Honors Program Endowed and Named
The Boone Honors Program - Staff Contributor
On
June 15, 2002 Ferrum College had a special gala at the Hotel Roanoke to
celebrate the successful completion of their capital campaign: "Not
Self, But Others: The Campaign for Ferrum College." During the celebrations
it was announced that that an effort spearheaded by Ferrum alumnus Charles
A. Skinner resulted in approximately 125 thousand dollars being raised
to endow the college's new Honors Program and rename it The Boone Honors
Program to recognize fifteen years of service to Ferrum College by retiring
President Dr. Jerry Boone and his wife Shirley Boone.
Honors Director and Associate Professor of Religion Dr. David Howell was excited by the gift. "The monies earned from the Endowment will help support activities for the program. Students will have increased opportunities to hear speakers we can bring to campus, attend cultural events, and travel to undergraduate research conferences." Howell thinks that the Honors Program is a fitting way to honor the Boone's. "The Honors Program is not simply about enriched academic opportunities in the classroom for Ferrum's best students. We also want to provide extracurricular opportunities for the honors students to learn and have fun together. Jerry spent part of his career working in Student Affairs, and the endowment for the Honors Program will help support some of the out-of-class experiences for our students." Howell noted that there is often a tendency by colleges and universities to honor people by naming buildings after them. "Those of us involved in higher education know that the real legacy of our work is not to found in brick and mortar but in the changed lives of the students we work with and teach. These gifts honoring Jerry and Shirley will make a difference in the educational experiences of our best students, so I can't think of a better to honor their work in education."
To read more about the new Honors Program and the gift to endow the Program in the Boone's honor, go to the 2002 edition of Profess.
Honors Students have Opportunities
to Study in England - Staff Contributor
Two Ferrum College honors students recently had opportunities to study
in England. Sabrina Tribbett, sophomore English major from West Virginia,
and Sandra Via, sophomore Political Science and History major from Virginia,
joined other students from Appalachian College Association (ACA) schools
and spent 6 weeks during Trinity term in Oxford during the summer of 2002.
Sabrina and Sandra were both awarded a $4000 scholarship from the ACA
to help with expenses. Working through the Oxford Study Abroad Program,
the students took an integrated course in British history and culture.
The course included visiting lecturers who would lecture on their areas
of expertise as well as field trips out of Oxford. In addition, students
in the program took a second course taught through the tutorial method
used to teach Oxford University undergraduates. Both Sandra and Sabrina
matriculated at St. Edmund's Hall as visiting students and took a tutorial
course in Shakespeare during their time in Oxford.
Learning in Oxford - Sandra Via
The
Oxford system of education differs greatly from the American education
system. The primary form of teaching at the colleges of the University
consists of tutorials. Each student is provided with a tutor who specializes
in the student’s field of study. Traditionally, the student meets with
the professor one on one for an hour. However, recently it has become
more commonplace for the tutor to meet with two or three students at a
time and Sabrina and I met together with our tutor for our Shakespeare
tutorial.
During the tutorial sessions, the tutor and students discuss specific areas under study. At a tutorial, students are given a specific topic for an essay which must be completed before the next tutorial session (usually sometime during the following week). Students read their essays and then discuss it with their tutor. This system allows no room for a student to hide or come unprepared to the tutorial.
The
Oxford essay is an important component of the tutorial system. The tutor
usually provides students with a reading list for their essay. Often,
the professor wants the essay to be written in an argumentative fashion.
Therefore, students must take a specific position in the paper and back
it up with sources and opinions. Our essays were a minimum 1500 to 2000
words each week.
The traditions associated with Oxford University have been in place for centuries. While many professors offer lectures on several topics, few undergraduate students attend. Our program of study at the Oxford Study Abroad Program combined the traditional lecture format associated with American higher education with the tutorial method of Oxford. I left Oxford with a unique perspective on this system of education and a greater respect for the traditions of other countries and schools.
The opportunity to study abroad in Oxford was an experience that I will never forget and I gained a greater appreciation for the beauty of England. Oxford itself was a fascinating city with beautiful architecture, lovely botanical gardens, interesting shops, and a variety of attractions to participate in including going to plays and listening to stirring debates at the Oxford Union. Outside of Oxford we visited Portsmouth to view the great Royal Navy Fleet; London where we say Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, the houses of Parliament, and the Tower of London; Blenheim Palace, and Stratford-upon-Avon with its various sites associated with William Shakespeare. My most memorable experience in Oxford was taking in the Botanical gardens and viewing the beautiful buildings that surrounded the gardens. My favorite experience outside of Oxford was taking a trip to London because the city holds so much history and actually seeing the historical sights was meaningful and interesting.
Studying in Oxford gave me a new perspective on education due top the fact that Oxford has the tutorial system which causes the student to work more independently. In the US students rely more on the professors and teachers for guidance and assistance when researching a certain topic. In Oxford a student tries to answer a question or prove something rather than trying to dig up facts.
Angelika
Shenk, sophomore art major from Virginia, received an Appalachia- London
Scholars Program scholarship administered through the Appalachian College
Association to spend the 2002 fall semester studying at Imperial College.
Ferrum College is a member of PCCIS (Private College Consortium for International
Studies) which operates a program in central London. The scholarship is
available to students who live in the Appalachia region and is worth $8,000.
Every student in the program takes a course titled "British Life
and Culture" which combines lectures with field trips to historical
and cultural sites in London and throughout England. As an art major,
Angelika is excited about the prospect of visiting some of the great art
museums in Europe to view the art works she has studied about in books.
To find out more about the London program and the ACA scholarships, go to the PCCIS webpage. Deadlines for scholarship applications are March 1 and October 1.
Dr.
Ernest Lee Addresses Honors Banquet - Staff Contributor
Students, faculty, and administrators celebrated the first year of the
College's new Honors Program with a banquet in May. Dr. Ernest Lee, Professor
of English and Director of the Appalachian Center at Carson-Newman College,
was the guest speaker at the 2002 Honors Banquet. A quote from Annie Dillard's
book A Pilgrim at Tinker's Creek provided Lee with the inspiration
for the title of his address, "Being There." In her book, Dillard
responds to that age old question "if a tree falls in the forest
does it create a sound if no one is there to witness it" with the
comments, "The answer must be, I think, that beauty and grace are
performed whether or not we will or sense them. The least we can do is
try to be there." Dr. Lee challenged students to "be there"
if they are to experience college and life. In his address liberally sprinkled
with quotes from literature and stories of memorable people he had known
who had the gift of "being," Lee spoke of what he learned from
Robert Pirsig about improving the world. For Pirsig, the place to begin
to improve the world is in "one's own heart and head and hands, and
then work outward from there."
Participants in ACA Religion and Science study
trip to England at Isaac Newton's house. The group is standing in front
of a descendent of the apple tree where Newton was hit on the head with
an apple.
Religion and Science Honors Seminar for Fall 2002 - staff contributor
Dr. David Howell, Associate Professor of Religion, and Dr. David Johnson, Professor of Chemistry and Environmental Science, are offering a team-taught interdisciplinary honors seminar on Religion and Science: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives for the fall semester. Two years ago, Johnson and Howell received a grant from the Center of Theology and the Natural Sciences to develop the group. This will be the second time they have taught the seminar which looks at issues where science and religion interface. Students are asked to explore the consider alternatives to the conflict model which so often dominates discussions of science and religion.