Grads

Attention all MALS graduates: The MALS Alumni Association will hold its annual luncheon and open meeting on Thursdayjuly 11, at noon. The event will be held in a new venue, the Ford Sayre/Brewster Room in the Hanover Inn. All MALS alumni, current students and faculty are invited. The popular MALS professor Klaus Milich will be the featured speaker. Last year Dr. Milich received the Association of Graduate Liberal Studies Programs' 2012 Faculty Award. His talk is titled 'We Are Family, or Can You See the Berber in Me? Genetics, Genealogy and the Humanities." The meeting will follow the luncheon and the talk and is open to all MALS alumni. During the meeting the alumni association council will share its projects and plans with you and will value your suggestions and concerns. Please call the MALS office at (603) 646-3592 for a reservation.

On April 17 Bonnie Barber posted an article about Matthew Sturdevant (MALS'08) on Dartmouth Now (now.dartmouth.edu). Matthew works as a staff writer for the HartfordCourant, Connecticut's largest daily newspaper. On December 14, 2012, he and a team of other Courant staffers covered the mass shootings in Newtown, Connecticut. On April 15 the Pulitzer Prize committee recognized them as runnersup to the winning Denver Post in the category of breaking news reporting. The Hartford Courant staff was cited "for its complete and sensitive coverage of the shooting massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, that killed 20 children and six adults, using digital tools as well as traditional reporting to tell the stoiy quickly while portraying the stunned community's grief." According to Barber, Matthew credits the MALS faculty in particular with helping him "expand my writing abilities. In the aftermath of the of the Newtown school shooting I have written stories about the families of children killed that day. The MALS program helped me write sensitively and vividly about what happened while putting the circumstances in context." She also quotes him as saying, "Fairness and accuracy are critical in an age when tidbits are leaking all over Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites. There was a lot of misinformation (about Newtown) out there that first day. Inaccurate information erodes credibility. In my reporting on the stories of people in Newtown, including victims, a sensitive and professional tone has nelped me to establish trust."

175 Greensboro Road, Hanover,NH 03755; (603) 643-3789; m.jane.welsh.adv98@alum.dartmouth.edu