Albion College

06/01/2026

05/29/2026

Eleven future educators stepped into classrooms this Maemester and discovered their calling. 🍎✏️

The 19th annual Maemester Showcase Learning Fair celebrated students who completed Boundary Crossings—an immersive three-week course where they designed lessons, led classrooms, and lived the day-to-day life of a teacher.

With support from mentor teachers in Marshall Public Schools, these students moved from theory to practice, experiencing firsthand how to navigate leading a classroom while assuming the roles and responsibilities of being an educator.

A huge thank you to the Fritz Shurmur Center for Teacher Development and Education and the C. Robert '63 and Sara '64 Maxfield Endowed Teacher Enhancement Fund for supporting future teachers! 💜💛

05/28/2026

Alex Kotas '28, one of 15 students from Albion’s public health and sports communication classes, just returned from an incredible study abroad experience through Greece — exploring ancient Olympic sites in Olympia, the healing sanctuaries of Epidaurus and Delphi, and the iconic Acropolis in Athens. 🇬🇷

From hands-on cooking classes at Athens’ historic central market to discussions with a former Prime Minister of Greece and meeting the mayor of Athens, the group dug deep into the intersections of ancient medicine, public health, democracy, and sport — all while walking the same grounds where the first Olympic Games were held. 🏛️

05/27/2026

A week in Detroit. A lesson in what leadership looks like. 🏙️

Albion students got to be part of one of the most dynamic stories in American urban revitalization earlier this month when they traveled throughout the city of Detroit with the Ford Institute for Leadership in Public Policy and Service's Sleight Leadership Program.

Students spent a week embedded in the city: touring neighborhoods, meeting community changemakers, and exploring the nonprofits, foundations, and businesses shaping Detroit's future. They toured Eastern Market and learned from its President and CEO. They visited Rebel Nell, a social enterprise empowering women. They explored Oakland Avenue Urban Farms, sat down with the team at Life Remodeled, and saw firsthand how organizations like Cass Community Social Services are transforming lives every day.

Along the way, students connected with Albion College alumni in the area. Thank you for taking the time to mentor, inspire, and show our Brits what is possible! 🕯️

This is what it means to learn by doing: students immersed in real communities, learning from real leaders, and witnessing firsthand how policy, service, and innovation come together to create change. 💫

05/23/2026

Students, faculty, staff, and President Webster returned this week from Poland, where they traveled for a little over a week engaging with history and doing meaningful service work as part of Albion’s Holocaust Studies Service Learning Project (HSSLP).

The group spent last week in Wrocław, exploring the city's deep Jewish roots. Participants helped clear and restore the city's New Jewish Cemetery — the only active Jewish cemetery remaining in Wrocław — pulling weeds, sweeping paths, and photographing gravestones to upload to the Find a Grave registry so that families may one day locate their ancestors. They also took a walking tour of Jewish Wrocław, tracing a community of 25,000 people who have largely been erased from the city's visible landscape.

Their journey finished in Kraków, where they toured historic Jewish neighborhoods, the ghetto district established during WWII, visited the Oskar Schindler factory with a plaque given by previous HSSLP groups, and other historic and culturally significant sites. On their last day, the group toured the former Auschwitz-Berknau death camps and had a ceremony commemorating the estimated one million lives lost on that site.

Participants documented the trip by taking turns as correspondents. Their reflections are available on the program blog at sites.google.com/albion.edu/holocaust-studies-26.

05/21/2026

Spring 2026 is a wrap! Already counting down the moments until fall semester with our Brits. What was your favorite moment from spring? Sound off in the comments! 🗣️

05/19/2026

Albion College is about more than books and classes—and we love celebrating the life moments that happen here. If you’re a Briton who got engaged on campus, we’d love to hear your story! Where did the proposal happen, and what made that spot meaningful? Was it a private moment or a shared celebration with friends and family? When did it happen, and what was special about that timing? Feel free to include any details you’d like, including how long you’ve been together or married. If you know a classmate who got engaged on campus, you’re welcome to share that story too—we’d love to hear it! Please complete submissions by May 31.

💍 www.albion.edu/haben-swaben/

📸 Megan McCulloch-Smith '23 and Kiehl Smith '19

05/19/2026

After 20 years at Albion, Professor of Religious Studies Jocelyn McWhirter retires having shaped this College as a scholar, teacher, and institutional builder in equal measure.

McWhirter authored and co-edited four books, presented 17 papers at international conferences, and was invited to write the introduction to the Society of Biblical Literature's HarperCollins Study Bible — a publication that has sold several million copies. In the classroom, she taught courses spanning the Bible, Greek and Hebrew language, Jewish life, and gender in biblical interpretation.

McWhirter founded the Newell Center for Teaching and Learning and helped build PathFinder, Albion's career readiness program, from the ground up. She also led Albion's Holocaust Studies Service Learning Program to Poland — an experience combining classroom instruction with hands-on restoration of a historic Jewish cemetery — seven times over the course of her career. She also has served as the lead marshal at Commencement and other College ceremonial events.

Jocelyn shares her approach to teaching Albion students and what she will miss most in retirement.

05/18/2026

After decades at Albion, Professor of Earth and Environment Thom Wilch retires having made an impact that stretches from our campus and the city of Albion all the way to Antarctica.

Wilch conducted 11 research trips to Antarctica — including a two-year appointment as the National Science Foundation's Antarctic Earth Science Program Director — while bringing that same commitment to experiential learning home to Albion students interested in climate change, environmental sustainability, and beyond.

As faculty director of the Center for Sustainability and the Environment, he grew the program to 100 students and supervised more than 50 AmeriCorps sustainability interns over the past four years. The produce those interns grow at the Albion Community Gardens and College Student Farm is given away free to local residents every year. The Albion NAACP recognized that commitment with its 2025 Community Service Award.

Thom share his teaching philosophy and the hope he has for Albion students to make a difference in their communities.