Notes from the Alumnae and Students of Color Conference
If there was one thing that Mount Holyoke students took away from November’s Alumnae and Students of Color Conference, it was that our older sisters went through a great deal for us to enjoy the safe space we have today.
The first-of-its-kind conference brought together a diverse group of nearly 150 alumnae and students. Keynote speakers included Ninotchka Rosca, founder of GABRIELA, the women’s-rights organization of the Philippines; and Debra Martin Chase ’77 (above), Emmy nominated motion picture and television producer.
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Mini-reunions are hot.
From on-campus visits to Las Vegas blowouts, classmates are gathering in ever more diverse locations and vowing to continue the tradition the following year. Organizers know that in between official reunion years, mini-reunions are a great way to stay connected with classmates who are dispersed geographically and professionally but remain united emotionally.
Women from the 1940s and 1950s are most active in organizing mini-reunions, says Joni Haas Zubi, associate director of classes and reunions. Their generally flexible schedules allow them to meet on campus, midweek, and during the school year to drop in on classes with current students, considered a particular pleasure. Overnight stays are usually spent at Willits-Hallowell Center, and meals are scheduled to include talks by faculty or staff members.
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The art of procrastination is as old as Mount Holyoke. In the early years, students listened to the radio or chatted with their neighbors instead of starting a paper. Today we also have all the dangers of procrastination that come with the World Wide Web. Among the most lethal is YouTube.
A popular Web site that allows users to share videos for free, YouTube engages viewers with activism, tutorials, television shows, political debates, music, and home videos. You simply type a few keywords into the search engine and wait for it to retrieve relevant videos.
The site includes both commercial productions, like clips from the television show “So You Think You Can Dance,” and independent films and home videos. You can listen to music for free online before buying it. You can also find entire episodes of television shows on YouTube.
For students, it’s a great way to keep track of what’s going on outside the Mount Holyoke academic bubble as well as an inexpensive way to access different forms of entertainment. It’s common to find a group of students clustered around a computer taking turns showing their friends their latest YouTube finds.
YouTube has MHC-specific applications, as well. For example, if you search “Mount Holyoke College” on YouTube, you will find videos of the Laurel Parade from different years, and a clip of the trees near Lower Lake in full bloom. YouTube is also a great way to learn something practical, such as honing your skills in tai chi or learning to play a musical instrument. And there’s even a program that helps nonprofits spread word of their organizations’ goals and activities.
As we push into this age of new media, Web sites like YouTube are becoming more relevant—and prevalent—in day-to-day life. YouTube’s popularity and use have skyrocketed since my first year at MHC. It makes me wonder what tools of procrastination will be available to the class of 2020.—Anindita Dasgupta ’08
Innovation in its many guises ran through the European alumnae symposium in Geneva this past fall.
Organized by Christine Gora Bruno ’98, Carolyn Geisler Hornfeld ’63, Bernice Timm Dorig ’63, Jessica Zerges ’03, and Alix Bishko ’00, with the input of Alumnae Association President Mary Graham Davis ’65, it began with our hotel—a high-tech high-rise where glass elevators whisked us up and down to our rooms and offered a view of trains gliding noiselessly into the Geneva train station.
The official city welcome to attendees came from Monica Bonfanti, Geneva’s chief of police, whose department the next day guided a mass demonstration for Burma through the city’s streets.
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Club Members Master the Arts of Fabric and Needle
Needleworkers adept at or interested in learning the arts and crafts of fabric and thread are getting together in several MHC clubs in Massachusetts and Connecticut.
Whether their interest is sewing a Raggedy Ann doll for their grandchildren, piecing together a quilt for their own bed, or knitting a sweater to block winter’s rage, alumnae are needleworking with a passion—and having a good time doing it together.
Every month, up to fifteen members of the quilting group of the Mount Holyoke Club of Franklin County, Massachusetts, meet to plan, design, and piece together quilts, pillows, cushions, and dolls. Overseeing their work is Patricia Spees FP’03 (right), club copresident, longtime quilter, and director of MHC’s costume shop.
The women meet at a local church to savor its monthly pancake breakfast, then get to work on their projects. They also make sewing kits to give to firsties who choose for their Second Saturday volunteer option to make quilts for at-risk babies in Springfield.
“It’s a great way of making connections with alums in the area,” says Spees. Karen E. Rose ’92 agrees. She organized a knitting group for people of all skill levels in October in Hartford, Connecticut. “I find that knitting is a great way to express yourself and be creative, and knitting groups are a fabulous way to meet some really cool women,” she said.—M.H.B.
Photo by Mieke H. Bomann
In Search of Board and Committee Members
Are you interested in volunteering for an Alumnae Association committee? Do you know of someone who might be just right for one? The Nominating Committee is always eager to hear from and about potential volunteers. Recommendations should be sent to Jill Brethauer ’70, Nominating Committee chair, at hb@fyi.net or 724-443-6575 or to W. Rochelle Calhoun ’83, association executive director, at rcalhoun@mtholyoke.edu, or 413-538-2300.
Do you remember life before you had a cell phone? Microwave? Computer? From the moment you added each item to your life, it became hard to imagine living without it, right? Facebook is the same.
I started my Mount Holyoke career as many of you did—I received my roommate’s name from Residential Life, then exchanged introductory letters and a timid phone call. On move-in day, I tried frantically to organize the sea of new faces in my dorm. During my first year, I sat in the back of classrooms and then cursed my shyness whenever I had a homework question and didn’t know the name of anyone in my class to ask. I’d chat with someone at dinner, then never cross paths again.
And then in my sopho-more year, Facebook struck.
For those who have heard the name but wonder what it’s all about, Facebook is a Web-based networking tool. You create a personal profile with as much or as little information as you want. Typically, users include a picture, contact information, interests, education details, and a photo album. Initially, you are connected to those with whom you share a workplace, school, or geographic location. Then you desig•nate others as “friends”; only they can see your profile.
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Led by tour coordinator Debby Hall ’74 and conductor Cathy Melhorn, professor emeritus of music, Glee Club alumnae went on tour to China this summer. Sponsored by the Alumnae Association, fifty-five singers from the classes of 1962 to 2009, and thirty guests visited Shanghai, Hangzhou, Xi’an, and Beijing, with some extending their trip for a Three Gorges Yangtze River cruise. Joining with outstanding Chinese women’s and mixed choirs, they performed in distinguished venues for large, enthusiastic audiences, and despite very hot, humid weather, managed a full itinerary of sightseeing, shopping, and eating! (For more pictures of the group’s trip, go to www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/gleeclub.)
Photo by John Lemly
Late fall is a good time to get ready for the spring job search, and getting an effective research strategy in place is part of that process, says Cori Ashworth, career and professional consultant for the Alumnae Association.
As a first step, it’s essential to make your job search manageable by narrowing your focus in terms of location and industry. “When you’re doing research, start at the macro level and move to the micro level,” Ashworth says.
Select a city where you’d like to live and work your research around that place, she advises. If you’re recently graduated and clueless as to which fields are best suited to your major, Ferguson’s Facts on File Career Guidance Center gives lots of ideas on how to apply a particular major to the real world. It’s available on the college’s Career Development Center (CDC) Web site.
One of the best places to start your job search homework is by doing the self-assessments Ashworth has put up on her career service pages on the Alumnae Association’s Web site. Once you have a handle on your work identity, you can begin to research relevant industries by looking at the database Vault Online Career Library, also at the CDC site. It gives you overviews of industries, Web sites, associations related to particular fields, and salary and hiring information.
Another useful site available through the CDC is CareerSearch, which contains millions of profiles of employers from the business and academic worlds. It enables a job seeker to do a geographical sort of companies by industry.
Armed with all that information, you then can make use of LifeNet, Ashworth points out, which is the Association’s networking tool that enables you to find alumnae working in particular fields and contact them for informational interviews and insights. —M.H.B.
Lila M. Gierasch ’70 is interested in the world. a well-respected scientist, researcher, and university professor with innumerable awards and professional commendations to her name, Gierasch is, according to one colleague, a leader, possessed of excellent judgment, and “at home in any company.”
Those desirable accomplishments, and her experience as department head and director of NIH-sponsored research programs throughout her career, led to her nomination this summer as alumnae trustee of Mount Holyoke by the nomination of Alumnae Trustees/Awards Committee of the Alumnae Association. The fact that she lives in nearby Ashfield and works in Amherst was considered a plus in strengthening local community ties to the board. Election to the five-year term will take place during the association’s annual meeting in May 2008.
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A small but enthusiastic cadre from the Mount Holyoke Club of Greater Washington, D.C., gathered at the sculpture garden of the National Gallery of Art Friday nights to listen to Washington-area jazz artists. Despite the often smothering summer heat, Club Copresident Alix Boucher ’00 attended nearly every week with friends and says the music was always fabulous, the garden setting next to the reflecting pool pleasant, and the sangria quite nice. She hopes to entice more people to attend this kind of gathering in future years.
To relax better at the end of the day, members of the Mount Holyoke Club of Greater Hartford joined yoga instructor Carlin C. Carr ’00 in two one-hour yoga sessions in Hartford’s West End. “We had a great showing,” said Carr. “I think it was a really interesting and unique event for local alums. It is a gentle, relaxation type of class. Who doesn’t need that?”
Alumnae Achievement Awards were presented to three alumnae at Reunion for “achievements and service to society that exemplify the values and virtues set forth by the college.”
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Eight alumnae were awarded medals of honor during Reunions I and II this year. Each woman exemplifies the tradition of service and ongoing commitment to the college that Mary Lyon worked to instill in all graduates.
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The fall exhibition at the MHC Art Museum—Two by Two: Lines, Rhymes, and Riddles—will feature the poetry and artwork of brothers Brad and Mark Leithauser. Brad is a prize-winning poet and MHC professor of English. Mark is a painter, draftsman, and chief of design at the National Gallery of Art. The show, which runs September 4 to December 16, is part of a series of book-themed events connected to the Museums10 “BookMarks” initiative that features Pioneer Valley museum exhibitions and events celebrating the words and images of books.
Visit www.mtholyoke.edu/go/artmuseum or www.museums10.org for more information.
A new occasional series, highlighting fascinating people and facts related to MHC.
Rarely do passion and service play themselves out in so gripping a manner as in the life of Helen Pitts Douglass, class of 1859. An educated woman whose sense of justice led her to take action in both the women’s and civil rights movements, Douglass is perhaps best remembered as the second wife of Frederick Douglass, the eloquent black orator, author, and spokesman for the abolition of slavery.
Following graduation from Mount Holyoke, Helen— who was white—taught freed slaves for two years and then, after many years of poor health, moved to Washington, D.C., to coedit The Alpha, a feminist publication. In 1882, she was hired as a clerk for Frederick Douglass in the office of the Recorder of Deeds, and following the death of his first wife, Anna, married Douglass in 1884.
Helen’s parents were abolitionists and old friends with Douglass but they nevertheless disowned her for entering into an interracial marriage. Another heartbreaking twist was the subsequent suicide of Ottilie Assing, a German journalist whose twenty-eight year professional—and most likely intimate—collaboration with Douglass was abruptly severed following his marriage to Helen.
But the Douglasses’ eleven-year union was by all accounts a happy one, and Helen wrote of her husband, “The more I know of Mr. Douglass, the more I wonder at the beauty and greatness of his character.” When Douglass died in 1895, Helen went on to distinguish herself as public speaker on civil and women’s rights. She died in 1903.—M.H.B
Photo: undated, National Park Service
Plan, Plan, Then Plan Some More
Planning for reunions begins
two years in advance. For Renunion 2009, class presidents were sent a
letter this past April asking for the names of reunion chairs, who are
then invited to a planning workshop in September. Most classes do a
"save the date" mailing a year in advance; the association sends
another letter eight months in advance. Registration materials are
mailed two months before Reunion; memos are sent to planners monthly
from August through May. It helps to write everything down.
A Celebrant for the Record Books
Lots
of women of every age come back for their reunions. In 2006 we welcomed
1,156 alums, along with 319 of their guests and 171 children. But get
this: one year, an alumna returned for her eightieth reunion. Now
that's enthusiasm! Th fiftieth class usually has a best attendance, in
the last five years averaging between 45 and 52 percent of the class.
The fortieth class comes in secon, with a five-year percent of class
members returning.
Basic Grooming Encouraged
Between six
and ten dorms with a total of about 600 beds are reserved for reunion
weekends. Classes often plead to stay in a particular dorm; those
requests are honored if the numbers of returnees match the dining hall
capacity and room availability. Loyalty classes (alumnae celebrating a
65th or later reunion) are housed in scenic Willits-Hallowell. Students
and staff housekeepers do a serious amount of schlepping and sweeping,
and make the beds, mop the floors, and brush the window screens in all
the dorms. No chocolates are left on guest pillows, but a small bar of
soap and towels are offered for basic grooming.
Grass, Trash, and a Fleet of Canoes
Mike
Buckley, Facilities Management’s superintendent of general services,
has his hands full leading up to reunion. His crews repair winter
damage along the road edges by tilling and reseeding. Two hundred white
stakes are then put into the ground and strung with twine to protect
the newly seeded areas. Those come down a day or two before Reunion I.
New sod is laid in the amphitheater for the annual meeting. Lawns are
mowed continuously so the campus grass is at attention when alumnae
arrive. A fleet of canoes is hauled from Upper to Lower Lake and fitted
with festive lanterns for the canoe sing.
Students Love Working Reunion
Guaranteed
hours, good wages, and a desire to make some fast cash before vacation
this year resulted in 270 applicants for 145 jobs at Reunions I and II.
Students make $7.75 an hour—student supervisors get $8.50—and they do a
lot of the heavy lifting. Job titles include luggage helper, loyalty
class assistant, van driver, housekeeper, custodian, grounds crew,
waitress, dishwasher, usher, child caregiver, lifeguard, ticket
salesperson, and registration assistant.
Speech, Speech
President
Joanne Creighton is on duty both weekends and will deliver at least six
speeches. She speaks on Friday night of Reunion I to the fiftieth
reunion class. She delivers a speech at Baccalaureate. She speaks at
the “Luncheon with the President” on both weekends. Finally, she speaks
at Commencement.
Reunion’s ‘Holy Book’
This will be the
fourth year that Joni Haas Zubi, associate director of classes and
reunions, has coordinated Reunion at MHC. She has worked for the
association since 1986. During both weekends, she carries around with
her what she loosely refers to as “the bible.” But instead of the
Lord’s instructions to Moses, it contains more mundane directions, like
when chairs should be delivered to Chapin Auditorium if it rains, and
the timetable for getting electrical service to Mary Lyon’s grave.
And Finally, a Funny Story
Okay,
there are lots of juicy stories that Joni won’t let us tell you. For
example, it’s safe to say that some serious imbibing of spirits goes on
each Reunion evening, and we’re talking bottled spirits. A papier-mâché
class sphinx became the object of actual genuflection by one spirited
reunion class. But interesting sober moments abound, too, such as the
alum who recycled items she found in the trash by using them to
decorate her Reunion weekend dorm room. Finally, lots of folks seem to
lock themselves out of their rooms when they take showers. One alum
simply made the best of it and walked around nude. I mean, we’ve seen
it all, yes?
—M.H.B.
