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Detroit ’67 is scheduled to run September 18-20 as an outdoor production on the front steps of Kresge Gymnasium. From the cast members to the audience on the Quad, social distancing will be in effect. So will a certain Briton determination and pride.

Albion College’s commitment to public purpose has been recognized in the 2020 rankings published this week by Washington Monthly. Among liberal arts colleges, the magazine places Albion at No. 2 in Michigan, No. 24 in the Midwest and among the top liberal arts colleges nationally.

Finding strength in numbers and spirit, the students of Albion College’s Class of 2024 were ready for the first day of classes earlier this week. Approximately 540 students, nearly 500 of them first-years, comprise one of Albion’s largest cohorts of entering students in recent history.

With its combination of quality education, size and affordability gaining more attention, Albion College ranked 38th nationally among small colleges—and No. 1 in Michigan—in Money’s Best Colleges for 2020, an in-depth report and listing published this week.

Albion College is featured in the Princeton Review’s Best 386 Colleges, the title of its annual guidebook for 2021. “Change can be seen everywhere,” the profile describes, adding that Albion “puts students in the real world and asks them to research, participate and lead.”

Professor of sociology emeritus Len Berkey passed away August 3 in Washington State. For more than 35 years, Berkey taught his Race and Ethnicity course to packed classrooms, exciting hundreds of students to wrestle with some of the most complex and controversial aspects of modern American society.

With leadership from Dr. Shannon O’Neill, associate dean for student success, the Sally S. ’75 and Alexander M. Cutler Center for Student Success and Academic Achievement aims to quickly become an integral resource, bringing together in one inviting and student-friendly Stockwell Library space a range of services often found in different areas of college campuses.

Now in its sixth year, the Build Albion Fellows program has grown and evolved to meet the needs of the time. But the 10 students comprising the Class of 2024 will deal with a changing landscape brought on by a pandemic. And they’re eager to face the challenges that await.

“Unless we can provide a context for indigenous objects, we might as well not have them,” says professor of art and art history Bille Wickre, referring to a collection of pre-Columbian art recently given to Albion College. Researching that context—which Wickre calls “a gift to the world”—was an ideal summer project for Rebecca Wagener, ’21 (left).

Tim DeWitt, who has held several positions in the Division of Finance and Administration in his 12 years at Albion College and who currently serves as the College’s interim chief financial officer, has been named the new president of Lumen Christi Catholic School in Jackson and the executive director of the Jackson Catholic Schools system. “Words cannot begin to describe how grateful I am for the opportunity to work and represent Albion College,” DeWitt said.