UMW has selected Dear Evan Hansen text and accompanying soundtrack as the UMW Common Experience for 2018-2019 academic year.

Featuring a high school student with a social anxiety disorder who struggles to make social connections, Dear Evan Hansen is a 2015 stage musical with music and lyrics by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, and a book written by Steven Levenson. The musical premiered in Washington, D.C. in 2015 and opened on Broadway in 2016. Dear Evan Hansen’s original Broadway cast recording entered the Billboard 200 at number eight in February 2017.

A launch party will be hosted on Wednesday, May 2 from 2-4 p.m. in the University Center’s Magnolia Room (406A). UMW faculty and staff are invited to stop by to pick up a complimentary copy of the book and sign up to be a facilitator for the Common Experience Discussions on Friday, August 24.

UMW will also be creating a video of UMW community members singing “You Will be Found” from the Dear Evan Hansen soundtrack. A video camera will be available at the launch party for recording. Individuals or groups can also email video clips to kslunt@umw.edu by Friday, June 1. Piano accompaniment for recordings is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wfaBzHd5QA.

If you cannot attend but would like to participate in the Common Experience discussions, please contact Kelli Slunt at kslunt@umw.edu. Join the conversation on social media with #youwillbefound.

Gari Melchers Home and Studio at Belmont will host a spring open house Sunday, April 22. The museum will open its doors free of charge to the public from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., allowing visitors to experience the 28-acre estate and former residence of the artists Gari Melchers and his wife Corinne.

Featuring complimentary house and studio tours, the open house will allow visitors to stroll the restored gardens and find unique gifts in the museum shop. Drop-in Preschool Palette classes will be conducted from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The Roots house will be open 12 noon until 3 pm during which time guides will give the public a rare view of the building and share its fascinating history.

Glory Dawgz will be serving gourmet hot dogs throughout the day. Gari Melchers Home and Studio is a 28-acre estate and former residence of the artist Gari Melchers and his wife Corinne. The property, which is operated by the University of Mary Washington, is both a Virginia Historic Landmark and a National Historic Landmark. Located at 224 Washington St. in Falmouth, Virginia, a quarter mile west of the intersection of U.S. 1 and U.S. 17, it is open daily with an admission charge.

For directions and more information, call 540-654-1015, or visit the museum website at www.GariMelchers.org.

Do you know of interesting or noteworthy students who are graduating this May? Has a student overcome a significant challenge or succeeded despite overwhelming odds? Has a student attained a remarkable achievement?

The Office of Media and Public Relations would like to hear about those students. We will share graduating senior story ideas with local and regional news media and will consider them for future story possibilities on the UMW website.

If you know of a student who has a unique story, please send a description of the student’s achievement and/or background to Marty Morrison at mmorris3@umw.edu, Lisa Marvashti at lchinn@umw.edu or Kristin Davis at kdavis24@uwm.edu. Please include the student’s contact information, including cell phone number if available.

Please send your ideas by the end of business on Friday, April 28, so that suggestions can be passed on to the news media in a timely manner.

Again this year, we hope that our administrative support professionals are able to take advantage of this professional development and networking opportunity — the one-day Administrative Professionals Seminar, sponsored by Germanna Community College, Center for Workforce & Community Education on Wednesday, April 25, 2018. Many of our administrative support professionals have attended for the last six years and continue to rave about the experience!

Please see the link for registration information on the conference and how to register through Germanna. Any questions about the training please contact Germanna at 540-891-3012. Apply the promo code ‘APS10’ to receive a $10 discount off the registration.

And don’t forget our annual appreciation lunch. We would also like to recognize the exceptional work and dedication that our administrative support professionals (administrative assistants, office managers, general administrative coordinators 1 or 2, administrative office specialist 3) give daily. The University will provide a complimentary lunch for our administrative support professionals on Thursday, April 26, from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the Magnolia Dining Room of the University Center (on the pizza and pasta side of the dining room). We look forward to celebrating these valued members of the UMW team.

If you have any questions and to rsvp for lunch please contact jcooper4@umw.edu

Congratulations to the following UMW students recently named to the Pi Mu Epsilon national mathematics honorary society:

• Riley Anderson
• Kaytlyn Biddle
• Gail Crunkhorn
• Kelsie Dalton
• Stephen Dojcak
• Hannah Frederick
• Sarah Hedgecock
• Kirstyn Howard
• Kelllie Hurley
• Joshua Lee
• Deidre Norman
• Kelly O’Grady
• Hollis Pultz
• Zhu Qian
• Andrew Rasure
• Brandon Rozek
• Amber Senecal
• Stephen Tivenan
• Sarah Wessel
• Meagan Wilkinson

From watering hole to swimming hole, the fountain in Palmieri Plaza has beckoned for a generation.

Students cool off in it on sultry summer days. (So has at least one president.) More than a few mischief makers have added liquid soap to the water, turning it sudsy.

Even UMW President Troy D. Paino has taken a dip in the fountain on Palmieri Plaza. “Can take one item off my bucket list!” he wrote on Twitter in the summer of 2016.

Now the fountain is the bubbling source of a scandalous rumor. Too pricey to maintain, the gossip goes, it is going away. Not so, says Vice President of Administration and Finance Lynne Richardson.

“The rumor is just that – a rumor,” she said. “Now you know!”

Named for beloved geography professor Richard Palmieri, Palmieri Plaza is one of the most-trafficked places on campus. The fountain, built in 1987, is its centerpiece, an iconic beacon here to stay.

Now you know.

Best-selling author and acclaimed attorney Qasim Rashid will deliver the keynote address at the Islamic Cultural Celebration Banquet at 6 p.m. Thursday, April 12 in the Chandler Ballroom of University Center.

The banquet caps the week-long Islamic Cultural Celebration at UMW, which featured a kickoff dinner, the art of henna and an interfaith harmony discussion.

Rashid is a former visiting fellow at Harvard University’s Prince AlWaleed bin Talal Islamic Studies program and executive director of AMI APS, a human rights NGO dedicated to advancing international peace and security.

Qasim regularly speaks at universities and houses of worship, and interviews in a variety of media including the New York Times, FOX News, CNN, Muslim Television Ahmadiyya International, Huff Post Live, Al Jazeera, NBC, CBS, Voice of America, among several other national and international outlets.

Qasim is the former Chairman of the Muslim Writers Guild of America. He has served as a Volunteer Chaplain for the Virginia State Prison system and offered pro bono legal assistance to victims of domestic and sexual violence through the Virginia Poverty Law Center. Qasim, his wife Ayesha, and their three children reside in Virginia. He dreams of one day walking on another planet.

UMW Theatre will close its 2017-18 season with Medea by Euripides, translated by Robinson Jeffers. Performances will be April 12-14 and April 19-21 at 7:30 p.m., and April 15, 21 and 22 at 2 p.m. in Klein Theatre, duPont Hall at the University of Mary Washington. There will be a sign-interpreted performance on April 21 at 2 […]