Changing the name of its athletic fund-raising organization is the latest development in Augustana’s renewed institutional commitment to NCAA Division II.

“From I Have a Dream to Yes we Can” is the theme of a weekend celebration at Augustana honoring the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. and the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama.

Dr. John Pennington, professor of percussion at Augustana, is the featured soloist with the Augustana Band and Wind Ensemble during the group’s January Interim Tour through South Dakota and Colorado.

Mel Antonen, an Augustana '79 alum, will be the guest speaker at the 43rd annual B'nai B'rith Sportsman of Year Banquet.  Antonen has been at USA Today for 22 years, primarily covering baseball.

Private colleges everywhere are closely watching the numbers, to see just how the economy is impacting enrollment and enrollments nationwide are down. At Augustana College in Sioux Falls, the story's a little different.

Dan Johnson, an Augustana College senior, has been selected among 43 “NASA Student Ambassadors” nationwide. He will promote astronomy and NASA activities in 2009, the 400th anniversary of Galileo’s discoveries with the telescope.

Dr. Jeffrey Johnson, assistant professor of history at Augustana, is the author of “They Are All Red Out Here: Socialist Politics in the Pacific Northwest, 1895-1925,” published by University of Oklahoma Press.

Jamie Horter, an Augustana senior majoring in chemistry and art, has won the school's Covenant Award for liberal arts.

A kinder, gentler Tom Shields emerges through his current abstract oil paintings. And a more daring ceramic artist Gerry Punt is revealed, his formerly symmetrical wheel-thrown works now pushed, pulled and distorted.

Visit Spearfish, an organization designed to market the Black Hills city, has been created – and its executive director is Mistie Caldwell, class of 1993.