In the News
![Photo of Don Wilkinson](/media/content-assets/images/news/2019-20/Wilkinson_48011[3]horz.jpg)
Donald “Donny” M. Wilkinson, VMI Class of 1961, who served the Institute loyally after graduation, passed away on April 13 at the age of 82.
Grace McDonald ’21 and Kirk Ring ’21 are making weekly trips to Rockbridge County High School, where they assist Annie Knepper, chair of the RCHS English department, with marketing, publicity, and tutoring support at the school’s fledgling writing center. Their work at RCHS fulfills the fieldwork re
![Maj. Steve Knepper and Maddy Moger '20 discuss her research on fairy tales.—VMI Photo by Mary Price.](/media/content-assets/images/news/2017-18/SURIFairyTalesMoger2019MLP0006-1-400x266.jpg)
Maddy Moger '20's summer research project has involved a deeper look at the "whys" of classic fairy tales, using a psychoanalytic approach.
![](/media/content-assets/images/news/2017-18/TiceAnnika2019KN064-1-400x266.jpg)
Annika Tice ’19, the first VMI cadet since 2001 to receive a Fulbright award, will use the opportunity to teach English in the Ivory Coast.
The English, rhetoric, and humanistic studies 411 fieldwork class, taught by Maj. Stephanie Hodde, is taking a more creative approach to service learning by hosting the Rockbridge Community Memoir Project.
![A portrait of Liza Mundy](/media/content-assets/images/news/2017-18/LizaMundy4-400x266.jpg)
Journalist and author Liza Mundy will be giving a lecture at VMI about the women on the home front who played a key role in World War II.
![An architectural rendering of the new South River Bridge](/media/content-assets/images/news/2016-17/SouthRiverBridgeProposal-1-400x266.jpg)
A long-awaited bridge on the Chessie Nature Trail may be a reality as early as 2019. In the meantime, VMI is improving parking and cadets are engaged in projects to support trail events and develop interpretive signage.
![Conquest Visiting Chair Claudia Smigrod shows cadets Angelique Barlow ’17 and Albert Wu ’17 how to print a positive image from a negative using an enlarger in the Preston Library darkroom. – Photo courtesy of Albert Wu ’17.](/media/content-assets/images/news/2016-17/Darkroom2017AlWu0016-1-400x266.jpg)
Two new photography courses being taught in the ERHS department this spring are exposing cadets to one of the youngest of the visual arts.
![Kerisha Goode ’18 and Greg Henderson ’17 take photos to document 2016 Chessie Trail Half Marathon and 5K. – Photo courtesy of Maj. Stephanie Hodde.](/media/content-assets/images/news/2016-17/DSC_0076[5]-1-199x300.jpg)
An English major’s life has traditionally been spent indoors, but last fall seven cadets majoring in English, rhetoric, and humanistic studies found themselves most decidedly outdoors as they undertook a field work project centered on the Chessie Trail.
![Sarah Lemon and Maj. Julie Brown reading.](/media/content-assets/images/news/2015-16/BrownSURI2016KN21List.jpg)
Cadet analyzes layers and layers of texts and edits in a summer undergraduate research project on the work of the 19th-century poet Emily Dickinson.