Around Tappan Square
COLLEGE CLASS FOR ADMITTED STUDENTS
Throughout the month of April, high school students who would normally be visiting campus to learn more about academics and student life experienced their Oberlin visits virtually through live Q&A sessions, video 6
hangouts and class visits, and webinars on a range of topics hosted by faculty, student, and staff panelists. But in response to the global health pandemic, Oberlin offered admitted students even more: a college class for college credit. Admitted members of the Class of 2024 had the opportunity to engage with faculty across multiple disciplines during a free, eight-week remote course designed specifically for them. Uncovering COVID19: Critical Liberal Arts Perspectives offered a holistic approach to the complex global phenomenon. More than 500 admitted students participated in the class, prompting the college to offer a second session this summer, as well as another course unrelated to the crisis. All of these courses offer college credit. Oberlin faculty members in biology, mathematics, politics, comparative American studies, cinema studies, economics, psychology, and rhetoric and composition provided a variety of perspectives on the pandemic, demonstrating the value of an interdisciplinary approach for fully comprehending the crisis. The course thus doubled as an introduction to the nature of liberal arts learning. Student leaders led small-group discussions following the faculty-led lectures, both to help students deepen their understanding of the topic in conversation with their peers and to share their knowledge of the student experience at Oberlin. Oberlin’s student newspaper, the Oberlin Review, worked with the students to create a multimedia digital hub that represents the different ways students are grappling with the pandemic. “In many ways, having the opportunity to work on the course for admitted students reminded me of the best parts of why I chose to come to Oberlin in the first place,” says fourth-year student Nathan Carpenter, editor-in-chief of the Review. “It means a lot to see the genuine investment from faculty in helping all of us to better understand what’s happening in our lives right now, from the perspectives of their different academic disciplines. It’s also been incredible to see the excitement on the part of admitted students—they want to engage with these big questions in a way that strikes me as very Oberlin.”
STITCH PERFECT
Oberlin Costume Shop Produces Face Masks Heather Leigh Brown, manager of the theater department’s costume shop, made 130 masks that were sent to Cleveland Clinic, plus a small number for the
Y VONNE G AY
“Fortunately, statisticians around the country have been sharing ideas, including one of my former students, Christl Donnelly.” A professor of statistical epidemiology at Imperial College London and one of the world’s leading experts in infectious disease epidemiology, Donnelly ’88 was lead author of the first scientific paper to investigate the SARS outbreak of 2002-03. Witmer says Donnelly was instrumental in directing him to important resources, and she agreed to do a live Q&A session with his class, despite the five-hour time difference between Oberlin and London. Other COVID-19 course offerings included Continuity through Disruption, Arts Practice Beyond the Institution, team-taught by studio art faculty; Finding Well-being and Ways Forward Through Adversity (biology); Drug Development and the Coronavirus (chemistry); Disability and Queer Community Health in Times of Pandemic (comparative American studies); Choreographing Catastrophe (dance); the Politics of COVID-19 (politics); Covering Crisis: Storytelling Across Media (rhetoric and composition); and Emergency Preparedness for Performing Arts Organizations (theater). The Career Development Center offered the 200 students participating in its Career Communities program the opportunity to design an independent project based on one of the COVID-19 second-module courses. The new plan replaces the workplace experiences that are normally part of the program. “Members of the Career Communities program worked very hard this year to hone their skills and secure summer internships,” says Dana Hamdan, associate dean of student life and executive director of the Career Development Center. “While there is no substitute for the rich experience our students would receive as interns, especially with Oberlin alumni and parents, we believe the independent projects will give them an opportunity to engage productively with the challenges we are facing today.”