Theme: Share Your Spark

We all have something that drives us. Something we are passionate about. Something that ignites our curiosity. This year's event will explore that "something".

Drake University
Des Moines, Iowa, 50311
United States

Arti Patel

Arti is currently a Senior at Drake University from Chicago, Illinois. She will graduate in May with a degree in Neuroscience and Biology. She is involved in various student organizations and does research in the neuroscience department at Drake. Having family from India, but growing up in the US has shaped her life and ignited a passion for medicine and public health. She is intrigued by the cultural difference and similarities in the medical field.

Crystal Harris

Crystal holds a B.S. in Biology from Drake University. She has also spent time at the School for International Training in Durban, South Africa, where she completed two research projects including one on the hindrances to tuberculosis control in semi-rural South Africa at a TB/HIV clinic. Crystal has also spent time studying health issues at home, interning at the Iowa Department of Public Health, Bureau of HIV, STD and Hepatitis, collaborating with the staff to conduct clinic audits. She currently works at the World Food Prize Foundation. There, she directs the Iowa Hunger Summit and assists with the grants for the Hall of Laureates’ Education wing and interactive exhibits.

Sarah Brown-Wessling

Sarah has been a high school English teacher in Iowa for the past 19 years. As an educator, she is also Nationally Board Certified, the 2010 National Teacher of the Year, and Laureate Emeritus for The Teaching Channel. But really, Sarah holds stories. She collects them and she holds them and she cares for them. She often tells her students, “Stories, literature should change you. You should be somehow different because you just read those words”.

Shea Sheiff

Shea Seiff is a junior at Drake, double majoring in Law, Politics & Society and Anthropology/Sociology, with a minor in psychology. After she finishes her undergraduate degree she plans to go to law school, where she will work to achieve her dream of becoming a civil rights lawyer because she has always been dedicated to fighting for the rights of others, especially for groups of people who are marginalized and oppressed. She is an avid political activist who has done many protests in the Drake and greater Des Moines Community. Last year, Shea started DU Spoken word on Drakes campus, which is an organization that focuses on the art of spoken word poetry. The goal of this organization is to draw people together through spoken word. By doing so, it allows the opportunity for conversations about positive social change, in a different medium than normally discussed.

Stuart Konfron

Stuart is currently a student at Drake University, majoring in musical theater. He attended an all boys, Catholic academy, run by Benedictine monks. He is passionate about his major in musical theater and LGBT rights in the U.S.

Vicky Goldsmith

Vicky taught English in six public schools and six colleges and universities, three of them out of the country. She started the first Women's Studies course in Iowa on the high school level. In 2005, she was Iowa Teacher of the Year and a finalist for National Teacher of the Year. That same year, she received an Honorary Alumni Award from Bolwing Green State University. An important part of her life is practicing zen meditation.