Brian O’Sullivan

On Wednesday night we had singing/song-writing comedian Brian O’Sullivan perform in the student activities center. The show was amazing and everyone enjoyed this extremely personable and talented performer. But the show didn’t stop after his last song. He actually came back to the our dorm and hung out in the common room with several students just playing songs, telling us about his career and what he has gone through and where he hopes to be. He even let me play his guitar and showed us some of the songs that got him started. I’ve talked to a lot of musicians and performers in the past and he was by far one of the easiest to talk to and truly just hung out and really had a good time. If you have any questions about what Unity offers for activities and events feel free to ask.

Crazy Weather

In Maine we have a saying; “If you don’t like the weather here, just wait a minute.” This was never shown more clearly than this past Wednesday.  I was out conducting routine ice fishing checks as part of a lab with the rest of my class when we saw a dark cloud looming in the distance and heading our way. We immediately began to each guess what the cloud would produce as far as weather was concerned. As we began walking on to the pond I looked behind me, it looked like a white out, in front of me there wasn’t a single snowflake. Then it hit like a wall, we were barely able to see, walking with our heads down to keep the snow out of our eyes. Then there was a huge flash of lightning, so close that a few students thought someone had taken a picture near by. A moment later there was a tremendous crack of thunder that made several students jump. We were advised to head back to shore and did so without argument. The road had already attained a couple of inches of snow and the hoods on our jackets had collected quite a collection of snowflakes. By the time we returned to campus the snow had stopped, just as quickly as it came. So whether you like rain, snow, sun, fog, or even thundersnow as we decided to name what happened, Maine never ceases to amaze you with its weather.

Activities at Unity

One of the greatest things about college is that it doesn’t just teach you academically but it also broadens your horizons socially. Because of this, Unity offers many activities that involve a variety of interests. Of course we offer the normal college activities such as concerts, comedians and open mic nights. We also offer events such as learning how to make pasta, zumba, the newly wed game, chili cook-offs, road races, hot dog eating contest, mechanical bull riding, rock climbing, search and rescue, etc. Over my four years at Unity I have seen everything from outdoor laser tag to fencing and karate in the gym. If you are the type of person who wants to try a lot of new things you will never run out of options at Unity. The only question is which activity you want to try.

Search Warrant

In my Conservation Law Enforcement Capstone class we recently executed a mock search warrant in lab. We were split into groups of 6-9 people along with a property description of the house to be searched. We located the proper house and then got to execute our plan of who would be in charge of controlling people in the house, who would be in charge of searching, who would be in charge of documenting evidence, who would be the supervisor, etc. The residents occupying the home were Unity College students who were either working for our professor or had volunteered to be a part of the search. The people being searched attempted to flee, resisted arrest, pulled weapons, etc. We were being assessed based on the evidence we collected, how we handled the people involved and how efficient our group was during the search. This whole event was preceded by learning how to interview witnesses and suspects, and the entire process from the original stop to the actual execution of the search warrant.

Camden Conference

The Camden Conference definitely surpassed my expectations this weekend. We first arrived at our bed & breakfast on Friday afternoon named the Hawthorn Inn. After having time to unpack, relax and explore our living arrangements we took a self guided tour of Camden looking into their shops, restaurants, etc. The conference was held at the Camden Opera House and also had satellite audiences in Rockland and Belfast. The speakers were very informative and came from a variety of backgrounds including Times Magazine Journalist, CIA, Ambassador, Authors, Professors and more. The speakers covered a range of topics from environmental concerns of China, leadership struggles in North Korea, the people of India, the effects of the Cold War, America’s desire for a military opponent, etc. A total of 800 people attended the conference. Approximately 50 high school and college aged students attended the conference and were all treated to lunch on Saturday and allowed to ask a Berkley Professor and Times Magazine Journalist questions about Asia, their career paths, foreign language advice, etc. If anyone has questions about the conference, speakers or the presidential seminar that allowed me to attend this event please feel free to ask.

Bowling

If any of you are into bowling Unity offers opportunities to bowl on a school team. There are different levels of competition of course. Our most competitive team (A Team) is composed of the top 6 participating bowlers. The bowlers will all bowl one string, and the team score will be counted. The team will also bowl one string as a team (2 turns for each bowler) and 5 of the team members will participate. Individuals will be allowed to advance in the tournament and the team automatically qualifies for the tournament and will be allowed to compete. I will be sure to update you as the tournament goes on to let you know how Unity is doing. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Camden Conference This Weekend

This weekend is the Camden Conference. The president of the college Mitch Thomashow, myself and the other 8 students in our presidential seminar class will be attending this event. The topic for this years conference is The Challenges of Asia. To prepare for this conference we have each read two books on China’s culture, economy, influence, etc. During classes we all compare our reading journals, news articles that we have found (both from american and chinese based news papers) as well as even being able to have Skype chats with an author of one of our optional reading texts. This provided a oppurtunity to ask questions of an American author who was currently living in China. We discussed everything from his education, career path, the culture in China and even how the traffic patterns were different in China compared to America. This was an amazing opportunity to gain insight from an individual who was living in the midst of our learning material and could give us the most current and up to date information. After the conference I will be sure to update my blog on the different speakers and topics that were covered over the weekend but until then if you have anything specific you would like to know feel free to comment and I will seek out that information while I am at the conference. Have a great holiday weekend!

Environmental Challenge

There are four core classes that all Unity students have to take before they graduate. These are Unity Experience, Environmental sustainability, The Enviromental Citzen and Environmental Challenge. I am now in the senior level course which is Environmental Challenge. Each week we have a speaker who will come to the Unity Center of the Performing Arts and will speak on a different environmental issue. This week we heard from two representatives of a company that builds passive houses and is planning on building a passive house dorm this summer on campus. The week before we heard from a speaker who informed us on how the Maine woods is being managed and how it is now for sale. We explored different opportunities for who may buy it and what that means for the rest of the state in terms of recreational use. The other speaker that we had was Unity’s own Jesse Pyles who along with 3 other students, described the solar road trip event that they went on over the fall semester. If you are interested int he solar road trip there are articles online as well as some of my other posts that have covered the event. If you have any questions about this class, the speakers, or any other aspects of Unity College, please feel free to comment.

New Residence Hall!!!

Unity College has recently been honored with a grant to help fund a new residence hall on campus that is expected to be completed over the summer. Unity is working with an architect and builder who both specialize in Passive House building. For those of you who haven’t heard of passive house, the idea is that if you increase insulation, windows, doors, material, etc. that your result will be a building that is exponentially more sustainable than common building practices would create. If these standards were used on a averaged sized home it could be heated by the same amount of energy used to run hair dryer. The new residence hall building will hold 10 students and will not only provide housing but also an educational experience as the students are living in a state of the art facility.

Career Fair

Today was Unity Colleges spring semester career fair. For those of you who have not attended a career fair before, the gym is filled with representatives from police departments, wildlife agencies, environmental departments, summer camps, etc all looking to hire part-time as well as full-time employees. Hundreds of students attended with dress clothes and resumes in hand. The career resource center has been working with students leading up to this event by helping to finalize resumes, practice interview techniques and choose which jobs they are best qualified for. If anyone has questions about work during college, after college, grad schools, etc feel free to ask and I can let you know how Unity can be a part of leading you to those goals.