The Missouri Western Women’s golf team was struggling to find someone to fill their roster up to four players. Head Coach Cathy Habermehl was desperate for anyone who could strike a ball or stroke a putt.

That desperation led her to select a Music Education major with no competitive golfing experience in high school or college.
People may wonder where or how Habermehl could find such a player. However, the slim possibility and timing that led to the discovery of Missouri Western senior golfer Kim Evans could only mean one thing. This was not a coincidence.

While playing golf at Lakeview Golf Course in the small town of Hamilton, Mo., Habermehl found the player to round out the roster. This was probably the last place she expected to find her fourth member.

Evans didn’t play golf in high school because she was playing softball in the fall at the same time golf was taking place. She was a varsity level athlete in every sport she participated in which included basketball, track, and the aforementioned softball. She only played golf once a year and that was during the summer. (Full story)

Since his major label debut in 2001, Andrew W.K. has made a song-writing career from a party hard attitude that stems from a personal ethos rather than excess.

During the downtime between tours, he has been working on a new kind of performance that he has labeled ‘happenings’. Part spoken word, part motivational, but all fun, Andrew W.K brought his rollicking performance to Missouri Western last Thursday. On the surface, it would be easy to dismiss the artist as fluff, but he has the guns to back it up. W.K (Wilkes-Krier) is a classically trained pianist and his own producer on his albums. His last full album, The Wolf, saw W.K play every instrument from start to finish. He has been using the musicianship to accent his happenings, which he displayed with full crowd par­ticipation points at various times during the show.

“This is new for me, to be speaking rather than singing,” W.K said. “With music, you’re communicating with a magical kind of material. I used to think music was the biggest and best, most amazing way to get a feeling across. I started having more experiences from talking to people after concerts and I saw this human interaction that was very powerful. Instead of music being the main focus, it’s just another way to get that feeling of goodness across.” (Full story)

For the members of Inpulse, a traveling a cappella group, getting real jobs after college was out of the question. Little did they know that dodging “real life” would soon turn into a really awesome opportunity.

Inpulse is made up of four gentlemen, three who are singers and one beat-boxer. Gabe Koxlien, Steve Howe, Matt McDonald and Marcus Hanson have been traveling the country for years performing their trademark vocal band routine.
Traveling the country they have performed at schools, festivals, trade shows and corporate functions. Everywhere they go they make sure to leave audiences impressed while challenging their original assumptions of what a cappella really is.
“The idea is that when we play we help work a cappella into a more mainstream outfit,” said Gabe Koxlien. “We want to change what people have though a cappella to be by bringing what we do best to the table.” (Full story)

by Jennifer Kohler

A crowd of over 300 people filled the Potter Hall theatre at Missouri Western State University March 5 to watch Step Afrika, the first professional company in the world dedicated to the tradition of stepping, perform the art.

Stepping, a unique dance tradition created by African American college students, uses the body as an instrument to create intense rhythms and sounds through a combination of claps, footsteps and spoken words. (Full story)

Still relatively new to the scene, the Missouri Western Griffons soccer team will enter into its fourth year of existence this fall. The Griffons reached a new plateau in 2007 by winning four games; that set a new single season record. Adding depth to their roster, the soccer team welcomes the addition of five new players to help continue the success for the 2008 season.
On February 11, 2008, Head Coach Hansen announced the signing of five players that will join the 2008 soccer line-up. Those players are: Joyce Endicott, from St. Louis, Mo., Brooke English, from Wichita, Kan., Audrey Henderson, from Liberty, Mo., Jeanna Ross, from Columbia, Mo. and Molly Slattery, from Elkhorn, Neb. (Full story)

Applying for a job at Missouri Western has now been made easier to do with an application instead of having to write a resume.

The Career Development and Student Employment Center saw the need for change in the way students apply for jobs, and filling out an application sounded like the best change they could make.

Kait Newhart is a freshman here at Western and works as a student assistant in the center. (Full story)

The WayStation, a local band, have played together both in St. Joseph and the area, since 1999.

There is a lot of different music out there, but it all gets filtered, formed, and shaped into the same old song and dance.
If you truly want to hear something different, take a ride on the psychedelic surfboard with The WayStation. The band features lead singer and Western sophomore Todd Long, and two Western alumni, Quentin Ames and Jeff Johnson, as well as member Jared Dunning.

It’s not hip-hop, classical, country, metal, punk or rap, but if you combine all these styles, you have what The WayStation has self- described as ‘organic rock’. (Full story)