COA Volume 5 | Number 1 Spring 2009 The College of the Atlantic Magazine COA Mission: Letter from the Editor College of the Atlantic enriches the liberal arts One of the great pleasures in putting together COA tradition through a distinctive is the oral history project associated with it. Since educational philosophy- College of the Atlantic may literally be the last in- human ecology. A human dependent liberal arts college created in the United ecological perspective States (do tell if there are others!), it seems essential integrates knowledge from to document just what it's like to create a school all academic disciplines and from scratch. Each COA issue includes an excerpt of a much longer from personal experience to interview with a person involved in the beginnings of the college. This investigate-and ultimately time, my victim is trustee Philip Kunhardt III '77, a member of the col- improve-the relationships lege's first class and a current COA parent. between human beings and our social and natural We talked in Philip's home outside New York City. As he spoke about communities. The human the early days, I watched the energy of a joyous young man geared up ecological perspective guides for one of the great adventures of his life take over the demeanor of all aspects of education, the serious adult I know from his COA duties. Read it! The enthusiasm research, activism, and is intoxicating. These students were doing more than creating a col- interactions among the lege; they were establishing a life for themselves, pushing boundaries at college's students, faculty, every front. staff, and trustees. The College of the Atlantic community What's more amazing is that this creative energy is still a potent force encourages, prepares, and at COA. For faculty, this is revealed by constant questioning and chal- expects students to gain lenges, tempered by careful, precise thoughtfulness-just read the dia- expertise, breadth, values, and log among Karen Waldron, Don Cass and Dave Feldman. practical experience necessary The energy is also apparent in today's students, especially at senior to achieve individual project time. As I write, students are mounting photographs, peppering fulfillment and to help solve them with ethnography, creating whale exhibits, finishing up novels problems that challenge and theses, building greenhouses and rebuilding walls-all while mak- communities everywhere. ing plans for their own futures. At one end of campus, two students are refurbishing the Hidden Garden. At the other end, JoAnna Cosgrove is busy digging a pollinator-friendly meadow. When I asked her what she Cover: says about COA when she talks to others, she sounded as enthusiastic Northern leopard frog, photo as Philip. "This school is absolutely ideal for nurturing those wacky, by Noah Hodgetts '11, taken out-there desires to do great things. They seem impossible at first, but in Baxter State Park on the the faculty and staff are incredibly approachable, encouraging and hi- first night of an extended field larious, in many cases." trip to Maine's north woods Ah, staff. Perhaps there's nothing "more COA" than the recognition that for last fall's "monster class." the COA community truly consists of staff members as well as students, (More on page 25.) faculty, alumni and trustees. This issue underscores that with the pub- lication of an excerpt from Leviathan, a novel-in-progress by COA stu- dent and webmaster, Sean Murphy. Back Cover: As Karen Waldron says in these pages, "the degree is different, the ap- Solid Impenetrability in a proach is different, the students are different, the faculty is different." Vast Stand of Trees. A scene And the structure is different, too. This issue, centered upon human from the performance of ecology, our mission and major, attempts to reflect COA's singularly Graupel created by arts faculty creative approach. member Dru Colbert. Photo by Christine Heinz. (More on page 28.) Damnghld Donna Gold Editor, COA features COA Letter from the President p. 2 The College of the Atlantic Magazine Volume 5 Number 1 Spring 2009 COA Beat p. 3 EDITOR Donna Gold News from campus and beyond EDITORIAL GUIDANCE John Anderson Richard Borden Jennifer Hughes Notes from a Watson Journey p. 8 Matt Shaw '11 By Ana Maria Rey Martinez '08 Rebecca Hope Woods EDITORIAL CONSULTANT Bill Carpenter Sum & Parts p. 10 ALUMNI CONSULTANTS Jill Barlow-Kelley Dianne Clendaniel By Kirk Torregrossa '00 PROOFING Jennifer Hughes Recent Alumni Books & Albums p. 13 DESIGN Rebecca Hope Woods PRINTING JS McCarthy Printers Donor Profile p. 15 Augusta, Maine A Living, Breathing Tribute: Clare Stone and The Allan Stone Chair in the Visual Arts COA ADMINISTRATION Oral History p. 16 David Hales Andrew Griffiths Philip Kunhardt III '77: Soaked in Poetry and Utopia President Administrative Dean Sarah Baker Kenneth Hill Dean of Admission Academic Dean Poetry p. 18 Lynn Boulger Sarah Luke Quando sono nata Dean of Development Associate Dean of Ken Cline Student Life By Stefania Marchese '11 Associate Dean Sean Todd for Faculty Associate Dean for Advanced Studies The Conversations the Connections BOARD OF TRUSTEES A School of Human Ecology William G. Foulke, Jr., Ronald E. Beard, Chairman Secretary Elizabeth D. Hodder, Leslie C. Brewer, What It Means to Teach Human Ecology p. 19 Vice Chair Treasurer Casey Mallinckrodt, Taking Human Ecology Into the World p. 23 Vice Chair By Rich Borden Edward McC. Blair, Stephen G. Milliken Life Trustee Philip S. J. Moriarty T. A. Cox What's It Like to Study Human Ecology? p. 22 Phyllis Anina Moriarty David H. Fischer William V. P. Newlin, Amy Geier Life Trustee Human Ecology, the Empty Vessel p. 24 James M. Gower, Elizabeth Nitze By Michael Griffith Life Trustee Helen Porter George B. E. Hambleton Cathy L. Ramsdell '78, Samuel M. Hamill, Jr. Trustee Emeritus Experiencing Human Ecology p. 25 Charles E. Hewett John Reeves, The Maine Woods "Monster Class" Life Trustee Sherry F. Huber Hamilton Robinson, Jr. John N. Kelly, Graupel: Dru Colbert's Aesthetics of Human Ecology Trustee Emeritus p. 28 Henry L.P. Schmelzer Philip B. Kunhardt III '77 Henry D. Sharpe, Jr., By Donna Gold Life Trustee Susan Storey Lyman, Life Trustee Clyde E. Shorey, Jr., Life Trustee Suzanne Folds Leviathan: Chapter 62 p. 30 McCullagh William N. Thorndike, Jr. By Sean Hugh Murphy Sarah A. McDaniel '93 Cody van Heerden Jay McNally '84 John Wilmerding, Trustee Emeritus Class Notes p. 35 COA is published twice each year for the Faculty and Community Notes College of the Atlantic community. Ideas, p. 39 letters and submissions (we are always looking for short stories, poetry and especially revisits Q&A with Margaret Pennock '84 p. 44 to human ecology essays) should be sent to: COA Magazine Human Ecology Essay Revisited p. 45 College of the Atlantic Doubt and Enduring 105 Eden Street, Bar Harbor, ME 04609 By Libby Dean '89 (207) 288-5015, dgold@coa.edu www.coa.edu Printed on recycled paper using vegetable-based inks.