By Kathleen Pierce, Bangor Daily News
PORTLAND, Maine — The Salt Institute for Documentary Studies, now part of Maine College of Art, will accept its first full-time students next fall for a new graduate certificate program.
For the first time in its 43 year old history, the program is fully accredited, allowing college students to apply for federal financial aid and enabling students at other colleges, such as Bates or Bowdoin, to take a semester here and apply credits to their degree.
“Salt is an amazing program. But formally being part of a college like MECA brings many more advantages for Salt students,” MECA Dean Ian Anderson said.
The Congress Street institute almost closed last year because of dwindling enrollment and endowment. With a grant of an undisclosed amount from the Quimby Family Foundation, MECA will build additional facilities and hire two faculty members over the course of this academic year.
The new 15-week graduate certificate program is available in four tracks: radio storytelling, photography, short documentary film and writing. Though not a master’s degree, documentary studies will be one of five academic programs at the college, which gives it clout.
When Salt, formerly located at 561 Congress St., was in danger of closing, celebrities including Ira Glass, host of this American Life, leaped to its defense. Graduates came together for a Save Salt campaign, though not all alum supported the acquisition.
To interim MECA president Stuart Kestenbaum, also Maine’s poet laureate, the move “connects MECA to Maine in a new way.”
MECA is taking applicants for the fall 2017 semester.
“It’s been a year since Salt has been online. We don’t want people to forget about it,” Anderson said.
This story appears through a partnership with the Bangor Daily News.