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The final event in the 2011 WorldView series attracted hundreds of local residents and Trinity students, faculty, and staff as former Palos Heights mayor Dean Koldenhoven presented “Religious Tolerance: The Mosque Controversy.”
Christians and Muslims, students and senior citizens, professors and ardent learners gathered together to hear Koldenhoven’s story of how, as mayor, he faced challenges in 2000 to stand firm in his Christian belief to “love your neighbor.”
Koldenhoven, a long-time friend of Trinity along with his wife Ruth, believes that what works is to talk peaceably through disagreements through “dialogue, dialogue, dialogue.”
Because of his efforts in the defense of religious freedom and tolerance, Koldenhoven received the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award and a special recognition award by the Arab American League.
For Elizabeth Fiala ’12 of Minneapolis, Minnesota, the lecture arrived at the end of an interfaith service project that she participated in with some fellow Trinity students and area Muslim students. “It was new for me to be able to interact with people of the Muslim faith for such an extended period of time, and I definitely learned a lot,” said Fiala, who serves as Student Association senior class representative and as a member of Trinity’s Ethnic Diversity Committee.
“Dean Koldenhoven is an example of a person who is participating in effective dialogue with the Muslim community, and I think that Christians can definitely take something from his message,” she said of the WorldView lecture.
Assistant Professor of Education Pete Post ’74 recently received a $250 Ray Graham Memorial Award from the Illinois Council of Exceptional Children for his proposal to create adaptive books with special education students in his Low Incidence Disabilities class.
Creating adaptive books is a method commonly used by educators that makes a book’s content more accessible and understandable for children with learning, vision, communication, or motor difficulties. Ways to adapt a book may include adding voice output devices, simplifying a book’s visuals, changing the text size or spacing within a book, or using pictures with text.
The grant will be used for purchasing books that Post’s class will adapt on the Elim Christian School campus this spring. Using Elim’s computers and Boardmaker program, the class will begin adapting books during Elim’s spring break, which, for Trinity students, will consist of taking the books apart and reassembling them using icons and interactive pieces they’ve created, according to Post.
Post believes Trinity students will gain the most from the award.
“Trinity students are the ones that really reap the benefits, especially working with the Boardmaker program,” he said. “It is wonderful to have financial support for an exercise that only helps Trinity students become better educators while contributing to the community and helping students learn to read.”
The adaptive books from Post’s class will be finished by the end of the spring semester and will then be donated to Elim and other institutions, including the Little Red Schoolhouse.
Hundreds of WorldView attendees were delighted by the inspiring performance of violin virtuoso Jaime Jorge on Monday, October 24.
Born in Cuba, Jorge has traveled around the world sharing the love of Jesus through music and testimony. As a child in Cuba, Jorge studied violin, a passion supported by his mother, who made plastic flowers to sell to raise funds for her son’s lessons. When he was 10, Jaime’s family came to the United States, and he began lessons with the eminent violinist Cyrus Forough.
Throughout the performance, Jorge shared favorite Scripture passages and his thoughts on his faith, his life, and his music.
“Music is a gift from God which I use to reach others,” he told the audience, who enjoyed arrangements of such songs as “I Surrender All” and a sampling of musical traditions from around the world.
Jorge was introduced by instructor of violin Matthew Mantell, who also serves as director of Trinity’s String Ensemble. Music students and other guests had the opportunity to meet Jorge following the concert.
For more information about Jaime Jorge, visit www.jaimejorge.com.
On Thursday, October 20, Dr. Donald Sinnema, professor of theology, presented his ARIHE lecture “Heaven: Is It Part of Creation?” to students and faculty at Trinity.
Association of Reformed Institutions of Higher Education (ARIHE) lecturers like Sinnema are selected from member institutions and are established scholars whose works model the type of scholarship that is distinctive at these colleges. Other Trinity ARIHE lecturers have included Dr. Brad Breems, professor of sociology, and Dr. Michael Vander Weele ’73, professor of English.
Sinnema’s ARIHE lectures focus on two topics related to misconceptions in popular eschatology.
“Heaven: Is it Part of Creation?” challenges the popular Christian conception that heaven is an eternal spiritual or celestial realm that is outside of creation, a realm that includes God, angels, and the souls of deceased believers.
“Time and Eternity: Will Believers Enter Eternity?” challenges the popular Christian view of time and eternity that time extends from creation to the last judgment (the “end of time”) and that eternity in some way surrounds time since it was there “before” time, extends “over” time, and will continue “after” the end of time.
“In my lecture, I wanted to challenge the common notion that heaven is an eternal spiritual realm outside of creation,” said Sinnema. “There are no grammatical or other good grounds in Scripture to distinguish between the singular heaven and the plural heavens, as if only the heavens or skies were created.
“My main point was that heaven is indeed part of God’s creation and that it has a history—in the beginning it was created, it is part of the fallen creation, and in the end it will also be renewed as the new heaven envisioned by John in the book of Revelation.”
About Dr. Sinnema
Dr. Sinnema is an internationally recognized scholar on the Canons of Dort. His understanding of and support for Reformed Christian higher education permeate his scholarship.
Sinnema has served as professor of theology at Trinity since 1987. He has published many scholarly papers and a book about the founding of Trinity Christian College (1952-1960) titled If We Begin with Christ.
He earned a master’s in philosophy at the Institute for Christian Studies in Toronto, Canada.
Trinity nursing students recently talked with senior citizens attending the Behind the Headlines class offered through the Seasoned Adults Learning at Trinity (SALT) program.
The class, taught by retired Cook County Sheriff Tom Panush, covers local, national, and international news topics.
With health care a timely topic and the flu season approaching, nursing students presented information about strokes and about conditions such as flu and shingles that more adversely affect the senior population.
Tina Decker ’06, assistant professor of nursing, introduced the student speakers and was also available to answer questions from class attendees.
Student presenters were:
Peggy Flynn ’13 of Evergreen Park, Illinois
Meghan Lyons ’12 of Oak Lawn, Illinois
Michelle Marcheschi ’13 of Alsip, Illinois
Christina Vrba ’12 of Worth, Illinois
When alumna Carrie Timmermans ’11 decided to take a break between graduating from Trinity and starting graduate school, she never predicted that break would bring her back to her alma mater.
Timmermans, who graduated with a theology and English double major, is a member of Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA), a branch of AmeriCorps that is devoted to fighting poverty through indirect service. AmeriCorps is a government program of the Corporation of National and Community Service that mobilizes individuals and/or groups to serve their local communities in numerous capacities.
As a VISTA member, Timmermans committed to serving full-time for one year at a nonprofit organization where her efforts would be focused on strengthening community and creating business. VISTA members help fight poverty through developing service-learning opportunities and encouraging involvement in community.
“I wanted to do something constructive during my break from school and began to search for different opportunities working or serving in the area of development,” said Timmermans. “I applied to various AmeriCorps positions, and found myself back at Trinity, working in the Office of Community Partnerships and Service Learning.”
Timmermans works as coordinator of the Students in Service program, connecting students to outreach opportunities. She also works with the office’s director Anna Rosas ’06 to encourage, plan, and incorporate service-learning opportunities into Trinity curriculum.
One particular Trinity experience, Timmermans said, prepared her for working with VISTA.
“My final semester at Trinity, I enrolled in Chicago Semester and had the opportunity to intern at the New Community Warming Center, a daytime homeless shelter,” Timmermans said. “This experience really shaped me personally and gave me the final assurance that I wanted to move toward a career resembling social work.”
The real-life experiences of Chicago Semester, combined with her Trinity education, were extremely influential in forming Timmermans’ love of community and service.
“During Chicago Semester, I put into practice all I heard and learned from my classes at Trinity about the importance of community,” Timmermans reflected. “I like to think that my theology classes laid the foundation for what I experienced when I went to Chicago Semester. I was reminded time and time again as I interned that great things can happen when a community comes together.”
Students in studio art and communication arts classes recently took advantage of the unseasonably warm weather for a field trip to Chicago to study various forms of messaging in the city.
Dr. Craig Mattson, professor of communication arts; Ellen Browning, assistant professor of art and design; and Dayton Castleman, assistant professor of art and design, accompanied students to Chicago to examine and discuss public spaces and art, along with the plethora of advertising and rhetoric found in the city.
The cross-disciplinary field trip encouraged all students to reflect on the amount of advertising produced in our culture and what such public messaging does.
“We often don’t give daily attention to the advertising that surrounds us,” said senior business communication major Karlie Monsma ’12 of Pella, Iowa. “On this field trip, my eyes were focused on every piece of text and image that surrounded us downtown, all trying to sell or persuade us in some way.”
“Our communications class works to find symbols and words that arbitrarily connect a symbol to our mind, creating a specific meaning,” added business finance major Zachary Thomas ’14 of Bradenton, Florida. “In downtown Chicago, there are millions of these symbols and words.”
For students, the field trip provided a strong connection between classes at Trinity and the Christian worldview and their application in the professional arena.
“While in Chicago, I recognized that our faith-based opinions and knowledge can allow us to apply our meta-narrative story of creation, fall, redemption, and new creation to messaging around us,” said Monsma. “We can all be redemptive in recognizing issues or problems with the messaging around us and try to redeem messages to be more pleasing to God.”
A busy Homecoming weekend at Trinity welcomed 300 alumni to campus on October 8.
Athletics and Troll Trot
The 80-degree fall day got off to a competitive start with alumni men’s and women’s soccer matches and the 5K Troll Trot. Played against the current varsity teams on the new Route 83 soccer fields, both alumni teams walked away with a win. Later that day, both the men’s and women’s soccer teams faced off against Illinois Institute of Technology. The Lady Trolls were able to capture a 2-1 win, while the men fell 0-1 to the Scarlet Hawks.
The Troll Trot welcomed more than 80 participants, ranging from alumni to current students, faculty, staff, and a Student Association team. Joey Lerner ’10 took first place for the men, and Rebecca Vannette ’15 of Washington, Illinois, snatched the title for the women.
Special alumni gatherings
Also included in the day were opportunities within certain programs for alumni to reconnect. A business and accounting breakfast took place during the morning and featured a panel discussion titled “Maintaining a Distinctively Christian Identity in Business.” The education department, in celebration of its 40th anniversary, hosted an education alumni reception.
The afternoon featured a luncheon honoring the 2011 Alumni of the Year Award recipients: Dr. Michael Vander Weele ’73, professor of English; Sanda Carra, former staff member; Grace Huitsing, former professor of English; and Dean and Ruth Koldenhoven, friends of the College.
TARC and nursing lab open houses
Alumni enjoyed an open house for the new Trinity Athletics and Recreation Complex, completed at the end of this summer. Visitors were given the opportunity to view the De Vos gymnasium and other amenities offered by the new facility.
A dedication ceremony was held for the renovated nursing lab, named after former department chair Cynthia Sander. The modernized simulation lab “has given new life to the program with the ability to provide all students with the simulations experiences that support their nursing classes throughout the curriculum,” said Dr. Laurel Quinn, associate professor of nursing and department chair. “There is a high level of excitement with the opportunities to learn and grow into the role of the professional nurse.”
Class of 1971
Trinity also hosted a Class of 1971 reunion, celebrating the first class to graduate with four-year degrees after the College transitioned from a two-year program. The reunion welcomed more than 40 attendees.
“I enjoyed seeing the tremendous development that has taken place since then,” said Mark Dykstra ’71. “In our years at Trinity, we learned to read both sympathetically and critically, to think in a structured manner, and to write with clarity and conviction. Our professors helped us face Western history and learning with a confidence rooted in our Reformed Christian heritage. I will always be grateful to God for my excellent Trinity education.”
Seerveld’s Ecclesiastes
Homecoming came to a close with a sold-out performance of former Trinity professor Dr. Calvin Seerveld’s theatrical interpretation Ecclesiastes in the Marg Kallemeyn Theatre. The original and engaging dramatization is a dialogue among various, frequently opposing voices, accompanied by live music.
During an open house on October 8, the newly constructed nursing laboratory, combined with the previous nursing department area, was officially dedicated and named the Cynthia Sander Nursing Lab. Dr. Sander served as chair of the department from 1993-2005.
Those attending the dedication ceremony included Sander, former and current faculty and administration, alumni, current students, and community members supportive of Trinity nursing education. A highlight of the event was the ribbon cutting ceremony led by Sander, President Steve Timmermans, Ph.D., and Nursing Student Organization President Dana Bush ’12 of Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Located in the former computer lab space on the first floor of the Classroom Building, the state-of-the art addition contains two lab spaces for junior and senior students to practice the skills they are learning and two high-tech simulation labs. The simulation laboratories contain standard nursing equipment as well as high-fidelity simulation manikins, which can realistically exhibit nearly any symptom and are able to automatically respond to intervention. New offices accommodate more nursing faculty members hired to serve the rising number of nursing students.
“During the reception, those attending were amazed at the capabilities of the Sim Man 3G manikin, when he spoke, seized, and cried,” said Dr. Laurel Quinn, current chair of the nursing department. “His presence truly enhances the ability to teach and learn in the lab and will support the education of safe, competent, professional Christian nurses now and in the future, just as Dr. Sander envisioned.”
In this environment, nursing faculty can ensure that all students are exposed to the same broad range of nursing scenarios using actual medical equipment and are more thoroughly prepared for real-life clinical situations.
“Nursing students and faculty feel so blessed by the provision of the new lab facility and eagerly anticipate the high fidelity simulation learning opportunities that will support their clinical practice,” said Quinn. “The students are so positive, and there is a high energy level of excitement among those already using the new lab.”
The College is grateful to those who have pledged their financial support to this vital project.
The Seasoned Adults Learning at Trinity (SALT) welcomed guest speaker and Social Security expert Laura Feldman to the “Behind the Headlines” course offering.
Class attendees were engaged as Feldman presented essential information with energy and humor. Starting with Politics 101, she explained the differences between Republicans and Democrats and moved on to two subjects of special importance to senior citizens, Social Security and Medicare.
Attendees enjoyed the presentation and participated throughout, posing questions and offering feedback.
The six-week SALT course covers local, national, and international news. Class members join in lively conversations led by instructor Tom Panush, a retired Cook County sheriff.
For more information about the SALT program and classes, visit the SALT webpage or contact Ruth De Bruyn at 708.239.4827 or ruth.debruyn@trnty.edu.
About Laura Feldman
Laura Feldman brings her skills as a teacher to educating senior groups and activists across the country. She is a native Washingtonian where politics is a local sport. Demystifying politics, personalizing it, and making it fun are her goals.
She has been a grassroots organizer for the National Committee to Preserve Social Security & Medicare for the past 20 years. The National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare is a non partisan advocacy organization supported by membership.
Prior to coming to the National Committee, she organized national programming for the National Science Foundation under a special education grant, which propelled her out of the classroom and into the public arena.