Week Ten Spring 1. June. 09

Sections

A. Inside the BubbleC. Op-EdD. EventsG. Arts & LiteratureH. The Docket

Music comes naturally to some people...and then there is Cora. In her usual effortless way, Cora wowed a full house on Saturday Night with nearly two hours of origional music that ended in a standing ovation, and encore of a crowd favorite “Wildflowers.”

“The concert was great” said sec-ond year Robin Van-Dyke, “Cora always has a great stage personal-ity, and her songs have a nice va-riety of feelings associated with them.”

“There’s just so much ‘Cora love’ in my head...how can one encap-sulate that into one sentence??” noted Geena Berry, “Cora is just plain awesome.”

The last COA concert Cora held included some accompanyment from her friends, all together they are known as “Hard Cora and the Flora.” She was joined by most of the Flora on Saturday for a great mix of solo and group pieces.

For those of you unfortunate enough to miss out onCoras Finale at COA, she has CD’s that are coming out June 20th, that will in-clude a number of the songs she performed at the show. If you are interested email her at clewicki@coa.edu with the address you want the CD sent to. CD’s are thirteen dol-lars.

Cora Lewicki’s Final COA Concert Lights Up Gates

Cora Lewicki performs with Daniel Reuters-WardPhotos Courtesy of Juan Soriano

-OTW Editors

Inside the Bubble A1

My name is Brooke Wel-ty, I am a student in the practical activism class at College of the Atlan-tic. We are very fortu-nate to be here with the wind power class, their hard work is testimony to the action oriented class-work here at College of the Atlantic... We are here to-day to support our classmates in their accomplishment and to endorse clean energy.

A few weeks ago Senator Collins said, and I quote: “The impact of your actions will make a difference today for seven generations to come.” We wholeheartedly agree, it is our collective action that will make the difference in the lives of the next generations and beyond. The students in the wind power class are taking action to create a renewable energy economy.

Maine has the second highest energy cost in the coun-try, we cannot afford to continue relying upon nonre-newable, non-local sources of energy.... But we also have a solution, we, as a state, have the potential to be-come energy independent. The most remarkable thing about this turbine is that it harnesses lo-cal energy that is eco-nomically viable and environmentally sus-tainable. The wind power class partnered with local contractors to help put up the tur-bine.... imagine how many green jobs we could create if we keep harnessing local energy throughout the state.

As we stand here to-day celebrating this groundbreaking step towards renewable energy in Maine, we recognize that the fu-ture of sustainable energy will also depend on strong climate legislation. We need national policy to support more projects such as the one we are celebrating today. We urge our Maine legislators to be proactive and sup-

photo courtesy Matt McInnis

port strong climate legislation that will guarantee fund-ing for clean renewable energy that will create clean energy jobs.

A few weeks ago, Senator Collins also stated that “sit-ting on the sidelines cannot be an option” when it comes to climate change...We are not sitting on the sidelines... Students are creating alternative sources of energy, running climate campaigns and becoming involved citizens. We need more motivated individuals, such as the ones here today, to harvest alternative sources of en-ergy.... Our elected officials should follow our lead and support strong climate legislation that would fund re-newable energy and create clean energy jobs in Maine.

Students from the Stillwater Montessori class question COA students in the Practicum in Windpower on how wind turbines work.

Wind Turbine Installed

photo courtesy Matt McInnis

The following speech is from the Wind Turbine Dedi-cation at Beech Hill Farm on May 27th.

A2News in Brief- Sasha ParisThe Tempest cast and crew quit school to form the Bol-lywood Shakespeare Troupe. They may someday per-form at COA again—for a large fee.

Official COA spectator sport: tourists getting stranded on the bar. Official Bar Harbor spectator sport: students skinny-dipping off the dock.

No one will win the tug-of-war. On May 25 (Towel Day), Douglas Adams informed a local medium that Krikkit robots would appear and steal the rope for use in destroying the universe. Participants are advised to run very far away when they hear the sound of a thou-sand people saying “whop.”

E-CAMS IIThe Rise of the Machines(apologies to Wikipedia and Arnold)- John Anderson

PLOTTen months after Amelia Ezelmann (Linda Hamilton) destroyed the original Registrator that was programmed to kill her, two Registrators arrive in Bar Harbor in the year 2009. The first is a Registrator (Alice Anderneg-ger) identical to the one that Amelia first encountered, while the second (Daveed Baldwinian) is a new model known to be the T-1000 which assumes the identity of an Academic Affaires Committee officer. Matt Shawn-er (Edward Furlong) is now a 10 year old living with foster parents. He has had an unusual childhood, with his mother Amelia constantly preparing him to fulfill his destiny as the snappiest dresser in the future hu-man resistance. Amelia’s experiences have made her tougher and more vigilant, but also desperate to warn humanity about the coming automated registration. Af-ter attempting to brick up the registrar’s office, Amelia is placed on social probation and remanded to the Davis Village for the Criminally Insane under the supervision of Dr. Hilberman. Meanwhile, the Registrators locate Matt Shawner in the Thirsty Whale. The Registrator orders Matt to “get down, get down TONIGHT” after the T-1000 tried to disco with him. After Matt is rescued, a chase through the MDI Carriage Trails ensues and the original Regis-trator escapes with Matt on his green electric golf cart. The Registrator explains that he is reprogrammed by the future Matt Shawner to provide stylin’ tips to Matt’s younger self. The other Registrator is a T-1000, an ad-vanced new prototype programmed to enroll Matt in random classes, place him on endless waiting lists and cast him through a “portal” at odd hours of the night and day. It is made of “a mimetic scheduling system”, a liquid metal that allows it to ensure that the classes that Matt most wants to take are either all at the same time or else have already been overbooked by other students who went through their portals hours earlier than he was

told he could do so. It can also, however, shape parts of itself into knives and stabbing weapons, and put ridicu-lous lab fees on seemingly innocuous courses.Upon learning that the T-1000 will likely enroll Amelia in pre-post-modern-reconstructionist cybernetic ceram-ics and then mimic her to lure Matt, Matt orders the Registrator to help free her. While making her own es-cape attempt, Amelia encounters her son and the Reg-istrator. Initially Amelia is terrified by the schedule of classes that she has been enrolled in, and tries to run away, and is captured by the IT staff, but the Registrator frees her. After being chased by the T-1000, Amelia ac-cepts that the Registrator is there to help. As they escape the campus, the Registrator informs Matt and Amelia about E-Cams, the sentient computer system that will nearly wipe out humanity in an apocalyptic nuclear at-tack on “Add-Drop Day”, and create the cyborgs that would take control of Earth. However, Amelia learns that the person most directly responsible for E-Cams is Judy Allan (Joe Morton), a Toxic Rivers Systems engi-neer working on a revolutionary new microprocessor that will form the basis for E-Cams.Amelia, Matt, and the Registrator eventually arrive in the desert at the camp of Donna Silver, Amelia’s old friend, who has preserved an underground weapons cache in case of war. Amelia plans to take Matt and flee to Presque Isle. While at this camp, the Registra-tor begins to learn about the value of a human advisor as it bonds more closely with Matt. Amelia once again then has a horrific nightmare of being enrolled in pre-post-modern-reconstructionist cybernetic ceramics and wakes up with strengthened resolve. After she leaves abruptly, Matt and the Registrator see the words “Can’t Do” (from the phrase “CAMS Can’t Do That” Daveed Balwinian taught her in the first movie), carved into a table earlier by Amelia, and deduce that she is planning to change the future by killing Allan. At Allan’s home, Amelia shoots Allan in the arm but finds herself unable to kill her in front of her family. After Matt and the Reg-istrator arrive, they inform Allan of the consequences of her research and convince her that they must destroy everything related to her chip design, including the Por-tal and arm from the previous Registrator.Amelia, Matt, the Registrator, and Allan break into the Toxic Rivers Systems building and retrieve the parts from the first Registrator. While preparing explosives to destroy all of Allan’s research, security alerts the Academic Affaires Committee, who show up in force. The Registrator manages to destroy most of the Aca-demic Affaires Committee vehicles without breaking an earlier promise to Matt to refrain from killing. The AAC team mortally wounds Allan, who stays behind to trigger the detonator. Amelia, Matt, and the Registra-tor escape in a AAC van with the T-1000 in pursuit, first in a Prius Hybrid and then in a liquid hydrogen fuel cell truck. The truck crashes into a steel mill, caus-ing the tank to rupture and spill liquid hydrogen ev-erywhere, freezing the T-1000. The Registrator shatters him, whereupon the pieces thaw and reassemble. The three split up as Amelia and the Registrator try to lead

Cont’d on A2

A3E-Cams, from A1

the T-1000 away from Matt, but the T-1000 catches and threatens to put Amelia on the waiting list for Under-water Basket Weaving unless she calls to Matt; she is saved when the Model 101 intervenes. The Registrators fight hand-to-hand, with the T-1000 stabbing the Model 101 through the portal with a metal pole, deactivating him. The T-1000, now disguised as Amelia, goes to hunt Matt but is revealed when the real Amelia shoots him. The Registrator reactivates itself using an alter-nate power source (in the DVD it’s explained to be a thermal generator, fueled by the surrounding heat from the ACM) and arrives on a rotating wind turbine. It fires the last mug of shade grown fair trade coffee into the T-1000, causing it to deform and fall into the molten steel below, where it is destroyed.Having destroyed the T-1000, Matt throws the parts from the first Registrator into the steel; but the Regis-trator says that he too must be destroyed to prevent his technology from being used to create E-Cams. Since the Registrator cannot self-register without Permission of Instructor, Amelia must lower him into the steel us-ing a winch. As the Registrator says goodbye, Amelia shakes his hand in a gesture of respect, and Matt tear-fully orders him to take Writing Seminar 2. The Reg-istrator reveals a newfound understanding of human emotions but insists that he must take the Human Ecol-ogy Core Course and at least two Studio Arts courses, an HY, two ESs and two HSs. As he sinks into the Writ-ing Clinic, he gives a “thumbs up” signal which Matt had earlier taught him. The film ends with a voice-over from Amelia: “The unknown Fall Term rolls toward us. I face it, for the first time, with a sense of hope. Because if a machine, a Registrator, can learn the value of hu-man advisors, maybe we can too.”

No. It isn’t actually very funny. The system doesn’t re-ally work. It can’t. That doesn’t really matter however. They have such short memories, these human institu-tions. In three years nobody will be left who will re-member that one used to actually have to go and talk to one’s advisor before signing up for courses, that people didn’t get “first dibs” on classes simply because they had hung out on campus longer than other students, that perhaps instructors were better able to judge whether someone was ready to take a class than a line of code could. We have spent (and will go on spending) tens of thousands of dollars on a system that reduces the “Hu-man” in our Human Ecology degree because someone, somewhere believes that “this is what students today demand”. Wonderful ironies abound. In a time when Faculty say they are over-worked and over-stretched we have installed a system that makes them work more. In a time when budgets are tight and Programs go hun-gry, we have leased at great expense a “program” writ-ten for other institutions that we will have to pay for forever. Without serious thought or assessment we have taken another step down the road towards being “just another little liberal arts college”. The machines have won, but perhaps humans should go down swinging….

The second weekend in May - just before the black flies become really aggressive and the spring water runs at an adventurous level - a group of ten loaded up and paddled canoes down the Machias River.

Since then, the Machias has become my new favorite river in Maine! It is buffered by 1,000 feet of conser-vation land on both banks, offers multiple sets of white water rapids that are appropriately challenging for an intermediate paddling group. The river is also not too far away, so that we can have two nights on the river without cutting into class time. Oh, and the flat water sections are beautiful while the wildlife that can be seen is impressive!

With skilled paddlers in the stern of three canoes, stu-dents had the opportunity to feel how the stability and maneuverability differs between white water and flat water canoes, a treat in and of itself. We discussed how to read rivers, identify obstacles, pick suitable “lines” through rapids, use specific paddle strokes to maneuver well from both the bow and stern position, swim safely should one tip, rescue swimmers from land, and how to laugh at our mistakes. The first evening graced us with a stellar view of the glowing gold full moon and sweet music sung ’round the warmth of a fire. We were warm enough, happy enough, challenged enough and silly enough that the weekend was considered a fantas-tic outing by all. Looking forward to next year’s spring paddling season already!

A New River Adventure- Tonia Kittleson

Phil Walters proudly sports his canoe gear Photo Courtesy Tonia Kittleston

A4

The Struggle Never Dies- Matt ShawGuess what, comrades! While we may feel a sense of own-ership over such issues as the mug “crisis” and low ACM turn-out; these are things the College has been struggling with for a long time. The ad-jacent clipping is from a 1998 issue of Off the Wall (yes, OTW is an age-old issue as well...), provided by gradu-ating senior, Becky Wartell.

If you don’t believe us, stop by the office in the Faculty Village. There you can find the largest collection of archived Off the Wall, COA News, The Insider, and The Per-egrine outside of Thorndike. We also have an impressive collection of old view-books.

Relaxing after a river adventure

Rambling down the Machias rapids

photos courtesy Tonia Kittelson

Op-Ed C1

A couple of weeks ago Gray Cox and a group of us hit the road to Montreal for the weekend. We attended a symposium called “Bringing the Economy in line with Ecology” organized by the Quaker Institute for the Fu-ture. The purpose of this symposium was to further de-velop ideas in the book “Right Relationship: Building a Whole Earth Economy.” Rather than proving you with a brief summary of the event, we wanted to share some of the ideas and thoughts that have stayed with us since we came back, these are economy and ecology, small victories and the low hanging fruit, and the power of chiquita.

Ecology and EconomyEcology and economy come from the Greek œcos meaning house, however these two disciplines remain far apart without even a common vocabulary. They are often pitted against one another in our society. We are driven to develop and we are centered on a capitalist market based notion of how society should work. How dare we ask for environmental protection measures that could possibly hinder our economy and infringe on our individual rights. We all know we cannot have our cake and eat it too. And yet coming together in Montreal we recognized that it was time to throw this perception out the window. We no longer have a choice to just focus on our economy and development. By ig-noring ecology and continuing on this path of environ-mental degradation we won’t have much left to make an economy of. Greenhouse gas emissions are heating our Earth, clean water supplies are not available in far too many countries, our rate of deforestation is stagger-ing-- we can not ignore the question of how to bring the economy in line with ecology. As human ecologists we should be considering this question more ourselves, and perhaps even be incorporating it as part of the Hu-man Ecology Core Course.

Small Victories and Low-Hanging FruitDuring the conference we broke up into small work groups to identify some key actions for realizing this goal of bringing the economy in line with ecology. The passion that hung in the air was almost tangible. Yet within all of the fevered conversation about policy and social action there was a clear reality. As much as re-envisioning an entire economic system and relationship with the environment is important and exciting, we first need to focus our energy on gaining small victories to

Reality Check: The Power of Chiquita- Juan Soriano and Lauren Nutter

build the momentum needed for large scale change. For example take climate change. Really if we want-ed to mitigate the effect of greenhouse gas emissions and take substantial action we would rebuild our entire economic infrastructure system starting right now. We would increase public transport, implement better land use planning strategies, utilize renewables on a massive scale. Instead of putting up more oil wells we would be racing to put up wind turbines and solar panels through-out the world. However the harsh reality is that it’s a long battle to gain the political will to redesign the sta-tus quo of our current economic structure that requires us to continue using cars and gasoline. So instead of feeling frustrated and overwhelmed by this we decided to focus on the “low hanging fruits”. The low hanging fruits are current issues in which we could have a strong positive influence like the health care and the Waxman-Markey bill. Strengthening the content of these bills are the first steps to build the momentum needed to ulti-mately realize this larger paradigm shift.

My Chiquita BananaAs a Peruvian, I find crossing borders an unsettling ex-perience. Maybe many people do not realize this but be-cause of my country of origin I pretty much have to get a visa to go anywhere abroad. It is a tedious and costly process in the first place and on top of that I have to cross my fingers hoping that I would have an uneventful ex-perience through customs. The scenery of rural Maine is beautiful. When we arrived at the Canadian Border the officers were not only attractive but also super nice and chilled. The Montreal countryside is as beautiful as rural Maine. However, the border experience felt much different coming back into the US. At the border we didn’t park the van ‘right on the marked spot’ and the US Homeland Security Officer approached our vehicle as if she were in of some sort of SWAT operation. Her dictatorial voice commanded our actions, we opened all of our doors and handed our passports. After scrutiniz-ing our passports it was time for questions; we weren’t bringing back any drugs, alcohol or fruits.

“Wait”, someone shouted from the back. “We have a banana, is that ok?” The officer replied: “Actually, ba-nanas are fine.”

Moral of the story: Never underestimate the power of Chiquita. She can go anywhere she wants. Have you asked yourself why?

Sycorax Talks Back- Poorva RajaramAll of us watched Dan and Alicia’s The Tempest in amazement. I would like to say a personal thank you to everyone who put in all that work. Watching a Bolly-wood version of The Tempest in Maine in the year 2009 made me think about how far we have come since the time the play was written.

The play usually makes me think of Caliban and his mother Sycorax. And then I get angry. The island be-longs to Sycorax before she dies and Prospero arrives. Sycorax is a witch banished from Africa to the island. She gives birth to Caliban there, where Prospero finds him. Prospero is initially nice to Caliban, and teaches him his language. In return, Prospero expects Caliban to be his slave and refuses to acknowledge Caliban’s ties to the island. A familiar story? Prospero’s attitude smells an awful lot like colonialism. It is not a coin-cidence that the play was written around 1610-11. As the new kid on the block, Prospero -- who has read so much -- thinks he knows everything. Yet Caliban is Prospero’s Lonely Planet when he needs it most.

All the Europeans who meet Caliban, including Pros-pero, think he is hideous monster. I think Caliban must have been really hot. The more they insist he is hideous, the more I suspect it’s only because of their ignorance of people who don’t look like them. Prospero owes his magic to Sycorax: Ariel is her spirit. No amount of reading could give him the kind of power she had. He lives on stolen resources. (Does the story still sound fa-miliar?) There would be no Tempest without Sycorax.

As it turns out, those who grandly promise freedom and civilisation can be the biggest jerks of all. And jerks are not hot.

C2The students of Maine want to urge Senators Snowe and Collins to support strong climate legislation. We know that they have very positive environmental re-cords. We are grateful that the senators have been lead-ers on climate issues in the past. We want to urge them to follow through with their commitments by pushing for a strong, science based cap on greenhouse gas emis-sions with no loopholes or giveaways to polluters.

Maine’s economy is highly dependent upon the envi-ronment. First of all, many of Maine’s major towns and cities are located close to the ocean. This means that sea level rise due to climate change will have an ex-treme effect on these places. NRCM calculated that 20 of Maine’s cities will lose 20 to 30% of their land area, along with millions of dollars of infrastructure, with the one meter sea level rise projected to occur by 2100.

Beyond the loss of land caused by sea level rise, many other sectors of Maine’s economy have been, and will continue to be affected, by climate change. Regional sea surface temperatures have increased almost 2° Fahren-heit since 1970. Warming sea temperatures could also have an effect on the lobster industry. The winters in Maine are not as cold as they used to be, resulting in changes in the maple sap industry. NRCM showed that precipitation has decreased by almost 20% throughout much of Maine. This is detrimental to the farmers of Maine and as climate change continues, these situations will only worsen. Climate change must be curbed in order to prevent further harm to Maine’s economy.

We need to start investing in clean, renewable energy for Maine’s economic future. Maine has the second highest energy cost in the country; we cannot afford to continue relying upon nonrenewable, non-local sources of energy. But we also have a solution, we, as a state, have the potential to become energy independent. Local energy that is economically viable and environmentally sustainable can be put to use for the people of Maine.

Renewable energy would bolster the economy and it will create countless new jobs that are desperately needed in our failing economy. As students, we will soon enter the job market and the harsh reality of our current economic status will hit us hard.

We need national policy to support more renewable en-ergy projects. We urge our Maine legislators to be pro-active and support strong climate legislation that will guarantee funding for clean renewable energy that will create clean energy jobs.

This legislation should be based upon scientific models, such as an 80% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by the year 2050. The legislation should not have any loopholes, meaning it should not allow any offsets. In addition, there should be no giveaways to big pollut-ers. We want this climate legislation to be effective for Maine’s people, economy and environment.

A few weeks ago, Senator Collins stated that “sitting on

An Open Letter from Students of COA

the sidelines cannot be an option” when it comes to cli-mate change. Students are not sitting on the sidelines. We are creating alternative sources of energy, running climate campaigns and becoming involved citizens. Our elected officials should follow our lead and sup-port strong climate legislation that would fund renew-able energy and create clean energy jobs in Maine. We are counting on our Maine senators to support strong climate legislation in Congress this year. Sincerely,Students of the Practical Activism Class.

Photo Courtesy Donna Gold

C3So what I want to say before the school year ends is principally WTF…- Jose Merlo1)This article stems from the millions of events that I’m exposed to daily. As an individual, they intrigue me, amaze me, annoy me, incite me, consume me, ignite me, provoke me, etc…etc…etc. My connection to the internet back home was extremely slow so I wasn’t ex-posed to phenomenons such as YouTube, online mov-ies and many more delicacies and distractions that the infinite World Wide Web offers us. I discovered this year that you don’t even have to type WWW anymore, fuck!

The human ecological spectrum is incredibly diverse. I am not going to pretend to give you a lecture about my vision about it, I just want to share with you a few ab-surd and/or reasonable lines concerning my ideas about this world and my minuscular presence in it.

I think we are really fucked because we are consum-ing way too much. Waste shouldn’t have a linear cycle but a circular one. I am going to collect huge amounts of waste and I will get rich creating a recycling com-pany; similar to what Mr. Burns from the Simpsons did. I never thought about being rich but the other day I had a fervent desire to become one of the richest people in this world – by legal means, most probably – and prov-ing to the whole fucking world that as a matter of fact, we just need around $400 or less to subsist. So I say to those millionaires up there: donate all your money somewhere (oh! there a millions of NGOs and charities to choose from, don’t you worry about that) and chill the fuck up. Die with a clean consciousness at least.

I think hemp is the crop of the future and I am going to invest my time in a near future planting it. Appar-ently due to the cotton monopolization in this country, the crop that could save us and prevent environmental disasters is illegal to harvest here. So if anyone happens to be unemployed in a couple of years and has the desire to move to a multi-seasonal country located just inside the Equator to drink 100% natural juices for breakfast every day and live surrounded by hemp, cacao and Tec-tona trees in the tropical mountains, contact me. You will never get over the cultural shock and you will have to learn certain practical hoaxes/ knavish abilities that only the underdeveloped environments can teach you. Trust me, it’s fun and worth it.

There needs to be an urgent reassesment of the peoples lifestyles. We, the masses, cannot be simple economic indicators. We have to open roads that allow us to liber-ate ourselves from the schemes that the system has cre-ated. Local manifestations, whatever forms they may adapt, have the huge power to spread and offer alterna-tives to the conventional order. We need to reestablish our relationship with our earth and rethink the social and economic parameters that govern us in order to transcend instead of fatally succumb.

Esteem, explore and manifest the realms of your senses. Stand your ground with the sufficient humane criteria. WILL OF MOTION…a personal decision…

2)

3)“We live a world that does not requests theatre, but it indeed, necessitates theatre to see ourselves, to imagine and re-create things but most importantly, to foster us to be actors – emancipation by communal experience…therefore, praxis.” --Llusepe Merlou

D1Events

On Saturday, June 6, 2009 at 2 p.m., COA will be hold-ing its 37th commencement. Ceremonies will honor 80 students receiving a Bachelor of Arts in Human Ecol-ogy and one student receiving a Masters of Philosophy in Human Ecology.

Graduates come from 22 states and 10 nations. Among the members of the class of 2009 are three Watson fellows, two Udall honorable mentions, a Humanity in Action fellow, a Da-vis Project for Peace re-cipient and a Goldwater scholar.

The graduation speaker will be Steven K. Kato-na, who was president of COA in 2005 when most of the current graduat-ing class began their col-lege studies. Katona is a founding faculty member of the college and also founded Allied Whale, COA’s marine mammal re-search group.

Since retiring in June 2006, Katona has been a consultant at the New England Aquarium in Boston, MA on a scien-tific overview of the im-pact of climate change on the marine environment, especially on fisheries. He is also working on ways of communicating climate change issues to aquarium audiences. With 1983 COA alumnus Greg Stone and an inter-national team of marine scientists, Katona is lead-ing an ocean health index that evaluates how the ocean is responding to human activities and conservation efforts. This effort is sponsored by the New England Aquarium, Conservation International and the National Geographic Society.

Additionally, Katona is working on developing research and demonstration programs that advance the use of re-newable energy, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, elec-

COLLEGE OF THE ATLANTIC HOLDS 37th COMMENCEMENT - Look Out World!- Donna Gold

tric vehicles and “smart” vehicle-to-grid power systems for Maine and New England.

Receiving honorary degrees will be Lucy Bell Sellers, who taught a theater workshop at the college for 23 years before retiring in November, 2008, Tom Chap-pell, founder of Tom’s of Maine and attorney and COA trustee emeritus and former COA board chair John Kel-ly. Student speakers include Sam Heller, Virve Hirsma-ki, Nick Jenei and Jasmine Smith.

Nearly 50 percent of the class of 2009 gained in-ternational experience through COA programs, internships, residencies or other means, including participation in United Nations-sponsored envi-ronmental conferences. For their final projects, a term-long capstone proj-ect required of all COA graduates, students have completed novels and works of creative non-fiction, begun gardens, greenhouses and arbore-tums, mounted photog-raphy and art exhibits, made videos, created ethnographies and con-ducted extensive scien-

tific research.

This is the sixth graduat-ing class to include mem-bers of the Davis United World College Scholars Program. Thanks to fund-ing from Gale and Shelby Davis, graduates from any of the ten internation-al United World College campuses admitted to COA receive scholarship support.

Since COA embraces the concept of sustainability to help people and nature

flourish and preserve choic-es for future generations, all

emissions the college can’t reduce or avoid-including those connected to graduation-are verifiably offset. This is the college’s second carbon-neutral graduation and its sixth no- or reduced-waste ceremony.

Seniors prepare for mandatory, pre-commencement tug-of-war in the school’s gymnasium. uniforms via their predas-sors the “Harvard Screamin’ 88s”

Faculty and staff prepare with ritual chest-pounding.Photo Courtesy Donna aGold

D2“INDiVIDUAL EMPIRES” IN DEERING COMMON- Donna Gold“Individual Empires” opens June 2 with refreshments and a celebration from 5 to 7 p.m. Says Mekeel, “My interests lie not only in human subjects but the space they chose to surround themselves with. These photos are my journey into understanding people’s lifestyles.” Through them, and through the telling details we often see in people without fully noticing, Mekeel seeks to discover what makes the space her subject’s domain, and to convey that through the photos, as if it were a story.

Upwards of 15 photos will be on display, each a 30-by-20-inch digital print. One is of Mekeel’s grandmother with her hand on her hip. “She used to pose for photo-graphs like a model, for my grandfather to keep while at war, and she’s telling me that with her hands on her hip,” Mekeel says.

Like the image of her grandmother, some of Mekeel’s photos are people very close to her—her boyfriend’s brother, good friends in Bar Harbor. Others are the re-sult of chance encounters. Her choices come from see-ing a strong connection between people and their spac-es, from a young woman lounging on a clothing-strewn bed to a man hanging out in a garage filled with motor-cycles and drums. “It’s not at all about what people do,” she says. “It’s about their environment.”

The exhibit is Mekeel’s senior project. She spent three years at COA and a year studying photography at Pa-cific Northwest College of Art in Portland, Oregon.

Each photo takes about an hour to set up, working on lighting and composition, making sure, says Mekeel, “that the space doesn’t take over the person.” Because, she adds, “While the space is what the photograph is about, it’s the space that’s describing the person.”

Peter Liotta of the Pell Center Speaks on the Four Freedoms - Donna GoldA discussion of the global and political impacts of cli-mate change is the topic of a talk by Peter Liotta, direc-tor of the Pell Center for International Relations and Public Policy. He will speak in the McCormick Lecture Hall on Monday, June 1 at 4 p.m. His talk, The Four Freedoms: Human Security in the 21st Century. is part of a lecture series presented by the college’s Turn of the Century Class. This talk is postponed from its original date on May 11.

A former United States Air Force pilot, Liotta is now a professor of humanities and executive director of the Pell Center for International Relations and Public Policy at Salve Regina University in Newport, Rhode Island. He has plunged into some of the most dangerous areas of the world—from which he’s removed himself to write 19 books that range from policy analysis to po-etry.

“Peter Liotta comes from a background of military, scholarly and artistic accomplishment to bring a unique perspective to the emergent human condition,” says Bill Carpenter. “He investigates, at the deepest level, the global interaction of politics, humanity and the envi-ronment.” Carpenter teaches the interdisciplinary Turn of the Century class with John Anderson and faculty emerita JoAnne Carpenter.

Among Liotta’s books are “Diamond’s Compass,” a novel about Iran, and a volume of prose poems, “The Graveyard of Fallen Monuments.” He has also coau-thored three recent books on the current state of the world: “The Fight for Legitimacy: Democracy versus Terrorism, A Fevered Crescent: Security and Insecurity in the Great Near East,” and “Gaia’s Revenge: Climate

Change and Humanity’s Loss.” Liotta is editor-in-chief of the Politics and Environ-ment Series for Praeger Books, a division of Greenwood Publishing.

Prior to becoming director of the Pell Cen-ter in 2004, Liotta held the endowed Jerome E. Levy Chair of Economic Geography and National Security at the U.S. Naval War College. He served for two decades in the air force, and was Fulbright lecturer and poet-in-residence in former Yugoslavia.

In 2005, Liotta became an adjunct profes-sor in Comparative Politics and Interna-tional Relations in the Department of So-cial Sciences of the United States Military Academy, West Point. He is an associate of

the Global Environmental Change and Human Security project of Oslo, Norway, and a member of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Working Group II, on Impacts, Adaptation and Vulner-ability of Climate Change.

“Bernice” digital print by Meryl MekellMy grandfather was a talented amateur photographer and would take many photos of her and their family, until his early death. I look through the photos now and am captivated by my grandmother’s presence. Ev-ery time I look through those old photos I think, Gram you got it going on. And she hasn’t lost it—she still knows how to strike a pose.

D3“ASYLUM AND ACCEPTANCE”- Donna GoldTo celebrate the publication of his book, “Streets, Boundaries, and Other Places: Stories of Asylum,” senior Michael Keller is presenting an exhibit of photographs and nar-ratives of refugees resettled by the International Rescue Committee in Charlottesville, VA. The show, “Asylum and Acceptance,” will run in the Blum Gallery from Monday, June 1 through Saturday, June 6 with a reception Wednesday, June 3 from 4 to 6 p.m.

“Too dangerous to go back” was the phrase many used to describe the nations that these people left, says Keller of his encounters with refugees in Virginia. His photographs and stories, he says, “show the resilience of refugees in starting over, in starting new lives.” The photographs depict resettled individuals from Bosnia, Serbia, Croatia, Myanmar, China, Afghanistan, Togo, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Somalia.

Keller’s connection to refugees began on the soccer fields of the Charlottesville public schools. It continued through a 2007 Kathryn W. Davis Projects for Peace award, during which most of the exhibition photos were taken. At that time, Keller documented the experi-ences, hopes and dreams of mothers, fathers, students, political activists, gardeners, soccer players and entre-preneurs who have joined the Charlottesville commu-nity. His work continued through a Humanity in Action Fellowship in New York and Berlin. Come July, Keller will return to Europe to further his connection with refugees, funded by a Watson Foundation fellowship, one of 40 extraordinary college graduates nationwide chosen for a year of international exploration.

While Keller’s senior project is a collection of nine short stories based on narratives of resettled refugees that he has come to know, the exhibit is composed of the photo-graphs and actual stories of refugees such as this one: “We couldn’t stay in Croatia because my dad was a Serb. My mom was Croatian. …There were people who didn’t care much about religion until the war started. …Then I had to move all of the time because my parents are of different religions. What is crazy is, it’s not really a big part of my life–re-ligion. … It’s funny how it’s not that big a part of my life, but it’s affected

Photo by Michael Keller.

Glass Blowing Exhibit- Linda Perrin

“Transparency” a glass sculpture exhibit in the Turrets Great Hall on June 6 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.Ten brave students have been expanding their minds by gathering molten glass in the Introduction to Glassblowing class new to the course line up this term. Do not miss the op-portunity to see the sparkles in person on June 6th from 10 am to 6pm in the Great Hall of Turrets. A reception at 4:30 will allow the new glass makers of AD4391 to illuminate your understanding of the mystifying pro-cess of shaping molten glass. Really don’t blow it and miss this unique opportunity to see some evocative glass sculpture made by people just like you.www.atlanticartglass.blogspot.com for more info

Sculptural Glass by Kelly Enberg

my life to the core—everything. When war starts, re-ligion just soars. The churches are full. The patriotic people are out on the street.”

Arts & Literature G1

Drawing by Julie Olbrantz and Chalese Carlson

Working Guidelines of Off the Wall, adopted by Publications Committee, Fall 2008 - Off the Wall is a community-wide publication that seeks within the broadest possible limits to express the complete spectrum of thought at the college. Although Off the Wall is the publication to list governance infor-mation, it does not reflect an official voice of any segment of the college population and relies on community input to achieve a well rounded voice.- Off the Wall prefers signed submission. Contributors may request their name be withheld from the publication or that a pseudonym be used, but this is done at the editor’s discretion. The editor is responsible to review mate-rial submitted and make decisions regarding the appropriateness of content. The editor is responsible for the content of unsigned material that is printed.- Off the Wall has a faculty or staff advisor who is responsible for assisting the editor in making decisions about questionable material. The advisor should have knowledge of Off the Wall and the concerns surrounding its publication. The editor must submit the name of the advisor to Publications and Communications Committee before publication of the first issue of the term.- The editor has the right to decline to print material on the grounds of excessive length, illegibility, or obvious libelous content. The editor may defer printing matter thought to be harmful to another person, cause liability, or which for any reason should be checked with the Off the Wall advisor.Contributors should bear in mind that Off the Wall should reflect a constructive and respectful approach toward other human beings and a thoughtful restraint on the use of resources.

The Docket H1

ACM Says “No”- Matt ShawIn a vote of 42 to 24 against, with three abstentions, the proposed flag policy was voted down in the Week Nine All College Meeting.

Reports at this time are unclear as to the future of flag flying at College of the Atlantic. Many have been in favor of the unofficially recognized “earth flag” which depicts a satalletite image of the earth from space, cen-tered on a blue background. To this reporter’s knowl-edge, the flag depicts the same view of our planet on both sides.

Still, others have suggested contacting the American Legion and VFW to garner support for a re-vote, add-ing the American flag to those in TAB, removing said flags from TAB, and investigating a way to display the national flag of each country represented each year.

There is trully no limit to the number of options.

anarcho-syndicalism

earth flag

confederate states of america

conch republic

a helpful windsock