The Yale Alumni Magazine is owned and operated by Yale Alumni Publications, Inc., a nonprofit corporation independent of Yale University.

The content of the magazine and its website is the responsibility of the editors and does not necessarily reflect the views of Yale or its officers.

January/February 2005
Volume 68, Number 3

Feature stories:

The Innovator
by Cathy Shufro
When Erin Lavik got her first chemistry set at age seven, the first thing she did was mix the chemicals she wasn’t supposed to mix. In high school, she built a catapult that cracked her parents’ windshield. As a biomedical engineer, she has created the next best thing to a miracle.

House Proud
In 1969, a handful of black students founded the Afro-American Cultural Center—“the House”—as shelter and home base for African Americans at Yale. What does the House mean today to those who love it? On its 35th anniversary, House-affiliated alumni talked about outreach, Saturday night dances, and where they’d like Yale to try harder.

Youth and Consequences
by Carlo Rotella ’94PhD
In the game most people were watching, Yale lost to Harvard. But at the places where football and life intersect, the contests were more complicated and the victories harder to call.

from the editor

letters
Readers weigh in on legacy admissions; the magazine wins an award.

light & verity
+  new seminars for freshmen
+  top fund-raiser resigns
+  how the College voted

milestones
A million-dollar prize for Pelikan; White House honors for Scully.

scene on campus
Looking down on Science Hill.

q&a: rick levin
Making room for art.

forum
How to outsmart the food industry.

findings
Spicy history; the world before DNA; sun-tanned mice; common causes.

arts & culture
Prosek on Audubon; all-Yalie film festival; Clarence Thomas up close.

news from alumni house
A social justice summer fellowship.

old yale
Long before Michael Doonesbury, there was Ichabod Academicus.

sporting life
Women’s soccer and volleyball make the NCAA tournaments.

where they are now
An alum embedded in Fallujah; a blues-playing bishop.

last look

©1992–2012, Yale Alumni Publications, Inc. All rights reserved.

Yale Alumni Magazine, P.O. Box 1905, New Haven, CT 06509-1905, USA. yam@yale.edu