Guest speak­ers and artists Miriam Brysk and Helen Degen Cohen have some­thing in com­mon with my grand­mother; all of these women are Polish sur­vivors of the Holocaust.

On Feb. 24, Cohen pre­sented her Holocaust-themed poetry and Brysk pre­sented her art­work on the same topic. Listening to the women talk about the Nazis invad­ing Poland made me cry silently and reminded me of sto­ries my grand­mother has told me about her own expe­ri­ence dur­ing World War II. (more…)

Every February, peo­ple across the nation pull out their wal­lets to spend money on their spe­cial some­one, but most peo­ple are unaware of how Valentine’s Day came to be.

The ori­gin of St. Valentine’s Day is still some­what of a mys­tery. One leg­end claims that Valentine was a priest in Rome dur­ing the third cen­tury. (more…)

The 2010 Festival of the Arts is dis­play­ing local art rang­ing from high school choirs to wildlife photography.

This month-long event kicked off on Jan. 28 with the Festival of the Arts Opening Reception. The fes­ti­val fea­tures 77 vary­ing events in 32 days.

Bruce Dilg, chair­man of the Festival of the Arts exec­u­tive com­mit­tee and FSU pro­fes­sor of archi­tec­ture, said the event was ini­tially started 50 years ago to cel­e­brate the 75th anniver­sary of Ferris State University. The event con­tin­ued until the early ‘90s. (more…)

Speaker, come­dian, and author Jeff Havens will be com­ing to cam­pus to present his lec­ture enti­tled “How to get Fired!”

Havens grad­u­ated as a Phi Beta Kappa from Vanderbilt University. He orig­i­nally began his career as a high school English teacher, but soon fol­lowed his father into the world of stand-up com­edy. (more…)

Dr. Mark Thomson, chem­istry pro­fes­sor at Ferris State University, has been brew­ing his own beer for the past 15 years.

Thomson, became inter­ested in brew­ing beer in grad­u­ate school. A mem­ber of his research group from Wisconsin was a home-brewer. He brought his beer to meet­ings and the deli­cious taste of the home­made beer sparked Thomson’s interest.

The main thing that pushed Thomson’s toward brew­ing was his wife. “I came home one day when we lived in New Orleans and she had bought all the stuff [brew­ing mate­ri­als] and it was just sit­ting out on the front room floor,” said Thomson. “I don’t know what made her decide to do that; I guess you would have to ask her. I’m really glad she did, though.” (more…)

January Jams, an annual tra­di­tion on cam­pus, is bring­ing rock ‘n’ roll music to Wink Arena on Jan. 21 to help beat the win­ter blues.

This year’s head­lin­ing band is Theory of a Deadman. Theory of a Deadman, com­monly abbre­vi­ated as TOAD, will be mak­ing its sec­ond appear­ance on FSU’s cam­pus. The band opened for 3 Doors Down in 2003’s January Jams. (more…)

Mujeres Triunfando, a new reg­is­tered stu­dent orga­ni­za­tion (RSO) on cam­pus, is offer­ing an evening of free Salsa danc­ing lessons.

Although “Mujeres Triunfando” trans­lates to “women pre­vail­ing,” Lissette Isabel, pres­i­dent of the RSO, explains that the group is “open to any­one that would like to pro­mote women empow­er­ment and Latin aware­ness.” (more…)

Several econ­o­mists from Ferris’ col­lege of busi­ness will be answer­ing health care ques­tions relat­ing to reform in the United States.

“Health Care Reform: The Economists’ Points of View” will fea­ture speak­ers from right here on cam­pus. Presenters include Ashraf Afifi, pro­fes­sor of micro­eco­nom­ics, pub­lic finance, and econ­omy of the European Union; Abdi Ferdowsi, pro­fes­sor of var­i­ous courses in eco­nom­ics; William E. Smith, pro­fes­sor of finance, man­age­ment, and law courses; and Roy McLean, pro­fes­sor of micro­eco­nom­ics and macro­eco­nom­ics. (more…)

Ferris Theatre presents Shakespeare’s play

The drama unveils in Vienna; the Duke, played by tele­vi­sion and dig­i­tal media pro­duc­tion major Keith (Keebler) Horvath, sup­pos­edly leaves town and puts Angelo, played by Jake White, in charge.

Angelo lets his power get the best of him; he arrests Isabella’s brother for get­ting a girl preg­nant. Isabella, played by math edu­ca­tion major Lindsay Cyr, is faced with a dif­fi­cult deci­sion; Angelo will kill her brother unless she sleeps with him. “While all this is hap­pen­ing, the Duke is secretly watch­ing and play­ing puppet-master,” said Cyr.

Cyr is excited for the upcom­ing shows. This is the fourth pro­duc­tion she has been involved in at Ferris, but her first with a major role.

“It’s a lot cra­zier being more involved,” said Cyr. “Theater is like a fam­ily, I love the peo­ple involved.”

This is Horvath’s sixth pro­duc­tion at Ferris State University. Horvath said that this show is dif­fer­ent from oth­ers he has par­tic­i­pated in.

“It’s a lot of lines to mem­o­rize with long para­graphs. Shakespeare can be tough to under­stand at times. But I enjoy how much this play has chal­lenged me as an actor,” he said.

“The basic moral of the play is to be hon­est,” said Horvath.

Tyler Easton, who plays a char­ac­ter named Lucio in the play, added, “Basically, the truth shall set you free.”

Jessica Wunderle, major­ing in pre-radiography and play­ing the part of Escalus, said, “This is my first time doing a Shakespeare play. It’s a whole new ball game. I enjoy this play a lot because it’s fun, inter­est­ing, and some­thing new.” She described the play as being more mod­ern and relat­able to the audience.

Tickets for Measure for Measure are avail­able online at fer​ris​.edu/​a​r​t​s​/​t​i​c​k​e​t​s​.​htm. The Williams Auditorium ticket office will be sell­ing tick­ets from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Thursday and on the Friday of the event. Show times are Nov. 12, 13, 14 at 8 p.m. and Sunday, Nov. 15 at 2:30 p.m. at Williams Auditorium. Student tick­ets are $4, senior cit­i­zen tick­ets are $6, and adult tick­ets are $8. Some lan­guage and sit­u­a­tions are not suit­able for young children.

“Everyone should come to the show. It’s a good show and peo­ple get to see me be seri­ous,” said Horvath.

With the change of sea­son comes a change of fashion

As the days in Big Rapids begin to grow colder, cloth­ing styles begin to change across campus.

Flip-flops and shorts are start­ing to be packed away in boxes to take back to Mom and Dad’s house to be stored until spring rolls around. These items will be swapped for thick win­ter jack­ets and Ugg boots.

But who says your per­sonal sense of fash­ion has to die along with the leaves? It’s def­i­nitely pos­si­ble to stay warm and chic at the same time.

As most women would agree, a pair of skinny jeans is essen­tial for the fall sea­son. Skinny jeans are per­fect for tuck­ing into a warm pair of Ugg boots.

According to vogue​.com, small touches of fur on coats is in this sea­son. Also, expect to see plaids, pur­ples and vary­ing shades of gray. “You can never go wrong with a neu­tral, like ephemer­ally cool char­coal,” says lifestyle​.msn​.com.

A per­fect way to beat the cold is to layer your clothes; this goes for both men and women. Both gen­ders can add lay­ers to their looks by wear­ing a jacket over a com­fort­able hooded-sweatshirt. This not only increases your warmth, but also adds more color and visual appeal to your over­all look.

Scarves are no longer just for women. “Scarves are appear­ing more and more fre­quently in the pages of men’s mag­a­zines and are quickly becom­ing the must-have win­ter acces­sory for men,” says style​feeder​.com, “A scarf adds a touch of color to a dark look and looks espe­cially sophis­ti­cated when worn with office attire.” Men and women alike should uti­lize both the warmth and mod­ish look that scarves provide.

The cold weather does not have to equate to a loss of style. For more ideas and tips on fall fash­ion, visit lifestyle​.msn​.com.