Since 1981 the Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts has offered a low-residency program leading to the master of fine arts degree. For three intensive summer sessions, artists from a variety of fields—film/video, music/sound, painting, photography, sculpture, and writing—live and work on the Bard campus in an environment that encourages artistic risk and recognizes the importance of engaged discussion to the artistic process. During the eight-week sessions, each Bard MFA student works individually, in conferences with 60+ faculty and visiting artists, in caucuses within the artist’s discipline, and in seminars and critiques with the community as a whole. Work toward the master of fine arts degree continues in two independent study sessions during the intervening winters. Bard MFA students include active, midcareer artists, teachers, and professionals in other fields, as well as recent college graduates. The faculty is composed of noted working artists who are concerned with nurturing student artists and with the theory and practice of their own.