The Harward Center sponsors and co-sponsors diverse public programs designed to equip participants for civically engaged lives. Links to some of those programs may be found below.

2025

The Struggle for Justice: From Atrocities in Bucha to Accountability in Brussels

Anastasiya Donets, Team Lead of Ukrainian Legal Team at International Partnerships for Human Rights.  In conversation with Cheryl Stephenson, Bates College Lecturer in Russian Studies, Donets shares her experience documenting war crimes and case-building in the context of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine (video on YouTube).

2024

In addition to a comprehensive program of voter education, registration, and mobilization (@BatesVotes), Bates offers an array of election-related programs designed to stimulate learning and discussion and to support informed civic action. The list below will be updated periodically during the 2024 election cycle.

For the complete list of campus-sponsored Elections 2024 programs, please visit: www.bates.edu/2024-elections

2024 Elections:

2024 Election Connection Conversations – Starts week of October 21

What is the conversation you hope to have at Bates about the election? Students, staff, and faculty are welcome to join a conversation group over food to meet new people, share your experiences, and learn about different perspectives on current events without debate. Groups will be limited to 8 participants maximum, meet over the course of October, November, and January for check-ins during times of leadership transitions for our nation. Participants have a chance to win gift cards, and share feedback on this work: https://bit.ly/Bates-Election-Conversations

2024 Bates Votes Public Memory Project

Across generations and over many elections, our collective experiences may differ about what it means to vote and why.  Over the years, presidential elections have energized and captured the attention of American voters.  While people vote for many different reasons, at the Harward Center, we’re leaning into the idea that voting is an act of care for one’s community – regardless of party, ideology, or candidate.  In that spirit, we invite the Bates community to share brief reflections to inspire and engage our campus ahead of the 2024 elections.  

• What was your first memory involving voting?
• What can you remember about the first time you voted?
• What does voting mean to you? 

The Harward Center for Community Partnerships and the student-led Bates Votes voter engagement initiative, hopes to select several stories to share over social media and on the 2024 Election Connection website.  Please consider submitting your comments along with a video, photo, or an image you’d like to share.  Submission to this form gives the Harward Center and Bates Votes permission to share your submission over social media, and will be shared with Muskie Archives for historical records. To submit, please complete this form: https://bit.ly/Bates-Votes-Public-Memory

Please contact jvendil@bates.edu if you’d like to participate, but would like support developing your submission.

2024 “I Voted” Sticker Design Contest – Deadline Extended – October 14 at 5pm

Back by popular demand, the Harward Center is sponsoring another “I Voted” Sticker Design Contest, open to Bates students for submission. For guidelines and to submit, please visit: https://bit.ly/2024-I-Voted-Contest

 

2023

What’s on my ballot?

Announcing the Bates Votes Guide to the 2023 Elections

Maine has 8 statewide referendum questions on the ballot, along with municipal races for Mayor, City Council, and School Committee.  Many of these races are consequential about whether our local government will invest in affordable housing, educational equity, public safety, and more! Take a look at the 2023 Bates Votes Guide to the Elections and the Bates Student Voter Guide. It’s a great nonpartisan resource to consider when you’d like to learn more about your candidates.

• Bates Votes Guide to the 2023 Elections: https://bit.ly/2023-Bates-Voter-Guide
• The Bates Student Voter Guide: https://thebatesstudent.com/24845/news/a-comprehensive-guide-to-your-local-ballot-and-how-to-cast-it-2/

2023 Election Forum Recordings:

Last week, the Harward Center sponsored two informational forums about the 2023 Elections. Please check out the videos from the event to learn more.

What’s on the Ballot? Making Sense of Maine’s Referendum Questions Monday, October 30, 2023 – Muskie Archives View Recording Here: https://youtu.be/blcURkJO46Q

Join us for a panel discussion with Maine’s Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, Steve Mistler, Chief Political Correspondent from Maine Public, and Kate Cough, Energy & Environment Reporter with The Maine Monitor. Moderated by Assistant House Majority Leader Kristen Cloutier, we’ll learn about the referendum questions – from banning campaign spending by foreign governments in elections, to create a nonprofit, consumer-owned utility company, to automotive “right to repair”, to requiring the state of Maine to publish all provisions of the Maine Constitution, including its obligations toward Wabanaki Tribes.

Who’s on My Ballot? Meet the Lewiston Candidates for Mayor, Council, and School Committee

Thursday, November 2 – 6:30pm – 8:30pm Bates College Muskie Archives, 70 Campus Ave. School Committee & City Council Candidates: https://youtu.be/LuxTsQB2Spg Mayoral Candidates: https://youtu.be/TcFisKiozAc

Do you know that there are 16 races on the Lewiston ballot? Join us on Wednesday, November 1 at Muskie Archives for a youth-led community forum with candidates running for Lewiston Mayor, City Council, and School Committee. Learn more about where your local candidates stand on issues such as education, housing, and more.

Event is open to the public. Chai & cookies, and local foods will be available.

Sponsored by Harward Center for Community Partnerships, Community Organizing Alliance, Maine Immigrant Rights Coalition, and Maine Students Vote.

2022

Wednesday, October 5:  Bates Voter Registration Day!
Did you know that every time a student moves, they need to re-register to vote?  On October 5, stop by the tables outside Commons to register or learn how to request an absentee ballot in your home state.  Additionally, voter registration cards and drop-off boxes will be located at the Ladd Library and Post & Print.

Call for Submissions – Bates “I Voted” Design Contest
Bates Votes, a nonpartisan voter engagement initiative, is excited to bring students, faculty, and staff a limited edition “I Voted” sticker to engage the campus community in the electoral process.  The winning design will be distributed in late October through Election Day to Bates voters.
Submissions are open to Bates students with the final design selected by the campus community:  https://bit.ly/I-Voted-Bates-Contest.

October 13 – Defending Democracy:  The State of Free & Fair Elections in Maine and the U.S.
A Talk with Secretary of State Shenna Bellows & Professor John Baughman
Thursday, October 13 – 7:30pm – 9pm
Fireplace Lounge, Commons
Register here:  https://bit.ly/Bates-Votes-Oct13

Voting is the cornerstone of American democracy, but our election system is challenged by persistent barriers to voting and unprecedented new threats.  Learn from Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows about election integrity, threats to free and fair elections in Maine and across the country. Secretary of State Shenna Bellows is Maine’s first female Secretary of State, sworn into her two-year position on January 4, 2021.  Currently, Secretary Bellows is serving on the National Association of Secretaries of State (NASS) Elections and Cybersecurity Committee.  A social activist, non-profit leader, and politician, she has led campaigns to protect same-day voter registration, worked on ballot campaigns to pass marriage equality in Maine, and championed legislation to expand voting rights during her time in the Maine State Senate.

2021

Maine League of Women Voters

2018

On 3/28/18, Mariam Jalabi, Representative of the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces at the UN, delivered a talk entitled, “The Struggle for Human Rights from Syria to Maine.” Born in Damascus, Syria and raised in the Golan Heights, Mariam Jalabi ran a fashion company until the Syrian Civil War began in 2011. She has been actively involved in democratic advocacy since the war began and is a passionate advocate for women’s inclusion in the Syrian peace process. She was recently promoted to Representative of the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces’ New York Office at the United Nations. She had served as Director since 2013. She is also a founding member of the Syrian Non-Violence Movement, a founding member of the Syrian National Council, a member of the Syrian Opposition High Negotiation Committee’s Women’s Advisory Committee, and works with the Syrian Women’s Network and the Syrian Feminist Lobby. She holds degrees from McGill University and the Fashion Institute of Technology.

Click here to watch video of this talk.

On 3/14/18, Joel Clement, former director of the Office of Policy Analysis and top climate change policy official at the U.S. Department of the Interior, delivered a talk entitled, “The Trump Administration’s War on Climate Policy: A View from a Whistleblower Who is Speaking Out.” Clement was demoted along with other climate policy experts, and was also a whistleblower on the Trump administration’s policy of reassigning employees to encourage them to leave government.

Click here to watch video of this talk.

Click here to listen to audio of this talk on Maine Public Radio’s website.

On 3/6/18, Dr. Shauna Shames, Professor of Political Science at Rutgers University – Camden, visited the Bates campus to meet with faculty and students to discuss the research in her book entitled, “Out of the Running: Why Millennials Reject Political Careers and Why It Matters.”

Click here to listen to audio of the talk she delivered on 3/5/18 at the Bangor Public Library on Maine Public Radio’s website.

On 2/28/18, Matthew Dunlap, Maine Secretary of State, spoke on his work as a member of President Trump’s Voter Fraud Commission, which the President disbanded after Dunlap sued the Commission for allegedly violating the Federal Advisory Committee Act.

Click here to watch video of this talk.

2015

Click here for video of the 11/16/15 Civic Forum lecture, “Harness the Sun: America’s Quest for a Solar-Powered Future” by lawyer, former Conservation Law Foundation president and author Phil Warburg.

Click here for video of the 11/12/15 Civic Forum lecture, “Burning Desire: Our Longing for Justice and Hope for Healing” by Becca Stevens, internationally acclaimed speaker, writer, and social entrepreneur, and founder of Thistle Farms, a social enterprise run by women who have survived lives of prostitution, trafficking, addiction, and life on the streets.

Click here for video of the 10/26/15 Civic Forum lecture, “Preserving the Cuban Revolution During ‘Normalization'” by Cuban popular educator and writer Ariel Dacal Díaz.

Click here for audio of the 10/14/15 Civic Forum lecture, “”How Washington Works (Or Doesn’t)” by Maine’s United States Senator, Angus King.

2014

Click here for video of the 10/1/2014 Civic Forum presentation by Passamaquoddy members Denise Altvater and Esther Attean on the history, necessity and process of the historic Maine Wabanaki-State Child Welfare Truth and Reconciliation Commission created to address the harm done to native children who were taken from their families by the State and forced to assimilate into the dominant culture.  The presentation includes an introduction by famed artist, Robert Shetterly, creator of the nationally acclaimed series, “Americans Who Tell the Truth.”

On 10/20/14 the Hon. James Tierney, Columbia Law School faculty and former Attorney General for the State of Maine, delivered a major address on the impact of immigrants on Maine’s economic future.

• Click here to watch the video file for that address.
• Click here to download a copy of an expanded text version of that address in PDF format.
• Click here to read the text version of another address that Tierney delivered on April 22, 2002 at The University of Maine, entitled “Diversity in Maine: An Opportunity.”

Click here for video of the 11/3/2014 Civic Forum discussion by the iDebate Rwanda team on the emergence of the younger Rwandan generation’s voice in creating their own sense of identity and leadership aims.  They discussed how they are using debate to overcome the consequences and legacy of genocide to provide a new path for their nation; and and how they deal with those consequences in the representation of memory in debate, literature and other artistic forms.

2013

Video of the 10/24/13 Civic Forum lecture, “Ubuntu: An African Contribution to the Universality of Human Rights” by South African Justice Albert Sachs

    Video no longer available.

Click here to watch a video interview with Manal al-Sharif by Bates College Television.

Click here to watch Manal al-Sharif’s TED talk.

Click here to watch Manal al-Sharif’s talk at the Oslo Freedom Forum.

2012

Click here to watch a video of the 9/11/12 Civic Forum lecture, “Will There Be an Occupy 2.0?” by Todd Gitlin.

Video of the 9/29/12 Civic Forum panel, “The Path from Activism to Leadership: Through the Alumni Lens of Engagement”:

    Video no longer available.

Click here to watch a video of the 10/1/12 Civic Forum panel, “The History and Future of the Clean Water Act in Maine.”

Video of the 10/10/12 Civic Forum lecture, “Frances Perkins: New Deal Legacy and Lessons for Today” by Laura Fortman:

    Video no longer available.

Click here to watch a video of the 11/14/12 Bertha May Bell Andrews Lecture, “Leading Change: Story, Strategy, Action” by Marshall Ganz.

Click here to watch an audio slideshow of Victoria Lowe ’12, a double major in dance and American cultural studies, as she discusses her Short Term experience with “Tour, Teach, Perform” and her goal of advancing arts education in the schools.

Click here to watch a video of Savoring Androscoggin County, a performative meal and the culmination of student research activities for the course “Food, Performance + Community,” taught by Professor Myron M. Beasley and supported by a Harward Center Grant for Publicly-Engaged Academic Projects.

2011

Click here to visit the Androscoggin River Portal, created by students in ES417 during the 2011 fall semester.