The Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (MCLA) formerly known as North Adams State College (NASC) is a

public In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociology, sociological concept of the ''Öf ...

liberal arts college A liberal arts college or liberal arts institution of higher education is a college with an emphasis on undergraduate study in liberal arts and sciences. Such colleges aim to impart a broad general knowledge and develop general intellectual ca ...

North Adams, Massachusetts North Adams is a city in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area. Its population was 12,961 as of the 2020 census. Best known as the home of the largest contemporary ...

. It is part of the state university system of Massachusetts. It is a member of the

Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges The Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges (COPLAC) is a consortium of 30 public colleges and universities in 27 states and one Canadian province. Established in 1987, COPLAC advances the aims of its member institutions and drives awareness of the ...

. Originally established as part of the state's

normal school A normal school or normal college is an institution created to train teachers by educating them in the norms of pedagogy and curriculum. In the 19th century in the United States, instruction in normal schools was at the high school level, turni ...

system for training teachers, it now offers a wide variety of programs leading to

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University o ...

and

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four yea ...

degrees, as well as a

Master of Education The Master of Education (MEd or M.Ed. or Ed.M.; Latin ''Magister Educationis'' or ''Educationis Magister'') is a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. This degree in education often includes the following majors: curriculum a ...

track.

History

MCLA was founded in 1894 as North Adams Normal School, and it offered first instruction at post-secondary level three years later. By 1897, the Normal School enrolled 32 students (29 women, 3 men) and employed 4 teachers. In 1932, North Adams Normal School became State Teachers College of North Adams, added an upper-division curriculum, and started awarding bachelor's degrees. In 1936, it instituted graduate program. In 1960, it changed its name to North Adams State College and, in 1997, to Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, reflecting its position as the public liberal arts college within the Massachusetts state university system. In 2004, President Mary Grant led in the creation of the Berkshire Compact for Higher Education and MCLA Gallery 51. MCLA also is the lead partner in the Berkshire STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) Pipeline Network. In 2008, the Massachusetts Higher Education Bond Bill included $54.5 million for a new Center for Science and Innovation at MCLA. It opened in 2013 as the Feigenbaum Center for Science and Innovation. In 2014, Grant left the college and Cynthia F. Brown was appointed Interim President. Although Greg Summers was initially named the new president, he later withdrew his acceptance, citing family health concerns. On December 9, 2015, Jamie Birge was named as president.

Academics

MCLA has a rolling admissions plan. It requires graduation from an accredited secondary school or a GED. MCLA uses SAT or ACT composite scores for entrance consideration. MCLA accepts transfer students with grade-point average requirements or with an associate degree. MCLA is accredited by the New England Commission of Higher Education. MCLA awards the

and a

on the undergraduate level and also confers master's degrees in both education and business administration, as well as a

Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study A Certificate of Advanced Study (CAS), also called an "Advanced Certificate" (AC), Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study (CAGS), or a Certificate of Advanced Professional Studies (CAPS), is a post-Master's academic certificate designed for professi ...

(CAGS). MCLA offers 19 major programs of study and 35 minors. On average, MCLA offers 300 academic courses each semester. Graduation from MCLA requires completing 120 credits of academic work. Of these, about 40 must in the college-wide core curriculum. Another 40 credits are required for a major. At least 40 upper-division credits are required. At least 45 credits must be earned while the student is in residence at the college. Students must earn at least a 2.0 grade point average overall and a 2.0 in their major.

Distinctive educational programs

MCLA offers internships for undergraduates through the Berkshire Hills Internship Program. It also offers undergraduates coursework in other countries through its travel abroad program. MCLA belongs to the Massachusetts Council for International Education (MaCIE), College Consortium for International Studies (CCIS), and the

National Student Exchange The National Student Exchange (NSE) is a member-based, not-for-profit consortium of accredited colleges and universities in the United States, Canada, Guam, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands that provides study away opportunities among its ...

(NSE). Through these associations and connections, students are sent on semester- or year-long programs to colleges around the world. The college

Honors Program Honors colleges and honors programs are special accommodation constituent programs at public and private universities – and also public two-year institutions of higher learning – that include, among other things, supplemental or alternati ...

includes ten percent of the student body for whom it offers special interdisciplinary courses in such topics as "The Mathematics of Fairness," "Ethics and Animals" or "The Romantic Movement." The college is authorized by the state to grant the distinction "Commonwealth Scholar" to students who complete the honors program with a capstone thesis.

Athletics

MCLA has 13 varsity sports. The college's varsity teams compete in the

National Collegiate Athletic Association The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges ...

(NCAA) at the

NCAA Division III NCAA Division III (D-III) is a division of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States. D-III consists of athletic programs at colleges and universities that choose not to offer athletic scholarships to their ...

level in the Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference (MASCAC). Active intercollegiate female teams are

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Sum ...

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball cov ...

, cross country,

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

softball Softball is a game similar to baseball played with a larger ball on a smaller field. Softball is played competitively at club levels, the college level, and the professional level. The game was first created in 1887 in Chicago by George Hanc ...

, and

lacrosse Lacrosse is a team sport played with a lacrosse stick and a lacrosse ball. It is the oldest organized sport in North America, with its origins with the indigenous people of North America as early as the 12th century. The game was extensiv ...

; while active intercollegiate male teams are

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding t ...

, basketball,

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...

, cross country, tennis and soccer. The college also has

NERFU The New England Rugby Football Union (NERFU) is a Geographical Union (GU) for rugby union teams in New England. Prior to 2013, NERFU had been a local area union ("LAU"), and part of the Northeast Rugby Union (NRU), which is the governing body fo ...

club

rugby Rugby may refer to: Sport * Rugby football in many forms: ** Rugby league: 13 players per side *** Masters Rugby League *** Mod league *** Rugby league nines *** Rugby league sevens *** Touch (sport) *** Wheelchair rugby league ** Rugby union: 1 ...

which was re-activated in 2011. From 1963, the college's athletic teams were known as the Mohawks, after the

Mohawk Trail The Mohawk Trail began as a Native American trade route which connected Atlantic tribes with tribes in Upstate New York and beyond. It followed the Millers River, Deerfield River and crossed the Hoosac Range, in the area that is now northwestern ...

which runs along Massachusetts Route 2. In response to concerns over using a Native American name (Francis Boots, cultural-preservation officer of the Mohawk tribe, has told college officials that his people were not honored by the name), the mascot was changed to the Trailblazers in 2002. In 2013, a new mascot, the Mountain Lion, was adopted while in April 2019, the Trailblazer community named the Mascot "Murdock" after a vote of the campus community, alumni, and community members. The most successful team in the college's history was the men's

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice ...

team, which was cut in 2003. However, MCLA will have men's and women's hockey teams beginning to compete again in the 2023-24 academic year.

Organization and administration

MCLA is governed by the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education. Beyond that, MCLA has extra-institutional representation of 11 voting members and the Board of Trustees, whose members are appointed by the governor which has 11 voting members. A student representative to the board of trustees is elected every spring by the student body to sit for one academic year. Administration positions include 12 men and 24 women. Academic affairs is headed by the vice president for academic affairs. Business and finances is headed by the vice president for administration and finance. Student affairs is headed by the vice president of student affairs. The full-time instructional faculty has 52 men and 36 women. The academic governance body, All College Committee, meets an average of nine times each year.

Publications

The school has two student publications: ''The Beacon'', a weekly newspaper, and ''Spires'', a literary magazine published each year
Radio Station WJJW
broadcasts for 140 hours each week, and episodes of the student-run college TV news program, Beacon Web News, are produced once a week. MCLA also has one faculty publication: The Mind's Eye, and one alumni publication, ''Beacons & Seeds'', which comes out twice a year.

Notable alumni

* Daniel E. Bosley - member emeritus of the Mass. House of Representatives (''served'' 1986 - 2011) * Thomas Calter- member emeritus of the Mass. House of Representatives (''served'' 2007 - ''2018'') *Mary Grant - former president of MCLA and the first alumna to serve as president. * Ken Hill - retired MLB player. * Anton Strout - urban fantasy novelist.Anton Strout
Anton Strout
s official

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dust ...

page, accessed June 6, 2011. * John Barrett III - state legislator, mayor of North Adams for 26 years "MCLA Announces Appointments to Board of Trustees"
MCLA, April 2016 (accessed 2018-03-08). *

Derek Lalonde Derek Lalonde (born August 18, 1972) is an American ice hockey coach who is the head coach of the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League (NHL). Playing career Lalonde played college hockey for Cortland State as a goaltender from 1991 t ...

- head coach of the

Detroit Red Wings The Detroit Red Wings (colloquially referred to as the Wings) are a professional ice hockey team based in Detroit. The Red Wings compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Atlantic Division in the Eastern Conference, and are ...

, two-time

Stanley Cup The Stanley Cup (french: La Coupe Stanley) is the championship trophy awarded annually to the National Hockey League (NHL) playoff champion. It is the oldest existing trophy to be awarded to a professional sports franchise in North America, an ...

champion as assistant coach of the

Tampa Bay Lightning The Tampa Bay Lightning (colloquially known as the Bolts) are a professional ice hockey team based in Tampa, Florida. They compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Atlantic Division in the Eastern Conference. They play ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Massachusetts College Of Liberal Arts Liberal arts colleges in Massachusetts Educational institutions established in 1894 Buildings and structures in North Adams, Massachusetts Universities and colleges in Berkshire County, Massachusetts 1894 establishments in Massachusetts Public universities and colleges in Massachusetts Public liberal arts colleges in the United States