Meet Gordon

Picture This
Shayla Deviney ’11
Social work major

Shayla loves photography and social work. Though a current student, she is also case manager for a local nonprofit, Girls Inc., where she incorporates her love for art into therapeutic photography with her clients, and into marketing resources for the organization.

Renaissance Man
John Iltis ’04
Music alumnus; professional musician and teacher

John is a performing percussionist whose range spans jazz, classical, funk, rock, Latin and experimental. He has been teaching music for 11 years, and is the founder and director of the Boston Music Academy. Always open to exploring new collaborations and forms of musical expression, John appreciates the breadth and depth his liberal arts studies brought to his musical interests—and the range of people he met at Gordon.

Scribbles, Dots and Lines
Alysa Obert ’11
Communication arts major

Alysa Obert writes because she has to. It’s how she engages the world around her. Recently she’s been turning characters that have been running around in her head for years into children’s books. “Words are important,” says Alysa. “Scribbles, dots and lines influence the way we think, talk, and act towards each other. They can motivate people for good—or cause world wars.”

We Are Not Alone
Gregory Keller
Associate professor of conservation biology and landscape ecology

Dr. Keller's research on bird and mammal habitats often takes him out of his lab and into the 450 acres of woodlands surrounding the Gordon campus. During his studies over the past year, he and his students spotted 22 different mammals—including three varieties of squirrels, beaver, muskrat, star-nosed mole, smoky shrew, river otter, striped skunk, Virginia opossum and little brown bat.

Teach a Language, Teach a Culture
Emanuelle A. Vanborre
Assistant professor of French
 
During her first year at Gordon, Dr. Vanborre organized a French film festival. Along with trips to Boston and Montreal, regular French meals and inviting French scholars to campus, the festival was another way she introduced her students to the French-speaking world—because learning languages prepares us to respond to the world's needs.

Location, Location, Location
Jon Nystedt ’09
Communication arts alumnus

Jon loved Gordon’s location half an hour from Boston—and being even closer to the multicultural city of Lynn, where he was involved all four years with the Gordon in Lynn service-learning program. His internship fueled a passion for urban work, and opened the door to his current position with Americorps, where he helps run a program for youth from a low-income housing development.

Because Math Is Beautiful
Andrea Bynum ’09
Mathematics alumna; high school math teacher

Andrea credits Dr. Richard Stout with teaching her not just to understand math but to see the beauty in it. Complicated proofs on the whiteboard were occasionally annotated by Dr. Stout with “BMIB.” All of his students knew exactly what that meant—“Because Math Is Beautiful.” Now Andrea’s high school students know what it stands for too.

The View from the Car
David Ells ’07 and Dan Stevens ’07
Communication arts alumni; film producers 

The name for David and Dan's film company, In the Car Media, was inspired by a lengthy road trip, but it was Gordon's liberal arts focus that broadened their creative scope and kept them from feeling bound to typical formulas and traditional aesthetics. As a result, they've been sought out for projects as varied as music videos, runway fashion, slavery abolition, and Earth Day.