Olivia DrakeSeptember 26, 20133min
The Friends of the Davison Art Center is hosting its first-ever online auction featuring many pieces of fine art including works by internationally-exhibiting photographers, Wesleyan faculty, alumni and friends. The online auction, supported  by Bidding for Good, runs for three weeks, from Oct. 15 through Nov. 9 and will be accessed at http://fdac.wesleyan.edu. As part of Wesleyan’s Homecoming/Family Weekend the Friends will also host a silent auction and free champagne reception at the Alsop House from 3 to 6 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 2. "We welcome the public to come get an up-close look at the pieces in the online auction…

Olivia DrakeSeptember 26, 20132min
The Wesleyan community celebrated the eat-local movement on Eat Local Challenge Day Sept. 24. Wesleyan's Dining Services and several local vendors provided meals made entirely from local ingredients harvested within 150 miles of the university. The menu included New England clam chowder, fried haddock and fresh cut french fries, whole spit roast pig with cranberry chutney, New England clam bake with steamer clams, corn and potatoes, vegan seitan hash, salad made from Long Lane Farm produce, wood fired pizza, blueberry and strawberry crisp, ice cream, apple cider, coffee and soda. Vendors included Pierce Brothers Coffee Roasters from Greenfield, Mass.; Sid…

Kate CarlisleSeptember 16, 20135min
Thanks to a matching grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and substantial gifts from generous supporters, Wesleyan’s Center for the Humanities has secured $6 million in endowment as it celebrates 54 years of scholarship. The $2 million Mellon grant was announced in October 2011 (see story here); Wesleyan succeeded in raising the $4 million required for the match in two years, less than half the time required by Mellon when the grant challenge began in 2011. Fifteen Wesleyan alumni, parents and friends supplied leadership gifts to win the matching funds. “At a time when one hears so much rhetoric…

Lauren RubensteinSeptember 16, 20133min
Clara Wilkins, assistant professor of psychology, is interested in research showing that whites are increasingly likely to see themselves as victims of racial discrimination, despite persistent gaps in income and other forms of inequality between blacks and whites in the U.S. Perceiving bias against whites is even more pervasive in white young adults than in the population as a whole, with 58 percent of whites aged 18-24 agreeing that, “discrimination against whites has become as big a problem as discrimination against blacks and other minorities.” In a new study, Wilkins and Joseph Wellman, postdoctoral fellow in psychology, investigated how whites react…

Kate CarlisleSeptember 16, 20132min
Wesleyan’s friends and neighbors in the community are invited (along with students, staff and faculty) to enjoy Middletown Day on campus Sept. 21. A menu of family activities is planned for the afternoon, leading up to the first night football game in the NESCAC, as the Cardinals face the Tufts University Jumbos in the season’s first contest. From 2:30 until about 4:45 p.m., Freeman Athletic Center will be the scene of games, live music, poster-making and balloon art, a bouncehouse for small visitors and various farmers’ market vendors. Free popcorn and beverages will be offered as well. At afternoon’s end,…

Olivia DrakeSeptember 16, 20132min
From Sept. 18-26, Wesleyan's Jewish community will observe the holiday of Sukkot by living, studying, holding classes, meditating, eating and socializing in a structure made completely of bamboo and steel rods. On Sept. 9-11, four members of Wesleyan's Physical Plant staff worked full days to assemble the massive temporary structure on the lawn of Olin Library. (more…)

Lauren RubensteinSeptember 16, 20132min
There are nearly 3 million post-9/11 veterans in the U.S., many wishing to attend college and pursue bachelor’s degrees. Unfortunately, liberal arts colleges and universities often struggle to recruit these veterans, and retention and graduation rates are low. In an effort to dramatically increase the number of veterans it enrolls, Wesleyan is entering into a new partnership with The Posse Foundation, Inc. Since 1989, The Posse Foundation has helped colleges and universities to recruit exceptional public high school students who may be overlooked by traditional college selection processes. Through its newest initiative, the Veterans Posse Program, the foundation identifies talented…

Olivia DrakeSeptember 16, 20131min
Ted Shaw '76 will speak on “Looking Backwards; Looking Forward: The Persistence of Race in 21st Century American Life” during Wesleyan's annual Constitution Day celebration Sept. 17. Shaw is Professor of Professional Practice at Columbia University Law School and counsel at the international firm of Fulbright and Jaworski. He served as director-counsel and president of the NAACP’s Legal Defense and Educational Fund from 2004 through 2008 and as a Wesleyan Trustee for 15 years. Shaw's talk begins at 7:30 p.m. in Olin Library's Smith Reading Room. Wesleyan’s Constitution Day event is part of a nationwide observance the U.S. Department of Education has…

Kate CarlisleSeptember 16, 20134min
The smack of the football in a receiver’s hands, the percussive thud of runners’ feet on the straightaway, the roar of spectators as the tape is broken or the ball goes through the uprights: these things don’t change. Other things do. Wesleyan athletes returning to campus this month were greeted by a sparkling new artificial turf field and track, glistening almost in Technicolor behind Freeman Athletic Center. The $1.6-million facility, funded by more than 100 generous supporters, will be home not just to track meets and everyday runners, but will serve as a practice surface for the football and other…

Olivia DrakeSeptember 16, 20132min
Aharon Barak, former president of the Israeli Supreme Court Interdisciplinary Center, in Herzliya, Israel will deliver the 23rd annual Hugo L. Black Lecture on Freedom of Expression at 8 p.m. Oct. 8 in Memorial Chapel. His talk is titled, “Human Dignity and Free Speech." Barak served as a justice on the Supreme Court of Israel from 1978 to 1995 and as president of the Court from 1995 to 2006. Earlier, he was Attorney General of the State of Israel and Dean of the Law Faculty at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In 1978, Barak traveled to the United States as…