Campus News & Events

Long Lane Farm will host its annual May Day Festival from noon to 5 p.m. on May 2. The rain date is May 3. The event is open to the community, and will feature food, live music, face painting, crafts and activities, a bake sale, and a small farmer's market. A yoga class will be offered at 2 p.m., and a contra dance held at 3 p.m. Long Lane Farm is located at 281 Long Lane in Middletown at the corner of Long Lane and Wadsworth Street.

WESU 88.1 FM is holding its annual Spring Pledge Drive to support another season of community-driven radio. The station aims to raise $20,000 this spring to close out a capital campaign that started at the beginning of 2014, when the station kicked off its 75th anniversary year. Meeting its pledge goal this spring will allow WESU to complete some much-needed studio updates, including an audio mixing console in the air studio, as well as other technical improvements that will strengthen infrastructure and better accommodate live in-studio performances. These upgrades will also enable WESU to broadcast from remote locations. (more…)

Wesleyan welcomed about 450 admitted students and their families to campus April 15-17 to experience life at Wesleyan first-hand. Visitors had an opportunity to explore all that Wes has to offer through tours of campus, film studies, science facilities, the Center for the Arts, and the theater department; parent-to-parent and student-to-student panels; departmental and center open houses; and a student activities fair, as well as lectures, performances and film screenings. (Photos by Dat Vu '15, Hannah Norman '16, Gabe Rosenberg '16, Dena Matthews and Lauren Rubenstein.) (more…)

#THISISWHY On April 15, faculty and staff met to share their service- and project-based learning stories during an Academic (Technology) Roundtable lunch at the Allbritton Center for the Study of Public Life. A(T)R lunches are designed to promote conversation, cooperation and the sharing of information, ideas and resources among faculty members, librarians, graduate students and staff. Barbara Juhasz, director of service-learning, associate professor of psychology, associate professor of neuroscience and behavior, led the session, providing an overview of service-learning at Wesleyan as well as the variety of ways that service can be used as a pedagogical tool. Other speakers included Rob Rosenthal, director of…

Beginning July 1, Marc Eisner will serve as Dean of the Social Sciences, Ellen Nerenberg as Dean of Arts and Humanities, and Joseph Knee as Dean of the Sciences and Mathematics. Eisner's appointment was announced April 17, while the appointments of Nerenberg and Knee were made at the faculty meeting in November 2014. Eisner will succeed Joyce Jacobsen; Nerenberg will succeed Andrew Curran; and Knee will succeed Ishita Mukerji. (more…)

#THISISWHY Cathy Lechowicz, director of the Center for Community Partnerships, was one of six people honored with a 2015 Community Service Award by the Connecticut Commission on Community Service and the Office of Higher Education. The winners--drawn from college students, campus programs and faculty and staff--were recognized at a ceremony April 14 at the Connecticut State Capitol. This was the 23rd annual awards ceremony conducted by the Connecticut Commission on Community Service. More than 50 students, faculty and staff attended the ceremony. "I am humbled by the recognition and grateful to work with an incredible team of people at Allbritton,…

#THISISWHY Wesleyan students Selin Kutlu ’16, Jacob “Jack” Lashner ’16 and Aaron Young ’16 have been chosen for honorable mention by the Barry Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education Program for the 2015-2016 academic year. The award is presented annually to U.S. sophomores and juniors for excellence in mathematics, science and engineering. This year’s recipients were selected from a field of more than 1,200 students nominated by faculty from more than 420 colleges and universities nationwide. Less than half the students nominated each year are selected as a scholar or for honorable mention. Kutlu, a molecular biology and biochemistry and…

The following statement was sent April 13 to the campus community from Michael Whaley, vice president for student affairs. To the Wesleyan Community: Many of you have asked for an update on the aftermath of the drug poisoning incident of Feb. 22. Two of the five students arrested have been permanently dismissed from the university; the judicial process for the others, who are currently suspended, is ongoing. Wesleyan is committed to providing a learning environment in which all students can thrive. The use of illicit drugs is clearly an unacceptable detriment to that environment, and our policies in this regard…

This month, Wesleyan was one of 12 colleges and universities across the country selected to take part in a new College Food Allergy pilot program being carried out by Food Allergy Research & Education (FARE). The program strives to help colleges and universities provide a safer experience for students with food allergies and offers schools "gold-standard recommendations and evidence-based resources needed to effectively manage food allergy, a potentially life-threatening disease." Associate Dean of Student Academic Resources Laura Patey has been instrumental in bringing this program to Wesleyan, and she answered questions about it. (more…)

#THISISWHY Approximately 45 student from the Macdonough School in Middletown came to Wesleyan for recess April 2. It was the fifth year in a row that an area school has been invited to Wesleyan's Bacon Field House for a noontime recess in eary April. Student-athletes from many Wesleyan athletic teams have spent significant amounts of time at Macdonough over the last five years to act as role models and speak to the students there on a variety of topics, such as sportsmanship. (more…)

This summer, Ruth Weissman will be stepping down as provost and vice president for academic affairs and returning to her role as the Walter A. Crowell University Professor of the Social Sciences. Joyce Jacobsen, the Andrews Professor of Economics, dean of the Social Sciences and Director of Global Initiatives, has accepted a one-year appointment as interim provost and vice president for academic affairs. "Ruth's efforts over the past two years in support of the faculty, in overseeing the curriculum, and in exercising administrative leadership have been extraordinary," said Wesleyan President Michael Roth in an all-campus e-mail. "Wesleyan has been fortunate…

Associate Professor of History Erik Grimmer-Solem’s research on a celebrated German general, known as an “anti-Nazi,” is continuing to have an impact on the ground in Germany today. Over the past year, Grimmer-Solem’s findings have ignited a public debate in the country over General Hans von Sponeck’s place in history—a debate which has now turned to the matter of a commemorative stone honoring him. Since World War II, von Sponeck had been celebrated in Germany with an Air Force base, city streets and other monuments named after him. All this has changed since Grimmer-Solem’s research shed new light on the…

Long Lane Farm to Host Annual May Day Festival

WESU Holding Spring Pledge Drive

WesFest Gives Admitted Students, Families a Taste of Campus Life

Faculty, Staff Share Service- and Project-Based Learning Stories

Wesleyan Announces Appointment of New Deans

Lechowicz Honored with State Community Service Award

3 Students Receive Goldwater Honorable Mentions

New Task Force to Look at Illegal Drugs

Wesleyan Joins Pilot Program to Protect Students with Food Allergies

Student-Athletes, Area School Children Play During Recess at Wesleyan

Weissman to Step Down As Provost, VP; Jacobsen to Serve as Interim

Grimmer-Solem’s Research Continues to Have Impact on the Ground in Germany