Mount Prospect, Illinois
History
If you’re looking for Amy Cohen, chances are you’ll find her at WOO 91, The College of Wooster’s student-run radio station, where she has a show every Sunday night from 8-10 p.m. It’s one of the few times you will see the senior history major from Mount Prospect, Ill., sitting down.
Cohen spends those two hours entertaining her audiences with classic and indie rock, but that’s just a small part of her role at the station. Cohen is also the general manager, which means she is responsible for running an operation that is on the air 24 hours a day — quite a task for anyone, especially a college student with a full course load — but Cohen has already proven that she is well equipped for the job. As assistant general manager last year, she was thrust into the top spot when the reigning general manager stepped down. Despite having just returned from a study-abroad semester in Ireland, Cohen made a seamless transition and immediately earned the respect of fellow staff members.
Actively Engaged
Managing a radio station and taking classes would be more than enough to fill the schedule of most students, but Cohen’s activities do not end there. She also plays clarinet in the Fighting Scot Marching and Symphonic Bands, and is a member of a clarinet trio that presents a recital each semester. In addition, she is the music editor for the Goliard, the College’s literary magazine.
Cohen first visited Wooster as a senior in high school, and immediately fell in love with it. “I came for a College Scholars weekend,” she said. “It seemed like everyone I met was someone I thought I could be friends with.” Cohen also liked the fact that she could become involved in activities that interested her right away, rather than having to wait several years like some students do at larger colleges and universities.
Academic Rigor
Of chief importance to Cohen, however, was the strength of Wooster’s academic program, particularly its nationally acclaimed Independent Study (I.S.) program. “I knew coming in that I would major in history,” she said. “I’ve always been interested in how people lived in the past.”
And she hasn’t been disappointed in her Wooster experience. “The history professors have all been great,” she said. “I have had a good variety of classes and feel that I have a strong foundation in world history.”
Embracing Research
For her senior I.S., Cohen will look at how and why gangsters appealed to urban immigrants in the 1920s. “I have always been interested in the outlaw in America,” she says. “It will be very interesting to study figures like Al Capone and the mob scene in Chicago, especially because of its proximity to my hometown.”
Cohen has taken advantage of opportunities outside the classroom as well, including an internship with Smithsonian National Postal Museum in Washington, D.C, during which she did research at the Library of Congress and the National Archives. She is confident that the experience will help her as she looks toward graduate school and a possible career in library or museum archives.
Wherever she winds up, she will be forever grateful for her Wooster experience. “I feel like I have invested a lot in Wooster and that Wooster has invested a lot in me,” she says. “I could not imagine myself at any other school.”