Williams-Mystic Evolves

The college is implementing recommendations allowing Williams to continue its partnership with the Mystic Seaport Museum for another three-year term.

After raising concerns last spring about the Williams-Mystic Program’s viability, college leaders recommended closing it when the contract with the museum ended in June 2025. Since 2015, Williams has bridged the financial gap between tuition revenue and expenses for the nearly 50-year-old program, which immerses students in an interdisciplinary coastal and ocean studies curriculum in Mystic, Conn. Some 22 students from around the country, including on average 10 from Williams, attend each semester. 

An outpouring of support from alumni of the program, as well as from Williams faculty and staff, led to the formation of the Working Group on the Future of the Williams-Mystic Program, which spent this past spring and summer developing recommendations. These include “a combination of careful cost reductions, new recruitment and enrollment measures, and viable fundraising strategies,” wrote Williams President Maud S. Mandel and Williams-Mystic Executive Director
Tom Van Winkle in an August letter announcing that the program would continue. “We are excited to jointly support the continuation of this exemplary experiential and interdisciplinary liberal arts program.”

Photograph, at top, courtesy of the Williams-Mystic Program