• Santa Paws
• Last Chance! Fall 2023 Exhibitions Close
• Holiday Lights Comes to Tenleytown
• Continued Work in Tunnel under Butler-Bender Complex
• Updates on AU Outdoor Tennis and Basketball Courts
• Damn Things Will Kill Ya
• Breakfast with Santa
• Stay Informed on Upcoming Meltzer Center and Sports Center Annex Construction
• The Child Development Center has Openings for Winter Enrollment
• Update on Army Corps of Engineers Ongoing Work
• February and Spring Courses at the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at AU

• American University’s Winter Break Closure 

• Orientation to the AU Neighborhood Partnership
• American University Events

Santa requested this one himself.

Join us for an evening exclusively designed for your pets and get your Christmas card photo taken care of at the same time.

Our Audubon room will be festively decorated for you to take your own pictures with Santa in front of the fireplace. Each pet gets treats from Santa, photos, and you get to make a paw print ornament to take home.

The experience is broken up into timeslots and space is limited. Sign up here!

Last chance to see our fabulous fall contemporary art exhibitions!

See how Nature’s Tapestry re-visions the everyday through Bernis von zur Muehlen’s evocative photographs of the natural world.

In CUSHNER, witness Steven Cushner’s masterful manipulation of color and scale, and in Rachel Rotenberg (just reviewed by the Washington Post) see how the artist imbues her cedar sculptures with both intimacy and monumentality.

The larger-than-life oil, heavily textural pastels in Franklin White: An American in Venezuela invite you to examine the way nature generously gifted Merida, Venezuela, with a bounty of beautiful things, while the photography in the must-see Lost Europe offers an intimate look into the lives of rural Ukrainians just before Putin’s invasion.

For more information on these exhibits, please visit the AU Museum website.

Staying in town for the holidays? Come experience Tenleytown Main Street Holiday Lights between November 17 and January 7. The businesses within Tenleytown Main Street will be decked out with holiday lights so you can explore, shop, and dine this holiday season.

• Stop by before December 10 to check out the displays and cast your vote for your favorite light displays. The business with the most votes will win a cash prize!
• Join the DC Holiday Lights Citywide Scavenger Hunt for a chance to win great prizes from DC businesses. More than $3,500 in gift cards are available to win! Plus, the top 4 players are guaranteed to win. Start playing today!
• Still have gifts to buy for the holidays? Knock out your last-minute holiday shopping during the Tenleytown Winter Holiday Market at the newly opened East West Cafe (4619 41st St NW) on Wednesday, December 13 from 5pm-10pm. With 20 local vendors, you’ll find something unique for everyone on your list. Enjoy delicious food and drinks, listen to tunes from a live DJ, and shop until you drop. We’ll also have a Children’s Craft Corner with the movie Elf playing on repeat.

Keep up with all the latest Tenleytown Main Street Holiday Lights happenings at https://dcholidaylights.org/tenley/

As part of the 2021 Campus Plan, AU proposed new development on the northwest quadrant of the campus to create an athletic, residential, and campus life village. Specifically, sites 3 and 5 (located adjacent to Reeves Field and behind Bender Arena) were recently approved for development by the Zoning Commission to house AU’s new Meltzer Center for Athletic Performance as well as an outdoor multi-activity court and enhanced student health and wellness facilities. The footprint of Site 3 includes the university’s outdoor tennis and basketball courts, which will be decommissioned once construction begins.

While the full construction schedule has not yet been finalized, the tennis and basketball courts will remain open and available through the end of the calendar year. More information about this important project can be found on the project website.  

December 5–8, 2023, 8 p.m. | December 9, 2023, 2 p.m. and 8 p.m.

"You can't choose who you love. It doesn't work like that."

A little thing like lung cancer isn’t going to stop Ruth from smoking—even in the hospital. As her children gather by her bedside, they struggle with the hard-headed, hard-hearted woman who raised them—and with each other. As events unfold, the family is forced to grapple with faith, fear, forgiveness, and the complicated consequences of letting go. Damn Things Will Kill Ya was written by recent AU graduate Olivia Luzquinos (CAS ’23) and features AU Theatre faculty member Tara Giordano as the matriarch Ruth. This production will be the first time the AU Theatre Program has fully produced a show by a recent graduate.

Content: This production includes adult themes and references to suicide.

By Olivia Luzquinos (CAS ’23) and directed by Aaron Posner

Tickets can be purchased here.

It's the most wonderful time of the year! Come to Airlie for a delicious breakfast made by our Executive Chef and his team. When you've finished dining, take the family to meet Santa Claus! Children can share their wish lists for the Holiday Season and families can take their own photographs as a keepsake to treasure. We can't wait to see you there!

Sign up for a day and timeslot here.

Recently, American University received the Zoning Order for the construction of the Meltzer Center and Sports Center Annex (Meltzer/SCAN). AU is now in the process of obtaining building permits and developing a construction schedule for the project.

Regular updates on the project will be shared in our newsletter. If you would like to receive specific  communication regarding the construction progress of Melzer/SCAN, please scan the QR code above or fill out the contact form found at https://tinyurl.com/MOutreach.

AU's Child Development Center provides high-quality education and care for children 2-1/2 to 6 years of age. The Center uses a research-based system that offers a comprehensive, evolving set of resources that emphasizes the developmental uniqueness of each child.

For questions, please contact, Beth Root, Director, Child Development Center, eroot@american.edu.

To learn more about the Center, please visit: Child Development Center | American University, Washington, DC

In September, The Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE) began their last phase of work on the former Public Safety Building site on the American University campus. As we continue to monitor the project, we wanted to share a project update with the community. While anticipating the possibility of noise and increased truck traffic in the Fletcher Gate area, the project will now require a crane to accomplish the work. Following the crane’s placement, supports will be placed into the ground. This will result in higher levels of noise temporarily, which will be closely monitored by our team. This work will be for a limited time and work is expected to be completed on this step of the project by mid-December.

Information and presentation materials related to the project will be uploaded regularly to the ACOE Project Updates website.

If you have any further questions or concerns on this project, please contact Dan Noble with the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers at dan.g.noble@usace.army.mil

Join us OLLI at American University, a community that embraces curiosity and lifelong learning, for our upcoming February and spring academic sessions. Members “50 and better” gather to enjoy a wide array of courses ranging from politics to poetry, including music, art, science, history, literature, philosophy and more. Enjoy the flexibility of both online and in-person classes and recordings, as well as a weekly lecture series and social events.

Registration for both our February Shorts and our spring semester opens on December 15. Visit olli-dc.org for more information.

American University will be closed for the winter holiday season. Offices and buildings, including Bender Library and the Fitness Centers, will be closed from Saturday, December 23, 2023, through Monday, January 1, 2024. AU Shuttle services will also not operate during this time. The university will reopen, and services will begin again on Tuesday, January 2, 2024.   

During the break, AUPD will continue to provide emergency services and routine campus patrol.  

Please consider joining the AU Neighborhood Partnership which works to provide a consensus-based forum to resolve issues affecting the communities near American University. Interested members of the community may join one of the Partnership’s five standing working groups, comprising community stakeholders and AU leadership.

The orientation sessions served as an introduction to the partnership, explored Zoning and Campus Planning in DC and offered ways to get involved in the partnership through one of the five working groups.

If you did not have a chance to attend the meetings, the Zoom recordings and presentation materials can be found on AU's webpage under the AUNP Orientation Materials tab. There is also a Member Interest Form that can be filled out, and a member of the AUNP partnership will follow up with you.

More information about the AU Neighborhood Partnership and the Office of Community and Government Relations can be found online at https://www.american.edu/communityrelations/.

Still have questions? Email us at communityrelations@american.edu.