By Racquel Joseph

When night falls on Friday, August 27, about 6,500 students will rush into the doors of the McLane Student Life Center and marvel at its transformation. In place of the normal crowd milling around in workout gear will be thousands of students exploring organizations, intramurals, and entertainment.

The McLane Student Life Center, commonly known as the SLC (pronounced slick), was completed in 1999. “Late Night at the SLC” has been a first-week-of-school tradition at Baylor since 2001. According to Jeff Walter of Campus Recreation, the event was originally designed as a showcase for the recreational facilities of the SLC itself. The first year, around 2,000 students attended. A few years after, the student organization fair was added through a partnership with Student Activities and attendance doubled. The result is an event that threatens to outgrow the building. Walter describes it as a loud, crowded, interactive, over-the-top three hours that will give students one more reason to be glad they chose Baylor.

More than 100 tables will line the walls, one for each of the 130 organizations represented. Many organizations use the fair as an opportunity to publicize their major events for the semester and recruit new members.

The first intramural game of dodgeball will be in the SLC gym. The racquetball courts will hold dance classes, mini-bingo halls, carnival booths, and mini-golf courses. Students can climb the rock wall and enjoy free food and Dr. Pepper. The latest addition to the tradition will be a live performance by worship band Dutton on the SLC’s outside courts.

The primary goal of “Late Night at the SLC” is to get students interested in campus involvement. The sheer scale of opportunities featured at Late Night gives students the confidence to know that their interests are represented in the spectrum of student organizations and campus recreation.

Late Night at the SLC is scheduled for 9:00 p.m. – 12 a.m.

New radio program updates listeners on former Baylor athletes

By Meg Cullar

Wondering what ever happened to that football or soccer player who was such a star at Baylor when you were in school? Well, wonder no more. The Baylor Alumni Association (BAA) is sponsoring a new radio segment on Waco’s ESPN 1660 that will clue you in. Titled “Where Are They Now?” the program runs Wednesdays between 5 and 5:30 p.m. during David Smoak’s show, “You Make the Call,” which also features Butch Henry.

According to Pete Rowe ’73, development officer for the BAA, the inspiration for the series came from the Baylor Line, the quarterly magazine of the BAA, which runs a “Where Are They Now?” feature in the Sports Report section. That feature is a short update on a former athlete and includes “then” and “now” photos. The radio program features a live interview with the former sports star and lasts about ten minutes.

“We thought it would be great for the listeners of 1660 to hear from some of our ex-athletes about their experience at Baylor and what they’ve been doing since then,” Rowe said. The first several shows feature former football players in anticipation of the upcoming season, Rowe said, but the program will branch out and cover ex-athletes from every Baylor sport during the corresponding season. This fall, producers are planning to contact former soccer and volleyball players, Rowe said.

During the August 4 interview with receiver Lawrence Elkins (1962-64), radio listeners heard the former NFL player describe his most disappointing Baylor loss, explain why he opted for Baylor rather than take a pro baseball contract to play in the outfield with Hank Aaron, and what he predicts for this year’s Baylor team. Elkins also elaborated on his decades-long career working in Saudi Arabia and told about his friendship with actor Robert Duvall.

Elkins was a consensus All-American his last two years as a Bear—Baylor’s first-ever two-time consensus pick. He played in the 1965 East-West Shrine Game, the Coaches All-America Game, and was named the MVP of the Hula Bowl. Elkins was inducted into the Baylor Athletic Hall of Fame in 1976, into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1994, and into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame earlier this year.

For the second week of “Where Are They Now?” the ESPN anchors talked to the other half of the 1960s-era dynamic duo—All-American quarterback Don Trull, who connected with Elkins and other receivers for a total of 3,784 yards passing. In 1962 and 1963 he was an academic All-American, and in 1963 was the Houston Post’s Most Valuable Player for the Southwest Conference. He was a consensus all-SWC pick in 1963, and that year he was the leading passer in the nation and won the Sammy Baugh Award. Trull played professionally for the Houston Oilers, the Boston Patriots, and the Edmonton Eskimos.

During the radio program, a former Baylor classmate of Trull’s called the show with a personal story. Buck Harris said that after he was wounded in Vietnam forty-two years ago, he called the Houston Oilers for Trull, wanting to see some footage of the season while he and his buddies recovered in a hospital. Trull and the team sent several tapes and reels, Harris said, and enjoying some highlights made a big difference to the wounded veterans. “I just wanted to personally thank you,” Harris told Trull on the radio.

For more updates on former Baylor athletes, tune in to the ESPN 1660 on Wednesdays in Waco. If you’re not in Waco, you can listen to the show through podcasts on ESPN’s website. Individual podcasts will also be posted weekly on the BAA website.

If you have a suggestion for a former Baylor athlete who should be featured on the “Where Are They Now?” segment on 1660, please send an e-mail to Pete Rowe at Pete@BaylorAlumniAssociation.com.

By Racquel Joseph

The American Voices tour took its last bow in Lebanon, and with its finale came Dr. Bradley Bolen’s homecoming. Now in the United States, Bolen’s last entry is a recap of the greatest moments and memories of an exciting experience. Thanks to considerably more bandwidth in the States, we can now check out videos of the descriptive scenes in Bolen’s blog and meet the people that were a part of his life for so many months.

Bolen’s blog will continue to be updated with news of American Voices and the fates of the students of the academy.

To read Dr. Bradley Bolen’s blog, click here.

To read the alumni association’s coverage of Dr. Bolen’s trip, click here.

By Claire Moncla

Welcome Week is just around the corner, and Baylor’s New Student Programs department is busy preparing events and activities for the incoming Class of 2014. The fun begins on August 19 with move in during the day. That evening, new students and parents can mingle with the Baylor family during the president’s picnic on Burleson Quadrangle.

The next three days are packed full of activity and interaction as freshmen attend the academic convocation, a spirit rally, and a service agency and church fair. Karen Hall ’05, coordinator of New Student Programs (NSP), is excited about these events. “I was involved with Welcome Week as a Baylor student and have helped out every year since then,” she said. “My favorite part is seeing the new students make connections and become a part of the Baylor family.”

One unique feature of Welcome Week is small groups.  According to Houston junior Daniel Haddad—who is a member of Baylor’s Chamber of Commerce and an intern for NSP—putting these small groups together is a lot of work. Current students must apply to be small group leaders and go through an interview process. If they make it, Haddad and other NSP staff members pair the leaders together and assign sixteen to twenty freshmen to the partners.  “The students are divided into groups based on their University 1000 section,” Hall said. University 1000 is a six-week new student course where freshmen discuss academics and values with a Baylor staff member. Small groups meet throughout Welcome Week and attend events together.

One party small groups will attend is Big Event, where freshmen can dance, hear a live band, and enjoy free food. The Baylor Activities Council plans and runs the event for NSP. “This year’s theme is ‘Neon Lights,’” Haddad said. “They will be turning the Ferrell Center into a huge black-light dance party.”

The Baylor family has not always welcomed its incoming students with church fairs and dance parties. Over the years, Baylor’s Welcome Week has included other traditions. Begun in 1946, Welcome Week was originally called the Pre-School Retreat. It was sponsored by the Baptist Student Union and held annually at Latham Springs Camp and Retreat Center in Aquilla. Students took bus rides into the country to stay in camp lodges and worship at an outdoor tabernacle. The freshmen assembled on a cliff top for vesper services, listened to inspirational speakers during the worship program, and gathered in the evenings around campfires.

In 1978, the university merged its orientation programs with the Pre-School Retreat to form Welcome Week. Beginning in 1979, upperclassmen annually welcomed freshmen on campus and participated with them in a field day, pep rally, and church camp.

Although Welcome Week festivities have changed, the love of tradition has remained. One such Baylor tradition is the Candlelight Ceremony. “Freshmen join with small group leaders and spend time worshipping with spiritual life leader Ryan Richardson,” Haddad explained. “It is amazing to see so many people from different backgrounds all praising God together in the Ferrell Center.” After the service, students take their candles—and like a trail of fire—file out to the Baylor Marina to spend time with their small groups.

Perhaps Welcome Week is not so different from past retreats that seem antiquated when compared to today’s campus activities and big events. Instead of traveling dusty roads to a remote camp and worshipping under the stars, Baylor students now walk solemnly across campus with candles—clutched in thousands of hands—held up to the dark sky.

By Julie Copenhaver

Dr. Bolen continues to travel across the Middle East, making new friends while exploring various cities and cultures. His recent adventures involve shopping in old Damascus, the student piano and voice recital in Syria (preparations for the gala pictured here), and discovering a Syrian myth that ceiling fans cause stomach problems.

Bolen also gains perspective from locals about politics and war, and after befriending a family struggling with war-zone obstacles, he discovers the “healing capacity of music is far greater than ever imagined.”

Don’t miss out on Bolen’s first sights of the Mediterranean Sea as he leaves Syria and travels back to the American University of Beirut, and read about the return of Omar from Iraq, as he takes his very first trip out of Iraq to visit Bolen in Beirut.

To read Bolen’s blog, click here.

To check out all of the BTL updates on Dr. B’s adventure, click here.

By Racquel Joseph

Long before freshman orientation, some students’ first exposure to Baylor’s campus is at summer camp. By the end of this summer, almost forty groups will have set up camp across campus. Some are university-sponsored, some are independent, but every camp draws young people for instruction, growth, and fun. Baylor has plenty for students and parents to choose from, and all campers get a chance to explore, stay in dorms, and, often, work with Baylor faculty.

One of the larger camps, Baylor’s All-State Choral Camp, ran from July 6-10 this year. The camp’s director, Dr. Lynne Gackle, greeted close to 300 students for this year’s program.

“We offer individual voice lessons and sight-reading. We really focus on music literacy, something no one else does,” Gackle said.

The camp is intended to prepare students for the auditions for the Texas All-State Choir. Participants’ days are packed with about six hours of singing. Faculty members in the voice department support the camp by giving individual voice lessons where they can sometimes discover their future students.

“[The camp] attracts the brightest and best to Baylor music,” Gackle said.

Some of the campers yet to arrive on campus will be attending the Baylor Debate Workshop or the Baylor Soccer Advanced Academy. According to its current director, Dr. Matt Gerber, Baylor’s summer debate program has been around since the late sixties. The workshop is longer than most summer programs. Gerber calls it “an immersive two-week session.” According to Gerber, the workshop gives Baylor an opportunity “to recruit for the debate program…and give back to the high school debate program.” The cherry on top? Many of the students who attend the workshop enroll at Baylor even if they are not recruited for debate.

It’s a similar story at the Baylor Soccer Advanced Academy, a girls-only camp. Baylor’s associate head soccer coach Paul Dobson says it’s a trend for players to attend camp where they hope to go to school. Other attractions include the small size of the camp and the fact that head coach Marci Dobson is a former U.S. national team player.

“The information that she can provide is really invaluable to girls who want to play at that same level,” Paul Dobson said.

The camp is now in its third summer, and a boys’ camp is already in the works.

Besides young campers, Baylor also attracts a wide range of people through conferences. The Alleluia Worship Conference will be on campus July 27-30, marking its ninth summer at Baylor. Sponsored by the Center for Church Music at Baylor, the conference allows guests to hear from clinicians like Michael Burkhardt and Marva Dawn on being a modern organist, and obstacles and ideas in modern worship. Attendees generally include music ministers, choir teachers, and entire praise bands.

Summer camps help to introduce new generations to the beauty and uniqueness of Baylor’s campus. In their ability to uncover talent and keep a summer vacation interesting, they are invaluable.

By Racquel Joseph

Dr. Bolen has been busy updating his blog! In his latest entry, you can read about the chaos involved in getting a group of people from Erbil, Iraq, to Damascus, Syria, including a nighttime border crossing. Read about his adventures exploring the city of Erbil just before he left the country and what it was like living just fifty miles from Mosul, a city in turmoil.

Finally getting the chance to leave “Modern City Hotel,” Dr. Bolen explored local landmarks, ran into YouTube celebrities (like Matt Harding, pictured here at Citibul with Dr. Bolen), and recorded the stories of his students and colleagues. Soon, you’ll able to see video clips of his exploits! Be sure to read all about his star pupil and, fingers crossed, potential Baylor student Boran Zaza and how they can almost be considered local movie stars.

To read Dr. Bolen’s blog, click here

Check out the YouTube video by Matt Harding

By Claire Moncla

The Perfect Major: Studying science in college was not a hard decision for Katie Johns ’10, a Houston resident. “I’ve always liked learning about how things work, especially the human body,” she said. Johns said she picked neuroscience because it combined two other sciences she likes: psychology and biology. “Neuroscience combines the two [psychology and biology] to study the nervous system and determine the cellular mechanisms behind human behavior,” Johns said. “I like to understand why people do what they do, so neuroscience was the perfect major for me.”

Award Winner: Along with Rachel Zamzow ’10, Johns was the winner of an award for outstanding research in neuroscience last semester. And like Zamzow, Johns took on a large-scale project. For her senior project, Johns joined psychology graduate student Alex Grizzell’s research on impulsivity. “We investigated a possible brain mechanism behind impulsive behavior in rats,” she said. Johns used a rat to understand similar brain behavior in humans. “An animal model is necessary because currently, no other models can mimic the complex interactions that occur in the brain during emotional behaviors like impulsivity,” she explained.

Importance: Impulsivity is a significant behavior to study because it is a core component of several human psychiatric disorders. Johns listed drug addiction, impulsive aggression, bipolar disorder, and ADHD as some of the disorders that contain impulsivity. “A better understanding of the brain mechanisms involved could lead to better clinical treatments for these disorders,” she said.

Blast from the Past: Johns and Grizzell built their project on past research. Johns said that previous studies have shown that low levels of a neurotransmitter called serotonin are associated with many types of impulsive behavior. Now that they had a possible cause for impulsive behavior, they needed to figure out exactly what brain areas are involved.

The Facts: Seizures are seen when neurons in the brain are hyperexcitable or firing too easily and too frequently. John and Grizzell’s idea was that impulsive behavior was a result of hyperexcitable neurons below the level required to see seizures. So they developed two hypotheses to test in rats, the first involving low serotonin levels and the second involving the administration of an anticonvulsant used to counter seizures.

The Results: “The results of the study didn’t support the first hypothesis, but it did show the trends that we expected for the second hypothesis,” Johns said. “Our results suggest that patients with impulse control problems may benefit from treatment with phenytoin or other antiepileptic drugs.”

Extracurricular: Johns’ spectrum of interest is greater than science and research; she described herself as more than your classic nerd. “I think of myself as a nerdy jock,” specified Johns, who enjoys playing basketball. She was also a part of the Baylor Neuroscience Society and Nu Rho Psi, the neuroscience honor society. Both involve discussion and presentation on hot topics and current research in neuroscience. “Both organizations also work together on service projects like Steppin’ Out and volunteer at a local Alzheimer’s care center,” Johns said.

Making a Difference: Johns said she wanted to conduct research on impulsivity because she wanted to make a difference. Now that her Baylor research days are over, she wants to continue making a difference in higher education. In August, Johns will begin medical school at the University of Texas at Houston studying clinical science and neurology.

Click here to read Faith In Science, the companion piece to Impulse Control.

The Baylor Alumni Association (BAA) recently announced the establishment of the 2010 Awards Banquet — a ceremony to bestow seven of the nine BAA awards, scheduled for September 10, 2010. After much consideration, a decision has been made to move the fall awards banquet to the spring.

The inauguration of Judge Kenneth Starr as the 14th president of Baylor University is scheduled for Friday, September 17, and Parents Weekend is scheduled for the weekend of September 10 – 12. “In order to pay respect to both of these events, along with our awards banquet, we feel it is best to move our fall semester awards banquet to the spring semester. This great new event will now combine eight of the nine alumni awards presentations previously held separately,” said Jeff Kilgore, executive vice president and CEO of the BAA.

The first Baylor Alumni Awards Evening will be held on Friday, January 21, 2011. Please make this change on your calendars.

Plans are in place for a very exciting evening to be held at the Phoenix Ballroom in Downtown Waco. The event will bring together hundreds of Baylor alumni to celebrate their place in the Baylor family and to honor those whose personal achievements in a wide variety of fields are being recognized this year. Former award recipients will also be recognized. It will be an unforgettable occasion, with many special guests and entertainment. You won’t want to miss it!

If you need to cancel a hotel room for September, or would like to reserve a room for January, please contact Peggy Jezek with the Hilton and Courtyard Marriott, at 254-759-5517.

The regular BAA board meeting on Saturday, September 11, is still scheduled for September as previously announced. More information about the Baylor Alumni Awards Evening will be released closer to the date.

The summer 2010 issue of the Baylor Line gives insight into the important cancer research Baylor professors are conducting. But what about students and alumni? There are many different kinds of research done at Baylor, and many undergraduate students have taken part in these research projects. Read on to discover more about Baylor research and the people involved.

Faith in Science
By Claire Moncla

“If you believe God created every human the way they are, is it ethical to cure people with autism and change their lifestyle dramatically?”

When a committee member asked Rachel Kressin Zamzow ’10 this question at her honors thesis defense, she knew what to say.

“I said, ‘here’s what I do know: I know that God’s sovereign, and I know he’s good. People who have autism have autism because he wanted it to be that way,’” Zamzow told the committee member. “‘I also believe that we’re given callings, purposes, and minds of certain intellect to solve problems we have on earth,’” she elaborated. “‘The ultimate goal in our lives shouldn’t be to cure autism; it should be to glorify God. But if you can glorify him through doing something science-related, it’s all the better.”

Zamzow’s belief in the importance of her research spurred her to academic achievement at Baylor: she won an award for outstanding research in neuroscience her last semester. As part of the honors program, Zamzow had to complete an honors thesis and defend it before a committee. She chose to do her thesis project with mentor Dr. Bradley Keele on autism research.

Why autism? Zamzow said she had three main reasons. “I’m really fascinated with the field,” she said. “There are lots of hypotheses and lots of theories, but nothing has been confirmed as a cause.”

She also had an experience that piqued her interest. Zamzow took a clinical psychology class in which she worked with an autistic student from a local school. “Interacting with him daily was fascinating because I was trying to see what in his brain was causing his behavior to be that way,” she said.

Zamzow’s mentor had also done smaller projects heading in the direction of autism research, so the path was set for her—but it wasn’t easy. “It was a substantially sized project,” Zamzow said. “We spent so much time and resources on it.”

Zamzow’s first step was to pick a specific topic in autism to study. She chose to research prenatal stress as a possible factor in autism. In order to study a disease or disorder that doesn’t have a cure, Zamzow had to create the effects of autism in an animal so she could study those effects. Zamzow said many researchers typically use rodents because they are easily acquirable and have similar brain anatomy and function to humans.

In humans, the three core symptoms of autism are communication deficit, social deficit, and repetitive motion. In order to test for these symptoms, Zamzow had to find symptoms in rats that were what she calls “translational”— or equivalent to the three core symptoms.

Rats’ primary form of communication is olfactory, so to test for the communication deficit equivalency in rats, she gave two groups of rats—one group unstressed and the other prenatally stressed—familiar and unfamiliar smells on swabs and documented their reactions to the scents. “We hypothesized that the prenatally stressed rats would be less interested in smelling the swab with the stranger smells,” Zamzow said.

To test for social deficit, she put an unfamiliar rat in the cages of the unstressed and prenatally stressed rats, and measured how much time both sets spent on the unfamiliar rat’s side of the cage and on the opposite side.

Testing for an equivalent of repetitive movement in rat behavior was a little more difficult, but Zamzow found a way. “Repetitive movement can also be translated in humans as the inability to change a routine,” she said. So she conditioned the rats to a routine and then changed the routine. Zamzow said she and her mentor hypothesized that the prenatally stressed rats would try to continue the routine more than the other group would and therefore demonstrate autistic symptoms.

Even though her results didn’t demonstrate a major break-through in an autism cure, the brains of the prenatally-stressed rats can be used in future research as a contrast in other studies. Through this project, Zamzow also found her field of future study. “I am really interested in developmental brain disorders,” she said.

Now a Baylor alumna, Zamzow is very busy. She recently married Corey Zamzow, a senior medical humanities major at Baylor, and she is applying to graduate schools. “I’m trying to decide between graduate school in neuroscience and doing research like what I did for my project. Or I might want to go to a field for science writing,” she said.

With many possible paths ahead, Zamzow is sure about two things: her passion about science and about God.  “As I learn more about science and as I learn more about my faith, I see them coming together,” she said.

Want to read more? Check out Claire’s companion story, Impulse Control.