Bates new front door, the place to learn what Bates is all about and to explore shared interests launches this week

All around the practice fields at Bates, there are fall athletic teams brimming with hope for the season ahead. In the case of the field hockey team, a preseason trip to Argentina fuels hope for its 2009 campaign.

N. Scott Momaday, whose novel "House Made of Dawn" in 1969 earned him the first Pulitzer Prize awarded to a Native American, offers the annual Otis Lecture at Bates College at 7:30 p.m. Monday, Sept. 21, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

As Bates College prepares for the start of its 144th academic year, the college is asking its 470 arriving first-year students to join together in researching and taking action on carbon emissions and climate change.

The Lewiston Fire Department, other local public safety agencies and Bates College will take part in an emergency training exercise at the Underhill Arena at Bates from 7 a.m. to noon Thursday, Aug. 20.

For students and parents new to Bates, here is a link to information from the Dean of Students Office that may be useful as you move through your first year at Bates College.

The Bates Dance Festival and the Bates College Midsummer Lakeside Concert Series end their seasons in high style this weekend, starting Thursday, Aug. 6, with the "Different Voices" dance performance and the folk band Réveillons!in a Lakeside concert.

The goal of the Bates Summer Scholars Program is to build a community of science scholars from among a diverse group of first-years, including first-generation college students and students from groups underrepresented in the sciences.

Though it's regarded as one of the nation's best small liberal arts colleges, Bates College is asking alumni to help it become even better. As part of a general assessment of its science and math programs, Bates is requesting that alumni who majored in those areas take part in a survey about their post-Bates careers.(See related story.)

A longtime favorite at the Bates Dance Festival, the Bebe Miller Company returns to Lewiston with the mysterious, visionary piece "Necessary Beauty" in performances at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, July 31 and Aug. 1, in Bates College's Schaeffer Theatre, 305 College St.

At Bates College, strong bridges between faculty, students and staff go beyond being merely friendly.

A national foundation that supports liberal arts education has awarded nearly $150,000 to Bates and Bowdoin colleges for a collaborative effort to strengthen students' quantitative reasoning skills. The New York-based Teagle Foundation has granted the colleges $148,780 for a three-year project exploring effective ways to teach quantitative reasoning.

A Bates physicist has won a grant from the Research Corporation for Science Advancement to study a phenomenon that hints at a possible basis for the next generation of computers.

A visually explosive, sensual marriage of modern American and Caribbean aesthetics, Tania Isaac Dance brings its newest evening-length work to the Bates Dance Festival in performances at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, July 24 and 25, in Bates College's Schaeffer Theatre, 305 College St.

Would it be the newspaper? Radio or TV? E-mail, Twitter or Facebook? If you had your druthers, what would be your favorite way to learn about arts and entertainment events in the Lewiston-Auburn region? That's what Bates and a number of local organizations would like to know. And we're hoping you'll tell us.

The collaboration of Bates Dance Festival musicians known as the One World Music Ensemble performs this week's installment of the 2009 Bates College Midsummer Lakeside Concert Series at 6 p.m. Thursday, July 30, in the Florence Keigwin Amphitheater at the college's Lake Andrews.

A psychology professor at Bates College has won a National Science Foundation grant to study the effects of interaction between interviewers and eyewitnesses in obtaining testimony.

Maine singer-songwriter Carolyn Currie performs this week's installment of the 2009 Bates College Midsummer Lakeside Concert Series at 6 p.m. Thursday, July 16, in the Florence Keigwin Amphitheater at the college's Lake Andrews.

Maine singer-songwriter Carolyn Currie performs this week's installment of the 2009 Bates College Midsummer Lakeside Concert Series at 6 p.m. Thursday, July 16, in the Florence Keigwin Amphitheater at the college's Lake Andrews.

In its Maine debut, the Battleworks Dance Company appears at the Bates Dance Festival in the world premiere of a collaboration created with composer-percussionist Carl Landa. Performances take place at 8 p.m. Thursday and Saturday, July 16 and 18, in Bates College's Schaeffer Theatre, 305 College St.

Opening the 2009 performance season of the internationally acclaimed Bates Dance Festival, the nuanced, sensual Kate Weare Company offers two Maine premieres at 8 p.m. Saturday, July 11, in Bates College's Schaeffer Theatre, 365 College St.

The Lewiston-Auburn based jazz band Three Point Trio opens the 2009 Bates College Midsummer Lakeside Concert Series at 6 p.m. Thursday, July 9, in the Florence Keigwin Amphitheater at the college's Lake Andrews.

Opening the 2009 performance season of the internationally acclaimed Bates Dance Festival, the nuanced, sensual Kate Weare Company offers two Maine premieres at 8 p.m. Saturday, July 11, in Bates College's Schaeffer Theatre, 365 College St.

Bates College President Elaine Tuttle Hansen has been honored as an outstanding alumna educator by the Mount Holyoke College Alumnae Association.

Daniel Berman '08 has "leaped into the global headlines" with a co-authored article pointing out evidence of election irregularities in Iran.

Bates ranked 57th out of the 310 NCAA Division III schools that scored points, as the final standings of the 2008-09 Learfield Sports Directors' Cup were released by the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA). It is Bates' highest final standing in the rankings since 2006.

The Bates men's varsity eight will be one of five U.S. boats competing in the Temple Challenge Cup, which begins July 1 in Henley-on-Thames, England.

When Bates College environmental coordinator Julie Rosenbach places cartons marked "Clean Sweep" in college dorms each spring, students know just what to do. In those cartons and at the college's ice arena, they drop off useable stuff they won't take along when they leave campus this spring. These goodies will be offered for sale at Clean Sweep, Bates' annual "garage sale."

Opening June 12 at the Bates College Museum of Art are exhibitions of work by two prominent artists with Maine connections, and a third exhibition revealing a compelling response to HIV/AIDS. The exhibition "Medium and Abstraction" explores influences at work in the wood reliefs of the late, beloved Maine artist Bernard Langlais. Rarely seen images by a pioneer in American modern art are displayed in "Landscape Drawings from the Marsden Hartley Memorial Collection."

People like to believe that positive change just happens, Academy Award-winning actress Geena Davis told the Class of 2009 during its commencement ceremony May 31. But with so many aspects of our society, Davis said, "change must be firmly and continuously pushed in order to be effected." She was one of five figures prominent in their fields to receive honorary degrees in the morning ceremony.

Bates College had its best showing ever in the NCAA Division III Women's Rowing Championships, claiming second place in both the team standings and in the Grand Final.

Just five minutes before midnight back in Maine, Ben Stein and Amrit Rupasinghe clinched Bates' first NCAA tennis doubles title, defeating Bowdoin's Jamie Neely and Oscar Pena 6-4, 5-7, 6-4 Sunday night in Claremont, Calif.

"If I wasn't teaching this course, I wouldn't have the time to investigate energy issues on the same level," says Josh Henry, visiting assistant professor of chemistry. "It's a topic that's been important to me since I was a little kid." Henry can pursue his investigations through a new course he designed, "Energy and Sustainability," thanks to Bates' Short Term.

This multimedia presentation features what has become a dynamic tradition at Bates: the annual Mount David Summit, held this year on April 3.

Jiyeon Glass, a Bates College senior from Upper Montclair, N.J., has received a scholarship from the federal government to study Mandarin Chinese this summer in a program in Suzhou, China.

Lisa Genova, a member of the Bates College class of 1992 whose self-published novel about a professor succumbing to early-onset Alzheimer's disease became a best-seller earlier this year, offers a talk and reading at Bates at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 20, in Chase Hall Lounge, 56 Campus Ave.

"The Hysterical Alphabet," an acclaimed multimedia performance piece exploring the "female malady" of hysteria, will be offered at Bates College at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 20, in the Benjamin Mays Center, 95 Russell St. Terri Kapsalis, who scripted the piece and is one of its performers, will give a lecture on its creation at 4:15 p.m. Thursday, May 21, in Room G65, Pettengill Hall. Both events are open to the public at no cost.

This is the third of a series of communications on H1N1 virus (swine flu) outbreak in the U.S. and abroad.

An actress, educator, biomechanics researcher, Maine philanthropist and CNN host will receive honorary degrees and speak at Bates College's 143rd Commencement ceremony on May 31.

Eric G. Wilson, whose 2008 book Against Happiness offers a provocative antidote to America's culture of "happiness at all costs," visits Bates College to give a talk called "The Power of Melancholy" at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 13, in Chase Hall, 56 Campus Ave.

Bates College students spent the last week of April encouraging Native American schoolchildren in Maine to picture themselves attending college in the state. The Bates students visited schoolchildren of the Maliseet, Micmac, Passamaquoddy and Penobscot tribes -- collectively known as Wabanakis.

Described by a Village Voice reviewer as "one of those special singers whose technique and blooming sound always serve sense and emotion," world-renowned soprano Lisa Saffer sings at Bates College at 7:30 p.m. Friday, May 8, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St. Joining Saffer is pianist Anastasia Antonacos, an award-winning musician with a worldwide following.

Lisa Genova, a member of the Bates College class of 1992 whose self-published novel about a professor succumbing to early-onset Alzheimer's disease became a best-seller earlier this year, offers a talk and reading at Bates at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 20, in Chase Hall Lounge, 56 Campus Ave.

Bruce Brown, one of Maine's foremost art collectors and curators, and Véronique Plesch, a Colby College professor and authority on Italian art, will offer separate lectures at Bates College on two Wednesdays in May.

This is the second of what we anticipate will be a series of communications as we all deal with the H1N1 (swine flu) outbreak in the United States and internationally.

"We're in the middle of a revolution," Bates President Elaine Tuttle Hansen said at midday on April 30, "and it's a hard place to see from." But Hansen, other members of the Bates community and three visiting scholars spent that afternoon seeking a better view of the academy's work amidst the tumult, amidst the creation and destruction, wrought by digital media.

This is the first of what we anticipate will be a series of communications as we all deal with the H1N1 (swine flu) outbreak in the United States and internationally.

Led by a jazz pianist whose acclaim belies his youth, the Jonathan Batiste Band performs at Bates College at 7:30 p.m. Friday, May 1, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

Facing an April 25 deadline, Tyler Fish '96 of Ely, Minn., and John Huston of Chicago are making a final dash to the North Pole.

President Elaine Tuttle Hansen has announced the program and speakers for the third annual presidential symposium at Bates College. Titled "The Teaching and Learning Shift: Diversity and Technology in the Twenty-First Century," the event explores ways in which Bates faculty and staff must both expand their knowledge of how students learn and deepen their capacity to engage them.

John Comaroff, an influential social scientist at the University of Chicago, gives a talk titled "Ethnicity, Inc.: The Commercialization of Culture and the Corporatization of Identity" at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 29, in Bates College's Keck Classroom (G52), Pettengill Hall, 4 Andrews Road (Alumni Walk).

Eric G. Wilson, whose 2008 book "Against Happiness" offers a provocative antidote to America's culture of "happiness at all costs," visits Bates College to give a talk called "The Power of Melancholy" at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 13, in Chase Hall, 56 Campus Ave.

Led by a jazz pianist whose acclaim belies his youth, the Jonathan Batiste Band performs at Bates College at 7:30 p.m. Friday, May 1, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

Ken Spalding '73 had reason to reminisce after attending a Bates luncheon on April 3 where supporters of Bates financial aid met students who benefit from their generosity.

Elizabeth Strout '77 has received the 2009 Pulitzer Prize award for fiction for "Olive Kitteridge."

For a budding scholar, developing a public voice is nothing short of a requirement. If you can't present your research, whether to a fellow scholar or to your roommate, "then your work is simply less valuable," says Professor of Biology Will Ambrose.

Anna Levy, a Bates College senior from Portland, has received a scholarship from the federal government to study Mandarin Chinese this summer in a program in Harbin, China.

Alexandre Dauge-Roth, an assistant professor of French at Bates College, is one of three Maine college professors to receive a 2009 Maine Campus Compact award for infusing public service and civic engagement into their teaching.

Pianist Frank Glazer, one of Maine's best-known musicians, performs at Bates College at 8 p.m. Friday, April 10, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

Two Bates seniors have received a 2009 Davis Projects for Peace award for their plan to create an economic stimulus project in an African village. Sam Nagourney of New York and Jacob Nudel of Woodbridge, Conn., will use the $10,000 grant to create an educational animal husbandry program and microcredit operation in Shimbwe, a village in the Mount Kilimanjaro region of Tanzania.

C.N. Le, director of the Asian and Asian American Studies Program at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, offers a lecture titled "Interracial Asian Adoption: Issues and Identity in 21st-Century American Society" at 7 p.m. Monday, April 6, in the Edmund S. Muskie Archives at Bates College, 70 Campus Ave.

Fourteen studio art majors from Bates College show work from their yearlong thesis projects in the annual Senior Exhibition. The show opens with a reception at 6 p.m. Friday, April 10, in the Bates College Museum of Art, 75 Russell St.

The eighth annual Mount David Summit, Bates College's annual celebration of student academic achievement, begins at 2:30 p.m. Friday, April 3, in Perry Atrium, Pettengill Hall, 4 Andrews Road (Alumni Walk).

The Bates College Modern Dance Company performs "Departure Point," its annual spring concert of new works, at 7:30 p.m. Friday, April 3; 5 p.m. Saturday, April 4; 2 p.m. Sunday, April 5; and 7:30 p.m. Monday, April 6, in Schaeffer Theater, 305 College St.

Directed by Maine pianist Thomas Snow, the Bates College Jazz Band performs at 7 p.m. Wednesday, April 1, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

Bates students perform "Closer," Patrick Marber's critically acclaimed dissection of love and lust, at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Wednesday and Thursday, April 4, 8 and 9 in Pettigrew Hall, Gannett Theater, 305 College St.

Students in Chris Bailey's "Computers, Music and the Arts" course perform their class projects on Tuesday, April 7, at 7:30 p.m. in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

Students in the Bates course "Acting and Directing for the Camera" screen their class projects at 4 p.m. Friday, April 3, in Pettigrew Hall, Filene Room (Room 301), 305 College St.

Known for its progressive food-service practices, Bates College has announced a pioneering partnership with the highly regarded nutrition navigation system Guiding Stars. First implemented in 2006 and now used in some 1,400 grocery stores, the science-based Guiding Stars system rates foods with zero to three stars highlighting items according to good, better or best nutritional value, respectively.

If you think of the yearlong Nourishing Body and Mind: Bates Contemplates Food initiative as an arch built from many stones, Mark Winne '72 set the moral keystone in place with an evening lecture in Olin Arts Center on March 30.

With the ultimate aim of teaching contemporary drama in her native Sri Lanka, a Bates College senior has received a 2009 Thomas J. Watson Fellowship to study performance arts in South Africa and Indonesia. Sulochana Dissanayake of Pita Kotte, Sri Lanka, is one of 40 recipients of the 2009 fellowship, a $28,000 award supporting a year of independent research abroad.

In a striking display of altruism and initiative, a Bates College first-year student collected enough yogurt lids to win a national contest. The prize: $100,000 in grants to help create and improve places for children to play for communities in Maine and Maryland.

As part of a two-day visit to Bates, food activist and author Mark Winne '72 gives a talk titled "Food Justice and Good Food — When Shall the Twain Meet?" at 7:30 p.m. Monday, March 30, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

As Bates senior diver Kelsey Lamdin was warming up for the final competition of her collegiate career, her goal was to win an eighth All-America award and become the most decorated diver in Bates history. But she would soon unintentionally prove herself as one of the toughest athletes ever to put on a Bobcat uniform.

A talk by Cornell University professor Per Pinstrup-Andersen takes place at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 24, in the Keck Classroom (G52), Pettengill Hall, 4 Andrews Road (Alumni Walk). Titled "The Global Food Crisis and World Poverty," Pinstrup-Andersen's talk is sponsored by the economics department.

Directed by John Corrie, the Bates College Choir performs Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's "Coronation Mass" and Gabriel Fauré's "Requiem" in concerts at 8 p.m. Friday and Sunday, March 27 and 29, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

The Harward Center for Community Partnerships shows "Neighbor by Neighbor: Mobilizing an Invisible Community in Lewiston, Maine," a documentary about a citizen response to a proposed construction initiative, at 7 p.m. Wedneday, March 25, in Bates College’s Pettengill Hall, Keck Classroom (G52), Alumni Walk.

Former Maine Gov. Angus King Jr. visits Bates College to address the theme "Protecting the Environment: Reflections on the Role of Leadership" at 7 p.m. Wednesday, March 25, at the Edmund S. Muskie Archives, 70 Campus Ave.

Marfa Inofuentes and Rosana Silva Chagas, cultural activists from Bolivia and Brazil, offer lectures at 4:15 p.m. Monday, March 23, in the Benjamin Mays Center, 95 Russell St.

"I can see the world through food," said Kirsten Walter '00, perhaps speaking for all the participants in a wide-ranging Bates discussion of food-related topics on March 16. "I can see all these different issues," she said, "and how to approach them and how to engage people with them." Walter, director of the St. Mary’s Nutrition Center, was one of four Maine-based Bates alumni, each an expert in food issues, who took part in a panel discussion sponsored by the College's "Nourishing Body and Mind: Bates Contemplates Food" initiative.

Junot Díaz, whose novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, offers a lecture at 4:30 p.m. Friday, March 20, in the Benjamin Mays Center at Bates College, 95 Russell St.

Yale University physicist O. Keith Baker, a researcher involved with the advanced particle accelerator called the Large Hadron Collider, visits Bates College to talk about the project at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, March 19, in Room 204 of the Carnegie Science Center, 44 Campus Ave.

Lavina Shankar, associate professor of English at Bates College, delivers a talk titled "Dogs and Their Humans: Bonds and Boundaries," at noon, Thursday, March 19, in Callahan Hall of the Lewistion Public Library, 200 Lisbon St.

Four writers from Equatorial Guinea, the only Spanish-speaking nation in Africa, visit Bates College to give a joint presentation titled "Writing Africa in Spanish: Four Equatorial Guinean Writers Speak of Exiled Dreams" at 4:15 p.m. Tuesday, March 31, in the Edmund S. Muskie Archives, 70 Campus Ave.

First-year Bates students Colin Etnire of San Francisco and his partner Ian Mahmud of Milton, Mass., defeated a team from Yale University to win the novice division of the 2009 Stanford University Parliamentary Debate Tournament.

Borealis Breads founder Jim Amaral and food activist-author Mark Winne are among Bates College alumni featured in two March events relating to the Nourishing Body and Mind: Bates Contemplates Food initiative.

Science historian Sheila Ann Dean, who has studied the correspondence of Charles Darwin extensively, presents the lecture "Charles Darwin: After the Origin and Before the Descent" at Bates College at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 11, in Chase Hall Lounge, 56 Campus Ave.

Welcoming the best collegiate skiers in the nation, Bates College plays host to the 2009 NCAA Skiing Championships March 11-14 at its two home venues: Sunday River in Bethel, Maine (alpine) and Black Mountain in Rumford, Maine (Nordic).

"Red Sox Nation," a course taught by Professor of History Margaret Creighton, uses the Olde Towne Team to discuss issues like race, class and gender in America. The Sox class now has some academic competition from a likely source.

Featuring performers from Bates and from around the region, the fourth annual F.A.B Winter Dance Showcase takes place at 2 p.m. Sunday, March 8, at the Franco-American Heritage Center, 46 Cedar St., Lewiston. This year's showcase features music and dance ranging from contemporary to classical to national genres.

At 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 4, 94-year-old pianist Frank Glazer reprises the program that he played in his Carnegie Hall debut 60 years ago to the day. The concert takes place at Bates College in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

Sarah Manguso, author of the memoir "The Two Kinds of Decay," reads from her prose at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, March 19, in Bates College's Skelton Lounge, Chase Hall, 56 Campus Ave.

On March 12 and 13, two decisive actors in the effort to curtail global climate change offer back-to-back talks at Bates College.

Martin Andrucki, Charles A. Dana Professor of Theater, directs the Bates College theater department production of Alcestis, Euripides' tragedy about a king, doomed to die, who offers up his wife in his place. Performances take place at 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, March 6, 7, 13 and 14, and at 2 p.m. Sundays, March 8 and 15, in Gannett Theater, Pettigrew Hall, 305 College St.

The Bates College Gamelan Orchestra, joined by professional guest artists from Indonesia, performs in concert at 8 p.m. Saturday, March 14, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

Sylvia Hurtado, an expert on student educational outcomes and diversity in higher education, visits Bates College to give a talk titled "Preparing College Students for a Diverse Democracy" at 4:15 p.m. Thursday, March 12, in the Keck Classroom (G52), Pettengill Hall, Alumni Walk.

Frank Warren, creator of an award-winning Web site that has allowed hundreds of thousands of people to anonymously share their secrets through handmade postcards, gives Bates College's annual Bertha May Bell Andrews Lecture at 7 p.m. Monday, March 9, in Lewiston Middle School Auditorium, 75 Central Ave.

The ensemble "Music for a while" offers a program of Renaissance, Baroque and early classical music at Bates College at 8 p.m. Friday, March 6, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

Science historian Sheila Ann Dean, who has studied the correspondence of Charles Darwin extensively, presents the lecture "Charles Darwin: After the Origin and Before the Descent" at Bates College at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 11, in Chase Hall Lounge, 56 Campus Ave.

Cornell University professor Per Pinstrup-Andersen offers a lecture about the impacts of globalization on poverty, food security and nutrition at 8 p.m. Monday, March 2, in Pettengill Hall's Keck Classroom (G52), Alumni Walk. Sponsored by the economics department, the talk is open to the public free of charge.

Fifty Bates College students are among an estimated 10,000 young people from around the United States who will gather in the nation's capital on Feb. 27 for a four-day summit supporting immediate action on climate, energy and economic issues.

The Brooks Quimby Debate Council hosts an American Parliamentary Debate Association Tournament at Bates College, on Friday, Feb. 27, and Saturday, Feb. 28.

Associate Professor of History Joseph Hall Jr., a member of the Bates College faculty since 2002, has received the college's 2009 Kroepsch Award for Excellence in Teaching. In conjunction with this honor, Hall gives a talk titled "How Maine Was Discovered" at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 25, in the Edmund S. Muskie Archives, 70 Campus Ave.

Following the January meeting of the Bates Board of Trustees and the February meeting of the Bates faculty, President Elaine Tuttle Hansen provides an update on Bates' financial picture and reaffirms that the College's actions and priorities will be "strategic and mission-centered."

A Bates junior has made news by turning the conventional model of online auctions upside down. Elliot Moskow of Coral Springs, Fla., is the chairman and CEO of Pricefalls.com. Unlike such auction Web sites as eBay, where bidding drives up the prices of items for sale, the selling prices on Moskow's site start high and decrease at regular intervals.

Bates College President Elaine Tuttle Hansen has announced the appointment of Stephen M. Fuller '82 of Freeport to the College's Board of Trustees.

Bates sophomore Charlotte Green was named Division III Women's National Swimmer of the Week by CollegeSwimming.com, the leading swimming Web site in the country.

Joe Woodhead, who has coached 15 Bates athletes to 39 All-America awards and six NCAA championships in his 25-year tenure as throwing coach at Bates, had the newly refurbished throwing circle inside Merrill Gymnasium named in his honor in a celebration before Saturday's Maine Intercolliegiate Men's Indoor Track and Field Championships.

Katalin Vecsey, a member of the Bates College theater faculty, reads from the writings of Holocaust survivor Judith Magyar Isaacson '65 in a free public event in Callahan Hall at the Lewiston Public Library on Thursday, Feb. 12, at 7 p.m.

Elizabeth Wilcox, a senior from South Glastonbury, Conn., directs the ninth annual Bates College production of Eve Ensler's The Vagina Monologues in performances at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Friday and Saturday, Feb. 5, 6 and 7, in Schaeffer Theater, 305 College St.

Another string of can't-miss musical performances at Bates College begins at 8 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 5, as Germany's Auryn Quartet presents the first in a multiyear series of concerts constituting the complete Beethoven string quartet cycle.

During her keynote address during Bates' Martin Luther King Jr. Day observance, scholar Melissa Harris-Lacewell asked her audience the key question: Now that Obama is president, who in our society is going to play the role of Martin Luther King?

College offices closing at 2.p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 28, due to weather

Music lovers might find themselves wanting to camp out at Bates College this weekend, as three concerts in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall add up to a critical mass of great listening.

"I wouldn't be as excited if I was watching by myself," said Janee White '12 of New York, one of some 300 members of the Bates community gathered to watch the inauguration of President Barack Obama. "But I would still be jumping up and down."

The Somali Diaspora: A Journey Away, a touring exhibition of photographs chronicling the migration of Somali refugees to Maine and other U.S. locations, opens at Bates College with events beginning at 5 p.m. Friday, Jan. 23, in the Olin Arts Center, 75 Russell St.

Jeffrey Miron, senior lecturer and director of undergraduate studies in Harvard University's economics department, presents a lecture titled "Bankruptcy or Bailout: A Libertarian Perspective on the Financial Crisis" at 7 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 22, in Chase Hall Lounge at Bates College, 56 Campus Ave.

Pianists Shiau-Uen Ding and Jacob Rhodebeck perform a program including music by Christopher Bailey, visiting assistant professor of music at Bates College, at 8 p.m. Friday, Jan. 23, in the college's Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.

The Harward Center for Community Partnerships continues its 2008-09 Civic Forum series, "Maine in a Transnational World, " with a presentation on women’s rights through the international perspective of female activists.

A Bates College junior and a recent graduate have been honored for their achievements in neuroscience research at the college.

"Manny's War," a play written by a Bates College theater professor about a Jewish American soldier taken prisoner by the Germans during World War II, opens in a Lincoln County Community Theater production at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Jan. 16, at the Lincoln Theatre, 2 Theater St., Damariscotta.

Melissa Harris-Lacewell, associate professor of politics and African American studies at Princeton, is the keynote speaker for the 2009 Martin Luther King Jr. Day observances at Bates College. Classes at the college are canceled and special programming is scheduled throughout the day with an emphasis on the theme "Inaugurating Change: Where Do We Go From Here?"

A slide show reviews 2008 at Bates