President Shirley Ann Jackson hosted a reception for Rensselaer alumni, parents, students, and friends at Steinway Hall in New York City on Nov. 15. The evening included a performance led by Mary Simoni, dean of the Rensselaer School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (HASS), and recognition of Simoni as a Steinway Artist.

The performance at Steinway Hall included selections from George Gershwin, Charles Strouse, Richard Rodgers, Cole Porter, and more. Simoni was joined by Kimberley Dolanski Osburn (soprano), manager of operations and administrative services in HASS, and Rensselaer students Aidan Gorby ’19 (saxophones), a biology major preparing for a career in medicine; Alexander Shane Jones ’18 (upright bass), a senior majoring in applied mathematics, with a minor in finance; and Matthew Lamport ’19 (drums), a junior majoring in mechanical engineering.

Rensselaer, the nation’s first technological research university, recently launched a new degree program, the Bachelor of Science in Music. The program will expose students to the art of music in a global context—a form of creative expression that is integrally tied to other arts and technology disciplines.

The new degree is part of a larger campus-wide initiative, led by President Shirley Ann Jackson and supported by HASS Dean Mary Simoni, to use the arts to enhance students’ capacity in their chosen majors, from mathematics to biology to engineering.

The program, called Art_X@Rensselaer, infuses education with the arts—by offering more opportunities to study artistic disciplines, like music, while expanding pedagogy and research with arts-inspired approaches to conceptual thinking. “Art_X is designed to help all of our students to see the art in, and of, science, and the science in, and of, art,” President Jackson says.

PHOTOS FROM THE EVENT

CLICK PHOTOS TO ENLARGE