First Year Seminars

All first-year students and transfer students with less than 15 credits are required to take a first-year seminar.
 

It's a fact that students are far more likely to succeed and feel satisfied with their college experience if they make a strong connection with a faculty or staff member. 

First Year Seminars are an ideal way to make that connection, and are designed to encourage the kind of active, collaborative learning and open dialogue that makes your undergraduate career come alive!

About First Year Seminars

What's in it for me?
This is a chance to take an interdisciplinary course in your first year. These course combine studies in more than one subject area and also involve a lively and exciting exchange of ideas.

Can such a course make a difference to my educational experience at JSC?
Absolutely! A First Year Seminar course can help you develop and enhance skills that you can use for the rest of your life. These include critical thinking, effective communication, informed evaluation and improved writing skills.

The First Year Seminar courses seem advanced; will I really be able to take them with my background?
Yes! By virtue of being small and taught by experienced faculty, the pace and material can easily be tailored to the background and abilities of the participants. These courses are intended as collaborative learning environments where students and faculty can learn easily from one another.

First Year Seminar Choices for Fall 2010

Contemporary Graphic Novel
Instructor: Ken Leslie
One could argue that cave paintings were the first comics, but this course focuses on the most recent graphic novels, including award-winning works by Art Spiegelman, Marjane Satrapi, Chris Ware, Alison Bechdel and many more. In addition to reading masterworks, we will study the history of comics, and the many uses of comics, including advertising and animation. Students will also design their own comics, and produce a limited-edition graphic work of their own. Drawing is only one way to approach this, but not the only way — photographers, writers, collage artists, and stick-figure maestros are all welcome.

Dystopia: Cautionary Tales of a Nightmarish Future: COURSE FILLED

Instructor: Tyrone Shaw
As opposed to the utopian vision of a more perfect world, dystopian literature and film depict the worst of all possible worlds. Probing basic questions of human nature and society, they reveal anxieties that remain chillingly applicable today. In this course, we will explore such issues as the self, alienation, freedom, complicity, citizenship, love, faith, sex, technology and happiness through a variety of novels and films.

Culture, Heritage and the Past
Instructor:  Fred Wiseman
One of Vermont’s major industries is cultural heritage tourism.  This course discusses the origins, development and current nature of heritage tourism, including museums, heritage trails, cultural festivals, and other Vermont activities that celebrate Vermont’s unique enduring history. Using the celebration of the 400th Anniversary of the discovery of Lake Champlain as a case study, we will see how state and local governments, community and ethnic organizations, scholars and museums work together to promote tourism focused specifically around a historical event.  Guest lecturers will explain the specifics of how their organizations are commemorating this event, and students will analyze the marketing program of the Champlain Quadracentennial Commission to understand how Vermont promotes itself to the world.

The Hidden History of Vermont      
Instructor: Karen Madden
This course will provide students with a new, more diverse perspective on Vermont history. Students will begin by using interviews to discover their own history in terms of class, ethnicity and gender, and then reach out in the larger world that includes the JSC community, Lamoille County and the state of Vermont.  Guest speakers and field trips will provide students with first-hand information on how class, gender and ethnicity shape the experience of Vermonters.  

The Long Emergency and the Coming War
Instructor: Bou Nacklie
This cross-cultural and inter-disciplinary course will range widely to discuss, among other topics: terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, black and white slavery, civil wars, resource depletion, the poisoning of seas and pollution of the air, the warming planet and its multiple consequences.  We shall also discuss the diseases of the Third World, its governments, the legacy of imperialism, its large and close-knit families and their struggles, the corruption, the inhumanity, the squalor, the cultures, the educational systems, and religions.

If I Can’t Dance – Keep Your Revolution  
Instructor:  Maris Wolff
History is not just about important revolutions, battles, politicians, and changing borders.  It is also about everyday people, and what is important in their everyday lives.  This course is a multicultural exploration of the simple things that give people pleasure: their dance, games, social activities, cuisine; some of the things that make a nation’s culture.  We see how geography, climate, work, religion/ritual, gender, and age all have their impact on a country’s customs.  This course investigates the similarities and differences between the various cultures of people around the globe.  This course celebrates what Emma Goldman called everybody’s right to beautiful, radiant things”.

A Call to Action
Instructor: Ellen Hill
Examine major movements of social action from the peace movement to the civil rights movement, and learn tools to activate your citizenship. Students will participate in a service learning project and learn about social issues, social activists, local community organizations and initiatives, and discover ways to make change in our community. Learn more about this class.


Journaling: 60 Ways of Looking at Your Life and the World, Through Writing       
Instructor: Alison Moncreif
The objective of this course is to use daily writing as a means to stimulate reflective and critical thinking. With this reflective and critical thinking, a student can then "read" the complex contemporary world in light of the self as a student, and as a citizen. Students will investigate not just the “how” and the “why,” of daily observations, but also the "what does this mean to me as a person, as a student, in the world?" Students will investigate and make connections through the mechanism of daily writing, and will recognize writing as a crucial medium for thinking.

Art of the Social Imagination: COURSE FILLED   

Instructor: Leila Bandar

This hands-on course follows a “learn by doing” model.  Students complete several group and individual sculptural and 2D projects, then they reflect on them for credit in their course-notebooks.  Sculptural projects stimulate creative energy by using everyday objects to spring-board the imagination. Local collaborations and on-campus print media address a variety of social issues. One Contstructivist-inspired sculpture-building competition (25%), one independent socio-sculptural project (25%), in-class participation (20%), and a 30-page notebook encourages discipline and challenges students to identify who they are by what actions they take and what research they do (30%). No prior art-making experience necessary, only a willingness to work and engage.


 
The Language of Film: COURSE FILLED

Instructor: Sherlock Terry

This course explores the richness of the art form of film through screenings, discussions, readings, writings, and hands-n video production.  This class is not a film history class, but instead will focus on the basic conventions of film expression including narrative, mise-en-scene,       cinematography, editing, sound genre, and more.  Over the course of the semester, we will watch a broad mix of international films from the past 100 years of cinema.  In class we will discuss films and required readings.  Participation in discussion is necessary and expected, and you may also be called upon to lead a discussion yourself.  Additionally, you will write film reviews and get to make a couple of short films of your own.


 

Pretty or Nasty         

Instructor: Liz Dolci
The popularity of cosmetics has increased significantly during the 20th century in western societies particularly in the United States. This course will look at cosmetic usage from its beginnings 6,000 years ago to the current worldwide $18 billion industry.  As an introduction to our topic, the class will attend a make-up session offered by a representative from a cosmetic company.  We then investigate the role of cosmetics in self image as a more comprehensive understanding of the influence of one’s social environment (including the media) is developed in the course.  An introduction to cosmetic chemistry will allow students to evaluate safety and ethical issues.  The course concludes with a personal reflection and analysis of cosmetic usage.

Truthiness 101     
Instructor: Lisa Cline
"Truthiness" is a term that television comedian Stephen Colbert popularized in 2005. He used it to describe things that a person claims to know intuitively or “from the gut” without regard to evidence, logic, intellectual examination or actual facts.  The overarching goal of this class is to explore some of the “truthiness” of the economic world we inhabit.  How have buying, selling, shopping and advertising become such integral elements of our world?  How does the proliferation of consumer culture affect us and the society in which we live?   Coursework includes weekly readings, ten short papers, two exams and a final project.

Perfect Body/Perfect Exercise            
Instructor: Maris Wolff
This course examines body image and exercise through history and across cultures. It also explores some of the many aspects of exercise and “fitness” and why they are good for us. Course objectives include: experiencing the health benefits of regular exercise through physical participation, as well as the basic understanding of a fitness program; coming to understand that what is “perfect” depends on who is doing the judging; and developing research and writing skills.   


Deep Survival: COURSE FILLED
Instructor: Brad Moskowitz
Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why is the title to a book by Lawrence Gonzales which investigates how some people manage to survive life-threatening experiences while others don’t live to tell their story.  By integrating the concepts of brain-based research, human physiology and psychology, one can draw conclusions about what it takes to survive adversity.  Perhaps these lessons can be applied to personal success while navigating the complexities and challenges of the college experience. This course combines a multi-day backpacking experience/wilderness orientation Sunday, August 1 – Friday August 7 with follow-up meetings (times TBD) in the fall semester to help participants understand how the concept of leadership, community, conservation, and having a sense of place are integral to surviving a wilderness living & travel experience, and how these lessons directly relate to surviving and thriving in the college experience, and in life. Check out the Deep Survival website for syllabus, equipment list, and more.

Left of the Dial  
Instructor: Joe Farara
"Left of the Dial" will ground students in the history of radio broadcasting in America, with special attention paid to the role college and community stations have had in shaping it. Students will match this background with hands-on broadcasting experience at WJSC, the Johnson State College radio station. By the conclusion of this semester, students will have hands-on familiarity of radio station operations including the roles of on-air talent, management and production. Learning approaches in this course will include lectures, group work, and an online component.

Tradition and Identity in Contemporary Literature
Instructor: Andrea Perham

This seminar — known informally as “American Visions and Voices” — examines ways that ethnic traditions and national origins influence identity, purpose, and fulfillment. Whenever we identify who we are, we make choices: what do we want or need to emphasize about ourselves? How will people respond to what they learn about us? Will our freedom and control (both short- and long-term) be enhanced or constrained as a result? What combination of skills, influences, insights, and effort will give us the best chance of meeting life on its own terms and making the most of it and of ourselves? We'll read essays by Julia Alvarez, Richard Rodriquez, and Amy Tan and focus on Tracy Kidder’s Strength In What Remains, a powerful account of a young man’s escape from the 1990’s Rwandan Civil War and his struggle to find sanctuary in America. As these explorations proceed, we will examine the impacts of these forces on our own lives. What vision do we have of our lives? What voice do we want to raise in celebration of ourselves, our country, our traditions, and our identity?  


Vampire: COURSE FILLED     
Instructor: Sharon Twigg
This course focuses on the vampire in Western culture in order to ask the questions how and why does a culture create outsiders, exiles, and scapegoats? Why has the vampire become a figure that fires our imaginations, our fears, and our desires? We will consider folklore, history, geography, literature, and film to study the cultural appeal of the vampire from the eighteenth to the twenty-first century, although the majority of the course will focus on the latter part of this chronology. We will also examine a selection of medical and psychological theories, such as Freud’s idea of the uncanny, to gain insight into why the vampire has remained a figure of attraction (or revulsion) for centuries. Bram Stoker's Dracula, largely responsible for Western ideas about the vampire, will be our central text.

 

 

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