When senior public relations major Kelly Tafoya learned that Drake had been chosen to host a regional conference of the Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA) next spring, she and her classmates knew they couldn’t organize such a monumental event alone. “It was exciting and kind of terrifying,” Tafoya recalls. Luckily, there’s been no...
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Remembering Pearl Harbor
Robert Isokane, LA’53, was on a golf course in Honolulu when his life—and, indeed, the world—changed forever. The date was December 7, 1941 and Isokane was 15 years old. The Honolulu native was working as a caddy for an Army lieutenant colonel when the colonel was suddenly called away. Soon Isokane [pronounced e-so-kahn-ay] and a...
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Maxwell jams with blues legend
During his celebrated musical career, John Paul Hammond has shared a stage with Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Muddy Waters, Tom Waits, and countless other legendary performers. This month the Grammy Award-winning musician added a lesser-known (at least outside of certain musical circles) bluesman to his list of collaborators: Drake University President David Maxwell. Maxwell celebrated his...
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East Meets West
Photo courtesy Hiltrud Schulz/UMass Amherst. Professor, author, scholar, archivist, and founder of the East German Film Archive at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Barton Byg has been pretty busy since graduating from Drake in 1975. Today Byg is the director of the DEFA Library. Named after an East German film studio, the library recently celebrated...
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Life-Changing Occupation
Photo: Health Sciences students study in the Ellis Disease Prevention Lab at Drake University. Elizabeth Heiny, AS’11, was volunteering as a caregiver for foster children in Texas when she became concerned about the wellbeing of a five-month-old. The baby boy wasn’t developing on pace and had poor control of his head. That’s when Elizabeth was...
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State of the state
Before he sets foot in the marshy wetland, Tom Rosburg, professor of biology, knows what to expect. Beads of sweat drip down his face as he trudges through knee-high wetland muck, 100-degree heat, and oppressive humidity. Then the buzzing begins. Gnats and mosquitos race around his nose and ears, reveling in the sticky air. All...
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Making the most of summer
Law student Brooke Yang was plenty busy this summer with two back-to-back internships, including one in Hong Kong for a global law firm.
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The Long Way Around
Kavilash Chawla, AS’98, is global practitioner-in-residence for Drake’s College of Business and Public Administration. His career path hasn’t taken him in the direction he’d planned while at Drake, but it’s taken him around the world—and he wouldn’t have it any other way, as he writes in the following essay: “The Long Way Around,” by Kavilash...
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No Place Like Home
As the smell of fresh baked challah wafts through the air, more than 40 students take their places at rectangular dining tables. A stream of food rolls out of the kitchen while hungry chatter fills the dining room. Gathered around tables, under the Star of David on the mantle, members of Drake Hillel do something...
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Intervention
Pneumonia, or infection of the lung(s), can be severely debilitating—even fatal—to those who are at risk. For people living with health issues such as diabetes, a heart condition, or an autoimmune disease, pneumonia can be particularly dangerous. “I think most people don’t think of pneumonia as a life-threatening disease, “ says Nicholas Lehman, assistant professor...