“First you must concentrate!” Tom Belfield, FC 1979, with a concentration titled Language, Literature, and Culture: A Structural View.
"My confession: my concentration was my attempt to legitimize myself and my education, and not a true expression of my passion. In compromising passion for a sense of normalcy, I paid dearly. This is a warning to all future Fairhaven students: woe unto thee who does not follow thy passion with all thy heart, no matter how disreputable, marginal or fearful that passion might seem. Those that go after me, heed this lesson well. If you don't follow your passion, heartfully and without reservation, you risk despair and regret." Arthur Warmoth, FC 1999, S&E, concentration titled, Shaping the 21st Century Learning Environment: Studies in Psychology and Education.The purpose of Fairhaven 303 is to assist you in all the steps necessary to complete your Concentration Proposal. This includes conceptualizing and identifying areas of study, justifying and rationalizing the program, selecting a committee, writing the proposal, and filing the finished product with the necessary paperwork. Your responsibilities include:
NOTE: Most of the formal e-mail communication (about evals, etc.) is sent to your university e-mail account. If you want it sent to a different account, please put your forwarding address in the system as follows:
Go to MyWestern
Click on "Mail" button in center of screen
Click on "Options" at top of screen
Click on "Forward by Western to another account"
Follow instructions that come up.
Jan 4 - IN CLASS: Introductions and Class Exercise. Worksheet #1 - Survey. Small group work: Explain ideas underlying your Concentration to others. Develop representation of your integrative concept(s) visually -- picture, mind map, diagram, or other form.
Jan 9 – DUE: Read the opening entries in the “Concentration Kit.” (blue section) Worksheet #2 – Purpose & Skills Bring to class. Presentations by former “concentrators”
IN CLASS: Meet with your assigned small group during the class time. Using your worksheet, discuss your ideas about purpose, skills and knowledge with your small group.
Jan 11 – DUE: Worksheet #3 – Finding Patterns and Commonalities. Bring your cards and the worksheet to class.
IN CLASS: Using someone else’s cards develop a brief statement (5 sentences or so) which integrates these classes and experiences into a coherent educational package. Choose any groupings you wish, ignoring what the “owner” suggested. Give it a title. Develop a list of questions that this person might want to answer through this Concentration. Sign your work. Share these with the group. (Copies should come to your writing advisor)
Jan 16 – NO CLASS – Martin Luther King Holiday
Jan 18 - DUE: Worksheet #4 – Developing the Rationale. DUE: Read Concentration Guidelines in preparation for Sooby’s visit to class Bring to class. IN CLASS: Bring your integrative statements, titles, and question sets to class. (A copy should be turned in to your writing advisor.) Meet with small groups to share these integrative statements and your title. Use your visual representations to discuss alternative approaches to the central concepts. IN CLASS - MOST IMPORTANT CLASS MEETING. Sooby will discuss filing requirements and all you should know (and remember) about the Concentration “protocol.”
Jan 23 -- Read section in the manual on Senior Projects. Worksheet #5 – Theme Paragraphs and Senior Project
Bring two copies your 1-2 page statement developed from Worksheet #5 (one for your writing advisor, one for small group). Meet with small group. Discuss your statement and brainstorm possible class and experiences that might support your themes. Get feedback from small group.
Jan 25 – DUE: Read Formatting Information for Concentration Proposals and Concentration Committee Roles and Responsibilities. Do Worksheet #6 – Committee members and Class List
IN CLASS: Bring two copies of class lists and committee choices (one for your writing advisor, one for small group). Meet initially with the large group and later with your small group. Discuss your class list and committee choices. Be prepared to explain to others why each class and experience fits with the themes in your integrative paragraph, and why each committee member was chosen. Get feedback from small group. Stan and Larry will be meeting with each of the small groups periodically to assist with the brain storming process. The small group process is vital to the formation of your concentration and is considered an important component of the entire class.
Exchange phone numbers and e-mail addresses with your small group. Commit to meeting times for next four weeks during class time.
January 30 -- February 27 - Meet once a week with your small group and once a week with your writing advisor. Meetings with your writing advisor should be during scheduled class time. (Sign up for times on our office doors.)
Wednesday of each week Larry or Stan will hold a workshop on some element of the concentration process during the first hour of class.
Small group meeting times and meetings should be scheduled during the other class times in the week. Use the questions on Worksheet #7 to guide your reading of each other’s proposals.
Be prepared to submit a revised version of your proposal each week, and to report on the small group process. You are responsible for attending these meetings, or rescheduling if you cannot. Your attendance is critical. Others in your group depend on your input, and vice versa. YOU ARE EXPECTED TO WORK CONSISTENTLY DURING THIS PERIOD, WRITING, REWRITING, REVISING AND REFINING YOUR PROPOSAL. USING THE FEEDBACK FROM YOUR SMALL GROUP, YOUR WRITING ADVISOR, and once you are ready, YOUR COMMITTEE.
During this time also complete the following assignments:
January 30 - Ratify your committee and meet with each member, explaining the intentions of your Concentration. (Get approval from your writing advisor first for any committee member from outside Fairhaven. If you’re working with a person who is not a faculty member at Fairhaven, be sure to take along the description of the purpose of the Concentration and guidelines for committee members in your handbook.) Read Proposals
Read at least three proposals farom the files in the front hallway. Use the questions on Worksheet #7 to review these proposals. Bring your answers to worksheet #7 to the workshop.
February 6 – Small group meetings—Due: Initial Version of concentration proposal
With course list and title ready to go out to Committee. Copies go to advisors.
February 8 – Workshop and small group meetings—Mtg. with advisors on initial draft.
February 13 – Class meeting/small groups. Proposal must be ready to go out to Committee by this week once it is cleared by your advisors. You should elicit constructive feedback and critique from your committee members on your proposal.
Allow them time to give an adequate response! It is also helpful to find a student mentor
(someone who is also working in the general area of your Concentration) and seek their advice regarding your program and intentions. (Your advisors and group members can help you identify student mentors and make these connections).
February 15- Workshop and small group meetings
February 20 – No class – President’s Day
February 22- Small group and individual meetings
New (hopefully final) drafts should be circulating to committee members. Schedule meetings with them to discuss feedback. Resubmit drafts if necessary.
February 27- DUE: Worksheet #8 – Small Group Feedback
MEET AS WHOLE CLASS with Sooby for final instructions and make appointments for filing proposals. Get any final feedback on proposals from committee members.
February 27-March 3: Deadline for getting Committee signatures.
DEADLINE FOR GETTING SIGNATURES of committee, prior to filing during the week of March 6-10. If you find that you are unable to complete the filing process (for any reason) meet with your writing advisor and your primary academic advisor before the end of the week; on-going work can be planned and credits deferred until the quarter of filing.
March 1: Individual Meetings
March 6-10 - FILING WEEK. A completed signature sheet, the proposal, the names of your committee members, and class list must be submitted to Sooby at the time of your appointment. Be sure to make a copy for yourself and for each member of your committee. Remember Stan or Larry also needs to sign the signature sheet.
March 6: Individual Meetings
March 8: Final class meeting. Evaluation of process and CELEBRATION!
March 13- Self-evaluations and class evaluations due.
Ranier Maria Rilke
Be patient with all that is
unresolved in your heart
and try to love the questions themselves
Do not seek for the answers that
cannot be given
For you would not be able to live them
And the point is to live everything
Live the questions now
and perhaps without knowing it
You will live along some day
into the answers
Alice Walker
I must love the questions
themselves
as Rilke said
like locked rooms
full of treasure
to which my blind
and groping key
does not yet fit
and await the answers
as unsealed
letters
mailed with dubious intent
and written in a very foreign
tongue
and in the hourly making
of myself
no thought of Time
to force, to squeeze
the space
I grow into
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