New Student Play to be Staged at Fringe Festival

AJ Golio and Shannon Morrall in the February
performance at Fordham
Contributed photo

Purgatory, the land of suffering inhabited by the souls of sinners atoning before going to heaven, is the setting for a new play written and performed by Fordham students.

My Personal Hell, a comedic murder mystery written and directed by Fordham College at Rose Hill senior Jonathan O'Neill, will be staged in August at FringeNYC, the largest multi-arts festival in North America.

The play, which was first produced by Fordham Experimental Theatre at Collins Auditorium, centers around Tucker Tomkins, a twenty-something photographer (played by Rose Hill junior AJ Golio) who is shot and killed. When he arrives in Purgatory, he is told that in order to get into heaven he must solve his own murder.

From the afterlife he witnesses how his friends, loved ones, and neighbors carry on in his absence, as he and two detectives try to deduce his killer. Suspicious characters include quarreling politicians, Tucker's hot-headed fiancée, his agoraphobic best friend, and pretentious journalist, among others.

O’Neill said he’s been working on the play for the last two years.

The cast of My Personal Hell at Fordham in February
Contributed photo

“It was an effort to combine traditional, large-ensemble mysteries such as Death on the Nile, And Then There Were None, and Murder on the Orient Express with a touch of post-war French drama along the lines of No Exit,” he said.

“The play has gone through another draft since our performance at Fordham in February; the characters are the same but the scenes have almost all been rewritten.”

The cast and crew of My Personal Hell features Timothy Rozmus, GSB '13, as the assistant director and includes:

From Fordham College at Rose Hill: AJ Golio, Michael Brown, James Flanagan, Shannon Morrall, Alyssa Marino, Michael Guariglia, Devin Chowske, Joseph Gallagher, Elle Crane, Sarah Hill, Giancarlo Milea, Christopher Pedro, James Murtagh, and MaryClare Demenna.
From the Gabelli School of Business: Pat McCarthy, Vincent Pellizzi, and Collin Wright.

The production takes place at Loretto Auditorium, 18 Bleeker St. in Manhattan.

Sunday, Aug. 10 at 7:45 p.m., Sunday, Aug. 17 at 3:30 p.m., Thursday, Aug. 21 at 2 p.m., Saturday, Aug. 23 at 9:30 p.m. and Sunday, Aug. 24 at 4:45 p.m.

Tickets are available at http://www.fringenyc.org/basic_page.php?ltr=M#MyPers

—Patrick Verel

Fordham Superbowl Flyover

Superbowl Heads Up

Had you looked up on Superbowl Sunday, you would have seen a Fordham alumnus. Lt. Col. Bernard J. Harrington, Gabelli ’97, was commanding officer of the U.S. Army’s 1st Battalion, 101st Aviation Regiment. He led a flight of nine helicopters on their flyover of MetLife Stadium just as the national anthem was ending. 

Three AH-64D Apache Helicopters on a Practice Flight over MetLife Stadium

Jennifer Brizzolara Harrington
and Bernard J.Harrington

Harrington, an Apache helicopter pilot, commanded three Apache, three Blackhawk, and three Chinook helicopters during the flyover. He is part of a contingent of soldiers from the 101st Combat Aviation Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) from Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

"It's an incredible honor to lead a team of professional, selfless soldiers and represent our armed forces during Super Bowl XLVIII," Harrington said. "Like so many military officers serving today, I feel that my Fordham experience, particularly being a member of the Pershing Rifles, provided me an outstanding foundation to serve in today's military. I was also blessed to meet my wife, Jennifer, at Fordham. She has always been the most important part of my life since leaving Rose Hill."

Harrington and his wife, Jennifer Brizzolara Harrington, FCRH ’97, live in Fort Campbell. Bernard Harrington is from Rego Park, New York, and was commissioned from the ROTC Battalion at Fordham, where he was a member of the Pershing Rifles drill team. He is a graduate of Xavier High School, in Manhattan.

Jennifer Harrington is from Wilmington, Delaware. She graduated from Fordham with a degree in anthropology, is currently raising their 3-year-old son, Jeremy, at home. Both her father and sister attended Fordham.

An Apache Helicopter from Harrington's Command
Flies Past the Freedom Tower in Lower Manhattan on a Practice Flight

Bernard Harrington and Jennifer Brizzolara at Commencement, Rose Hill 1997

—Bob Howe

Fordham Undergrads Visit Capitol for Government Tour

Fordham Students meet with Treasury Deputy Secretary Neal Wolin

Students from Fordham College at Rose Hill, Fordham College Lincoln Center, and the Gabelli School of Business got to see the nation’s economic levers of power in person during a visit to Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, March 27. 

The trip, which was sponsored by the Fordham President's Council member Ed Blount, FCRH '69, brought 25 students to the Treasury Department, the Office of Management and Budget, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Reserve. 

At the Treasury Department, the group met with Deputy Secretary Neal Wolin, who spoke to them about the economic recovery and the ongoing work by the Administration to strengthen economic growth and stability in our financial systems. Wolin also touched on the ongoing debate in Washington on how to reduce our deficits in a balanced way.

Olivia Chopra, FCRH '13, a dual economics and Middle Eastern Studies major, said the trip not only bolstered her passion for public policy but also gave her a sense of where her passion can take her in the future.

“I particularly enjoyed the Q&A session with Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Neal Wolin, who was able to answer our questions regarding international economic issues, including the current financial policy towards Iran,” she said. 

Veronica Daigle, FCRH '93, program examiner for the Office
of  Management  and Budget, chats with students.

“Equally as engaging, the presentation at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) shed light onto the domestic issue of the Federal budgeting process and the current sequester.  I was very impressed by our presenter at the OMB, Fordham alumna Veronica Daigle, whose knowledge of and dedication to her work as a program examiner was inspiring.”

Evangelos Razis, FCLC '13, said the experience was both exciting and humbling.

“We toured the institutions that are fundamental to our nation’s political economy, and it’s quite something to see where those fundamental decisions are being made. It’s too easy think of a government body like 'The Treasury' and the 'SEC' merely in the abstract. In the end, we’re talking about real people, buildings, and things,” he said.

“The people we spoke with were all professionals committed to serving our country. As an aspiring public servant, that shared sense of duty resonated with me.”

—Patrick Verel

Student Play Honored in Theater Festival

The cast of Cowboys Don't Sing

Cowboys Don’t Sing, an original musical created by members of the student club Fordham Experimental Theatre, was honored at the West Village Musical Theater Festival.

The play, which was written by Dennis Flynn, FCRH '12, Johnny Kelley, FCRH '13 and TJ Alcala, FCRH '13, first debuted at the Collins Auditorium’s Black Box Theater at Rose Hill in February. 

It was one of 24 plays selected for the festival, which ran from June 13 to June 17 at the Bessie Schonberg Theatre in Chelsea. After a watching a segment of the plays in the festival, members of the audience voted on the submissions. At the end of the festival, Cowboys Don’t Sing took home several awards:

For the series competition, (five shows):

Best Dead Guy: Steve Tyson; Best Actor: Matt Van Orden; Best Song: Racist Song; Best Script; Best Lyrics; and Best Direction: Dennis Flynn 

For the entire festival:

Best Lyrics; Best Script; Best Direction: Dennis Flynn; and Best Musical 

Flynn said the show, a loving parody of the standard tropes of the Westerns and musicals, had to be whittled from and hour and 45 minutes down to 15 minutes, and had to be performed without Alcala, who is in Africa. 

“It was a little weird to do it with a slightly different cast, but we’re all such good friends that it just came together,” he said. “It was fun though. I think it was received so well because we decided to go as big and fast as possible.”

—Patrick Verel

RecycleMania Taps Enthusiasm for the Environment

Six weeks after joining a nation-wide contest to see who can best keep their bottles, cans and cardboard out of landfills, the residents of Queen’s Court, Salice-Conley Hall and McMahon Hall are in the lead for Fordham's biggest recycler.

According to statistics compiled weekly, the Rose Hill campus’ Queen's Court has recycled the most paper and cardboard, at five pounds per person. Nearby Salice-Conley Hall is leading the charge with glass, metal and plastic, at 6.70 pounds per person.

When it comes to keeping trash out of the system though, students at the 10 residence halls in the Bronx have nothing on their Manhattan brethren. Residents of McMahon Hall, which is on the Lincoln Center campus, have generated 9.75 pounds of trash per person.

RecycleMania, an annual contest between colleges around the country to see who can recycle more during an eight-week period, started in 2001 as a competition between Miami University of Ohio and Ohio University, and now features 630 schools.

This is the first year Fordham has participated in the contest, in the informal “Benchmark” division. In both the formal and informal divisions, schools submit weight data for paper, cardboard, cans and bottles, food waste and general trash each week, and are in turn able to see how they measure up against each other.

Since the competition began, a total of 45 tons of material have been collected from Fordham residence halls. The contest runs through April 2, so there is still time left to earn bragging rights as the greenest among them all.

For more information, visit http://www.recyclemania.org/

—Patrick Verel

Kevin Rooney Jr., GSB '07, to Fight, Flack

Boxer Kevin Rooney Jr., GSB ’07, will step into the ring for the first time as a professional on April 22 at the Mohegan Sun resort in Uncasville, Conn.

The son of Mike Tyson's former trainer, Kevin Rooney Sr., Rooney posted a 9-2 record as an amateur. Last year, he reached the quarterfinals of the New York Golden Gloves before deciding to turn pro. He is expected to fight at 154 pounds, about 10 pounds less than his amateur fighting weight.

When not in the ring, Rooney is director of media relations for Joe DeGuardia's Star Boxing. DeGuardia—a former boxer turned promoter who also served as a Bronx assistant district attorney—is a 1986 alumnus of Fordham College at Rose Hill. He established Star Boxing in 1992.

Fittingly, Star Boxing is promoting the April 22 card, and Rooney will work the media after he’s through working his opponent.

"I'll go in the back to the dressing room after my fight to change," Rooney recently told ESPN. "I'll put my suit back on and be back working as the publicist for the show."

—Miles Doyle, FCRH ’01

Vote for Cassandra, Vote for Fordham

Fordham College at Rose Hill junior Cassandra Lombardi, a communications and media studies major, has been selected as a finalist in the national University Language Service Photo Contest for her artistic perspective of Rome’s famous Via Del Corso as it stretches, endlessly, to the horizon.

Lombardi took the photo while she was a study abroad student in Rome during the Fall 2010 semester. If Lombardi’s photo is voted as one of the top two, she has a shot at a $500 college scholarship.

Lombardi is up against some stiff competition from five other student photographers. If you would like to support Lombardi, you can vote for her in the contest at the ULS website. It only takes a few seconds to support a member of the Fordham community by clicking here (or at the url below), checking the circle next to Lombardi’s name, and then submitting your choice on the Vote icon.

www.universitylanguage.com/finalists

Winners of the scholarship contest will be announced on or around April 25, 2011.

—Janet Sassi

Fordham Students Take Home Design Award

Shane Moan and Andrew Koudlai may call different Fordham campuses home, but when it came to a recent design competition, they won as fellow Rams.

Moan, a sophomore theatre design major at Fordham College at Lincoln Center, and Koudlai, a senior pre-architecture major at Fordham College at Rose Hill, took home honorable mentions on Tuesday, March 2 in “Revealing Shadows,” a contest sponsored by the New York City section of the Illuminating Engineering Society of North America.

They were chosen along with four other prize-winners from a field of 135 entries from schools such as Parsons The New School for Design, Pratt Institute, New York University’s Tisch School of Arts and New York School of Interior Design.

Their light studies and those from other Fordham students who entered will be on display starting Thursday, March 10 at the Push Pin Gallery, on the ground floor of the Lowenstein Center, at the Lincoln Center campus.

"The Heart of a Confident Man" by Shane Moan

"Perspective Counts" by Andrew Koudlai

—Patrick Verel

Husband and Wife Team Up to Run Medieval Academy of America

Eileen Gardiner, TMC ’69, GSAS ’80, and Ronald Musto, FCRH ’69, met as pre-med students in a science lab on Fordham’s Rose Hill campus in the late 1960s.

“I was pulling Ds,” Musto said. “She was pulling Cs. I asked to borrow her [burners] and flasks. Hers were always clean. Mine were not.”

Musto and Gardiner’s interest in medicine didn’t stick. She found her calling in English—medieval literature, in particular—and he rediscovered his love of history.

“I was always reading history as a kid,” said Musto, who earned his master’s and doctoral degrees in medieval history at Columbia University. “It constantly raises questions that fascinate me.”

Meanwhile, Gardiner went on to earn her doctorate at Fordham. She was “drawn to the amazing imagination that one could find in [medieval] literature, which combined religion and nature and a sort of way of life that was so different from our own,” she said. “There was just something that naturally attracted me to it.”

As Gardiner and Musto found their academic calling, they also fell in love.

“We tried to get married [at Fordham] one night by a Jesuit friend,” Gardiner said. “He told us to go home and sleep it off!”

They did, but eventually married in 1970, a year after graduation, and they’ve been together—personally and professionally—ever since.

Recently, Gardiner and Musto were named executive director and editor, respectively, of the Medieval Academy of America and its journal, Speculum, following a successful 10- year stint as co-directors of the American Council of Learned Societies’ humanities e-book division.

“We’ve always done things together. We were business partners from so early on,” said Gardiner.

“It makes for an interesting breakfast conversation,” Musto said. “It makes for obsessiveness,” Gardiner added.

In the first of their many projects together, Gardiner and Musto started the Co-Op Bookstore at Fordham with a $10,000 investment from the University’s United Student Government. They ran the store, located at 613 Fordham Road, during their junior and senior years.

Later, after earning their doctoral degrees, Gardiner and Musto worked in book publishing. Eventually, they decided to start a publishing house.

In 1985, they founded Italica Press, publishing six titles in their first year, mostly out-of-print books. Though they still publish roughly the same number of titles today, Gardiner and Musto have expanded their list to include original academic titles.

They also publish electronic books, something they did earlier than most houses.

In 1999, the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) tapped them to publish an electronic collection of monographs in history.

Together, Gardiner and Musto created the ACLS Humanities E-Book Division, a fully searchable online collection of nearly 3,000 titles. With more than 640 institutional subscribers, in 33 different countries, it is widely considered one of the best online resources for research and scholarship.

At the Medieval Academy of America, Gardiner and Musto will help bring the academy into the digital realm, while maintaining the quality of the academy’s journal.

It is, in a sense, their dream job.

“The opportunity to work for the Medieval Academy really combines everything that we could imagine to be able to work on,” Gardiner said, “and to do it for the premier society in the world is an honor.”

“We’ve always been outsiders,” Musto said. “We’ve never held academic positions. I think it’s delightful and in a certain sense ironic that we’ve ended up in a position that is central to this world.”

—Miles Doyle, FCRH ’01

Nature's Back in Session

Fordham’s on-site photographer Nicholas Lombardi, S.J., glanced out his Rose Hill campus window today and spotted a lone member of Fordham’s renowned hawk family, sharp-sighted and back in attendance for the semester.

Rose Hill in the Snow

Fordham University was closed on Wednesday, Jan. 12, because of predictions for heavy snow. That didn't stop intrepid correspondent Nicholas D. Lombardi, S.J., from capturing these images of Rose Hill beneath a white mantle. The University will reopen Thursday, Jan. 13.

(Click on Images to Enlarge)

Fordham Senior To Present Research at Biophysical Society

Congratulations to Stacey Barnaby, a Fordham University at Rose Hill senior and chemistry major, who has received The Biophysical Society student travel award to attend the Biophysical Society's 55th Annual Meeting at the Baltimore Convention Center in Baltimore, Maryland, March 5 through 9.

Barnaby is one of 48 students worldwide to receive the award, which is based on scientific merit, with priority given to those who will present a paper at the conference. Her paper, "Ellagic Acid Nanotubular and Poly-Cationic Conjugates as Nano-Carriers for Delivery into Mammalian Cells," will be presented in poster format at the convention.

Barnaby has been doing research in the laboratory of Ipsita Banerjee, Ph.D., associate professor of chemistry and her mentor, for more than a year. She and the other winners will also be recognized at a reception on Saturday, March 5.

—Janet Sassi

FCRH Dean's New Book on U.S. Foreign Policy

Michael E. Latham, Ph.D., professor of history and dean of Fordham College at Rose Hill, has been getting some advance praise for his new book, The Right Kind of Revolution: Modernization, Development, and U.S. Foreign Policy from the Cold War to the Present (2010, Cornell University Press).

“Michael E. Latham’s readable and insightful book casts recent nation-building undertakings within a century-long history of the faiths—and delusions—of America’s recurrent efforts to ‘modernize’ others. The broad scope of this book recommends it to scholars, policymakers, and citizens alike.”
Emily S. Rosenberg, University of California, Irvine, author of Spreading the American Dream: American Economic and Cultural Expansion 1890–1945

“Well-written, broad-gauged, and just plain smart, The Right Kind of Revolution ably synthesizes, indeed moves beyond, the scholarship on American efforts to ‘improve’ the Third World. The new standard work on American modernization and development policies, it is has much to teach scholars and graduate students while still being suitable for use in undergraduate courses.”
David Engerman, Brandeis University, author of Know Your Enemy: The Rise and Fall of America’s Soviet Experts

Latham is also the author of Modernization as Ideology: American Social Science and “Nation Building” in the Kennedy Era, and coeditor of Staging Growth: Modernization, Development, and the Global Cold War and Knowledge and Postmodernism in Historical Perspective.

Cornell University Press
P.O. Box 6525,
Ithaca, NY 14851-6525
orderbook@cupserv.org
www.cornellpress.cornell.edu
Phone: (607) 277-2211 | Fax: (607) 277-6292

Freshman Convocation at Fordham College at Rose Hill

The second annual freshman convocation was held at Rose Hill on Monday, August 30, 2010, welcoming the Class of 2014 to Fordham College at Rose Hill. The faculty speaker was J. Alan Clark, Ph.D., assistant professor of biological sciences.

UPDATED: FCRH Student Lobbies Congress for Research Funding

Video update: Saturday, October 16, 2010.

Stacey Barnaby, a Fordham College at Rose Hill senior majoring in chemistry, participated in “Hill Day,” in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, September 20, 2010, in which young scientists engage policymakers on current research challenges and communicate the importance of supporting scientific discovery.

“It is scientists who spend many hours in the laboratory and come up with leading breakthroughs toward the cure for a disease, or vaccines, or build new materials for solar cells, or biofuels, to perhaps one day make us independent of foreign oil,” said Barnaby, who met with the staff of U.S. Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-New York, among others. “The nation is at a turning point in its history and that it is natural for scientists to play leading roles in helping to determine what’s to come.”

The event, sponsored by the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB), featured undergraduate and graduate researchers from universities across the nation, including Fordham, Brown and Yale Universities, and New York Medical College. The ASBMB is a nonprofit scientific and educational organization with more than 12,000 members worldwide.

“This is one of our most important activities,” said Thomas Baldwin, dean of the College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences at the University of California, Riverside, and a member of ASBMB’s public affairs panel. “Not only does it afford us an opportunity to talk with our elected representatives in Congress, which itself is a critically important activity, but it is an opportunity for young scientists to engage in the process of public debate. These are our scientific leaders of the future. Getting them involved now will pay dividends to the science community for years to come.”

Most ASBMB members teach and conduct research at colleges and universities. Others conduct research in various government laboratories, at nonprofit research institutions and in industry. The Society’s student members attend undergraduate or graduate institutions.

Bronx Nonprofit Names Fordham Student 'Volunteer of the Year'

Ryan Elizabeth Vale, a rising senior at Fordham College at Rose Hill, has been named 2010 Volunteer of the Year by the board of directors of City Squash, a Bronx-based, not-for-profit after school enrichment program.

“She exemplified the perfect volunteer,” said Shandar Edwards, an office administrator who worked closely with Vale at City Squash, an organization that serves children from economically disadvantaged households in the South Bronx.

“[Ryan Elizabeth] was very dedicated,” Edwards said. “She helped us with tutoring in the academic office or anything else we may have needed in the administrative office. No matter what, we could always depend on her.”

Vale, a Winston-Salem, N.C., native, worked three days a week at City Squash as a function of her community service program with the Honors-Curran Center for American Catholic Studies at Fordham.

"Volunteering with CitySquash has been the capstone of my Fordham experience,” Vale said. “Not only did CitySquash allow me to engage Bronx youth through my commitment to education, but its mission also coincides with the most basic reason I chose to attend a Jesuit university—an established commitment to caring for the whole person. These shared values, in addition to its exceptional group of children and wonderfully supportive staff, made tutoring with CitySquash an experience more rewarding than I could have ever expected."

Vale was unable to accept the award in person at an annual board of directors meeting in mid-July because she is in North Carolina interning at the Moravian MESDA Museum for the summer.

She said the experience of working at City Squash was one she will never forget.

“I have been deeply enriched by this opportunity, and I hope in return I have given the Bronx half the hope and joy ‘CitySquashers’ have given me,” Vale said.

Founded in 2002, City Squash helps young people from economically disadvantaged households in the Bronx fulfill their academic, athletic and personal potential. The intensive, year-round commitment includes squash, tutoring, mentoring, community service, travel, culture, high school placement, employment training and college prep. CitySquash begins working with students in third grade and serves them through college graduation.

—Gina Vergel

Spotlight on Undergraduate Research

Fordham College at Rose Hill Third Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium

Wednesday, April 21, 2010 | Noon to 5:30 p.m.
McGinley Center, Rose Hill Campus

Undergraduate students working on creative or scholarly projects in all academic disciplines participate. The symposium will feature student oral presentations and a poster session, and include outstanding student research work. All undergraduates, faculty, and members of the Fordham community are invited to attend.

See "Undergraduates Come Out of the Labs, Into the Limelight" for previous coverage of the undergraduate research symposium.

For more information, visit: www.fordham.edu/fcrh/fcrhsymp.

Engineering Physics at Fordham

Martin Sanzari, Ph.D., assistant professor of physics and director of the Engineering Physics Program addresses the Fordham College at Rose Hill Board of Visitors on February 18, 2010.

Fordham Students Challenge the Fed

On Thursday, Nov. 5, Fordham's Fed Challenge team won the first round of the New York Federal Reserve Bank's Fed Challenge. Fordham's team is one of six out of the starting 30 to move on to District semi-final and final rounds on Friday, Nov. 20.

The Fordham team consists of Andrew Vigliotta, Filippo Bianchi, and Robert Pergament, economics majors at Fordham College at Rose Hill; and Anu Joseph and Michael Cropano from the College of Business Administration. The team's faculty advisor is Mary Burke, Ph.D., clinical associate professor and associate chair for undergraduate education at Fordham.

The Fed Challenge is a competition in which teams of five students present an analysis of the overall U.S. economy as if they are part of the Federal Open Market Committee. Based on this economic analysis, they then must recommend specific monetary policy actions. The presentations are 20 minutes long and are followed by 15 minutes of questions from the judges.

The winning team of District’s final round will compete in the national finals at the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, Dec. 2.

Twin Biology Majors Net Prestigious Fellowships

Biology apparently is destiny, at least for twin sisters April and Kim Barnum, Fordham College at Rose Hill juniors, both of whom are biology majors, and both of whom spent the summer in Germany on prestigious DAAD RISE fellowships.

Barnum & Barnum studied at Universität Bayreuth under the German Academic Exchange Service (in German, Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst—DAAD) Research Internships in Science and Engineering (RISE), which gives undergraduates the chance to work with doctoral students for a summer, including the opportunity for hands-on experience in the field and laboratories.

Donna Heald, Ph.D., associate dean for science education and director of pre-health professions advising at FRCH, called the juniors "amazing students and delightful people."

Kim Barnum is in the pre-medical program at Fordham and plans to medical school. This summer she researched “Selective Use of Plant Provenances: A Potential Tool for Climate Change Adaptation?” Her major area of interest is biogeography.

April Barnum plans to minor in chemistry. This summer she conducted research on the microbially catalyzed formation of thioarsenic species during the dissolution of arsenic-sulfur minerals. She also presented at the national meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS) last week in Washington, D.C., a rare honor for an undergraduate.

Both April and Kim blogged about their experiences in Bayreuth (see links above). In the image above, the pair are preparing to descend into an old mineral mine in Seiffen. April is on the right. The Sisters Barnum will be joined at Fordham by their younger brother, Ricky, who will be entering Fordham College at Rose Hill as a freshman in September.