51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ

As we look forward to 2025 and reflect on the past year, celebrate all that 51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ has accomplished with the 5 most-read stories from 2024.

A remarkable merger with University of the Arts dance. A class devoted to strengthening democratic discourse. Literary luminaries like journalist Michael Pollan '76 and poet and memoirist Safiya Sinclair '10 returning to meet students and families.

2024 brought notable alumni and artists back to campus and brought Bennington's aesthetic and influence to the world.

Dance Magazine highlighted the 36 BFA students, 20 continuing low-residency MFA students, and 13 faculty members from University of the Arts who have merged into 51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ.

51³ÉÈËÁÔÆæ is the only college Michael Pollan ’76 applied to. Pollan’s mother had attended Bennington in the fifties, and he remembered reading through her college papers, which were kept in the attic of his childhood home, and thinking about how extraordinary it was to have been taught, as she was, by poet Howard Nemerov and literary critic Kenneth Burke.

By Anne Thompson