Dan Shea, professor of government, wrote an opinion piece in the Portland Press Herald titled “Can average citizens rise to the occasion in response to Mueller’s findings?” The Jan. 18 piece questions if average citizens are still able to see their role as fundamental in a democracy, or if they’re swayed by partisan identification. “Can we break...
The FiveThirtyEight data journalism site recently featured an interactive personality test developed by Associate Professor of Psychology Christopher Soto and collaborator Oliver John. The test, known as the BFI-2, measures the Big Five personality traits: extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, negative emotionality, and open-mindedness. The FiveThirtyEight feature shows how your personality compares with the average American adult. You can take the test and see...
“Bugs in our Backyard,” a citizen science project by Associate Professor of Biology Dave Angelini and Biology Research Technician Josh Steele, was named one of the Top 18 projects for 2018 on the CitSci aggregator site SciStarter. The project encourages K-12 students to take surveys of bugs in their backyards, schoolyards, and neighborhoods; the surveys are...
Damon Mayrl, assistant professor of sociology, was awarded a Project Grant for Researchers grant from the Louisville Institute for his project titled “A Changing Wall: Local Religious Leaders and Church-State Interaction in a New Era.” Mayrl and his co-researchers plan to interview 150 religious leaders across the country “to document the changing landscape of church-state relations...
The article “Science and Culture: Journal entries, maps, and photos help ecologists reconstruct ecosystems of the past” recently posted by PNAS, includes the work of Loren McClenachan, the Elizabeth and Lee Ainslie Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies. The article mentions her 2017 study, in which “her team used 18th-century British nautical charts to estimate changes...
Garry Mitchell, deemed “an excellent painter,” was included in a Portland Press Herald art review about Maine’s 2018 arts scene. Mitchell, associate professor of art, topped the list for what reviewer Daniel Kany called “his elegant and poignant show at Speedwell Projects.” The show “was a lesson in how to begin to take on political subjects,”...
An article by Aaron Hanlon, associate professor of English, was published in the Chronicle of Higher Education Dec. 7. Titled “Lies About the Humanities—and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them,” Hanlon outlines four categories of what he says are “bad theories about the humanities,” including “the humanities are ‘noncognitive’ and humanities professors push left-wing ideas on students.”...
Luis Millones, the Charles A. Dana Professor of Spanish, was the lead in a Washington Post story about personalized learning at King Middle School in Portland, Maine. Millones, an immigrant from Peru, was interviewed by seventh-grade girls for a project on immigrant stories. What did he miss about his country, the girls asked. “I miss the sound of...
Walter Hatch, associate professor of government, penned an op-ed for Crosscut titled “Why conservative think tanks thrive in liberal WA.” The Dec. 20 piece looks at the history and influence of conservative think tanks in the progressive state of Washington. Hatch focuses on three think tanks: Washington Policy Center, the Discovery Institute; and Freedom Foundation, noting that “conservative organizations...
Shreya Chakdar, visiting assistant professor in physics and astronomy, has been named a KITP Scholar by the University of California Santa Barbara. KITP, the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics, targets its scholar’s program specifically for physics professors at primarily undergraduate institutions and invites them to make three two-week visits to the institute over three years. Chakdar,...
In a Dec. 14 New York Times op-ed titled “Is Environmentalism Just for Rich People?” Neil Gross, Charles A. Dana Professor of Sociology, discusses the issue of whether or not environmentalism is a “boutique issue, a cause only the well-off can afford to worry about.” Gross compares the situation with the recent Yellow Vest protests in France and the...
Tim Hubbard, associate professor of economics, and students in his auctions class have partnered with Friends of Waterville Public Schools to create an online auction to raise funds to help cover the costs of lunches for local students. In a WABI-TV news story about the auction, Hubbard said, “My students are engaged in every step of...
The Nov. 29 “Match Book” column in the New York Times, titled “Women and Maine,” includes many writers associated with Colby, such as Professor of English Debra Spark and her novel Unknown Caller, described as having “a sharply hooked premise and well-conceived structure.” Other Colby-affiliated writers in the column include Monica Wood, who taught multiple times as a sabbatical replacement; speakers...
Cheryl Townsend Gilkes, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Professor of Sociology and African-American Studies, was quoted in a Religion News Service story about megapastor Jamal Bryant and his move from Baltimore to a church in Lithonia, Ga., which has lost two pastors since 2017. Bryant’s transition demonstrates the problem of continuity in churches with nationally significant pastors,...
Tanya Sheehan, the William R. Kenan Jr. Associate Professor of Art, has published an article in the journal Panorama on Thomas Le Clear’s High, Jack, Game. This genre painting depicts two Irish newspaper boys engrossed in a card game called Seven Up as an African-American whitewasher dressed in a mismatched military uniform observes their play. Sheehan’s article follows the...
Colby was mentioned in a feature story titled “Getting college students to ask what makes life worth living” in Christian Century magazine Nov. 1. The story looks at a course titled “Life Worth Living,” developed by Yale Divinity School theologian Miroslav Volf and taught at Colby as a Jan Plan course. Kurt Nelson, Colby’s dean of religious...
The new Bill & Joan Alfond Main Street Commons was awarded a Smart Growth Award from GrowSmart Maine. The downtown mixed-use development project was named “outstanding project,” the Morning Sentinel reported. “Smart growth is a common-sense concept that helps communities welcome growth while maintaining existing historic and natural assets,” the Sentinel wrote. In addition to the 102,000-square-foot Alfond Commons, the...
An Oct. 27 New York Times op-ed titled “Science Confirms It: People Are Not Pets” cites a 2007 study by Thane Pittman, Professor of Psychology, Emeritus. The piece takes a fresh look at social psychology research concerning intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation and notes that “the conclusions that rewards frequently kill both interest and excellence have, if anything, grown...
The Guardian quoted Laura Seay, assistant professor of government, in their Oct. 30 story “Backlash over Lena Dunham script for Syrian refugee film.” Dunham has “suffered a social media backlash after it emerged she has been commissioned by Steven Spielberg and JJ Abrams to write the script for a film about a Syrian refugee who was stranded at sea,” the Guardian reports....
Associate Professor of English Adrian Blevins has had more poems published. Her most recent placement is in Waxwing, which published “Exile Status” and “Renegade Status” in its fall 2018 edition. Translations of these poems, and other new work by Blevins, were performed by Kathryn Butler ’17, Sara Gibbons ’15, and Delaney McDonough ’13 as a dance choreographed Annie Kloppenberg, associate...
