Events

LEXINGTON, Ky.—Dozens of Transylvania employees will don tennis shoes and jeans on Friday, taking business casual to a whole new level. Earlier this year, Transylvania University was one of only 19 colleges in the country to be named a gold level Fit-Friendly Company by the American Heart Association. The AHA highlighted Transylvania’s Wellness Works initiative, which offers various programs to faculty and staff that target physical, financial, emotional, occupational, intellectual and social wellness, and Transylvania’s status as a tobacco-free campus. But the university is not resting on its laurels, and on November 4 will roll out a new program, Fit Fridays, to encourage employees to build more physical activity into their workdays. “When we filled out the Fit-Friendly protocol, one of the questions asked was whether the company encouraged employees to be more active by having casual days or wear your tennis shoes to work days,” said Ashley Hinton-Moncer, director of fitness and wellness. “We didn’t, and we thought that was something we could add.” One-third of Transylvania’s staff members have already signed up to participate, which means they’ll use a portion of an extended lunch period to exercise and will wear a Fit Friday T-shirt and jeans or other casual slacks and tennis shoes. The specially-designed T-shirts will help spread the message to the campus community and visitors that Transylvania is a company focused on fitness and wellness. Last week, Transylvania launched the Big Green Get Around, which combines

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LEXINGTON, Ky.—Transylvania University Theater opens the 2011-12 season with “Almost, Maine,” which runs Oct. 27-29 and Nov. 3-4 at 7:30 p.m., and Oct. 30 and Nov. 5 at 2 p.m., in Transylvania’s Lucille C. Little Theater. Sullivan Canaday White, program director and assistant professor of theater, directs this play that the Wall Street Journal called “a comic romantic roundelay.” On a cold, clear, moonless night in the middle of winter, all is not quite what it seems in the remote, mythical town of Almost, Maine. As the northern lights hover in the star-filled sky, Almost’s residents find themselves falling in and out of love in unexpected and often hilarious ways. Knees are bruised. Hearts are broken. But the bruises heal, and the hearts mend-almost-in this delightful midwinter night’s dream. “What has made this production a unique experience and an extraordinary learning opportunity for the students is that they have been coached by professional actors Evan Bergman, Ginna Hoben and Spencer Christensen,” said White. Tickets are $10 and may be reserved by calling the box office at (859) 281-3621. For more information, contact Transylvania’s  fine arts office at (859) 233-8141.

Richard Taylor LEXINGTON, Ky.—In celebration of the National Day of Writing, Transylvania University will host a poetry reading, “Writing the Landscape” at the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning on Thursday, October 20, at 6 p.m. The reading, which is free and open to the public, features authors Carrie Green, George Ella Lyon, Bianca Spriggs ’03, Richard Taylor, and Lisa Williams. Green is the author of “It’s Not My Birthday, That’s Not My Cake.” Lyon is the author of numerous books for children and adults including several collections of poetry such as “Catalpa,” “Where I’m From, Where Poems Come From” and “Choices: Stories for Adult New Readers.” Spriggs, an Affrilachian poet and Cave Canem Fellow, graduated from Transylvania in 2003 and is the author of “Kaffir Lily” and “How Swallowtails Become Dragons.” Taylor is a former poet laureate of Kentucky and the current Kenan Visiting Writer at Transylvania. He is the author of “Sue Mundy: A Novel of the Civil War in Kentucky,” “Rail Splitter,” “Stone Eye” and “Girty.” Williams is associate professor of English at Centre College and the author of “Woman Reading to the Sea” and “The Hammered Dulcimer.” The lecture is sponsored by the Carnegie Center, the Transylvania Writing Center, and Transy/Sustainability. A book signing and reception will follow the reading. For more information, contact Scott Whiddon, assistant professor of writing, rhetoric, and communication and director of the Writing Center at Transylvania.

LEXINGTON, Ky.—Actors from the American Shakespeare Center (ASC) will perform “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” on Monday, November 7, and “’Tis Pity She’s a Whore” on Tuesday, November 8, in Carrick Theater at 7:30 p.m. The ASC strives to recreate the festive sense of community that delighted patrons of Shakespeare’s Blackfriars Theater during the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras. Instead of using elaborate sets and electronic wizardry, the innovative company focuses on presentation, performing with the house lights on and speaking directly to the audience. ASC has honed its art since 1988, performing in 47 states and five foreign countries. This will be the  group’s first appearance in Lexington. Through the generosity of the William R. Kenan Jr. Charitable Trust, free tickets, two per person, are available at the William T. Young Campus Center (corner of Broadway and Fourth Street), beginning Tuesday, October 18 from 6-11 p.m. Hours for the campus center after Tuesday are: Monday-Thursday, 8:30 a.m.-11 p.m.; Friday, 8:30 a.m.-8:30 p.m.; Saturday noon-8 p.m.; and Sunday 1-11 p.m.

LEXINGTON, Ky.—Coaches and players from both the University of Kentucky and Transylvania University will attend a tip-off dinner on Oct. 30 at Keeneland Entertainment Center in advance of the historic meeting of the teams on Nov. 2. Tickets are available for the event, billed as “Dinner with the Pioneers and Wildcats.” The teams will then meet on the court for the first time in 100 years on Nov. 2 at 7 p.m. at Rupp Arena in an exhibition game. Individual seats for the dinner are $150 but tables can also be purchased for prices ranging from $1,200 for seating for 10 to $15,000 for a table that includes the head coaches. All proceeds from the event will go to the Transylvania athletics department. Click here for more information about reserving a table or buying an individual ticket, a live auction, and other events to be held in conjunction with the event. Check-in and a cash bar begins at 5:45 p.m. with dinner to follow at 6:30 p.m. Follow this link to see the all-time record and learn more about the history of the rivalry. Follow this link to find head shots of the Transylvania players and coaching staff. The exhibition game with Kentucky follows a pre-season trip to Canada for the Pioneers, set for Oct. 15-17. Transylvania will take on Calgary, Windsor, and Western Ontario in exhibition contests. Transylvania and UK last played on March 3, 1911, in a game

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