Everything Nac

Launching at the SFA Gala tomorrow, the university’s centennial celebration features concerts and commemorations to remember those who have kept the Lumberjack spirit alive through challenges and successes over the last 100 years.

Events will culminate in a weekend of festivities leading up to Sept. 18, a century after SFA opened its doors on the 53rd birthday of its first president, Alton W. Birdwell.

“This year, Sept. 18 falls on a Monday, so the centennial committee is busy planning a full weekend of events and activities including concerts, a luncheon, dedications and a big birthday party,” said John Branch, chair of SFA’s centennial committee. “There will be more details as we get closer to the date.”

The university also has exciting changes in store this year as legislation enabling the university to become a member of The University of Texas System is considered. In addition, the search for SFA’s next president is underway.

“SFA has more than 115,000 alumni who contribute to the economic and cultural vitality of Texas and beyond,” Westbrook said. “That number will continue to grow as we offer students a strong return on their higher education investment.”

For more information on SFA’s history as well as centennial events and memorabilia, visit sfasu.edu/centennial.

Originally scheduled for Feb. 21, humane education advocate Zoe Weil’s presentation “The World Becomes What We Teach: A Solutionary Approach to Humane Education” will now take place March 2 on Zoom. Weil is co-founder and president of the Institute for Humane Education.

The presentation is made possible by SFA’s Montgomery Professorship for Humane Education. The professorship was awarded to Dr. Sarah Straub, associate professor in the Department of Education Studies, in October 2020. It was established by the late Charlotte Baker Montgomery in memory of her husband, Roger, to encourage and perpetuate the teaching of humane education in elementary and secondary schools, both public and private, through the support of teacher preparation in humane education.

“Zoe is an innovator in the field of humane education,” Straub said. “The Montgomery Professorship seeks to share current trends in the field, and Zoe definitely does that through her work with the solutionary approach. I got to know Zoe’s work more intimately as I began pursuing my own micro-credential in this area, and I am honored to be able to get to know her on a more personal level as we prepare for her invited speaker series.”

Weil’s institute supports graduate degree and certificate programs in humane education — a field of study and an approach to teaching that draws connections between human rights, animal protection and environmental sustainability — through class curriculum, workshops and presentations. Weil, the author of multiple books and a seasoned commentator through essays, radio, TV and podcasts, speaks regularly at universities, conferences and schools throughout the United States and Canada.

The presentation, which is free and open to everyone, will take place at 5:30 p.m. March 2 via Zoom. To register for the event, visit gosfa.com/weilregistration. For more information, contact Straub at straubsm@sfasu.edu.

The Stephen F. Austin State University School of Art and the SFA Department of English and Creative Writing will present the exhibition “Re-Visions,” showing Feb. 6 through 10 in the student galleries of the Lower Art Building on Wilson Drive.

Formerly a course at SFA called Pen & Pigment, Words of Art is a student organization-led collaborative event that presents contributors with a publication and exhibition opportunity. Students who participated in Pen & Pigment engaged with one another to produce cohesive paintings and poetry that effectively correlated their disciplines. Words of Art re-envisions the idea of interdisciplinarity by expanding the accepted disciplines and by being facilitated by student organizations Subplots and Art Alliance. The goal was to increase the flexibility and increase the disciplines involved in the event.

An opening reception for “Re-Visions” is scheduled for 5 p.m. Monday, Feb. 6. The public is invited to celebrate the contributors and the people who made this event possible. Attendees will have the chance to show their support by voting for the People’s Choice Award, highlighting the artist and writer who best accomplished this interdisciplinarity.

The gallery hours are from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. For more information, contact Megan Bynum, Art Alliance president, at (325) 998-5425 or bynummc1@jacks.sfasu.edu.