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Everyone has a calling from God. And for Kevin Walker ’05, business is his calling.

“You have to recognize what that calling is and how you can impact the world for Christ,” Walker, owner of several El Famous Burrito restaurants, told the audience at a TBN Speaker Series event on April 10.

Walker learned at a young age that he enjoyed the world of business, when he found $20 on the sidewalk. He continued to work throughout high school at jobs such as piano tuning. At Trinity, he majored in business, then went on to work in the insurance industry and for Corporate Chaplains of America before entering the restaurant industry. “But I came to realize that being in business wasn’t just about how much money I could get,” he said. “And I want to challenge the thought process that business isn’t a calling.”

Walker pointed out that most people spend 40 or more hours a week at work, but only an hour a week in church—if they go at all. That leaves many opportunities to practice one’s faith in the business environment. “People who may never get inside a church, you may see every day. You can be a light to those people.”

Walker discussed the set of principles that drive his business’s goals and purposes:

1. Do the right thing
2. Give
3. Be a light
4. Do ministry

“God has given each of us a calling,” he said. “The question is, how are you utilizing your calling?”

The Speaker Series, presented by Trinity Business Network (TBN) in collaboration with Fusion 59, is focused on entrepreneurship and innovation for students, alumni, and friends of the College. The series focuses on Trinity alumni and friends who have flourishing companies and exhibit the entrepreneurial spirit woven into much of our business curriculum.

April 9 was a beautiful day for the 20^th Annual OPUS celebration! The College also welcomed incoming freshmen and their parents as part of  the Third Annual Admitted Students Day.

As part of the rich tradition of OPUS, the day was filled with Christian scholarship, presentations, and performances. There were also games, a dunk tank, chalk drawings, snacks, and much more.

Congratulations to this year’s winners!

Awards in Art & Design

Graphic Design:

• 1^st Place– Yolanda Sinaga: “Vaporfly 4% Infographic”
• 2^nd Place – Mariah Nelesen: “Unroll”
• 3^rd Place –  John Michael Jones: “Gene’s Refried Beans”

Printmaking/Photography:

• 1^st Place – Claire Sukamto: “Facelift”
• 2^nd Place – Jacob Boglio: “Doy Dags”
• 3^rd Place – Emilianna Sweeting: “Faded”

Sculpture/3D:

• 1^st Place – Deborah Fry: “Untitled”
• 2^nd Place – Deborah Fry: “Jumble”
• 3^rd Place – Dainius Soliunas: “Ever-Shifting Sun”

Drawing/Painting/Mixed Media:

• 1^st Place – Alexandria Johnson: “My Safe Space, Untitled Inner Feelings, Untitled black & white, A Rainstorm”
• 2^nd Place – Samantha Willis: “Normal vs Mental, Still Life”
• 3^rd Place – Anne James: “Bart Simpson”
• Honorable Mention – Rachel Bast: “Disappointed”
• Honorable Mention – Gabrielle Lenting: “Headache”
• Honorable Mention – Jacob Boglio: “Expanse”
• Honorable Mention – Gabrielle Lenting: “Color Theory”

BEST IN SHOW  (Printmaking/Photography)

Claire Sukamto: “Incognito”

Awards in Literary Arts

Fiction:

• 1^st Place – Leah Taylor
• 2^nd Place – Leah Taylor
• 3^rd Place – Emily Homman
• Honorable Mention – Shinhye Hwang

Non-Fiction:

• 1^st Place – Deborah Fry

Poetry:

• 1^st Place – Leah Taylor
• 2^nd Place – Jessica Pilota

Awards in Music

Instrumental:

• 1^st Place — Ranita Luhur, piano: “Selling Sundry Goods”
• 2^nd Place — Jonathan Rietveld, trumpet: “Fantasie Brillante”
• 3^rd Place — Emily Homman, bassoon: Sonata in F minor, movement 1

Vocal:

• 1^st Place — Morgan Limback: “Stars and the Moon”
• 2^nd Place — Aaron De Boer: “Love Leads to Battle”
• 3^rd Place (tie) — Benjamin Friesen: “Extraordinary” and Ryan Van Gilst: “Lost in the Wilderness

Presentation Showdown Award (Best Presentation)

• 1^st Place — Abigail Lammers, Casey Wiegers: “Tiny Killers on Campus: Viruses in Local Waterways”
• 2^nd Place — Abigail Lammers, Amber Shoberg, Andrew Kowitz: “Writing in the Language of God: Editing Genomes at Trinity”

Runners up:

• Abigail Lammers: “From Predators to Prey: Shark Misconceptions, Threats, and Conservation Efforts”
• Nicole Syverson: “Therapeutic Communication”
• Peyton Carroll: “Creating a Wellness Program”

Golden Troll (department with highest proportion of presentations, both at OPUS and off-campus: Biology Department

As part of a yearly tradition for Trinity’s Social Work Department, a group of students, faculty, and practitioners visited the state capitol in Springfield, Ill., for the National Association of Social Workers-IL Chapter Advocacy Day on April 3.

A dozen students, along with Dr. Cini Bretzlaff-Holstein, department chair and associate professor of social work; and Dr. Allison Tan, assistant professor of social work, attended the event.

The Trinity group spent the day with more than 1,000 fellow participants from around the state in educational sessions and advocacy activities.

Art therapy has been recognized as a powerful way to heal the mind and improve the spirit, and Trinity is proud to offer a B.A. in Art Therapy.

But we don’t just teach art therapy–we practice it, too.  With the end of the semester quickly approaching, Trinity’s Counseling Services recently offered an art therapy event for students, with all the materials provided.

The April 4 event was led by a graduate counseling intern, Sharina Porter, according to Dr. Stephanie Griswold, PsyD., Director of Counseling Services and Instructor of Psychology. “In the Counseling Center, we talk a lot about ways to support students through the ups and downs of college. We do this through one-on-one counseling all the time, but it’s also important to do this on a larger scale within the community.”

The Counseling Center identified two goals for the event: to provide a creative and intentionally relaxing space to support students who might be stressed; and to support those students who are managing their stress well but would could perhaps benefit from a new and creative way to express themselves.

“We were blown away by the response. Around 80 students came to the event. I even had to go run and get extra supplies!” said Griswold.

Trinity is pleased to welcome Kevin Walker ’04 to campus as part of the TBN Speaker Series.

The Trinity Business Network in collaboration with Fusion 59 is presenting this free year-long speaker series focused on entrepreneurship and innovation for students, alumni and friends of the College. The series focuses on Trinity alumni and friends who have flourishing companies and exhibit the entrepreneurial spirit woven into much of our business curriculum.

Walker has opened several El Famous Burrito locations in the Chicago area. Join him, students, alumni, and friends of the College for this free event on April 10 at 4 pm. Registration is required. Learn more and register here.

4 pm Networking and Food Sampling (El Famous Burrito)
4:30 pm Presentation

Walker was recently featured in Forbes: Click here to watch the video.

Thank you to our event sponsorsL
-Baird & Warner – Tom Lemmenes
-Edward Jones – Rick Powell
-Evenhouse & Co. P.C.
-P&L CPA
-Schepel Buick, GMC, Cadillac
-Service Sanitation

Trinity Christian College is pleased to announce the introduction of a new Master’s Degree program in Special Education—Diverse Learners. This Master of Arts degree leads to an ESL (English as a Second Language) and LBS I (Learning Behavior Specialist) grade range endorsement, which can be added to graduates’ Professional Educator’s License (PEL). The program, designed for teachers who currently have their licenses, can be completed in 18 months.

“We have done extensive outreach and realized there is a need for graduate programs that prepare teachers to work with diverse learners and individuals with higher behavioral needs,” said Dr. Sara Baillie, Ed.D., Associate Professor of Special Education and Director of the Graduate Programs in Special Education at Trinity. “We are excited to offer a degree that leads to both of these endorsements.”

The program can also be completed in 12 months for those seeking an ESL endorsement.

The new program joins two other MA Special Education programs that Trinity currently offers. Those include the MA in Special Education, which allows licensed teachers to add the LBS I to their PEL; and the MA in Special Education- Behavior Intervention Specialist, which allows students to sit for the Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) exam upon completion. For the already licensed special education teacher, the MA in Special Education-BIS program leads to the LBS II: Behavior Intervention Specialist as well.

“All of our MA programs meet one night per week with additional work completed online,” said Baillie. “This model allows for flexibility for our students, while still building lasting relationships with professors and colleagues in the field.”

For more information about the new Diverse Learner’s program, click here.

Congratulations to Sarah LeMahieu ’20, who recently presented at the Midwest Regional Conference on Faith and History (CFH) Student Research Conference.

LeMahieu presented her paper titled “The Aba Women’s Riots and their Causes” to the conference.  She wrote the paper for Prof. David Brodnax’s course on The History of Africa, and the paper is about protests in Nigeria in 1929.

Prof. of History John Fry, Ph.D., and several other Trinity students also attended the conference, which took place at Trinity International University. Students from four different colleges in Illinois and Indiana attended and presented papers.

The Regional CFH is a chapter of the National Conference on Faith and History, a “community of scholars exploring the relationship between Christian faith and history.”

Everyone has wrestled with fear.

“We have all been there,” Rev. Julius Medenblik ’82, president of Calvin Theological Seminary, told those gathered for a recent Chapel. “No matter where you are from, we have all experienced fear at one point or another.”

Medenblik recounted Numbers 13, where the Lord told Moses to send 12 men to explore the land of Canaan. While the Israelite spies found a land flowing with milk and honey, they also found strong people already there. Out of fear, 10 of the men reported that they would not be able to enter the Promised Land. Only Caleb and Joshua had faith that God would fulfill his promises. Hearing the negative report, the people wept and blamed Moses and Aaron for bringing them out of the Egypt only to die in the desert.

According to Medenblik, the Israelites forgot God’s faithfulness to them and became afraid. “Kingdom vision sees beyond the moment to the promises of God,” he said. “When we see and hear God clearly, we can see ourselves clearly and accept the grace, faith and love that equips us for life and living as God’s witnesses in the land that he gives us.”

To learn more about Medenblik, click here.

All are welcome to Chapel, which is held in Ozinga Chapel Auditorium on Wednesdays and Fridays at 10 am when classes are in session.

Whether pursuing an undergraduate degree in a psychology-related program or earning a Master of Arts in counseling psychology, students at Trinity learn to blend a liberal arts based approach to psychological science with the art of understanding the self and relating to the contemporary world in all its complexity.

And now, students who are working towards their B.A. in Art Therapy, Psychology, or Speech-Language Pathology at Trinity can begin taking graduate-level courses in their junior or senior year.

That means students can earn a psychology-related B.A. and an M.A. from Trinity in five and a half years, instead of six.

“Undergraduate students who take graduate coursework at Trinity can seamlessly transfer those courses into the Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology program upon finishing their Bachelor of Arts degree,” said Dr. Kara E. Wolff, Ph.D., Director of the Graduate Program in Counseling Psychology and Associate Professor of Psychology.

“This new opportunity is also ideal for undergraduate students who are interested in graduate school and would like to experience graduate coursework prior to beginning a full graduate program,” said Wolff.

With this new program, students may take up to three courses at the graduate level during their undergraduate experience, allowing for up to nine credits of graduate coursework that can be counted towards both an undergraduate and graduate degree.

Trinity is also welcoming our alumni back to their campus home for graduate school. Alumni who enter the Counseling Psychology graduate program for the fall of 2019 will receive a $250 tuition discount. The College is also offering a $500 scholarship, in the form of a tuition discount, for Trinity alumni who graduated with a 3.5 GPA or higher.

There are several requirements for undergraduate students looking to start graduate level coursework:

–3.0 cumulative GPA, junior or senior standing, previously completed four psychology courses with grades of B or higher: PSYC 121, 122, and two other psychology courses.

–Successful completion of an interview with the graduate program director.

Students interested in enrolling in the M.A. program after completing their Trinity bachelor’s degree will have their application fee waived. They will need to complete the following elements of the graduate application process:

1. Submit an application ($50 application fee is waived)
2. Submit two letters of recommendation through the online application portal
3. Complete an interview with program faculty
4. If accepted into the program, pay the non-refundable enrollment deposit of $250 and attend orientation

Learn more about Trinity’s B.A. psychology-related majors here. Click here to learn more about Trinity’s M.A. in Counseling Psychology.

Have you ever wondered why the moon looks different every night?  Well, then Trinity Theatre’s upcoming production, The Old Man and the Old Moon, is the perfect pastime for you!  This folktale musical integrates acting, live music, shadow puppetry, and more to create an immersive and exciting theatre experience.

Originally produced by New York-based Pigpen Theater Company, The Old Man and the Old Moon is the tale of how the moon acquired its phases.  As we are told by the character Matheson, “There was a time when the moon was always full. Not just once a month, mind you, but every single night. And how it came to be the way we know it now, well, that’s quite the story.”  It is quite a story, and the audience can expect comical bantering, intense sword fighting, and songs of both love and loss throughout its retelling.

According to actor Ben Friesen ’17, “This play is over-stimulating in the best way. It has everything you could hope for, nothing you could expect, and something for everyone. It feels like a five-act epic beautifully spun into a continuous fable and strung together with music, puppetry, and every form of storytelling you can imagine. It’s been a huge process to undertake this production, but it’s been so rewarding and exciting to work on the individual pieces and begin to combine them and form the full picture of the show.”

Fellow actor Morgan Limback ’19, says of Old Man, “I love all the creativity that is going into the production. We are getting to work with shadow puppets, and it is amazing what we are able to do with them. I also really love the music. Pigpen is my favorite band, and it is fun to see where my favorite songs fit in the context of a show.”

Trinity Theatre hopes that songs from The Old Man and the Old Moon will become some of your favorites, too.  Come out to see the show on April 5^th, 6^th, 11^th, 12^th, 13^th, or 14^th in the ArCC.

Tickets are available online here or by calling the Trinity Box Office at 708.293.4537.

–Emma Darcy ’19