Photo Spotlights

RIT's fall 2021 semester concluded last week. Students return from their holiday break and resume classes on Jan. 10, 2022.

RIT’s Vignelli Center for Design Studies hosted its inaugural “Beyond Fashion” event to celebrate design and community Dec. 10, inside MAGIC Spell Studios’ soundstage. The event showcased a diverse collection of garments and wearables inspired by the Vignelli Archives and featured pieces crafted by Rochester-area designers Karissa Birthwright (SaintVegann), Jenna Gagnier, and Krista Jenkins (Spirit + Thread Crochet) as well as undergraduate and graduate students from RIT’s metals and jewelry design and industrial design programs.

RIT Libraries hosted Destress Fest in Wallace on Ice with events for students to take breaks during exams. Four-leaf clover plant kits were handed out as a “good luck with finals” gesture. Sara Kuehl, left, manager of Marketing and Communications at RIT Libraries, shows Jessica Sides, a fourth-year physics and psychology student from West Grove, Pa., the plant kit.

Usama Tariq, a graduate student from Pakistan in Saunders College of Business, sorts canned goods at RIT FoodShare Center. FoodShare provides RIT community members with access to food supplies and reduces waste by using donated food. The Center is open for shopping and donations from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays and from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturdays.

New York Lt. Governor Brian Benjamin, right, visited campus Dec. 1 where he met with RIT President David Munson, left, and Head of Thomas H. Gosnell School of Life Sciences Andre Hudson, center, and others.

Officials including Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of The Executive Council of Dubai; RIT President David Munson; RIT Senior Vice President for Finance and Administration James Watters; and RIT Dubai President Yousef al Assaf toured RIT Dubai’s state-of-the-art new campus during a grand opening ceremony on Nov. 28. The campus includes a wide range of spaces designed to facilitate instruction, learning communities, research and innovation laboratories for experiential learning, collaborative meeting and events areas, and more.

RIT 365 is a first-year student experience to form connections at RIT and to provide a foundation for the years ahead. In a 365 class, facilitator Laurence Wainwright-Maks led a labyrinth exercise in the Allen Chapel. Walking a labyrinth is a tool for self-awareness and creates a sense of calm.

A palette of autumn colors showed up in gardens and foliage around campus.

RIT Global had a kickoff event for International Education Week with food, games, prizes, and activities. Christopher Ferrari, vice president of Student Government and a third-year marketing and political science double major from Spencerport, N.Y., tests his skills at a curling game.

Bestselling author and entrepreneur Suneel Gupta visited campus Nov. 11 to speak in Saunders College's 2021 Gasser Lecture Series and as the RIT Entrepreneurship Conference keynote. 

RIT's annual Veterans Day Breakfast returned this year featuring a keynote address by Thomas L. Peeples ’94 (mechanical engineering), ’03 MS (professional studies), an RIT alumnus, adjunct faculty member, and active member of the military. The missing man table, also known as a fallen comrade table, is set up in honor of fallen, missing, or imprisoned military service members.

The 2021-2022 Frederick H. Minett Professor Perry Ground, a storyteller from the Turtle Clan of the Onondaga Nation, shared stories during Native American Heritage Month.