If you have any questions about the projects on this page, please contact the office of Calvin's Dean for Research & Scholarship.

This list represents the projects which may potentially be funded. Not every faculty project listed below will be funded. Some consideration is given to achieving a wide distribution of disciplines. Before proceeding to the project list, please read the following notes:

• Following the deadline for student applications, the McGregor Fellows will be chosen from among the applicants and paired with a faculty project/mentor.
• Preference given to rising juniors and seniors (over rising sophomores) who would benefit academically and vocationally from such an experience.
• Students graduating in May 2004 are not eligible, although students graduating in December 2004 are eligible.
• Fellowship Awards will be announced on March 18, 2004.
• Students are encouraged to apply for multiple projects as one or two choices may ultimately go unfunded.
• Students may apply (in order of preference) for up to three of the following projects; you need only submit one application regardless of how many projects in which you express interest:

1. Religion and Culture in Prague, 1890-1930,
   Bruce Berglund, History.
2. Exploring Intentional Christian Community at Calvin College,
   Jeff Bouman, Don DeGraaf, Mark Mulder, Interdisciplinary.
3. Church Closings: Estimating the Rate and Reasons,
   Kevin Dougherty, Sociology.
4. Theatre and Christianity,
   Debra Freeberg, Communication Arts & Sciences.
5. Contested Meaning of Stewardship,
   Kathi Groenendyk, Communication Arts & Sciences.
6. Seeking to Be Christian in Race Relations: Christian Writing on Race 1935-1950,
   Randal Jelks, History.
7. Hands-on Musicology: Editing the Music of William Walton,
   J. Brooks Kuykendall, Music.
8. The Vocational Leadership of the Laity,
   Shirley Roels, Lilly Vocation Project.
9. "Blest Be the Ties That Bind": Unity and Diversity among Canadian and American CRC Members,
   Corwin Smidt, Political Science.
10. Spirituality, Ecology, and Metaphors for Language Education,
    David Smith, Germanic and Asian Languages.
11. The Violence of Belief: Democratic Peace Theory's Commitment to Secularization,
    James K.A. Smith, Philosophy.
12. Maintaining Business Activity and Jobs in the City of Kentwood, Michigan
    Evert Van Der Heide, Economics & Business
13. Designing and Publishing a Writing Textbook,
    Elizabeth Vander Lei and Dean Ward, English.
14. Organizational Behavior meets Financial Results in Fast Food Industry,
    Julie Voskuil, Economics & Business

Religion and Culture in Prague, 1890-1930
Bruce Berglund, History Department [return to top]

This is a project of religious and cultural history, focusing on the intersection of the arts (art, architecture, sculpture, literature) and Christian faith and thought in turn-of-the-century and interwar Prague. The study concentrates on an architect named Joze Plecnik, who worked in Prague from 1910 to 1927. Plecnik was an ethnic Slovene, but he gained fame as an architect in Vienna at the turn of the century and was hired to teach at the university in Prague. Plecnik is recognized today by architectural historians as one of the most important European architects of the early 20th Century, and the buildings he designed in Prague are regarded as some of his greatest accomplishments. Plecnik was also a devout Catholic. His faith was essential to his philosophy of architecture, and critics and fellow architects of the time (including non-believers) recognized the importance of faith to his work. My research examines the response of these Czechs and Germans in Prague to Pecnik's designs and to his faith-centered philosophy of architecture. In addition, my research looks at Plecnik’s contacts with other artists in Prague and elsewhere in Eastern Europe, both Christians and non-Christians, in order to better understand his place in cultural circles of the times.

Student Contributions:
The student will contribute to this project by researching secondary and primary sources pertaining to Plecnik’s work, architecture and the arts in Prague, and the connection of religion to the arts at the time. I will work with the student in identifying the relevant themes in the sources and discuss with the student how that material applies to the research project.

Student Qualifications:

The student must:

• have proficient reading ability in German, Czech, Croatian, or Slovene language;
• be willing and able to spend hours in the library reading primary sources (newspapers, architectural and art journals, letters), some of which might be on microfilm, as well as historical studies of the times (books and scholarly articles);
• be a careful reader and writer of notes, someone able to write clear summaries of the sources and (if requested) reliable translations of some key passages that we will identify;
• and be self-motivated and self-directed.

The student should:

• have an interest in European cultural history, architecture, or religion.
  

How has the Calvin experience connected the mind, heart, and hands in a meaningful way for both students and society? This study explores this question by examining intentional Christian communities associated with Calvin between 1965 and 2004; the Worden Street Community, and Project Neighborhood. Several faculty-owned houses co-operated on Worden Street during the 1970s to build authentic Christian community; and since 1997, Calvin has offered housing in three Grand Rapids neighborhoods desined to facilitate both internal and external Christian community. McGregor Fellows will conduct and transcribe 40 interviews with former residents of these communities, and examine the impact on their post-Calvin lives.

Purpose of the Study:
The purpose of this study is two-fold. First to examine the effectiveness of two distinct intentional Christian communities in connecting the Mind, Heart, and Hands portrayed in the figure above. Second to identify the long-term impacts perceived by residents of living in both the Worden Street Community and Project Neighborhood.

Objectives:

1. Develop a method (instrument) to understand the intentional Christian community experience through the eyes of former residents.
2. Identify the long-term impacts of living in a intentional Christian community.
3. Identify what elements of the experience that facilitate positive impacts of the intentional Christian experience.
4. Develop strategies to assist the development of positive experiences related to intentional Christian community.
5. Compare/contrast the two contemporary Christian intentional communities at Calvin (Worden Street & Project Neighborhood) with other historical student Christian communities of the late 1800s.

Student Contributions:

Assisting in identifying the sample for the study (tracking down addresses, calling potential subjects and asking them to be involved in the study);
• Conducting interviews;
• Transcribing interviews;
• Analyzing data (assisting in the searching for common themes);
• Assisting in the writing of one to two articles;
• Assisting in presenting the results at a regional and/or national conference

Benefits to the student

This project will offer a student an opportunity to work closely with professors from three different disciplines in an interdisciplinary study. The student will be involved in all aspects of designing and implementing a research study as well as presenting and writing up the results of this study. Students will also have the opportunity to examine the importance and potential of intentional Christian community as well as document two important aspects of the Calvin experience (both past and present).

Qualifications of Student Researcher:

How many churches close each year? For thirty years or more, a common assumption is that approximately one percent of U.S. churches shut their doors for the last time each year. Yet, there appears to be no sound basis for this statistic. No one really knows how many churches close annually. This research will seek to remedy this oversight. By assembling congregational data from an array of denominations, the research will attempt to estimate a failure rate of U.S. churches and look to identify common conditions under which churches close.

Student Contributions:
The enterprising student will bear the responsibility for the development and outcome of the research. Professor Dougherty will guide literature review and then participate in statistical analysis and writing. The student will manage the process of data collection independently and have substantial ownership in the final stages of analysis and writing.

As bacground, student and professor will review sociological research relevant to church decline and closing. The student will spend the first week reading selected book chapters and journal articles identified in collaboration with the professor. Reading may continue throughout the summer, but it will represent a small component of the student's time.

The majority of the student's time will be spent in assembling congregational data from denominations in the United States. Analysis will depend upon information from the same congregations collected from at least two points in time. For denominations like the Church of the Nazarene and the Southern Baptist Convention, annual congregational data are available from denominational websites or the American Religion Data Archive (www. theARDA.com). The student will download relevant data from denominations and convert them into SPSS data files. For denominations that do not have congregational data publicly available online, the student will contact the denominations directly. This will require the student to present herself/himself in a competent, professional manner. It will also demand meticulous record keepting skills to track contacts and note any stipulations placed upon use of denominational data. Data collection represents approximately half of the student's summer responsibilities.

Once data are collected, student and professor will jointly conduct analysis using SPSS statistical software and produce a written summary of their findings.

Summary List of Student Responsibilities:

Library Research: 10%
Data collection (from websites and through denominational contacts): 50%
Statistical analysis: 20%
Writing: 20%

Theatre archive web site: this project involves the collection and transfer of published and unpublished articles, conference papers, addresses, interviews, and images related to the subject of theatre and the Christian faith, particularly theatre in the Christian community. In the first phase of the project, a theatre archive website will be created and data entered--culled from professional theatres, individual artists, and organizations like Christians in Theatre Arts and participants. Moreover, the student will conduct specific research regarding the CRC church and the theatre. The student will present their preliminary research to the CCCU theatre seminar in July. Outcomes may also include a co-authored paper for Christian Scholars Review and their finished article included in a book about Theatre and the Christian Church, co-edited by D. Freeburg and Dr. Theresa Ter Haar of Trinity Christian University. The student will also work as a seminar assistant in the Coalition of Christian Colleges and Universities' Theatre Discipline workshop at Calvin College in July 2004.

Student Contributions: The student should be self-motivated, savvy with computers, adept at Web design programs such as Fireworks and Dreamweaver, and be able to relate to people in the conduct of interviews, and able to think and write extremely well.

After Lynn White Jr.'s influential article "The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis," many environmentalists linked Christianity to our Western culture's abuse of nature. Christians, in response to these accusations and their own desire to treat God's creation wisely, reexamined Biblical approaches to environmental action. Many Christians embraced the term "stewardship" to define a Christ-like attitude and set of actions. Yet this term and its implied actions have varied between groups and over time, confusing lay people and complicating Christian environmentalists' work with non-Christians. I plan to examine the term "stewardship" from a rhetorical perspective, using the theory of the ideograph to explicate the historical development and current use of the term. To understand how an ideograph is used in public argumentation, the critic must identify the ideograph's current relationship to other related terms. Through understanding the historical and current uses of "stewardship", and its interplay with other key environmental ideographs, we can identify the ideological uses of the term, how "stewardship" defines certain groups, and what terms would best prompt environmental action.

Student Contributions: The student will assist in locating historical and recent texts that use the term "stewardship." The student will help determine which texts have made the most impact in Christian and public discussions of stewardship and then, through Calvin's Library, will assist in locating these influential texts. Once the texts are in hand, the student will read through the documents and provide a short analysis about the text's themes and how "stewardship" is used to define a certain type of environmental awareness and action. The student will also assist in drafting a historical overview of the term "stewardship" and in identifying the recent terms used in conjunction with "stewardship".

Breakdown of activity:

In 1946, Benjamin Mays, an African American religious scholar and college president wrote a small book entitled Seeking to be Christian in Race Relations. This book was part of a wider series that was used in mainline churches in this era. Beginning with May's book, this project will research and catalog the various literatures on race relations that Christians wrote in the era of the New Deal until the beginning of the Cold War.

Student Contributions: The student will spend approximately two weeks with the Professor reading May's book Seeking to be Christian in Race Relations and his autobiography, Born to Rebel. Accordingly, the student and the professor will spend another week reading David Chappell's A Stone of Hope: Prophetic Religion and the Death of Jim Crow in order to gain a fuller context. The student will spend another four weeks independently locating books, articles (e.g. magazine, newspaper), interviews in research data bases, archives, and the Hekman Library. The professor and the student will meet weekly to assess and give direction as this database is developed. The final two-weeks in the program will be spent by the student developing an outline of a research paper for a conferene presentation and or publication on the topic by professor and the student.

Student Qualifications:

• Independently motivated and smart.
• Willing to develop strong archival and research skills.
• Completed History 294 or its research equivalent.
• Have a strong interest in American social and religious history.
• Familiar with research and Internet search engines.
• Write well.

Outcomes: The result of this collaboration is to present this work at Cavlin College during a History Department Colloquium, and also at an academic conference, and finally published in a refereed journal.

Composers aren't perfect: they almost always have second--or third--thoughts. Revisions may be prompted by practical, technical, musical or dramatic reasons. Sometimes revisions are fairly small; sometimes they are massive. Reconstructing the compositional process is essential in musicological studies, but it can be messy. In what sequence were the changes made? For this project, we will prepare a new critical text of two orchestral works by English composer William Walton (to be published by Oxford University Press as part of a complete William Walton Edition). We will then go further to examine the larger significance of compositional revisions. This project will open a student's eyes to the wider world of "behind the scenes" in the music industry.

Student Contributions: Most of the work (perhaps 55-60%) is essentially critical proof-reading, which means comparing every detail--every note, every articulation, every dynamic marking--of every source in order to establish what is the best text to publish. The process is not mindlessly mechanical, but requires a great deal of critical judgement. Another 15-20% of the project is research. While the musical sources are readily available to us for comparison, what other sources might impinge upon our understanding of the works? A student can assist greatly in tracking down and analyzing such sources. The remaining 20-30% of the time would be absorbed by another collaborative project, depending on the interest of the student, as well as with attending the weekly McGregor student colloquia.

Student Qualifications: An assistant for this project must, of course, have a fluent reading knowledge of music. (Any student studying music at the college level should be qualified; there is no need for the student to have had any particular level of music theory, although theoretical training would make for better informed judgements.) Any student considering going on to graduate study in musicology might benefit most from working on this project. Students considering further study in another discipline of the arts or humanities might find this an engaging introduction to critical methods. This project requires no particular background in music history, but it does require the inquiring, skeptical mindset of the historian; the editor must never be willing to trust a source at its face value. Beyond this, the student must have great patience and diligence.

To be effective, healthy and sustainable, the Christian church needs strong lay leaders who complement ordained pastors. However, churches and their related denominations/associations are limited in their knowledge about attracting, structuring, educating and sustaining quality lay leadership. This study will investigate the pathways through which lay leadership can be more effectively cultivated. It will involve a literature review of church systems theory, the gathering of existing research on lay leadership from a variety of denominations and associations, and structured telephone interviews with a selected cross-section of pastors and lay leaders. The outcome of this research project, minimally, will be an article for publication and a session at the 2005 Worship Symposium of the Calvin Institute for Christian Worship.

Student Contribution: The student will provide assistance in identifying books, articles and other studies that develop systems theory in relationship to the ever-changing configuration of the Christian church. A student research assistant would help me in two ways, first by identifying and organizing sources fo such material; and second, by reading and summarizing the contect discovered. The initial reading will include a review of back issues of the periodical Congregation and the several short books that explore congregations as systems. Second, the student reasearch assistant would solicit information about ongoing studies of lay leadership within various denominations and church associations. For example, within the CRCNA 2002 denominational survey, there are several questions about the nature of lay leadership. A student could document and organize the relevant survey responses and compare such results to those from other denominations and associations. Identifying, summarizing and comparing knowledge about lay leadership from these sources will provide a much broader picture about the current situation, future needs and the connection between systems theory and church practice. Third, to provide a closer analysis of lay leadership over the life cycle of such leaders, the student would interview by phone a selected population of church leaders.

Distribution of Activities:

1. Review church systems literature (25%)
2. Gather and review existing denomination/association research (25%)
3. Develop and conduct phone interview research (50%)
   --Establish the research population and interview structure (10%)
   --Conduct the phone interviews (25%)
   --Analyze interview results (15%)

Student Qualifications:

1. A strong interest in the future of Christian congregations as healthy, sustainable and effective ones.
2. Curiosity about the connections between church ecclesiology and practice.
3. Some background in related social sciences, psychology, sociology or management/leadership theory.
4. An interest in social science research methods and results.
5. Skills in summarizing written texts, structuring and analyzing data.
6. Strong oral communication skills, both speaking and listening.

This summer research project, a component of a larger research effort related to a study of members of the Christian Reformed Church (CRC) and members of the Reformed Church in America (RCA), will focus on similarities and differences evident among Canadian and American members of the CRC. The two geographical components of the CRC are to be compared and contrasted in terms of their social characteristics, theological perspectives, and religious practice. The study will entail library research, web-based research, analysis of survey data, and the drafting of a major report that discusses and analyzes such similarities and differences.

Student Contributions: For the most part, this project will provide the student researcher with a great deal of latitude to shape the final product that is forthcoming from this project. The mentor will provide some direction, serve as a resource person, teach basic skills as needed, and discuss the outline of the project in terms of the basic ideas, themes and findings to emphasize. But the student researcher will be the major researcher and the major author of the resulting product that is forthcoming. The student will also make one or two paper presentations related to the research project, either as the sole author or as a co-author.

Desirable Qualities:

1. Someone who has a personal interest in the Christian Reformed Church, its history, its current character, and its future structure.
2. Someone who has some personal acquaintance with, and knowledge of, the Christian Reformed Church.
3. Someone who has some experience with research methods generally and with SPSS more specifically.

Essential Qualities:

1. Someone who is motivated and diligent in their work.
2. Someone who is self-directed and can work, for periods of time, on her or his own.
3. Someone who finds library research and the analysis of data to be interesting and engaging.
4. Someone who enjoys writing research papers.

Spirituality, Ecology and Metaphors for Language Education
David Smith, Germanic and Asian Languages [return to top]

This project is concerned with how we think about hte teaching and learning of languages. It will explore connections between: 1) the recent shift from talk of "teaching method" to "classroom ecology"; 2) the use of ecological metaphors by Comenius (1592-1670) to connect teaching with spirituality and ethics; and 3) increased recent attention to the relevance of spirituality and ethics in language education. The goal is to clarify the implications of the turn to ecological language for the spiritual and ethical aspects of language learning. The inquiry will be philosophical and will study both recent language learning research and Comenius and related educational thinkers from the 17th and 18th Centuries. Some literature is in German.

Student Contributions:

1. Literature Surveys (a): The bulk of the work on this project (75%) will be related to the literature surveys described in the project description. This will include guided use of databases (including citation indices) to identify relevant literature in the three areas, placing ILL orders if necessary, keeping records of literature surveyed, and entering the data into Endnote Plus. These activities should consume 20-25% of the total time.
2. Literature Surveys (b): The student will also be assigned some specific areas of the literature survey. This process will consist of reading, noting and recording key points, relevant passages and further references for follow-up, and then discussing with the faculty mentor. Exactly which areas the student takes on is to some degree open to negotiations with the student. Examples of likely areas of concentration include the following: i) tracing recent citations by scholars of articles in which garden metaphors have been revived; ii) surveying recent literature on Comenius' use of metaphor; iii) reviewing discussions of spirituality and ethics in recent research literature in foreign language pedagogy and providing a survey of the recent discussion. This study of the relevant sources should take up 50-55% of the total research time.
3. Outcomes: The student will be involved in concrete outcomes by way of a combined writing project (an original article combined with satellite pieces of writing drawn from the same research base). The main article is intended for a mainstream foreign language education journal, where co-authoring with a student may be inappropriate, but the student's assistance will be acknowledged as appropriate. The student will either author or co-author one or more short articles.

1. Good academic potential, organizational skills, and ability in terms of organizing ideas.
2. Basic facility with computers/data entry (training in specific software will be provided).
3. Interest, experience and ability in philosophy (while focused on foreign language learning, the nature of the project is philosophical and will require the ability to read philosophically).
4. Ability to read German at 300 level (Much of the secondary literature on Comenius and some of the literature in foreign language pedagogy is in German; if this reading ability were not present, it would hamper the efficiency of the research).
5. Good writing skills.
6. Interest in and recent or ongoing experience of foreign language learning*.

*Desireable qualification, but not essential.

The theory of "democratic peace" is often cited as "the closest thing we have to an empirical law in the study of international relations." Informing American foreign policy for the past two administrations, one aspect of this program has been under-theorized: the relationship of democratic peace theory to the project of secularization. This project will investigate the ways in which the theory is predicated on a confidence in secularity as securing peace and therefore parallels "postmodern" critiques of religious violence. Both feed into the increased secularization of the public sphere based on assumptions about the "violence" of particular, determinate religious confessions.

Student Contributions: The project will require the student to be engaged in a number of different kinds of activities, from the "leg-work" of locating and copying articles, to high-level reflection on theoretical questions--all in regular consultation with the professor. In particular, the summer's research would involve the following:

1. Read an article provided by the supervision professor (SP) and then meet with him in order to be oriented within the basics of "democratic peace theory" in general, and specifically with the hypothesis, methods and strategies of the project at hand. (5%)
2. Undertake database research on democratic peace theory across a range of disciplines. Generate an initial bibliography to be reviewed by SP in order to establish an agenda for research. (10%)
3. Locate and copy articles and books from the bibliography. This will include downloading and printing electronic files where available, photocopying from journals and books, and securing those resources not owned by Calvin's library through ILL. Meet with SP to prioritize resources. (10%)
4. Carefully read articles and books as directed by SP then write 2-3 page summaries of the core argument of each, with particular attention to themes outlined in the research agenda. Regular meetings with SP to discuss findings. (40%)
5. With SP, establish overall findings vis-a'vis the guiding research hypotheses. Generate a draft report of the findings that will later be incorporated into an article on the topic. If absence of explicit discussion of religion and secularization is confimed, establish agenda for teasing out the implicit assumptions about such in the literature. (20%)
6. Together with SP, draft a paper for presentation of both research findings and critique of democratic peace theory's assumptions regarding the correlations between religion/violence and secularity/peace. (15%)

Student Qualifications:

1. An interest in the topic and attendant issues of politics, religion, and global violence.
2. An ability to quickly get "up to speed" with new knowledge.
3. Initiative to work independently but also the ability to work as a team where required.
4. Background in philosophy, political science, or religion, preferably with at least one course completed in each area.
5. Facilty with research databases at Calvin College (though training can be provided for specific databases).
6. A good "feel" for the Hekman Library (both physical and digital): knowing where to find databases on the website, knowing where to locate e-journals and hard-bound journals on the shelf, etc.
7. Critical reading skills, including the ability to read across different disciplines and genres and discern weaknesses in an argument.
8. Strong writing skills, in particular being able to digest an article then write a summary exposition of the argument. This requires the ability to condense and "translate".
9. A spirit of engagement in order to be a sounding board for the SP.
10. An interest in presenting research at a conference or symposium.
11. Solid facility with English. Since most of this literature is in English, no foreign langauges are required.

Outcomes: the fruit of this research will be disseminated in several forms:

1. Findings presented at a regional conference such as the Midwest Meeting of the American Academy of Religion or Calvin's Symposium on Religion and Politics. Ideally, the student would be involved as co-presenter.
2. Some findings will be taken up in SP's forthcoming Sabbatical project and ensuing book (Holy Wars and Democratic Crusades). The student's contributions will be duly acknowledged.
3. A separate article on this question to be published in a peer-reviewed journal, based on the drafts and reports from the summer research. The student would hopefully be the article's co-author.

Cities like Kentwood work through their Economic Development Commissions (EDC) to evaluate regulations and restrictions that may discourage business from locating locally. Mayor Richard Root of Kentwood has gone as far as to say that his city is restructuring its relationship with its businesses. Kentwood, he says, is “open for business”. A special Tax Abatement Taskforce will investigate the need for more generous tax abatements for the relatively few manufacturers that apply for relief under State Act 195. Kentwood’s EDC is responsible for advising the city on other issues that may attract and maintain businesses of all sorts to the city.

Student Contributions:

The student who works on this project will work closely with Kentwood’s EDC to gather data relevant to the EDC’s work. The student will be part of all aspects of a survey of businesses to determine business attitudes and opinions about working with city officials in Planning, Engineering, the Treasury Department, Fire Safety and other departments. At the conclusion of the survey, the student will write an analytical report that summarizes the current business climate and identifies significant relationships. The report will also make recommendations to the EDC for its consideration. Prior to designing the survey, the student will conduct a literature review and find out what other communities have done to determine business opinion of local government services. As time permits, the student will gather demographic and economic data of the City to help the EDC in its promotional efforts for the City. These tasks will be supervised by Lisa Golder of Kentwood’s Planning Department, and Professor Van Der Heide.

• Applicants for this project should be business or economic majors with interest and aptitude in survey research. Knowledge of basic statistics is important.

This project will allow a student to experience the publication process from the inside--as part of an editorial team composing a textbook on writing across the curriculum (WAC). The McGregor Fellow will work with the primary editors and the contributors (Calvin professors and students), helping them describe and demonstrate what characterizes good writing in various disciplines.

Student Contributions: Specifically, the McGregor Fellow will read in rhetorical and WAC theory and then, as an assisting editor, bring that knowledge to the following tasks:

1. Help with revisions of chapter introductions, commentaries, and exercises;
2. Participate in a week-long set of meetings of the editorial team;
3. Help in editing final copy for publication;
4. Help with format design; and
5. Work directly with student authors to help them compose and edit their contributions to the book*.

*This will be the primary task for the student fellow.

• Help design project parameters;
• Participate in data gathering and analysis;
• Produce and present results of research to appropriate audiences;
  
  Student Qualifications:

• Good academic potential, organizational skills, and ability in organizing ideas.
• Independently motivated and inquisitive.
• Willing to develop strong archival and research skills.
• Have an interest in business applications of human resource activities.
• Familiar with research and Internet search engines.
• Basic facility with computers/data entry (training in specific software will be provided).

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