A List
9/4/00
NEW ACADEMIC PROGRAMS, FACILITIES MARK START OF YEAR AT SLU
CANTON -- New academic programs as well as new and refurbished
facilities on campus highlight the 2000-2001 academic year at
St. Lawrence University, which began fall semester classes on August 31.
Three new academic programs will begin this year:
Adirondack Semester
Directed by Associate Professor of Biology and Director of
Outdoor Studies Karl McKnight, the program follows the model of study
abroad in another nation by offering students an immersion experience
in the natural world. Those who enroll will consider their life as global
citizens of the human community as well as of the global ecosystem. The
fall semester program will involve four academic courses: Natural History
and Ecology of the Adirondacks; The Arts of Nature; Cultural History of
the Adirondacks; and The Ethics of Personal and Community Identity. The
program is designed to balance the skills development and personal
transformation that can happen on wilderness education programs with the
academic study and critical thinking more commonly found on campus.
The Adirondack Semester begins with a 12-day extended wilderness
experience. As field study, it will provide students with an introduction
to natural history, ecology, cultural history and ethics. The main part
of the program will be based at Camp Massawepie, in the northwest part of
the Adirondack Park, without cars, television or other conveniences.
The 11 students participating in the program have agreed to temporary removal
from urban and campus amenities to study and reform the ethics of their
relationship to society and nature.
In addition to the academic coursework, there will be workshops in
such skills as rock climbing, kayaking, canoeing, first aid, mapping,
boatbuilding, photography, trail maintenance, and museum display. At the end
of the semester, students will travel out west for a 14-day experience in a
dramatically different ecosystem.
Global Studies
St. Lawrence's Global Studies initiative emerged from a series of
grants in international education and intercultural studies, received over
the past decade, that have enabled a significant portion of the University's
faculty to explore the varied ways societies, cultures and development can be
studied. A result of their exploration is the decision to make existing area
studies programs -- African Studies, Asian Studies, Caribbean and Latin American
Studies, European Studies and Canadian Studies -- part of a larger whole, and
engage students involved in those programs in comparative study as well as a
particular "area."
Associate Professor of Philosophy Grant Cornwell and Associate
Professor of English Eve Stoddard will direct the program. A course they
taught in the spring 2000 semester serves as a model for how Global Studies
will be approached at St. Lawrence: Using funds from a Ford Foundation "Crossing
Borders" grant, their course was web-linked with a similar course being taught
at the University of the West Indies in Trinidad. Active student and faculty
interchange took place, via the Internet, between campuses and across cultures
on a full range of academic texts, topics and social issues.
The culmination of these converging factors at St. Lawrence took place
last spring with the award of a $1 million challenge grant from the Christian
A. Johnson Endeavor Foundation to initiate a new program in Global Studies.
This generous grant is providing start-up funds to establish five new,
tenure-track faculty positions in Global Studies; a new major in Global
Studies was approved as well. The new faculty will begin this year, working
with other faculty leaders on campus to reformulate teaching and learning to
strengthen and link current area and intercultural studies programs through
in-depth study and comparison of societies and cultures throughout the world.
Integrated Science Education Initiative
After several years of planning, a group of science faculty representing
biology, chemistry, geology, environmental studies, mathematics, and psychology,
have launched the Integrated Science Education Initiative, or ISEI, a
comprehensive project aimed at transforming the way students learn and understand
science.
The primary site of activity will be the 76-acre nature preserve on the
edge of campus many know as the Kip Tract. It offers richly diverse ecosystems
for study, including the Little River, its watershed and oxbow ponds, deciduous
and coniferous forests, old-growth meadow, and marshy wetlands.
In the past, faculty and students have conducted various field studies
in this area on a course-by-course basis, but have had no mechanism for long-term
retention or sharing of their data. Through ISEI, faculty and students will
develop a series of geographically referenced field science sites for ongoing
study and data collection, and install permanent monitoring equipment at selected
points. Data collected will form a long-term, multidisciplinary Geographic
Information Systems (GIS) database that will represent the collection and study
of a wide variety of conditions, ecosystems and habitats over time.
Facilities
This summer, work was completed on St. Lawrence's new football facility,
Leckonby Staduim. It will open in the fall, with dedication ceremonies set for
Homecoming/Laurentian Leadership Weekend, October 6-8.
Also completed during the summer was the refurbishing of Dean-Eaton
Residence Hall and the Common Room of Sykes Residence Hall, as part of a multi-year
program to improve student living spaces.
Work has begun on a new 150-station fitness center and the Newell Field House,
to be completed for fall 2001 at an expected cost of $12.9 million. The field house
will contain a six-lane competition 200-meter indoor track with an eight-lane
straightaway and five tennis courts, freeing Leithead Field House to become a
single-surface turf indoor field for a wide variety of activities.
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