing industry.

Yet, it was actually in the spring semester of my senior year that I discovered a new passion. In Professor Leslie Kendrick’s “Advertising and Promotion” course, I signed up to try a new role in our Advertising firm, named “HopComm.” The class was broken up into teams for Public Relations, Event Planning, Advertising/Creative Design, Marketing Research and Finance, which all worked together on a marketing campaign for a real paying client – The Navy’s HPSP. Although, I already had experience in Public Relations and Event Planning, I decided to try something new and signed up as the Marketing Research Department Manager.

My role as the Marketing Research Department Manager of HopComm was a challenging one, but a truly valuable experience. From our work, I learned how to write quantitative studies targeted to our market to gain feedback before and after our marketing campaign. In addition, I learned how to conduct in-depth interviews and how to turn response data into presentable material. My team worked hard and helped discover that our marketing campaign was a huge success among students at Johns Hopkins: our work made many students more aware of our client and the Navy’s HPSP we were promoting. From this Advertising and Promotion course, I gained both academic experience with marketing research and a job in the industry.

It was because of the American Marketing Association's Student Job Workshop that I learned about my first job out of college. During this networking event in April, I met with a few Hopkins alumni who worked for marketing firms and one, in particular, recruited me to work for his firm – The Futures Company. I learned even more about marketing research in my first year on the job and can now work directly with a client to design a custom questionnaire, manage field work, analyze data and write custom reports to present to our clients.

And, to top it off, I was transferred to The Futures Company’s London office in my second year. I’ve been in the United Kingdom for less than two weeks, and I am LOVING this experience! While I didn’t want to go into politics or apply for typical “International Studies” jobs, I still wanted to somehow make my career international, and I have. I managed to combine my passion for my business minor (focused on marketing) as well as my major (International Studies) and I could not have done this without all of the marketing courses offered at Johns Hopkins (and someday, I hope they offer more and more!)

Lastly – here is a picture of my new office building in London! Well, actually, it’s off to the left as I was too busy focusing on half of Tower Bridge in the distance (just like that guy on the bike!)

Getting into Marketing or Advertising with an Undergraduate Degree From Johns Hopkins University

Name: Leslie Kendrick, Senior Lecturer
(Faculty Profile)

Department: Center for Leadership Education / W.P. Carey Program in Entrepreneurship & Management (Whiting School of Engineering)

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Having taught marketing to undergraduate Arts & Sciences students (and even a few engineers) for eight years in the Entrepreneurship & Management Program, I can honestly say that JHU students are as competitive as business or marketing majors when it comes to landing internships and jobs in the marketing field.

I am a full-time Senior Lecturer and have developed the five undergraduate marketing courses that are taught out of our Center for Leadership Education(CLE).  This includes Principles of Marketing, Marketing Strategy (an MBA-style case course), International Marketing, Advertising & Promotion, and Media & P.R. in the Big Apple (an intersession course with a NY trip component).  Students who minor in business, or those just interested in the marketing field, can take any or all of these courses.  All feature small sections (15-35 students) and lots of personal interaction and mentoring (all students have to do is ask!).

CLE Lecturers come from industry and we integrate this experience into the classroom.  Many of the group exercises that I use in Marketing Principles come from my experiences as a Sales Representative for Harper & Row, a Brand Analyst for Londontown Corporation and a Marketing Director at Lippincott Williams & Wilkins medical publishers.  When we cover non-profit marketing, I describe the challenges of marketing a merit scholarship award (for which many of my JHU students are eligible) and an annual job workshop as a 20-year board member of the Baltimore Chapter of the American Marketing Association. 

Guest speakers in my classes are often JHU alumni—former students of mine who have landed positions at local firms—in market research, marketing management, or as entrepreneurs.  There’s nothing more rewarding to me than seeing my former students mentor my current students, whether it’s through informational interviews or assistance with internships or jobs.

The other hat I wear is that of Internship Coordinator.  I place and supervise 40 students per year in internships locally in marketing and finance.  Being located in a large city is a major advantage when it comes to doing internships for academic credit during the school year.  Many of my students have at least three quality internships on their resume before graduating.  And even more important, they know from these internships the functional area of marketing in which they’d like to work.

And speaking of gaining practical experience, students now have the opportunity to work for a real client and spend real money in the Advertising & Promotion class—one of the upper-level courses.  Every spring, I work with a firm that matches my JHU class up with clients like Nissan and The U.S. Navy and then oversees the development of an integrated marketing communications campaign targeting JHU students.  The class is run like a real advertising agency—with student-run departments such as Market Research, Advertising/Multimedia, Public Relations and Events.  Many students have landed internships and jobs based on this unique experience.  The class that worked with The Navy won a Scholastic Achievement Award and five students from the class were flown (along with me) to the Navy recruitment headquarters to present our project to high level officers.

 

My marketing colleagues in Baltimore often choose my JHU students for internships and jobs over those from competing local colleges because they are not only versed in marketing through the applied and experiential courses I teach, but they are bright and highly motivated!

For more information on the Center for Leadership Education, including courses offered and experiential programs, visit our website:  http://web.jhu.edu/Leadership.  If you have questions for me, I can be reached at: kendrick@jhu.edu.

Kinetic Sculpture Race

 

Johns Hopkins had its first ever entry in the Baltimore Kinetic Sculpture Race.
The team name was Twitter Jay and the Recyclists. The Baltimore Sun describes "Twitter Jay is part art installation, part sports team mascot and part community-building enterprise."

Find out more: Baltimore Sun, JHU Gazette.

Watch a video about Twitter Jay below.