Campus continues push for education around trans issues
As colleges across the nation try to accommodate LGBTQIA+ students, Wellesley students have launched the Trans People of Color (POC) Collective on campus and Wellesley 20/20 is starting up again with open and educative meetings. Trans POC Collective is one of the newest LGBTQIA+ student organizations on campus, and aims to support students of color who identify as transgender. Wellesley 20/20 will reschedule a Gender 101 workshop that it canceled on Sunday due to Flower Sunday. Its first open meeting will be this Sunday at 3 p.m. in the Library Lecture Room. Meanwhile, other college have run into trouble in promoting similar programming. University of Tennessee Knoxville (UTK) tried to recommend using only “ze” and all its forms as a gender-neutral pronoun to promote inclusion, which elicited strong opposition from UTK’s community and Tennessee lawmakers. Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey called the recommendation “political correctness gone amok.”
Wellesley alums earn around $56K ten years after graduation
The U.S. government compiled College Scorecard, which calculates and compares characteristics of colleges across the country to the national average. According to the College Scorecard, the median salary that Wellesley alums make a decade after graduating is $20K above the national average of $34K. The annual average cost for students on financial aid is about $21K, which is also above the national average of $17K. The scorecard includes a chart of the average cost dependent on the family income bracket of a student. The College Scorecard is intended to help families compare colleges based on typical student debt, the net price and other financial factors. Some high education leaders have voiced doubts about the database, claiming that it simplifies the processing of comparing specialized schools, such as an engineering college or a liberal arts college, on categories like post-grad income.
Live webcam monitors Pendleton construction
The College installed a live webcam that captures construction on Pendleton West 24 hours, seven days a week to answer the campus community’s curiosity about what is going on behind the construction site’s walls. For the next year, the feed “will allow the community to watch the project develop from the ground up,” according to the College’s website. So far, the construction site includes piles of dirt, a scooper and construction workers as renovations just began in June. Jon Alvarez, Wellesley’s director of design and construction, expects that viewers will see walls form in the next few weeks and concrete panels put into place in the spring. Construction will add 10,000 square feet to Pendleton East that will be used for visual and performing arts and connect to Jewett. Until renovations approach their expected completion time next fall, students, faculty and staff can monitor the construction progress themselves online.
College to launch “The Wellesley Effect” campaign
“The Wellesley Effect” campaign kicks off on the weekend of Oct. 23-24 with events showcasing the work of Wellesley women around the world and leadership in various fields. The College administration has coined the phrase The Wellesley Effect to mean that educated, Wellesley women can drive social change in the world. The campaign launch coincides with the annual Alumnae Achievement Awards ceremony. Parents, students, alumnae and friends of Wellesley College have been invited to attend. The keynote session will include generations of alumnae who will speak about The Wellesley Effect and their experiences with it. The weekend also features a cocktail gala in the Dorothy Towne Field House that is invitation only. After the launch, alumnae association clubs in cities around the world will host their own regional launch events through into the next year.
