coa magazine fall 2013

collaborations

COAVolume 9 . Number 2 . Fall 2013

The COllege OF The ATlANTiC MAgAziNe

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COAThe College of the Atlantic Magazine

East Peak by Blakeney Sanford '02Site-specific installation, Ethel H. Blum Gallery Courtyard at COA

Standing beneath the curved wave of Blakeney’s East Peak, summer visitors experienced the cool of the ocean, delighting in the ways the sculpture’s

varied aqua tones echoed how water alters light. Although envisioned and designed by Blakeney, the piece was collaboratively assembled, with faculty,

staff, students, alumni, and various family members all pitching in.

Collaborations

Letter from the President 3

News from Campus 4

COA's New Dean • Heather Albert-Knopp '99 6

A Cornucopia of Books 8

Donor Profile • Becky and Dylan Baker 11

Collaborations 12Designing for Acadia • Creating the Acadia Nature Center 13

Team Teaching • An Introduction 17

Collaboration in Process • Developing the Unexpected Journey 18

Evolving Democracy • Dustin Eirdosh '04 in Madagascar 22

Tutoring as Collaboration • The COA Writing Center 25

Collaborating to Conserve Communities • Julie Massa '93 28

Aversion • Short Story by Michael Griffith '09 31

Paintings by Alonso Diaz Rickards '12

Ghost • Poetry by Moses Bastille '13 37

Alumni and Community Notes 38

In Memoriam 47

Take-A-Break • A New COA Cookbook 48

Embracing our Interconnectedness • Jesse Karppinen '13 49

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Collaborations. Life is a collaborative enterprise. And a solitary one. To raise a child — or educate a student — it does take a village, one ideally with parks, teachers, and caregivers. The creation of each human being, literally and figuratively, is a collaboration. But that person also must raise her- or himself. To become full individuals we need to look inside, learn to reconcile the complicated pulls of our desires with our gifts and the world within which we live. Perhaps that, too, could be seen as a collaboration, one with ourselves.

For most of us, college is a time when the internal and external are shaken up, probably more extremely than at any other point in our lives. Our preconceived notions are challenged, along with our ways of questioning, the nature of our curiosity, and our ability to live on our own and make friends. Comfort zones? Those are shattered.

And so, true learning begins. One of the very unusual, and yes, amazing qualities of COA is the expansiveness of the "village" that educates our students. Within the collaborative dance that the COA community performs fifty-two weeks of the year, it's not just the faculty that are challenging the students, or classmates, but also the staff. As advisors, as committee members, as workstudy supervisors, as friends, COA's staff members equally engage with students in their learning process. And for many — both faculty and staff — the hours of service are uncommonly generous.

There are many ways humans collaborate to create communities, and communities take many shapes. There's COA itself, along with the ten-week community that each class forms. There are the communities that Julie Massa '93 helps to create by mentoring manufactured home renters to become cooperative home owners. And then there's the primal community that Dustin Eirdosh '04 alludes to, as defined by the evolutionary theory known as multi-level selection — which sees humanity as having evolved because we connect, we collaborate, and we help each other. Collaboration, say these evolutionary theorists, is what has made us human.

From a collaboration between two alumni separately plying their arts as painter and writer, to team-teaching, to the over-the-top efforts of student designers collaborating with each other and Acadia National Park to redesign the park's central museum, this magazine concerns people drawing upon their inner strengths to connect to others so as to enhance the lives of many.

The faculty, students, trustees, staff, and alumni of College of the Atlantic envision a world where people value creativity, intellectual achievement, and diversity of nature and human cultures. With respect and compassion, individuals construct meaningful lives for themselves, gain appreciation of the relationships among all forms of life, and safeguard the heritage of future generations.

COA is published biannually for the College of the Atlantic community. Please send ideas, letters, and submissions (short stories, poetry, and revisits to human ecology essays) to:

COA Magazine, College of the Atlantic105 Eden Street, Bar Harbor, ME 04609 [email protected]


Volume 9 · Number 2 · Fall 2013

WWW.COA.EDU

EditorialEditor Donna GoldEditorial Guidance Heather Albert-Knopp '99 Marni Berger '09 Rich Borden Dru Colbert Ken Cline Michael Griffith '09 Sarah Haughn '08 Jennifer Hughes Katharine MackoEditorial Consultant Bill CarpenterAlumni Consultants Jill Barlow-Kelley Dianne Clendaniel

DesignArt Director Rebecca Hope Woods

COA AdministrationPresident Darron Collins '92Academic Dean Kenneth HillAssociate Academic Deans Catherine Clinger Stephen Ressel Sean Todd Karen WaldronAdministrative Dean Andrew GriffithsDean of Admission Heather Albert-Knopp '99Dean of Institutional Lynn BoulgerAdvancementDean of Student Life Sarah Luke

COA Board of TrusteesBecky Ann BakerDylan BakerTimothy R. BassRonald E. BeardLeslie C. BrewerAlyne CistoneNikhit D'Sa '06Amy Yeager GeierGeorge B.E. HambletonElizabeth D. HodderPhilip B. Kunhardt III '77Anthony MazlishSuzanne Folds McCullagh

Sarah A. McDaniel '93Linda McGillicuddyJay McNally '84Stephen G. MillikenPhilip S.J. MoriartyPhyllis Anina MoriartyHamilton Robinson, Jr.Walter RobinsonNadia RosenthalMarthann Lauver SamekHenry L.P. SchmelzerWilliam N. Thorndike, Jr.Cody van Heerden, MPhil '15

Life TrusteesWilliam G. Foulke, Jr.Samuel M. Hamill, Jr.John N. KellySusan Storey LymanWilliam V.P. NewlinJohn ReevesHenry D. Sharpe, Jr.

Trustee EmeritiDavid Hackett FischerSherry F. HuberDaniel PierceHelen PorterCathy L. Ramsdell '78John Wilmerding

Donna Gold, COA editor

Front Cover: Abiquiu, by Gabriela Niejadlik '14, for the Unexpected Journey class “We were out in the desert and there was this incredibly deep and big sky that wrapped around like a different version of the ocean. It was collaborative in the most magical of ways: the convergence, this immersive experience between mostly strangers, bonding and constantly changing. Back on campus our journey continues on between us and inside of us. The class is hands down the best I've ever taken.” (see page 18)

Back Cover: Family & Alumni Weekend, October 11–14, 2013. Friends, families, and beautiful fall weather made for an unforgettable Family & Alumni Weekend of field trips, lectures, panels, and class visits.

Printed on recycled paper with vegetable-based inks on equipment using 100% wind-generated power.

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COLLEGE OF THE ATLANTIC MAGAZINE 3

From the President: Darron Collins '92, PhD

Max Friedlander, Maggie Collins, Darron Collins '92, and Alex Pine '14 take a ride in COA's solar-powered SUNN electric vehicle built by COA students from a kit, and purchased in partnership with the Seal Cove Automobile Museum. Photo by Sune Andersen '16.

For the COA community, the most palpable effect of the recent government shutdown was the closure of Acadia National Park. As individuals, we were of course frustrated by not being allowed to enjoy the trails, paths, rocks, and beaches during the height of the fall foliage in what has been a particularly beautiful autumn. But for the college as an institution — not to mention the ANP employees — the sixteen-day closure presented a much larger challenge.

We enjoy a more proximate relationship — both geographically and thematically — to a United States national park than any other

college or university in the country. We hold classes in the park, work collaboratively with park staff, use park data, and share goals. Without access to these resources, we’ve had to pivot creatively during the fall term of 2013. Acadia National Park is not just our backyard neighbor, it ’s a partner in the truest sense of the term: one that bends and squeezes our very form. Not having the park underscored the essential role Acadia plays in our curriculum.

COA is a small college; partnerships enhance our offerings and our impact by orders of magnitude. As president, I am committed to keeping the size of the community small, yet I am equally

committed to expanding the influence of the college on the wider world, and increasing the opportunities for faculty, staff, and students. Working with our community on the island, and with a widening circle of communities further afield, are essential to our creativity, awareness, and intellectual growth. Collaborative partnerships will continue to play an enormous role at COA.

Enjoy and stay in touch,

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4 CheCk out more stories and photos at newsworthy.Coa.edu

A RecoRd 147 community membeRs Plunge in foR the bAR islAnd swim

AlyssA seemAnn '16 sings mozARt's "o zittRe nicht, mein liebeR sohn!" in the community tAlent show

the doRR museum oPens "300+ objects to descRibe humAn ecology"

SEPTEMBER OCTOBER nOvEMBERCOA opens with the largest entering class ever: 105 first-years and 26 transfers, with 17 new internationals, and two MPhils.

The College Database's 50 Colleges Committed to Saving the Planet ranks COA as #9, the first of the colleges (not universities) on the list.

Again, COA makes US News & World Report's top 100 colleges, rating #12 for best value, and #6 for percentage of international students.

Some 200 friends, family, and alumni descend on COA for lectures, activities, and reuniting during Family & Alumni Weekend.

More than 20 students talk about their science, education, and policy research during COA's third Student Science Symposium.

Bugs are a delicacy at the annual Nature of Halloween celebration at the Dorr Museum.

Having studied the issues throughout the term, 13 students from eight nations, along with faculty member Doreen Stabinsky head to Warsaw, Poland, for the 19th Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Solar panels — 195 of them — are installed on the Kathryn W. Davis Student Residence Village roofs and the Peggy Rockefeller Farms; an additional 6% of COA's annual electricity needs now comes from the sun.

Phinn onens '13 And mollie bedick '13 celebRAte AfteR commencement

meAghAn lyon '16 bAnds A gull chick on gReAt duck islAnd

PARticiPAnts in coA'sRiveRs: A wildeRness odyssey

AUGUSTJULYGraduation speaker Dr. Paul Farmer of Partners in Health, now an honorary human ecologist, tells COA graduates to "partner hard."

President Darron Collins '92 gives Conway College's commencement speech.

Hatchery students Leland DeWalt '14, Stevie DuFrense '14, Cayla Moore '13, and Robin Owings '13 present their ventures at Bar Harbor's Artemis Gallery, owned by Deirdre Swords and trustee Cody van Heerden, MPhil '15.

Alumni artists David Vickery '89 and Blakeney Sanford '02 open the summer season with a joint exhibit at the Ethel H. Blum Gallery.

Anneke Hart '16 finds that gulls on Mount Desert Rock are much tamer than those on Great Duck Island. Meanwhile, Tyler Freitas '16, Meaghan Lyon '16, Ariana Rambach '16, and Kate Shlepr '13 monitor the gulls and other birds of GDI, and Jane Strader '16 examines the impact of sea level rise on Acadia's nesting seabirds.

In July and August, 30 high school students receive college credit by attending one of COA's three Summer Field Institutes: Rivers: A Wilderness Odyssey, Farm to Fork, and Islands Through Time.

Princeton Review rates COA a 98 out of 99 in academics, listing us as #7 for "professors get high marks" and "best campus food," #8 for "most liberal students," and in the top 20 for "best quality of life," "great financial aid," "their students love these colleges," and "most accessible professors."

JUNE

NEWSfrom campuS

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New faculty. More scholarships. A farm. A protectorate. A boat. That's only a portion of what COA's three-year "Life Changing, World Changing" capital campaign has meant for the college. Overseen by Lynn Boulger, now dean of institutional advancement, and trustees William Foulke, Jr., Samuel Hamill, Jr. and Hamilton Robinson, Jr., the campaign raised more than $32 million toward a myriad of COA needs.

The success list is mind-boggling. COA now has an additional $12 million in its endowment for scholarship support, and six new endowed faculty chairs bringing needed faculty funding. These chairs are: the Partridge Chair in Food and Sustainable Agriculture Systems, held by Molly Anderson; the David Rockefeller Family Chair in Ecosystem Management and Protection, held by Ken Cline; the Allan Stone Chair in the Visual Arts, held by Catherine Clinger; the Richard J. Borden Chair in the Humanities, held by John Visvader; the Lisa Stewart Chair in Literature and Women's Studies, held by Karen Waldron; and the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Chair in Earth Systems and GeoSciences.

With the campaign, too, came the Peggy Rockefeller Farms and an endowment to keep it going, the lovely 100-acre woodland known as the Cox Protectorate, and our new boat, the M.V. Osprey, roomier, speedier, and quieter than our other vessels.

But that's not all. The campaign also brought COA $4 million to support faculty salary equity, $2 million to endow research travel for students, and $1 million to enhance the school's information technology infrastructure. Meanwhile, fundraising continued for the annual fund and began for the renovation of Turrets.

The school can't thank the donors enough — from those who gave $1 dollar to those who gave $6 million.

TURRETS REVIVED

COA thanks the E.L. Shea crew for giving us back our Turrets in such a splendid condition, with tight new windows and roof, solid stonework, and glimmering copper. The crew posed for this photograph one afternoon in the midst of repairs, echoing the 1890s photo of the original construction crew. Same great craftsmanship, even if boaters have been exchanged for hard hats.

But the greatest achievement might be the alumni. During the campaign, support rose to 40.8%, placing COA among the nation's top twenty-five colleges in percentage of alumni donations.

"The success of the college is made possible by the generosity and support of some truly remarkable

people," said Will Thorndike, COA board chair, during the August campaign celebration held at the summer home of Mitch and Emily Rales. "With their help, the college continues its pursuit of excellence, and our students and faculty continue to win a steady stream of national and international prizes, scholarships, and fellowships."

$32 MILLION!COA COMPLETES LARGEST CAPITAL CAMPAIGN

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6 COLLEGE OF THE ATLANTIC MAGAZINE

HEATHER ALBERT-KNOPP '99COA'S FIRST ALUMNA DEANBy Donna Gold

Gardener and activist, organizer and adventurer, project consultant and weaver, data cruncher and listener, negotiator and strategizer, Heather Albert-Knopp '99, COA's new dean of admission, might be just what you'd expect from the college's first alumna dean: very much the unexpected. Smart, savvy, and cheery, Heather is a quintessential COA grad: a person taking on the world in a personal, local, and holistic manner.

As COA's director of summer programs for three years, she raised the net funds coming into the college by 250%. At the same time, she became president of the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association, or MOFGA, board. A gardener herself, growing everything

from arugula to winter squash with her husband, librarian Erich Read, this year Heather also chaired MOFGA's search for a new executive director.

Perhaps what most distinguishes Heather is her ability to listen — and then judiciously to act. The campus saw that quality while she chaired personnel committee. They also saw her openness. As busy as she is, Heather is one of the most approachable people on campus.

Born in a one-room cabin near Lincoln, Maine, and raised in Readfield, on the outskirts of Augusta, Heather chose to leave the state for school, heading to one of the nation's most challenging and elite private colleges. She did well, but

knew something was missing. "People weren't enjoying their education," she says.

In her sophomore year, she interned at a sea turtle protection project in Costa Rica and found herself spending a lot of time speaking with the people of the region, hearing their concerns about tourism, land use, and cultural change. "It was one of the most meaningful educational experiences I had," recalls Heather, "because it was applied, and in the real world — not just in books and papers."

At the start of her junior year, she balked. She did not want to return to college. "Where will you go?" her mother asked, fearing Heather would drop out altogether. That winter she transferred to COA. A few years later, her brother Eben, now a lawyer, followed a similar route, transferring to COA from an Ivy. Heather’s Costa Rica work led to a senior project investigating communities and tourism in Maine.

As fellow alum Darron Collins '92, COA's president, said in announcing her new role, "Heather brings all the essential attributes to this position … extraordinary abilities to solve problems, to analyze complex issues, to understand and represent the values of the college, to recruit program participants including young students, to work effectively with all of us at the college, and to simply and effectively get things done. As a graduate, she brings a special perspective and is a great model for prospective students thinking about COA."

Heather couldn't be happier. "I had such a remarkable experience here, and now I get to go out and find the people who are going to thrive at COA. I love being able to work with new and prospective students, and the mix of the work is really compelling: talking with people, thinking about how we promote the school, working with the wonderful faculty and staff and students."

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College of the AtlAntiC MAgAzine 7

The lakes of Mt. Desert Island — many of the largest locally called ponds — get short shrift. There are over twenty-five lakes on Mt. Desert, and over forty streams important enough to rate a name. … Why, then, is the fresh water of Mt. Desert largely relegated to the role of scenery only? … In 1989 I set out to change that by publishing the Down east guide to the lakes and Ponds of Mt. Desert. I was gratified by its reception. Many persons who

used it, year-round residents as well as seasonal visitors, told me it became their go-to book when looking for an excursion in the interior of the island. In time, however, the inevitable happened. Its first printing sold out and the book became unavailable.

Something else happened, something more subtle. Nature is not static. The book had become out of date. It included a section that told the reader where

to swim in a lake called The Tarn, but now, in the summer, The Tarn is nearly entirely covered by rushes. … Other lakes have suffered a similar fate. … It was clear that were the book to be reissued, it would need a thorough revision.

… As I pondered my options, and as time passed, fate in the person of Ken Cline, a professor at College of the Atlantic, gave me a nudge.

The College of the Atlantic Guide to the Lakes & Ponds of Mt. DesertBy William V.P. newlin, CoA life trustee, with faculty member Kenneth S. Cline, Rachel Briggs '13, A. Addison namnoum '14, and Brett Ciccotelli '09illustrated by Molly Parrish

Co-published by College of the Atlantic Press of Bar harbor, Maine and north Atlantic Books of Berkeley, California

Aunt Betty Pond Size: 34 acres/Maximum depth: 7 feet/Altitude: 210 feet/Game fish: none

Aunt Betty Pond is a small, shallow pond, accessible only by foot or bicycle along a carriage road. it is the largest lake on the island that is not accessible by automobile, and as such is a quiet haven. in the summer, much of its surface is covered by various water plants, especially water lilies. So while fishing and swimming are both legal and possible, its main attraction is as a sight and a good place for a picnic.

One of the prime attractions of Aunt Betty Pond is the variety of wildlife that one can find there. A friend once told me of spending nearly an hour watching two otters playing in the water. Aunt Betty Pond also boasts a lakeside bog, perfect for observing typical bog flora.

i remember laughing at news reports of President Carter's being startled by a large rabbit during a visit to the Western wilderness. Imagine! Then one fine summer evening, as I was walking alone along Aunt Betty Pond, I was taken aback by a great crashing in the brush by the path. When i had summoned the courage to investigate, i found myself face-to-face with a monstrous bullfrog, the biggest i have ever seen. We world leaders have to keep on our toes.

Central to the College of the Atlantic approach to education are the connections made across all sorts of boundaries. So it makes sense that the very first volume under the new College of the Atlantic Press is a mega-collaboration: life trustee Bill newlin and environmental policy faculty member Ken Cline co-teach a class to update Bill's guide to Mount Desert island's freshwater, originally published in 1989. Co-authors of the new edition, in addition to Bill and Ken, are two students and an alumnus. The president writes the forward; faculty, staff, students, and alumni contribute poems, photographs, and scientific data. Other efforts come from Acadia national Park personnel and beyond.

And still, like the college for which it's named, the guide is personal, replete with warmth. See for yourselves in the excerpt from Bill's preface and the first entry from the Lakes section. – DG

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8 College of the AtlAntiC MAgAzine

Children's Books and Young Adult fiction

Chelsea (Mooser) Confalone '00 and Nick ConfaloneOcean MonstersPenguin Young Readers, 2013Did you know that the giant squid can grow to over forty feet long? this book features some of earth's weirdest creatures: the gulper eel, the vampire squid, the ghost shark, and more.

Sarah Drummond '05Raven and the Red BallPomegranatekids, 2013A story made from sixteen lovely woodcuts, with not a single word of text.

Sara Wilson Etienne '00HarbingerPutnam Juvenile, 2013A psychological thriller set in a turrets-like building. "heart-wrenching, terrifying, hot, and un-put-down-able!" says veteran young adult novelist tamora Pierce.

Ryan Higgins '06Wilfred Dial, 2013A humongous, hairy, and lonely giant named Wilfred meets a brave little boy who sees something special in the timid giant.

Demitria Lunetta '04In the Afterharperteen, 2013A post-apocalyptic thriller in which a courageous girl must navigate a world overtaken by vile creatures rapidly devouring humankind.

Coreysha Stone '00One Little Alewife Counting Home2012the rhythmic journey of one alewife during spring spawning.

Let's Go For A Woods Walk2011A lyrical amble through the natural world of the northern woods.

fiction

Barbara Kent Lawrence ('93)Islands of TimeJust Write Books, 2013A girl, a Maine island, a summer romance. Years later, the "girl" returns. "Rich in emotion and introspection," writes Aislinn Sarnaki of the Bangor Daily News.

A Cornucopia of BooksCOA last ran a similar page in the 2010 fall issue. Much has been published by our alumni and faculty since! (Stay tuned for films and albums in Spring 2014.)

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Mindi Meltz '99Lonely in the Heart of the WorldLogosophia, 2013 Called a "fiercely imaginative epic" in the Publisher's Weekly starred review, Lonely's voyage of discovery becomes "a prolonged reflection on why we live."

Nonfiction

John Anderson, biology faculty member Deep Things Out of Darkness: A History of Natural HistoryUniversity of California Press, 2012 (see COA Spring 2013, page 57)

Emily Bracale '93In the Lyme-Light, Portraits of Illness and Healing2011The impact of Lyme disease on one's inner and outer life and the process of Emily's healing. Clinicians have called the book extraordinary and brilliant.

Anselm Bradford '02The HTML5 Mastery: Semantics, Standards, and Styling Apress, 2011Aimed at web designers and developers who want to take their markup further with multimedia, interactivity, and improved semantics.

Liza F. Carter ('76)Moving with the Seasons: Portrait of a Mongolian FamilySaltwind Press, 2013With photos and text, Liza follows a traditional nomad family traveling through the unforgiving climate of Mongolia.

John Cooper, music faculty memberLinear TransitionsC Lynne Music, 2011A nine-volume series of developmental improvisation studies for jazz ensembles to "hyper-develop" a student's music fluency.

Lise Desrochers, co-director of COA's food serviceIllustrated by Lauren Benzaquen '14, Carly Segal '13, Zuri Camille de Souza '14 Take-A-Break: Recipes from the Kitchen of College of the Atlantic2013 (see page 48)

Steven Donoso '80 Returning The Gift: Dialogues with Eckhart Tolle, Adyashanti, Timothy Wilson, and Laura Waters Hinson Resonance Arts Press, 2013The narrative reads like a quiet visit with friends: spiritual teachers Tolle and Adyashanti, and peace promoters Wilson and Hinson.

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Dave Feldman, physics and math faculty memberChaos and Fractals: An Elementary IntroductionOxford University Press 2012 (see COA Fall 2012, page 46)

Isaac Fer '07, editorTraveling the World for National Geographic by Thomas J. and Lynn B. AbercrombieBirch Landing Press, 2011"We traveled aboard a magic carpet, the one with the yellow borders, National Geographic magazine," writes reporter, photographer and explorer Thomas Abercrombie in this book edited by grandson Isaac.

Amy Goodman ('79) and Denis MoynihanThe Silenced Majority: Stories of Uprisings, Occupations, Resistance, and HopeHaymarket Books, 2012A record of the events, conflicts, and social movements shaping our society today.

Matt Arsenault, Glen H. Mittelhauser '89, Don Cameron, Alison Dibble, Arthur Haines, Sally Rooney, and Jill WeberSedges of Maine: A Field Guide to CyperaceaeUniversity of Maine Press, 2013 A fully illustrated guide to all Maine sedges, or grasses.

William V.P. Newlin, COA life trustee, with faculty member Kenneth S. Cline, Rachel Briggs '13, A. Addison Namnoum '14, and Brett Ciccotelli '09, illustrated by Molly ParrishThe College of the Atlantic Guide to the Lakes & Ponds of Mt. DesertCo-published by College of the Atlantic Press and North Atlantic Books 2013 (see page 7)

Josie (Sigler) Sibara '94The Galaxie and Other RidesLivingston Press, 2012 (see COA Fall 2012, page 32)

Deb Soule '81How to Move Like a Gardener: Planting and Preparing Medicines from PlantsUnder The Willow Press, 2013A guide embodying Deb's deep love and respect for the spirit of the medicinal plants she has worked with for almost forty years.

Tara Stevens '08Whales and Dolphins of Atlantic Canada & Northeast United StatesBoulder Publications Ltd., 2013A guide to help others identify and appreciate the twenty-seven species of whales and dolphins that make this region home.

Karen E. Waldron, literature faculty member, editor, Rob Friedman, editorToward a Literary Ecology: Places and Spaces in American LiteratureScarecrow Press, 2013Essays theorizing literary ecology through a study of the interconnections between literature and the environment.

Peter Wayne '83 The Harvard Medical School Guide to Tai Chi: 12 Weeks to a Healthy Body, Strong Heart, and Sharp MindHarvard Health Publications, 2013 (see COA Spring 2013, page 12)

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"We weren't looking to be on the board of anything," say College of the Atlantic's new parent trustees Becky Ann and Dylan Baker as they settle into a spot of sun near the Kaelber Hall archway following the summer trustee meeting. As film, television, and stage actors, the Bakers are busy with their own lives. But, like their daughter Willa, who applied early decision to COA in 2011, they fell in love with the school, "its sensibility, its idea of its place in the world, its belief in changing things," says Becky, sitting comfortably cross-legged on a low-slung table on the red bricks. So when COA President Darron Collins ‘92 asked if they'd like to be parent trustees, they were quite excited.

It was Becky who first heard about COA, having read a feature about the college in the Education Life section of The New York Times. Willa wasn't even in high school at the time, but Becky remembers telling her daughter, "You're going to want to read this." She was right. COA stayed on Willa's radar, and remained high on her list when it came time for college tours.

"When you get a little idea of the kind of people who are at COA, you become really attracted to it," says Dylan, staring out at Frenchman Bay. He recalls accompanying Willa on a visit to campus. The two sat in on the Future Studies class taught by Gray Cox, faculty member in political economics. "We figured we would excuse ourselves after fifteen or twenty minutes, but we got so wrapped up in the class that it ended before we knew it. I looked at my watch and it had been an hour and twenty minutes! I said, 'Willa, you've got to go here.'"

Though Willa's passions tend toward science, she was raised in an active theatrical family. Becky started out on Broadway with the long-running hit Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. She has since acted in many on- and off-Broadway plays, several movies, and such popular TV series as Kings and Girls. Most recently, she was in the 2013 New York Public Theater's Shakespeare in the

Becky and Dylan BakerNew Parent TrusteesBy Donna Gold

Park production of The Comedy of Errors. Dylan, known for his roles in Spiderman and Happiness, will be appearing in the soon-to-be released Anchorman sequel, The Legend Continues. Currently, he's doing the rounds of festivals with 23 Blast, an indie movie he directed about a Kentucky high school football star who suddenly goes blind.

The Bakers joined the COA board early in 2013. Knowing the college from the inside, as trustees, has only increased their enthusiasm for the school. "There's an extraordinary group of passionate people who sit on the board," says Becky. "We are amazed by all of them — we feel incredibly lucky to have been asked."

The feeling is mutual, says Darron. "Becky and Dylan bring a multi-layered interest to the college — as proud parents, accomplished artists, and intense professionals," he says. "As actors, they understand COA's transdisciplinary, hands-on approach to learning, and appreciate the passion for the arts that so many of our students hold. Even better, they have graciously offered to help us achieve our longed-for goal of a chair in the performing arts."

Raising money for this chair — a position encompassing theater, speech, and communication — is the major task the Bakers have taken on as trustees, one they're devoted to as actors and human ecologists. While traditional academics separate and compartmentalize, explains Dylan, "human ecology seeks to grasp all the disparate subjects and bring them together so that the whole — and how each aspect operates as a part of that whole — can be understood." The search for connection and comprehension that is human ecology is essential to the story of our lives as human beings, he continues. In the minds of the Bakers, enhancing performance at COA means spreading a message of connection and understanding throughout the world.

Phot

o by

Will

a Ba

ker

'15.

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COLLABORATIONS"We're par t of a complex web of personal , int imate connec t ions ," said College of the At lant ic commencement speaker Dr. Paul Farmer. The eminent medical doc tor, public health advocate, overal l humanis t , and newly cer t i f ied human ecologis t told COA's class of 2013, "A l l social jus t ice ef for ts require teamwork , and a g lobal endeavor requires a great many par tners to get things done. … Par tner hard!" he urged the crowd assembled under the translucent tent .

"Whether you look hard at the l i fe burgeoning in a pond or at labor migrat ion, whether you get your news from the changing seasons or from The Colber t Repor t , look ing hard, and look ing cr i t ical l y, reminds us that there's no honest way to deny our connec tedness and our complexi t y," the good doc tor continued.

I t 's fair to say that most of that audience already knew the impor tance of teamwork , shar ing , col laborat ion. What 's di f ferent about COA is that we recognize, honor, and credit these connec t ions throughout our ent ire sys tem. We don' t assume that s tudents only learn from teachers , or that teachers have al l the answers. Our professors learn from each other and from students — and s tudents learn from each other, f rom their teachers , f rom the communit y, and also from themselves , f rom their own obser vat ions and understandings.

Collaborat ion f lour ishes where hierarchy is diminished. While we haven' t el iminated hierarchy at COA , we do downplay i t . Recently Ed Kaelber, our founding president , was reminiscing with Ann Peach, his former assis tant , about the ear ly days. "There was a lack of pomposit y in those days ," remembers Ed. "You may be direc tor of admissions , you may be Ed Kaelber, you may be Ann Peach, but i f there's a snowstorm, you pick up a shovel. … And i t worked."

I t s t i l l work s. We may have a bi t more div ision of labor nowadays — an army of Buildings and Grounds work studies to chip ice, and even a miniature plow for the many walk ing paths meandering through campus — but that sense that we're al l in i t together, that al l communit y members expec t to be treated as equals , and learning comes from a myriad of sources is what col laborat ion, COA s t y le, is al l about .

Of course, we've only scratched the sur face — and a magazine can only convey the verbal and v isual . May I suggest you put on a bi t of jazz , maybe watch the v ideo of Nathaniel Hi l l iard's 2013 senior projec t concer t from the COA website (his music per formed in col laborat ion with his mentor, facult y member John Cooper) , maybe munch on a morning glor y muf f in from Take-A -Break , the cookbook by L ise Desrochers , co-direc tor of food ser v ices , and remember that the s tor ies here are samples , representat ions of COA's many col laborat ive ef for ts .

–DG

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Designing for AcadiaThe Class National Park Practicum: Designing the Acadia National Park Nature Center

The Instructors COA faculty & Acadia and COA staff

The Learning CollaborationBy Donna GoldCOLLABORATIONS

"Opening the door of the Nature Center, the first thing to catch your eye is a monumental, three-dimensional model of Mount Desert Island illuminated by overhead lights. You hear bird calls from the back of the room … you see a gallery-like space with visitors observing large art pieces. … You notice the integration of art, natural history, and science. The use of natural materials and simple technologies gracefully blends the historical setting of the building into the modern age. The room has an open, inviting flow and you can't wait to explore the exhibits just as you would the outdoors."

From the Acadia National Park Nature Center exhibition proposal "Mapping Climate Change," created by Alexandria Fouliard '13, Meaghan Lyon '16, Matthew Messina '16, and Ivy Sienkiewycz '14

Come 2016, it is possible that visitors to Acadia National Park will encounter something like the above in the Sieur de Monts Nature Center. They might then examine a 360-degree mural of the park, listen to a "sound tree" of native birds, or peer through a scope that shows, not distant flora, but changes in the park's vegetation over the past fifty years. More flexible visitors might even crawl into a model of a loon nest.

Each one of these innovative, place-based exhibits will have been designed by College of the Atlantic students working in collaborative teams during a course that itself was a collaboration between COA and Acadia.

A partnership based on youth, place, and quality The impetus for the class, National Park Practicum: Designing the Acadia Nature Center, came from

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the park itself, and the recognition by park employees that not only did they need to redesign and update its central museum, but also reach out to a younger generation. "We wanted to create a youth voice and perspective in the park," says Lynne Dominy, Acadia's chief of interpretation and education. What better way, she and others thought, than by having undergraduates initiate the design? COA students, she continues, "are here, are involved … and they have a good idea of what's going on with the landscape."

Lynne's wishes were realized in May, 2013 when the students presented three-dimensional models, written concept plans, and PowerPoint explanations of four possible designs to a panel of high-level park personnel. "The students did an amazing job," says Lynne. "The exhibits were extremely different, extremely original, and also had elements that the students thought

were really important." The designs, she adds, incorporated multiple senses — soundscapes, bark textures, and food, as well as art and community voices — ideas that a more professional design team may not have considered.

But while the coursework challenged students in science, technology, and design, when they look back they found it was the collaborative experience that taught them the most. Says teaching assistant Jane Piselli '12, MPhil '15, "learning how to collaborate during the creative process, to work toward a polished product for an outside organization, was the most valuable skill set that I gained during my time at COA."

Science, technology, and awe The course's collaborative teaching team was composed of COA arts faculty member and ace exhibit designer Dru Colbert, COA biologist and Acadia researcher Steve Ressel,

science educator and COA alumni relations coordinator Dianne Clendaniel, and Ardrianna McLane '02, Acadia park ranger for partnerships, outreach, grants, and youth, who has since become COA's director of summer programs. The four spent nearly a year planning the class before they introduced it to students with this flyer: "WANTED! Creative minds to help shape the future of Acadia's Sieur de Monts Nature Center. Must love sharing the wonders of nature with others."

Not to mention must love talking about climate change. Following directives from the National Park Service that all parks need to intensify their discussions of the issue, Acadia chose climate change as the central theme of the redesigned museum. According to Ardrianna, the COA class marks the first time students have designed a climate change exhibit in any national park.

The thirteen students ranged from first-years to master's level. Whether they came from interests in science, design, or education, in ten weeks for this one-credit class they needed to:• Understand, analyze, and learn to

communicate climate change issues • Research the natural history of

Acadia • Learn about exhibition design • Review best practices in

contemporary exhibition design and available and upcoming technologies

• Conceive of a full museum with multiple exhibits

• Create learning objectives for each exhibit area

• Consider such permanent and historic elements as the building's fireplace and doors, while also accounting for a small sales area, ranger station, and visitor flow

• Produce conceptual drawings • Build and populate a three-

dimensional model of their design

And, adds Ariana Rambach '16, ensure that "the visitor will feel awed by visual representations of Acadia."

Back circle, left to right: Dianne Clendaniel, alumni coordinator, Ariana Rambach '16, Steve Ressel, biology faculty, Annie Cohen '13, Ardrianna McLane '02, former Acadia National Park ranger, now COA summer programs director, Jane Strader '14, Dru Colbert, arts faculty, Kate Ross '13, Brittany Cullen '14, Chris Phillips '15; Front circle: Ivy Sienkiewycz '14, Matt Messina '16, Marissa Altmann '13, Alex Fouliard '13, Jane Piselli '12, MPhil '15, Meaghan Lyon '16.

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Calling the class "a deep learning experience on a real problem," Dru never doubted that the students were up to the challenge. "I think our students, they play and they discover; they don't know everything going into an experience, but because they have a passion for the subject, they are intrinsically motivated to learn," she says. And their freshness "created a wider array of possibilities, and more divergent thinking — something you really want to have happen in the early phases of a design process, rather than worrying about budget, or practical feasibility, or thinking 'you just don't do that.'"

From details to design The class began with readings on the National Park Service, exhibition design, and climate change, along with the psychology of how to present such issues to the general public. Guest speakers underscored the value of connecting to visitors' hearts as well as to their minds. Soon the class created four overarching concepts, one for each design team. That was the first half of the term.

And then, says Ariana, "With all this info in our heads, we moved into putting our ideas into a design." Dividing into four teams of three or four students, the groups "drafted a floor plan, discussed what the exhibits were going to look like," and found ways to translate scientific facts and concerns into exhibits while applying measurable learning goals, such as distinguishing the call of a cicada, or certain basic animal tracks, or recognizing the difference between invasive and native species, "all in pretty intense detail. I feel like I could have devoted my life to it," adds Ariana.

Her team was given park diversity as an overarching theme. Their design contains a naturalist's cabin with a working weather station. Nearby, a sound board emphasizes amphibian calls so visitors can learn what happens to animals from such changes as heavy flooding caused by

Using ongoing climate research, students in the nature center design class developed detailed exhibit concepts, including write-ups that discuss such impacts of climate change in Acadia National Park as increasing storm severity and temperature change, disturbing both individual species like loons and warblers, as well as entire forest ecosystems.

increasingly extreme weather events. Later, at a station representing a mountain summit, visitors can reflect upon their experience while reading poems relevant to the region.

As Lynne had hoped, the exhibits are truly place-based. The students didn't just look at climate change, but climate change here, in the park. To enhance the specificity, some designs include voices of local fishermen and naturalists talking about the changes they've been witnessing, such as sea level rise or ocean acidification.

Learning to collaborateAnother group incorporated a section featuring park researchers collaborating with local Maine artists to convey their scientific findings through art, an exhibit spearheaded by Ivy Sienkiewycz '14 and cited as one of the stand-out elements of the designs. Having spent much of her time at COA on individual curating projects, Ivy found the teamwork to be the highlight of the class. "Working with other people is a great way to generate ideas," she says. "Being able to talk to people and combine ideas,

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to see someone put their own twist on an idea," was both exciting and rewarding.

For Annie Cohen '13, collaborating was, "simultaneously the hardest and most exciting part of the class. … We all had to be willing to share and rework every idea, to acknowledge that your idea was no longer 'yours' once it had been shared with the group, and be able to let go to keep the process moving forward."

There were rough patches, but that is part of learning. Ariana found that when classmates got frustrated, "and felt that their ideas weren't getting heard," she learned to slow down, even stop. "I enjoyed that aspect

of working in teams, and those are skills you can take anywhere, to anything that you do." She also recognized that disagreements are part of any process, since reluctant or stubborn colleagues are part of the working world, not to mention conflicting ideas, competing requests, or demanding clients whose desires frequently change.

"You could see the excitement grow"As the designs began to come together, the students used the scale model they built to try out three-dimensional simulations of their ideas, from the central, articulated map of Ivy's group to the storytelling grove of Ariana's. As they did, says Dru, "you could see the excitement grow. The

more they would shape and model, the more buy-in there was to their ideas, the more real it all became." The students began to think, "This could actually be something."

Then, like any design firm, each group presented their ideas to a broad contingent of park personnel, including Lynne, Abe Miller-Rushing, park service science coordinator, Rebecca Cole-Will, cultural resources program manager, and Michael Kelly, park exhibit designer.

Because the students offered four concept designs, the park now has an array of options for the space. "We can't use all of them," says Ardrianna. "We'll now work with Mike Kelly on combining and refining, morphing, and pulling certain pieces" for the final design. Which is typical of any design process, adds Dru. Had the park gone to a professional exhibition design studio, she says, it most likely would have received just three different approaches, and spent a lot of money. "And it wouldn't have been as good, because the park wouldn't have been as involved," notes Ardrianna.

The next step is another student collaboration, this time with Northern Arizona University, where Mike, an experienced designer, leads a team of graduate students. From the ideas in the four separate COA models, the Arizona team is creating a single, more refined concept plan, complete with fabrication specifications. These will then be presented to a community planning group.

So, would the park work with COA student designers again?

"Absolutely!" says Lynne. "The process was really great because of the amazing learning environment created at COA and the caliber of the students." In fact, she's hoping to incorporate changing exhibits within the new Nature Center, so that the design connection with COA becomes an ongoing collaborative class.

After measuring and mapping the Nature Center space and its fireplace, windows, and doors, students developed scale tactile models to demonstrate how complex exhibit ideas might look and feel in the space.

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Team-teaching was part of COA's pedagogy from the beginning. It provided the quickest and most effective path for faculty to overcome their conventional training and gain an interdisciplinary perspective. Human ecology was practically defined by some of the legendary teaching teams as we were getting underway and trying things out: Dick Davis and Dan Kane — early faculty members in philosophy and law — teaching the class Whitehead and Whitewater. Steve Katona in biology and Sam Eliot in literature teaching Humans and the Great Whales. Team-teaching modeled professional collaboration and mutual respect, and the equality of discourse opened discussion so students could jump in on the same level. We reveled in the freedom from specialization and the explosive expansion of concept and language as departmental boundaries dissolved. Team-teaching brought what Ed Kaelber, COA's founding president, called "the amateur spirit" that did so much to level authority structures and reexamine questions in wide-spectrum light.

If there are two teachers in the classroom, each teacher can spend half the time being a student, and if the students see the faculty learning, they quickly realize that they, the students, are also teachers themselves. Knowledge and intellectual leadership become equally distributed as the conventional authority point vanishes. There are no absolutes in a team-taught class; students must find that authority and confidence in themselves.

For many years I taught Turn of the Century with biologist John Anderson and our former art historian, Joanne Carpenter. These classes were among the personal high points of my teaching. We came from the three divisions of the faculty and to some extent we were able to transcend the intellectual boundaries that the resource areas impose on a free-flowing curriculum. It wasn't that we were in there advocating for our particular ways of knowledge, but the presence of our colleagues' expertise allowed us to venture beyond ourselves, in the continual intellectual stretching that Karen Waldron mentions in the next story.

Like any good collaboration, team-teaching is not just the sum of its parts, two or three professors in a room together voicing their individual perspectives. The collaborative group, including the students, becomes an intellectual superorganism truly ready to address problems in their wholeness without the narrowing of academic specialization. Rather than asking which of many competing perspectives is the best approach, the teaching team models the open and visible construction of a whole new approach based on the intrinsic challenges of the problem itself.

Of course, that's the harmonious kind. In another class I team-taught for years, Text and Theory, with Etta Kralovec, former faculty member in education, our role was to entrench ourselves in our opposite positions and deconstruct the other's view till the class often became a modern/postmodern battlefield with the students choosing sides in an intellectual pillow fight that left everyone exhausted and hopefully enlightened that there's no single answer, which is why the postmodern view usually won out.

Mellow or confrontational, team-teaching has been and continues to be a pedagogical hallmark of COA. Human ecology is not thought of as the expert domain of individuals but as the ever-changing thought process of a community. Anyone reading the sparkling interview with Karen and Catherine Clinger that follows will realize that the creativity and camaraderie of team-teaching continues to this day. Teaching teams have often been the origin and expression of long-lasting friendships. The instructional meetings before class are moments of such mutuality and insight that we often stop and say, "Hey, it's not fair to do this without the students!"

Team-Teaching, a COA StandardBy Bill Carpenter, faculty member in literature and creative writing

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Collaboration in Process Developing The Unexpected Journey Catherine Clinger and Karen Waldron, arts and literature faculty members, respectively, talk about the process of developing this fall's team-taught course: the Unexpected Journey: Art, literature, and history on the Road in nuevo México. the three-credit class is comprised of Catherine's Art and Culture in northern new Mexico, Karen's native American literature with a Focus on New Mexico, and the co-taught Processing the Unexpected Journey, with a three-week field experience in northern new Mexico.

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Catherine Clinger: Our collaboration actually developed informally through students.

Karen Waldron: There was an increasing pattern of students working with both Catherine and me. In talking with them, we discovered resonances, as if we were tag-teaming — not quite filling in each other's blanks —

Catherine: But building bridges that brought similar patterns into greater consonance within the work.

Karen: Frequently our students were taking classes from both of us, referencing ideas between our classes and also extending those ideas, stretching them, so that we were in a virtual conversation. So we thought, Why don't we meet together?

Catherine: And then we began co-supervising projects —

Karen: And in that process of co-supervising — stretching out each other's intellectual responses, but also learning from each other — we discovered a thread of simpatico thinking. We are each very aware of different historic, artistic periods, but neither of us says, "I am a cubist" or "I am a deconstructionist." There's an ability to expand the conversation from recognizing these categories and exposing and exploding and complicating them —

Catherine: So I tried to seduce her: Why don't we do a course together?

Karen: And I thought, that would be awesome —

Catherine: And why not make it a big course — why not go somewhere? We didn't want to just provide the opportunity for an experience. We want to have an experience together, creating new spaces for discourse. And we thought, let's have an experience within the US political borders —

Karen: That is complexly multicultural —

Catherine: Our ideas have changed a lot. I'm really doing a history of the region, a survey of cultural traditions, with loads of visual imagery: paintings, prints, ceramics, sculptures, architecture —

Karen: Each of our courses has become more interdisciplinary through our conversations. We decided we'll go to each other's classes and read each other's materials, so we can immerse ourselves in the experience along with the students, modeling for them how deeply you can develop ideas and work from inspirations.

Catherine: The idea is that all of us will be together learning in concert with one another. The three courses enable an ecology of experience, one that furthers a deeper understanding of the myriad of subjects through which we peer into this cultural space.

New Mexico is a very old place with a long history that is described through indigenous stories in ancient images and modern texts. The native peoples have had their world ripped apart, and yet there's an integrity to their being there because they've always been there and will always remain part of this landscape. I lived and taught in New Mexico and found myself wanting to return in a different context — on a journey with these wonderful people.

Karen: And I've never been to New Mexico. My access is through the literature, which makes clear and visceral how much the stories arise from and take place

Previous page: Pecos (with Zoe Mailena Fassett-Manuszewski '16).

This page from top: Cactus; Slot Canyon; Ghost Ranch, Abiquiu Lake

Page 20: From Atop a Mesa

: Ghost Ranch Gathering

All photographs by Gabriela Niejadlik '14.

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in and on a particular land: there are white settlers, Hispanics, Native Americans, all interacting in this one space, seeing the land and their relationships. By having an immersion experience ourselves we can challenge our students and offer a tag-team effect that is really interdisciplinary. The work will rely heavily on what we're observing through our own eyes. We want an experience that will be incredibly complicated —

Catherine: With no easy resolution. There needs to be a sense of political-social cooperation among the three dominant groups that live in New Mexico. Our students are going to be witnessing that interaction while they are in the process of beholding — as individuals as well as with their COA colleagues — all within an immense physical and cultural landscape —

Karen: The students will make their way through issues of cultural appropriation and guilt, and we're going to be putting them in a place where they are going to have to wrestle with deep challenges — how is this changing us, how can we incorporate the changes that we are experiencing, what are our biases, what thoughts and feelings have to come together, how do scholars deal with themselves as conduits of perception and knowledge?

Catherine: And we will talk about the contested symbols of the spirit of the place. There's a strong Catholic influence in New Mexico — a land of serpents and sacred mountains, santos, and kachinas. People read them conventionally as being fixed, eternal. I'm hoping that

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our students learn that traditions are living and changing. There is no termination point in the formation of place — our journey will mirror the incessant invention of place, culture, landscape.

Karen: We want students to look for satisfaction in making their own discoveries. This is part of the idea of COA as a graduate school for undergraduates — confronting the self, doing the intellectual work that is exciting and transformative because you are changing yourself and learning, and realizing they have to happen together.

Catherine: Another thing that Karen and I arrived at is that we need to have the space to absorb and rest and sit with the experiences — incorporate the outer and inner landscapes.

Karen: We have to let the unconscious work. We emphasized that from the very beginning. The field experience

is in the first third of the term so that we can have plenty of contemplative time, workshop time, to try artistic techniques, and time to discuss how we are processing oral, written, and visual material. We will discuss the process of processing to learn how to dive into that kind of learning and show how much it's worth it to tackle real questions, how hard that engagement is, and that it's a risk —

Catherine: So you can't be lazy.

Karen: We're talking about the value of struggles. Each student has to come up with a project that has to be substantial — each has to take their own work seriously.

And that's some of what comes from our conversations. Having this constant stretching is the most intellectually satisfying aspect of teaching, it happens with teacher and students, but more in team-teaching, where there are more variables.

Catherine: Personally, it's a goal of mine in my new role as associate dean for academic affairs in long-term curriculum planning to advocate for more courses like this. We already have such courses, but I would like to see more intensive and immersive experiences —

Karen: So students can learn how to read a landscape —

Catherine: And consider how it is read by the folks that are present, turning the pages of these places.

… I could name zillions of examples of why I'm so glad I'm here at COA, and Karen Waldron is definitely one of them.

Karen: When you find a relationship that's satisfying and challenging and interesting that also can work in a teaching setting — why not?

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With the piercing screech of worn-out brakes and blinding swirls of red dust clouds, our tricycle rickshaw has once again safely delivered us to the rural campus of the University of Toliara, just a few miles out of town. Comprised of some four thousand students, it is the oldest educational institution in the economically challenged southwestern corner of Madagascar.

I arrive with my assistant and translator, an eager high school student named Justice Damy. (While my students speak English, they are still learning, and my Malagasy is still rather poor, so Justice assists us for more complicated ideas.) We were expecting to meet with about twenty-five of our educational psychology students to talk about developing a student-led governance system within the university, yet as the dust clouds settle, it is clear we have underestimated the interest. More than one hundred students stand waiting — the rumors of our work had spread across disciplines like wildfire. But why the intense excitement? How did I even get here? And importantly, can I deliver on the hopes and dreams I see in the eyes of these struggling young scholars? Let's take a quick step back in time.

From cattle to classroomSome three years ago, a collaboration offering the master's program at the University of Kassel-Witzenhausen in Germany to COA alumni sent me from my small grass-fed beef farm in Pennsylvania across the Atlantic to study the nexus of food and culture from a multitude of perspectives. This opportunity of a lifetime changed me in three profound ways. First, I realized that studying meat production so intensely was actually starting to wear on my brain and

spirits. This earlier career choice was slowly overshadowed by two more uplifting passions, one for my wife, a German agronomist named Susan Hanisch, and one for a new approach to understanding our complex world, something called evolutionary studies, which offers scientific and historic accounts for the incredible human capacity to cooperate. When Susan's doctoral work sent her to Madagascar, I followed.

Upon settling in, I was offered a job within the newly established educational psychology department to teach and develop curriculum for the inaugural faculty. I was able to get this position based on my general background in psychology, and my prior experience as the service-learning coordinator for the Mount Desert Island Regional School System. As I became familiar with the Toliara program, it seemed they had few resources and little planning in place; I was essentially offered a blank slate upon which to sketch out my dream program. For assistance, I turned to my colleagues in the State University of New York system who are coordinating the international Evolutionary Studies (EvoS) Con-sortium. EvoS is the brain-child of Binghamton University biologist and anthropologist David Sloan Wilson. Its aim is to cultivate an applied understanding of the human condition from an explicitly evolutionary perspective. In October, 2012 the University of Toliara became the first African university to join EvoS. Thus began a whirlwind experimentation in institutional development.

So there I stood in our tiny concrete classroom, the one hundred-plus students overflowing out the door and eagerly hanging on to each and every windowsill just to learn about

our new service-learning project linking democracy and education. I began by tapping on the thick steel bars that line all the windows like a jail cell: "These bars are strong, and the doors here all have brand-new locks," I said. "How is it then, that seven new computers recently donated to the psychology department were just stolen?" Everyone there knew about this recent (and recurrent) crime: computers procured for common student use have a history of disappearing. Students from across disciplines eagerly called out various hypotheses about the "problems of the Malagasy people," but my psych students already had a more nuanced and evidence-based understanding of the problem. During the weeks leading up to this meeting, my students had been studying the dynamics of democracy from an evolutionary perspective.

The evolution of cooperationWe started by exploring the science of cooperation on multiple levels. Using resources from the Bill Gates-sponsored Big History Project, we looked at human, animal, and even cellular and molecular notions of "group-level cooperation." We also looked at the science of democracy and cooperation as a historical development itself. Within this context, the theft of these computers could be understood as the selfish grabbing of common-pool resources at the expense of the group. In this vein, students learned first about ecologist Garrett Hardin's famous conception of the tragedy of the commons. Hardin had argued that people acting in their rational self-interest will naturally deplete common-pool resources (be they cattle pastures or computers) unless there is top-down regulation. Following our study of Hardin, and

Evolving DemocracyExploring the New Science of Cooperation in Southwestern MadagascarText and photos by Dustin Eirdosh '04

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Using a computer model, University of Toliara psychology student Lea Ravirinafolra works on designing an effective student governance model by exploring the social dynamics of group-level cooperation.

using resources adapted from evoS, students learned how the late nobel Prize winner in economics, elinor ostrom, proved eight core design principles — such as strong group identity, fair distribution of costs and benefits, inclusive decision-making, and fast and fair conflict resolution —

are required for groups to overcome the tragedy of the commons at a grassroots level. they learned how just this year, Wilson and ostrom demonstrated the broad applicability of these principles to fields such as community development. And now these simple yet powerful rules

are what we have used to design a democratic student-run committee to oversee and develop information technologies at the University of toliara.

Some of my students have even been able to engage a social

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dynamics modeling software, NetLogo, to interactively understand the dynamics of cooperation, corruption, and enforcement within groups. Many consider these rules to be more than humanistic ideals; rather they are evolutionary

essentials, core design elements for flourishing democracies across multiple scales of society. Let me explain.

Wilson is the founder of multi-level selection (MLS) theory, an answer to a complex of questions regarding the evolutionary development of altruism and cooperation that is now gaining acceptance. This model of growth and change is currently bearing significant fruit for the field of community development. In brief, MLS recognizes the inescapable tensions resulting when the individual parts of a system begin to integrate into a united whole. Whether it is biochemistry within a cell, organs within an organism, or individuals within a society, rules of cooperation must exist for the system to function and grow. At the biological level we see membranes, organs, and multiple scales of physiology as operating under rules of cooperation. When we scale these rules up to the socio-cultural domain, we find the generalized group design principles of Wilson and Ostrom. These rules of group design can be seen as historical guidelines for the modern development of effective human ecologies. That is to say, where evolution occurs on ecological time scales, evolutionary studies are, by definition, studies in human ecology. Importantly, these broad-stroke principles are only minimally prescriptive, requiring significant local adaptation. This critical local adaptation is now our ongoing task.

Today, student-led democratic governance has its very first foothold at the University of Toliara. We now have a young but eager Technology Leadership Committee of more than fifty students from across 100 percent of the institutions and departments of our university system. The by-laws and culture of the committee are increasingly being shaped by Wilson and Ostrom's group design principles to support multiple levels of student leadership and organization (at local, institutional, regional, and even national levels). This committee has set an ambitious goal for 2014: that every student at the University of Toliara engages in ten hours of free internet access per week for their studies. Our efforts will continue until our students get reasonable, secure, and free access to the information technologies so critical to their basic education. Besides the direct technology education enhancements, there are also collateral impacts of pursuing this objective. By explicitly organizing around the group design principles of Wilson and Ostrom as a model for cultivating cooperation at ever-larger scales, students are gaining invaluable tools to create democracy from the ground up. With the support of EvoS we are, in the most literal and rigorous use of the phrase, evolving democracy in a nation otherwise deeply marred by the effects of poor political processes.

Dustin Eirdosh is research director of the Positive Education Action-Research (PEAR) Laboratory at the University of Toliara. The program is now accepting international interns and visiting researchers and welcomes contact from interested members of the COA community. For more, visit PEARLab.UniToliara.info or MythicMinds.us. Contact Dustin at [email protected].

Top: Cows graze the commons just beyond the University of Toliara’s windows. And yet, says Dustin Eirdosh '04, "our classrooms are anything but naturally designed." One of his projects is to alter classroom configurations away from rows of desks. Bottom: Students from across disciplines use core design principles to shape the first democratic student governance for the University of Toliara.

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"Darron," said Anne, "I think you should work on your writing."

And so he embarked — a bee, but humbled — relearning to write. Through Anne and the transformative process she encouraged, the then-eighteen-year-old Darron Collins '92 came to embrace writing not as a reflection of him personally, not as a forum to show off his cache of multisyllabic adjectives, but as a skill he could further develop. His hard work earned him a spot as a writing tutor, and he became close friends with Anne.

Now president of COA, Darron reflects on the value of writing itself as a learning process that is also inherently collaborative. "Writing for me is not just about describing; it's a process of learning how one thought connects with another, how one person connects with another. Knowing my intended audience influences my own writing."

Ashley Heinze, MPhil '13, a research assistant at Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory, agrees that

knowing how to write for each audience travels hand in hand with knowing what to write. She came to COA with a research-based marine science background without understanding how crucial good writing is to good science. Then biologist John Anderson introduced Ashley to Anne.

"After reading over some of my work, Anne knew what I was missing and geared my writing courses directly to the structure and style of my writing," Ashley says. Anne showed Ashley how her research could be better understood if her technical writing were clearer. Using the writing center's guiding text, Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace by Joseph Williams, Ashley worked on principles of syntax and audience, and also gained important editing skills for the scientific posters frequently used in presentations.

"After working with Anne and John a few times on problem-set drafts, I realized, 'Wow, now all of this makes more sense.' It was a huge relief because I knew I could write, but I

needed the proper tools and skills to piece everything together."

She now enjoys helping students at MDIBL revise their posters. As she seeks to publish papers from her master's thesis, Ashley continues to draw on the clear, concise, audience-specific technical writing she learned at COA.

The collaborative structure of the writing center not only pairs product with process, but also students with peer tutors. Anne had seen the benefits of faculty tutoring during her time teaching at Lansing Community College in Michigan. She recognized the importance of such process-oriented work, but when she launched COA's writing center in 1980, she used another model: trained peer tutors who collaborate laterally, offering guidance not grades.

Writing tutors undergo thorough training so as to be able to help students write professionally and discover their unique voices — their own art balanced with the pragmatics of structure and style. Peer tutors

Tutoring as Collaboration The COA Writing CenterBy Sarah Haughn '08

Superb. Sharp. He was the bee's knees when it came to writing. Sitting down in the college's main building for the incoming students' placement exam, he had sixty minutes to demonstrate this aptitude. God, he thought, they're going to have to make a new level for me. I'm just that good. A few days later, he got a note in his box. "Please see me," it said. It was signed simply, "a." Aha, he thought, I was right! Off he went to consult with Anne Kozak, founder and director of College of the Atlantic's writing center.

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take the Advanced Composition seminar and Methods of teaching Writing Across the Curriculum. they meet with each other to improve their skills, and refer students to each other when they feel the scope of an assignment exceeds their particular understanding. Anne works on a personal level with tutors on and off campus, establishing a sense of craft-based solidarity. Creating a close-knit community of writers facilitates clear communication and a sense of accountability to fellow tutors and student tutees.

"it is always a struggle to make sure people who use the center do not think of it as a place just to have their work proofread," notes Colin Capers '95, MPhil '09, former writing tutor and now assistant director of the writing program. With the potential for the drop-and-go efficiency that email brings, Colin and Anne deliberately emphasize the importance of one-on-one time with tutors, who help students make their own revisions. "individual contact and direct time with a tutor are important," says Colin. "there has to be dialogue where tutors ask questions to discover a student's voice and meaning."

Colin and Darron — both writing tutors during their undergraduate days — recognize the profound impact tutoring had on their own writing. "teaching writing made me deconstruct what writing was all about," says Darron. "i really pared down my writing. i also had to think about how to imbue students with a sense of how to edit, instilling the idea that great writing requires editing. Writing is rewriting."

Colin, too, found that the collaborative work of tutoring was a learning experience for him. "even growing up with a librarian and a journalist as parents, i found peer tutoring very helpful in honing my skills as an editor. it helped me develop interpersonal skills, too."

As a tutor, Colin received the added benefit of working with students for whom English was not a first language. Those efforts enriched his comprehension of how language functions and rendered the process of collaborative editing more relevant.

Bhupendra nagpure '06 — who since graduating from CoA has earned an MSc in teaching physics and math from the University of Maine, orono and a MSc in mechanical engineering from Boston University — remembers arriving at CoA from a rural indian village. A native hindi speaker, Bhupi had only two years of english studies at Mahindra United World College of india before coming to CoA.

it was through working with CoA peer tutors as both friends and teachers that he grew confident in his ability to fluently articulate himself in written and spoken english. it's a capacity invaluable to Bhupi in his current profession as a search engine marketing engineer for PAMedge, a Boston-based information technology management company.

"Writing is an integral part of my daily duties," he says. "from corresponding with various clients within the country to interacting via chat with people abroad, my writing reflects upon my education. More importantly, my writing is the first impression my clients witness about my company. our whole business depends on good customer relationships. in today's world, where we have fewer verbal interactions and more text-based contacts, writing is part of personality."

for Bhupi, working with tutors during college was thoroughly collaborative. "there was always someone working on their own writing at the center, so that meant there was always someone to interact with or seek help from. My experience at the writing center was a mirror reflection of my learning at CoA in classes. CoA's philosophy of lateral knowledge-sharing extended everywhere on campus, and the writing center was no exception."

A significant difference between CoA's writing center and those of other institutions lies in the academic diversity of the tutors themselves. Most similar programs across the country draw primarily from english majors who may not be comfortable tackling a technical science poster or a landscape design project. At CoA, says Anne, the tutors are "simply good writers coming from any and every discipline. they are comfortable talking about oceanography and animal behavior."

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"To ease us into the efforts of writing in what is often not a native tongue," says Bhupi, "Anne would take international students and writing tutors for long walks on Ocean Drive, organize potlucks and dinners for us, and help us interact. This not only improved our spoken English, but also helped us make friends and hence have more teachers to learn from — for peers are the greatest teachers."

Continues Bhupi, "There was a time when I pestered a writing tutor to help

me polish my essay via continuous back and forth email during a snowy night." She was happy to help and more happy that I was motivated to keep working until I couldn't work it anymore. But as writing goes, there is never a final draft."

"Writing is difficult," Anne acknow-ledges. "You need to be able to admit that. Anyone can struggle with writing, and not be sure it's entirely accurate or that it's meeting the requirements of a certain field. We have to recognize

that we all struggle — students, tutors, and myself. Students have to feel comfortable knowing they are not the only ones who can't figure it out."

Sarah Haughn '08 writes from Davis, California, where she is working on a master's degree in creative writing.

Above: Writing tutor Nathan Thanki '14 and classmate Alison Pierik '14 discuss the best way of incorporating some recent research into Aly’s internship report.

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Imagine suddenly losing your home in the community you have known for decades. Your landlord needs to sell, and you live in Oregon where there are no rent increase caps; your rent will likely skyrocket. This is where Julie Massa '93 and her team at CASA of Oregon step in. Located in Sherwood, where urban growth meets farmland on the edge of wine country, CASA operates to assist residents who face the risk of displacement.

CASA is a statewide nonprofit whose mission is "to improve the lives of Oregonians in underserved communities by building affordable housing, neighborhood facilities, and programs that increase families' financial well-being."

Julie"My mother's family were hard-working people who lived on very little money," Julie explains. "I grew up around my grandparents, and I watched that struggle." This experience has led to a lifetime of service for Julie. At COA she interned with Downeast Sexual Assault Services in Ellsworth, Maine, then created a model of campus support groups for sexual assault survivors for her senior project.

After graduation, Julie pursued a nonprofit career seeking to prevent domestic violence in Maine and New Mexico. She then found her way to one of Oregon's most expansive nonprofits, the Oregon Food Bank,

where she spent five years working on welfare organizing policy and then turned to lobbying for affordable housing.

But years of policy work proved draining. When the position of resident organizer opened up at CASA in 2010, Julie was ready for direct service, for getting to know the people she wanted to help by working with them side by side. "I feel like I've graduated into exactly what I've wanted to be," she says.

The residents Julie has gotten to know the diverse residents of the manufactured housing parks well. Many of those who live in these factory-built

Collaborating to Conserve Communities: Julie Massa 9́3By Marni Berger '09

It feels great to be able to walk on this ground and say: 'This is mine. It's mine for the rest of my life.' — Elias Montemajor, resident, Horizon Homeowners Cooperative

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modular home communities work in the community and support families; others are retired. Most live on fixed incomes. A good number have careers in forestry and so enjoy the closeness to nature of park living. Frequently these parks have prime locations, such as along the banks of the Rogue River, a few miles from the Pacific Ocean.

With little financial flexibility, the renters are particularly vulnerable to shifts in the economic climate. Between 2001 and 2007, when sixty-nine manufactured housing parks closed in Oregon, 2,800 residents were displaced.

"In every case," Amanda Waldroupe writes in a 2012 Street Roots article profiling CASA, "the park owners sold the park to companies or individuals who demolished the parks and redeveloped the land."

To mitigate further displacement, CASA started converting manufactured parks into co-ops in 2007, capping residents' monthly payments by helping them turn rents into mortgages. Julie began rolling up her sleeves with the team in 2010, working directly with residents throughout the conversion process, as well as providing support thereafter. Says Julie, "If I can make that happen for other people, I've fulfilled my job as a human ecologist."

The processThe multi-step process takes months. After finding out about low-income parks from the real estate brokers with whom they have developed a relationship — and who receive a commission from selling a park — the CASA team ascertains that the

park can be converted. If it can be, CASA meets with the landlord with an offer to purchase the property as a co-op. Afterwards, Julie and her coworkers approach residents, often accompanied by the landlord, to gauge their interest in a conversion. Finally, Julie sets up the first of approximately six meetings with residents.

Meetings are held in whatever large, free community space is available — fire stations, libraries, gymnasiums, or resident homes. "We bring an easel," Julie says. "We hold ice-breaker activities, and we encourage democratic decision making right away." At these initial meetings, Julie and a coworker help community members elect a board to act as a liaison between CASA and the park community, and set up a structure for potential lenders. Once the board is elected, Julie and the coworker offer a four-hour training on community development, real estate transaction, and how the organization should be structured.

Julie is aware that even though CASA's goal is to help, a co-op can be a sea change to residents, and many at first are rightfully wary. Fortunately, after the first or second meeting, when Julie has laid out the math and proven CASA's willingness to find funding for the purchase, trust cements and residents are eager to take the helm.

The mathThough a sale to residents is likely to be less lucrative than one to a developer, the incentive for landlords is the capital gains tax exemption they receive if they sell to a nonprofit. CASA's co-ops qualify as nonprofits.

Other financial aid for park conversions comes from the state of Oregon and nonprofit lenders. The state has made a commitment to affordable housing. Most of the existing co-ops have received a $600,000 grant for the preservation of manufactured housing. Additionally, nonprofit lenders — such as Network for Affordable Housing, ROC USA Capital, and Rural Community

Assistance Corporation — lend specifically to organizations like CASA.

TonyTony Weisbecker is 68 years old, retired, a deft conversationalist with a twenty-two-year background in talk radio. He describes himself as someone who never, ever changes his mind. He was one of CASA's most outspoken resident opponents. Like many residents at the outset of a conversion, Tony was dubious of the financial strain it could entail. He told Julie when they met, "I can be your best friend or your worst enemy."

Not long after his neighbors approved a co-op conversion, says Tony, it finally sunk in: "What's done is done. I can fight it. Or I can work with it." Over time, Julie earned Tony's trust through her ability to listen to a diversity of opinions and mediate, and he began to see Julie as someone who authentically wants to help — not control — his community. He has since become one of CASA's most loyal supporters.

Photos: ROC USA/Mike Bullard

After initially opposing the conversion of his community, resident Tony Weisbecker has become an advocate of Julia Massa '93 and CASA.

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Collaboration has fused a working friendship into something of a family bond for tony and Julie. "i got one daughter," tony says. "if i had another one, i'd love to have Julie."

he adds, "basically, she's saving homes. She's saving people's lives."

this year, as new cooperative opportunities arise, tony has been accompanying Julie and her team to the introductory meetings with residents, using his radio skills to introduce the co-op idea to residents. he provides his perspective, knowing that it helps residents to hear from someone who has already undergone the process and experienced similar doubts.

"[Working with my community] has been rewarding for me," tony says,

"and i wouldn't have gotten involved in it without Julie's encouragement."

the admiration is mutual. Julie says that beyond the conversions, the most rewarding moment of her career was when tony agreed to testify on behalf of oregon's house Bill 3007, requiring landlords to offer the facility to tenants before selling it to a third party. CASA's executive director drove him to the hearing while Julie and the team watched a live feed of the proceedings. tony was passionate and adamant. Recalling it, Julie gets teary.

That's how you live in a communityJulie attributes much of the inspiration for her present work to All College Meetings, CoA's weekly democratic decision-making forums. "i tell residents, 'You're not going to get exactly what you want, because

everyone has a say. You have to learn that your neighbor's opinion is just as valuable as yours.'"

"that's how you live in a community," Julie adds. "i learned that at CoA, and i try to teach that."

Julie believes there is more for her to learn. Speaking of her own home, she says, "to be a part of my own community, to be active and involved — i haven't mastered that yet. i can do a better job."

But Julie has certainly made a home for herself at CASA and with the cooperative residents of oregon. As she puts it, when a park is converted, "i sleep better at night."

for more visit www.casaoforegon.org.

Clackamass River Community in Clackamass, Oregon.

Marni Berger '09 is a New York City-based writer, teacher, tutor, and dog fanatic. Her essays, short stories, and author interviews can be found at the Millions, fringe Magazine, litro, and the Days of Yore; her poetry is forthcoming this year at Crescendo City.

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normally tim avoided theorists like Alix. once, after a friday afternoon seminar turned into a pub crawl, he was dragged to a gathering where everyone came dressed as foucault. he was gently chided and handed a pair of browline glasses and a turtleneck at the door. things began to go downhill after he introduced himself as an art historian. if he had owned to being a trained conservationist, he suspected, threats might have been made. Yet whenever he could, he ventured forth from the history department to his friend Manu's conservation studio. Some work last year on a Comper altarpiece, so spare it could hardly be called gothic, had caused a pleasurable tingle to course his spine. he knew he was edging into craftsmanship then. At the end of a working day he would notice the swell of his hands, scarlet with white nails, and take pride in the throbbing. Before dinner Christian would massage each finger, firm at first, reforming recalcitrant joints, only to end more gently. When the altarpiece was finished Tim told Manu that if he had his own way, he would rather not pack up his tools again. the pair, apprenticed together what seemed an age ago, allowed the evening news to fill the darkening studio. All over london, accidents and misunderstandings had triggered widening scenes of human drama, some to be resolved by nightfall, others never. "there's always space for you here, tim." Manu pressed a folded piece of foolscap to his chest. Visible inside, despite the dimness, was cash. "Do the most difficult thing." tim was perhaps not as courageous as his friend imagined. he continued to draw a salary from the college, which had one quality, above all others, to recommend itself: what used to be called constancy. You would never earn very much, but you might always earn a little. not that he lacked ambition, within limits. Alix Alexander was said to be leading a committee tasked with hiring an art historian who could teach a module on conservation. the job would mean leaving well-fenced Bloomsbury for the Strand, where churches were traffic islands and casinos lined Anne Boleyn's coronation route, but it would make doing the difficult thing, if not easy, then at least possible. Christian suggested Tim take Alix out for coffee. "on what pretense?" "Research, of course."

Surely Alix had been in london for too long to produce uncalculated effects. Yet when the dove grey doors parted she advanced into the Somerset house café seemingly prepared, like most north Americans, to smile at anything or nothing. Tim was briefly conscious of his duplicity. The

glare of her glasses obscured her eyes so that he could only make out two stretched lips, uncannily detached from expression. Was she trying to communicate irony? for tim, this introduced the possibility that she might not mind ulterior motives. Her cornflower print dress lapped a body of indeterminate size, exposing a small, cropped head above and a pair of Doc Martens, in what appeared to be a men's size, powderpuff pink with banana laces, below. She must have had limits, but he could not detect any on her person. As she seated herself, dealing him a firm handshake, he could just make out her eyes: irony beneath blue-veined lids. "A pleasure to see you again, sir," she said. A server, seemingly in a panic, set down two overbrimming lattes and dashed off. tim was relieved that conversation came naturally. Alix offered an overview of the gossip in her department, which gave him time to prepare some remarks on changes within the University of london, the vast, nebulous consortium to which both of their colleges belonged. When this was over, as if on cue, Alix began to chat about her module on medieval anachronism, something to do with curation studies, and somehow tim could not help but listen. Probably Alix had that effect on everyone. "You should know, Alix, I'm not very … theoretical." "oh, but that's lovely tim! i suppose i should make a confession myself." tim waited. "i'm a Ruskinian, and William Morris is my hero," she said. "But i don't believe what they believed. i’m a critical theorist." "indeed, most academics are these days." "not you though." "i’m afraid that some of us don’t fit so neatly in this century." Alix nodded like a theater actor aiming for the back row of the dress circle, if not the gallery. "that's why i like you, tim. You think that criticism isn't enough. And i think you're right in this sense: we need lovers and artists and craftspeople, too. We need all kinds of voices in academia.” Suddenly tim understood how his friend ed, a congenitally cautious Midlander, had become engaged to a texan after three weeks, at most, of dating. north Americans moved fast, but tim wished to woo, or be wooed, slowly. he asked if Alix knew whether or not Morris and Co. had provided windows, perhaps just a single window, to St. Andrew's, the Anglican church in Moscow? in the mid-1880s it had cost 213,616 rubles, "exclusive of stained glass and other presentations," to construct, in Moscow, a red brick Victorian Gothic edifice of the type found in any English

AversionStory by Michael Griffith '09, Paintings by Alonso Diaz Rickards '12Created in collaboration

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The Old Public Record Office Looking East to the City of London, 2013, oil on board, 11x14 inches.

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village. Nothing special there, and none of the church records or spiral-bound histories hinted at any involvement with "the Firm." It was likely that the glass had been produced locally at minimal expense. "Or it might have come from France," offered Alix. But an English governess, a Miss Cormell, working for a St. Petersburg family, had visited Moscow in 1892 and written a letter to her mother insisting that a certain window in St. Andrew's was identical to one in their parish church at New Ferry, Merseyside. Tim had landed upon the letter in the British Library whilst searching for something entirely else. Of course he had looked up the New Ferry church, St. Mark's, immediately, and discovered that the Firm had sent a St. Andrew's window up to New Ferry in 1876, and according to his sources, the design — by the painter Edward Burne-Jones — was reused in 1894 in Chelsea and elsewhere in 1896. Was a fourth window floating around Russia? "You are brilliant," said Alix. "Gold star for making me super fucking curious." "No ideas, then?" Tim was surprised by her honesty, but realized he shouldn't be. Despite her appearance, or his response to it, Alix's strategy was truth-telling. "None," she replied. "At least there are two of us now." "But wait a minute — my other brilliant friend, Clare, might have a hunch. She's done work on both Morris and Anglican churches abroad." Alix checked her polka-dotted watch. "I'm sure Clare will know something." "So there shall be three of us on the hunt. Good." "Do you have a partner?" "What?" "Boyfriend, girlfriend?" "Alix, I'm — " "Because I want to invite you to a party at my place, a week from tomorrow." "Oh. My partner's name is Christian." "I knew it!" she cried. "I bet he's fabulous." Tim ignored this, but urged his diary and a pen from his overfilled satchel. "Where do you live?" "Highgate Valley, more commonly

known as Archway. Come at eight, and please bring nothing but yourselves. Our place is full of booze. Clare will be there." "What's the occasion? Not that you need one." "The twenty-fourth of March, of course." "Yes?" "H-e-l-l-o!" said Alix, gathering up her things. "It's a birthday party for Mister Morris!" Alix's head must have been very small, he lost sight of it even before the automatic doors opened once again for her. She was like a Burne-Jones figure, he thought, big bones and drapery. What's more, it occurred to him as he began cautiously to like her, she knew she was a Burne-Jones, and gloried in the effect. She was an empiricist when it came to the matter of awe, at least.

It was raining in Archway, and they had come, as they always did, early. Christian invited Tim into his umbrella's ring of protection, a kind-hearted precursor to a disagreement about physics. The taller one should hold the umbrella, yes, but remain sensitive to the size of his dependent, the more liable to exposure — if the shorter one is so sensitive, he should retain the umbrella, here, take it, but hold it aloft. They argued up and down several terraces and into a mews, Tim stopping, and even lowering the umbrella, to comment on a fine late Victorian door surround. Work in stone had been more expensive, of course, but ultimately, Portland cement had held up better in the war. Coade stone, or fortified clay, phased out by the 1840s, had done even better. The incident occurred within a minute or two of their arrival. Alix had shunted them up a narrow stairs, an exclusion zone between Karam Curry House and the Cheap-o Liquor Store. Inside the door, Alix's partner, Geoff, smiled at them and disappeared. "This is Clare and her partner John," said Alix, drawing Tim and Christian toward a dim lounge where two fair people, who might have been siblings, sat on the edge of a futon. "Clare, John — this is my colleague Tim, and his lovely partner …"

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Alix was telling Clare about Tim's research when he noticed that Clare's eyes were gathering moisture. The drops were not necessarily tears. When Alix's voice shifted to a higher key, and John looked brightly, then desperately away, however, Tim began to worry. At the word "India," where Christian was headed for an artist's residency, Clare's body subsided. As she slumped over John — perhaps she hadn't any dinner, but then she was crying also — it occurred to Tim that he or Christian might have somehow upset her. "Perhaps we should go," whispered Christian, as Alix returned to the room with a squeezed but dripping rag. The water on Clare's face made it impossible to tell whether she was crying, sweating, or experiencing a kind of relief. But then, the rash on her cheeks made it difficult to tell, also, whether she was laughing or dying. That was the most important thing to clarify, thought Tim confusedly. After Alix and John led Clare to the kitchen, Geoff joked, "Clearly, she's had a long day!" John returned to the lounge, and to Tim and Christian's surprise said much the same thing. By the kitchen, Alix could be seen kissing Clare's forehead, wrapping her into a shawl, unfurling an umbrella. She handed the latter to John as the front door swung open, letting a triangle of light into the darkened room. Clare went first. "Is she okay?" demanded Christian. Alix sat down where her friend had been. "Oh god, poor Clare." She looked up at Geoff, confirming a mutual understanding, then turned to Christian. "She has these attacks, usually after a long, long day." "It has happened before," admitted Geoff. "Did we interrupt something?" "No, no. That's the thing, Tim — we were just chatting." Geoff said, "But she does this sometimes." "She even apologized, the darling. She quoted Morris by the door just now: 'Whatever is unhappy is immoral.' What a fucking kickass scholar she is. It sucks that Tim didn't

get to discuss his stained glass with her." Alix smoothed down her pleated skirt and added, "Of course, we'll follow up with Clare tomorrow." She appeared slim and cool now, master of the situation, but so small that Tim felt a liar for thinking her a Burne-Jones figure. He fixed his attention on Christian, who was arranging a stack of laminated coasters on the coffee table. Each displayed a different Morris print. She was wearing no glasses, that was the difference. Possibly she wore contact lenses.

"What was her problem, do you think?" Christian asked again after a few weeks. "The woman at Alix's party." India, that had seemed the trigger, but it might have been something entirely else. Did Tim resemble someone Clare knew — used to know? He imagined a young pale brother suspended from a length of rope. He had no reason to feel guilty, of course, about a possible resemblance; nor did he. Still he was obscurely troubled. He meant to ask after her, but he would have to see Alix for that, and in the past few weeks he had not seen Alix. This did not have the effect of making him less worried about the job. As Christian rightly pointed out, only the opposite could be true. After Christian had packed for Delhi they took a walk on Hampstead Heath, prepared to be impressed by quantities of greenery, absent now for many months. They had spoken of nothing but easels and visas for days it seemed, in a rush of urgency that suited the leaver, as always, better than the stayer. Tim did not grumble, unless a fit of stoicism can be interpreted as a kind of complaint. His brow could be seen to glow, however. Three heavy bags, filled mostly with supplies, lined the hall. With any luck, they would not be unclosed before Christian's departure. On the nineteenth of April, as it turned out, the heath had yet to green. Fat, damp twigs littered the bare soil, the sort that immediately

give way when you step on them. Is there anything better — that is, more harmless — for a sufferer to do? They would be months apart, an enfilade of chat screens down numberless days. Yet just now a raw wind from the home counties muted any scent of approaching spring. Wishing for a solvent of coffee, Tim and Christian surfaced in the Spaniards Road, where one must finally admit to the existence of suburbs. "Don't look," said Christian, grabbing Tim's wrist. He bowed his head. "What is it?" They walked on. "Clare and John, from the party." He shifted discreetly and turned to see the back of an anonymous woman's head, then a face, Clare's face, craned round like his own. "She recognizes me." "What?" "Her face fell," he said, putting his hand to the back of his neck. "Someone is playing a prank on us; the prank will be aired on the reality channel." Christian was alarmed, he wasn't sure why, to hear Tim laugh just now. "There may be a camera nearby." "Who could she be?" "When I looked, her face turned to pixels." "Did you ever ask Alix about her, love?" Tim was not quick to respond. Perhaps it took more effort than usual to face straight ahead, to keep stepping toward what, eventually, would be the airport. Finally, as the High Street rose into view, Christian ventured, "It's just the city. With so many atoms whizzing around, they're sure to bump into each other." "Perhaps, after all, there is a higher — or even a lower — order." "Tim." "Why are we certain there's not? Have we ever really given it a thought?" "You never called Alix," said Christian, putting the fact into circulation. Surely something more could be done? "You never looked up Clare online, on Facebook?"

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"no. i've deactivated my account again." "is that true?" "No.Icouldn'tfindheronfacebook, then i deactivated my account." "We should google her." "She's not on the department's website; probably in adjunct purgatory. her name is common. let's drop it." Both of them knew where they would go, and got there without speaking. tim stood in the queue: sometimes a gift is what you can manage. As usual, Maite put cow milk in Christian's soy latte, tim dropped 20 p. into the bowl by the till, and silently, at the communal table, they exchanged drinks. tim's brow

could still be seen to glow. Christian appeared unperturbed. he was quietly calculating the expense of a cancelled trip, however, on his heart. it was the same old story, really, a feeling that it was impossible to go or stay, and a deeper certainty, equally disquieting, that very shortly you would do one or the other thing, impossible to say which, but soon you would know and bejustfine.Notyet,though. But tim set down his latte and said, "i don't mean to ruin our day. listen. i'll call Alix tomorrow, or perhaps i'll text her, after you've gone." Dislodged, Christian cried, "You haven't ruined our day!"

TwodaysafterChristianflewoff,tim received an email with the subject

line, "Urgent: Pre-Raphaelite Wombat Attack!" his friend tobias was excited to share the confidential news that, during some routine preservation work at the Red house, a new mural had been discovered in the Morrises' bedroom. the national trust was alreadyholdingofftheWilliamMorrisSociety,whichwasbeginningtofieldcalls from curious amateurs retired on the Costa Brava. Just how word had leaked so quickly he couldn't say. the important thing was to get together a team ASAP to identify the figuresandinscriptionsbeforeThe Guardian showed up. “Come out to Kent, Bexleyheath Stn, we'll pick you up.We’veonlymanagedonefigureso far, a wombat curled up beneath a chair. Probably Rosetti sketched it

Two Trees in Hampstead Heath 1, 2013 , oil on canvas, 16x20 inches.

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in during one of the famous painting parties. They would have been in their twenties, remember, and likely sauced.” The email was cc'd to a dozen conservationists and historians from London and Oxbridge. Tim knew them all. Alix's name came third on the list, just before his own. At London Bridge Station he bought a single return ticket to Sevenoaks, Kent.

Tim knew very well that he should report to the Red House instead. There was still time to make it to Bexleyheath, he was already in Kent. He knew, too, that it would be best to approach Alix in person. Certainly Christian would expect him to. He knew all that, but knowledge rarely makes action easier. If anything, it works against you. Tim resolved to move without thinking up to Knole House, through the crested hall screen and up the leopard-neweled staircase, symbol of Sackville family power. This is where he had always gone to get away. When he saw a piece of nineteenth-century glass, it was true, thoughts of Alix returned. But Knole's fabric was mostly Elizabethan and late Stuart, and much of its early seventeenth-century glass, miraculously, remained. This offered a means of escape — from his period, from Alix. He could stare at the glass for days and know he was only studying surfaces. But it was overcast just now, and the lights inside, where they existed, had been turned so low he could barely make out the faces of figures. Only the heavily worked silver furniture showed any detail, picked out by its own radiance. He mentioned the light to an ancient, stationary docent, wielding an enormous torch, apparently eager to highlight the best features of anything that could be reached by her beam. "It's much darker than it needs to be for the preservation of textiles," he said. "Lady Germain's letters to Pope were most spirited," she replied, readying her instrument. Tim smiled and moved on quickly,

in time to see Clare and John enter the Brown Gallery, as he was doing, but from the opposite end.

That in all of Knole, said to contain 365 rooms (fifty-two staircases, twelve entrances, and seven courtyards — a calendar house), in all of greater London, they should meet here. It was not enough to say they were both art historians. It would be lying, he argued silently, to suggest that this happened all the time. A woman behind him said, "Excuse us, love." He would step aside, lower his face, and wait. The couple would branch off to Lady Betty's china closet before he was seen. There will be no tears, he decided. Clare must have had stronger eyes than he imagined, for she took a long time with each portrait. John moved in a tight orbit around her, held by love's gravity, or guilt's. For a few minutes Tim pitied him, then he began to feel annoyed. Why should she keep him from walking down the Brown Gallery? Or from taking a job that put them into proximity? Cautiously Tim made his way forward. So far Clare had not so much as glanced in his direction. He did not wish to be seen, he told himself, only to move freely on his path. Of course, this was not entirely true. He paused, and coughed a little. Perhaps if she saw him like this, completely natural, unassuming, and he met her gaze with a kind smile, telegraphing sympathy, he could simply ask what was the matter?

It took surprisingly little time for the crowd to surge towards the fainting woman, whom it did its best to suffocate. Perhaps John had asked for help, though he didn't hear it. A man with a large red nose shouted to Tim for water, and since he nodded, and left the room, the man must have expected him to return with a bottle and help. Tim, so averse to confrontation, now sought more. Alix answered on the second ring.

"Just who I wanted to speak to," she said. "Alix. Hello. There's something — " "Something important?" "Yes." "Something that can't wait 'til tomorrow?" "Well, yes." "Are you free tonight?" "Fantastic. Yes. Yes." "Then you're coming to my engagement party, Tim. I've been terribly remiss. We've been so busy tracking down unglazed Staffordshire dogs, you know, for you guys to paint as party favors, that we forgot to post half the invitations. We'd be so honored though if you'd grace us with your presence — and Christian, of course!" "He's in Delhi." "One second. Okay, back. He's in Delhi?!" "Yes, he left a few days ago." "Oh my god. I'm going to have to ask him for a huge favor. Do you think he'd mind? There's a garrison church built by one of Lutyens's assistants, one Arthur Gordon Shoosmith, that's like a 1930s power station smashed into a cathedral. Fantastic stuff. I need pictures of the reinforced concrete roof, from the belfry." "Alix, I need to speak to you alone. In person I mean." "Don't worry, you will. I need to speak with you, too. This prohibition against mixing business with pleasure is fucking artificial, and not in the fun, Bakelite sort of way. I have a special message from our committee. I want to tell you over booze, with a Smiths cover band playing. We'll find a little corner." "Alright." "But hey, are you at the Red House right now? How are those freaking wombats, man?!" "So you aren't there, then?" "I'm lifting several times my weight in folding metal chairs at Conway Hall. It just wasn't the right day. If Geoff knew about anything other than cameras I would have sent him as my proxy. Hubby can barely lift two chairs. What's your excuse?" "I've been studying some glass at

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Knole house, actually, which — " "holy shit! My friend Clare is there today! have i introduced you?" "excuse me?" "i'm being so rude. of course, you were both at my William Morris birthday party." "to be quite frank, that why i'm calling." "oh?" "i think i made her faint again." "nonsense." "i'm telling you, there was a direct correlation." "nonsense. We'll sort it out tonight, darling, over Dom. trust me. the famous Conway hall humanist center, Red lion Square. eight p.m."

in 1861, the headquarters of Morris, Marshall, faulkner & Co. were established at no. 8 Red lion Square. the young partners undertook carving, stained glass, metalwork, paper-hangings, and printed fabrics, steadily reforming the taste of Victorian Britain from the street tim now stood in. it took several long years for the enterprise to earn a profit. In the meantime, designers like Burne-Jones were paid for their work in glazed tiles, or sometimes not at all. nevertheless a spirit of camaraderie prevailed and an occasional wombat was painted. they did it their own way. he must have spent about two minutes inside, not more. enough time to notice that unglazed Staffordshire dogs stood erect on a little table beyond the vestibule, along with pots of paint in Pugin colors: oxblood, fuchsia, gold, sage. A papier-mâché model of the Crystal Palace bestrode the stage, framing the faux Smiths. As they started up "Vicar in a tutu," a vicar in a tutu was lifted up in the center of the floor to wild hoots and catcalls. he spent enough time inside to note the inscription above the proscenium, which he had never noticed before: To Thine own Self Be True. When he saw Alix and Clare giggling by the punch bowl, however, he was still near enough to the door to slip back through it, quite calmly, without attracting any notice.

Alonso Diaz Rickards '12 is a painter. Michael Griffith '09 recently completed a master's in English literature at King's College London and is writing his first novel. They live and work together in Mexico City.

ghostBy Moses Bastille '13

hello,

ghost,

hanging in the closet

like an old coat.

You threadbare thing

just stale air

and dry moth wings.

But oh,

ghost,

you cracked kaleidoscope

how i laughed

when you broke —

i laugh til i choke.

Your voice hurts most —

purr,

whine,

cold hand

in mine.

A bitter chill

around you —

So why do i keep coming here,

and who is haunting

who?

Do you recall

how i let you in

and started it all?

You,

ghost,

subtle saboteur …

My hand creeps to

the closet door.

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A L U M N IN O T E S1978This fall Jackson Gillman is a featured performer at the National Storytelling Festival in Tennessee. He is also starting a weekly, year-long Whales, Tales and Sails program at the New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park. He writes, "I've been very active in the Boston story slam scene and in the grand finales for three of its four years. I'll again be offering my Springboards for Stories workshop at Kipling's historic Vermont home Feb. 7–10. It is designed to help individuals develop their own personal stories and is open to all, regardless of experience." jacksongillman.com.

1980After 32 years in New Mexico, Susan Freed relocated to California to take a job in the County of San Diego's energy and sustainability program. She writes, "I am so pleased to devote this time of my career to implementing climate action projects and being a part of the solution!"

1981Becky Buyers is farming in the Caribbean, growing passion fruit, pineapple, and papaya among other tropical fruits for home consumption, local markets, and several specialty product lines. With her husband, Raphael "Cas" Samuel, she owns Madam Ground Farms, located in the rainforest in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. They come back to enjoy the special charms of Maine from time to time, especially in summer. Contact her at [email protected].

Marti Gudmundson completed a surgical technology program at Skyline College in San Bruno, CA. She writes, "Just before I entered the program in June 2011 I was contacted via Facebook by Nick Molenaar, whom I knew from a Unitarian summer camp back in my home state of Minnesota in the early 1960s. We kept in touch via

Skype and fell in love during my year-long program." Marti and Nick married on May 18, and live in Caldwell, ID. Their story "50 Years After Summer Camp, Love at Second Sight" was recorded and aired as part of Boise State Public Radio's Idaho StoryCorps.

1982Stu Dickey Summer is the lead teacher and co-founder of EARTH: Education and Renewal Through the Hands, launched in September 2013. This place-based farm program connected to Hawthorne Valley Waldorf School is designed for children who need more hands-on, practical experiences. It builds on Waldorf education's developmental insights while encouraging the students' academic, artistic, and social skills through experience in animal care, gardening, forestry, and shelter building.

1988Dorie Stolley completed an MA in communication at Johns Hopkins University in August. She runs her own business, Three Birds Consulting, conducting outreach, education, and behavior change campaigns for conservation organizations. "As a wildlife biologist, I knew the scientific reasons for conserving wildlife, plants, habitat, and water. I told people what they could do to take care of these resources, but sadly, fewer people than I desired actually changed their behavior. After going through the communication program, I know how to motivate positive behavior change and understand what works and why." As a graduation present, Dorie's twin 7-year-old nephews spent a week at "Auntie Dorie's Nature Camp." Highlights included learning to kayak, releasing banded birds in Manomet, MA, and finding crayfish and dragonfly larvae in a stream. Find her at [email protected] or on Facebook.

1991

Gordon Longsworth, COA's GIS Lab director, and Danielle Marie Gurney were married on Aug. 3. Josh Winer '92 was the photographer. Gordon and Danielle then celebrated with two weeks in Scotland. Gordon also recently earned his 3rd degree black belt, or SanDan, in Shorin-Ryu Matsumura karate.

1993CedarBough Saeji is assistant professor of Korean Studies at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in South Korea. Recent publications include "Drumming, Dancing and Drinking Makgeolli: Liminal Time-Travel through Intensive Camps Teaching Traditional Performing Arts" in Journal of Korean Studies, and several reviews, including her reviews of Wind Bands and Cultural Identity in Japanese Schools by David G. Hebert in Ethnomusicology Review, Cheonha Je'il Talgongjakso's Chushyeoyo and Ta'ak Project's Good Pan in Asian Theatre Journal, and a review and photo essay, "The Bawdy, Brawling, Boisterous World of Korean Mask Dance Dramas," in Cross Currents: East Asian History and Culture Review, available at cross-currents.berkeley.edu.

Sarah (Cole) McDaniel has co-founded the new law firm Douglas McDaniel Campo & Schools, located in the historic Dana Warp Mill in Westbrook, ME. She continues her focus on property issues throughout Maine, helping clients with boundary disputes, land use opinions,

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permitting, and titles. Her favorite cases are land conservation projects where she represents landowners working to protect their land with Maine Coast Heritage Trust project managers Patrick Watson, Bob Deforrest '94, and Marty Anderson '94. For more, visit mainelandlaw.com, or douglasmcdaniel.com.

1994

Ngaio Richards writes, "My foundation year in human ecology at COA had a profound and lasting impact. COA's frank discussions and debates gave me the tools I needed to channel my restless energies toward practical, tangible goals. After completing a PhD in wildlife forensic science at Anglia Ruskin University, I'm happily based in Montana as a field biologist with Working Dogs for Conservation, workingdogsforconservation.org. We train dogs to detect noxious weeds and imperiled plants, the scat of rare and elusive wildlife species, and on occasion the animals themselves. I have traveled from arctic Alaska in search of black and grizzly bear scat to the jungles of Cameroon to find the dung of an endangered primate. I often recall COA, where I was introduced to interdisciplinary problem-solving. I came away with a firm sense of my roots, the faint but sure outlines of a blueprint for accomplishing my dreams, and a strong desire to be part of something larger than myself."

1996This fall Rebecca Aubrey (right) took a new position as a Spanish teacher at the Ashford School in Ashford, CT, where she was delighted to find herself working with Carly Imhoff '10. She writes, "My family also recently grew with the addition of two girls,

ages 14 and 9. Together with my boys, now 15 and 11, I have a busy but wonderfully fulfilling home!"

Mary Harney completed her master's degree in Irish studies at the National University of Ireland Galway, and has returned to Maine.

Mike Staggs is the proud father of Grayson Everett Staggs, born on July 26. He has taken Grayson trekking up mountains, out on the ocean, and hiking carriage trails.

1997Margaret Hoffman is the new assistant director of the Boothbay Railway Village in Wiscasset, ME.

1998 Toby Stephenson and Andrea Perry '95 fulfilled a longtime dream by installing a 4,500-watt solar power system and a solar water heater for their home in Ellsworth, ME.

2000Nikolai Fox is living in Philadelphia and working as a cinematographer and photographer with his sister Avi. One of his photographs was published in the May 2013 Sun Magazine. Nikolai also plays fiddle with The City Wide Specials and The Dill Pickle Old Time Orchestra and is recording original music. This summer he returned to painting and created a series of abstract compositions that explore the resonances between

emotion and intention. He writes, "I am now searching for a master's in fine art program with a philosophy of mysticism and religious studies component. Find me at [email protected] — portfolios at nikolaifox.net. I'd love to hear from you!"

2001

Pictured on a recent trip to Prince Edward Island is Caroline Leonard with Iris, 15 months, Field, 16, and Ad 10. Partner Peter is missing from the photo. Caroline writes, "I am certainly busy with three kids at such different ages, it's fun — for the most part!"

2002

Nicole D'Avis, husband Mark, and their 2-year-old daughter Clarabelle welcomed Lucan Jesse Anderson to the family on July 20. Clarabelle is completely smitten by her baby brother and has been a great helper. Nicole hopes that continues when she returns to work at the Museum of Science, Boston.

2003Allison Fundis joined Ocean Exploration Trust as director of education. Based at the University of Rhode Island's Graduate School of Oceanography, Allison is working to promote STEM education and ocean exploration by providing at-sea and onshore opportunities for students and educators in

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"We give to the annual fund because we see the many ways that the college provides a foundation for its community to go out and change the world for the better. every day we witness the influence of COA in the local MDI community and beyond.

We give because we believe there should be places like CoA in the world for our children."

the annual fund seeks to raise unrestricted support from CoA alumni, parents, friends, trustees, faculty, and staff. We ask everyone who is part of the CoA community to participate. each and every gift is important, no matter the size.

it's important to remember that tuition and endowment income combined are not sufficient to meet all operating expenses. the annual fund covers the gap. it brings much needed support to all programs, and offers enhancements to the academic curriculum, including our studio and performing arts, as well as to student life, technology (both for equipment and education), facility maintenance, financial aid, and community outreach.

Strong participation in the annual fund demonstrates commitment and dedication to CoA. When we apply for foundation or corporate gifts, the percentage of alumni who participate in the annual fund is often an important consideration.

JOIN THE BLACK FLY SOCIETY

Honoring College of the Atlantic's mascot,

The Black Fly Society was established to make donating to COA's

annual fund easier and greener.

We hope you'll join this swarm of sustaining donors by setting up a

monthly online gift!

It's the paperless way to give to COA.

Go to coa.edu/donatenow and under "gift frequency" select "monthly."

If you want to give to the annual fund by mail:

COA Annual Fund

105 Eden Street

Bar Harbor, ME 04609

Please make your check payable to College of the Atlantic.

Questions? Call 207-801-5622.

Why We Give:ZACh '00 AnD AutuMn '01 SoAreS

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oceanography, engineering, and science communication: [email protected].

Amanda Hollander married Katherine McCormack on the shore of Branch Lake in Ellsworth, ME, on May 26. They were joined by close family and friends, including COA alumni. The day's rain just made the knot even tighter!

2004

On Aug. 3 in Austin, TX, Lee Kuck, MPhil, married Scott Bellware of Montréal, Québec. They celebrated with local hot jazz musicians, friends, and family. They will continue to live in Austin with one small black cat and several million bats. Lee currently works behind the scenes at the Texas Senate, cheering on Wendy Davis, and moonlights with the City of Austin teaching fifth-grade students about watersheds while they get incredibly muddy in local caves.

In April Nellie Wilson took a job in Hampshire College's advancement office. She writes, "It's been nice to be living in the northeast again; I've been enjoying all the lovely places to go hiking. I appreciate my time at COA more and more now that I am working in higher education. I'd love to connect with more alumni in the western Mass area."

2005In addition to publishing her book Raven and the Red Ball (see page 8), Sarah Drummond finished a master's in environmental studies with a focus on environmental history through Prescott College in May 2012. Her thesis was an expansion of her Watson Fellowship, detailing the work of artists on expeditions in the Southern Hemisphere and South Pacific. This summer, two of her linocut block print pieces were included in the David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation's Wildlife Artist of the Year exhibition at the Mall Galleries in London, UK. She completed her seventh season as a naturalist guide on a vintage wooden charter boat in Alaska's inside passage, and continues to seek opportunities to guide, teach, learn, and draw.

2007

At the end of a two-week trip, Charlie Fischer summited Mont Blanc, the highest point in Western Europe. He also climbed Le Petit Verte and Le Petit Flambeau, and marked his success with a COA flag.

Fellow fifers Kate Sheely (left) and Sally Morong Chetwynd '76 connected at the 2013 Lexington Muster at the Minute Man National Historical Park in Lincoln, MA. They play with Connecticut Valley Field

Music and The Musick of Prescott's Battalion, respectively. In addition to fifing, Kate completed an MS in interactive media this August and received the Faculty Award for Academic Excellence from the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University.

2008Malcolm Afaayo Nambale was born on May 2 in the water at home. He and sister Nora are adjusting to their mama, Sarah Haughn, pursuing an MA in creative writing at UC Davis. Papa Wanyakha Timbiti Moses is working on his PhD in horticulture and agronomy. The family looks forward to returning to Uganda for six months in March 2014.

Amanda Spector received her DVM from Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine in May and is currently working at an equine hospital in Selma, TX.

2009As community programs coordinator at the University of Washington Botanic Gardens, Sarah Short Heller has started a nature preschool, The Fiddleheads Forest School. She welcomes any local Seattle or visiting community members to stop by to see 3- to 5-year-olds playing, exploring, and learning outdoors, rain or shine.

Ingrid Lindstrom earned an MA with highest honors in the history and philosophy of science from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in May. Her thesis was "History, Ecology, and Destiny: Utopias, Dystopias, and Intentionality of Place." She also completed a Teaching English as a Foreign Language certificate program at the University of Arizona, and will be a foreign professor of English at the Pacific English School in Hamamatsu, Japan.

2010The second season of Harborside Shakespeare Company, run by directors Dan Mahler and Alicia

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Hynes '11, was an acclaimed success, with six performances of A Midsummer Night's Dream in four locations, including an audience of more than 200 in Ellsworth, a foray to Portland, and two nights at COA. Among the actors were Alex Depavloff '14, Hannah Mencher '13, Jabu Mickle Molefe ('14), Ben Moniz '14, Phinn Onens '13 (as Puck in photo), Kristen Wegner '16, and Kira Weintraub '12.

Becky Wartell writes, "I inadvertently ended up living in NYC for the past two years — three months of that in Zuccotti Park — after participating in an action in September 2011. Much of

last year was spent doing hurricane recovery work with Occupy Sandy. Currently I'm active with The People's Puppets of Occupy Wall Street performing political puppetry and doing legal activism with the Mutant Legal Collective." Becky is now a Grace Paley Organizing Fellow through Jews for Racial and Economic Justice.

2011Jacqueline Bort is a contractor to US Fleet Forces Command (Navy) for natural resources support and marine mammal acoustic work. She is engaged to fellow marine mammal biologist Steven Thornton who completed his master's from the lab of Bill McLellan '88 at the University of North Carolina Wilmington. Bill will officiate the wedding ceremony.

2012 Ashley Heinze is working in two labs at Mount Desert Island Biological Lab. As a research assistant in

Dustin Updike's lab, she uses the small roundworm C. elegans as a genetic model to understand germ granule function across species. As a phytoplankton specialist under Jane Disney, she collects and tests phytoplankton levels to monitor safe shellfish consumption. She also trained for her first half-marathon. Because she has been living with ulcerative colitis for nine years, she and her boyfriend ran to support the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America, raising nearly $6,000 at a race in wine country Virginia.

Jess McCordic's paper, "Differential rates of killer whale attacks on humpback whales in the North Atlantic as determined by scarification," was published in the Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom, with biology faculty member Sean Todd and Peter Stevick '81 as co-authors.

GRADUATE PROFILEELIZABETH (HALE) MORRELL '12, YALE SCHOOL OF FORESTRY AND ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES '15

Focus: Land and wildlife conservationGoals: Field-based research and surveys that help promote conservation

Campus life: The classes are challenging but informative and often applied. The community is strong and emphasizes student-teacher relationships, as at COA. The students are interesting and motivated, and come from a huge range of backgrounds. We are all eager to learn from each other, which helps foster the interdisciplinary environment that FES strives for.

COA preparation: Rigorous classes such as my Ecology class and Environmental Law and Policy were particularly helpful in preparing me for this difficult program. The "-ology" courses I took were also very helpful because I am able to identify and know the natural history of many species that we discuss in class. The discussion-based courses helped too, because most of our professors expect us to contribute to classes in a meaningful manner.

Additional thoughts: COA taught me how to solve problems creatively and be proactive about my education, which is expected in graduate school. Also, I really value the real-life experience that COA requires and supports, such as internships, presenting at conferences, and making connections with professionals in our fields.

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Heather Anderson has joined COA as the public relations manager, and is delighted to call herself a Mainer again.

In September, for the annual meeting of the Waterbird Society in Germany, John Anderson, William H. Drury, Jr. Chair in Evolution, Ecology and Natural History, organized and co-chaired a symposium on the decline of gulls in the North Atlantic. With him were Kate Shlepr '13 and Lindsey Nielsen '13, who gave oral papers. John is now archivist of the society, and a reviewer for the journal Waterbirds and for the University of Chicago Press. In May he spoke on the history of natural history to the first Northeastern Natural History Gathering in Vermont, and spoke about the importance of the visual arts in natural history and conservation to the annual meeting of the Guild of Natural History Illustrators. On sabbatical during winter 2013, John gave a seminar on the interactions of gulls and eagles and their implications for conservation biology at the University of Otago in New Zealand, and participated in a round-table discussion on the role of traditional ecological knowledge in conservation.

Molly Anderson, Partridge Chair in Food and Sustainable Agriculture Systems, presented on food system indicators for the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Science in September, served on a panel on climate change at MOFGA's Common Ground Country Fair, and also gave an invited paper at the Yale Food System Symposium. In July she co-facilitated a workshop on developing indicators for Farm to Institution New England, in June presented at the New England Food Summit in Portland, ME, and the Agriculture, Food & Human Values conference in Michigan, and participated in the annual conference of the Sustainable Agriculture & Food Systems Funders in Rhode Island. In May she joined a charrette on northeast food system responses to climate change at CUNY and moderated a food and climate change forum in Camden, ME. Molly also co-authored papers on food system adaptation to climate change and food sovereignty, available online at the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems and Community Development. She wrote on the right to food and nutrition in the US for the international Right to Food and Nutrition Watch, and helped an international team report on agriculture technology for development for the UN's Department on Economic and Social Affairs. Molly joined the international advisory council for the Sustainable Food Centre in Ontario, Canada, and the advisory board of the national organization Food Tank, as well as

the editorial boards of the journals Agroecology & Sustainable Food Systems and Agriculture, Food Systems & Community Development.

After a successful Kickstarter campaign, arts faculty member Nancy Andrews and producer Peter West completed a three-week shoot of the live-action elements of The Strange Eyes of Dr. Myes, Nancy's first feature film. It stars Michole Briana White and Jennifer Prediger '00, with Marco Accardi '14. The film crew includes arts faculty member Dru Colbert as production designer, Rohan Chitrakar '04, director of photography, Lauren Benzaquen '14, production assistant and assistant animator, Ben Moniz '14, assistant grip, and Adrian Garber '05, costume supervisor. It also features a scene with Coke Weed, the band of staff member Zach Soares '00. Zach helped create much of the film's music. Many other community members were also involved. Watch for a release in spring or summer 2014. Nancy is also one of 21 artists in the 2013 deCordova Biennial in Lincoln, MA, through April. Her work is in Animation Sketchbooks by Laura Heit, published by Chronicle Books in the US, and Thames and Hudson in the UK, showcasing the private sketchbooks of 50 current independent artists working in animation. In September Nancy launched the University of California Berkeley/Pacific Film Archives series Alternative Visions, with screenings of two of her films.

COMMUNITYN O T E S

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Stay tuned for the spring 2014 release of Ecology and Experience: Reflections from a Human Ecological Perspective by Rich Borden, Rachel Carson Chair in human ecology, by north Atlantic Books, with distribution by Random house. Meanwhile, in August Rich helped coordinate the human ecology section of the ecological Society of America annual meeting, served in the mentor program, and participated in the society's preparation for the 2015 centennial conference.

Read about Heath Cabot, faculty member in anthropology, in an interview in American Ethnologist, americanethnologist.org, and her accompanying article, "the social aesthetics of eligibility: ngo aid and indeterminacy in the greek asylum process," at onlinelibrary.wiley.com. heath also wrote the chapter, "engagements and interruptions: Mapping emotion at an Athenian Asylum Advocacy ngo" for Ethnographies of Social Support, edited by Markus Schlecker and friederike fleischer, and published by Palgrave Macmillan in June. She also won emerald Press's outstanding Author Contribution for best chapter in a series, which she co-authored with Ramona lenz from germany's Medico international. the essay, "Borders of (in)visibility in the greek Aegean" was published in Culture and Society in Tourism Contexts by emerald in 2012, emeraldinsight.com/books. heath also presented papers at last spring's American ethnological Society meeting in Chicago and at the law and Society meeting in Boston.

Bill Carpenter, faculty member in literature and creative writing, was guest poet and workshop leader at the Roque island Poetry festival in July; he also gave a poetry reading.

for the 15th anniversary celebration of the publication Object, Catherine Clinger, Allan Stone Chair in the Visual Arts, delivered the paper, "the hut in the Snow" at University College london, UK. her essay, "Speleological interiority — the Mindfulness of a Spelunking Anatomist," appeared in

the volume Discovering the Human: Life Science and the Arts in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries edited by Ralf haekel and Sabine Blackmore, and published by V&R gmbh in germany.

Dru Colbert, arts faculty member, is a board member of the MDi historical Society and designed its summer exhibition, "Shifting gears: how the Automobile transformed Mt. Desert island."

the article, "Community Smart grid Utilizing Dynamic Demand Response and tidal Power for grid Stabilization," by Anna Demeo, lecturer in physics, has been published in the journal Smart Grid and Renewable Energy. Anna completed her PhD in engineering in the natural sciences with the presentation and acceptance of her dissertation, "A three-Pronged Approach to Community Scale Renewable energy: education, incremental Capital investment and Smart grid technology," at the University of Maine, orono.

Dave Feldman, faculty member in math and physics, spoke on "Predictable Unpredictability: Strange Attractors and the Butterfly Effect" in August at the eagle hill institute in Steuben, Me. in July he gave a talk at the American Association of Physics teachers in Portland, oR, titled, "An interdisciplinary, Project-Based Class in Sustainable energy," using the renewable energy course he developed with Anna Demeo. he also gave a talk, "local Complexity for heterogeneous Spatial Systems," at the information in Dynamical Systems and Complex Systems workshop in Burlington, Vt, sponsored by the Army Research Office and hosted by Clarkson University.

Jay Friedlander, Sharpe-Mcnally Chair in green and Socially Responsible Business, was a featured speaker at the european Conference on Sustainability, energy and the environment in the UK in July. he also delivered talks on using sustainability to spark business innovation to new hampshire Businesses for Social Responsibility's spring conference in May and the MDi Chamber of Commerce in April. he has been working with Sustainable harvest international as an advisor on the potential of earned income ventures. his choice to come to CoA was featured in the article "lean out" in CNNMoney (money.cnn.com). A co-authored article, "Sustainability: A Paradigmatic Shift in entrepreneurship education," has just come out in the New England Journal of Entrepreneurship.

Sarah Hall, faculty member in geology, presented her research on Peruvian

Curious about Chaos?

Dave Feldman offers COA's

first (and so far only) massive,

open, online course, aka

MooC. Actually, it's not CoA

that's offering it, but the Santa

fe institute, as part of its

Complexity explorer project.

Dave's MooC, Chaos and

Dynamical Systems, is based in

part on his CoA course Chaos

and fractals. the only pre-

requisite is familiarity with high-

school algebra. learn more and

sign up at complexityexplorer.

org/online-courses/4. the free

class begins Jan. 6, 2014.

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Lovely Journeys, DarleneDarlene Nolin, assistant registrar, started as a temporary worker under former registrar Sally Crock in September 1997; within four months she was hired fulltime. On December 31, 2013, Darlene retires to enjoy, she says, "whatever new opportunities and challenges come forward." She leaves behind many a fond memory of supportive conversations with students, staff, and faculty. But she promises to remain in Bar Harbor and come to campus frequently to continue her many COA friendships and partake of cultural events. Former workstudy student Anjana Rajbhandary '06 speaks for many in saying, "In this world it is rare to come across such a beautiful soul. Darlene has a magical way of looking at life that makes everything more amazing. I loved listening to her stories. She was always there when I needed a listening ear, when I needed guidance, and also to share many happy moments; she taught me to value each moment in my life. Darlene will always hold a very special place in my heart." A world traveler, Darlene has encouraged many — faculty, staff, and students — to purse their dreams. And while Darlene says she has no immediate plans, she allows that "a trip to Kamchatka, Russia, is on the horizon, but not immediately. I like to stay in Bar Harbor during the beautiful winters to be available for skiing and getting together with local friends while we're all less busy." Come back to share your adventures, Darlene!

tectonics and climate at the Geological Society of America's October meeting in Denver, CO, and spoke at MDI's Somes-Meynell Wildlife Sanctuary on "The Geology of MDI" in August and at Middlebury College in Vermont on "Active Tectonics in the Andes: A view from the Peruvian forearc" in April. She also co-authored a publication in the journal Geomorphology titled, "Geochronology of pediments and marine terraces in north-central Chile and their implications for Quaternary uplift in the Western Andes." In June Sarah took three students from her South American Earth Systems class on an optional field trip to the Cordillera Blanca of northern Peru. Pictured are Emily Hollyday '15, Zabet NueCollins '15, Ben Moniz '14, and Sarah.

Monica Hamm is now the coordinator of international student services, taking over from Kylee Gies who has moved to Washington State with her husband and baby Oliver.

In September biology faculty member Helen Hess worked as a taxonomist on the BioTrails project at MDIBL, helping citizen volunteers identify marine invertebrates. She also gave a campus talk to EcoLeague partner Alaska Pacific University on biomimicry, and lectured to an ichthyology class on her research on parasites in MDI estuarine fish.

Isabel Mancinelli, Charles Eliot Chair in Ecological Planning, Policy and Design, chairs the Beatrix Farrand Society Landscape and Garden Committee, which runs Garland Farm on MDI, and is on the board of directors of the Somes Pond Center for Landscape History, also on MDI.

Ardrianna French McLane '02 is now head of summer programs at COA.

Suzanne Morse, Elizabeth Battles Newlin Chair in Botany, joined faculty

from the University of Nebraska and Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences in their capacity-building meeting in Malmø, Sweden, aimed at the development of an international doctoral program in agroecology.

In August biology faculty member Chris Petersen attended the Northeast Regional IDeA conference in Delaware to represent COA's biomedical research as part of its INBRE grant. He also attended the Joint Meeting of Ichthyologists and

Inside an ancient site in Kirkwall, Orkney.

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herpetologists in Albuquerque, nM, in July where he presented a poster co-authored with Helen Hess, Robin Van Dyke '11, Zinta Rutins '14, and MDiBl's Charlie Wray on population genetics and parasite prevalence in an estuarine fish. Chris also co-authored "Phylogenetic perspectives on the evolution of functional hermaphroditism in fishes" with investigators from Scripps institute of oceanography and UC Santa Barbara in the July Journal of Integrative and Comparative Biology.

With Jillian E. Gall '13 as first author, CoA faculty member in botany Nishanta Rajakaruna '94, published "the physiology, functional genomics, and applied ecology of heavy metal-tolerant Brassicaceae" in Brassica: Characterization, Functional Genomics and Health Benefits, by nova Science Publishers. With RS Boyd, Nishi published "heavy Metal tolerance" in Oxford Bibliographies in Ecology, edited by David gibson and published by oxford University Press, and "edaphic factor" in Reference Module in Earth Systems and Environmental Sciences, edited by Scott elias and published by Elsevier, Oxford, UK. With Nathaniel Pope '07 as first author, Nishi and two others published "the role of elevation and soil chemistry in the distribution and ion accumulation of floral morphs of Streptanthus polygaloides gray (Brassicaceae), a Californian nickel hyperaccumulator" in Plant Ecology and Diversity. nishi is on the scientific advisory committee for the 2014 international Conference on Serpentine Ecology.

in September biology faculty member Steve Ressel gave the talk, "Cold-Blooded Animals in a Cold Weather State: the amphibians and reptiles of northern new england" at the eagle

hill institute of Steuben, Me, and in August the talk, "the ecology and Conservation of Vernal Pools: A race against time" at the Somes-Meynell Wildlife Sanctuary on MDI. In July he presented the poster, "Coverboard sampling of terrestrial salamanders in Acadia national Park: employing citizen scientists to monitor the population dynamics of amphibians" at the 2013 Joint Meetings of ichthyologists and herpetologists in Albuquerque, nM, co-authored with Sarah Colletti '11. Steve also served as a judge of student oral presentations for the Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles Seibert Award in Amphibian Conservation. While there, Steve and Chris Witt '97, University of new Mexico biologist and curator of birds at the Museum of Southwestern Biology, exchanged regional bird specimens for their respective museums' teaching collections. Steve's "Natural History note" on the occurrence of snakes swimming in open cold seawater, co-authored with Eddie Monat '88, was published in the June issue of Herpetological Review.

Doreen Stabinsky, faculty member in global environmental politics, was appointed to a two-year position on the ad hoc technical expert Group on Risk Assessment and Risk Management of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety. She spoke at the Common ground fair in September, and lectured in August on "humanitarian aspects of limits to adaptation" at an international conference on adaptation, loss, and damage in the Asia-Pacific region, hosted in Bangkok by the institute for global environmental Strategies and the Asia Pacific Adaptation Network. She also spoke on the global politics of climate change and its impact on

agriculture in Rangeley, ME, in July and in Camden, ME, in May. Recent writings include a policy brief on climate change and agriculture published by the Climate Action network South Asia, and several reports and monographs on loss and damage in climate negotiations. in november she heads the CoA delegation to the 19th Conference of the Parties to the Un framework Convention Climate Change.

Bonnie Tai, faculty member in education, spoke on critical exploration in teacher education as a panelist at the annual meeting of the Jean Piaget Society in Chicago this June. Her essay, "Witness to learning," came out in Always Wondering … a Mélange of Eleanor Duckworth and Critical Exploration, edited by Shorr, hoidn, lowry, and Cavicchi, published by Critical Exploration Press. She serves on the board of the next Step Domestic Violence Project and on the advisory board of IMPACT Boston.

Sean Todd represented CoA at a joint US/Canadian oil Spill exercise (CAnUSlAnt), serving as a key wildlife respondent. He co-authored "Has designating and protecting critical habitat had an impact on endangered north Atlantic right whale ship strike mortality?" in Marine Policy and another with Jessica McCordic '12 (see alumni notes). Sean's work on grants for Allied Whale has netted an $80,000 Prescott grant, and $90,000 from anonymous donors.

Toward a Literary Ecology: Places and Spaces in American Literature, co-edited by Karen Waldron, lisa Stewart Chair in literature and Women's Studies, and Rob Friedman, was published by Scarecrow Press in August, 2013.

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Victor Amarilla Cañete '05February 26, 1982–April 17, 2013

Victor Amarilla Cañete '05 was born the youngest of six in a suburb of Asunción, Paraguay. He was a deep thinker, great writer, and cut-throat Scrabble player. He liked brownie sundaes and small dogs, and had a great appreciation for guava pie and a cheese and yucca bread called chipa. He perfected his English pronunciation by listening to Beatles songs. After seeing a newspaper notice, a teenage Victor applied to study at the Armand Hammer United World College of the American West in New Mexico, not telling his family until he was accepted. He came to COA in 2002. Victor hated the cold weather, but he bundled up and studied human ecology, especially literature, history, and philosophy.

Victor was my best friend for most of my adult life and helped create many of my memories, habits, jokes, and routines. He interned at my family's farm one summer and fell in love with tomatoes. While his hands were busy transplanting young kale plants, pruning tomatoes, or picking beans, his mind wandered to the thinkers he had studied with COA philosopher John Visvader, as well as to the political and cultural realities back in Paraguay. On a Wednesday in September 2005 Victor and I married at the Ship Harbor Trail in Acadia National Park. John officiated, witnessed by Amy Hoffmaster '06, Coltere Savidge '06, and some gnarled driftwood.

In 2009 Victor was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. He had begun certification to teach Spanish in high school, but soon realized that wasn't for him. His struggles with direction compounded his depression. He tried different medications and counseling. In 2011 he chose to leave Maine for Paraguay and we divorced.

Victor held a special place in his heart for rivers. He was awed by the majestic Iguaçu Falls of Brazil and Argentina, not far from Asunción, at UWC he joined an expedition to the Grand Canyon, and at COA he paddled the Allagash. When we lived together in Southern Maine, we walked our dogs and rode his scooter along a shady road by the Saco River. Victor chose to end his life there in mid-April 2013 near the Salmon Falls Bridge. In the woods near that spot there is a newly-planted white pine. It witnesses the cool water that moves like time — sometimes fast, sometimes slow, always onward.

Carolyn Snell '06

Clyde Everett "Ev" Shorey Jr.June 9, 1922–July 23, 2013

I first met Ev and his wife Joan in 1985 after Ev joined COA's board of trustees. A graduate of Yale University and Columbia Law School, having served in the Army Air Force in India during World War II, Ev was deputy general counsel to the US Agency for International Development in Washington, DC. After Joan contracted polio in 1953, Ev became active in the March of Dimes, serving on its board, chairing the committee that broadened its mission to include maternal and child health concerns, and leading lobbying efforts for the WIC program. Ev was also treasurer of the liberal advocacy group People for the American Way. An advocate for nature and for people, he saw that at COA he could help prepare students who would protect nature and strive for healthier communities, better lives, more freedom, opportunity, justice, and peace.

As a COA board member, Ev chaired the annual fund drive; in 1995 he became board chair. By then, I had become COA president, so we worked together very closely, raising $20 million during COA's first major capital campaign. In challenging situations, Ev's sage and strategic advice always led to an ethical position and a good solution that left us far better off than before. Ev stepped down as chair in 2001, receiving an honorary MPhil. He continued as an active trustee until he was elected life trustee in 2006. On campus, the golden chain trees — a species Ev loved — were planted on the path between Turrets and Kaelber Hall, and Shorey House in the Katherine W. Davis Student Village is named for his family.

I visited Ev and Joan one week before Ev died — peacefully — at his DC home. We spent several hours over dinner talking about life and all that we needed to do to improve it for everyone. Ev was re-reading Jonathan Alter's book on President Obama, The Center Holds. Books waiting to be read were stacked like incoming flights to La Guardia on a foggy evening.

I knew it was our last visit together, so of course I was sad, but what I felt most was gratitude to both Ev and Joan for all they taught my wife Susan and me, for nourishing the college so devotedly, and for showing everyone what a full, productive, committed life can be.

Steve Katona,founding faculty member and former COA president

In Memoriam

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Lise Desrochers cherishes a special photo her mother gave her. It's of a little girl proudly standing in the kitchen making pies ahead of Thanksgiving dinner. Her Thanksgiving dinner. Lise made the squash, mashed potatoes, stuffing, even the Flagstone fruit salad (a mid-twentieth century favorite, with canned fruit, cream, and mayo), and all the pies for the entire family. She believes she may have had help with the turkey. She was nine years old.

Now co-director of COA's food services (rated among the top ten in the nation, mind you), Lise recently published a cookbook of recipes from COA. It's called, simply Take-A-Break, and it features the dishes we have all come to love, from morning glory muffins to butternut lasagna, to chocolate brownies with chocolate ganache. Filtered through Lise's culinary expertise, the recipes are something of a history of COA food, with delights from previous chefs and a multitude of students.

Lise steps away from the kitchen one September morning to talk about food, cooking, and growing up in a French Canadian family in South Berwick, Maine. "We're French, we're all about food," she says. Her parents first owned a diner — the kind housed in a railroad car; then bought a general store. By junior high, Lise was cooking the muffins, omelets, and lunches served at this local meeting place.

Food, family, friends — and the beauty of Acadia — are central to Lise's life, and why she so loves working at COA. Each morning at 5 a.m. she drives slowly over the bridge to Mount Desert Island on her way to work, taking in the still waters, the sunrise. Later, to decompress from the intensity of a day in the kitchen, she's likely to head to the Witch Hole Pond carriage trail for a walk with friends. But at present lunch calls. "We're serving the pink pesto recipe from the book," she says on her way back to the kitchen. The recipe comes from the Italian grandmother of Australian-born Lara Montesanto '14. Now, when people ask Lise for this, or dozens of other recipes, she can point them in the direction of Take-A-Break, the book, with a portion of the profits going to Healthy Acadia.

The following recipe is one Jesse Karppinen '13 shared. It hails from his home in Helsinki, Finland. Jesse is now in medical school in Europe. An excerpt from the heartfelt student perspective he gave at graduation — which brought the audience to its feet and tears to many an eye — is on the facing page.

Take-A-BreakRecipes from the Kitchen at College of the Atlantic

Jesse's Pannukakku(Finnish Oven Pancakes)Serves 6–8

3 eggs3½ cups milk1 tsp vanilla extract1 tsp baking powder2 cups all-purpose flour2 Tbs granulated sugar1 tsp kosher salt5 Tbs butter, melted and cooled

In a medium bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, vanilla and butter. In a separate large bowl, mix the dry ingredients. Combine the wet and dry mixes and mix well. Heat a 12" oven safe sauté pan in a preheated 425 degree oven. Pour the batter into the pan and bake for 20 minutes until the pancake is puffed and nicely browned. Serve with berries, jam, maple syrup or cinnamon and sugar.

Jesse Karppinen '13, a Davis United World College scholar from Finland, asked if we could make this recipe that he grew up with. Heather* made it for brunch and it was a big hit. Thank you, Jesse!

*Heather Halliday, COA cook.

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Embracing our InterconnectednessJesse Karppinen, student perspectiveCommencement 2013

I remember my first moments at COA. All of us in the 2009 incoming class were like small electrons, confused about what to do with ourselves. We were ready to be excited, eager to interact with each other, longing for adventures. We had the potential to create something special, our unique spin on human ecology. We would challenge each other to critically tackle local and global problems; we would form bonds, generating bigger molecules — groups of students, groups of friends.

The COA campus is like a cell where small molecules interact, unite, and form part of the larger community of Bar Harbor. The town is the tissue within which the different cells collectively work. As a community we give a greater function to this tissue. Just as the different levels of our biological bodies are connected, so are individuals, academic disciplines, and healthcare systems. I began seeing how social psychology, medical anthropology, social movements, and economic development relate to scientific notions of health.

I longed to draw these connections onto the global map, I had a burning need to see how public health initiatives work in an unfamiliar culture — to engage with them through experience. I needed to observe how the different organ systems — countries — could make a healthy and sustainable body: our interconnected world.

Thirsty for communal work and new languages and people, I landed in rural central Java and visited a local rehabilitation center for disabled children. I entered a room of around

thirty children, all mostly apathetically lying on the floor. These children had minimal control over their bodies and limited communication skills. Due to a lack of staffing, they had hardly any physical or verbal interactions. As I held one of the residents — Ari — in my arms, watching his shining, starry eyes, feeling the loose muscles around his brittle bones, wiping the drool around his mouth, I was struck by my emotions.

The science-oriented, medically inclined student in me knew that Ari was struggling because his biological body did not work properly. Because different parts in it were disconnected. The molecules within his cells were failing their functions, the cells, tissues, and organs were unable to communicate. Ari was also lying on the floor because the socioeconomic factors in his community were equally disconnected. He was left to lie on the floor. It broke my heart.

Each of us — each electron — can only thrive if we are integrated into the dynamic world. Our bodies, our well-being, can be in balance only with a correct and holistic — interconnected — combination of socio-psychological factors: the natural environment, money, culture, political economy, etc. Ari was lying on the floor not only because his physical body did not work properly, but also because he lived in a small rural village with poor infrastructure and minimal medical access. Because he was born fated to a life of the poor. Because his family had been forced to abandon him due to social, religious, and financial reasons.

Just as we cannot heal the sick by fixing only one system in the body, we

cannot vaccinate children abandoned on a street without finding them homes.

We cannot work disconnected from each other. No person alone can defeat violence and injustice. No town alone can implement equitable solutions for health care. No community can thrive without collaboration. No country can sustainably exist — or combat pandemics — without its neighbors. Our societies will end up dismantled and broken if East and West, North and South don't communicate. The global world needs to live under the sense of nonduality.

Though our efforts arise from the potential, passion, and drive in each one of us, we must embrace the interconnectedness that exists between us.

Starting right now we can deliver something as simple as a smile, because even the smallest effort does make a change. By acknowledging each other, we strengthen the movement of compassion. By making sure that no one is ignored, we can increase the momentum of a wave of understanding and caring.

Four years ago, I sat in Take-A-Break cynically preaching that compassion did not exist. Today — still recognizing my limits of understanding — I stand here as a believer in the power of devotion, solidarity, and transformation! I hope that you will join me, because we cannot afford for you not to, because Ari cannot afford for you not to. This is my only chance and it is your only chance as well.


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coa magazine fall 2013

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