Bard College

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A Private College for the Public Good
Bard College seeks to inspire curiosity, a love of learning, idealism, and a commitment to the link between higher education and civic participation.
Meet Javen and learn about the Bard Conservatory, dance, Italian studies, and the Senior Project.

Academics

Academics at Bard focus on giving students a strong scholarly foundation with our core curriculum, then encouraging them to explore individual academic interests. The College seeks to engender in every student a wide curiosity and love of learning. Close contact with scholars who are teachers but also active in their disciplines is a constant, and the level of academic discourse in the classroom is high.

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Civic Engagement

Civic Engagement

“At Bard, we show up. We build, paint, dig, teach, play, sing, sweat. We show up in the middle of the night, work in the rain, crawl under the car, whatever it takes. This does not mean erasing the self. It means struggling with the tension between self and collective interests, and then acting compassionately.” —Paul Marienthal, Dean for Social Action; Director, Trustee Leader Scholar Program

Visit the Center for Civic Engagement

Watch: Lola, a joint major in film and studio arts, explores Avery, where film classes are taught at Bard.

Campus Life

The focus of student life at Bard College, both inside and outside the classroom, is on campus. From its historic Hudson Valley setting to its state-of-the-art science and arts facilities, the College offers an idyllic environment where students can enjoy a rich social life interwoven with their cultural and intellectual pursuits.

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Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

We embrace plurality, respect divergent viewpoints, and are committed to understanding the rich spectrum of experiences that comprise our community. Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) at Bard seeks to materialize our commitment to plurality, dialogue, and rigorous study. We strive to create a learning environment that upholds the College’s mission to meaningfully include the voices, works, and ideas of communities and cultures historically marginalized in liberal arts and sciences education.

DEI Initiatives

Arts at Bard
Photo by Chris Kayden

Arts at Bard

Bard College offers the best of both worlds: a traditional liberal arts college with exceptional programs in the fine and performing arts. In small classes taught by notable faculty, students work closely with top professionals in their fields. All students, whatever their major, are encouraged to take advantage of the same high-level arts instruction and engagement; the discipline of cultivating one’s artistic abilities has wide-ranging collateral benefits.

Get to Know the Division of the Arts

Bard News and Events

Featured News

L-R: The Margarita Kuchma Project Award winners Anna Shupack ’22, Sarah Soucek ’22, and Abdullah Naseer BCB ’23.
Bard’s Margarita Kuchma Project Award Selects Two Winners
The Margarita Kuchma Project Award selection committee has named two final winning projects. Anna Schupack ’22 and Sarah Soucek ’22 from Bard’s Annandale campus won for their project, “The Columbia Collective,” a multimedia arts mentorship collective where incarcerated artists are given the opportunity to define their own voices. Michael Nyakundi ’23 and Abdullah Naseer ’23 from Bard College Berlin also won for their project, “Project MA3: Masanse Na Mayouthman (From Violence to Co-existence),” which focuses on community engagement as a working solution to police brutality in Soweto slums in Embakasi, Nairobi. The two winners will split the $10,000 award to realize their projects over their proposed timelines. The results of the winning projects will be presented to the Bard community in a public presentation sometime during the fall 2022 semester. More >
Bard Film Professor Ephraim Asili Directs Louis Vuitton’s Spring-Summer 2023 Men’s Fashion Show in Paris
Assistant Professor of Film and Electronic Arts and Director of Film and Electronic Arts Ephraim Asili directed the Louis Vuitton Spring-Summer 2023 Men’s fashion show in Paris. A tribute to Victor Abloh, fashion designer and creative director for Louis Vuitton who passed away in November 2021, the show opened with a cinematic prelude conceived and directed by Asili. Asili’s film, titled Strange Math, explores the relationship between imagination and reality, which are central themes to the collection.  More >

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Upcoming Events

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