Oregon State graduates Alexa Humphreys and Jessica Hoffman are biking across the US. (contributed photo)

Two recent Oregon State University graduates are cycling across the United States via in an effort to challenge assumptions about how Americans, and particularly women, travel.

Starting July 1 from Portland, Ore., and riding to Portland, Maine, Alexa Humphreys and Jessica Hoffman plan on covering 3,500 miles as they bike and camp along the northern United States. The women call their journey “The Ride to Choose,” and say it reflects the myriad of choices one makes in life, including ones pertaining to health, travel, identity and personal goals.

“Much of the theme celebrates our ability to choose to cycle across the U.S. and embrace our privilege as two young, strong, independent, able-bodied women,” Hoffman said. “Rather than focusing on the hardships life has bestowed upon us, we are choosing to take charge of our lives, our freedom? and our choices and actually live.”

Some friends and family members thought the trip was a crazy idea, but four weeks into the journey, they’re now hearing more support and admiration.

“One of the top questions we get is, “Are you doing this alone?” and my response is always, “No, we’re doing this together,”” said Humphreys.

The women, both of whom have previously traveled internationally, estimate it will take around 10 weeks to cross the country. Their biggest challenge, in addition to the physical exertion of constant biking, will be finding safe and legal campsites as they travel.

Hoffman and Humphreys are blogging about their journey, at www.ridetochoose.com. Both women are avid photographers, and are capturing their travels on camera and sharing the photos, along with tales of their journey, on the blog. They hope the stories they share inspire others to consider taking their own journeys.

Jessica Hoffman cools down during the first leg of her cross-country bike trip. (contributed photo)

“We want to get people excited about traveling with their own sheer willpower as their fuel, while intimately exploring this expansive country,” they wrote on their blog.

Hoffman is a 2009 graduate with a double degree in Public Health and Secondary Education. A substitute teacher, Hoffman said she feels her journey can inspire others to realize how physical activity is empowering and essential to leading a fulfilling life.

A health crisis early in the journey stalled for a few days as Hoffman contracted strep throat in The Dalles. By the second week of July, they were leaving northeastern Oregon and heading toward the northeastern tip of Washington.

Humphreys said they’ve encountered few problems on the first leg of their journey.

Alexa Humphreys celebrates after catching a fish with a piece of driftwood and a rope. (contributed photo)

“We’ve had people make us breakfast, invite us into their homes, suggest routes, give us fishing tips, and even give us orthopedic insoles for our cycling shoes,” she said. “This trip has been an abundance of kindness and support.”

Humphreys, who graduated with a liberal arts degree from Oregon State, has spent time doing everything from bartending in the US Virgin Islands to living in Thailand for six months. While she was attending OSU, she met a group of cyclists who were riding cross-country, and the idea intrigued her enough that she eventually put it on a ‘life-list’ of things she wanted to accomplish. And Hoffman jumped at the chance to participate when Humphreys invited her.

When the friends began planning their trip, they laid out a map of the country and began highlighting which cities they wanted to see. Determined to travel light, they each packed 50 pounds of gear, including clothing, bedding, a tent and water and food to last them two days.

Both women credit their Women Studies courses at Oregon State with helping shape their world view and nurturing their personal growth.  Hoffman was part of the Women’s Affairs Task force for ASOSU, the Student Executive Council and the President of the Public Health Club during her time at OSU, and said she misses being a student.

“Having been out now almost a year I am very grateful for all my time spent at OSU, and I am looking forward to building upon my strong foundation,” she said.

With the support of their friends and family, and those they’re meeting along the way, Hoffman and Humphreys can almost taste the glass of beer they’ll drink to celebrate when they reach Portland, Maine. And they hope the OSU community will follow along with their adventures.

“Thank you to everyone at OSU who I ever encountered,” Humphreys said. “You are a piece of the intricate puzzle that makes me the adventure-seeking female that I am.”

~ Theresa Hogue

Eric Stoller, an academic adviser for the College of Health and Human Sciences at Oregon State University, is also a sought-after consultant and blogger on issues of technology, social media and student affairs. He has just joined the blogging ranks of Inside Higher Ed. Photo: Theresa Hogue

During the day, Eric Stoller is busy advising students in the College of Health and Human Sciences and working on web projects for the college. In the evenings and on weekends, he’s juggling everything from consulting projects to blogging to chatting with his 1,800 Twitter followers.

“Downtime? What’s that?” he laughs.

And these days, he’s added another job to that list of tasks, as a paid blogger for the highly popular academic website, Inside Higher Ed. As one of 13 regular bloggers for the site, Stoller has begun writing at least two blog posts per week, focused on student affairs and technology.

Stoller describes himself as an introvert, but in truth, his passion is communicating and sharing with others, especially when it comes to his three favorite topics: social justice, cutting-edge technology and the student experience. He’s been working at Oregon State since 2007, and graduated from OSU in 2006 with an Ed.M. in College Student Services Administration.

Ever since his childhood days using a Commodore 64, Stoller has always been interested in new technology (he’s just purchased a new Droid X phone and is obsessed with exploring its capabilities). But where he’s attracted the most attention is his work in social media and blogging.

He’s given speeches at conferences around the country, including the National Association of College Auxiliary Services and ACPA College Student Educators International, he’s hosted social media webinars, and co-written chapters on academic advising and technology. But in June of this year he had one of his most surreal experiences, when he was invited by Sodexo Corporation to come to New York and film a segment for the company on social media for campus auxiliary services.

Stoller was put up in a hotel in SoHo and found himself in front of a camera in a studio, surrounded by a professional crew and enjoying a brief moment of celebrity as he mastered the use of the teleprompter. His video will be shown this fall by Sodexo regional managers to their higher education clients. He said the experience was both exhilarating and terrifying.

“I’m just a guy who grew up in a cornfield in Iowa,” he said.

It was just as thrilling when he was contacted by Scott Jaschik, the editor and co-founder of Inside Higher Ed. Jaschik had read Stoller’s personal blog and liked what he saw, enough that he offered Stoller a role as a regular blogger. While Stoller’s personal blog receives around 10,000 unique visits per month, Inside Higher Ed gets hundreds of thousands of visits on a monthly basis. This kind of exposure can only open more doors for Stoller, and he’s excited to become a part of a news outlet he respects.

“I’ve been a reader of Inside Higher Ed for years now,” he said, “and now I get to see what’s on the other side.”

Stoller will focus on technology and student affairs, but his other passions will find their way into his work as well. For instance, equity, access and social justice are continuous themes in his work, and one topic he’d like to explore is how admissions offices should make their on-line videos accessible for deaf students by captioning them.

As a consumer of media, Stoller has learned how to use different technologies for different purposes. His own Twitter feed has become a networking group that allows him to conference with other student affairs personnel around the country on a regular basis, and he follows 800 other Twitter accounts, as well as subscribing to more than 350 RSS feeds.

That’s a lot of information to absorb, but it fuels Stoller’s passion, and keeps him abreast of the latest advances and topics, and keeps him excited about the future of higher education and technology.

“It never feels like it is work for me,” he said. “It’s still fun.”

To read Stoller’s Inside Higher Ed blog: http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/student_affairs_and_technology/

For his personal blog: http://ericstoller.com/blog/

To follow Stoller on Twitter: http://twitter.com/ericstoller/

~ Theresa Hogue

Children get excited before the launching of the Hallie Ford Center. (photo: Theresa Hogue)

On Sept. 9, at 9:09 a.m., Oregon State University launched the Hallie Ford Center for Healthy Children and Families, a new research initiative focused on the human lifespan, with a special emphasis on the physical, mental and behavioral health of children. The center was made possible by a generous gift from the late Hallie Ford, and is part of the College of Health and Human Sciences.

The following speech was presented by Dean of the College of Health and Human Sciences Tammy Bray during the morning presentation:

Tammy Bray, Dean of the College of Health and Human Sciences (photo: Theresa Hogue)

We are gathered here on the ninth day of the ninth month of 2009 and you heard the chimes at 9:09! This is a once-in-a-lifetime moment with all the nines being aligned – it is the last set of repeating, single-digit dates that we will see for almost a century. Why all the nines? Nine is an auspicious number in my culture signifying transformation. The number nine also represents unselfishness and altruism, characteristics of Hallie Ford and her family that have led us to this historic moment, in this amazing place!

I am delighted to recognize members of the Ford family with us today – first, Hallie’s children Carmen Ford Phillips who received both her bachelors and masters degrees from our college and Allyn Ford, a long time friend and supporter of OSU, his wife Cheryl and their nephew Drew Hedges.

A number of children participated in the morning event. (photo: Theresa Hogue)

Hallie would be touched that many of her grandchildren came today – Kathy Phillips Bauer, Gerald Phillips, David Phillips, Allyson Ford, and Martina Ford.

Today marks a milestone in a dream that started more than five years ago. Guided by the mission of our college – Taking Care of Life, and the value of a land-grant university, our faculty came together in a series of discussions to create a strategy to address the challenges that face children and families in Oregon and beyond.

They begin to share ideas about ways to collaborate on research, work across departments, involve community organizations and private industry, and engage our students in new ways. Their energy, enthusiasm and creativity were infectious. I knew then, they were poised to do great things. And then, the stars must have been aligned. I feel very lucky and grateful…

Carmen Ford, the daughter of philanthropist Hallie Ford, speaks during the celebration of a center named for her mother. (photo: Theresa Hogue)

First, thanks to the vision and leadership of President Ed Ray, the University strategic plan began to unfold, with improving human health and well being as one of three signature areas. Our faculty aspired to make a significant difference in the area of healthy people.

Second, thanks to the skillful leadership of Mike Goodwin, and his team of OSU Foundation, and the synergy he has with President Ray, OSU’s first ever Capital Campaign was launched and donors and alumni rallied around our shared vision of taking care of life.

And most importantly, thanks to the extraordinary generosity of Hallie and her children, Carmen and Allyn Ford. You inspired us and inspired the excellence of our faculty, and we feel honored to be creating a preeminent Center that carries the legacy of Hallie Ford.

Dean Bray embraces student Holland Snider, who spoke about the impact that OSU researchers have on early childhood development. (photo: Theresa Hogue)

I am proud that, as Oregon’s land grant university, we are truly serving the needs of our citizens. And I want to acknowledge the support of the State Board of Higher Education, the Governor, and the Oregon Legislative Assembly who helped us attain our vision for healthy children and families. During the last session, despite extremely tight economic times, the legislature approved $5 million in state bonds to assure that this dream would become a reality.

Our holistic approach of addressing the needs of children in the context of families and communities is unique and will put our new Center at the forefront. Our researchers are courageous pioneers – exploring new paradigm to school readiness, solving complex issues of childhood obesity, finding clues to childhood and family resilience in the face of risk, and reaching out to rural and vulnerable populations.
You will learn more from our faculty in the Hallie Ford Symposium following this ceremony. You will find that they are doing important and groundbreaking work. Our faculty members are practical idealists making what “should be” happen through talent and innovation. We are honoring Hallie’s legacy.

Director of Government Relations Jock Mills and President Ed Ray talk after the Hallie Ford celebration. (photo: Theresa Hogue)

I eagerly look forward to the day when all of this energy, intelligence, wisdom, and passion dedicated to children and families are under one roof. Our new Hallie Ford Building will enhance our collaboration, and help us even more to attract preeminent faculty and bright students to OSU and to the state of Oregon. When we open our doors in 2011, the Hallie Ford building will be a premier center for research, teaching, and outreach on children and families.

Thank you for sharing our vision, supporting our dream, and celebrating with us today.

“I was a brand-new, wet-behind-the-ears, tenure-track professor who had no idea what she was doing,” she said.

At the time, her department was predominantly male, and Gray felt a little lost and lonely. She felt like she needed to connect with other female faculty members for support, but she didn’t know how to do it.

Juanita Phillips, center,administrative program assistant for recreational sports, speaks with two other guests during the OSU Women’s Network Open House on May Day in the Memorial Union. The network is an expansion of the faculty women’s network, and now includes staff as well. (Photo: Theresa Hogue)

So she contacted the only female OSU administrator at the time, Joanne Trow, who invited her over to her office to talk. The discussion grew into an idea, the creation of a faculty women’s network.

Gray took on the task, and 200 women responded to the first request to meet.

“Obviously there was a need, and we were born,” Gray said.

During those first years in the early 1980s, the network tackled a lot of issues, from forums on how to negotiate salary to how to deal with sexual harassment. Guest speakers from other universities were invited in, and social gatherings rotated around food and conversation.

Beth Rietveld, director of the OSU Women’s Center, was one of the early members of the board, and took over the running of the network for two decades.

“I felt it was a welcoming atmosphere,” she recalled, even when the topics were tough. The network focused on issues that were unique to women, such as how to balance being a mom and a professional, what childcare options were available, how to navigate promotion and tenure in a heavily male environment.

“Some topics led to us taking suggestions to the upper levels of administration,” Rietveld said.

When the Office for Women’s Advancement and Gender Equality was formed last year, Rietveld decided it was only right to hand over the operations of the network to Donna Champeau’s office. Champeau, the director of WAGE, was glad to make the network a part of WAGE, but she felt that the network needed a little expansion to fit in with WAGE’s mission of social justice.

Beth Rietveld, director of the Women’s Center, talks with Donna Champeau, right, director of the Office of Women’s Advancement and Gender Equality, and Kathy Gunter, College of Health and Human Sciences. (photos: Theresa Hogue)

“We want to break barriers down,” Champeau said, including those of class, race and status within the university. So after a lot of discussion, it was decided to shift the network from being faculty focused, to being inclusive of all women who work on campus, including classified staff that were previously not included in the “faculty” designation.

“There was always the sense that we might lose something, but we are going to try hard to provide programming for all areas and interests,” Champeau said.

Mirabelle Fernandes-Paul of the WAGE Office is now in charge of the OSU Women’s Network (OWN), and at an open house on May Day, she suggested that members form their own special interest subgroups, “So that everyone feels anchored in sisterhood,” she said. Those subgroups can be divided many different ways, from interests like quilting or music, to regional origin, to work type.

Champeau said the network provides support, but it also allows women on campus an opportunity to use skills they have which may not always be expressed in the work that they do.

“This organization can address issues to empower women and bring women together,” she said. “But we don’t have to join hands in a circle and sing ‘Kumbaya.’”

For more information about OWN, go to http://oregonstate.edu/wage/OWN. Members can make a suggested donation of $20 or less, but it is not required to participate in OWN activities. The donation will go toward programming costs.

~ Theresa Hogue

Emily Ho, associate professor of Health and Human Science, at the last Science Pub Corvallis.

But in this era of marketing buzzwords and hype, how can we ensure that the plants and produce we’re buying really are organic? What requirements must growers meet to earn the organic, sustainable or green labels? What should you, as a consumer, look for in judging what to buy, whether at a farmer’s market or at the local grocery store?

OSU Soil Science Instructor and Organic Growers Club advisor James Cassidy promises to “dish the dirt” on what’s essential for a healthy underground. And as an added bonus, he’ll talk about “Hoo Ha,” the Organic Growers Club’s food and music extravaganza – a wildly popular annual event!

Joining in the presentation will be Professor Anita Azarenko, head of the OSU Department of Horticulture, and a longtime advocate for sustainable and organic growing practices. She teaches and conducts research on integrated and organic tree fruit farming systems, especially orchard floor management systems, and is a small farmer who grows organic fruit and hazelnuts for local markets in the Willamette Valley.

Kathy Gunter, a researcher in OSU’s Center for Healthy Aging Research and an assistant professor in Health and Human Sciences, speaks at the April 13 Science Pub Corvallis. (photos: Theresa Hogue)

Science Pub is intended to take science out of the laboratory and into the community with informal presentations in a fun, relaxed atmosphere. It is sponsored by OSU, the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry and the Downtown Corvallis Association.

“Science Pub Corvallis” takes place beginning at 6 p.m. May 11, at Old World Deli, 341 S.W. Second St. Information: www.omsi.edu/sciencepubcorvallis or 754-6624.

Linus Pauling, Nobel prize winner who used to teach at OSU, was a big fan of humor. (archival image courtesy of OSU archives)

“We have a lot of humor in the English department,” said Kerry Ahearn, associate professor and chair. “We’re all children of Mark Twain and Tina Fey here – Mrs. Twain notwithstanding.”

Teaching an appreciation of the humor in literature, he says, is a difficult task.

“I think comedy is like good silver – if you handle it much, it starts to tarnish,” he said. “In general, scholarship to my mind usually kills humor. I risked this many times, as when I’ve taught Twain and even Faulkner – who can be screamingly funny. I’ve killed Twain for decades. Twain, who saw pork-barrel politics and wrote, ‘Let’s say I’m an idiot. Let’s say I’m a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.’”

Ahearn said comedy is something to be prized.

“I tell students, ‘If you find great comedy, send it to me.’ Because writing humor is so hard – you can’t be a pretender. Hundreds have written tragedies. Comedy is infinitely more rare.”

Tracy Daugherty, distinguished professor of English, recently published “Hiding Man,” a biography of author Donald Barthelme, whom Daugherty says was “very much a humorist.”

“The most important thing about comedy is timing,” Daugherty says. “One thing I did was analyze the rhythm of Barthelme’s sentences. For humor, a sentence can’t be too long, or you lose the joke. If it’s too short, a reader doesn’t have time for the joke to register… Humor is Barthelme’s mode of seriousness – a way of slipping in very important ideas.”

Daugherty finds that teaching students about humor isn’t always easy.

“So much depends on context. If you’re teaching literature, reading works from several decades ago can be problematic: students may not get the humor when they don’t understand the context. For instance, I was teaching ‘Libra’ by DeLillo. In a passage about newspaper coverage of the JFK assassination, he showed how so many articles were about what Jackie was wearing. I wanted students to catch the absurdity. But one student came up to me after class and asked ‘Is that really how Kennedy died – he was shot?’”

Even when the topic of a course isn’t humor-related, throwing in a few jokes sometimes helps a professor relate to students.
“Humor is critical to my outreach and education work towards healthy aging,” said Sharon Johnson, associate professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Science in the College of Health and Human Sciences.

Her courses, presentations, monthly cable TV show and weekly online and print column depend on humor to get the information across. And in addition, she helps people understand the dynamics of humor.

“I am always looking for a light-hearted approach. When people laugh, they start breathing better. And when they breathe better, they are cognitively more receptive to the information I’m giving.”

Johnson also has a full presentation titled “Laughter – the Healing Power.” In it, she analyzes and demonstrates types of humor: parody, satire, slapstick, nonsense, black, dry, puns and sarcasm. She presents various theories on what makes us laugh, and why.

“I get invitations to speak to organizations of community-dwelling older adults. When I list my possible topics, they usually want the one about laughter – especially lately in these economic times.”

Jon Lewis of English focuses on film and cultural studies, including comedy in film. In fact, his dissertation was on comedy in film. He said it’s hard to talk about what’s funny in an analytic way.

“The minute you start to investigate, it kind of destroys it,” he said. So instead, he places comedy within a historical framework.
“For instance, in silent film the humor is completely crude,” he said. “There’s Chaplain selling hotdogs from a cart on the street: the comedy is sexual, physical, plays on stereotypes – when America was even more puritanical than now. Comedy is always an attack on propriety.”

Today’s humor has its own rude edge.

“Looking at humor in film now – there’s the whole gross-out thing, like in ‘Something About Mary,’ and ‘Dumb and Dumber.’ We live in such a rude culture that those films really had to go far. There’s the popularity of the Jackass films for teens – guys who are sort of stunt men do outrageous, physically unbelievable gags – like someone going into a porta-potty that gets knocked over and dragged down the hill. It’s hysterical in a way.”

Many comedies released during the Depression were about the rich and ridiculous.

“They show that even if you have money, you aren’t necessarily happy – which is a message the rest of us like to hear.” Lewis said. “Comeuppance for the rich and powerful, and someone like Chaplain coming out on top.”

Lewis and other OSU faculty said that teaching someone how to be funny is perhaps the hardest part of addressing humor in the classroom.

Charlotte Headrick, associate chair of Speech Communication who teachers and directs in the Theatre Arts program, likes to quote the actor Edmund Kean to her students: “Dying is easy; comedy is difficult.”

OSU’s Theatre Arts Program meets the challenge of humor head-on. Headrick exuberantly lists its choices of productions of comedy, past, present and future.

“Where do I begin?,” she says. “We devoted one entire season to A World of Comedy in 1999-2000, producing an Irish, an American, a Russian and a French comedy.”

In comedy, as in life, timing can be everything.

“We try to teach students to hold for laughs,” Headrick said. “That means when the audience reacts to humor, the actor should not keep talking, so people don’t miss the next line. The actor should stay in character, wait, and come back with energy.”
In his scholarship, Marion O. Rossi, associate professor, director and acting coach in the University Theatre and director of JumpstART in the department of art, said comedy actually addresses a basic need.

“Comedy is simply the artistic version of the basic human need for humor. Humor is not just about laughter,” he said. “It’s about coping with pain and desire and loss and difference – and the joyous release we feel when we laugh at life’s vicissitudes rather than succumb to them. The connection between humor and pain is so visceral that sometimes we laugh so hard we cry and, more often, we laugh even as we weep.”

Though no OSU scientist is currently measuring, weighing or charting laughter, humor is alive in laboratories and in the field. The Linus Pauling Institute’s researchers and staff are serious, of course, in their focus on micronutrients in promoting health and preventing and treating disease. Yet they are inspired by not only the scientific genius of Linus Pauling, but also his sense of humor.

“He was a funny person,” recalled Steve Lawson, administrative officer, who worked directly with Pauling. “In his famous lectures about vitamin C and health, he would often begin by holding up a vial containing 13 grams of C, saying ‘This is how much C a goat’s body synthesizes each day.’ Then he’d hold up a vial that looked almost empty, saying ‘This is how much the Food and Nutrition Board says we need. I think that a goat knows more about nutrition than does the Board!’”

The LPI crew is known for incorporating humor into their days. “Mainly impromptu– most of it not memorable!,” Lawson said.

“Much of it is irony. And in the stress of trying to get grant applications out by the deadlines, you’ll hear black humor about losing funding.”

Adrian Gombart, also of LPI and an associate professor of biochemistry and biophysics, considers humor essential for scientists.

“Research can be long and hard, and a lot of it doesn’t go the way you want,” he says. “With all the technical hurdles, and hypothesis-changing, maybe only 10 percent of what we do gets published. So a good sense of humor and an optimistic attitude really go a long way toward success.”

He studies the effects of vitamin D, which some researchers are looking at regarding brain function and moods – but Gombart’s focus is on the immune system.

“I do make sure I have plenty of D,” he says. “And I try to surround myself with people who have a good sense of humor. Far Side cartoons are popular in labs. Someone put on our door this anonymous quote: ‘It may look like we aren’t doing anything, but at the cellular level we are really quite busy.’”

~ Jana Zvibleman