Welcome

Bates College is a national leader in delivering an exceptional liberal arts education to a diverse and talented community of students. Our faculty are consequential and accomplished scholars and artists producing transformative educational experiences that help shape the world. A Bates education balances building broad knowledge across distinct modes of inquiry with a depth of understanding within a specific field of study.

Our goal is to create an environment that fosters the collaborative and respectful development of critical and independent thinking and learning – skills necessary for meaningful contributions to ongoing and sustainable development of humanity. These web pages offer a portal to Bates’ academic world.

Scholarship in Action

Dec 19, 2025

New funding pushes Carolina González Valencia’s film toward the finish line

Featuring: Carolina González Valencia

Dec 18, 2025

Photographers’ favorites 2025: Behind the viewfinder

Featuring: Heidi L. Taylor

Two first-year seminar classes join together for a dynamic, interdisciplinary final class session During the last week of courses for the fall semester, two instructors, two classes, and one rabbit gathered together for an interdisciplinary, interactive first-year seminar class session. It was easy to tell who was from which course. Students from “Beyond the Rainbow: Exploring the Language (and the Science, Art, and Culture) of Color” had all walked in sporting colorful hats. Joining them in a classroom in Dana Hall were students from “Sex in the Brain: The Neuroscience of Sex, Gender, and Hormones.” While it is typical for students to grow close in these small — 16 students maximum — seminars, this merging of the courses for a class session was a new idea, meant to create new connections between both the subjects and students as the semester came to a close. Lindsey Hamilton ’05, director of the Center for Inclusive Teaching and Learning, and Wells Castonguay, the center’s assistant director, devised the plan. Castonguay was teaching “Beyond the Rainbow” and Hamilton “Sex in the Brain.” Throughout the semester, each professor had heard students’ ongoing curiosity about the other’s course and saw an opportunity for the students to learn from each other.

Dec 18, 2025

Two instructors, 30 first-year students, and a bunny walk into a classroom: Interdisciplinary learning abounds

Featuring: Wells Castonguay Lindsey R. Hamilton Ph.D.

They are jumping for joy. Women’s varsity rowing teammates Oli Seline ’24 (left) of Delaware, Ohio, and Olivia Dekker ’24 of Bethesda, Md., high five it at the conclusion of their last-ever Bates lab in Bonney 360. The teammates are students in Assistant Professor of Biochemistry Geneva Laurita’s Short Term course, “Chemistry and the Arts.” Seline is a biochemistry major with a GEC in “Visible Ideas,” while Dekker is a biochemistry major with a minor in art and visual culture. The course explores the connection between chemistry and various topics in the arts and arts-related fields. The students learn about the chemistry behind these topics, exploring the literature behind various artistic practices, and applying hands-on techniques in the laboratory involved in various art processes This year, Laurita asked students to focus on the origins of color, different crafts, print making, jewelry making, dyeing, and art conservation. Laurita is the recipient of a major National Science Foundation grant of $581,984. The NSF CAREER award, considered to be one of the foundation’s most prestigious awards for faculty members who are just beginning their teaching and research careers, is based on both her scientific research in solid state materials and how she brings undergraduates into that vital area of scientific exploration. 3:18 What the particular lab was about...the lab handout. Kate Baumler, intern for Geneva’s NSF grant, wearing, black shirt Benji Richards, ’27, wearing tan shirt Finian Gunny ’27, gray pullover and blond hair Charlotte Maffie ’25 with pink tie dyed and hair in bun Sister Alice Maffie ’27 in t-shirt and pony tail Nina Greeley ’24 with hair in bun and pink t-shirt Riley Lund ’26 in gray sweatshirt Jahan Baker-Wainwright ’25 in green golf Rohini Kandasamy ’27 in dark tan Life is cool t-shirt and low bun Chemistry and the Arts S28, the origin of different crafts, print making, jewelry making, dyeing and art soncserv

Dec 11, 2025

Faculty member Geneva Laurita wins national teaching award

Featuring: Geneva Laurita

Dec 4, 2025

Everybody in the pool: The making of Metamorphoses

Featuring: Courtney P. Smith Sally M. Wood

Dec 4, 2025

In the News: December 2025

Featuring: Francesco G. Duina Matt Coyne Darby K. Ray Kamal A. Kariem

National recognition for Bates’ ‘exemplary’…

Bates has once again been recognized by the American Council on Education and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching for its deep level of commitment to community engagement, an honor the college first achieved in 2008 and again in 2015. Recently Bates was also lauded by ACE and Carnegie for its success in providing paths for graduates to earn competitive wages.

Mohammed M. Obaid Shwani ’24 selected as Schwarzman Scholar

Mohammed M. Obaid Shwani ’24 has been a world traveler and an award winner since he was a teenager. In 2016, he first came to the United States after being named an Iraqi Young Leader through a State Department program, then traveled to Bosnia to attend United World College on a scholarship before landing in Maine for college.

Dean of the Faculty