UPCOMING EVENTS

• GATHER with the Williams Asian and Asian American Alumni Network on April 6 during WAAAAN Connects, a monthly series of informal, virtual group-chats to see old friends and meet new ones.
• CONNECT and discuss the bestselling novel Trust in the Purple Prose Book Club forum. Hernan Diaz's second novel was the winner of the Kirkus Prize, longlisted for the Booker Prize and named one of the 10 Best Books of the Year by both The New York Times and The Washington Post. You can register now for a virtual talk with the author on Wed. May 17, at 2 p.m. ET.
• CHECK your email for your Alumni Trustee ballot and VOTE by April 2 if you haven't already. Can't find the ballot in your email? Contact hello.alumni@williams.edu. 
• WATCH your inbox for reunion registration coming your way on April 4. If you are a 3 or 8, don't miss this once-every-five-year opportunity to reconnect with your classmates in person.  We hope to see you in Williamstown June 8 -11.

ICYMI

• RECHARGE your routine in six healthy steps from performance/wellness consultant and Alumni Career Commentary contributor Eric Minkwitz ’96.
• LEARN from faculty—the spring 2023 Faculty Lecture Series is in full swing, with professors sharing their research on everything from Russian style to beautiful math. Check out video recordings on Williams’ YouTube channel.

The results are in! 

Alumni in the News

• Eve Biddle ’04 is keeping the art of her late mother, Mary Ann Unger, alive in more than 20 museums, including at the Williams College Museum of Art in 2022, while forging her own path as an artist, says Town and Country magazine.
• “For someone who’s written a novel about class, I came to it surprisingly late,” says Jenny Jackson ’01 in a New York Times interview highlighting her debut novel Pineapple Street.
• Liza Johnson ’92, one of the directors of HBO’s The Last of Us, dissects an episode centered on a teen romance for Yahoo!’s TVLine.
• “Mathematics can be joyful and playful,” says Haydee Lindo ’08 in a profile as a Black History Month 2023 honoree on Mathematically Gifted and Black.
• “Real-life Lorax” Meg Lowman ’76 will receive the Explorers Medal, the highest honor bestowed by the Explorers Club.
• “People can change,” says Judge Marshall Murray Jr. ’75, whose optimism for breaking the cycle of domestic violence comes from an eye-opening moment about his own life.
• Steve Rogers ’79 restores a piece of land to Black ownership by purchasing it, with plans to use it as a Black community space, according to The Daily Northwestern.
• An art history major who gravitated toward theater, Polly Wood-Holland ’75 talks about how she stumbled into scenic design at Williams and has since created sets for Annie, The Wiz, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and more.
  
  

Read the Latest Williams People

News from the college

Commencement, Baccalaureate Speakers Named

An Award for Change

Zaki Named President of Bowdoin

Faculty and Staff in Focus

• Williams has named two Gaius Charles Bolin Fellows: Da’Von Boyd (2023-24), whose research focuses on the political phenomenology of religion in liberation movements, and René Cordero (2024-25), whose focus is on the rise of anti-racist and anti-authoritarian activism in the Dominican Republic during the 1960s and ’70s. Named after Williams’ first Black graduate, Gaius Charles Bolin, Class of 1885, the fellowships create a pathway for scholars of color into careers in higher education as they complete their dissertation work and teach at Williams.
• Economics professors Gregory Casey and Matthew Gibson have won a 2023 Innovative Research in the Economics of Climate Change Award for their research showing that the welfare cost of climate change may be larger than current estimations.
• "Politics shape the questions that scientists ask,” says Laura Martin, assistant professor of environmental studies, in an article for Aeon examining how Cold War history has affected scientists’ view of disturbance ecology—the impact of natural events on plants and animals.
• Nelly Rosario, associate professor of Latino/a studies, is helping to tell the stories of her alma mater’s Black community through her work as a writer for the MIT Black History Project.
• Associate Professor of Psychology Kate Stroud will be Williams’ next John Hyde Teaching Fellow, a three-year appointment supporting excellence in teaching.
• A new Clean Cuisine station at Whitmans' Dining Hall, providing safe options for students with food allergies and restrictions, is featured on MenuTrinfo, with shout-outs to Dining Services staff Temesgen Araya, Charlotte Clark, Nathan Demo, Bridget LaValley, Jake Snow and Allyse Wiencek.

Student Stars

• The College Swimming and Diving Coaches Association of America has named Williams a Scholar All-America Team. Executive Director Samantha Barany congratulated Coach Steven Kuster and noted that the men’s team had the second-highest GPA among all Division III swim and dive teams.
• Will Titus ’23—a volunteer firefighter in Williamstown, along with ten other Williams students—is quoted by The Berkshire Eagle at a town meeting to approve the building of a new fire station.

For more news about the Williams Community, visit Williams Today. 

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