Wofford College

Wofford's chapter of Phi Beta Kappa welcomed 39 members into the nation's oldest academic honor society during an induction ceremony at Leonard Auditorium on May 1.

Three Wofford students joined Dr. Dawn McQuiston, professor of psychology and director of the South Carolina Innocence Initiative, to attend the Innocence Network Conference held April 3-5 in Seattle. The attendees were Sydney Holland '25, Teagan McIntosh '27 and Nick Ross '26.

Cole Anderson '27, a computer science and Chinese major, has been awarded a 2025 Critical Learning Scholarship to study Chinese in Tainan, Taiwan. The CSL program is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State and provides immersive study abroad opportunities for students to learn languages deemed essential to American foreign relations. Anderson, who is from Charleston, South Carolina, was one of 500 students accepted out of a pool of about 5,000 applicants, according to an announcement about this year's recipients.

West DeWaard '27 took home first place at the ninth-annual Terrier Startup Challenge. The student-led business event is organized by the Career Center's Launch Program, which aims to support and guide students in growing their entrepreneurial skills and ventures. DeWaard's fledgling business Raised Outdoors aims to divert wood waste by upcycling wooden pallets into raised flower beds.

As Wofford's 2025-26 Presidential International Scholar, Margeaux Stapleton '26 will immerse herself in three locations across the world to understand birthing practices and outcomes, especially preterm and special needs births. Each year Wofford's Presidential International Scholar is chosen by the college's president as the student with "exceptional potential to benefit humankind as evidenced by a demonstrated passion for service learning combined with a globally minded intellectual curiosity." The scholarship rewards these students with the funding to carry out independent research in non-traditional locations around the world.

Joe Cahill '26, an environmental studies major with minors in Chinese and economics, has developed a passion for sustainability, and he's acting on it every chance he gets. Cahill is now a marketing and research intern with GIC Group, an international agribusiness company specializing in financial advisory services based in Bethesda, Maryland. Through his work with the GIC Group, Cahill was given the opportunity to research, write and publish an article for the Global Food Safety Forum on sustainable food packing and its effect on safety as well as the economy.

On Jan. 15 Schwarzman Scholars announced its 10th cohort, and Chandler Compton '20 was selected to the Schwarzman Class of 2025-26. He will attend a one-year, fully funded master's degree program in global affairs at Schwarzman College, Tsinghua University in Beijing, China.

Wofford College provost Dr. Timothy Schmitz has announced Dean's List students for the fall 2024 semester.

Gabriel Tawiah '25 spent part of his winter break doing community service in Asheville, N.C, which is still recovering from Hurricane Helene. He worked behind the scenes preparing and cooking food, providing manual labor on the farm and filling boxes with supplies in partnership with three local organizations.

Grace Loughlin '27 brought home a victory at the National Horse Show at the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington, Kentucky, earning first place in her Amateur Hunters division. "It's such an honor to get to compete at this venue, let alone win," says Loughlin of the National Horse Show, which has hosted some of the highest-achieving riders and horses in the world. This year, Loughlin was one of only 15 women in her section invited to compete.

A professor in Australia challenged Wofford students Lilly Bridges '26, Archer Meares '26 and Strom Thurmond '26 to write and publish an article on the conservation of a specific bird species. Getting the article published turned out to be the easy part. The real challenge was the rain-drenched search for the declining species and the sense of responsibility the trio of biology majors now carry to help tell the story of the threatened but resilient tooth-billed bowerbird.

Chanson Bullard '26 and Dr. Matt Cathey have been invited to Oxford University to present their research on King George III's mysterious illness at the British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies' annual conference in January. They will also participate in a roundtable discussion featuring scholarship from the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada. Bullard and Cathey spent the summer reviewing royal physician diaries and recording values for information logged, such as sleep, pulse, medicines administered, mood, bowel movements, exercise and much more. The database they developed has more than 100 categories.

When Marga-Rita Van Der Linde '25 was sworn in as Campus Union president for 2024-25 on April 22, she became the first woman since Claudia Albergotti Ruffin '11 to serve in the role. The new vice president, secretary and treasurer are also women, making this the first all-female executive cabinet since the 1995-96 academic year. It's something that Van Der Linde takes seriously but doesn't dwell on. She and the other women on the executive council have plans for enhancing the Wofford experience for all students. "Wofford has done a great job at putting the students' needs first, and I want to continue building on the foundation that the previous student body presidents have laid," says Van Der Linde, who is joined on the cabinet by Simrin Channa '25, vice president; Julia Brooks '25, treasurer; and Geneva Kowbeidu '26, secretary.

This summer, two Wofford students have picked up where they left off last summer. Clayton Hixon '26, a government major from Jackson, Georgia, and Julio Del Jesus '25, a government major from Kissimmee, Florida, are back in the courthouse with the Hon. Timothy Madden '85, continuing their legal internship with the 13th Judicial Circuit in Greenville, South Carolina. Last summer's internship enabled Hixon and Del Jesus to learn various components of law and how they interconnect. This year, they are making connections by visiting courthouses across the state, learning about different specialties in law, meeting with lawyers and networking in the legal community. Madden, a family court judge, has also taken the students to visit the University of South Carolina's Joseph F. Rice School of Law, where he completed his Juris Doctor degree.

Wofford College awarded 421 baccalaureate degrees during its 170th Commencement Exercises on Sunday, May 19. The Hon. Costa Pleicones, a 1965 Wofford graduate, member of the college's board of trustees and retired chief justice of the South Carolina Supreme Court, delivered the keynote address to the Class of 2024. "The capacity to communicate, to create, to think and to adapt are the hallmarks of the liberally educated person," Pleicones says. "These are the skills and capacities Wofford has instilled in you." During the ceremony in the Jerry Richardson Indoor Stadium, the college conferred honorary degrees to three individuals: Betty James Montgomery, Dr. Daniel Baker Morrison Jr. '75 and Tony L. Thomas. Special teaching awards were presented to Dr. Kimberly Hall, associate professor of English, and Dr. Natalie Spivey, associate professor and chair of the Department of Biology. Hall received the Philip Covington Award for Excellence in the Teaching of Humanities and Social Sciences. Spivey received the Roger Milliken Award for Excellence in the Teaching of Science. The college presented the prestigious Algernon Sydney Sullivan Awards to Jack Galbraith (student recipient) and Craig Burnett '68 (non-student recipient). The student recipient of the Mary Mildred Sullivan Award was Arnise Wright. The non-student recipient was Ruth Littlejohn.

Becca Watson '24 arrived at Wofford College with her sights set on becoming an attorney. During the first week of her college journey, Becca, a government major from Chesnee, South Carolina, joined Wofford's Launch Program. Through the program, she gained insights that broadened her business knowledge and started her on a path to becoming a fourth-generation owner of Watson's Furniture, her family's 72-year-old furniture store in Chesnee.

Maggie Genoble '24 dives into complex ideas about the modern dilemma of bodily awareness in the digital age in her exhibition "Touchy Subjects." The exhibition is on display through Feb. 28 in the Richardson Family Art Gallery. Genoble, the 2023-24 Whetsell Fellow, will give an artist talk at 6 p.m. on Feb. 22 in the gallery. The exhibition and the talk are free and open to the public. Each year, the Whetsell Fellowship is given to a student-artist to provide mentorship and funding for a personal project. Genoble, an art history and studio art double major from Jonesville, South Carolina, took inspiration for her sculpture exhibit from Donna J. Harraway's book "A Cyborg Manifesto," which explores ideas of feminism and materialism through the lens of technology, as well as an interwoven connection between nature and machine.

The Southern Guards Battalion Army Reserve Officers Training Corps held its annual tribute on Saturday, Nov. 18, commemorating the 101 Wofford College students or alumni who have fallen in combat since World War I. As the morning sun rose above the treetops, cadets gathered in front of the Charles E. Daniel Building and read aloud the names. Jason Kellinger '24, an international affairs major from Calne, England, played "Taps" on a trumpet to conclude the brief but somber ceremony.

Dozens of Wofford College students were recognized for academic excellence, leadership and citizenship on Friday, May 19, at the college's annual Honors Convocation held in the Jerry Richardson Indoor Stadium. President Nayef Samhat named Josh Lipscomb '24, a philosophy and Spanish double major from Travelers Rest, South Carolina as Wofford's Presidential International Scholar for the 2023-24 academic year. Academic departments also recognized their outstanding students, and a variety of other leadership and citizenship awards were presented during the event.

Messiah Jones '23 surprised himself while teaching at Meeting Street Academy during the fall semester. Jones, a sociology and anthropology major from Chicago, Illinois, discovered that he enjoyed teaching. Jones' time in the classroom was made possible by a new partnership between Wofford College and Meeting Street, a public school of innovation in Spartanburg School District 7.

Promise Henry '25 knew she didn't want to pursue a traditional internship in finance at a bank to gain experience in the financial field. "I have an interest in higher education," says Henry '25, a double major in finance and accounting with a minor in education from Cowpens, South Carolina. "I thought it would be best for me to reach out to one of the finance professors here at Wofford to see what things look like in academia." Henry contacted Josh Harris '09, visiting assistant professor of finance, and Harris introduced Henry to a long-term project that explores the impact of self-esteem in personal finance.

Wofford College's fraternities and sororities held their annual Greek Week the week of April 25 and concluded it with the annual Greek Awards that recognized both organizations and individual achievements of members. Additionally, organizations raised $27,051 for the Grateful Hearts Project, started by Cate Whitlatch '24, a psychology major from Greensboro, North Carolina. The project creates themed boxes of decorations for kids admitted to the hospital.

In a small community in the eastern corner of the Dominican Republic, Santa Rhina Barett Figaro has a thriving business where she sells bread, sandwiches, fried chicken and fresh juices. It was all made possible by a $100 loan through funding provided by the James-Atkins Student-Managed Investment Fund.