Fall 2025 Online Class Notes

Stories from 2025

Fall 2025 Online Class Notes

Friday, December 19, 2025 12:48 pm

Catch up with friends and family in our online edition of Class Notes, covering the months since our last issue of Bates Magazine. This is a one-time-only online version as we prepare to debut our redesigned magazine in Spring 2026.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2026 schedule

Friday, December 19, 2025 12:43 pm

View the schedule for this year's observance of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day, centered on Sunday and Monday, Jan. 18–19.

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

Friday, December 19, 2025 11:30 am

Associate Professor of Art and Visual Culture Carolina González Valencia's feature-length film How to Clean a House in 10 Easy Steps will be complete by the end of the year.

Photographers’ favorites 2025: Behind the viewfinder

Thursday, December 18, 2025 3:58 pm

Revisit 2025 through the eyes of Bates photographers Phyllis Graber Jensen and Theophil Syslo. Their favorite images of the year capture our vibrant campus community through the seasons.

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.

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

Thursday, December 18, 2025 8:14 am

During the last week of classes for the fall semester, two first-year seminars gathered together for an interactive joint class session.

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

Faculty member Geneva Laurita wins national teaching award

Thursday, December 11, 2025 4:04 pm

Geneva Laurita, associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry, was recently named a Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar — one of only eight to receive this national award — in recognition of her commitment to scholarship and undergraduate research.

Scenes around campus at dawn on Nov. 5, 2025. Pettengill Hall

Picture Story: November 2025 at Bates

Thursday, December 11, 2025 3:49 pm

November at Bates saw a field hockey championship, orchestra and dance performances, seminar-style learning, and more.

Everybody in the pool: The making of Metamorphoses

Thursday, December 4, 2025 5:09 pm

Shortly after Courtney Smith joined Bates in the fall of 2024 as an associate professor of theater, he floated an idea for a production that was both over-the-top ambitious and absolute catnip to his colleague Sally Wood, a visiting lecturer in theater who was trying to decide what play to direct in the fall of 2025.

In the News: December 2025

Thursday, December 4, 2025 5:03 pm

A selection of recent mentions of Bates people in the news, including coverage of a mother-daughter basketball record, an alumna winning big on reality television, alumni new and faculty updates.