I come from a small industrial town in the eastern part of India called Asansol. After earning my bachelor’s in 2011, I worked as a software developer in Kolkata. Although the work was interesting, I couldn’t help but feel that something was missing. Pursuing higher education in the U.S. was my dream, but quitting my […]
A group of serious, hardworking intellectuals published Rivet, the campus humor magazine, according to the 1949 Debris. Circulated as Limp Rivet in 1947, the tome had shortened its moniker by the following year due to the “suggestive” title. “The clever style of presenting campus problems and discussing them with an air of superimposed authority has […]
Super Bowl champ counts blessings as his foundation builds schools in Haiti Anyone’s life can change in an instant. A heart attack, a hurricane, a knee to the chin. At just 33 years old, Cliff Avril (HHS’11) speaks with hard-earned authority on each of those examples. His father, Jean Samuel Avril, died from a heart […]
Change can be scary, especially when it involves creating an unknown and uncertain path forward. That’s been the reality for some former street kids in Kenya, who were displaced from their families because of issues such as poverty and political unrest. They left life on the streets, where they had developed their own survival system […]
Meghan Fay (HHS’06) has a knack for being in the right place at the right time. What else could explain a career that began with a degree in behavioral neuroscience and has included continent-hopping work in law, wedding planning, and luxury fragrance design? Her personal credo underscores the varied avenues she’s taken: “I have a […]
Kyle Fiechter (S’10) knows it’s easy to make superficial assumptions about others. “So many times we conceive an image of who people are and think there’s a box to put them in,” he says. “But then they surprise us with their thoughts or their backgrounds or their resolve to overcome adversity.” That instinctive feeling to […]
It’s no surprise that Elizabeth Harter (HHS’12) found herself bringing hope and healing to residents of developing nations lacking adequate medical care — her grandparents, aunt, and uncle have spent years as overseas missionaries and imparted a passion for faith, sacrifice, and adventure. “I felt called to serve the forgotten, to take care of people […]
More ills than its 6,500 patients bring every month to the Polyclinic of Lidia Saavedra de Ortega in Managua, Nicaragua, once plagued the country’s only pay-as-you-can healthcare site for the elderly. For years, the clinic faced frequent electrical outages, unreliable service, and power fluctuations that damaged X-ray machines, MRIs, and other expensive medical equipment. What […]
For Breanne Lawler (HHS’12), a Purdue student working toward her doctorate in audiology, the moment that confirmed her place in her chosen profession came in Lusaka, Zambia, as she and other students from the department provided hearing assessments for Zambian children and adults. A woman who was experiencing difficulties with her hearing walked more than […]
Alumna improves the lives of women across the world at UN Kathy Calvin would like to ride the Dragon. As soon as she hears that she’s talking with an interviewer in East Tennessee, she asks about the 25-mile stretch of US 129. There is absolute joy in her voice as she considers the possibility of […]
