Growing up in Portland, Ore., Bella Rodriguez ’24 was struck by the absence of Latino stories in the narrative of the city’s history. It wasn’t until she started studying history, environmental policy and decision making, and Latina/o studies at University of Puget Sound that she started to ask questions about the history of Latinos in Portland. That curiosity led her to dig deep into the city’s complicated racial history and uncover the story of the Cuban refugee community which sprang up overnight in the 1960s.

SOME SISTERLY HELP

Ella Slattery ’25 had only been on campus for a few weeks when she laid eyes on the plasma chamber. As a first-year student at University of Puget Sound, she was on a tour of the physics department and got to chatting with postdoctoral researcher Brett Klaasen Von Oorschot about a project he was working on with some of his students—a small, silver device connected to a mass of wires and sitting on a rolling cart.

“I’d never seen a fusor before. It was utterly fascinating,” Slattery recalls. “I immediately knew I wanted to get involved and learn as much as I could about it.”

It’s midmorning at Driveline Baseball, a performance training facility in Kent, Wash., and Kevin Covarrubias ’23 is spraying a thin layer of adhesive on the skin of an athlete in preparation for attaching 45 reflective markers to their arms, legs, chest, and back. Once the markers are in place, he has them step into the center of a massive, motion-capture camera rig that will record their tiniest movements, track the movement of each marker, and send the data to a computer for analysis. It’s all part of the company’s data-driven approach to helping baseball players perfect their form.

After returning from a summer studying abroad in East Asia, where she was studying cultural taboos around tattoos, Morgan MacFarlane ’21 had a polished paper ready to publish, but couldn’t find an outlet that would take her research as an undergraduate. She knew other Puget Sound students were conducting interesting research, too, but didn’t have the qualifications to submit to an academic journal to share it with the wider community. So, she decided to start her own.

For Zia Kloetzel ’25, who goes by the stage name Zia Blue, the journey to American Idol began on Instagram. In June 2021, just a couple of months before arriving on campus for her first semester, Kloetzel posted a clip of herself singing “Sixty Years” by Sophia James to her Instagram account. A few hours later, she received a direct message from one of the show’s senior producers inviting her to audition for Idol’s 20th anniversary season. It was the start of a whirlwind experience that would take her all the way to the historic Orpheum Theatre in Hollywood.

Every year, University of Puget Sound students are selected to receive highly competitive grants, awards, scholarships, and fellowships which enable them to continue their educations and dive deeper into their fields of expertise. This year is no different, with six Loggers being named Fulbright U.S. Student recipients, two students receiving the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship, and several others earning other prestigious awards.

Ted Parker ’22 fully intended to finish his bachelor’s degree when he first enrolled at University of Puget Sound in the fall of 1974. But after four years—and three majors—he had a wife, he had a job, and he was ready to begin the next chapter of his life. The only thing he didn’t have was a bachelor’s degree.

“I simply ran out of time,” Parker says. “By 1978, life was moving on.”

Alanna Volk ’22 is on a mission to end sexual assaults and promote healthy relationships through the power of sex education. Growing up in Oregon, she was taught a science-backed sex education and was surprised to learn that not everyone in the country benefits from the same curriculum.

On a typical weeknight, you can find Capriana Jiang ’23 at the Neighborhood Clinic in Tacoma’s Hilltop neighborhood. Each night, the free clinic sees about a dozen patients. Jiang is a clinical support volunteer, helping clients fill out their intake forms, checking their vitals, and keeping exam rooms clean and well stocked.