Rhode Island College Faculty of Arts and Sciences

10/28/2024

Join us for the Open Books - Open Minds Visiting Author Talk featuring Ryka Aoki, the author of this year's common book, "Light from Uncommon Stars!"

📅 Date: Thursday, November 7, 2024
🕓 Time: 4:30 PM - 6:30 PM
📍 Location: Gage Hall 100

This is a fantastic opportunity to hear from the author and engage in a thought-provoking discussion about the book. A signing will follow, so bring your copy or get one at the event!

All alumni are encouraged to attend and reconnect while exploring this year's shared reading experience. Don't miss out on this enriching event!

10/21/2024

Check out these gorgeous photographs of our most recent theatrical production of Blithe Spirit! If you missed it, you missed a fantastic show, but make sure not to miss the remaining in our season, which include Into the Woods, Almost Maine, Antigone, The Prom, and The Revolutionists. See below for a link to the box office!

10/18/2024

Recently, our Biology 318 Ecology Lab (under the mentorship of Dr. Daniel Hewins) visited Stump Pond in Smithfield, Rhode Island, to collect and study benthic invertebrates. These aquatic organisms, which vary in their tolerance to pollution, serve as key indicators of ecosystem health. In addition to sampling invertebrates, students measured critical water quality parameters, including dissolved oxygen, pH, and turbidity, all of which are essential for sustaining aquatic life. After a day of fieldwork, students returned to RIC to identify their specimens, assign them to a pollution tolerance category, and summarize their findings in lab reports. They also learned about the process of obtaining DEM Scientific Collectors Permits, with their data being submitted as part of the annual report to the DEM by the Biology 318 Lab course.

In addition to the environmental biology classes, Arts and Sciences also boasts a popular Environmental Studies major, and an active Environmental Club!

10/18/2024

Looking for something to do this week? Check out the exhibit juried by our very own award winning Art Professor Stephen Fisher.

10/11/2024

At RIC's school of Arts and Sciences, we prioritize and value experiential learning for our students. For example, recently in Anthropology professor Dr. Baker’s ethnobotany class, the students went to her studio to learn about plant dyes and botanical printing. They also had the opportunity to print their own cotton scarves.

In the dye workshop, students learned how to prepare fabric for dying and the ways mordants (some mineral and some plant-based) work to bond plant dyes to cloth fibers. Depending on the mordant, different colors bond more effectively; some students had scarves mordanted with copper, enhancing dyes in the blue/green spectrum, and other students dyed scarves with a mordant mixture of alum and aluminum acetate (enhancing the red-yellow spectrum), a touch of copper, and iron (which darkens the dyes). They also learned how shifting the ph to make a dye more acidic or alkaline can dramatically change the color of plant dyes.

Students then went through the yard to collect leaves and flowers. They learned about which plants dye (add color), block (prevent dying: grasses and hosta), discharge (remove color: Virginia creeper) and some that both discharge and dye (Japanese maple).
After selecting their plants, they laid out the plants on their scarves and rolled them tightly on wooden dowels. The scarves were steamed for an hour and then unwrapped their scarves to see the beautiful results. Check out the pictures below!

10/07/2024

Did you know that the beautiful RIC campus is one of the state's only official arboretums? RIC's school of Arts and Sciences is proud to help sponsor a new project designed to propagate oak trees grown from the acorns of RIC's beautiful oaks to help restore Rhode Island's oak tree populations, and bring a little piece of RIC to communities around the state.

Students and faculty members (and some other helpers!) worked last week to gather more than 240 acorns from trees around the campus, and planted them. In the upcoming years we will have many RIC Oak seedlings! The plan is to give these seedlings to Rhode Islanders and RIC graduates, so that they can maintain a living connection in their yards and neighborhoods to our wonderful RIC community.

Here's a link to a list of the trees you can visit in our campus arboretum: https://www.ric.edu/department-directory/division-administration-finance/facilities-and-operations/campus-sustainability/arboretum-accreditation/celebrating-trees-ric

10/07/2024

We welcome you to come this week to hear Physical Sciences' alum Dr. Chris Reddy speak to how RIC's school of Arts and Sciences helped him build the foundation for his success as a senior scientist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute and as a prominent expert in science communication during crises.

07/30/2024

We are shaping the future in Arts and Sciences. Join us!

07/30/2024

Last week, RIC Arts and Sciences undergraduate students in Biology and Biochemistry presented their research projects at the Rhode Island Summer Undergraduate Research Symposium hosted by URI and joined by students from institutions across Rhode Island. Working on everything from sea urchins (which they harvested from the waters of the Pacific in Washington state) to K-12 lesson plans about reducing pollutants in our local waterways, to examining the DNA repair capabilities of cancer tumors, our students illustrate the importance that the school of Arts and Sciences places on experiential learning and undergraduate research.

Congratulations to our fantastic students, who will continue pursuing their studies next year at RIC as sophomores, juniors, and seniors! We look forward to seeing your growth as researchers and scholars, and to your important contributions to our understanding of nature and the world around us. (For more details on their projects, you can zoom in on the photos of their posters!)

We also wanted to highlight and recognize the wonderful talents and care of the faculty mentors for the projects: Dr. Anabela Resende da Maia and Dr. Carla Narvaez Diaz of the Biology Department, and Dr. Jamie Towle-Weicksel of the Physical Sciences Department.

07/09/2024

Four Justice Studies undergraduate students (and now recent Arts and Sciences alums!) wrote a 116-page book in which they interviewed professionals in the field of criminal justice. The authors are Ethan Bernardo ’24, Tyler Morra ’24, Troy Morgan ’24 and Priscilla Nichols ’24.

Their book includes interviews with DEA and FBI agents, local and state police officers, a judge and defense attorney, the executive director of the Rhode Island Training School for juvenile offenders, and the chair of the Probation and Parole Board for adults exiting the prison system.

The book is named in their honor – “Guardians of Justice.” For more information, see:

Four justice studies students wrote a 116-page book in which they interviewed professionals in the field of criminal justice. The authors are Ethan Bernardo ’24, Tyler Morra ’24, Troy Morgan ’24 and Priscilla Nichols ’24.Their book includes interviews with DEA and FBI agents, local and state...

07/01/2024

Looking for a good listen? Listen to New Books Network podcast with our very own Arts and Sciences English Associate Professor Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo as he discusses his new book "Growing up in the Gutter: Diaspora and Comics"!

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