A gifted photographer, Joel first worked as The Cabinet’s photo editor during his sophomore year before being promoted to editor as a junior. This is an administrative role with a lot of responsibility, but Joel enjoys it. As the editor, he leads weekly meetings with the staff, generates ideas for news stories, assigns articles to the writers, and follows with them to make sure that stories are turned in on time. Joel pens the weekly editorial column, “Honestly,” through which he shares his thoughts on student life. He also creates the final layout of the paper and has the final say on everything that is included in each issue.
The timing of each issue is complicated because articles have to be assigned two weeks in advance. “Sometimes we have to guess what will be going on that week,” says Joel. “We anticipate campus events so that we can write about them ahead of time.” Each issue is finalized on Tuesday night, sent to the printer on Wednesday and distributed to students on Thursday. The entire process requires Joel to put in 20-30 hours of work a week, but he feels that it is work well worth his effort.
As if working on The Cabinet doesn’t give him enough to do, Joel also works as a photography intern in Geneva’s public relations office. In addition, he tutors for Geneva’s writing center, The Pendragon, helping students improve their writing skills. And he is a member of Geneva’s Honors Program. For his senior honors project, Joel is working with Dr. Tom Copeland to design an integrated media website for posting the content of The Cabinet and The Chimes, a literary magazine that is published each semester.
Joel first heard about Geneva through a homeschool co-op that he attended during high school—“The names of lots of small Christian colleges floated around, and Geneva was one of them.” Some of his older friends had attended Geneva, so Joel decided come for a visit. “I liked Geneva because it was a small Christian college and I felt comfortable on the campus,” he says.
During his first two years in college, Joel was an English education major. He came to have an interest in that area after his journalism experiences in high school, but also after attending Worldview Academy, a Christian summer camp. “It was the first time I had ever heard anyone talk about what it means to be a Christian in a secular culture,” says Joel, a concept that is explored throughout Geneva’s curriculum.
Although he recently switched to an informational writing major, Joel says that he hasn’t ruled out a career in education: “I still might like to teach, possibly at the college level.” But no matter what he pursues after graduation, Joel feels confident and well prepared because of all his hard work and the many hands-on learning opportunities he’s taking advantage of at Geneva.
-Richard Louther ’15