Students and staff convened in the Multicultural Resource Center in Keefe Campus Center on Nov. 2 to discuss the ongoing search for a new chief diversity officer for the college. Bud Moseley, a search consultant with the firm Isaacson, Miller, facilitated the discussion. Moseley said the purpose of the meeting was to give him a better sense of the needs of the Amherst College community.
Eric Lander, who helped lead the Human Genome Project and author the earliest publication of the sequence of the human genome, spoke to students in Stirn Auditorium on Nov. 9. Lander is a biology professor at MIT and the founding director of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard.
Biology professor David Ratner organized and introduced the talk, which was titled “Secrets of the Human Genome.”
For college students across the nation who have too many interests and don’t know exactly which direction to take in the future, Melissa Kantor ’91 is a prime role model. Exploring a variety of interests that led her down many different paths, Kantor has pursued what she honestly finds the most happiness in doing. Today, this include being a young adult novelist of eight books, an English teacher and, most recently, dean of faculty at St. Ann’s School in Brooklyn Heights, New York.
Life at Amherst
“I was walking down the street recently and a black guy with a mohawk coming down the street complimented a white guy with a mohawk going the other way. So I made a wish. Yeah, I know how miracles work.”
Amid loud applause, Amherst alumna and comedian Aparna Nancherla ’05E began her stand-up stint on “Conan” in October 2013. Although this was her first time receiving national attention for her comedy work, Nancherla has been making people laugh even before she ever picked up a microphone.
Once a biology major at the college, Emily Stern ’83 has now integrated her science education at Amherst and medical training at Cornell into revolutionizing functional neuroimaging for studying functions of the brain. The director of Functional and Molecular Neuroimaging and of the Functional Neuroimaging Laboratory at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, one of the primary teaching hospitals of Harvard Medical School, Stern is a leading expert in imaging of neuropsychiatric diseases.
A Determined Researcher
He has served on the boards of more than 40 profit and nonprofit companies. He has co-authored a well-received book regarding entrepreneurial practice. Now, at age 80, things have slowed down a bit, but H. Irving Grousbeck ’56 remains busy working as a professor at the Stanford Business and Medical Schools.
Huston Powell ’91 has mastered the art of tracing musical tastes around the world. Working with Austin-based concert and festival promoter C3 Presents, Powell has the task of booking bands for the world’s most prominent festivals. Most notably, Powell holds the reins to the annual Lollapalooza music festival.
After his time at Amherst, Powell took an unconventional path to join C3 Presents, the incredible force behind much of the eclectic music, good vibes and flower headbands that the world has come to love.
The Path to C3 Presents
