Steve and Lois Alderfer (behind) have a trio of offspring enrolled at EMU: (from front left) Josh, Elizabeth, Andrew. (photo courtesy of the Alderfers)
Basketball players, religious studies majors, Iraqi STEM students, and missionary kids are among the 100 siblings who have chosen to attend EMU together.
The EMU database contains 46 family names associated with siblings enrolled in the fall of 2014. Three families have a trio of offspring enrolled, including two sets of parents who themselves graduated from EMU: Steve and Lois Alderfer ’86, parents of first-year Andrew, third-year Josh, and fourth-year Elizabeth; and Pat and Kathy King ’81, parents of triplets who are sophomores, Emma, Isaac and Rachel. A third trio of sophomores: Kennedy I. Okereke and twins Chidera T. and Chinazo A. Nwankwo, children of Theodora Nwankwo.
Not surprisingly, the largest cluster of siblings (14 sets) come from Harrisonburg and vicinity. Besides Virginia, home states of siblings are: Pennsylvania (12 families in nine municipalities); Ohio (eight families, all in different locations), two sets of siblings from Maryland, and one set each from Goshen, Indiana; Wellman, Iowa; Rochester, New York; Plymouth, Minnesota; Puyallup, Washington; and Charles Town, West Virginia.
The 46 surnames of siblings culled from EMU’s database in October 2014 are: Alderfer, Baltimore, Barrett, Beachy, Bills, Bishop, Blosser (two different families), Clemens, Cox, Driediger, Dutcher, Ferrell, Gallardo, Gish, Gonzalez, Graber, Hartzler, Jones, Kauffman, King, Kiser, Kratz, Longenecker, Luther, Mack-Boll, Mansoor, Martin, Mast, Miller, Mumaw, Myers, Nafziger, Nussbaum, Okereke, Patterson, Poplett, Raber, Salladay, Shenk-Moreno, Sprunger, Treichel, Trotter, Weaver, Wengerd, Ygarza, and Yoder.
The stories of three sets of siblings recently on campus can be read on EMU’s news blog: emu.edu/siblings. The three sets are:
1. Austin, Aaron and Adrian Ardron, commuters from Fishersville, 30 miles south of Harrisonburg. They are the sons of healthcare professionals and were attracted to EMU due to its strong reputation in nursing and pre-med preparation.
2. Shawn and Kevin Treichel, brothers from Philadelphia who grew up in and out of foster care and who are both interested in psychology-oriented careers.
3. Sisters Alicia and Katrina Poplett of Plymouth, Minnesota, both of whom perform musically at EMU. Alicia is majoring in elementary education and Spanish; Katrina is interested in peacebuilding. — Randi B. Hagi and Bonnie Price Lofton