News

RIT is creating a School of Performing Arts to offer additional creative opportunities for thousands of students who wish to pursue their passions in performance while majoring in a range of other fields. The new school will be housed within RIT’s College of Liberal Arts beginning July 1, and a national search is underway for a director. 

RIT Esports is a national champion again, after a team of students came out victorious in the 2022 Hearthstone Collegiate Masters Tournament. The Tigers bested more than 200 teams to win the tournament, which is the main event for collegiate Hearthstone and is run by the game’s maker, Blizzard Entertainment.

Leigh Rubin, the syndicated “Rubes” cartoonist and RIT’s “cartoonist-in-residence” returns to the campus in person after a two-year virtual residency due to the pandemic. He’ll be speaking with students and offering a presentation and Q and A session, “Imagination through the eyes of RIT Cartoonist-in-Residence Leigh Rubin,” on April 19.

Bruce Austin, professor in the School of Communication, writes about Professor Emeritus Denis Defibaugh, who retraced Rockwell Kent’s voyage to Greenland.

The Tina Lent Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Museum Studies was given on Friday, March 18, 2022 as part of the College’s 42^nd Annual Writing Awards Ceremony. The award followed in the tradition of awards named in honor of other College of Liberal Arts faculty, including Stan McKenzie and Mary C. Sullivan, both esteemed former deans of the College of Liberal Arts. The inaugural recipient was Hannah Rachel Riley, a third-year student from Buffalo, NY who is undertaking her thesis this semester and will graduate in May 2022.

RIT honored the service and dedication of its employees with the Presidential Awards for Outstanding Staff ceremony March 31. The annual awards are presented to staff members who exemplify outstanding service and dedication to the university and who exhibit a high degree of personal ethics and integrity while consistently demonstrating a strong commitment to student success.

From robot waiters to river otters, RIT’s Graduate Showcase will cover a wide variety of topics representing graduate scholarship from the university’s Henrietta and global campuses. The symposium, held April 7, will feature oral presentations in the morning and poster presentations, demonstrations, and visual exhibitions in the afternoon.

NTID’s Department of Performing Arts presents its production of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Tony Award-winning musical In The Heights, April 15-17, at Panara Theatre, Lyndon Baines Johnson Hall. Directed by Principle Lecturer Luane Davis Haggerty, NTID’s production features deaf, hard-of-hearing, and hearing actors performing on stage simultaneously.

“Up Against the Wall: Art, Activism, and the AIDS Poster” will be on view at RIT’s University Gallery March 14 through April 8. This is a satellite companion exhibition to the main exhibition of AIDS posters at the Memorial Art Gallery, March 6 through June 19.

RIT’s College of Liberal Arts spring production, Men On Boats, opens at 7:30 p.m. tonight with additional performances at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Saturday, and 2 p.m. Sunday in Webb Auditorium in James E. Booth Hall.

The former president of the American Civil Liberties Union and constitutional law and human rights expert Nadine Strossen will be the keynote speaker at RIT’s Center for Statesmanship, Law and Liberty’s annual symposium on March 30.

Diverse subjects involving safety and autonomous automobiles, Black women in computing, and Italian cinema are just some of the winning entries for this year’s student writing awards, sponsored by RIT’s College of Liberal Arts.