WRFH/Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM - Collegian Week in Review: September 25th, 2025

Episode Date: September 26, 2025

On this episode of the Collegian Week in Review, hosts Catherine Maxwell, Alessia Sandala, and Megan Li first discuss the top headlines of this week's Collegian. Then, they talk to Christian Papillon about homecoming. Finally, they talk to Ellie Fromm about Dr. Arnn's recent announcement about the latest recipients of honorary degrees from Hillsdale.

Welcome to the Collegian Weekend Review on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. Here are your hosts, Alessia Sandela, Catherine Maxwell, and Megan Lee. Welcome to the Collegian Week in Review, where we give you an inside look into Michigan's oldest college newspaper. We're your host, Alessia Sandela, Megan Lee, and Catherine Maxwell. And today we'll be talking to assistant sports editor Christian Papillon about homecoming updates. and news editor Ellie Fromm about an announcement college president Larry Arn-made during his speech at Charlie Kirk's memorial service. But first, here are this week's top headlines. In features this week, social media manager Sky Graham wrote about August Edmund,

a sophomore who worked at a counselor in the world's largest youth camp in the backcountry of New Mexico. Endman was at this campsite named Whiteman Vega, the northernmost camp at Philmont Scout Ranch, which is the world's largest youth camp, spanning 140,000 and 177 acres of mountainous terrain. So on the features page, there are these pictures that Edmund took of him hiking through lots of grassy mountain area, sweeping views of the sky. And it looked like a beautiful place. And Edmund was there for most of the summer, clearing trails that had fallen into disrepair. So a lot of physical labor, lots of lifting and cutting tree trunks and things like that. Executive editor Mora Gleason wrote about a 100-year-old theater pipe organ that will be returning to its original home in Hillsdale's Dawn Theater this fall. This organ called the Willitser Pipe Organ,

was originally installed in the Dawn Theater in 1925, but it eventually fell out of use and was removed in the 1940s. After moving around between several different storage facilities with two additional installations and a three-year restoration process, it will soon be coming back to the Dawn Theater. And there are some really cool pictures of what the organ looks like, the process that has been undertaken to restore this organ, and a lot of other things in the article by Morric Gleason. And finally, there is a question and answer section with the Radio Hall of Famer Lee Harris, who visited campus last Thursday to talk about how to cover breaking news.

Lee Harris is a very seasoned radio broadcaster who has been on the air since he was 13 years old and is still doing the same work now. To see Harris' really cool story and his extensive radio experience all across the country, take a look at the Q&A on the features page. In culture this week, the top story was about Ballet Hartford's performance at Hillsdale College. The choreographer had visited Hillsdale last spring to teach Tower Dancers a master class about the ballet she choreographed. and they invited her back for the Ballet Hartford's performance to Mozart music.

Also on the front page of culture is a behind-the-scenes article about the winning homecoming banners, including Off-Campus Coalition's winning banner featuring their Instagram post and the banners for Olds, Calloway, Needfelt, and Simpson. Culture also featured a variety of music reviews this week. Writers recommended listening to the new 21 Pilots album Breach and rapper Tom McDonald's new single, Charlie, written in the wake of Charlie Kirk's assassination. Writers did not recommend Ed Sheeran's new album,

play, calling it dull and saying it doesn't make use of his full talent. And Culture's professor this week for Professor's Picks is Dr. Charles Steele, Associate Professor of Economics, with some really cool Russian suggestions in music, book, and movie. Shout out to Dr. Steele, if you're listening. In news this week, we have a piece about the new financial aid director, Jimmy Criswell. Chris Well is coming to Hillsdale College after 20 years of experience in college financial aid. He's worked at Dallas Baptist University and Chris Well College, no relation to him, even though they share a name. And he's very excited to be at Hillsdale. He said he and his family, quote, came here for a challenge.

Everybody here, they're doers. They're taking their work seriously. The students are taking their work seriously. The students are taking their education seriously. They take their faith seriously. They're involved in the community. It's really spectacular, end quote. The new hire comes as former financial aid director, Rich Mogenberg, is becoming the director

of Hayden Park. The former director of Hayden Bark, Wild Bill Lundberg, retired at the end of last year, and Rich Mogenberg will be taking over that job. He said he'll still be working with students through the student. activities office, club sports activities, and of course, the athletic department. And he's excited to still be serving the college and still interact with students. Mogenberg will be assisting Chris Well in the meantime, helping Chris Well adjust to Hillsdale and the way financial aid works here.

Both Chris Well and Muggenberg said that the major difference with financial aid at Hillsdale is that the college doesn't accept any federal funding or federal aid, whereas all of the schools where Chriswell previously worked did accept federal aid. So that will be an adjustment, but they both think the transition will go really well, and they're both excited for these new opportunities. Another bit of news from this week was that the goal program here at Hillsdale College our volunteering services was awarded a grant from the Hillsdale County Community Foundation of a total of $25,778 earlier this month. And this is HCCF's eighth consecutive year providing financial support to the

college's volunteering program. The money is going to support 19 of the 26 school programs here on campus. and they're going to allow these programs to buy new materials and equipment, as well as supplies for various events. The goal program A Few Good Men, which does yard work, home repair, and other service projects, is going to buy new chainsaws and replace its yearly supplies with some of that grant money. In City News this week, Dennis Cook, also known as Gate Guy, endorsed Matthew Bentley for Mayor of Hillsdale in an Instagram post this summer. He said that his major issue was the road diet, and he supports Bentley's position on that. Cook said that the road diet would impact his coworkers because they would be able to spend less time with their families due to the additional traffic that the road diet would cause. Bentley opposes the road diet, mostly due to the bike lanes, which are a part of the plan,

and supporters of the road diet say that it will help to increase safety on M99. Also in City News this week, Camp Hope is planning to become a permanent homeless shelter. A storage facility behind Hillsdale Community Thrift will be repurposed into the shelter and will be renamed Hope Harbor. Camp Hope had faced a 14-day deadline to get their make-reform. shift tent shelter up to code, and after meeting that deadline, they decided to shift to a permanent shelter. Additionally, Lyme disease cases in Hillsdale County have nearly quadrupled in the last year, according to local health officials. Lyme disease is a bacterial infection that can manifest as a

bull's eye rash, can come with fever and muscle aches, and it's contracted from a bite from an infected tick. To avoid Lyme disease, local health officials suggest wearing long pants and long sleeves when going into the woods, wearing insect repellent, and also checking for ticks when you return inside. This year is the 175th year of the most popular fair on earth. Megan, you went to the fair this year. What was your experience? It was a great time. Me, Lauren Bixler, the writer of this piece, and Sophia Mantz, visited the fair. on Monday evening, I believe. And we didn't go on any rise. Unfortunately, we were just walking around, looking at things, buying food. We got to see the live birthing tent. Unfortunately, no live births were occurring at the time. But there were some very cute baby lambs that I think had just

been born earlier that day. And of course, there was the chick displayed, which was very cute. and we kind of stood from afar and watched all of the rides, some of which looked really crazy if you look at the graphic on the page. And there was so many good food options there. There was elephant ear, fries, funnel cake, candied apples, and everything. It was a really good opportunity just to get away from the college campus for a bit and go into the town and see the people of the town, which I feel like living here on this campus, you don't get to see as much of. So it was a great experience and it's very cool that it's the 175th year. There's so much culture and so much history behind this fair.

And it's just a beautiful place to see the community. Also in City News, a new Asian takeout service is coming soon. The business is called Akitsu Kitchen and will open on October 2nd. It is located in the Don Park Catering Kitchen, which, which is in the same building as Rough Draft, and the weekly menu can be seen in Rough Draft, Akitsu Kitchen will serve a variety of specialty Asian dishes that chef Vincent Kenyte will cook specially for customers.

A Vietnam War veteran was honored for his community service on Monday. The honoree is retired U.S. Army Major Brian Peacock. He has been a member of the Jonesville American Legion for over 40 years and currently serves as the first vice commander of the Jonesville Post. Peacock visits veterans in care facilities and drives them to VA hospitals, and he's also an active member of the Legion Honor Guard. Jennifer Warts, who's the state representative that represents Hillsdale, she was there and actually handed him the award. And then lastly, in City News, we had a news section called Hillsdale History. This was something that I put together using my love of historical research.

and a fun fact, on September 2nd, 1971, a Quincy manufacturing plant was destroyed and a massive fire that could be seen from Hillsdale. On September 3rd, 1836, the first train made its way from Toledo to Adrian. On September 14th, 1840, the first moves were made in the creation of a local school district. Also in September of 1840, Hillsdale County Native Americans were forced to move west by the United States government. On September 22nd, 1814, Chauncey Washington Ferris, a father of the city of Hillsdale, was born. That's all for this week's top stories, and now we will be transitioning to interviews with Assistant Sports Editor Christian Papillon and News Editor Ellie From. This is the Collegian Week in Review.

I'm Megan, and here we have Assistant Sports Editor Christian Papillon talking to about our updates from Hillsdale College's homecoming. So, Christian, could you tell us what the current team standings of homecoming are as of this recording? Sure. So as of this recording, Simpson currently leads. They have 385 points. OCC is in second with 325. Then there's Neidfeld with 300, Callaway with 270, and then Olds is in fifth with 255. Simpson is in the lead after winning the trivia competition on Wednesday night, which came down to a four-way tie. Christian, what was the question and what was the winning answer? So the tie-breaking question was, how far is the Earth from Mars at their most distant points? And the winning answer was 232.5 million miles, which was pretty close to the

actual correct answer of 249. Now, the Simpson trivia team captain said the team didn't know the answer immediately, but they were able to do some math to figure it out. How did they calculate their guess? So one of their team members knew the distance in astronomical units, which one astronomical unit is how far the Earth is from the sun. And then they used that to multiply by a number of astronomical units to figure out the correct answer. And they got pretty close doing that. They told me the reason for the discrepancy was they used the average distance from the sun instead of the maximum, which, I mean, it doesn't really matter. It was pretty close. I cannot imagine knowing any distance in astronomical units. So good for Simpson. What were some of the other trivia category questions?

We had a lot of questions on Star Wars trivia. You know, what's Emperor Palpatine? first name and we had basic astronomy questions, maybe not basic, but traditional astronomy questions. And there was space pop culture, so non-star Wars space trivia, like sci-fi. Can you guys remember a time when Olds has placed? Overall, not in my recent memory. I just know Olds at McIntyre have never placed in the final homecoming rankings. Olds is doing really good. For a freshman girls dorm, they have a difficult time getting a homecoming team together. It's tough because the freshmen don't know homecoming. They don't know how the strategies and everything that people who are seniors are able to kind of, they have the cracked code, I guess.

So that's one advantage that the guys dorms have over the girls dorms, at least the freshman ones. Christian, could you tell us a little bit about the rankings for banner and for the video that are two of the major events that have happened already? Yeah, so OCC opened the week pretty strong with a banner on banner drop. It was a nice banner. It was an Instagram post saying Dr. Arns announcing the campus is moving to Mars. And it was pretty funny. It was well done. You had all the outer planets in the background of Central Hall.

And then all the banners this year have been really strong. Olds did a good one. Calloway had a really good banner. Neatfeld had an awesome one. It's just been a really strong slate of banners this year. And Christian, if you're on campus during the day, you might see a horde of people running around looking for something. How does the scavenger hunt work? And who has been leading that? So apparently it's the RAs that have to do the scavenger hunt. I have no idea what they're actually looking for, but it's the dorm RAs and they do the scavenger hunt and win extra points for their team. Of course, the whole week is leading up to the Mock Rock competition on Saturday night. But before Mock Rock, we've got the homecoming football game. When is that and who's playing?

So the football game is going to be at 2 p.m. it's going to be the Chargers, or they're going to face Kentucky Wesleyan University. And the games earlier this year, which is kind of nice, because if students want to, they can go for most of the game and still make it to Machrock, where in the past, the game started, I think, at 4 o'clock, and that runs right into mock rock. So I think it's better scheduling-wise this year. I agree. I remember the stadium just emptying out at halftime in previous years, so everyone could change and save spot. for mock rock. What's the Chargers record going into this game? The Chargers have one win and two losses this year. They won their opening game and now they're on a two-game losing streak,

but Homecoming is a great opportunity to turn that around. And they're still very much in this season. They've just started conference play. They have a record of starting slow and then finishing on a tear. So we'll see if that's the case this year too. Well, we all wish them good luck. That was Assistant Sports Editor Christian Poppeon joining us for Homecoming News. Thank you so much, Christian. Thank you. The Collegian Weekend Review continues. We're here with news editor Ellie Fromm to talk about an announcement

College President Larry Arne made during his speech at the memorial service for Charlie Kirk. Ellie, what was Arne's announcement? Arn announced that Charlie and Erica will be. be receiving honorary Hillsdale degrees this May at commencement with the graduating senior class. What was Arne's motivation for giving the Kirk's these honorary degrees? He mentioned that Charlie took 31 online courses and texted him every single time that he completed one of these courses, a picture of the certificate of completion. So he said that Charlie really represents asking questions, trying to get to the bottom of the answers that Arn would pose to him

and taking Hillsdale's online courses. Who are some previous recipients of honorary degrees from Hillsdale? So Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and psychologist Jordan Peterson have both recently received, within the past seven years, received honorary degrees from Hillsdale. At this memorial service, Arne made a second announcement alongside honorary degrees, and what was that announcement? He announced that he and his wife, Penny,

have set up a scholarship fund for Kirk's two children, He didn't say if that was for a specific school, I believe it sounds like it could be for any school, but he did mention that he has a certain college in mind for the two kids. I wonder where that college is. In the article, we have a quote from Molly Hemingway, editor-in-chief of the Federalist and a Hillsdale Senior Journalism Fellow. And what were some of the comments she gave as to the fittingness of the Kirk's receiving these degrees? So Hemingway was at the Memorial Service, and she said that,

Charlie just really sums up what Hillsdale education is about, Socratic philosophy, and he really understood Aristotle and such, and he loved to read the great books. He really read his Bible, and he would take all of this and bring it together. So she said that Charlie really just came together and brought all of it together in the Hillsdale fashion. Someone else who was attending the memorial service was a former journalism student and 2025 graduate Olivia Perro, how did she describe the service? She was holding the camera for interviews at the Daily Signal, and everyone she talked to,

she said, was speaking about religion and faith and about God and how God is working through this country. It's clear that Charlie Kirk has made quite an impact in the lives of many Hillsdale students. And what were some of the things students were saying after hearing this announcement from Arne? So one student junior Nathan Ferdess who started a TPP USA chapter in his hometown during high school said that, quote, this degree is not a measure of hours spent in a classroom, but of lives impacted, end quote. So I think a lot of students who were involved with TPSA in high school are grateful that this is recognizing his work and mission. And Arne's full remarks are published in the opinion section of the Collegian. Ellie, thanks for joining us.

You've been listening to the Collegian Weekend Review on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. I'm Megan Lee. I'm Catherine Maxwell. And I'm Alessia Sandela. You can find the Collegian Weekend Review online at cwir.com. You can find more news at Hillsdale Collegian.com or on our Instagram at Hillsdale Collegian. Thanks for tuning in on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM.