SCENE continues its community-centered focus by presenting some of the most exciting intellectual happenings that our area has to offer. Education Matters focuses on higher education, with an emphasis on difference-making programs, professors and students.   This month, we proudly feature New College of Florida.

While most students are slowly transitioning back into "school mode" in mid- to late-January after a hefty holiday break, something far different is happening for many New College of Florida students. A cornerstone of their academic program is the collaboration between faculty and students with the outcome being innovative, experiential independent study projects (ISPs) that occur during a four-week January Interterm before the normal Spring courses begin. This isn't just for the Type A overachievers--every New College student is required to complete three ISPs prior to graduating. Talk about tailor-making your own educational experience! Thanks to the ISPs, students are allowed to dig a bit deeper into their fields of study and get far more than classroom discussions and textbooks can offer.
What type of projects are being taken on? This January, New College students will examine the Holocaust as both memory and history, work with the Longboat Key Chamber of Commerce on urban development, and create a performance examining and deconstructing a specific social issue. Another will be interning in Oregon for a political campaign.
Nicolas Scheffer, a sophomore from Jacksonville, is excited to be going on his first ISP soon. Scheffer didn't come straight to New College for his college experience--he first spent time at Florida Atlantic University before realizing it was "simply too big and impersonal to foster a sense of community." On his parents' recommendation, he visited New College and was instantly taken by their campus and unique school system. Now, this January, he's embarking on a trip to France to study several solar energy facilities in Sarreguemines, in the Alsace-Lorraine region on the French-German border. His goal? "Learn about the new technologies being used for renewable energy," but also "gain perspective on how cultural differences might affect environmental practices." While that's already an impressive-sounding project, Scheffer is quick to point out that it's important we don't lose our sense of stewardship to the earth. "The decisions we make today directly affect future generations," he explains. "We should feel responsible for the maintenance and management of our natural resources."
Who wouldn't want a student like that in their classroom?
Dr. Jocelyn Van Tuyl, a Professor of French Language and Literature (and frequent faculty ISP sponsor), has been involved in the ISP at New College for 17 years. She explains that while much of the draw of the ISPs is the experiential or service learning, there's also typically a research and writing component where students can document and process much of what they encountered. "For instance," she explains, "a few years ago, one student volunteered with Habitat for Humanity. He divided his time between swinging a hammer and writing materials that Habitat used for various purposes."
Over the years, Dr. Van Tuyl has been involved with a lot of memorable projects, including last year's French cooking project led by Holly McArthur and Margeaux Sherman. Together, they planned, budgeted, requested, and obtained funds, then cooked and served French dishes to fellow New College students through a four-week period. The final part of their project was a banquet for their faculty sponsors – "the most pleasurable project I've ever had to evaluate!" confesses Dr. Van Tuyl. But it wasn't just about food preparation. The students also researched the history and regional variations of French cuisine, produced a research paper and a cookbook, and learned a host of practical skills.

About her experience of preparing forty different recipes within a single month (ratatouille, pear tatin, black nougat, fougasse bread, puff pastries, boeuf bourguignon, and eggs a la dieppoise, to name just a few), McArthur says, “The ISP actually taught me a great deal about working with a group and planning events where food was involved. It didn't always go smoothly, and a few of the recipes were disasters, but we always had something to feed to the people that showed up." With 10 to 20 people showing up hungry each day, they didn't have the option to just turn their fellow students away with a shrug and a smile. What a valuable lesson in learning to work on a real-world deadline!
Faculty sponsor Dr. Uzi Baram, Professor of Anthropology, practices what he preaches. He's actively engaged in combining theory and practice in "taking the ideas being generated in my academic discipline and assessing them through archaeological or ethnographic means." As Director of the New College Public Archaeology Lab--whose mission is preserving regional heritage--he models for his students how to become engaged by delving deeply into the archaeology, history, or contemporary communities of a region.
While he's sponsored past projects where students created digital or graphic representations of historic sites or helped organized archaeological artifacts from local excavations, he recently headed up a very unusual ISP. This past year, a group of three New College students tried their hands at flint knapping--making projectile points from stone. This is especially relevant since it's one of the technologies used by the ancient peoples of the region. Coincidentally, the materials for this particular ISP came from the same federal FIPSE grant (Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education) that created the New College Public Archaeology Lab.
Junior Ashley Parks from Bradenton explains: "Jehan [Sinclair], Daphne [Hudson], and I spent a lot of time watching various instructional videos, reading books about flint knapping, and even spending time with one of the members of FPAN (Florida Public Archaeology Network) to guide us through the flint knapping process. We then spent most mornings in January testing our methods on chert and obsidian, with varying degrees of success.” What she found – what the whole group found – was that something as seemingly simple as making a pointed rock is incredibly difficult.
"By the end of the ISP," says Sinclair, a junior from Miami, "we still could not produce a decent projectile point. However, we came away from it with a lot of knowledge on the process. For example, by examining the flakes left behind from knapping I can discern whether or not the artisan was skilled. This is potentially useful in examining prehistorical archaeological sites.”
For obvious reasons, the New College faculty loves the ISPs. "They require that students delve deeply and independently into a topic or an academic concern," Dr. Baram says. "From their first year, New College students have to move beyond the classes of their first semester where the professor has organized readings, activities, and assignments to figure out how to manage their time and effort to successfully complete a project. It's a great learning experience."
Clearly, the ISPs are a crucial part of New College's commitment to educating students with real-world issues and opportunities. It's also important to point out that New College doesn't just treat ISPs as a type of unfunded mandate. A branch of student government, the Council of Academic Affairs, assists students with funding. Plus specific projects often receive support from departments, such as Nicolas Scheffer's renewable energy project in France which was helped by the Environmental Studies Department.

One of Dr. Van Tuyl's favorite ISPs this coming year is a group project on Children's Literature.  While she often sponsors work on juvenile fiction, this year's project is special since it's designed in conjunction with the Children's Literature Symposium to be held at USF-Sarasota/Manatee in February 2012.  All of the New College students involved in the group project will be attending the conference, "where they'll hear a recent NCF alumna speak," Dr. Van Tuyl notes. What a wonderful way to bring New College and USF-SM together in a meaningful way. Would we expect anything else from a college with such a commitment to experiential, community-relevant learning?