Author: Leslie Gibson McCarthy

Members of the African dance company Creative Pandemonium perform during the Brown School’s 18th annual International Festival March 25 at the 560 Music Center. This year’s theme was “Around the World in 180 Minutes.”

More than 600 people took part in the 4th annual “Take Steps for Kids” 5K and one-mile fundraiser March 24 on the Danforth Campus. Event organizers doubled the fundraising goal this year — and still managed to surpass it — raising more than $8,200 for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Eastern Missouri. Hosted by Washington University Club Running, “Take Steps” is the largest student-run 5K in Missouri.

Barry Lynn (second from left), executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, talks with WUSTL students March 20 during an informal gathering in the Danforth University Center. Lynn was on campus to deliver an Assembly Series/John C. Danforth Center on Religion & Politics lecture that evening. The students enjoyed a lively discussion about how religion is influencing many current debates among political candidates.

The Gephardt Institute for Public Service invites students, faculty and staff to apply for the Civic Engagement Fund (CEF), which awards grants to support service trips, civic initiatives or community service projects. CEF grants, available to individuals and groups, provide up to $500 for projects in the St. Louis area, across the country and around the world. Deadline for the upcoming funding rounds are April 13 and July 20.

The baseball team won all five games last week to improve its overall record to 17-6 on the season. Updates also included on softball, men’s tennis, swimming & diving, track & field and women’s golf.

Students in the McDonnell International Scholars Academy pose in front of the Statue of Liberty on a cruise to see the Manhattan skyline March 11. As part of its leadership training program, the academy takes scholars each spring to New York or Washington, D.C. During the New York trip the week of spring break, scholars met with leaders from the financial sector and international politics.

Song, dance and dishes from a variety of nations represented by students at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis highlight the 18th annual International Festival beginning at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, March 25, at the 560 Music Center. Admission is $2 in advance and $5 at the door.

The No. 21 softball team secured a second-place finish at the 2012 University Athletic Association (UAA) Championship Tournament with a split in the final two games March 17 in Altamonte Springs, Fla. Updates also included on baseball, men’s and women’s tennis, swimming and women’s golf.

The annual Summer Writers Institute at Washington University in St. Louis returns for its 17th year, this time with a new, compressed format geared toward working professionals and offering workshops in four genres. The new format takes place over eight days, from Friday, July 13, through Saturday, July 21, with evening workshops in fiction; creative nonfiction; flash fiction and prose poetry; and screenplay writing.

Barry W. Lynn, JD, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, will present “It’s Religion, Stupid, Not the Economy” at 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 20, in the Knight Center, Room 200 on the Danforth Campus of Washington University in St. Louis. The talk, which is free and open to the public, is the Thomas Hennings Lecture, jointly sponsored by the John C. Danforth Center on Religion & Politics and the Assembly Series.