Sustainability in the News

News & Updates

The Annual Harvest Dinner held in Commons, followed by horse rides around campus, a dessert part and the Annual Trashion Show in the Gray Athletic Building. Where friends, fashion, fun, and sustainability all collide. Welcome to the Bates Trashion Show 2025, held in the Gray Athletic Building on Wednesday, Nov. 19. All participants were winners! Singled out for recognition were, in first place, seniors Annie Robinson and Grace Thomas (the model), who designed the dress together; Professor of French and Francophone studies Kirk Read in second place; and in third place, a team of students in Read’s first-year seminar “Family Stories.”

December 4, 2025

Sew sustainable: Student, faculty designers stun at annual Tr…

At the 20th annual Trashion Show, students and faculty modeled 16 elaborate runway designs crafted from trash to draw awareness to waste around campus.

Leaving out of Northeast Harbor on Mount Desert Island/ Acadia National Park, the morning cruise with Sea Princess Cruises featured a historic and nature commentary by National Park Ranger Tess Black ’20, as the boat traveled to and from Little Cranberry Island, there passengers docked for 45 minutes to visit the Island museum and other sites before returning to Northeast Harbor. Explore the connections between people and the sea on a ranger-led boat tour of Great Harbor and Somes Sound. Visit a 200-year-old lobster fishing village on Little Cranberry Island and enjoy the Islesford Historical Museum (open seasonally).

September 25, 2025

On a purposeful path: Park ranger Tess Black ’20 builds a car…

As a seasonal park ranger, Tess Black ’20 educates park visitors on the beauty and importance of the National Park System.

September 4, 2025

Pulling mussels: Bates researchers spend the summer studying …

A research team from Bates spent the summer investigating Maine’s disappearing shellfish, the blue mussel.

Justin Moriarty, technical Director for Theater and Dance, directs students Natalia Jacobs '26 of Amherst, Mass., (in downstairs shop) and Gideon Berrie '26 of New York City (on the Schaeffer Theatre stage) in building and painting sets in the shop and on the stage of Schaeffer Theater with the assistance of Aidan McDowell on February 14, 2023.

June 18, 2025

2025 Green Innovation Grants support sustainability projects …

The grants award up to $10,000 to fund creative sustainability solutions proposed by Bates students, faculty, and staff.

When the Bates student EcoReps encounter a sustainability problem that needs solving, they don’t just sit around and debate solutions — they envision and then execute them. In two of their most recent successes, the students helped to secure funding to solve an unexpected problem with the existing electric vehicle chargers on campus and helped purchase a slew of new EVs for campus use. “It's really cool that as students, I feel like we have a voice,” says Martin Carriere ’25, an EcoRep from Davis, Calif. “I always feel like our ideas are heard. We're positioned to have bolder ideas and be able to bring those to the table.” Bates is known for its impressive achievements in sustainability, but the existential threat of climate change gives expanding the work great urgency. Carriere, a double major in politics and environmental studies, and fellow EcoRep Cassidy Meyer ’25, an environmental studies major from Carbondale, Co., are both set to graduate this month — and both are working on sustainability solutions right until the end. They even had a meeting on local renewable energy scheduled with college leaders during their last week of classes, amid the haze of studying for finals and saying goodbyes. The two pose for a portrait with the F-150 EV truck outside of Cutten Maintenance Center. And in one photograph, they pose with Paint Shop supervisor Tom Tom Espeaignnette.

December 13, 2024

Wear garnet, go green: Students and Facility Services team up…

“It’s really cool that as students, I feel like we have a voice,” says Martin Carriere ’25, a student EcoRep from Davis, Calif. “I always feel like our ideas are heard.

Bates people on stage in costumes made from recycled materials

November 22, 2024

Traditional garments, elegant gowns, and out-of-this-world ou…

At the Bates Trashion Show, one person’s trash is not just another’s treasure, but perhaps even another’s trend.

Associate Professor of Biology Larissa Williams teaches students in Bio s39f a lesson on “uses of Genetic analysis to understand the population of dynamics of crabs in Maine.” They met in Bonney 370 laboratory and received instruction on how to use a pipette, including closing their eyes in preparing to click the instrument. The course’s instructor is Jesse Minor ’00, a lecturer in biology.

August 13, 2024

Bates biology professor and three young graduates publish &#8…

New research from Bates reveals that daily exposure to triphenyl phosphate, a chemical used in many fire retardants as well as nail polish, harms developing zebrafish and, perhaps, humans.

June 21, 2024

When it rains, it pours: Bates’ Mike Retelle coauthors …

Ask Professor Emeritus of Geology Mike Retelle about his contribution to a new paper in Nature, and he’ll point to the pipeline of talented Bates students who’ve supported the Arctic research over the last two decades.

See more at bates.edu/news

Everybody in the pool: The making of Metamorphoses

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.