A message from Dr. Eric Poehler, former Director of 5CollBLDH, upon the ending of the programs:
It is my duty to report that, after a decade of existence, the Five Colleges programs in Blended Learning and Digital Humanities are coming to an end. It is a bittersweet moment, naturally, full of both pride in all that 5CollBLDH has accomplished and sadness to see it to completion. Yet, in many ways the success of the program in encouraging the adoption of digital tools in teaching and in research has helped to create the conditions of diminishing returns of such outreach into the future. Indeed, in the midst of our global pandemic, we are all engaged with digital technologies.
The last act of 5CollBLDH was a joyous one: the 7th annual Five College Digital Humanities Undergraduate Fellows Symposium. We witnessed another excellent group of students wrestle with profound questions in the Humanities and their intersection with complex digital modes of expression. I encourage you all to watch those student presentations on our Symposium webpage: https://5colldh.org/programs/dh-student-fellowships/symposium/. Additionally, you may be interested in watching a short history of the 5CollBLDH program (https://youtu.be/U-VQWEiUr6c) and discussion of its impact with a panel of Post-Baccalaureate Fellows, past and present (https://youtu.be/a_ce4RBk69g) and former BL director, TreaAndrea Russworm (https://youtu.be/Pb3lYEe3FF0).
A final word of thanks goes out to the genuinely hundreds of people who led, worked for, learned from, and/or engaged with our program. You are why we succeeded and why we are here.
Best,
—
Dr. Eric E. Poehler
Associate Professor of Classics
Director, Five Colleges Blended Learning & Digital Humanities Programs
University of Massachusetts Amherst
527 Herter Hall
Amherst, MA 01003
epoehler@classics.umass.edu
http://umass.academia.edu/EricPoehler
http://digitalhumanities.umass.edu/pbmp
Author of The Traffic Systems of Pompeii
Oxford University Press, 2017