Window on Wellesley

Spring 2015

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Riots of Blooms

Planted in fall 2013 thanks to a gift from former trustee Sidney Knafel, these 30,000 daffodils brought particular cheer this year to a winter-weary campus.More

Crucial Conversations on Race

The American conversation on race has grown more urgent all over the country in the past year—and this has been true at Wellesley, too. President Bottomly has formed a Presidential Commission on Race, Ethnicity, and Equity at Wellesley to study the issues and make policy recommendations.More

Voices from the Home Front

Their words both haunt and teach us: “Before the war, I had two brothers and no money. Now I have more money than I’ve ever had—and no brothers.” “Every home on the street has…More

Living the Oxford Life

Beba Cibralic ’16 reflects on her time abroad in Oxford, including the tutorial system, the drawbacks of cooking for yourself, and Blackwell’s Bookshop.More

Field House of Dreams

The renovated Dorothy Towne Field House includes a new 4,600-square-foot fitness center, hardwood flooring for basketball and volleyball competitions, arena seating for 500, three indoor tennis courts, a spinning room, a climbing wall, a four-lane 200-meter track, a high-jump area, and a new long- and triple-jump pit.More

Being and Nothingness

Iranian sculptor Parviz Tanavoli’s art, which is on display at the Davis Museum until June 7, draws on 3,000-year-old Persian culture.More

Dean of Students Announces Retirement

Dean of Students Debra DeMeis, who spearheaded the Initiative for Diversity and Inclusion at Wellesley, announced that she was retiring from the College on July 1. She will be joining Cambridge Hill Partners, a consulting firm focused on enhancing organizational effectiveness.More

‘Alas, Poor Yorick…’

This skull is just one of myriad props that reside in the basement of Shakespeare House, the society’s Tudor-style headquarters and theater. The group is the College’s oldest continually operating student organization, founded in 1877 by Henry Fowle Durant himself. Hamlet opened this spring on Shakespeare’s birthday, April 23.More

Science From a Kid’s Eye View

Through the Wellesley chapter of the national Science Club for Girls, students share their love of “STEM”—science, technology, engineering, and math—with young girls from all over Boston.More

Promoting a Thriving Jewish Life on Campus

Early in April, the College announced the appointment of Rabbi Audrey Marcus Berkman as rabbi and director of Wellesley College Hillel, beginning in the 2015–16 academic year. Most recently rabbi of the Shir Hadash Reconstructionist…More

First-Year Crowned NCAA Diving Champ

Maura Sticco-Ivins ’18 scored 500.35 in the women’s 3-meter diving finals to earn the third NCAA national championship in Wellesley history at the 2015 NCAA Division III Swimming & Diving Championships at the CISD Natatorium in Shenandoah, Texas.More

Dean of Admission Leaves Post

After enrolling the class of 2019, Dean of Admission and Financial Aid Jennifer Desjarlais stepped down earlier this month to join the executive search firm Witt/Kieffer, where she will focus on higher-education leadership in enrollment…More

The Asian American Experience

Assistant Professor of Psychology Stephen Chen, whose research centers on Asian American families, enabled the College to lauch the Asian American Studies minor last year.More

The Critical Reader

In his 38 years of teaching, Tim Peltason, professor of English and Class of 1949 Professor in Ethics, has helped generations of Wellesley students become astute readers of British and American literature.More

Bells Are Ringing

The first time Margaret Angelini ’85, carillon instructor and director of the Guild of Carillonneurs, heard the bells on campus as a first-year, she ran across campus to find out how she could play them, too.More

Bottomly to Step Down as Wellesley’s 13th President

As this issue went to press in April, H. Kim Bottomly announced that she will step down from the presidency of Wellesley College in July 2016.More

College Road

“Winning the Grammy Award for Best Opera was completely unexpected,” says Aaron Sheehan, a member of Wellesley’s music performance faculty. “The category was full of well-seasoned, former winners, so we definitely were the underdogs. The win is a wonderful and much deserved validation for the Boston Early Music Festival and for my own career path.”More