I have something to confess. It’s actually pretty funny,” I admitted to two of my friends from my freshman seminar. “Remember that time we had lunch together before our Fall Break trip? I didn’t actually know your names.”
The two exchanged sideways glances and dodgy smirks before responding.
“I guess we should tell you something, too,” they replied. “We didn’t actually know yours either. We tried to sneak a peek at your prox when you swiped in to the dining hall but didn’t manage to get a good enough look.”
Take a moment to consider your precepts and seminars. If you had to, could you name each of your classmates correctly? This task would be nearly impossible for me; precepts played the name game on the first day and have since avoided this touchy subject. What is the result of this? Perhaps students are less eager to participate because of these unfamiliar surroundings. The feeling of classroom anonymity may adversely impact learning, for students may feel less comfortable speaking up in front of others they do not know. Or, perhaps this same sentiment is used to justify apathy — if no one knows who you are, you may feel less of a need to participate.
This is how my freshman seminar, FRS 101: Signals, Yardsticks, and Tipping Points of Global Warming and Ocean Environments, could potentially be categorized. That is, until my classmates and I spent eight days together in Bermuda during our break.
The seminar focuses on exactly what its title indicates: understanding the climate signals (warnings), yardsticks (metrics) and tipping points (thresholds) of global warming. By indentifying the dangers currently facing our environment and comparing today’s state of affairs with those of the past, we can actively seek to reduce our negative impact around the globe. This course, however, does not fall under your classic classroom category. One of our first tasks was to memorize 43 species of fish and 16 types of coral. Were we quizzed in the lab room with images of angelfish and great barracudas on our exam papers? Not quite. We ventured over to DeNunzio Pool, equipped with bathing suits and snorkels, and sought to correctly identify lamenated pictures carefully suspended in the water with ropes and weights. This exercise served to prepare us for our snorkeling excursions in Bermuda by simulating a marine environment.
In Bermuda, snorkeling and cave exploration (not to mention general beach frolicking ) came with lab work and lectures. But the value of this seminar is not limited in its capacity of taking not just that it took us out of the classroom and into a world of oceanography. By putting us in an environment which made it easy for close relationships to form, it accomplished so much more. The changes in dynamic from the first day to the post-trip atmosphere were ideal. Moreover, when students and faculty work together closely for a week, the changes in task commitment are astounding. Our progressively heightened investment in our work, coupled with the comfortable relationship with our faculty and peers, created a model environment that can be translated back into the classroom. The comfort we gained by working with each other in the lab in Bermuda will create a more productive and effective lab back in Guyot Hall. The lectures that we attended during the trip will stimulate important discussion topics during our own lectures here in Butler. More importantly, these discussions will be filled with every student’s voice. The potential feeling of insecurity when raising one’s hand to ask a question or add to the conversation no longer applies to this class.
When our group returned to campus, we had mixed feelings of excitement and displacement. The 13 of us had just spent eight days together, isolated in the most northern part of Bermuda, and we were now thrust back onto campus. Separation for five minutes felt like three days, and dinner (30 minutes after we dropped our luggage in our dorms) felt like a reunion. This feeling of a special little community was what made this freshman seminar a remarkable experience. Immediate reminiscing was necessary, detailing the time we watched “Aladdin” together (and sang in unison when “A Whole New World” came on. C’mon, you know you have to) or that time when we all jumped off a cliff into a pool of water. The feeling of identifying a queen parrotfish together while in the middle of the ocean? Priceless. Climbing every rock formation we could get our hands on? Scar worthy.
With this trip descriptively chronicled in a journal, I compare how things are now to how they once were. Not only do I consistently eat meals with my freshman seminar classmates, I know more than just their names. My lab partner loves onion rings. The classmate who lives on the floor below me can do a mean impersonation of Brad Neely. My trip roommate is an incredible artist. This is what makes my freshman seminar certifiably amazing. These close relationships are not only valued for the sake of friendship, they directly enhance our learning experience in the classroom. Thus, my seminar-mates and I did not just survive the Bermuda Triangle. We emerged from the waters with a new understanding of how incredibly influential such an experience can be.
Samantha Batel is a freshman from Greenvale, N.Y. She can be reached at sbatel@princeton.edu.
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