Alt-weekly’s article highlights Vermont collaborations, opportunities for students
Norwich University’s new Bachelor of Science in Design Arts program got big local ink this week, with a 1,400-word feature in Vermont’s alt-weekly newspaper, Seven Days.
The story, by Anne Wallace Allen, describes how Barre, Vermont, once dominating North America’s granite industry as an impetus for originating Norwich’s program, an offering of the College of Professional Schools’ School of Architecture+Art and a partnership of the university and the Vermont Granite Museum in Barre, Vermont.
Allen describes how Norwich University’s program aims to revitalize a stone trade that drew Vermont farmworkers and immigrants to Barre for the first half of the 20th century. She also reports how Norwich Psychology Department Chairman and Vermont Academy of Arts & Sciences President Kevin Fleming encouraged the university-museum collaboration.
(The Bachelor of Design Arts program) nurtures critical thinking, includes partnerships with nearby industries and expands Norwich’s offerings to create a new undergraduate degree that unifies art, craft and technology with a pragmatic approach to integrating theory and application.
As the story relates, Norwich is working with the Stone Trust, a Dummerston, Vermont, nonprofit, to teach drystone construction and stone carving, and other Vermont institutions. Vermont Granite Museum Director Scott McLaughlin, a Norwich adjunct history professor, told Seven Days students will apprentice with local companies and graduate with the practical skills they need to earn a living.
Cara Armstrong, director of Norwich's School of Architecture+Art, told Seven Days, “This could become the kind of place where we could create a renaissance in America's stone arts as we merge new and old tools and ideas. People from around the world would come to this.”
As a university statement from May 2020 relates, the new program was developed for students who are curious, artistic and want to develop their talents for practical solutions.
“It nurtures critical thinking, includes partnerships with nearby industries and expands Norwich’s offerings to create a new undergraduate degree that unifies art, craft and technology with a pragmatic approach to integrating theory and application,” the statement said.
Patricia Canaday, a Norwich University administrative assistant, was the program’s first student; another student is due to enroll this fall.
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