Slideshow: This Month at Bates

We’ve experienced a stunning fall season.

Gorgeous light and colorful leaves have provided the backdrop for an embarrassment of riches: new traditions, the voices of brilliant writers speaking and reading to us, displays of heart and soul in class, onstage, and on the playing field.

Enjoy these moments of beauty as we look back at This Month at Bates.

This Big

In one of several Bates classrooms open to families for Back to Bates Homecoming & Family Weekend, in October, Assistant Professor of Economics Julieta Yung teaches intermediate economic theory to an attentive audience including Ama Asamoah ’21 of Burlington, Mass., and Mark Baxter P’20.

---

Full Extension

Osceola Heard ’22 of Newark, N.J., performs in Uda Clarke, choreographed by Alexandria Onuoha ’20 of Malden, Mass., during a dress rehearsal for the annual Back to Bates Dance Concert.

---

Kindling the Light

Families and friends of the Bates Jewish Student Union gather for Shabbat evening services and dinner in the Benjamin Mays Center on Friday evening of Back to Bates.

---

Formal Fare

The Deansmen perform during the annual Back to Bates a cappella concert in the Gray Athletic Building.

The event also featured the Crosstones, Gospelaires, Manic Optimists, Merimanders, and TakeNote.

---

Round and Round She Goes

Ella Ross ’19 takes her morning run on the Burgoyne Walk at Lake Andrews.

As the college’s Post-Baccalaureate Civic Engagement Fellow, Ross is spending the year helping Bates students connect with volunteer opportunities in Lewiston and Auburn.

---

Outside Looking In

Photographed from outside the Benjamin Mays Center, Robyn Moss ’20 of White Plains, N.Y., performs during the popular Village Club Series Student Showcase.

---

Apples and Corn

Students set out toward a corn maze, out of sight past the apple orchard, at Wallingford’s Fruit House in Auburn. The visit was sponsored by Cultural Explorations in Maine, a student organization that introduces students to various cultural traditions in Maine through service, trips, food, music, and more.

---

Back to Bates Reunion

Gabrielle Brewer ’23 (left) of New Britain, Conn., gets a kiss from Maple, a Labradoodle puppy held by her sister, Natalie Brewer ’21. The Brewer family brought Maple to campus for Back to Bates.

---

Listening and Telling

Visiting author Kiese Laymon (left) speaks with students, including J.D. Glenn ’22 (center) of Carbondale, Colo., as a guest of Associate Professor of English Eden Osucha (right) in her class on early American literature.

Laymon, author of the prize-winning Heavy: An American Memoir, was the 2019–20 Social Justice Speaker at Bates and gave a talk titled “Reckoning With Our Racial Past and Present in the Liberal Arts.”

---

Dad on Her Skateboard

On the Friday of Back to Bates, Eliza Brower ’22 (left) of Seattle catches her father, Josh Brower, skateboarding — with her board — on Alumni Walk.

---

Reset. Muse. Solve. Enjoy.

“I needed time to clear my mind and reset,” says Ben Skiest ’20 of Longmeadow, Mass., as he takes a break on the Puzzle Bench at Lake Andrews. He’d spent much of the day working with two classmates on a data-set problem for their econometrics course.

---

Hardware in the House

Members of the men’s soccer team celebrate a rivalry-game victory, a 1-0 shutout over previously unbeaten Middlebury.

The win secured the Hedley Reynolds Cup, named for the late Middlebury history professor who became Bates’ fifth president.

---

Leaf Peeping

Fallen maple leaves offer blazing color and dizzying geometric patterns outside Hedge Hall.

---

Sunrise Ceremony

Assistant Professor of American Studies Kristen Barnett joins Richard Silliboy, vice chief of the Aroostook Band of Micmacs, as he leads a sunrise ceremony on Alumni Walk during the college’s, and Maine’s, first official observance of Indigenous Peoples Day, on Oct. 14.

The ancient ceremony is the “beginning of light and the Creator coming to us to make sure that life and nature continue,” Silliboy said. Barnett helped to organize various events to celebrate the day.

---

We Scored

Emily Gianunzio ’21 of Darien, Conn., and her field hockey teammates celebrate her goal vs. Tufts in late September.

---

The Next Steps

Seniors Sheridan Frank of Round Lake Beach, Ill., and Mitchell Willsey of Glastonbury, Conn., discuss doctoral programs with graduate-school representatives during the annual Graduate and Professional School Fair in the Gray Athletic Building. Frank is interested in clinical psychology, Willsey in chemistry.

The fair draws reps from some 80 programs in the arts, sciences, business, education, health professions, law, and public policy.

---

Finding the Life

“We found a patch of light we liked on the perfect fall day,” said Isabel DuBois ’23 of Freeport, Maine, joining Robby Sheils ’23 of Portland, Maine, for the golden hour in mid-October.

---

Intestinal Physiology Explained

Munashe Machoko ’21 of Harare, Zimbabwe, explains his biological research to Vice President of Academic Affairs and Dean of Faculty Malcolm Hill during the annual Back to Bates Summer Research Poster Session in Perry Atrium.

Machoko received one of the first Abelson Research Fellowships from Bates to work with Dr. Richard Hodin at Boston’s Mass General Hospital on “The Biochemistry of Intestinal Alkaline Phosphates in Cell Cultures and Animal Models.”

---

Honorary Captain

Six-year-old Brayden Austin, the Bobcats’ honorary football captain this year, walks onto Garcelon Field with seniors Jon Lindgren of Plainville, Conn., Zach Doyon of Eliot, Maine, and Matt Golden of New Bedford, Mass., for the pre-game coin toss vs. Middlebury on Sept. 21.

Now healthy, Austin suffered a serious health crisis four years ago that required a long stay at The Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital followed by a challenging recovery.

---

Drobo Pozhalovat’ to Bates!

Welcome to Bates! Associate Professor of Russian Dennis Browne offers a tour of campus — in Russian —to students in his elementary Russian course.

---

Elizabeth, Again

Pulitzer Prize–winning author Elizabeth Strout ’77 says goodnight to Hermione Zhou ’21 of Shenzhen, China, after signing her new novel, Olive Again, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall.

Earlier in the evening, a packed audience heard Strout interviewed by President Clayton Spencer.