The Digest
What’s Happening at KVCC
What’s below in this edition
ü Healthful day (Pages 1/2) ü Vets get-together (Pages 9/10)
ü Chef Channon (Pages 2/3) ü College tours (Page 10)
ü Clean water (Page 3) ü Artifact hunt (Page 10)
ü Our want-ads (Page 4) ü 2,500 donors (Pages 10/11)
ü ‘Empty Bowls’ (Pages 4/5) ü Fitness fun (Page 11)
ü Kazoo’s builders (Pages 5/6) ü Resumes, cover letters (P-11/12)
ü Wellness screens (Pages 6/7) ü The Coliseum (Pages 12-14)
ü Relay for Life (Pages 7/8) ü ‘Success’ sessions (Page 14)
ü Looking at careers (Page 8) ü Rock’s history (Pages 14/15)
ü Wishek’s sounds (Pages 8/9) ü And Finally (Page 16)
☻☻☻☻☻☻
Festival of Health fills museum March 15
The best way to ward off disease and other medical maladies is to prevent them in the first place, and that’s the theme of the seventh annual Festival of Health slated for the Kalamazoo Valley Museum on Saturday, March 15, from noon to 4 p.m.
It will focus on how to keep oneself in peak shape, on the keys to having healthy families, on how to establish personal habits that boost wellbeing, on alternative methods of health care, and on tips for personal behavior that can promote a vigorous physical condition.
The free Festival of Health will feature professionals and representatives from traditional and nontraditional health organizations presenting information, conducting demonstrations, providing free messages, and providing hands-on activities and health-related games for children that promote healthy habits and fitness.
The Festival of Health will offer a full compendium of programs that teach people of all ages the ways and means for achieving optimum health throughout the body, including:
l spinal screenings and posture evaluations
l choosing healthy snacks and engaging in physical activity
l the basics of family health
l dental safety and cavity prevention
l self-defense techniques that can boost self-conditioning
l how biotechnology can strengthen or intervene in a body’s functions and how its processes can reduce or eliminate pain, boost stamina, aid deep sleep, and improve complexion
l the life-saving equipment in ambulances
l vision screenings and the basics of eye care
l the importance of rest and sleep in children’s health
l how massage can ease stress
Among the organizations that will be participating in the Festival of Health are:
The Life EMS Ambulance Service, the Bronson BirthPlace, the Kalamazoo Center for the Healing Arts, the Michigan State University Cooperative Extension Service, Juice Plus, the Milwood Spine Center, Great Lakes Health Plan;
Bio-Resonator, Blue Heron Academy, Rx Optical, the KVCC Dental Hygiene Clinic, the KVCC Student Nurses Association, Bronson Methodist Hospital, Elite Tae Kwon Do, The Sharp Smile Center, and Gazette Sports.
For more information about the Festival of Health, contact Annette Hoppenworth at the Kalamazoo Valley Museum, at 373-7990.
Does she have a $25,000 cupcake recipe?
If Dan Mondoux knows that his family will be $25,000 richer Sunday night, he’s not telling.
It’s part of a non-disclosure pact his wife, Channon, agreed to when she entered The Food Network’s “The Ultimate Recipe Showdown” cook-off.
Channon is in the finals of the cupcake competition that will be aired at 9 p.m. Sunday on The Food Network, which is Channel 47 on the Charter cable system. The episode was filmed last August in Los Angeles.
Her “winner” is 4-inch-in-diameter gingerbread cupcake covered with brandy sauce and whipped orange-flower cream. Dan, KVCC’s assistant director of planning, research and assessment, has sampled the recipe’s result and he reports it is “good.”
If a panel of food-expert judges agrees Sunday night, the Mondouxes can add $25,000 to their savings account.
According to an article in the March 3 Kalamazoo Gazette, the family and friends will prep for the evening’s viewing by having a 6:30 p.m. dinner at Mulligan’s Bar & Grill, located at 9136 Shaver Road.
The Sunday-night episode will focus on the finals in the cupcake, birthday-cake and chocolate-cake competitions.
Channon, who was born in Canada, prepares food at The Fetzer Institute, owns a personal-catering company called Renaissance Cuisine, and writes free-lance articles about her profession for The Gazette.
A cook since childhood and tutored by a grandmother, she was trained by the Canadian Personal Chef Association and completed a variety of classes from Le Cordon Bleu in Montreal.
She also studied under a Lebanese restaurateur, learning the subtleties of Arabic cooking and gaining an appreciation for the foods of the Middle East.
More than a decade ago, she began to study the cuisines of history, which led to recreating famed dinners from the past as part of fund-raising events for nonprofits.
Channon now offers her services as a culinary historian for both private and public events. She is also known for her theories of healthy foods.
With a couple of bachelor’s degree from the University of Windsor, she entered the social-work profession, served as an assessor, and did public relations for the Canadian government before the Mondouxs and their three children moved to Kalamazoo five years ago.
She told the Gazette she believed her background in food history and in public relations, as well as her cooking talents, helped in being selected among the nine finalists in a category that attracted 10,000 entries.
Whether her speaking and presentation skills needed in the taping of the program will win the day is what the nation will find out Sunday night.
Safe drinking water is KAMSC topic March 12
Water, which should be Michigan’s ace-in-the-hole in playing the economic-development game and might be what future wars are fought over, is the topic to be covered in the 2008 installment of the Kalamazoo Area Mathematics and Science Center’s (KAMSC) “Distinguished Speaker Series.”
Abul Hussam, a professor of chemistry at George Mason University and the inventor of a water-purification device, will talk about “The Sono Filter: Making a Difference with Safe Drinking Water” on Wednesday (March 12) at 6 p.m. in the KAMC Presentation Center on the fourth floor of old Kalamazoo Central High School on South Westnedge Avenue.
His presentation is free and open to the public. Participants should use the Dutton Street entrance. Refreshments will be provided.
Originally from Bangladesh, Hussam was named one of the “Heroes of the Environment” in 2007 by TIME magazine. His “Sono Filter” was awarded the Granger Challenge Prize for sustainability by the National Academy of Engineering.
The “Sono Filter” is described as a simple, inexpensive, maintenance-free system for converting tainted water into what can be safely drank to sustain life. Futurists have been predicting that pure water will sometime replace oil as a valued resource.
The device is in use today around the world and is credited with saving countless lives among the 137 million people whose water supply is contaminated.
Hussam has earmarked the majority of his million-dollar prize for inventing the filter to making it more widely available.
Co-sponsored by a U. S. Department of Education grant and the Haworth College of Business at Western Michigan University, the KAMSC series “celebrates its successful years of serving the area’s high school scholars.”
The KAMSC mission is to design and deliver educational experiences to selected students who will benefit from a highly rigorous, sequential and integrated exposure to mathematics, science and computer science in an environment where respect for self and others is valued.
The director is Brenda Prater Earhart. She can be contacted at more information at (269) 337-0004 or .
KVCC’s own want-ad network
The Office of Human Resources’ web page contains a want-ad system to link KVCC folks with their colleagues in the sharing of talent, knowledge, skills, goods and services.
The “KVCC Swap Meet” provides a forum to barter goods (made or grown) and to post information about services that can be provided -- painting, sewing, computer assistance, etc.
It can also be used to post an announcement about services or goods that are being sought.
There are four categories on the site: Services Needed, Services for Hire, Goods Needed, and Goods for Sale.
This site is for KVCC employees only and is intended as a way for employees to network with each other for trade or sale purposes. KVCC will not be responsible for any transactions or the satisfaction of either party, and will not enter into dispute resolution.
“KVCC Swap Meet” is housed on the Human Resources website under Quick Links.
To post a service or item, just click Post Ad, select the appropriate category, complete the online form and click submit.
Co-workers will be able to view the posting by the next business day. It is requested that the postings be made during non-working hours.
‘Empty Bowls’ fund-raiser is Saturday
Instructor Francis Granzotto and his ceramics students have created more than 100 vessels as their part in the 2008 Empty Bowls Project, a fund-raising initiative through Kalamazoo Loaves & Fishes to feed the hungry in this part of the state.
The fund-raiser will be staged on Saturday (March 8) from 5 to 6:30 p.m. in The Woodward School for Technology and Research at 606 Stuart Ave. A silent auction of bowls made by professional potters and ceramic artists will also be on the agenda, while area artists have donated pieces made of paper, metal and glass.
The KVCC students and ceramicists in Southwest Michigan crafted ceramic bowls for the event. For a donation of $10 for students and $15 for adults, participants can choose a bowl to keep, enjoy a light dinner of donated soup and bread in it, and learn about efforts to curb hunger in the community.
This will be the third year that Kalamazoo Loaves & Fishes has arranged for an Empty Bowls observance locally. Granzotto and his students were part of the inaugural fund-raiser. The 2007 event attracted 450 bowl-buyers and raised more than $5,000.
One of the organizers is Jennifer Johnson, who is the communications coordinator for the human-service agency and also serves as an English instructor at KVCC. She can be contacted at 488-2617, extension 213, or .
“Hunger affects a person’s ability to fully function in daily activities,” she said. “When the next meal is in question, the person’s ability to function in any setting – school, work, family or community – suffers. This affects us all.
The origins can be traced to 1990 when an art teacher at a high school in Michigan brainstormed on a way for his students to support a local food drive. What evolved was a class project to make ceramic bowls for a fund-raising meal. Guests were served a simple meal of soup and bread, and were invited to keep the bowl as a reminder of hunger in the world.
By the following year, the originators had developed this concept into Empty Bowls, a project to provide support for food banks, soup kitchens, and other organizations that fight hunger. A 501(c)3 organization, was created to promote the concept. Since then Empty Bowls events have been held throughout the world, and millions of dollars have been raised to combat hunger.
Among the sponsors will be Millennium Restaurant Group, Panera Bread, Bravo Restaurant and Café, the Food Dance Café, Irving’s Market, the Sprout Restaurant, and Zazio’s in the Radisson Plaza Hotel and Suites.
Bowls have also been made by Kalamazoo College, Western Michigan University and Kalamazoo’s Chime Street Elementary School students. The West Michigan Glass Society and the Michigan Commission for the Blind have donated bowls as well.
Proceeds support Kalamazoo Loaves & Fishes’ programs and services that provide food to thousands of people in Kalamazoo County through a network of 23 volunteer-run Grocery Pantries. It also supports meal programs at Ministry With Community and the YWCA Domestic Assault Program.
‘Builders of Kalamazoo’ in Sunday spotlight
Three builders who helped shaped the architectural appearance of central Kalamazoo in the late 18th and early 20 centuries are the next installment of the Kalamazoo Valley Museum’s “Sunday Series” presentations about the history of Southwest Michigan.
“Builders of Kalamazoo: Frederick Bush, Thomas Paterson and Henry Vander Horst” will be the topic of Tom Dietz, the museum’s curator, at 1:30 p.m. on March 9 in the Mary Jane Stryker Theater. All Sunday Series presentations are free.
“A walk through downtown Kalamazoo reveals many architectural treasures dating from the last half of the 19th century through the early decades of the 20th century,” Dietz said. “From the quiet splendor of the Ladies Library Association to the towering presence of the American National Bank Building, these buildings provide an identity for the city. Frequently forgotten today are the men responsible for building them.”
Frederick Bush came to Kalamazoo from Detroit in 1844 at the age of 12. In his early teens, he moved to New York, became a carpenter and, together with Thomas Paterson with whom he had gone into business, returned to Kalamazoo in 1856.
Over the next half century, Bush & Paterson would build homes, plat an addition to the city’s North Side, operate a lumber yard, and build many of Kalamazoo’s public buildings. These included the Ladies Library Association, the Lawrence & Chapin Iron Works (now National City Bank), the Michigan Central Railroad Depot, the Grand Rapids and Indiana Depot, and the Desenberg Building.