Author: Brynn Boyer

One student pooled his $2 with a friend to buy a jar of generic peanut butter. Another planned to buy rice and beans. Associate Professor of Economics Shawn Humphrey used his $10 for the week up-front to buy basic groceries to last him until Friday.

Humphrey and 35 UMW students are participating in the annual $2 a Day Challenge, an experiential learning exercise aimed at raising awareness and funds for poverty-related causes.

For the week, they will live in a self-made structure on Ball Circle and spend only $2 each day on food and other expenses. In the process, they hope to raise more than $2,000 for La Ceiba, a microfinance institution, while shedding light on poverty issues.

“The $2 a Day Challenge was born out of the classroom,” Humphrey said. “Education is the primary focus.”

The $2 a Day Challenge, founded by Humphrey, is in its sixth year at UMW. The program is part of the larger TDC organization, which also includes the Month of Microfinance movement and the Poverty Action Conference. This year, several other universities, including Wake Forest and Elon, are holding $2 a Day Challenges.

To hear from students and learn more about the challenge, visit http://www.umw.edu/news/2012/04/02/umw-students-raise-awareness-of-poverty-through-2-challenge/.

The University of Mary Washington Debate Team qualified two groups of students to compete at the National Debate Tournament that began Thursday, March 29 at Emory University in Atlanta, Ga. The tournament, which ran through Monday, April 2, hosted 78 teams this year, all chosen based on a competitive qualification process.  UMW has qualified for the National Debate Tournament 16 times in the tournament’s 66-year history, finishing as high as third in 2010.

Sophomores Patrick McCleary of Shrewsbury, Pa., and Colin McElhinny of Erie, Pa., qualified for the second consecutive year, placing second in the District 7 qualifying tournament, which was hosted by UMW in February.

Senior Peter Susko of Erie, Pa., and sophomore Thomas Pacheco of Baltimore, Md., comprise the second team.  Susko has previously qualified for the tournament and in 2010 reached the semi-finals. The duo finished eighth in the qualifying tournament, securing the district’s final spot for the national tournament.

Results of the tournament are available at  http://bit.ly/NDT2012.

University of Mary Washington’s Department of Music will hold auditions for its annual summer Operafest on Saturday, April 14 from 1 to 2:30 p.m. in Pollard Hall, Room 304. Students who wish to audition should prepare an operatic aria or a classical song. An accompanist will be provided.

The Operafest program, now in its 13th year, is a performance-based class for serious singers of all voice types who want to expand their repertoire in opera or gain on-stage performance experience. In the fast-paced, five-week course students will learn scenes from various operas with staging and costumes. The course will culminate with opera performances on Friday, June 22 and Saturday, June 23 at 7:30 p.m. in George Washington Hall, Dodd Auditorium.

Rehearsals will be held over the summer on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays from 5 to 8 p.m. beginning on Monday, May 21. Operafest can be taken as a three-credit course or audited for $300. Members of the community as well as UMW students are encouraged to audition. For more information about Operafest or auditions, call (540) 654-1012.

The Foundation would like to introduce our new staff members: Gregory A. Branner, CPA, 1985 graduate of UMW, joined us in October as the Director of Finance and Administration.   Shannon C. Williams, CPA, joined us in March as Controller.  Melinda D. Albrycht joined us in January as an accountant.  Greg came to us from the UVa Health Services Foundation while Shannon and Melinda both moved over from other positions at UMW.  Please join us in welcoming them.

Debra Hockenberry, visiting instructor of management and marketing, will present “The Ontological Phenomenon of the Unseen and the Unheard that Predicts the Propensity of Futuring™ within Creative Deviance, Intrapreneurship and Entrepreneurship” at the 21st Annual Conference of SC’MOI (The Standing Conference on Management and Organizational Inquiry) from Thursday, April 12 through Saturday, April 14.

Also, she will present “A Co-Posited Approach to Time, Space and Matter within Intrapreneurship” at the fourth International Conference of the Academy of Management and ISEOR Research Center on Organization Development and Change in Lyon, France in June.

In August, Hockenberry will present “Mother, Must I Start My Own Business? A Qualitative Socio-Economic View of Single Mothers in the United States” at the 2012 Ethnography Symposium at the University of Liverpool’s Management School in Liverpool, England.