CUR 2002 Workshop Summaries

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CUR 2002 Workshop Report

Sessions V and VI - Interdisciplinary Centers and Undergraduate Research at Connecticut College

Panelists: Fred Paxton, Bridget Baird, Robert Askins, and Margaret Sheridan
Recorder: Sarah Barr Attendees: 27

Common Elements to the Four Centers

Certificate Program: additional to major; funded internship; senior integrative project; early entry: sophomore or freshman year; coursework unique to each center; and students from virtually all majors.
Faculty with cross-disciplinary interests run the centers with administrative staff support
Activities in addition to the certificate program such as lecture series
Funding through endowments
Integral part of the college: 17% of class of '02 received center certificates

Toor Cummings Center for the International Study of the Liberal Arts (CISLA)
http://cisla.conncoll.edu
Fred Paxton

The center is imbedded in the liberal arts education with a central question of tradition versus modernity. This question of modernity versus tradition is addressed in the application process, sophomore seminar, a senior seminar, a senior integrative project, and an addendum to the students independent study or honors thesis.
To date, there have been 274 graduates of the Center for the International Study of the Liberal Arts and the Center's students have traveled to 42 countries.
Cooperation among faculty colleagues is vital to the success of the Center since faculty advise students on their senior integrative projects from initial conception through completion in their senior year.
After returning from an internship at the South Pacific Information Services in
Christchurch, New Zealand, CISLA student Eunice Kua '02 completed an outstanding senior honors thesis titled "Science in the News: DNA Microarrays, the Human Genome Project and Cancer," a project that examines the roles of the scientist, the journalist and the public. She was awarded the Oakes And Louise Ames Prize at graduation for completing the year's most outstanding honors study. Her honors study drew on her multidisciplinary activities and experiences with the Center.

Ammerman Center for Arts and Technology
http://cat.conncoll.edu
Bridget Baird

The Ammerman Center for Arts and Technology was designed to support faculty and student research in arts and technology.
To complete the certificate program, students complete coursework in arts and computer science, a senior seminar, and research with faculty through independent studies or summer work.
Examples of Center activities include workshops in computer animation, colloquia series, and symposium.
Research interests include 3D, music and technology, and haptics.
The Center draws art students into computer science and computer science students into art.
Student projects include a virtual tour of campus, visualization of scientific principals, software interface for theater lighting, educational software, and character animation.
Center work is labor intensive work for faculty but they enjoy the experience.
Jeanne Stern '03 spoke to the group about her experience with CAT. She is currently interning at Sonalysts where she is using Maya to create computer animation. Her senior integrative project will be a tracking system that links original art to music.

Goodwin-Neiring Center for Conservation Biology and Environmental Studies
http://ccbes.conncoll.edu
Robert Askins

Certificate program requirements include sophomore entrance, Environmental Studies 110, 3 courses, participation in a Center conference, internship, senior project, and the certificate seminar during the junior and senior years.
The Center is a natural outgrowth of a series of traditions dating to the establishment of the Connecticut College Arboretum in 1931. Now encompassing over 750 acres of College property, the Arboretum's natural areas have nurtured generations of faculty and students in ecology, environmental teaching and field research. The Center is a direct outgrowth of the early ecological studies pioneered largely but Dr. Richard H. Goodwin and Dr. William A. Niering, much of it taking place in the college's own Arboretum.
The Goodwin-Neiring Center attracts students from a variety of fields including Philosophy, Environmental Studies, English, Human Development, Zoology, Gender and Women's Studies, Botany, Ethnobotany, Religious Studies, and Italian
The program is run by a faculty committee with participants from Anthropology, Botany, Chemistry, Economics, Government, Philosophy, Physics, and Zoology.
Marjorie Lundgren '02 spoke to the group about her internship as the Invasive Species Monitoring and Control Intern at The Nature Conservancy in Connecticut. She also discussed her senior integrative project "Environmental and Site Characteristics Influencing Invasion of Ten Exotic Plant Species in Southern New England."

Holleran Center for Community Action and Public Policy
http://holleran.conncoll.edu
Margaret Sheridan

The mission of the Holleran Center is to foster active citizenship and community leadership in a multicultural democratic society. We do this through teaching, learning, research, and community collaborations that include faculty, staff, students, and community members.
Public Policy and Social Ethics, a required course for certificate students, explores tensions among individual wants, community needs and citizens' responsibilities and how these tensions are affected by globalization forces and new social and economic arrangements.
In addition to the gateway course, students are required to participate in supervised community learning. The students are divided into smaller groups and paired with community partners who will supervise them as they explore policy challenges in our community.
The Center also offer skills training to our students. Past topics have included public speaking, negotiation, diversity, field research, Excel, and grant writing.
Examples of student research: Blumberg, Rachel. "Design Issues in Children's Hospitals: The Adolescent Client" Psychology Honors Thesis, Broderick, Trinity. "Cracking the Test: Unraveling the Impact of Standards and Accountability Based Education Reform on Inequities Between Urban and Suburban Schools" American Studies Independent Study, Brownell, Emily. "Relocation and Reclamation: The Renaissances of Harlem and Sophiatown" English Independent Study, and McDonald, Emily. "Journey Through AIDS: Women, Inequality, and Meanings of Healing" Gender and Women's Studies Honors Thesis.