At the final Town Meeting last spring, the library announced that the annual “Check Me Out” Award, for checking out the most books in an academic year, went to Emily Tatro ’16. Emily smoked the opposition by taking out a stunning 103 books in the pursuit of her intellectual interests. While Marlboro College students take out an average of 52 books a year from the library, the national average for college students is 12.

Louisa Jenness ’15 passed the highest level of the Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi, a Chinese proficiency test for non-native Chinese speakers and the only international standardized exam recognized by the Republic of China. She passed level VI, which means she has a vocabulary of more than 5,000 characters and can effectively express herself both orally and on paper.

In February, sophomore Chris Lamb competed at the Harris Hill ski jumping competition in Brattleboro. Chris first competed at Harris Hill at the age of 11 and still holds the record for the longest jump there, at 102 meters, set in 2010. “It’s like learning how to ride a bike—you don’t forget,” said Chris. During the competition the announcers nicknamed him “the Professor,” because they saw him reading Immanuel Kant.

Benchmarks for a Better Vermont, a program of Marlboro’s Center for New Leadership (CNL), sponsored a training geared specifically for results-based accountability (RBA) trainers in April. Results expert Deitre Epps led the program, which was attended by a diverse group with deep experience in Vermont, and from as far away as Florida and Australia.

Theresa Chockbengboun ’15 (pictured right) was awarded a Fulbright U.S. Student Program grant to teach English at a university in Laos, while pursuing research opportunities in public health. “I’m excited to spend an entire year in another country and to learn about their culture and unique challenges in facing the future,” said Theresa. She did her Plan on public health in Southeast Asia, including an investigation of water quality and the use of “biosand” filters in Cambodian villages.

In April, seniors Edward Suprenant and Christian Lampart attended the Vermont Academy of Arts and Sciences Intercollegiate Student Symposium at Green Mountain College. Edward presented a paper about the tendency toward essentialism in historical studies of Buddhist traditions. “The idea that there is an essential practice or idea throughout history that is Buddhist is completely against the practices and ideas of Buddhism,” says Edward. Meanwhile, Christian presented a paper on Orthodox Christianity.

With support from a summer internship grant, senior Felix Jarrar spent his summer workshopping a new opera, The Fall of the House of Usher. Based on Edgar Allan’ Poe’s story by the same name, Felix’s opera tells the famed gothic tale from the perspective of Lady Madeline. The main project for his Plan of Concentration, the opera will be premiered next March at Marlboro and at the DiMenna Center in New York City. Learn more.