In 1901, Buffalo played host to fairgoers, stunts, and a presidential assassination — Christian Science Monitor

During the 1901 Pan-American Exhibition in Buffalo, anarchist assasinated President McKinley.

Professor of History Margaret Creighton grew up in Buffalo, yet “knew little about the exposition next door,” writes Christian Science Monitor staff writer Randy Dotinga. “No wonder. Almost all of the fair’s buildings have vanished, replaced by streets and elegant homes.”

Creighton fills the gap with her new book The Electrifying Fall of Rainbow City: Spectacle and Assassination at the 1901 World’s Fair.

She came up with the book idea after her students read Devil in the White City, about the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, and asked her about other such fairs.

“Creighton’s curiosity about Buffalo’s past inspired her to dig into the fair and the epic tragedy that defined it,” Dotinga writes.

Creighton says that she soon learned “that an entire world surrounded this assassination, very rich and compelling and full of eccentric characters.â€�

Students and professors dig in deep for lessons on climate change — Portland Press Herald

The primary function of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€“Morse Mountain Conversation Area, writes Portland Press Herald staff writer Mary Pols, is “to serve as a research and educational laboratory for both ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ students and professors.”

Case in point is Cailene Gunn ’16, whose research experiences at BMMCA with Professor of Geology Beverly Johnson led to Gunn’s job at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, one of the U.S. Department of Energy’s national labs.

Cailene Gunn ’16 of Granby, Conn., poses for a portrait in a marsh near ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½â€“Morse Mountain in August 2015. (Josh Kuckens/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Pols explains that Johnson is an expert on how coastal ecosystems capture carbon emissions. These so-called blue carbon ecosystems “sequester roughly 15 times more carbon per unit area than the upland forests.”

Johnson is part of the international policy and scientific experts who come from universities, governments, and NGOs worldwide.

Our magnetic 5-year-old is not a threat to anyone — Washington Post

Over the summer, Vanessa Kalter-Long Ford ’02 and her husband Ron Ford shared their experiences, including a first-person , as parents of a young transgender child.

They did so after a May 2016 federal directive to public schools about accommodations for transgender students sparked backlash in some states.

“The national conversation about transgender people — about our daughter, Ellie — isn’t truly about bathrooms,” Vanessa and Ron write. “It is about discrimination.”

They write:

Our daughter, like thousands of transgender and gender non-conforming children, does not want special treatment. She wants to make friends, to learn, to participate in sports, to go trick-or-treating on Halloween and wear pretty dresses on her birthday.

 And, yes, she wants use the bathroom that matches her gender identity when she needs to pee. Not because that’s special treatment, but because that’s the same treatment everyone else receives. Our daughter wants to be included, just like everyone else.

10 questions with Val Smith, president of Swarthmore College — NBC10 Philadelphia

In a Q&A with NBC10 of Philadelphia, Val Smith ’75, now into her second year as president of Swarthmore College, was asked about the qualities of a good listener.

Good listening, she said, furthers the goal of making “every effort to respect the opinions and ideas of our interlocutors, even if we think we have nothing in common with them.”

There are time, she said candidly, “when I think I don’t want to listen to what other people have to say.” That’s the exact moment to “remind myself that however right I may think I am about a particular issue, there was usually always something I can learn if I let myself listen to what other people have to say.”

The result? “One’s deeply held opinion might change or be modified or gain nuance if one is able to enter into conversation with other people.”

Her poetry is much like the author herself: passionate and purposeful — Take Magazine

In a Q&A with Take Magazine, Crystal Williams talks about her work as the college’s chief diversity officer and associate vice president for strategic initiatives, then deftly switches to the meaning of a line of her poetry (she’s also a widely published poet and professor of English).

Crystal Williams is a professor of English, chief diversity officer, and associate vice president for strategic initiatives at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½. (Photograph by Brian Fitzgerald)

The line is, “The heart is a beautiful monster; it nearly always survives its fate.”

Williams tells writer Alexa Harrison that “our hearts, or spirits, are our most robust qualities. They are from whence emerge our kindnesses and our travesties. So they can be both monstrous and beautiful and are often both — at once. This duality is what makes human beings, at least to me, so very interesting and compelling.”

In 2016, most students don’t have memories of 9/11 — Portland Press Herald

A Press Herald story published on the 15th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks quotes Associate Professor of English Eden Osucha, who has taught the course “Narrating 9/11 in Literature and Film.�

Associate Professor of English Eden Osucha. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

The youngest ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ students, barely 3 years old when 9/11 took place, “don’t have personal baggage” associated with the attacks, she tells reporter Edward Murphy.

But they do carry “cultural baggage”: the burden of comprehending all the stories of what happened that day.

At the same time, Murphy writes, “many don’t have a full understanding of the cultural landscape of America prior to the attacks because, understandably, the events of that day overshadowed the years that immediately preceded them.”

The event gives some 250 high school sophomores the opportunity to create research projects across a wide spectrum of topics. Last year’s winning projects studied the effects of different teaching styles; accuracy on goal in lacrosse; the efficacy of antibacterial hand sanitizers; and the efficiency of airfoils.

The projects are assessed by judges from ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ and the community.

Mandatory for 10th-graders at the high school, participation in the fair is beneficial in many ways, explains Laurie Haines, a science teacher at LHS and the event’s coordinator. Putting together a research project builds skills in problem solving and critical thinking, and in oral and written expression.

“Those students who take the fair seriously really gain an appreciation for the hard work that goes into solving scientific problems,” she says.

“The fair allows students to use the tools from their introductory courses to investigate something that they are interested in,” adds Andrew Kageleiry of Dover, N.H., one of the two ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ sophomores working with Haines. “While it’s important to learn about abstract concepts like atomic theory or DNA, these projects give the students a chance to tangibly pursue an idea of their own choosing.”

Kageleiry’s partner in the project is Colby Maldini of New Castle, N.H. Says Haines, “I could not run the fair without them. The event has evolved into a true partnership.”

The ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ coordinators, she explains, “create the spreadsheets for student projects, plan the gym placement of exhibits, register the students and most importantly, recruit numerous judges for the event.”

“Organizing an event like this is great experience for college students,” she says, adding that “our sophomores truly enjoy the interactions with the college students, and everyone who helps out has a positive influence on our student body.”

Winners will be invited to an afternoon at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, including lunch in Commons and a tour of the college’s science laboratories.

“The Center for Community Partnerships will ensure a sustainable link of the College’s academic mission to its commitment to service, and to mutually valuable partnerships with the community beyond the College — partnerships that bring benefits and support that otherwise would not be possible,” Harward said in remarks at a breakfast seminar of business, civic and health-care leaders from the Lewiston-Auburn community. “Our engagements with the community outside of the College have been true partnerships. They serve mutual, yet independent, interests that honor the integrity of both partners.”

The Center for Community Partnerships will consolidate existing and new programs, current and future collaborations, personnel and resources:

* The Center will enhance ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½’ focus on and support to service-learning. Service-learning at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ goes beyond traditional volunteerism by incorporating community service into academic course work. Since 1995, more than half of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ student body has engaged in service-learning projects, while more than a third of the faculty has included a service component in their courses. In the last academic year, September 2000 to May 2001, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ students participated in 53,547 hours of service in the local community. ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ enjoys national recognition, having successfully integrated academic excellence, with a model service-learning program involving nearly 150 community agencies and institutions.

* The Center will provide an ongoing institutional structure and resource for collaborations with the community, including LA Excels. A community-based strategic alliance founded in 1998, LA Excels is composed of colleges, schools, hospitals, municipal governments, arts organizations and businesses that work together to create a shared vision of excellence in community development. After two conventions involving more than 1,000 local citizens, LA Excels decided to champion plans that no single entity could accomplish, including: bringing Lewiston and Auburn together to develop a performing arts center, a community arts learning center, and a museum devoted to the area’s industrial and social heritage. It also supports an LA conference center, neighborhood housing improvements, green corridors and bicycle pathways linking the two cities, and projects to increase educational aspirations of local schoolchildren. In its second year, the Civic Institute is offering leadership training for area citizens and middle-school personnel. The Institute is supported by grants from the Wallace-Reader’s Digest Funds.

* The Center will align and support research projects by students and faculty that have application in the community — research that brings external support that otherwise would not occur. Examples include a student who developed a Geographical Information System for Lewiston and Auburn and saved the municipalities nearly $200,000 in labor and consultants’ fees. Another gave 34 students from Lewiston’s Longley Elementary School a chance to conduct hands-on science experiments with four ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ professors. Significant grant support from the Christian A. Johnson Endeavor Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation provide resources that enable these College and community collaborations.To reinforce its grounding in the academic life of the College, the director of the Center will work with the new President and under the direction of Dr. Jill Reich, Vice President for Academic Affairs and the lead academic officer of the College.

The ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Board of Trustees voted to create the Center and authorized a search for its first director at its meeting Oct. 27. The work of the Center will be supported by a new Board of Trustees Committee, confirming the centrality of its work to the mission of the College.

During Board discussion, Board Chairperson Burton Harris, among others, noted the importance of a lasting partnership between campus and community. “The fences, physical and metaphorical, have come down,” Harris said. “The College and its partner, the community, now have a direct, a sustainable, and a mutually-reinforcing relationship.

“The establishment of this Center, one of the most significant steps taken by the College, will assure the Lewiston-Auburn community that, as partners now and in the future, both the College and the community can reinforce their strengths, their mutually beneficial interactions and their missions of excellence.”

There will be two two-week camp sessions, weekdays 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The first session runs from July 6-17, and the second from July 20-31. The cost for each session will be $216. Sliding scale tuition and scholarship funding are available for qualified campers.

Children attending the Auburn Land Lab Summer Camp will explore the natural world, work in the community gardens and enjoy a variety of games and activities. Four ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ students, including sophomore Bridget Huber of Wells, junior Matt Schlobohm of West Springfield, Mass., sophomore Ethan Miller of Allentown, Pa., and sophomore Laurie McKenzie of Portland, Ore., will work with the children. The program also will present community members, including master gardeners and storytellers.

“We’re interested in sparking a sense of wonder about the natural world in children,” Huber said. “We also want to encourage them to feel a sense of empowerment, that it’s up to them to protect the environment.”

Grants to ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College from the Howard Hughes Foundation will fund part of the camp operations and student salaries. Additional funding for ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ student salaries is provided by the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Center for Service Learning.

The programs are a three-week workshop with members of the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange, leading to the annual Community Performance project; and the Youth Arts Program, three weeks of daily classes offering youngsters ages 6 to 16 a chance to learn dance and music with nationally acclaimed artists.

The annual Community Performance Project will be preceded by a three-week intensive workshop directed by choreographer-educators Peter DiMuro and Kimberli Boyd of the Lerman company. Twelve area residents, ages 17 and up, will be selected along with 12 ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Dance Festival students to create and perform a new piece.

The workshop meets at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College weekdays from 4 to 6 p.m., July 29-Aug. 17.  Participants must be available to attend all classes for the three weeks.

No prior dance or performance experience is required, and all interested individuals are encouraged to apply.

The piece will be performed as part of the festival’s culminating concerts on Aug. 15 and 16 in Schaeffer Theatre.

The workshop is offered free of charge as part of the festival’s ongoing community outreach effort. Interested individuals must complete a project questionnaire, available through the festival office, by May 30.

DiMuro has been a performer and teacher with Liz Lerman Dance Exchange since 1993. He received the 1995 Public Service in the Arts Award presented by the mayor of Boston in recognition of his AIDS education and outreach work.

Boyd joined the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange in 1988. As the troupe’s associate artistic director, she conducts theater performances and community-based residencies throughout the U.S., working with dancers, teachers, healthcare professionals and community workers.

Liz Lerman Dance Exchange is a multigenerational, Washington, D.C.-based organization composed of dancers who range in age from 20 to 75. The group leads community residencies across the country, involving people from all walks of life in an exploration of the expressive range of dance and theater performance and artmaking.

The ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Dance Festival Youth Arts Program will take place July 29-Aug. 17 from 9 a.m. to noon each day at the Lewiston Recreation Center. The cost is $180.

The Youth Arts Program is three weeks of daily classes divided into three age groups: 6-9, 10-12 and 13-16. Students have a chance to learn a variety of dance and music styles and put together a show to perform in the final concert of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Dance Festival.

Teacher Jane Weiner, from the Doug Elkins Dance Company, will instruct a combination of modern, ballet and hip hop. Musician Andrew Kushin, of the dance and music group Contraband, will teach music through rhythm and song. Master classes in creative movement and African dance also will be offered.

The Youth Arts Program is sponsored in partnership with the Lewiston Recreation Department.