Alumni News

Booker Prize-winning author Kiran Desai '93 was one of sixteen Indian writers who traveled across the country to document the HIV/AIDS crisis for the new book AIDS Sutra: Untold Stories from India.

Michael Pollan ’76 seems to have stirred the political pot with his much-read column in The New York Times asking the next U.S. president to rethink the nation’s food policy. President Barack Obama cited Pollan’s piece at length in a pre-election interview with Time Magazine:

The entire Bennington community mourns the death of alumna, long-time administrator, and Trustee Rebecca B. Stickney, who died on August 21, 2008, after a brief illness.

The Guggenheim Memorial Foundation has announced that five members of Bennington's community have been honored with this year's 2008 Guggenheim Fellowships for their "distinguished achievement in the past and exceptional promise for future accomplishment." Guggenheim Fellowships, one of the nation's most prestigious honors, were given to current MFA in Writing faculty member Michael Paul Burkard; acclaimed poet Reginald Shepherd '88; innovative choreographer Myrna Packer '74; New Yorker magazine editor and translator Ann Goldstein '71; and professor of organism biology and ecology at the University of Massachusetts, Laurie R. Godfrey '67.

 Joan Tower '61,  one of America’s preeminent composers won three Grammy Awards for her orchestral composition "Made in America."