A new water quality research project investigating water-borne disease-causing agents in Winneshiek County is underway. Eric Baack and Jodi Enos-Berlage, both professors of biology at Luther College, were recently awarded a $39,938 grant from the Iowa Center for Health Effects of Environmental Contaminants that will allow them to quantify levels of harmful bacteria and viruses in both ground and surface waters. Luther is the first small college to receive this grant in CHEEC’s 30-year history.

The Norwegian-American Historical Association is pleased to name Anna M. Peterson, Luther College assistant professor of history, as the Association’s new editor. For the past decade Peterson has been an active scholar in the field of Norwegian-American history. She will hold the two roles concurrently.

Luther College faculty Xiao Hu and Du Huang received the Tomson Family Faculty Fellowship award. A married couple amongst Luther’s faculty, Hu has been employed at Luther since 2002, and Huang since 2001.

Luther College presented the H. George Anderson and Jutta F. Anderson endowment to Anita Carrasco, Luther associate professor of anthropology, and Rachel Storlie, Luther alumni guest lecturer in music.

Three Luther College professors, Jane Hawley, Olga Michels and Holly Moore, were granted Luther’s Doris and Ragnvald Ylvisaker Endowment this spring.

Luther College awarded Ryan Torkelson, assistant professor of accounting, the Uwe J. Rudolf Endowed Faculty Fellowship for the 2018-19 academic year. This endowment honors Professor Uwe J. Rudolf for his dedication to Luther College, its students, the liberal arts and the Department of Economics, Accounting and Management at Luther.

This May and June, Luther College professor Dan Davis will take two different groups of Luther students on excavations: Robert Muller, Anna Luber and Zachary Ziarnik, will accompany Davis to Caesarea, Israel, where they will help launch a new, multi-year excavation, and Collin Carpenter and Alex Aakre will help Davis with artifact processing in Southern Greece. Davis is a classical archaeologist who focuses on both ancient shipwrecks and harbor sites in the Mediterranean and Black Sea regions.

Using anecdotes from her personal life to encourage readers to become actively engaged citizens and human beings, Luther College Associate Professor of English Amy Weldon has released a new book, “The Hands-On Life: How to Wake Yourself Up and Save the World.”

Luther College Professor Richard Bernatz recently had two pieces published in academic journals. “The Math Inquiry Workshop” was published in Consortium: the newsletter of the Consortium for Mathematics and its Applications, vol. 112, in the Spring-Summer 2017 edition, and “A statistical, spatial and hydrologic comparison of gauge-based and MPE-based rainfall measurements” was published in the Journal of Iowa Academic Sciences, vol. 124, in February 2018.

“Making Change,” a collection of works responding to issues of hatred and violence, will be on display in the Center for Faith and Life Gallery March 6 through April 6. David Kamm, Luther College assistant professor of art and Gallery Coordinator, created all of the works in the exhibit.