Luther College News

Drawing from his interests in public speaking and advocacy for disability rights, Luther sophomore Mikayel Simonyan of Tavush, Armenia, spent the summer as an intern at Bridge of Hope in Ijevan, Armenia.

Luther junior Madeline McLean, of Des Moines, served as a summer intern at the Patchwork Green and River Root farms.

Luther sophomore Trevor Phillips, of Decorah, Iowa, spent the summer as an intern at Oneota Valley Family Eye Care. His internship consisted of observing and shadowing professionals in a successful non-corporate optometry setting and working with patients as a prescreening technician.

Luke Pulliam, Luther College senior, interned with IowaWORKS, assisting displaced workers and young adults with employment barriers. He helped them find unemployment insurance, gave assessments to pinpoint career opportunities, referred them to jobs and established plans of action for each person.

Developing information technology skills while also taking financial structure courses and job shadowing, Luther senior Charles Mugwagwa spent his summer as an intern with the Cambridge Investment Research, Inc., in Fairfield, Iowa.

Savannah Hartman, Luther College senior, worked for the Northeast Iowa Area Agency on Aging in Waterloo, Iowa, for her summer internship. Specifically, she worked in the Elder Abuse Awareness and Prevention program. The daughter of Jeff and Jen Hartman of Cedar Falls, Iowa, Hartman graduated from Cedar Falls High School. She plans to graduate from Luther in 2018 with a bachelor’s degree in social work.

Sthela Gun Holly Hanitrinirina, Luther College junior, was the Research and Evaluation intern for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s Global Mission unit in Chicago, Illinois. She facilitated conversations on gender justice within the Global Mission unit, which will contribute to the 2019 ELCA Churchwide Assembly.

Megan Gmitro, Luther sophomore, spent her summer among Roman and Greek pottery in Corinth, Greece, as part of an internship with the Isthmian Archaeological Museum. From the Roman port of Kenchreai to the Cummer Tomb, Gmitro processed many artifacts from this area to be catalogued for the museum.

The National Collegiate Athletic Association announced that Luther College senior Paul Blackburn is one of 40 students selected nationwide for the NCAA III Student Immersion Program.

As technology develops, so too does the use of digital medicine and personalizing care. Luther College alumnus Steve Demuth, chief technology officer and head of the office of IT strategy and architecture at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, will present “Digital Medicine: Why Doctors and Computer Scientists Increasingly Need Each Other,” at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 9, in the Franklin W. Olin Room 102 on the Luther campus.