This interterm, instructors offered 32 noncredit courses to students who opted to stay on campus.
In four afternoons spent behind the scenes at the Mead Art Museum and on field trips to artists’ studios, Beyond Shopping: Acquiring Art for the Mead covered the ins and outs of museum acquisitions and laid the groundwork for the project’s grand finale: a mock-court-style presentation in which students, working in teams, argued the cases for particular works of art. Voting by secret ballot, museum docents and curators chose one work for the museum to purchase. Mead Director Elizabeth Barker taught the course.
Filming a Scene simulated what it’s like to work on location for an independent production company. Instructor Peter Marvin, senior multimedia specialist in the information technology department, taught students how to shoot and edit a short scene.
For the eighth interterm in a row, the astronomy department offered Celestial Navigation, in which Henry Parker Hirschel teaches students to measure the sun’s angle in the sky using sextants. The class took field trips to Avery Point, Conn., and to Rhode Island’s Block Island Ferry to practice their newly acquired skill.
For eight interterms in a row, students have learned to use sextants.
Photo by Samuel Masinter ’04
Modeled on writers’ and artists’ colonies such as MacDowell, Yaddo and the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center, the Winter Creative Writing Residency helped students devote sustained, undistracted attention to their fiction, poetry, dramatic writing and creative nonfiction. Each of eight sessions included a brief morning meeting at the Frost Café followed by three hours of independent writing. Writing Associates Michael Keezing and Roy Andrews also offered one-on-one mentoring. The final activity was a community reading.
In Financial Accounting, students learned to read corporate annual reports and to prepare the three typical financial statements: the balance sheet, the income statement and the cash flow statement. Sponsored by the Career Center, the course was taught by UMass Associate Professor of Accounting Richard Asebrook.
During a one-day Drawing Marathon, Resident Artist David Gloman and Sylvia Li ’14 began by having students discuss and practice various ways to approach drawing. Then, after lunch, the participants—artists of various skill levels—drew for five hours straight. Paper, pencils and charcoal were provided.
Photo by Rob Mattson