On Oct. 20, Johnson went to pot, hosting its 23rd annual Throw-A-Thon .

The event was overseen by Amy May, part-time instructor of ceramics. Students, faculty, staff, alumni and various community members all showed up to take part in this fundraiser for a variety of charities.

“Turnout this year was great. I’m sure we had more participants this year than we did last year,” May said. “Over the course of the day and right up until midnight it was busy. We’ve had kilns firing nonstop ever since.”

Throw-A-Thon has been a popular annual event in part for its inclusiveness. The event is open and free to the public, and an artistic background isn’t required. “It’s interesting because frequently we’ll get people from the community — and students and faculty — who maybe have not ever worked with clay before, but they’re curious about it,” said May.

May also enjoys how many people it takes to make Throw-A-Thon successful. “Everything throughout the process is in little bits. So you might be the person who made the poster, you might be loading and unloading the kiln or making a glaze,” May said. “It’s a lot of little micro movements, a lot of little things, a lot of hands and, in the end, it is what it is.”

Although she doesn’t know the exact number, May estimates that a couple hundred ceramics pieces were made during the 12-hour period, all of which will be glazed by her classes. “Today we’ll have people just glazing up a storm,” she said. “It’s a little overwhelming, but it’s also really fun.”

These pieces will be sold during the Holiday Sale on Nov. 15, which May says serves as a great opportunity for her students to present their work to the public. “Often I’ll have students donate projects that they’ve made for class that they aren’t sure about, and then they’ll see somebody come to the sale and think it’s just such a unique piece,” she said. “It makes it so special when they see somebody else respond to it and it’s the thing they want to go home with.”

The profits of the sales are always donated to charities. “Over the course of time we’ve supported a lot of local charities,” May said. “In the early days, we did Vermont Cares, Clarina Howard Nichols Center and JSC Arts.”

This year the proceeds will be given to two charities, with the first being the Vermont Food Bank. “The idea we had for part of that was to make a lot of bowls,” said May. “Some of the money generated from the sale of a bowl will go to the food bank.”

The second charity Throw-A-Thon is raising money for is one they’ve been supporting for a while: Operation Smile, an organization that provides free surgery for children in developing countries who are born with facial deformities such as a cleft lip or cleft palate. According to May, the organization almost always matches Throw-A-Thon’s donations dollar for dollar.

Because of the Throw-A-Thon’s considerable contributions, Operation Smile one year invited the ceramics students to Honduras to paint a mural in one of its clinics. “Most everything was going to be paid for, except it was going to cost some for transportation,” May said. The students figured out that only a few of them would be able to afford the trip. So instead, the students turned down the trip and donated what would be the cost of transportation to pay for multiple cleft lip and palate surgeries.

May noted that Throw-A-Thon is an important aspect of the Johnson Community for several reasons. “It’s making the arts accessible to a wider community,” said May, who added that students who don’t have time to take art classes often come to participate, as well as students who aren’t sure whether or not ceramics is something they want to explore. “It offers an opportunity to come and do something fun and see what it’s like.”

May also considers the event to be a homecoming of sorts. Alumni, students and community members come together to create something bigger than themselves. “At the heart of it is community,” May said. “That it is something people can do with their families, and I think that’s something that’s very special about it. You just contribute a little bit of good, little drops, and it adds up over time.”