Davidson's New Faculty Faces

g r e g m a u r e r , r o b m c s w e e n e y ,
j o h n k o g o y & j i m m y n e w l i n

One of the best things about coming (back) to Davidson is the multitude of unknown faces on campus. But even in a small community like Davidson, it can take a while to learn the names and personalities that correspond to those faces. To help you along, we picked out a few fresh faculty faces and peppered them with penetrating interrogatives. We then condensed our 22 notebook pages of interview material into these seven brief profiles full of interesting facts about your future Grade Lords.

Brian Philips (Math):

Dr. Philips is “thrilled” to be making his professional teaching debut at a “nationally recognized institution” (Davidson). Even though he is still a “very eligible bachelor,” he’s proud to say that he recently picked up some valuable lessons in the art of child rearing: this summer, he stepped up to help his older sister Veronica raise her newborn child, Justin. When he’s not busy crunching numbers, he enjoys listening to the Pat Metheny Group (“mostly the early stuff”) and cooking “light and Asian.” Dr. Philips also added that he “wouldn’t mind” if students call him Brian, but “only outside of class.” His optimism and quiet charm should bring a new level of enthusiasm to Davidson’s math department.

Andrea Lugosi (Psychology):

It’s been four years since she’s taught at the college level (the University of Rochester was her last gig), and according to her, “that’s four too many.” At Davidson, she plans to “apply some new teaching strategies to old topics of interest.” We jokingly asked if she’s related to the famous horror film actor and, to our surprise, she is (ask her about the time Grampa Bela chased her and her two brothers through the woods wearing his stage fangs!). Apparently, however, this traumatic experience hasn’t permanently traumatized Dr. Lugosi since her favorite thing to do after afternoon classes is “take walks on the cross-country trails on nice days.”

L. Carlton Hall (Sociology):

This renowned Marginalism scholar declined interview. When the department chair also refused to tell us anything about the new professor, we went to Bobby Vagt, who let slip that Davidson is “shelling out some pretty big bucks” for this “academic celebrity.” Other than that, all Bobby could tell us was that Dr. Hall “seemed happy to be teaching in the States for the first time.” Those camera crews you saw during the first weekend of school were wrapping up a PBS documentary on Hall’s latest tome. We’ll see if the sociology department’s reputation as the “jock major” still sticks now that Dr. Hall is batting clean-up.

Mary D’Agostino (Music):

Dr. D’Agostino promises to bring a little “soul” to the Davidson Music department. She’s happy in her new environment, although adjusting to the southern lifestyle is like ”learning to play Bach #4 on one of those keyboard-guitars,” says the native Pacific-Northwesterner. Her favorite thing about Davidson is the attitude of “friendly competition” she has already observed in her students; her least favorite is that faculty members don’t have “equal laundry service privaleges.” In the last few weeks she’s enjoyed “making new friends,” though she hasn’t gotten to spend enough time with her three dogs, Satchmo, ‘Trane and Chet.

Trevor Stone (Theatre):

Dr. Stone may soon be best known for being the only member of the Davidson faculty to have kissed actress Bea Arthur. "While I was working on my masters at University of Miami," Dr. Stone confesses, "I had a bit roll in a Golden Girls episode as one of Dorothy's suitors. Naturally, Sophia (Estelle Getty) thought I was too young for Dorothy, and the usual sitcom mayhem ensued..." One of the Southeast's top Chekhov experts, as well as a fan of traditional Broadway musicals, Dr. Stone hopes to one day complete a Rodgers and Hammerstein-esque rendition of Uncle Vanya, which would be "more than just a little tongue in cheek."

Professor Darrel Martin (Biology):

Dr. Martin has been avidly researching the cardiovascular systems of octopi and other cephalopods since his days as an undergrad student at the University of Florida. When asked what factors influenced his move to the Lake Norman (where there is not one octopus to be found), he responds: "I mostly work with dead ones, actually. They don't move around very much, and we can have them flown in, frozen, from just about anywhere." As far as pets go, Dr. Martin prefers more terrestrial species. Be sure to look for him walking his two German shepherds, Prince and Chester, around campus this semester.

Proudly out of place at Davidson, Dr. Kobiela looks forward to being “a real firecracker on campus.” He hopes to upset the “sterility and monotony of outdated teaching methods” at Davidson by encouraging his students to swear in class, “make up their own damn MLA guidelines,” and cite “cartoons and commercials rather than critics and canonical crap.” We couldn’t help asking how it felt to be riding the cultural studies bandwagon. He laughed good-naturedly and said “Good, good. Right on. Challenge us. You should be skeptical of everything your professors try to teach you.” We at Libertas are taking bets on how long Davidson will tolerate Dr. Kobiela’s subversive sensibilities.