Rhodes College opens its one hundred and seventy-second session with a virtual convocation Saturday, August 22, at 10:00 a.m. CDT, welcoming the Class of 2024. The event will stream live at www.rhodes.edu.

Dr. Clara Pascual-Argente, L. Palmer Brown Chair in Interdisciplinary Humanities and associate professor of Spanish at Rhodes College, has been awarded a National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grant, together with Dr. Emily Francomano of Georgetown University, to support work on an edition and translation of two medieval Iberian narratives about fictional king Apollonius of Tyre. Their work will appear in the Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library collection, published by Harvard University Press.

Rhodes College welcomes 10 new faculty to its distinguished roster for the 2020-2021 academic year in the areas of biology, history, modern languages and literatures, political science, psychology, sociology, and religious studies.

Aaron Weist '21 spent the summer interning remotely for the lead organization for the Memphis Continuums of Care program, a national organization committed to ending homelessness by developing strategies in the specific communities in which it is based. Says Weist, “Rhodes has provided me with so much knowledge about the state of the U.S. and how far we are from achieving true equality. Memphis has not only given me the opportunity to see systemic differences on a large scale, but has so many wonderful nonprofits making a real difference that it’s easy to get involved with something you’re passionate about.”

Rhodes College ranks 11th for “Students Most Engaged in Community Service” and is recommended as one of the nation's best institutions for undergraduates to earn their college degree in The Princeton Review’s newest edition of The Best 386 Colleges.

Molly Mulhern has proven that you never really know where a job might take you. The Austin, TX, resident had been working as an event coordinator after graduating from Rhodes in 2018, but she found herself out of a job due to the COVID-19 pandemic. With much of the economy shut down, she wasn’t having success finding employment—until one day she stumbled upon a posting for a candlemaker at a Texas beeswax candle company. What happened next is buzz-worthy.

Despite the Rhodes Mock Trial team not being able to compete in the American Mock Trial Association National Championship Tournament for the first time in 33 years due to COVID-19, recent graduate Brian Burgess says that membership on the nation’s most successful collegiate mock trial team for four years was about more than trophies.

The annual Ostrander Awards recognize the best in Memphis theater. Hissifit (by Knight/Brinegar), produced by Rhodes’ McCoy Theatre for the 2019-2020 season, garnered eight nominations in the collegiate division, including one for best production. An adaption of Medusa in Greek mythology tracking the rise and fall of a modern-day punk rock band, Hissifit was directed by Dr. Joy Brooke Fairfield, who is among the Ostrander Award nominees.

Tony Eskridge ’20, an urban studies major and former Rhodes Student Government president, has won an Emerson National Hunger Fellowship, an 11-month program that provides unique leadership development opportunities for motivated individuals who wish to make a difference in eliminating hunger and poverty in the United States.

Justin Terrill’s Summer Service Fellowship at Just City took on new significance in response to concentrated COVID-19 outbreaks in jails and after the death of George Floyd and the nationwide protests that followed, putting him on the front lines in the battle for systemic changes to the criminal justice system.