Special Features: CAS, MOE and STEM, p.3
Fayetteville State University
Ms. FSU, CJ Major, p.7
College of Arts and Sciences
Outgoing ACJS President, p. 8 International Early College, p. 9
SPRING/SUMMER 2012
Calendar of Events, p.10
Faculty Spotlight On... Avis HatcherPuzzo Avis HatcherPuzzo, a faculty member in the Department of Performing and Fine Arts, has been very busy this academic year. Just a sprinkling of her many activities: planning the Holiday Spectacular in December 2010; choreographing a show at the NC Museum of History, as part of a Kick –off to black history month; and shepherding a group of students to Texas, where FSU was inducted into the Black College Dance Exchange. Her work continued past the end of the semester, when she taught an intersession class, taking her students to New York City to train with one of her old students, founder of the Faison Firehouse Theatre. She topped this off with yet another trip to New York, this time for a week of grant-funded study at Alvin Ailey. What drives HatcherPuzzo? Simply, it is to upend our commonplace notions of dance and its purpose. Brought in five years ago this August to create a dance minor, HatcherPuzzo’s wants students and the community at large to see dance as something more than simple entertainment. Most folks are exposed to dance in its more popular forms (reality television shows, for instance). But dance is also an artistic discipline, with a set of formal techniques that require training for mastery. By exposing her students, and the FSU community at-large, to the world of dance as art, she seeks to expand expectations of what dance is and what it should be. Her efforts seem to be paying off. FSU has recently been host to major dance performers, including Philadanco and Judith Jamison. Moreover, she is slowly building a cadre of students who seek further study in dance. In a notable example: one student has received a half scholarship to study with Lula Washington. Ms. HatcherPuzzo sees these events as proof that she is on the right track.
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