Latest Stories
Prepared to Serve
Joan Weed Montagne ’67
In the Bozeman, Mont., home of Joan Weed Montagne ’67, there’s a wooden door with a large glass panel on which a spider web spirals out to fill almost the entire space. Joan’s father, famed furniture maker Walker Weed, built the door in memory of her mother, Hazel, a talented weaver, but it could well represent Joan’s own expansive life. She inherited her parents’ trait of embracing different cultures, and since her childhood in Gilford, N.H., she’s lived a year each in Norway and Japan. For the past 20 years, she’s focused on BioRegions International, the nonprofit she founded with her husband, Cliff, and its work connecting rural Mongolia with the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.
Designing Her Future
Gabrie Libby ’18 Interns at Studio Sage and Red Oak Montessori
Graphic design is an art form, but it’s also a creative service that fulfills a need for customers. This spring, graphic design major Gabrie Libby ’18 of Gorham, Maine, experienced the joy of delivering a final product to clients while interning with two local organizations. She discovered that delivering a meaningful product is the greatest reward.
180 Years of Welcoming Students
This year, the educational institution now known as Colby-Sawyer College will celebrate the 180th anniversary of welcoming its first students. While founded as New London Academy and officially established through a charter from the state of New Hampshire on July 4, 1837, the first class of 26 girls and a 10-year-old boy didn’t matriculate until May 1838.
How Art and Science Shape a Life
For more than a quarter of a century, Carrie and I were a part of the Colby-Sawyer community as college librarian and biology professor, respectively. We were attuned to the dynamic pulse of its daily life. Since our retirements, we live on an island off the coast of Maine, where life unfolds according to different rhythms. It was with some surprise, then, that I encountered a correspondence between these physically distant and seemingly disparate worlds.
In the Market for Success
Lauren Blanchard ’18 Interns at Pellettieri Associates
Business majors are expert marketers. They learn how to discover a product’s selling point and convince people to buy it. Most important, business majors learn how to market themselves. Lauren Blanchard ’18, who worked as a marketing and management intern at Pellettieri Associates, leveraged professional development skills she learned at Colby-Sawyer to land a job offer from her internship site.
Family Matters:
The Support Behind Student Success
For every student and alumni success story, there is a cast of supporting characters: the parents and families who help their children through life’s changes and stages. They play a major role in making a Colby-Sawyer education possible for those they love. From afar, and mostly behind the scenes, they’re essential to the success of Colby-Sawyer students and the future of the college. Though their stories and relationships with the school vary, they all have one thing in common: pride for their children-turned-college students.
Adventures in Service:
Nursing Major Brendan Libby ’19
In a polarizing world, it can be easy to forget that the people around us are more than what they appear to be on their surface. This is especially easy to forget while living in the intense microcosm of a small college, where it is all too easy to break apart social groupings by major, sport or club. Sometimes it takes meeting and getting to know someone like Brendan Libby ’19, a nursing major from Contoocook, N.H., to remember that we are all more than what is on our transcripts.
Raised to an Exponential Power:
Alumni Network Expands Experiential Learning
Experiential learning is a hallmark of a Colby-Sawyer education. Incoming students look forward to taking field study courses, working on research projects with faculty and peers, and gaining work experience through internships. While the power of those opportunities is often clear in the moment, after a few years those students-turned-alumni also have the perspective to reflect on the lessons they gained through direct experiences that occurred outside a traditional academic setting and how they affected their lives.
Winning the Lottery
Mohamed "Mo" Jafar '18
Early last April, I woke up on the wrong side of the bed and spent my morning complaining. There was still too much snow. The photocopier jammed again. I had a too-long to-do-list, and the news headlines made me cringe. The miserable day seemed endless.
Laughter, the Universal Medicine
A Medical Mission Trip to Costa Rica
This January, 24 fellow nursing students and I, along with two faculty members, traveled to Costa Rica on a medical mission trip thinking we would help change people’s lives. Little did we know the trip would have a tremendous impact on each of us as well.
True Blue
A Colby-Sawyer Love Story
On a warm June day in 1953, just hours after she graduated from Colby Junior College, Gretchen Hoch watched her family’s car drive off as she stood in the college parking lot. Gretchen was engaged to a man whom her father did not approve of because of religious differences, and given an ultimatum, she’d chosen her fiancé over her father.
Joy + Gravity in Design
Inspiring People to Care
Like many design educators, I pursue two primary activities: I design, and I teach. Along the way, I’ve come to realize that a common, fundamental purpose underlies my approach to both pursuits: I aim to move people.
Healing the Marines
I moved to New London in 1971. Colby-Sawyer was a junior college then, and I saw all the wonderful changes the institution underwent during the 30-plus years I lived there.
Containing Contradictions
A Nursing Student Writes Herself Out of the Box
Good writers know that compelling characters are often contradictory. Take Marvel superhero Matt Murdock — blind lawyer by day, vigilante by night — or Jesse Pinkman, the drug dealer with a heart of gold on Breaking Bad. Contradictions make a story more interesting by subverting an audience’s expectations. They also express a seeming paradox of life: People are one thing, but they’re also another.
Variable Conditions
Carving Careers in the Ski Industry
Colby-Sawyer alumni work in almost every facet of the ski industry, from coaching and sales to ski patrol and program direction. Sport management major Brian Heon ’98 and exercise and sport science major Megan Costello Burch ’01 are among those who constantly think snow. They’ve traversed winding paths back to New Hampshire: Heon is vice president and general manager of Wildcat Mountain in Gorham, and Burch is marketing and sales director at Mount Sunapee, home of the Chargers’ alpine ski program. Both exude passion for the sport and industry that has taken them from college ski racing to working with the biggest boss of all: Mother Nature.
Testing the Water
Town Partnership Powers Student Research
Symbiosis describes a relationship between two or more organisms that live closely together, often for the benefit of both parties. From the microbes taking up residence in the human gut to the bumblebees that pollinate flowers on their search for nectar, life depends on—and is better—in partnership. The same holds true for research. Learning is most meaningful when applied to real-world scenarios, and the relationship between Colby-Sawyer College and its hometown of New London has allowed environmental students to collaborate with local stakeholders to solve community problems.
Top Charger
Peter Sula ’03 Builds a Dream Team to Transform Boston’s Battery Wharf Hotel
By the time sport management major Peter Sula ’03 gathers his team for its daily 9:30 a.m. stand-up meeting, he’s been awake for almost seven hours. The general manager of the Battery Wharf Hotel in Boston’s North End steps outside his office into the circle of directors. He positions his six-foot-five basketball player’s body into a comfortable power stance, arms crossed, and listens.
Mather Cleveland and His Service
Celebrating the 100th anniversary of America’s Involvement in World War I
Mather Cleveland was born in 1889; he graduated from Yale University with a B.A. in 1911 and an M.A. in 1914. Cleveland enrolled in the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons to earn an M.D., but before completing it, he left to serve a tour of duty with the Harjes Ambulance Corps in France. Of note is that Cleveland did so more than two and a half years before the United States entered the conflict on April 6, 1917. He returned home and completed his medical degree only to return to military service when America joined the war effort.
An Office as Big as All Outdoors
Diana Abbott ’18 Fly Fishes Her Way to the Future
Montana is the kind of state where people go to find second chances and start a new life, and where people care more about what you will do than what you’ve done.
Aquaculture for a Cause
Professor Pine Shares Agriculture Expertise in Senegal
This summer, Associate Professor of Environmental Studies Harvey Pine shared his expertise in aquaculture with agricultural extension agents in Senegal as part of a volunteer project funded by the United States Agency for International Development. And, as a bonus, he donated a set of Colby-Sawyer soccer uniforms to a local youth group.
Forward Momentum
Colin Turner '19 Interns at Physiotherapy Works
Physical therapists are experts in movement — they help patients restore mobility through exercise and similar treatment plans. Exercise science major Colin Turner '19 received hands-on clinical experience while also experiencing a new culture when he spent his summer working alongside physical therapists in Ireland. The exposure to his discipline in an international setting took his learning to an even higher level, and the transferable skills he learned brought him one step closer to his ultimate goal of helping people improve their quality of life.
Being Seen as Susan
Susan N.T. Sam-Mensah ’18 is a champion among the approximately 1,100 smart, motivated students who attend Colby-Sawyer. Setting her apart is her public and conscious journey to shape her identity in a world that attempts to dictate her self-worth.
Getting Down to Business
Maliha Azizi '17 interns with PricewaterhouseCoopers
This summer, Maliha Azizi '17 worked as a private company services tax intern for PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the second largest professional services firm in the world. As a multinational network, its 223,000 employees help individuals and companies maximize value by providing assurance, tax and advisory services in more than 157 countries. At their office in McLean, Va., Azizi helped the company achieve its ultimate goal of solving important tax problems for clients in local, national and global markets.
Giving It Her Best Shot
Alex Danas '18 interns with Virginia Military Institute’s Basketball Program
Alex Danas '18 knows there are plenty of benefits to playing a team sport in college. Not only do student athletes benefit from the regular physical activity, but they also learn time management and leadership skills. And if sports are useful to students like Danas, then they are especially advantageous to cadets studying at military colleges like the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) in Lexington, Va., where Danas interned this summer.
Experiencing Science
Students Conduct Important Research with Real-World Impact
“Imagine if schools taught baseball the way they taught science,” goes a popular saying. If it were so, students would spend 12 years reading about the game, with a few opportunities as high schoolers to reproduce famous plays. Only as graduates would they have a chance to get out on the field and learn what it means to play the game. Of course, the analogy is a critique of how many schools at all levels teach: out of a book and in a classroom instead of engaged in the scientific process.
On Course:
Emily Lopez ’17 Combines a Passion for the Sea, Conservation and Law
Just south of Portland, Maine, Cape Elizabeth juts out into the Atlantic between Saco Bay and Casco Bay. On the southeast edge of the cape is Two Lights State Park. There are no lighthouses in Two Lights State Park, a source of consistent dismay and clarification for the park rangers who patrol the 41-acre park. What there is, instead, is an abundance of wildlife and a well-worn trail whose loops combine for a two-mile stroll that offers glimpses of minke whales making their way up the coast.
My Top Ten(ish) List
Local Places You Should Know About
Honestly, this is a Top 20 list of places I think Colby-Sawyer students should know about. The college provides numerous opportunities on campus, but there are also lots of activities and adventures to be had in town … and beyond. You’ll really make New London your home when you explore all the town and the area have to offer. These are just my personal favorites — get out there and find your own!
A Dog-Powered Sport
Bailey Friedman '18 Interns at Alaska Heli-Mush
Controlling 30 strong, high-energy sled dogs is an exercise. It is an exercise in flexibility and teamwork, but it’s also just plain exercise. Mushing requires intense and precise physical exertion from both the dogs and people trained to practice Alaska's official sport. This summer, Bailey Friedman '18 applied her exercise science major to her canine athletes while interning at Alaska Heli-Mush Inc.
Ready to Research
John Rojas '18 Interns at the National University of Natural Medicine
John Rojas '18 possesses a variety of talents. Last semester, he made the Dean’s List while majoring in health promotion and minoring in psychology and studio art. Outside the classroom, he’s active in the Hispanic-Latino Club and Student Government Association. He’s also known around campus for his expressive breakdancing. This summer, however, he focused on tackling a self-admitted weakness: research.
Ambition Has No Limit
Omar Hajajra '18 Interns with U.S. Senator Jeanne Shaheen
For history and political studies major Omar Hajajra ’18, working in the heart of the nation’s capital this summer was his “dream internship.” As an intern for New Hampshire’s U.S. Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Hajajra assisted senior staff, completed clerical duties and, most importantly, was on the frontline of communication with Senator Shaheen’s constituents.
Business of Care
Brigitte Ruiz '18 Interns with Genesis Rehab Services
Brigitte Ruiz '18 has found a variety of ways to improve the well-being of others at Colby-Sawyer, such as participating in Christian Navigators Fellowship and the Medical Reserve Corps. A health care management major in the Business Administration Department, Ruiz worked at New London Hospital as a community wellness intern and helped launch the “Healthy Eating Initiative” in the New London community last summer. She wanted to make an impact on yet another community, though, so she secured a second internship. This time, it took her to the other side of the world.
Stepping Up to the Plate
Chris Hood '18 Interns with the Upper Valley Nighthawks
Baseball is in full swing in the summer. For a lot of students, the season is also the perfect time to complete Colby-Sawyer’s required internship. Chris Hood '18, a sport management major from Goffstown, N.H., paired the classic summer activities as an intern with the Upper Valley Nighthawks in White River Junction, Vt. Baseball is America’s pastime, and it was Hood’s job to make it the pastime of the Upper Valley, too.
First Exhibition in New Center for Art + Design
“Inner Visions: Selections from the Collection of Beverly Stearns Bernson ’55” Features Outsider Art
Colby-Sawyer invites the public inside its new Center for Art + Design to view an extraordinary exhibition composed primarily of outsider art. Colby-Sawyer and the Fine and Performing Arts Department is proud to host “Inner Visions: Selections from the Collection of Beverly Stearns Bernson ’55” as the first exhibition in the center’s stunning Davidow Gallery. An opening reception will be held Friday, Oct. 13, at 4 p.m. during Homecoming.
Renaissance Woman
Morgan Forrest '18 Interns at Royall & Company
As a corporate events intern with the direct marketing agency Royall & Company, Morgan Forrest '18 of Brewer, Maine, had the opportunity to view higher education from the perspective of her business administration major. At Royall’s offices in Richmond, Va., she worked to improve the performance of higher education institutions, and the experience showed her how everything comes full circle — she helped market colleges to prospective students, which she once was.
Solid Foundations:
A Colby-Sawyer Couple Builds a Life Together
When David Rosso ’10 turned 18, his girlfriend Lindsey Brown ’12 whisked him away for his first visit to the Big Apple. Navigating New York City’s grid with confidence, she guided him from one landmark to another with unerring accuracy while he shook his head at the roar, stared up at the skyscrapers and wondered how anyone could ever be part of it. The city was, the Vermonter thought, overwhelming and unreal.
Giving Back with Every Cup
Nishchal Banskota's Commitment to Corporate Responsibility
A cup of hot tea holds more than just a strong, aromatic liquid. In its nearly infinite mutability, the beverage has served as a tonic, a centerpiece to social gatherings and even as the spark of a political revolution. For Nishchal Banskota '15, a cup of his company’s tea holds the product of a small business and its commitment to corporate responsibility.
Research on High
A Season in Phenology
Plant phenology describes the science of annual life cycle phases of plants, and collecting this data can help scientists understand how factors such as climate and elevation in influence those cycles. I’m one of several people who do this work for the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC), which has determined that plants now bloom as much as two weeks earlier in the valley than they have historically, but only two days earlier on the summit. This change is likely connected to climate change. Our data is also fed to the National Phenology Network, and Colby-Sawyer’s Alpine Communities Field studies class uses it as well.
From Theory to Practice
Aaron Records '15 Reflects After Year One of Law School
Aaron Records '15 majored in philosophy and creative writing and spent a year after graduating as the Presidential Fellow for College Communications before enrolling at Syracuse University College of Law. This summer, he is working for the Hon. Thomas J. McAvoy, senior judge for the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York, at his Binghamton chambers.
Lobbying on Capitol Hill
Emily Johnson '16 Leads Students
This spring, nearly 200 volunteers with Save the Children Action Network (SCAN) traveled from across the country to Washington, D.C., to speak with their representatives. The group included two Colby-Sawyer juniors, who lobbied on Capitol Hill for children’s rights. The students, along with the rest of the New Hampshire delegation, were under the leadership of Emily Johnson ’16.
Going the Distance
Colby-Sawyer Invests in Students to Make a Private Education Possible
When Emily Lopez ’17 and her mother started the college selection process during her junior year of high school, they had no idea that a small, private liberal arts-based college like Colby-Sawyer could be even more affordable than a public school because of generous institutional aid.
Challenging Stereotypes
Nathaly Abreu '17 Breaks Away from Misconceptions
Communication studies major Nathaly Abreu ’17, the daughter of Dominican-born parents and a native of the Bronx, has spent most her life defying stereotypes. “As a Latina, people think I’m crazy and sassy. Sure, I can be kind of sassy, but I don’t think that is because I’m Latina,” said Abreu. “I think it’s because that’s who I am.”
Everything I Wanted
Why I Chose Colby-Sawyer
I discovered Colby-Sawyer as a junior at a college fair in Baltimore, Md. I pocketed the information collected from the royal-blue booth and pulled it out months later, in the fall of senior year, when I began my priority application. On paper, Colby-Sawyer had everything I wanted – a New England location, a creative writing major and small classes. Then my acceptance letter arrived, along with my financial aid award. The college was more than affordable.
Leader of Change
Theresa Edick ’18 Selected for Emerging Leaders Fellowship
Environmental studies major Theresa Edick ’18 of Dublin, N.H., was one of 20 scholars from around the world – and the only undergraduate – chosen to participate in a week-long fellowship this month in San Francisco with The Unschool of Disruptive Design, an international organization that aims to activate positive social change by facilitating experiential knowledge labs.
On the Right (Pre-Law) Track
Jacintha Jackson ’17 helped trauma victims heal
Jacintha Jackson ’17 of London, England, is a history and political studies major and is on the pre-law track. She used the skills and knowledge garnered from her studies at Colby-Sawyer to make a difference through her internship with the Association for Trauma Outreach and Prevention (ATOP) Meaningfulworld. The international organization has chapters in three countries and works with the United Nations (U.N.) in an effort to heal trauma experienced by victims of war and natural disasters as well as transgenerational trauma.
In the Students' Service
Doug Atkins Reflects on 30 Years of Service
My earliest recollection of being cognizant of Colby Junior College was when I was 10 years old and in New London visiting my grandparents. It was June, and with the house full, my bed was on their porch. At eight o’clock in the morning, I was awakened by the carillon that used to play from the tower on Colgate Hall. Little did I know then that some 50-plus years later I’d be contemplating retirement after more than 30 years of service to that very same college.
Health Beyond the Hospital
Stephanie Cameron ’11 Helps Health Care Leaders Collaborate
The health care issues that New Hampshire faces are tied up in a complicated knot. Mental health disorders are linked with physical health conditions, and the presence of one can dramatically increase the severity—and costs—of the other. Ideally, treatment should address issues in conjunction, not in isolation. Public health major Stephanie Cameron ’11, a research associate at the Institute for Health Policy and Practice (IHPP) at the University of New Hampshire, knows this. It’s her job to make sure others do, too, and to help health care leaders collaborate in order to ensure New Hampshire residents have the chance to achieve their healthiest selves.
Law of the Land
It’s Never a Dull Day for Conservation Officer Christopher McKee ’06
“People just don’t know what we do,” says Fish and Game Department Conservation Officer Christopher McKee ’06, who’s been on the job for more than a decade and a member of the dive team for five years. That may start to change Sunday, March 5, when “North Woods Law: New Hampshire” debuts on Animal Planet. The series shows conservation officers working across the state to enforce laws, protect wildlife, aid the lost and injured, and recover drowning victims. McKee expects to appear on at least the first episode. Regardless of his airtime, he says, the film crew was on hand for some good cases.
Thriving in the ICN
Elizabeth Abbott ’17 Provides Care for Newborns and Their Parents
Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center (DHMC) is home to an Intensive Care Nursery (ICN) with a twist: among those providing care for the newborns and their parents are a troupe of Colby-Sawyer alumni, faculty and student nurses, including Elizabeth Abbott ’17.
A Smuggler's Poetry
An Interview with Ewa Chrusciel
Associate Professor of Humanities Ewa Chrusciel’s whirlwind of a sabbatical took her to many European countries, including her native Poland. It also gave her the opportunity to put the finishing touches on her book, Contraband of Hoopoe, released in 2014.
Mind Games
Brandon Legendre '17 Explores His Interests in Psychology and Athletics
Psychology major Brandon Legendre ’17 of St. Johnsbury, Vt., was an intern this summer with the Psychology Department at Columbia University in New York City. There, the captain of Colby-Sawyer’s track and cross country teams was able to explore the intersection of his interests in psychology and athletics.
A Dash of Confidence
Developing Self-Esteem Through Fitness
Running has been an emotional outlet for exercise science major Olivia McAnirlin ’17 of Newport, Maine, since she was 10. “I started running because I had a lot of problems with self-esteem,” she said. “I wanted to better myself and found that exercise is really good for that.”
No Dream Too Big
Aaron Feng '14 Finds a Home for His Dreams as a Graphic Designer
Aaron Fan Feng ’14 is a graphic designer at Compass, a high-end real estate brokerage that trades in luxury and the promise of guiding buyers home. He’s based at the Fifth Avenue office, where he works on print and digital pieces with marketing and product managers and agents throughout the design cycle. For all his self-professed shyness and diligence, the fact that Feng walks through Compass’s doors five days a week points to his secret status as a bit of a rebel.
The Highest Court
Ashley Woodside ' 18 Interns at the International Tennis Hall of Fame
If Ashley Woodside ’18 is not studying, she’s on or near a tennis court – and that includes during her internship this summer at the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, R.I.
From the East Coast to the Far East
Jon Keenan's Sabbatical Journey
Jon Keenan peered into his wood-fired anagama kiln as the star-filled September sky erupted with plumes of smoke. The hand-built kiln, modeled after the natural firing environment of sixteenth-century Japanese potters, was the centerpiece for the final night of the semi-annual ceramics firing at Professor Keenan's home studio.
Finding Her Passion
Meghan Andersen ’03 Makes Her Professional Dreams a Reality
In January 2016, Meghan Andersen ’03 was named creative director at The Boston Beer Company, parent company of Sam Adams, Twisted Tea and Angry Orchard brands. With that promotion, her ultimate professional dream came true. Getting there, she said, was “a very cool progression.”
Richard M. Damas '17
Moving Closer to His Goal
Richard Martin Damas ’17 is a communication and media studies major who wants to be a sportscaster on ESPN. Through Colby-Sawyer’s affiliation with the Washington Internship Institute, he had a semester-long internship as a field producer with WJLA-TV ABC7 News Channel 8 in Washington, D.C., that moved him one step closer to that goal.
Siembra Hoy y Cosecharas Mañana
What You Plant Now, You’ll Harvest Tomorrow
Kevin Salazar ’17 has heard this saying all his life. “My mother used it as a motivation for me,” he said. “She always told me that the hard work and dedication put in today will pay off later.”
Robin L. Mead ’72
Lifting up the Student Experience
Gone is the (text)book store of yore that was tucked away in the basement of Colgate Hall and managed by an external partner. In its place is a student-centered, college-run store that offers high-quality branded items and products selected by students, including international foods that meet the needs of a diverse student body.
Lindsey Hebert '17 Travels to Thailand as Elephant Sanctuary Volunteer
Helping an endangered species through hands-on learning
This summer, Lindsey Hebert ’17, a biology major with a pre-vet concentration, spent two weeks in Thailand helping animals and learning hands-on what it’s like to be a veterinarian. Hebert, a resident of Parker, Colo., was part of a small volunteer team that provided care at a dog shelter for one week and a second week working with rescued elephants at a sanctuary.
The Unconquerable Folk Heroes and Saints of the One Story
James Joyce called it the monomyth. Mythologist Joseph Campbell popularized the term in his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces, which I read in my 20s and loved. Campbell’s premise is simple: Every culture has its Hero Myths, and every hero pursues a quest that is as symbolic as it is significant.
A Newfound Authority
Travis Yandow '17 interns at engineering firm BSC Group
Travis Yandow ’17 of Franklin, Vt., chose to major in environmental science because of his passion for the great outdoors. This summer, he completed an internship as an environmental monitor for BSC Group, which gave him the opportunity to enjoy nature while working to keep it unpolluted.
Footprint of New Arts Building Makes An Impression
Construction of Colby-Sawyer’s long-planned arts building is underway and continuing at a brisk pace as summer turns to fall.
The Next Generation of Leadership
The Investiture of President Susan D. Stuebner
When Susan D. Stuebner, Ed.D., talks about the impact of higher education — especially the transformation that students can experience in their time at a small, liberal arts-based college like Colby-Sawyer — she gets actual goose bumps.
Sweet Summer Research
Students Partner with NH-INBRE to Bring Bees to Campus
In fall 2014, a black bear cub graced our campus. It materialized out of nowhere like a swath of New London mist before loping across the Quad and up a tree. We peered at it from our classrooms in Colgate Hall and took blurry iPhone photos.
The Dreams and Nightmares of a Social Psychologist
A New Paradigm for Selecting the Perfect Juror
Over the past 15 years, my primary interest has been teaching Psychology and the Law and related courses. Then, in spring 2014, I taught Group Dynamics and Processes, an experience that renewed my interest in my own research.
A Sojourn to Walden Pond
Out of the classroom and into literary history.
“It is one thing to read about Walden Pond and have Thoreau describe it; it’s another when you get to walk all along the beach and run into the woods and see where Thoreau’s cabin was.” So wrote one of the students in my course on 19th-century writers of the American Renaissance after our field trip to Concord, Mass.
Welcome, President Stuebner
Susan D. Stuebner joins the Colby-Sawyer community.
The Colby-Sawyer community welcomes Susan D. Stuebner, Ed.D., the college's ninth president, as she takes office July 1.
Filmmaker Tim Bradley ’05
Inspired by alumni friends, Bradley creates an award-winning love letter to home.
Tim Bradley ’05 grew up in Western Massachusetts and has long been inspired by the region’s natural beauty and cultural richness. His 2015 short documentary “The Whiskey Treaty Roadshow” serves as a sort of love letter to his childhood home. Chronicling five singer-songwriters who come together in a collaborative band, the film overflows with haunting performances set in the rustic wilderness and has garnered much acclaim at film festivals across the country.
First Among Equals
President Galligan Says Farewell
In February 2015, Colby-Sawyer College’s eighth president, Thomas C. Galligan Jr., informed the Board of Trustees that he would not seek a third term. His ten years of service will conclude on June 30, 2016.
Taking and Eliminating Risks
Amigo Khadka ’14 is working to change the banking industry as a risk regulatory management analyst.
It’s noon on the kind of Monday in July that gives Manhattan its reputation for swampy summers, and the sidewalks are filling with office workers hunting lunch.
Commencement 2016
On Saturday, May 7, Colby-Sawyer College will celebrate its 2016 Commencement, recognizing students and other individuals for academic excellence, outstanding contributions to society, and service to the college and community.
Around the World
With Stephanie Guzzo ’07 and the Harlem Globetrotters
Stephanie Guzzo ’07 navigates the cinderblock labyrinth of the Cross Insurance Arena in Portland, Maine, like she’s been there a hundred times, though it was just the night before that the Harlem Globetrotters’ caravan of an 18-wheeler, a 20-foot truck and two tour buses pulled into town for a March afternoon game. After three months on the road, she’s gotten used to orienting herself quickly so she can focus on her job.
Anything But Empty
Learning Comes Alive in the Sonoran Desert
After the coyotes sang a lullaby and the cloudless sky filled with constellations, the wind blew down from the Santa Catalina Mountains that first night with such fierceness that it lifted the tents until they threatened to snap their tethers to the desert floor, only to shift and pin them to the ground. Inside the pitching tents, the warm, dry desert air filled the lungs of 12 sleepless students on spring break at the end of March. The windy welcome was an early lesson on humankind's tenuous existence in a desert environment.
Martha's Vineyard
A Marine Community Pulled by the Past, Pushed by the Future
Millennia before the first wave lapped the shores of Martha's Vineyard, glaciers did their work. The last continental ice sheet ground down over Canada and across Cape Cod, pushing along rocks and boulders, sand and gravel, fossils and sediments from what author Norman Maclean calls the basement of time. The glaciers ebbed and flowed until their final retreat, and where the ice sheet surrendered 15,000 years ago, a new outpost of land heaved up into the world. Then, as the ice melted and the sea rose, that land dissolved into Staten Island, Long Island, Block Island, the Elizabeth Islands, Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard.
Every Drop Counts
Living and Learning in the Arid West
It was May 10, but flurries sprinkled the Colorado Flatirons rock formations with much-needed precipitation. Fresh off the plane from Boston and reveling in the beauty of our first hike, my group of Colby-Sawyer travelers paused beneath a stone arch to watch the snow welcome us.