Press Releases

Acclaimed writer Cathie Pelletier will offer her first reading in southern Aroostook County with an appearance on Monday, June 1 at The Vault restaurant in Houlton. The event will include a reception and meet-the-author time starting at 6 p.m. Hors d’oeuvres and a cash bar will be available. The reading will start at 7 p.m. Pelletier will offer a short reading and then participate in a question and answer session. She will also sign books after the session.

“I want this to be a very informal couple of hours, more like a visit than an actual reading,” Pelletier said. “It’s my chance to meet new people and learn a bit of the history of Houlton.”

Pelletier, a native of Allagash, is an award-winning writer who has written nine novels and had two of them turned into movies. She wrote her first novel, The Funeral Makers, in 1986. That novel was followed by Once Upon a Time on the Banks, The Weight of Winter, The Bubble Reputation, A Marriage Made at Woodstock, and Beaming Sonny Home.

Three hundred and forty-five students graduated from the University of Maine at Presque Isle on Saturday, May 16, during the 2009 Commencement Exercises – the University’s 100th Commencement ceremony. President Donald Zillman conferred degrees for the 2008-2009 academic year upon 149 students who participated in the ceremony held in Wieden Gymnasium.

Congressman Michael H. Michaud addressed the graduates as the commencement speaker. During the historic event, Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters Degrees were presented to Congressman Michaud and Bruce Brown, a leading proponent of art education and contemporary art in the State of Maine.

State and local dignitaries joined the University of Maine at Presque Isle on Thursday, May 14 in celebrating the official commissioning of the campus’s 600 kW wind turbine – the very first midsize wind turbine to be installed on a University campus in the State of Maine.

The midday event included a short presentation on how the University’s wind turbine will transform wind into electricity and how that electricity will be delivered to the campus buildings it will power, as well as a Native American drumming song at the turbine site, and a ribbon cutting featuring the release of environmentally-friendly balloons.

The University of Maine at Presque Isle held its annual Awards Convocation on Sunday, April 26, in the Campus Center, presenting top students with academic honors and recognizing them for their service to the institution.

Live classical music returns to the University of Maine at Presque Isle’s Wieden stage with a special recital concert by the students of Dr. Anatole Wieck, Professor of Upper Strings at the University of Maine in Orono, at 8 p.m. on Friday, May 15.

Dr. Wieck’s students will perform their year-end recital, and Dr. Wieck himself will play two pieces during this very special collaboration between the two UMaine campuses.

The University of Maine at Presque Isle will host a special ceremony at 11 a.m. on Thursday, May 14 in the Campus Center to officially commission its 600 kW wind turbine – the very first midsize wind turbine to be installed on a University campus in the State of Maine. The public is invited to attend this special event.

The University’s Wind Turbine Commissioning Ceremony will be held just two days before the University hosts its 100th Commencement Exercises and just two years after University officials announced their intentions to move forward on installing a wind turbine on campus.

The commissioning event will include remarks by local and state officials and a short presentation to explain how the University’s wind turbine will transform wind into electricity and how that electricity will get from the turbine to the campus buildings it will power. The event will then move outside to the wind turbine site where a formal commissioning ceremony will be held.

“This has been such an exciting time for us at the University of Maine at Presque Isle as we have watched the turbine assembly and counted down the days until our wind turbine starts spinning,” President Don Zillman said. “We are extremely proud to be stepping forward as a statewide leader in the utilization of wind as a renewable energy resource with this project and look forward to attaining our major goals of reducing our carbon footprint, lowering our energy bill, and serving our educational and community roles as a public university. We welcome everyone to come and be a part of this historic turbine commissioning event.”

The University of Maine at Presque Isle will hold a regional GIS championship – one component of a statewide GIS program sponsored in part by the National Science Foundation – on Saturday, May 9, from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. in the Campus Center.

The Northern Maine GIS Championship, a poster competition for middle and high school students in northern Maine, involves students developing and submitting posters on a project they have done using computer mapping software and hardware. The event also will include GIS and GPS activities open to anyone interested in learning more about geospatial technology.