Geography alumnus appointed to Dartmouth faculty

Ben Gerlofs, a former president of GRCC’s chapter of the International Geographical Honor Society (GTU), has accepted an appointment as a Visiting Assistant Professor of Geography at Dartmouth College, which houses the only Geography Department in the Ivy League. Ben received his BA at Aquinas College and MA at Syracuse University.  His research on an edge city in Illinois was published in the peer-reviewed journal, Urban Geography, and he is currently at Rutgers University in the final stages of completing his Ph.D dissertation, which is devoted to Mexico City. Last week, Ben presented a paper at the American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting in Boston titled: “Resisting Postpolitics in Mexico City’s Avenida Chapultepec.” Geography alumna Stacey Murphy, now studying at Aquinas, and April Shirey, the current GTU president at GRCC, co-authored a paper that was also presented at the Boston meeting: “Food and Housing Insecurities in Michigan Community Colleges: What can Geography Students do?” The conference is the largest annual gathering of geographers worldwide.