Whether he was working with legislators on key educational issues as part of the U.S. National Parent Teacher Association (PTA) or helping University of Puget Sound students just beginning their collegiate journey, Pietenpol’s desire to help others has been unyielding.
And to think, it all started with a food and safety committee.
Vincent Maurer, who felt drained due to a demanding career in healthcare and the death of his sister, hadn’t ridden since he was a teenager, but as soon as he was back on the bike, he felt his burdens disappear. “It was just this therapeutic thing that was incredibly freeing,” he recalls. “It made me feel like I was a kid all over again.”
She volunteered at a local zoo in her hometown of San Jose, Calif., thinking she was interested in being a veterinarian, but later shifted her focus to human health. As a second-year Matelich Scholar at Puget Sound, Jiang was accepted to a prestigious medical school through an accelerated pathway with support from staff in Puget Sound’s Health Professions Advising program. But it was an internship with the Neighborhood Clinic in Tacoma that solidified her passion for helping patients navigate the complex world of healthcare.
When Maddie Hanses ’20 was visiting Germany in 2019 as part of the Connections 330 course—Finding Germany: Memory, History, and Identity in Berlin—she was intrigued by the Stolpersteine, or Stumbling Stones, that she had learned about in class from Associate Professor Kris Imbrigotta. These four-inch concrete cubes, which are inscribed with the name and life dates of victims of Nazi extermination or persecution, commemorate the last place a person chose freely to live, work, or learn. Hanses said she looked for them wherever they travelled.
Alisun Thompson has always aspired to be the kind of teacher she needed when she was in school. While she loved her time as an English teacher, she also saw firsthand many of the flaws in the K–12 education system. Her new book, Going the Distance: The Teaching Profession in a Post-COVID World (Harvard Education Press, 2024), presents an unflinching yet ultimately hopeful appraisal of the workplace factors that determine career risk and resilience among teachers, informed by the lessons of the pandemic.
The University of Puget Sound Business Insights event brought together students, faculty, alumni experts, entrepreneurs, and business leaders in March for an engaging conversation about leading in an AI-powered world. The Arches team asked President Isiaah Crawford to share his thoughts on the event and discuss some of the opportunities and challenges of AI. Here’s what he had to say:
University of Puget Sound has named Chelsea Herman as its new athletics director, effective June 30, 2025. Herman brings more than 20 years of senior-level leadership experience in collegiate athletics, most recently serving as deputy athletics director and senior woman administrator at California State University, San Bernardino. She will succeed Amy Hackett, who retired in December 2024 after 21 years as the longest-serving athletics director in Logger history.
