As college students juggle classes, tests, papers, projects, sports, clubs and countless other obligations, few would be eager to invest their valuable time in standing in line for a meal. Fortunately for students at Messiah College, they can opt out of the long lines at mealtime by ordering online before they arrive. 

“Students get so little time in between classes so if they can order from their phone or laptop as they’re leaving class, the food is ready when they get here. That way we don’t get 50 people all at once and it’s a little more staggered,” said Jennifer Whitcomb, operations manager in dining services. “Not everyone uses it but I think for those that do, it’s been really helpful.” 

Messiah students can now preorder their meals regardless of choosing to eat at the Union Café or the Falcon Express Snackshop. With the exception of pizza, all of their food is made fresh to order, which clearly can take some time if several customers arrive in a short window. Now, those who preorder can arrive during the preparation or shortly after, picking up their to-go box labeled with their name and order with no lag time.  Read the rest of this entry »

As Tony Dungy took the stage at Messiah College on April 24, he admitted to his initial curiosity upon receiving an invitation to speak from Messiah. “I read the letter and thought, why did we get invited to a school without a football team?” he joked, and then joined the audience in their laughter.    

However, despite his many years as a player and coach in the NFL, Dungy’s message wasn’t exclusive to a locker room full of football players. He spoke to all young student athletes, and his advice actually discouraged a mindset confined to the locker room. Read the rest of this entry »

You might not expect a historian of Medieval and Renaissance Europe to be among the first educators at Messiah College to volunteer to lead a pilot project exploring the impact of mobile technology—in this case, the iPad—on students’ ability to learn. But that’s exactly what happened.

Joseph Huffman, distinguished professor of European history, and the eight students in his fall 2011 Intermediate Latin course exchanged their paper textbooks for iPads loaded with the required texts, relevant apps, supplementary PDFs and a Latin-English dictionary. The primary goal was to advance the learning of Latin. The secondary goal was to determine whether the use of the iPad improved, inhibited or did not affect their ability to learn a foreign language. Read the rest of this entry »

There is a student organization at Messiah College that has recently been drawing much attention from students and alumni. It’s Messiah’s student alumni council Eyas, an organization that seeks to build school spirit and tradition, unify students and connect the student body with alumni. Eyas was founded in 2006 and has quickly grown in popularity as its members have been creating exciting programming for students and alumni. 

So, where did a council with such unique impact find an equally unusual name? According to Eyas’ website, “An eyas is a falcon in the stage of its development when it learns to fly. This stage occurs right before the falcon leaves its mother to exist on its own. In the same way, Eyas looks to positively impact students during their time at Messiah before they move on to their various future endeavors.” Read the rest of this entry »

Messiah College alum Adam Brock is practically a household name in the Pittsburgh area and here at Messiah after crooning his way to one of the most coveted spots in television—the top 24 contestants on American Idol.

Brock, a native of Washington, Pa., graduated in 2007 with a bachelor’s degree in theatre. While at Messiah, he was involved in many theatre production and served as costume shop manager. He also sang in several musical ensembles. “I loved everything about Messiah,” he said. “It was a great environment for learning and being creative.”

After graduating, Brock attended Le Cordon Bleu Institute of Culinary Arts and spent some time as a demonstration chef at a high-end grocery store before accepting the position of creative arts director at his church.

We caught up with Brock after his whirlwind AI experience and chatted about his experiences on the popular television show. Read the rest of this entry »

Just a few miles south of Messiah College, a 244-year-old farm is the site of an archaeological dig involving Messiah students, young participants in the Oakes Museum Curator Club, and older adults from nearby Messiah Village’s Pathways Institute for Lifelong Learning. The treasures from this effort aren’t simply the artifacts buried beneath the ground.  The great value, according to the dig directors, is in collaboratively exploring regional history, answering real research questions and adopting keen problem solving skills.

David Pettegrew, a professor in the Department of History, and Ken Mark, director of the Oakes Museum of Natural History, are overseeing the dig at the Stouffer Farm, a York County property dating back to 1767. The dig has been underway since fall 2010. Read the rest of this entry »

On Feb. 7, Chad Frey, director of Messiah College’s Agape Center for Service and Learning, and Hope Hess ‘12, student director of outreach, participated alongside Dr. Sybil Knight-Burney, superintendent of the Harrisburg School District, in a round-table discussion facilitated by the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships.

This is not the first time Messiah has partnered with the Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships.  This past summer, Messiah joined the White House’s Interfaith Campus Community Challenge, which encourages increased student service in the community.

The round-table discussion focused on the role of faith-based organizations and colleges in helping low performing schools and a possible partnership between those organizations and the White House. Since the discussion, the partnership, entitled “Together for Tomorrow,” has been announced by the Obama administration. Read the rest of this entry »

This year’s Humanities Symposium, which took place from Feb. 20-25, was centered on the theme “The Transforming Book.” This topic proved apropos in an era when there is uncertainty about the future of the printed book as we know it.

Throughout the week, various faculty and student panels and colloquia explored the transforming and transformational role the book has played and continues to play. There were presentations on subjects ranging from Don Quixote to six-year-olds’ interactions with e-books.

The week’s most anticipated event was the symposium keynote address. On Feb. 23, Anthony Grafton, Henry Putnam University Professor of History and the Chairperson of the Council of the Humanities at Princeton University, delivered the symposium keynote address, entitled, “The Book: Its Future and its Past.” He began his lecture by quoting the first sentences of A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, emphasizing that at this point in the history of book, we “are going straight to heaven and straight the other way” in terms of the future of the book. Read the rest of this entry »

One year ago, autocratic ruler Hosni Mubarak resigned after a series of successful protests known as the “25 January Egyptian Revolution.” Messiah College graduate Matthew Bucher ‘06 experienced this tension first-hand during his four years of peace-building work in Egypt, and he echoes the cries of Egyptian people that their movement toward peace and democracy is far from over.

Bucher’s passion for service began during his years at Messiah as a history education major with a peace and conflict studies minor. “After participating with a short-term Christian Peacemaker Teams delegation to Israel/Palestine as a part of my peace studies minor, I knew I wanted to return to the Middle East,” Bucher explained.

From July 2007-May 2011, Bucher served with the Mennonite Central Committee in the Coptic Orthodox Diocese in ll-Qosseya, Egypt. Bucher’s responsibilities while living in what he explains was the “hub of all church-activity in town” included preparing and leading peace-building workshops and teaching English courses to Muslims and Christians. “In both programs, we emphasized relationship building and sought nonviolent strategies to solving conflicts,” he said.

Bucher attributes his preparedness for his service assignment to his education at Messiah. “Whether thinking historically while reading Egyptian history, employing pedagogical strategies while teaching English as a second language or preparing trauma healing workshops, I noted many times how formed I was from my time at Messiah,” Bucher said. Read the rest of this entry »

From left to right, Jason Long, Michael Adams, and Zach Felix. (Student Anthony Spargo and advisor Scott Weaver are missing from this picture.)

As if it’s not impressive enough to solve four challenging computer programming problems in five hours, a Messiah College team—comprised of students Michael Adams `13, Anthony Spargo `13 and Zachary Felix `15—solved the problems correctly and quickly enough to earn them third place in the Mid Atlantic United States Regional Programming Contest of the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM).

The impressiveness of their accomplishment does not end there however. The team, led by advisors Jason Long `03, ITS employee; Scott Weaver ‘85, computer science professor; and Jonathan Corbin `03, was notified in mid-December that their stellar regional performance earned them a coveted invitation to compete in the ACM World Competition in Warsaw, Poland in May.

Messiah College will be one of only 20 American colleges and universities competing at the international level! Read the rest of this entry »