Talk:Hampshire College

Initial comments
How about a new picture? This one is ugly. Also, it snows like 2/3 of the academic year at Hampshire. Maybe a nice picture with snow on the ground would be good. It's also worth noting that the standard wikipedia format for colleges has the college's seal, not an image of the campus. 

A few people have mentioned on the discussion page that the re-rad stuff is quite POV and I think that's impossible to argue with. I'm torn over whether or not it should be deleted. Any thoughts? It should AT LEAST be shortened down to a single paragraph, at most. BlackCoffee

I can't figure out the right wording, but something ought to be said about the fact that 3-person dorms have existed at Hampshire, as lounges have been occasionally converted to triples in recent housing-crunch years. Doctawojo 18:09, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

The elitist re-radicalization stuff needs to go. I would go as far as saying it's not a valid cause *and* is POV and doesn't belong here anyway. -ChristopherC

Yo, the Re-Rad stuff is a bit POV. There are lots and lots of other projects that go on and have gone on at Hampshire that are as important as that. Putting it in is just shilling for a pet cause. Not that it's not a valid cause, but it doesn't belong here. 69.236.95.188 22:08, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Over Hampshire's history, different projects have come and gone. This seems like a much more serious investigation of the school's academic structure. I'd put it up there with the reorganization of the four schools into five, and the Cole Science Center protests (which actually needs to be added to this article history at some point), as a pivotal moment in designing Hampshire. Hampshire was created as a "great experiment," as discussed in the history, and these more recent events show the continuing controversies over defining the school and its programs. 67.10.133.121 09:16, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Sorry I changed before checking the talk page... still pretty new to Wikipedia ettiquette... but I don't know that Re-Rad is anything more serious than the Radical Departure which happened in 1996-1997. I tried to capture the fact that these things happen all the time at Hampshire in my edit. and I know my opening sentence was a bit POV, but seriously, students DO have a tendency to get all sky-is-falling about these issues. I agree that the Re-Rad stuff here reads like it got added by students involved in the project who didn't have much perspective on it. Seriously, Tim Shary's booklet includes some half a dozen projects which were very much like this. I agree the Cole Science Center protests should be added. 24.199.118.71 04:41, 11 September 2006 (UTC)GusAndrews


 * "Today the school is on more solid financial footing (though still without a sizable endowment), a condition often credited to the fundraising efforts of current president Gregory S. Prince, Jr.."

Okay, this is really getting into minutiae, but I've much more often heard (prior president) Adele Simmons credited for fundraising than Prince. And the College's selectivity is still comparable to many, many other liberal arts colleges'.

Rbellin 05:02, 14 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Why do you have to adjust for size if it's already the percentage? 160.39.159.146 (talk) 00:20, 25 November 2009 (UTC)

One of Hampshire's less constructive experiments was allowing pets on campus. By the time I got there (1976), there was a sizable pack of essentially feral dogs -- students acquired puppies and many were abandoned at the end of the school year, sadly. These dogs could be fairly aggressive and making the journey from say, Dakin to the Gym after dark could be a scary experience.

I assume that allowing pets has been long discontinued, and perhaps "the hounds of Hampshire" isn't worthy of a section, but I think it's worth noting as one of the pitfalls of trying to different from other colleges in EVERY possible way. ShouldvejustgonewiththeIPaddress (talk) 16:25, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

Who would say "The College is widely known for..." when it clearly is not widely known. Seriously. Tigah Dude (talk) 04:12, 23 November 2016 (UTC)

"Lily" the frog
(in response to Rkevins82's comments on my talk page:)


 * Thanks for fixing the motto of your alma mater. However, I have reverted your change to the mascot. Just because you have never heard of something, that doesn't make it wrong. Two seconds on Google would have shown you this: [3]. Quote, "Taking Root explains Hampshire history, Hampshire legends, and the Hampshire academic system, narrated by the friendly mascot, Lily, the Hampshire frog." Rkevins82 - TALK 18:56, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

This is a good example of an instance where a single Google hit shouldn't be relied upon so exclusively. The link you're pointing to is to a comic book, created over twenty years ago, which invents a frog character to narrate about the school. I've seen the comic book (it was rediscovered and updated a couple years ago), but had forgotten the frog even had a name and I'm pretty certain "she" doesn't appear in any other college publications (official or student-generated). The whole frog-as-mascot thing is pretty marginal to the campus culture these days to begin with (our only interscholastic sports team is the "Red Scare" and Hampshire students are, if anything, known as "Hampsters"), and Lily simply doesn't exist outside of this comic book. I'm removing the reference again -- please don't revert back unless you've got something more substantial to point to. RadicalSubversiv E 20:41, 21 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Actually, the lesson here is that in trying to fill the gaps in a story, it's best to look for multiple sources. While I don't think it matters what the campus thinks of a mascot (if Illinois students either didn't like being the Illini or didn't know about it, that wouldn't change their mascot), I am glad that we've been able to straighten this out some more. After looking at some wire reports online, I've seen Hampshire college's mascot also called the "Fighting Frogs".  The original use, as you seem to agree, was Lily, though that has apparently fallen into disfavor (not enough that Lily was removed form the College webpage, in fact, restored!).  Put simply, I didn't go to Hampshire and I've never been to Hampshire - all I was trying to do was improve the article with what I thought was proper information.  The College doesn't exactly have the largest online presence, so I went with what I could. Hopefully, we can agree to leave it at "frog" - best wishes. Rkevins82 - TALK 02:48, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

The frog actually predates Lily, going back to the founding of the school when a pictorial directory was issued and quickly became known as the "frogbook" -- I believe because it had frogs on the cover. In any case, thanks for your research and good-faith efforts. RadicalSubversiv E 07:47, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

Folklore from Hampshire while I was there maintained a number of traditions: first, much as many people at Hampshire are averse to team sports, they're averse to their trappings, so we did not consider ourselves to have an "official" mascot or team color. According to legend, the frog was chosen because a species or subspecies of frog was wiped out when a swamp was drained in developing the campus. "Lily" would be the creation of Mark Tuchman, who wrote Taking Root. The fencing team when I was there was known as the "Fighting Hamsters;" the basketball team was the "Fighting Black Sheep," after the flock of sheep sold to the school along with the land the college was built on (so named by a Dean of Students who was nearly universally despised and moved on after a few years); the Ultimate team became the "Red Scare" when the UMass newspaper called them that as a joke in an April Fools issue; and the Tavern was named the Negative Space Cafe after the relatively new (and also disliked) institutional logo which replaced the breadfruit tree (which itself was mistaken as a pot leaf by many, and was drawn by the son of a school founder or original faculty member, I forget which). Many of these legends could be confirmed with the library's campus archivist, who keeps great records, but I'm not on campus and don't have the time to get in touch with her. 24.199.118.71 04:50, 11 September 2006 (UTC)GusAndrews

Discussion on selectivity
In the "History" section, it reads, "For several years in the early 1970s, directly after its founding, Hampshire College was among the most selective undergraduate programs in the United States (Making of a College 307-310)." Yeseterday, I added the word "among," which was not previously there, and asked for a citation which was quickly provided. Thanks for provideing that. It's important, however, to understand the meaning of selectivity (the citation, BTW is availabe online at http://library.hampshire.edu/archives/makingcollege/President_report.pdf relevant pages are 308 and 309.) For the first two classes at Hampshire, 14.8% and 18.9% of applicants were accepted, respectively. The next year, the rate jumped to about 30% and now sits at about 59% according to numbers provided by the College to the Princeton Review. Obviously a very low acceptance rate is one measure of selectivity of a college but by no means is it the only measure, particularly when a college is populating itself itself for the first time. There remains questions of whether the College received large numbers of minimally qualified students and accepted a smaller first year class for that reason? Or perhaps they accepted a smaller number of students because they expected to have a higher yield (the numbe of accepted applicants who, in turn, accept the invitation to attend the school). Or, perhaps, the small percentage of acceptances was due in part to a an adjustment in the College's estimation of how many students it could accommodate in the first two years, so it scaled down the number of admitted students to purposely keep the College small during the first year or two of its operation. Selectivity must be evaluated in context. We can't just look at acceptance rate alone and conclude that Hampshire is four times less selective now than it was in 1970. 71.195.206.168 12:43, 16 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Obviously you're right about the dangers of overgeneralizing from this one statistic, and I added that source because it was the only one ready to hand -- I'm afraid I've forgotten where else this institutional history is documented. This claim about selectivity does not seem very important to retain (to me), though it's a useful subject for further research for this article.  The college's folklore, at least, has it that the college was turning away many extremely qualified applicants during the few years after its founding (though you'll note that the President's Report itself expected this to revert to the norm). -- Rbellin|Talk 20:13, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

the frog
Do frog books still exist?

(Back in the day, those were the self-produced yearbooks. They weren't comic books!)

Who knows! In fact I had the same question: I think the (national/international) Facebook website may have eroded the need. But you should be signing your questions/comments, bud (friendly smile) - anonymous comments will still list the IP - Use four tildes at the end of your comment, like this - 67.10.133.121 09:00, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

nope, there aren't any more frogbooks. they haven't been around for a while. although a student search engine is lovingly referred to as "stalkernet"

The frogbook certainly does still exist at Hampshire! (Or at least it did as of November 2005, which is when I recieved my last one.) It does not, however, have pictures anymore, it's pretty much just a listing of names and numbers. There is also a search function on the Hampshire Intranet which displays ID card pictures.Tuckerekcut 03:09, 18 May 2006 (UTC), previous Hampshire Student

removing/keeping various "notable names"
I added Abraham Ravett. We're not buddies, I haven't seen or spoken to him in ten years, but can't for the life of me understand why someone would remove his name, noting that he was "not notable". (Sour grapes? - He told you you'd have to wake up at 5 AM to get a job in the film industry? He told me that, too. grin)

Please define your standards of what "notable" is. Notable does not necessarily mean "famous". It can mean being well regarded and having made achievements in your field, particularly when the person is an academic. In terms of Hampshire, its reputation has grown as a "film school", so it seems especially worthwhile to list people who are actively working in film. You can't argue that it's a matter of sheer audience size, though. Although Eugene Mirman's done great and has a VV column, arguably another alumn, Sarah Goldfinger, the script editor/writer for CSI, is having her work seen by millions more people every Thursday. But no one thought to add her before. (Hey, I didn't even know until I caught a rerun on Spike!)

Like Bill Brand (and Liebling, who has been on the planet a lot longer), Ravett is an experimental and/or documentary filmmaker. This stuff isn't going to show up with a lot of hits on IMDB, but the sheer number of prestigious theatres and festivals that have shown his work makes him notable. Oh, he's also listed on the New York Times film database, with particular note to his work "Forgotten Tenor", a critically acclaimed jazz documentary. It's still considered one of the main references on Wendell Gray's life: http://www.villagevoice.com/home/0323,mitchner,44581,23.html

Meanwhile, one of the alumns listed is primarily known because he appeared once on a game show and is a political blogger and operative. Outside of political circles he might not be considered as notable as, say, Micah Marshall, but in his field, he's notable.

In fact, there are several other professors associated with the school today or at one time, who belong on the list. Off the top of my head: Susan Douglas, popular culture critic and David C. Kelly (due to the popularity of Yellow Pig Day). I don't know Kelly and have generally snarky things to say about Douglas, but they've made their impact.

So, again, if anything - this list of notables is too short, not too long. 67.10.133.121 19:12, 2 February 2006 (UTC)


 * No, I'm not in the film industry. I don't know him, just like the next 100 people you would meet on the street.  He pulls about 500 hits in the Google test, which doesn't seem very high to me for a professor.  If he is so notable, maybe you could make a page.  Any of the others that are non-notable you should cut. Rkevins82 23:52, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Div 1 requirements
"Before the fall of 2002, Division 1 traditionally consisted of five independent projects, one in each of the "Schools" or academic departments. These projects could consist of purely independent work, or one course and a smaller independent project."

I entered in 2000, and this statement does not describe my program. There were 4 div 1 exams in 5 areas, one of which was not a school (QA- quantitative analysis). Students were required to complete 2 project-based exams, and 2 other options (one-plus-one, two-course, or transfer credits). Transfer students were only required to complete 1 project-based exam. Students were allowed- but not required- to use more than two projects to satisfy the exam requirement.

I thought I'd post before changing the article, because the program was continually changing at that point, and often pretty vague. I'm positive about the 4 div I exams, but there may have been more options for satisfying them. As a transfer, I had one transfer credit, a two-course, a one-plus-one (an AP test from high school + an HC class), and a project. I definitely only completed one project.

Juicifer451 16:27, 14 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes -- the sentences you quote are simply false. Thanks for pointing it out.  That whole paragraph seems garbled and distorted, and a bit like it's trying to advance an agenda -- it should be corrected or cut to strictly factual descriptions.  Feel free to fix it, and I'll try to look it over as well. -- Rbellin|Talk 16:38, 14 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Done. Juicifer451 19:49, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Initially, there were only four schools (H&A, NS, LC, SS). As a result only four Division I exams were needed. I entered Hampshire in 1976; not sure how long after that it was changed to five schools. Also, at that time it was possible for transfer students to get previous credits accepted as one or more Div I exams. I don't know if that is still the case. -- ShouldvejustgonewiththeIPaddress (talk) 16:17, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

Accreditation
I'm removing a section from "current issues" on the school's accreditation. It does not seem important enough to merit a mention, since (a) all colleges and universities are periodically re-accredited in exactly the same way and (b) Wikipedia is not a current-news source. And no sources are cited that would give any reason why this was more relevant or interesting than every other routine reaccreditation in the academic world. If there's some reason why it is more relevant or meaningful than it appears, then this needs to be cited and explained in the article. -- Rbellin|Talk 00:46, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Yellow Pigs Day
Is there a reason that Yellow Pigs Day does not have it's own article or at least have it as part of the Hampshire College Summer Studies in Mathematics article. I went to Hampshire College and didn't know about Yellow Pigs day until I heard it about it from someone at MIT. It's definitely important but definitely not an important part of the college. -- mako (talk•contribs) 23:22, 17 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I think that there was originally a separate article on Yellow Pig Day, and when that article was deleted (the subject not being important enough to warrant a separate article), the content was mistakenly merged into this article. You're right, it should be in the Hampshire College Summer Studies in Mathematics article, not this one. -- Rbellin|Talk 01:31, 18 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Makes sense. I've gone ahead and made that edit. Thanks for your input! --mako (talk•contribs) 05:59, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Andrew Rich
I removed "Andrew Rich, American Winemaker" from the list of notable alumni because I there was no article and, searching around on a few places, I couldn't find any information to claim that he was notable. He does, of course, seem to be a winemaker. Before re-adding him, please add a reference to demonstrate notability or, better yet, provide such a reference on the Andrew Rich page and then link to it from her. — m a k o ๛  12:28, 6 July 2007 (UTC)


 * The list of "notable" alumni should really only contain people who are notable enough to have Wikipedia articles. I'm removing the red-linked names again now; editors who think any of them are notable enough for an encyclopedic treatment are welcome to begin articles on them and then re-add them to the list.  -- Rbellin|Talk 15:26, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

"experimenting"
It seems like every month or so someone deletes the word "experimenting" from the lead sentence, or substitutes "experimental," without explanation. But the school's preferred self-description uses "experimenting," and it's worth preserving for that reason and for descriptive specificity even if it reads a bit oddly. It is a principle of Wikipedia's house style that a lead sentence needs to mention what makes the article's subject interesting, and succinctly describe what distinguishes it from other things like it (i.e., in this case, from conventional liberal arts colleges). Unless someone can present a strong argument for deleting it, "experimenting" should stay in the lead sentence. Please don't continue delete it without providing any explanation or justification. -- Rbellin|Talk 20:45, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Content removal
An anonymous user has removed content in this edit. --Joshua Issac (talk) 16:05, 9 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I think deleting this content is a good idea. An encyclopedia article on the college does not need to go into excruciating detail about the transient issues of the moment (see WP:UNDUE).  And this stuff is really not notable enough to deserve mention -- the purpose of the article should be to describe the important facts about the institution to an outsider, not to serve as a record of every student grievance in its history.  If every college article did this we'd be deluged in complaints about dining-hall food at the expense of broad coverage and readability. -- Rbellin|Talk 16:22, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Notable Alumns/Faculty
Just removing alumni because they are not linked seems sketchy. Some of the people who were removed are well known and frequently mentioned in relation to the school. I've added a couple of them back and then placed the rest below. Add them back and, if possible, create an article! If they have article (i.e., if they are not red links below) please don't hesitate to add them back!


 * Ethan Gilsdorf, poet and journalist, author of "Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks: An Epic Quest for Reality Among Role Players, Online Gamers, and Other Dwellers of Imaginary Realms"
 * Ben Herson, founder of Nomadic Wax Global Hip-Hop and Underground Music and Media Company
 * Eric Krasno, guitarist for Soulive and Lettuce.
 * Alice Kinnon and Charlotte Pingress, characters in the film The Last Days of Disco
 * Ray Coppinger, world-renowned dog behavior expert and ethologist
 * (fictional) In an SNL episode aired on December 14, 2002 host, Al Gore plays Dr. Ralph Wormly Curtis, a professor at Hampshire College. In the same sketch it is implied that the band Phish attends Hampshire as well, though in reality all four members attended the University of Vermont.
 * Justin Carven, founder of Greasecar.

— m a k o ๛  02:08, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

More Content Removal
Removed the section on the 2009 Israeli Divestment controversy. First, it did not seem remotely NPOV - it was clearly written by one or more people firmly on the side of SJP (the group advocating the divestment) and does not give equal weight to opposing viewpoints, as well as cherry picking its facts. In this case equal weight was necessary and would not fall under undue weight, given that there were a wide range of views held across campus and one was not singularly dominating.

Of course, the solution to this issue would be to edit it such that it was NPOV. The reason I deleted it wholesale is that it seems out of place in the scope of the article. It is illustrating a single event in the history of Hampshire college in through detail. This might be more acceptable if a campus-rocking event wasn't an annual occurance at Hampshire. At the time this was written, it was presumably a current event. It no longer is, and no longer has a place in this article. Aerothorn (talk) 23:34, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Divestment from Occupation of Palestine
There seems to be no note surrounding the divestment from the Occupation of Palestine. Um, this history, though contentious, has been well documented by many sources, and I have a feeling that Hampshire College itself is responcible for removing any discussion of this because there are certainly enough sources (from various sources) to be cited about this event - which If I am not mistaken is against Wikipedia's norms. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.240.205.12 (talk) 03:27, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

The Logo
Someone with better coding skills than I posses should really update the logo as I will probably break the whole page. The one currently on the page is incorrect. This page: http://www.hampshire.edu/7139.htm has the official version as well as an explanation of the colors. The two vertical bars should not be the same color as is the case with the logo currently displayed. Cryseyde (talk) 17:09, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

Info from Hampshire Staff Member (and COI declaration)
I am a member of the communications office at Hampshire College, and wish to disclose my possible COI. I would like to suggest a few factual corrections on behalf of Hampshire's communications office, and in consultation with them.

Our current endowment is $34 million and our current undergraduate class size is 1400. Our average class size is also 15. These numbers can be verified on our website http://www.hampshire.edu/discover/4637.htm

Also, the information on the colors are incorrect. The Hampshire College logo, four rectangles that form an H in the open space between them, represents the four colleges (Amherst, Mt. Holyoke, Smith, and the University of Massachusetts Amherst). The logo employs the four “founders” colors, which closely approximate the colors of the founding schools. The colors are purple, blue, red, maroon, and white. Verification on the logo can be found here: http://www.hampshire.edu/7139.htm. I can also supply the pms or cmyk if that would be useful.

Also, it is probably misleading to place Diana Arbus under our notable past and present faculty, as she only taught one summer workshop.

I do have a number of other factual edits and suggestions, but would like to start with this to get a sense of how I can best offer edits to you and be fully transparent about my relationship to the College. Please let me know if you have suggestions or if I can continue as I have above. --Dora Meer13 (talk) 16:57, 26 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Hey Dora - This was mixed in with the "initial comments" so I gave it its own section. I'm checking your sources and am happy to implement the corrections if it checks out! Aerothorn (talk) 01:44, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Okay, While I have no reason to suspect the college would be dishonest about its endowment, the college's own website isn't the strongest source for the endowment numbers. Can you provide some sort of public filings that reveal the same information? The last numbers were cited from such a source and I believe it would be poor form to replace them with these if I couldn't get an equally strong source. Other suggestions seem good and I am adding those. Aerothorn (talk) 01:55, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Hi Aerothorn - thanks for giving this its own space. I will look into finding a third party source for our endowment number. Also, here are a few suggested edits for the notable alumni and faculty section, if you approve (and let me know if you want me to supply citations or links for any of this):

Notable Alumni corrections or additions: Stephen Petronio is a choreographer, not a composer Naomi Wallace is also a MacArthur Fellowship recipient Stephen McDonnell: I don't think there need to be single quotes around Applegate Farms

Notable Alumni to add: Nancy Lord, past Alaska Writer Laureate Roger Sherman, Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker Buddy Squires, Oscar-nominated filmmaker and Emmy winning director of photography Doug Stanton, writer, In Harm's Way Erica Wheeler, singer-songwriter

Faculty Corrections or additions: Micheal Klare is a scholar on U.S defense policy and global resource issues Michael Lesy is also a U.S. Artists Foundation Simon Fellow

Faculty additions (these are all current faculty) Aracelis Girmay, poet Polina Barskova poet, Russian literature Ryan Joo, top-selling Korean author

I also wonder if the first paragraph under the History heading could be revised to the following, taken from our website's history page. I think it is both more descriptive and easier to follow:

The idea for Hampshire originated in 1958 when the presidents of Amherst, Mount Holyoke, and Smith Colleges, as well as the University of Massachusetts Amherst, appointed a committee to reexamine the assumptions and practices of liberal arts education.

Their report, “The New College Plan,” advocated many of the features that have since been realized in the Hampshire curriculum: emphasis on each student’s curiosity and motivation; broad, multidisciplinary learning; and close mentoring relationships with teachers.

In 1965, Amherst College alumnus Harold F. Johnson donated $6 million toward the founding of Hampshire College.

With a matching grant from the Ford Foundation, Hampshire’s first trustees purchased 800 acres of orchard and farmland in South Amherst, Massachusetts, and construction began. Hampshire admitted its first students in 1970.

--Dora Meer13 (talk) 16:39, 13 November 2013 (UTC)


 * Those updates looked good, so added them in (save the various awards/nominations for artists, which seems to generally not be Wikipedia house style just so such lists do not become clogged with them). Aerothorn (talk) 02:06, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Request Edit
Hello, I am a staff member at Hampshire sharing some new information that I believe should be added below the 2019 section to reflect all the more positive changes and growth the school has gone through in the last two years. I posted this in my previous COI section but am moving it here.

2020-present: Hampshire’s Fundraising Efforts, Admissions Gains, and COVID-19 Response In fall 2020, the college welcomed a total of 119 new students, an 815% increase from the previous year.

Hampshire College also began celebrating its 50th Anniversary in October 2020 through a series of virtual events, with an in-person celebration planned for October 15–17, 2021.

Hampshire recently ranked #8 among best liberal arts colleges in the U.S. https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2021/01/27/new-ranking-system-lists-swarthmore-as-nations-1-liberal-arts-college/?sh=2d60d31a40ee

Academic Changes

In 2020, the College introduced the addition of theme-based Learning Collaboratives to the curriculum. These collaboratives serve to bring disciplines together to address pressing issues facing society through an interdisciplinary lens. The Learning Collaboratives will evolve and change to reflect the world around us. Hampshire announced that the four 2020-2022 Learning Collaboratives are Environments and Change, In/justice, Media and Technology, and Time and Narrative.

Fundraising Efforts

As part of the college’s ongoing fundraising efforts, in mid-November of 2020, the College announced its largest single donation since its founding when philanthropists Paula and James S. Crown 71F, the latter of whom is an alum, invested $5 million in Hampshire’s Change in the Making campaign. That same month, Hampshire College announced a second multimillion-dollar donation when retired NASA scientist and alum Dr. Lucy McFadden 70F contributed $2 million. The Change in the Making: A Campaign for Hampshire has raised $22,538,810 since its launch in January 2019.

COVID-19 Response During the fall semester, Hampshire repurposed the Robert Crown Center gymnasium as a testing center for asymptomatic COVID-19 infection. Every other week, all students and those faculty and staff members working on campus in close proximity with others participated in the testing program. The College also provided symptomatic tests at their on-campus clinic. Hampshire was one of the safest campuses in the country, with only six COVID-19 cases among the students and a positivity rate far below that of the local community. In January of 2021, the college was listed as the #1 chill college by College Magazine because of its mix of self-determined academics and peaceful location. https://www.collegemagazine.com/college-magazines-top-10-most-chill-colleges-in-the-country/ Other Supporting links https://www.gazettenet.com/HampshireGift-hg-111920-37383084 https://www.gazettenet.com/HampshireDonation-hg-112420-37456793 https://www.hampshire.edu/news/2020/12/17/hampshire-successfully-implements-campus-covid-19-testing-program https://www.hampshire.edu/news/2020/11/23/alum-makes-2-million-donation-second-seven-figure-contribution-this-month https://www.hampshire.edu/news/2020/10/22/in-conversation-with-christoph-cox-part-1 https://www.hampshire.edu/news/2020/08/26/getting-to-know-the-fall-2020-entering-students

Dora Meer13 (talk) 14:37, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

Below are a few suggestions, expansion of information for the Curriculum and Schools and Programs section.

Under Curriculum, I am thinking that the last two paragraphs are not from a NPOV and also don't have citations. Beyond that, the changes to the Div system it talks about in the first paragraph are nearly a decade old. I would suggest editing to simply say the current requirements (or removing all of it):

"Effective in Fall of 2011, students are required to fulfill four of the five distribution areas: Arts, Design, and Media (ADM), Culture, Humanities, and Languages (CHL), Mind, Brain, and Information (MBI), Physical and Biological Sciences (PBS), Power, Community, and Social Justice (PCSJ). Students are expected to complete seven courses in their first year, four to fulfill distribution areas and three elective courses in areas of their own choosing.[8]" ✅

I would also propose some edits to the Schools and Programs section. First, the sentence "The Schools function much as departments do at a traditional liberal arts college," does not seem accurate to me. I am not sure what evidence would be useful to give here. ✅

While there may be some basic similarities in that both the Schools and a traditional department have Deans (or Chairs) and somewhat similar administrative functions, by Wikipedia's own definition academic departments are "a division of a university or school faculty devoted to a particular academic discipline." This is certainly very much less the case at Hampshire, where faculty and students work very broadly and purposefully across and through disciplines. I think that sentence is dismissive of these more broader academic and pedagogical differences.

To further explain the interdisciplinary nature of the schools, I thought it would be better to show examples of areas of study for each (this language is taken directly from the College website, ):

"Hampshire’s Five Interdisciplinary Schools Instead of traditional, single-discipline departments, Hampshire's curriculum is organized into five interdisciplinary schools: Needs an independent source

The School of Cognitive Science (CS) engages students with interests ranging from psychology, philosophy, and neuroscience to animal behavior, child development, computer science, digital multimedia, linguistics, and more.

The School of Critical Social Inquiry (CSI) includes faculty trained in history, psychology, psychoanalysis, anthropology, economics, sociology, politics, law, philosophy, cultural studies, and education. What unites CSI is a common commitment to understanding the processes of social and cultural formations and their implications.

School of Humanities, Arts, and Cultural Studies (HACU) engages students with interests ranging from philosophy, literature, film, video, photography, history, dance, painting, art history, cultural theory and history, critical theory, religious studies, studio arts, to ancient studies, music, American studies, media studies, environmental design, and architecture.

In the School for Interdisciplinary Arts (IA), students and professors work across boundaries of art forms such as theatre, sculpture, writing, literature, children's theatre, creative drama, and arts and social action.

School of Natural Science (NS) students involve themselves in original scientific research. Areas of interest include environmental sciences, agricultural studies, health sciences, and more. Students can--and do--concentrate in almost every branch of science, from astronomy and bioengineering to marine ecology and genetics."

Also, currently there is only one line describing a Hampshire center or program, of which Hampshire has many more. I would suggest the following edits below:

"Centers and Programs

The College supports a number of programs and centers that focus on new, emerging areas of study that aim to establish novel combinations of disciplines or to integrate learning with community-based or socially conscious endeavors internal and external to the college.

Examples include:

Culture, Brain, and Development Program (CBD)

Critical Studies of Childhood, Youth, and Learning

Center for Design

Law Program

Farm Center

The Five College Program in Peace and World Security Studies (PAWSS) is based at Hampshire; its director is Michael Klare.[9]

Full list of centers and programs: http://www.hampshire.edu/academics/533.htm" Most of the article's content should be from independent sources

Finally, I would like to suggest some edits to the Five College Consortium section. When compared to the other four colleges in the consortium, our wikipedia description feels the least flushed out. Below is the description of the Five College Consortium directly taken from Amherst College's Wikipedia page, with only the corrections made to make it refer to Hampshire instead. I think this description is much more thorough and descriptive of the consortium and its related academic merits. (I hope this is okay to suggest. If not please let me know and I can draft a version unique to us, I just thought it would work best to illustrate the differences in descriptions across pages.)

"Hampshire is a member of the Five Colleges consortium, which allows its students to attend classes at four other Pioneer Valley institutions. These include Mount Holyoke College, Smith College, Amherst College, and the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Hampshire students have an additional 5,300 classes to consider through the Consortium (without paying additional tuition) and access to 8 million library volumes.[citation needed] The Five Colleges are geographically close to one another and are linked by buses that run between the campuses.

The Five Colleges share resources and develop common academic programs. Museums10 is a consortium of local art, history and science museums. The Five College Dance Department is one of the largest in the nation.[35] The joint Astronomy department shares use of the Five College Radio Astronomy Observatory, which contributed to work that won the 1993 Nobel Prize in Physics.[36]

The Five College Coastal and Marine Sciences Program offers an interdisciplinary curriculum to undergraduates in the Five Colleges.[37] Through active affiliations with national centers for marine study, students engage in hands-on research to complement course work. The disciplines represented include biology, botany, chemistry, ecology, geology, physics, wildlife management, and zoology in the sciences, and economics, government, and public policy in the social sciences. Many students in the program go on to advanced study or professional work in various areas of marine science."

Please let me know if there are questions about my suggestions, or if you need further citations or references. --Dora Meer13 (talk) 15:08, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Recent Political Issues
This is a section made to specifically talk about the recent political issues. Covering up the facts of the communities response, statements made, and the effect is what is a NPOV issue. This is a real thing that happened. I will gladly work with you Dynagirl to find a common ground, perhaps two sections, with a college point of view and community reaction. Or different format. However quotes from the Official Spokes person from the college, the president of the college, the local state representative, the mayor of the largest local city, information about the number of protesters, etc are not irrelevant or slanted pieces of information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Umassfan (talk • contribs) 06:13, 28 November 2016 (UTC)
 * This section is useful but: (1) should not be the first section (no other college/university page has such a thing) and (2) includes editorializing prose. Consequently, I'll move it to the "in the media section" and attempt to clean up the prose. -Reagle (talk) 13:53, 28 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Okay, that's all I can do now, I left templates for additional improvements. -Reagle (talk) 14:10, 28 November 2016 (UTC)


 * Moved it back to its own section, below history. In respect to no other college has this, I can't say I haven't read all colleges pages on wikipedia, however no other college has ever made this decision either. I added back the quotes from Lash and Courtmanche but made it clear that they were quoted as saying and gave the link. This is a relevant piece of information to have.  I also added recent information regarding the petition on whitehouse.gov to freeze federal funding.  Feel free to edit these things, however I feel like we are close to an appropriate addition, it is important for people to see the quotes from the inappropriate side, not just the marketing team rendered quote provided earlier as that does not adequately show the event.  It should remain it's own section as well, this is a defining moment in the history of the school and it is not a backpage subsection issue.:::: Umassfan (talk) 03:09, 29 November 2016 (UTC) UMassfan
 * (cc: ) I'm reverting some recent changes that are violations of WP:NPOV and WP:BLP. Critically, Courtmanche was referring to students who regard the flag as "a powerful symbol of fear" and it is completely misleading to say he was "was quoted as calling the American Flag 'a powerful symbol of fear'." Claiming that the protests will "continue to grow in size" violates WP:CRYSTAL. I don't really care where the section goes, but this is a minor incident in the college's history and we should be careful that it isn't given undue weight. The petition could be included at some point, but seeing as it only has 1,373 signatures right now, it doesn't seem noteworthy. Please gain consensus here before reverting again. gobonobo  + c 04:43, 29 November 2016 (UTC)
 * The petition is nothign but a user-generated piece. It appears that anyone can open a petition on anything there. If it receives 100,000 signatures in 30 days then it will be looked at by the powers that be. Even then, so what. Take a look at http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/doris-day-petition-hits-the-mark-1.209426 for a meaningless online petition to have a Canadian politician change his name. It had hundreds of thousands of signatures. Meters (talk) 05:09, 29 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Forgot to say that I support User:Gobonobo's undo. Meters (talk) 05:21, 29 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I appreciate your points/edits. -Reagle (talk) 14:31, 29 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Editing back, the points are relevant and the petition was reported on in the news. In addition I moved it back out and to the top, we can keep having the back and fourth, however you are just trying to make it go away which it won't.  This is relevant information for people interested in Hampshire College to be confronted with.  This type of negative public opinion about a local college is completely unprecedented and therefor should be made its own section.  If you are concerned about the quotes that your schools spokesman and president were quoted as stating than maybe you should talk to them about picking better words.::::::  Umassfan (talk) 15:55, 29 November 2016 (UTC) umassfan


 * I removed the part about expected to grow in size, I agree there, I left the rest and filed a arbitration request. Real quotes, quoted by national media from the official public speakers of the institution are relevent information. A petition that gained 800 signatures in a day and has been reported by 2 local and 1 national news source is relevant.  This section is and always meant to be about the Community Anger over the issue.  I agreed a while back to change the name from Political Image Issue to its current name, however I feel perhaps two sections are necessary one where you can talk about why the college did it and another where the communities reaction can be shared as it is a defining moment in the history of a the college.::::::Umassfan (talk) 16:15, 29 November 2016 (UTC)
 * , restoring BLP violations like that is a sure-fire way to get yourself blocked. Please review WP:3RR and recognize that you are reverting over the stated wishes of multiple editors. gobonobo  + c 16:55, 29 November 2016 (UTC)


 * Thanks Reagle and Gobonobo and Meters, its clear this has become a heated battle and representation of factual information is clearly important here. The current section regarding the flag reads well. There are multiple sources to back up the story as currently quoted if needed. There are numerous mischaracterizations of the incidents that have been portrayed by less-than-credible sources, which seem to be a rallying cry around this heated subject. For what its worth, this private college has a history of protest and the entire section of "in the media" could be expanded.--Debaser42 (talk) 02:48, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

It's my clear assertion that you are biased. that what I have posted is factual. That you out of bias Continue to delete things that are cited properly. For this reason and do to your repetitive biased changes I have filed for official arbitration.Umassfan (talk) 17:00, 29 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Your WP:E1, subsequent history of only editing this page, and knowledge of rules falls under WP:PREC. It seems like you're asking for arbitration against multiple long-term editors despite you not editing from your main account. --Debaser42 (talk) 03:07, 30 November 2016 (UTC)
 * I agree that the current version of this section reads well, and I don't see any bias. Umassfan's repeated accusations of bias are a personal attack, and the repeated claims that arbitration has been requested are false. Meters (talk) 03:40, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Removal of images
I would like to request to remove the following images: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hampshire_College_viewed_from_Bare_Mountain,_October_2017.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hampshire_College_campus_in_the_snow_December_2017.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:R.W._Kern_Center_at_night.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:R.W._Kern_Center_at_night.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:MapleSugarShack.jpg

This is because I feel I have added too many of my images and this article has become to cluttered. I apologize for removing them without any notice. I own the rights to these photographs.

Thanks, 132ARb6558 (talk) 12:49, 4 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Disregard my discussion. The images stay. 132ARb6558 (talk) 13:22, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
 * As explained on your talk page, when you uploaded the images you released the rights.  You cannot undo that, and "I no longer want my images on this page" is not a valid reason for us to remove them form the article. I agree that there are too many pictures on the page, and I think that some of them are not great pictures and do not contribute  significantly to the article. I wouldn't object to removing some of them on those grounds. Meters (talk) 15:58, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

I'm not going to get into an argument over the pictures' qualities, but I am going to remove a couple photographs that have no connection to the article. The one's I mentioned I feel are fine, but the one of the Housing Operations and Hampshire in Winter, I am going to remove because that do not pertain to this article.

Thanks, 132ARb6558 (talk) 20:47, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
 * And I removed one that I consider to be a terrible picture for this article. An image that is 90% sky contributes nothing to the article. Meters (talk) 20:54, 4 July 2018 (UTC).

This is a bad choice of an image for this article. I will plan to place a new and better image of the building sometime this year.

132ARb6558 (talk) 21:26, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Request to move Alumni and Faculty to new page
I would like to request to move the Notable Alumni list to a new page since it is quite large and taking up space.

Thanks, 132ARb6558 (talk) 13:41, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Raymond Coppinger
I recently made an article for professor Raymond Coppinger. It is a work in progress. I would appreciate any assistance from the Hampshire community. Thanks! Thriley (talk) 17:33, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

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