Dartmouth seems to be one of those places where people come and just don't leave.
Julie Kalish '91 has come and gone, but there's something about Hanover that just keeps pulling her back here. She's risen from the rank of student to professor to the current acting assistant dean of first-year students.
"I keep finding myself drawn back," Kalish said as she sat in her new office in the basement of Parkhurst. Her husband, Ted Bush '89, does technical writing and cancer research at the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center.
Kalish, who majored in English, spent a lot of her time as a student tutoring in the Composition Center.
After she graduated with Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa honors, Kalish earned her master's degree in English at University College London.
She then returned to Dartmouth, intending to use Career Services to find a job. But she visited the Sanborn House during her visit, and somehow ended up with a six-month-long job tutoring international students taking English 2 and 3.
Kalish next interned for six months in New York City for The Children's Television workshop, doing research and development for an animated show called "Crow" that was field-testing episodes for network television. She said the internship allowed her to combine her interests in education and the arts.
But Kalish didn't leave Hanover for long. She returned in the Fall of 1994 as assistant director of composition and a professor of English 2 and 3.
Kalish became acting assistant dean of first-year students this term. She replaced Stephanie Hull, who accepted a position as assistant to the president and secretary of the college at Mount Holyoke College.
In her first week and a half as assistant dean, she has been arranging the College's interactive academic studies programs -- including Math 1 and 2, English 2 and 3 and Chemistry 3 -- along with advising students and dealing with other logistical matters.
"The learning curve is steep," Kalish said. "With every student I see, I'm learning something new about the way life works at Dartmouth."
Kalish said she enjoys teaching students about writing, because it is skill that will be very important to them. The English 2-3 classes are also small, so she has had the opportunity to get to know her students well.
In her current position, Kalish said her relationships with students have changed, because she meets more students temporarily about issues that go beyond only academics.
"You probably get to know the complete student more than you do as a faculty member," she said.
Kalish came to Dartmouth in 1987 -- the same year James Freedman was inaugurated as president of the College. She said she has seen positive changes in the College over the years.
"In some ways I've seen Freedman's admissions goals manifest in my classroom," she said, adding that the student body is also much less polarized in its views than it used to be, and the campus is "much more open and tolerant."
Kalish, who took several Studio Art classes as a student, still exerts her creative energy during her free time.
She enjoys hands-on activities such as cooking, and she is looking forward to using the College's workshops to build a fence and an entryway bench for her new house.
Kalish said she thinks the College's location is one thing that makes people so attached to it.
"The location is so beautiful, and there's a certain point where you separate your relationship with the College as a student with your relationship with the area," she said.
Wearing hiking books on one of last week's wetter days, she added that she prefers urban to rural settings.
"To make light of it, there's parking," she said with a laugh.
