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Yearly Archives: 2012

Acquiring New Lenses

Students Ponder Faith, Justice, Lifestyle and Policy in the Middle East written by Andrew Jenner ’04 photographs by jon styer ’07 Spirits were high as the 30 EMU students on the 2012 Middle East cross-cultural marched merrily into the Judean desert. Guides had assured them of a short and easy stroll from the Mar Saba […]

Taking the Lead in Sustainable Homebuilding

A construction company owned by Aaron and Melinda Yoder, both ’01 grads, took a top award in 2012 for building a single-family home in an environmentally friendly manner in Virginia. AM Yoder & Co. Inc. was awarded in Virginia’s third annual Sustainable Leadership competition for an EarthCraft-certified home built for retired language professor Carroll Yoder […]

Adventurous Alumni in Brief

Challenged by Amish Runners Jim Smucker, PhD (in management), who was scholar-in-residence in EMU’s business & economics program this spring, and R. Todd Weaver ’87, a dentist in Souderton, Pa., were featured in a long, contemplative feature in Runner’s World magazine (published 02/27/2012) about discovering superlative runners among the Amish. The main author, Runner’s World […]

More Info on Wartime Mental Hospital Service

In the previous issue of Crossroads, we listed 29 alumni whom we believe served in mental health institutions under the Civilian Public Service program in World War II. We asked readers to correct errors and to fill in omissions and are grateful for these responses: “Please add my dad, William J. Rhodes (HS class of […]

More Alumni in Mental Health!

Updated on July 20, 2012 The previous issue of Crossroads, published in the spring of 2012, covered dozens of alumni working in the mental health field. Since then, the following alumni have sent in updates. (We will continually update the online version of this list, as new information is received.) Carol Brunk ’89 // Resident […]

Improving Mental Healthcare

Uncle William did not look like a hero to me when I was a child. As I got older, I came to realize that this Iowa farmer had been one of hundreds of young men who served the nation during World War II by tending to people who previously had been treated as beneath “the […]

Striving for Love Amid Filth and Abuse

Why EMU Has a Heart for Mental Healthcare The first night at Western State Hospital in Staunton, Virginia, was horribly memorable. Emory Layman, assigned by Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) to work as an attendant at the mental hospital during World War II, was shown to a bed in a cramped office, just off the noisy […]

There Has to be a Better Way

By Andrew Jenner ’04 Since the very beginning, the conviction that “there has to be a better way” has been a guiding principle for the Mennonite mental healthcare institutions that were established as a response to the experience of conscientious objectors (COs) during World War II. Mennonite mental healthcare institutions have demonstrated ingenuity and leadership […]

Reversing the Homeless Slide

Not long after becoming executive director of the Good Samaritan Shelter in 2009, Nate Hoffer ’03 found himself sitting in the shelter living room in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, with a young homeless man in the middle of a severe paranoid delusion. Not knowing how to respond, Hoffer wondered exactly what he’d gotten himself into. “You can’t […]

Impact of Faith on Care of Mentally Ill People

The following are excerpts from “An Ethos of Faith and Mennonite Mental Health Services” by Aldred H. Neufeldt, professor emeritus of community rehabilitation and disability studies at the University of Calgary and past chair of Mennonite Mental Health Services. His article was originally published in the Journal of Mennonite Studies, (vol.  29, 2011, pages 187-202), […]