Agenda

Museums10 Summit

May 16: Arts educator Patty Bode will discuss ways museums can engage with their communities and broaden their audiences in the 21st century, in a keynote address at the fourth annual summit of Valley-based collaborative Museums10. Bode’s talk, “Museums, Engagement, and Creating Social Change,” will take place at 4 p.m. at the Yiddish Book Center at 1021 West St. in Amherst. It is free and open to the public. Bode has decades of experience working with museums through hands-on practice as an educator in urban schools, community arts programs, and teacher education, with a particular emphasis on collaborating with marginalized communities. In her address, she will discuss why access to and participation in museum life is a civil and human right in our democratic society. She will also offer case studies that demonstrate ways museums have been successful in engaging a wide range of audiences across race, social class, language, sexual orientation, and religion. Currently a teacher at Springfield Conservatory of the Arts, a magnet public school, Bode is the former director of Art Education for Tufts University in affiliation with the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and was a visiting associate professor at Ohio State University’s Department of Arts Administration, Education and Policy. For more information, visit fivecolleges.edu and click ‘events.’ Museums10 is a collaboration of seven campus and three campus-affiliated museums that work together to celebrate the collections and promote the programs of its member museums to local, regional, and national visitors. Museums10 is facilitated by Five Colleges.

Mental Health and Wellness Fair

May 18: In celebration of Mental Health Awareness Month, Clinical & Support Options Inc. (CSO) will host its 14th annual Mental Health and Wellness Fair at the Energy Park in Greenfield from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Featuring CSO’s Green River House and Quabbin House Clubhouse members, the fair will be an afternoon of music, singing, poetry, and testimonials by members to highlight mental-health illness, wellness, and recovery. The fair started in 2002 in an effort to bring awareness and information to the community about mental-health illness and recovery. The event is an opportunity to dispel the stigma around mental-health illness, encourage people to seek support, and spotlight agencies available to assist. This year, the theme is “Mental Health Matters.” In addition to local community providers sharing information, there will be live music, a food vendor, and raffles, and WHAI will be on site doing a live broadcast. For more information, call the Green River House at (413) 772-2181.

Ad Club Creative Awards

May 19: Ad agencies, design firms, marketing departments, and other members of the Western Mass. and Northern Conn. creative community have submitted work for the Advertising Club of Western Massachusetts’ Creative Awards, the club’s annual recognition of creative excellence. Each year, they come together to celebrate the region’s best creative work with a festive evening of camaraderie. This year’s event — titled “Make. Believe.” — will be held at Open Square in Holyoke. The judges for this year’s Creative Awards include Kevin Grady, global head of design and communication for brand strategy firm Siegel + Gale, and Nikita Prokhorov, a freelance designer, author, and professor based in Brooklyn, N.Y. “We were really fortunate to get two judges who are at the top of their field,” said Lynn Saunders, co-chair of the Ad Club’s Creative Awards. “They held the work to a very high standard.” On May 19, the region’s creatives and guests will convene to find out which works Grady and Prokhorov deemed worthy, and to set the bar for the upcoming year of local advertising and communications. The event will feature hors d’oeuvres, a cash bar, live music, a champagne toast to the local creative community, and the opportunity to rub shoulders with, and celebrate with, colleagues whose creative work will be on display. Tickets are $35 for members, $50 for non-members, and $20 for students. For more information about the 2016 Creative Awards or to purchase tickets, go to adclubwm.org or call (413) 736- 2582. This year’s Creative Awards sponsors include Andrew Associates, BusinessWest, Cecco – the Design Office of David Cecchi, Common Media, 423 Motion Inc., Marcus Printing, Meyers Brothers Kalicka, P.C., Milltown Productions, Six-Point Creative Works Inc., Stephanie Craig Photography, TSM Design, and WWLP-22News.

IBS Explores Value of IT

May 20: Innovative Business Systems will explore the ways IT can return more value to organizations. The lunch-and-learn session will take place at 163 Northampton St., Easthampton, from noon to 2 p.m. Ideally, every IT dollar spent should provide a return by helping to increase revenues, decrease costs, or improve efficiencies. Over lunch, participants will learn many value-driven best practices, while demonstrating how IBS best adds value through its client engagements. Topics will include how the use of automation can reduce support costs due to economies of scale, how providing streamlined access to support can improve efficiencies, what skills are required and how to staff the IT function within an organization, and disciplined project selection, management, and budgeting best practices. An open-discussion IT roundtable will be faciliated by IBS immediately following the lunch-and-learn session. To register online, visit www.for-ibs.com/news/simple-registration-form.

Storyteller Series on Women in History

May 22, June 5, June 26: Wistariahurst will host artist Tammy Denease in a series of historical storytelling performances. At each of the Sunday sessions, Denease will bring to life a woman from the past. The women featured in the series are Clo Pratt, born into slavery but self-employed after being freed; local hero Elizabeth “Mum Bett” Freeman, who successfully sued Col. Ashley for her freedom in 1781; and Bessie Coleman, “First Negro Aviatrix.” The family-friendly performances will take place in the Belle Skinner Music room at 3 p.m. on each of the days, and are free and open to the public of all ages. This series is supported in part by a grant from the Holyoke Local Cultural Council, a local agency supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, and the New England States Touring program of the New England Foundation for the Arts, made possible with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts Regional Touring Program and the six New England state arts agencies. Educational programming at Wistariahurst is supported by Historic Holyoke at Wistariahurst.

Garden Party

June 5: The Garden: A Center for Grieving Children and Teens will host a Garden Party fund-raiser from 4 to 6:30 p.m. Guests will enjoy live music, appetizers, and drinks. Representatives from the Western Mass. Master Gardeners Assoc. will speak about the significance and meaning of herbs and flowers. There will also be a silent auction of artist-designed watering cans. The cost is $35 per person, and all funds raised will change the life of a grieving child. For more information, contact Shelly Bathe Lenn, coordinator at the Garden, at (413) 582-5312 or [email protected].

Northampton Garden Tour

June 11: Come visit eight gardens on display for the 2016 Northampton Garden Tour, a fund-raiser for Friends of Forbes Library Inc. The event will be held from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., rain or shine. The Garden Tour aims to inspire and educate everyday gardeners with plantings in a variety of appealing and unique landscaping styles and creative use of hardscape. In contrast to the 2015 tour that was localized in the center of Northampton, this year’s tour takes participants on a scenic and varied 18-mile route to the outer reaches of the community. Tickets come with directions to this self-guided tour of gardens within easy driving distance of the library. There is no obvious, easiest route, but suggestions will be available to make the tour both safe and expedient. At each garden, there are descriptions of the plantings, and garden guides will be on hand to answer questions. The terrain of this year’s tour broadly circles Northampton, making gardens accessible by car or a bicycle ride for the recreational peddler comfortable with 20-plus miles. Tickets for the tour are $15 in advance at Forbes Library, Bay State Perennial Farm, Cooper’s Corner, Hadley Garden Center, North Country Landscapes, and State Street Fruit Store. The cost is $20 on the day of the tour at the library only. The Garden Tour also includes a raffle to win organic compost, gift certificates, garden supplies, a landscape consultation, and more. Raffle tickets are available at Forbes Library through the day before the tour as well as at one of the gardens on the day of the tour. All event proceeds benefit Friends of Forbes Library to support programs, events, and projects for the library that could not otherwise be funded. For details: on the organization, visit www.forbeslibrary.org. For more information about the Garden Tour, call Lyn Heady at (413) 584-7041.

‘Leverage Technology to Do More with Less’

June 15: Comcast Business will present “How to Leverage Technology to Do More With Less,” part of the BusinessWest/HCN Lecture Series, at the Lyman & Merrie Wood Museum of Springfield History, 21 Edward St., Springfield. Registration will begin at 7:15 a.m., followed by breakfast and a panel discussion from 7:30 to 9 a.m. The panelists — influential minds in the IT field — will discuss issues that every business IT department is being forced to deal with, including rising demands to make changes to existing systems, increasing efficiency and improving security, and how budget restrictions impact IT. Panelists include Michael Feld, CEO, VertitechIT, and interim CTO, Baystate Health and Lancaster General Hospital; Frank Vincentelli, chief technology officer, Integrated IT Solutions; and Patrick Streck, director, IT Services, Baystate Health / Information & Technology. Admission is free, but pre-registration is required by June 7. Register online HERE, or call (413) 781-8600 for more information.

40 Under Forty

June 16: The 10th annual 40 Under Forty award program, staged by BusinessWest, will be held at the Log Cabin Banquet & Meeting House in Holyoke, honoring 40 of the region’s rising stars under 40 years old. Their stories were told in the pages of the April 18 issue. The winner of the second annual Continuing Excellence Award, honoring a past 40 Under Forty honoree who has continued to build on his or her success, will also be revealed at the gala. The event is sponsored by Northwestern Mutual and Paragus Strategic IT (presenting sponsors), EMA Dental, Health New England, Isenberg School of Management at UMass Amherst, Moriarty & Primack, United Bank, and the Young Professional Society of Greater Springfield.