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Fall Festival To Start Thursday With Taste Of Newton

There are a few changes in the autumn air for Bethel College’s 43rd Fall Festival, Oct. 3-6 this year with most events taking place Oct. 5 on campus. “Though many of the longtime traditions will continue, a few will be ended, downsized or relocated in 2013,” said Fall Festival organizer Dave Linscheid ’75, Bethel director of alumni relations.

To start, the Fall Festival buttons are being retired. “Instead, we invite you to spend a little extra to support the many groups raising money at Taste of Newton and the Fall Fest fair,” Linscheid said.Taste of Newton downtown is the first major event, from 6-9 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 3. Taste of Newton features a wide variety of food from local restaurants, and church and civic groups plus live entertainment ranging from square dancing to choral music to jazz to tae kwon do to Newton’s Azteca Dancers.

The star of Friday, Oct. 4, will be a brand-new limerick book produced by the Bethel College Women’s Association. “A BC ABC Book: Bethel College of Kansas in Art and Rhyme” will be introduced in convocation at 11 a.m. in Krehbiel Auditorium and celebrated in a book launch party from 5 to 7 p.m. in Mojo’s Coffee Shop.“A BC ABC Book” features limericks by 17 Bethel alumni and illustrations by 27 alumni artists (class years ranging from 1947 to 2014). It will be for sale at the party and in the BCWA Market on the Green tent on Saturday, with proceeds going to support Bethel College.

The 7th annual STEM Symposium begins at 1 p.m. Friday in Krehbiel Auditorium, this year honoring chemistry at Bethel. Alumni speakers are Daniel Unruh ’06, Kalona, Iowa, and Sharon Thieszen ’94, Sheboygan, Wis., on Friday, and Don Miller ’85, Winnipeg, Manitoba, on Saturday (keynote, in the Ad Building chapel). All lectures are free and open to the public.

The Fall Festival theater production this year is the classic comedy “You Can’t Take It with You” by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman, with the first performance at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 4 (additional shows 3:30 p.m. Oct. 5 and 2 p.m. Oct. 6, all in Krehbiel Auditorium). Tickets are on sale at Thresher Bookstore in Schultz Student Center during regular business hours or one hour before each performance, subject to availability, in the Fine Arts Center ticket office.

Learn more about Fall Fest on our website.

New Student Numbers Up Significantly For Fall 2013

Bethel College enrollment is up slightly from fall 2012 but an even more important figure is the significantly higher number of new students (first-time freshmen and transfers).

“The class of 2017 is the largest class in recent memory,” said Todd Moore, vice president for admissions. “It has eclipsed the size of any class since the turn of the century.

“I am pleased with the diversity of the class, as well as the additional number of students who are attending from different parts of the United States,” Moore added.

The class of 2017 includes 10 valedictorians, with 15 percent of freshmen coming from the top 10 percent of their high school graduating class and 34 percent from the top quarter.

Other characteristics of Bethel’s fall 2013 student body: first-time freshmen come from 18 states (Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Hawaii, Louisiana, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey,New Mexico, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Texas, in addition to Kansas) with three new international students, from China, Manitoba and Sweden; first-time freshmen represent 39 different Kansas high schools; and 25 first-time freshmen are legacy students, meaning a parent, grandparent or sibling has previously attended Bethel.

Bethel’s overall enrollment for fall 2013 is 482. First-time freshmen number 123 and transfers 74. Transfer students come from 15 states.

There are two additional students from Germany, from the Bergische Universität in Wuppertal, as part of the exchange program that has been in place since 1951.

Mothering Mennonite Symposium Slated For Oct. 26

A “Mothering Mennonite Symposium” will be from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Oct. 26 at Bethel College.

The event will feature a day of readings, presentations, conversations and panel discussions about what it means to be a mother in a Mennonite context.

Based on a new book of the same title (Demeter Press, 2013), co-edited by Rachel Epp Buller ’96, this symposium brings together writers, historians, stay-at-home mothers, church workers, social activists and professors from several Mennonite colleges.

Topics will include Old Colony mothers, gender roles and stereotypes, mothers in the mission field, infertility, sexuality, step-mothering and other-mothering.

The cost for the day is $10, which includes lunch. Preregister by emailing <mennomother@gmail.com> by Oct. 15.

The event is sponsored by the Marpeck Fund and the Bethel College Women’s Association. Learn more about the event on Facebook.

For more information on the book, visit the publisher’s website.

Admissions Office To Attend School Fairs

Personnel from the Bethel College Admissions Office will attend the following college fairs in Kansas, and they encourage children of Bethel alumni to go meet with them:

Oct. 1

  • 8:45-10:30 a.m., Garden City High School.
  • 1:30-3 p.m., Seward Community College.
  • 6-7:30 p.m., Ulysses High School.

Oct. 2

  • 1-2:15 p.m., Pratt Community College.
  • 6:30-8 p.m., Kansas State University-Salina.

Oct. 7

  • 8-9:30 a.m., Arkansas City High School.
  • 1:15-2:30 p.m., Butler Community College.
  • 6-8 p.m., Wichita Future’s Fair.

Oct. 8

  • 8:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m., Wichita Future’s Fair.

Oct. 9

  • 9-10:30 a.m., Newton High School.
  • 1:30-3 p.m., McPherson High School.
  • 6:30-8:30 p.m., Kansas City College Expo.

Oct. 10

  • 1-3 p.m., Topeka Expo Center.

Oct. 14

  • 9-11 a.m., Manhattan High School.

Oct. 15

  • 9:30-10:30 a.m., Highland Community College.
  • 1:30- 2:30 p.m., Junction City High School.
  • 6:30-8 p.m., Lawrence High School.

Oct. 16

  • 1-2:30 p.m., Osawatomie High School.
  • 6:30-8:30 p.m., Shawnee Mission East High School.

Oct. 17

  • 6-7:30 p.m., USD 500-Schlagle High School.

Oct. 21

  • 9:15-10:55 a.m., Hutchinson High School.

Oct. 22

  • 9:50-11:10 a.m., Russell High School.
  • 2-3:05 p.m., Hays High School.

Oct. 23

  • 9:15-10:30 a.m., Thunder Ridge High School.
  • 2:30-3:30 p.m., Decatur Community High School.

Oct. 24

  • 9-10:15 a.m., Colby Community College.
  • 1:30 -2:30 p.m., Great Bend High School.

Oct. 28

  • 9:30-11 a.m., Labette Community College.
  • 1-2:30 p.m. Oct. 28, Pittsburg High School.

Oct. 29

  • 9-10:30 a.m., Coffeyville Community College.
  • 1-2:30 p.m., Allen Community College.
  • 6:30-7:30 p.m., Emporia High School.

Oct. 30

  • 9:30 -10:30 a.m., Valley Heights High School.
  • 1-3:30 p.m., Abilene High School.
  • 7-8:30 p.m., Leavenworth High School.

Museum Program To Focus On Mennonite Settler, WPA Art

Art historian Reinhild K. Janzen ’63, Newton, will speak on “Art Born of the Great Depression: Newton’s Mennonite Settler and Roosevelt’s New Deal” at 3:30 p.m. Oct. 13 at Kauffman Museum.

Janzen’s involvement with the Mennonite Settler began in 1992 when she led the local initiative to restore the statue under the national Save Outdoor Sculpture (SOS) initiative.

The illustrated talk on the only known monument to a Mennonite farmer in the United States will tell the story of the sculpture in the context of public art created with government funding, as well as the role of government and private citizens in saving art.

The Sunday-Afternoon-at-the-Museum program complements the current exhibition “Art That Worked: WPA Art in Newton, 1939-1943.”

The program is free and open to the public.

For more information on the lecture or the exhibition, contact Kauffman Museum director Rachel Pannabecker at rpann@bethelks.edu or 316-283-1612.

Learn more on Bethel’s website.

Worship And The Arts Symposium

The Worship and the Arts Symposium will be Nov. 16 at Bethel College.

Keynote speakers include Thomas G. Long, Bandy Professor of Preaching at Candler School of Theology at Emory University at Atlanta; John Ferguson, Elliott and Klara Stockdahl Johnson Professor of Organ at Church Music and cantor to the student congregation at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn.

Long will speak about “Re-Claiming the Christian Funeral” during the 9:30 to 10:30 a.m. Plenary Session in the Fine Arts Center, and Long and Ferguson will have a response and conversation time during the 11 a.m. to noon Plenary Session. Long and Ferguson will take part in other activities that day, as well.

Ann Resnick will be the guest artist. She will give an artist presentation from 4 to 4:30 p.m. in the Fine Arts Center on “Inconsolable.” Her recent art explores the transitory nature of life and our connections to others. As she considered the visual arts aspect of Bethel College’s Worship and the Arts Symposium, Rachel Epp Buller thought of Resnick.

Epp Buller, assistant professor of art, schedules the exhibits for the college’s Fine Arts Center Gallery. The biennial symposium will be centered on exploring how cultural realities influence Christian practices of marking life transitions.

Epp Buller knew Resnick’s recent art has explored “memories and rituals around the end of life.” Resnick’s exhibit that will open at Bethel Nov. 1 is titled “Inconsolable” and will include work focused on “themes of commemoration and renewal.”

Resnick also is collaborating with local residents to create one of the major pieces for that exhibit.

On Sept. 7 and 11, Resnick had paper-cutting workshops in North Newton with interested residents of Kidron Bethel Village’s independent living, assisted living and health-care facilities.

As part of the symposium, there also will be concurrent workshops from 2 to 2:45 p.m. and from 3 to 3:45 p.m. in the James A. Will Family Academic Center. Workshops include “Telling Our Funeral Stories: Panel Discussion of Pastors and an Undertaker” and “Bedside Liturgy: Rituals of Healing and Dying.”

The registration fee is $50, which includes lunch and supper. For more information, call Mary Regier at 316-284-5250. The symposium is made possible by the Reimer-Boese Worship and the Arts Endowment, and Lucille Graber Estate.

For more about Ann Resnick, visit Bethel’s website.

You can find additional details and registration info for the Worship And The Arts Symposium on Bethel’s website.

Hege To Give Program At Living Endowment Dinner

Daniel Hege ’87, Jamesville, N.Y., music director and conductor of the Wichita Symphony Orchestra, will be the featured speaker Sunday, Oct. 27, at Kauffman Museum’s annual Living Endowment Dinner. The event starts at 6:30 p.m.

After a reception featuring a string quartet of recent and current Bethel students and a gourmet dinner around the circle hallway in the Fine Arts Center, guests will adjourn to Krehbiel Auditorium where Hege will speak on his journey from Bethel College to recognition as a conductor at the national and international level. After his presentation, “Podium Perspectives,” Hege will entertain questions from the audience.

Reservations ($125 per person) may be made using a credit card by emailing or contacting the museum at asa@bethelks.edu or 316-283-1612, by stopping at the museum, or by mailing your donation to Kauffman Museum, Bethel College, 300 E. 27th, North Newton, KS, 67117. Reservations are required.

Please direct questions to Andi Schmidt Andres ’84 at Kauffman Museum at the number and email above.

Mennonite Foodways Topic For 2013 Menno Simons Lectures

A Canadian historian and professor will give what may be the first-ever Menno Simons Lectures at Bethel College to focus on food as

a marker of Mennonite identity.

Marlene Epp, professor of history and peace and conflict studies and director of Mennonite studies at Conrad Grebel University College in Waterloo, Ontario, will deliver the 61st annual lectures on the overall topic “The Semiotics of Zwieback, Sauerkraut and Spring Rolls: Mennonites and Foodways,” Oct. 27-29.

The schedule will deviate slightly from past lectures, with the first one being given in the afternoon rather than the evening and in a different location.

The first in the four-lecture series, “Eating Like a Mennonite: Food and Identity,” will be at 3:30 p.m. Oct. 27 at Bethel College Mennonite Church.

The second and third lectures will be Oct. 28. “Are We Eating ‘Just’ Food?” will be the convocation presentation at 11 a.m. “Eating Across Borders: Mennonite Missions and Migrations” will be at 7 p.m.

The final lecture, “‘Just’ Recipes: Re-reading Mennonite Cookbooks,” will be at 7 p.m. Oct. 29. Lectures 2-4 will be presented in Krehbiel Auditorium in Bethel’s Fine Arts Center.

Opportunity for questions and discussion will follow each lecture. All sessions are free and open to the public.

Find more info on Bethel’s website.