Brandon Blackwood ’13. Courtesy of Brandon Blackwood NYC

Designer Brandon Blackwood ’13 Inducted into the Council of Fashion Designers of America and Profiled in Harper’s Bazaar

Fashion designer and Bard alumnus Brandon Blackwood ’13 was one of 10 new members inducted into the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) this year. Thom Browne, chairman of the CFDA, said, “Our newest members represent everything America has to offer . . . diversity . . . creativity . . .  and true individual talent.” 

BHSEC Manhattan. Photo by Beyond My Ken (CC BY-SA 4.0)

New Bard High School Early College Slated to Open in South Bronx

A new Bard High School Early College is slated to open in the South Bronx this fall. “From the first conversation with Chancellor Banks and his team, something that was really important was about bringing the same quality and standards and resources and rigor that defines this program to the Bronx in full,” said Stephen Tremaine, vice president for Early College Policies and Programs. “First and foremost for South Bronx residents—and to do that unapologetically.”

Miúcha, The Voice of Bossa Nova will Premiere at Bard College on April 30

On Sunday, April 30, the film Miúcha, The Voice of Bossa Nova will have its first public premiere at Bard College. Produced by alumnus Mostafiz ShahMohammed ’97, the film will be screened in Bard’s Jim Ottaway Jr. Film Center at 4 pm, with a reception to follow until 6:30 pm. This groundbreaking documentary, which received global recognition at Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), and Rio Film Festival, explores the illustrious life of Brazilian singer Heloísa Maria Buarque de Hollanda, known by her artistic name Miúcha, and captures the story of her unique talent. 

L-R: Stacy Burnett ’20 MBA ’23 and Charlene Reyes. Photo by Stacy Burnett, courtesy Bard MBA in Sustainability

Bard MBA Student, BPI Alumna Stacy Burnett ’20 MBA ’23 Wins Mid-Hudson Business Plan Competition, Three Other Bard Teams Compete

“Stacy Burnett has a powerful idea to shake up the big-business of prison re-entry: hire formerly incarcerated people to mentor folks who are newly released,” writes Katie Boyle MS ’07, director of enrollment and marketing for Bard’s MBA in Sustainability, on the Lead the Change blog. Burnett, a current MBA student and alumna of the Bard Prison Initiative, pitched the idea at the Mid-Hudson Valley Regional Business Plan Competition alongside her business partner Charlene Reyes. The idea, which Burnett and Reyes developed when they were both students in the Bard Prison Initiative, won first place in the Learn, Work, and Play category.

Dale Beran ’04. 

Bard College Alumnus Dale Beran ’04 Interviewed on CNN about Online Radicalization

Dale Beran ’04, Bard alumnus and lecturer at Morgan State University, appeared for an interview on CNN, where he spoke about the online radicalization of young men and discussed how certain online communities form, such as the spaces on Discord and other platforms where highly classified US documents were first leaked by Jack Teixeira, a 21-year-old air national guardsman.

Photo by Jordan Uhl / CC-by-2.0

“A Reasonable Supreme Court? Hardly. Don’t Be Fooled by this Extremist Establishment:” Moira Donegan ’12 on the Court’s Recent Abortion Pill Ruling for the Guardian

In an opinion piece for the Guardian, Bard Written Arts alumna and journalist Moira Donegan ’12 cautions that we should not be fooled by the highest court’s decision to allow the abortion drug mifepristone to remain available—temporarily staying a Texas federal judge’s ruling to reverse the drug’s FDA approval and pull it from US markets—while the case goes through an appeals process. Donegan deduces “sharp intra-Republican disagreement over how to handle the unexpectedly virulent political fallout from the Dobbs decision” among the right-wing Supreme Court justices who jointly ruled to overturn abortion access as a federal right.