Colby reached out to victims of Hurricane Katrina, opening its doors to displaced students, raising money, and considering possibilities for a service Jan Plan. In the two weeks following the storm, Colby admitted students displaced from Tulane and Loyola. Meanwhile the Goldfarb Center for Public Affairs and Civic Engagement set up a panel discussion including a former New Orleans director of city planning and launched a fund-raising effort on campus. Working with
Lewis Krinsky '65, the center identified The Greater New Orleans Recovery Corps of Teach for America to receive funds raised on campus, helping K-12 students through an organization with which the College has a long history and close ties. In the early days of the crisis Alumni Relations contacted more than 100 alumni and parents in the affected states and facilitated connections between several displaced citizens and alumni who were eager to help them. For Colby's statement on Katrina and links to Katrina-related developments on Mayflower Hill, see
www.colby.edu/president. Read more about the Goldfarb Center at
www.colby.edu/academics_cs/goldfarb.
Alumni and parents are welcomed back to the campus for Family Homecoming Weekend, Oct 28-30, 2005. Special events, apart from a football game with Bates College, include a performance by mentalist Max Maven, called "the master mindreader" by Television's Entertainment Tonight, and a Duo Guitar performance by Carl Dimow and Jim Lyden. Also on the schedule are a concert by student a cappella groups, field hockey and soccer games, President Bro Adams's State of the College Conversation, and the annual C Club awards banquet. Visit www.colby.edu/alumni/family_homecoming. for a full schedule or to register online.
Trustee David Pulver '63, along with his wife, Carol, and daughter Stephanie Pulver '93, have made the naming gift for a major expansion and thorough overhaul of Cotter Union. Pulver, who's had an eye on campus life for decades as a member of the Board of Trustee's Student Affairs Committee, said that when he considered extracurricular life, his question was, "Where do kids kind of hang?" He expects the Pulver Pavilion to take over for "The Street" in Miller Library as Colby's place to see and be seen. Groundbreaking for the 7,000-square-foot Pulver Pavilion, including a café, lounge area, and new-and-improved Spa, is slated for summer 2006.
During a visit to India this summer, Professor Nikky-Guninder Singh, chair of Colby's religious studies department, had two unforgettable encounters—a private meeting with India's prime minister and dinner with one of her students' families. Nikky met with Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh to present her translation of Sikh sacred verses and discuss the plight of Sikh women. At the urging of Neha Sud '05, she contacted Neha's mother, Anita Sud, who whisked her off for a special meal in the Suds' home and talked late into the evening. "The affection and the warmth that her mom gave me—I will never forget it," Nikky said.
From the early decades of the 19th century, through the struggles of the Civil War, and as it moved from the riverbank up onto Mayflower Hill, Colby has always carried high aspirations. Over the years it has relied on generations of alumni and friends as it grew in stature and in reach. Now Colby is poised to build on its impressive legacy, to push itself another notch higher, and to make sure that a Colby education is accessible to the best students regardless of their financial means. October 21-23 in Waterville, Colby will kick off its most ambitious capital campaign yet to help realize those goals. Campaign kickoff events also are planned in Boston on January 20 and in New York on January 26. Kickoff event details are online at www.colby.edu/campaign/watervillekickoff. Invitations were mailed to alumni last week, and online registration is available at www.colby.edu/events/reg/kickoff2005.
Two on-campus events this month draw on the expertise of Colby alumni. On September 19 Caroline Borge '99 of ABC News Primetime Live will address the complex process of making television documentaries. She will focus on ABC's controversial 2003 documentary Jesus, Mary, and Da Vinci, for which she was ABC's researcher. On September 29 David Systrom M.D. '76, a Harvard and Mass General pulmonary and critical care physician, will speak about his experience treating tsunami victims from Banda Aceh on the Project Hope Mercy hospital ship.
When Kristin Ralff Douglas '87 heard about Colby's plans to have the new Schair-Swenson-Watson Alumni Center's certified as a LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) building, she got excited. "I was actually the first managing director of the U.S. Green Building Council and helped develop and launch LEED, so you can imagine how pleased I would be that my alma mater was actually using it!" she wrote. The new alumni center will be dedicated at 3 p.m. on October 22, and tours of the building and it's state-of-the-art environmental initiatives, including geothermal heating, will be offered.
In the first week of the fall athletic season, volleyballer Cait Cleaver '06, an outside hitter, was named NESCAC's Volleyball Player of the Week. That honor came after the volleyball team beat Gordon, Bowdoin, USM, and Univerity of Maine Farmington in the Colby Invitational over the weekend. Cait has 46 kills in the four games. It's the third year in a row that Colby has won its own invitational, having won each of its last 12 matches in the tourney 3-0. Lots more sports news, including a profile of the new women's head basketball coach Lori Gear McBride, is online at www.colby.edu/athletics.
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