With Spring term well underway, Haley Morris '08 is troubled by one aspect of her Dartmouth life: She can't get into residence halls. Morris, along with Lindsay Greenberg '08, are spending their off-terms running a college preparatory program at Mascoma Valley High School. Because Morris is not currently enrolled in classes at the College and lives off campus, her Dartmouth Card no longer acts as a key.
While some Dartmouth students take advantage of their 10-week break from Dartmouth to spend the term touring exotic locales, volunteering in the Third World or interning in a major city, others find valuable experiences on campus in what has come to be known as the Hanover FSP.
Students with an academic focus in the sciences tend to dominate the ranks of leave term students in Hanover. Some conduct research with Dartmouth professors, while others prefer to study for upcoming Medical College Admission Tests on campus rather than at home.
Christopher Cahill '07 did both his junior summer, studying for the MCAT and serving as a research assistant to Dartmouth Medical School professor William North, who was working to produce a drug that would stop small cell lung cancer.
"I got to know more about what it's like to work in a lab, and what the scientific community is like," Cahill said.
John Shellito '07 stayed on campus his junior fall to do full-time research in organic synthetic chemistry that counted toward his thesis, an activity he described as impossible were he to have been taking classes at the time. Shellito, who intends to remain at the College for a fifth year, is spending another off-term on campus. He is directing the Dartmouth Outing Club's First-Year Trips and writing conclusions from his research.
"I was happy with the decision I made," Shellito said. "For me as a chemistry major, there is no chemistry [Foreign Study Program], so that was part of my motivation in staying here, because here is where the professors are. This is where the research goes on. It's not like ecology and evolution where my roommate was doing research in Costa Rica."
A number of students also noted social motivations for staying on campus, seeing the Hanover FSP as a way to combat some of the difficulties of the D-Plan and maintain relationships with friends. The social setup was not without its share of difficulties, however.
"The biggest problem was definitely that when I was free, all of my friends were in class or just generally busy, and when they were free, I was busy," Richard Tsen '08 said. Tsen did research involving amyotrophic lateral sclerosis with a neurologist at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center for his off-term.
Bryan Siegel '08, who remained in Hanover this past winter because he did not want to be away from campus for more than six months after participating in the Spanish Language Study Abroad in Barcelona in the fall, echoed Tsen's sentiments.
"I got bored," he said. "I got bored fast."
Siegel worked a temp job for Resource Systems Group in White River Junction "to make enough money to pay [fraternity] dues" while studying for the MCAT.
Cahill emphasized the importance of having a big project to be able to work on at any time, such as MCAT studying, because of the incongruence of schedules.
Over the past three years, at least 35 leave-term sophomores and juniors have lived in on-campus housing in each of the winter, spring and summer terms, according to the Office of Residential Life. These numbers do not include students who reside in off-campus housing.
Until this past September, students not enrolled in classes were not even allowed to apply for housing in the fall, although a small number did live in Greek houses.
ORL Director of Housing Rachael Class-Giguere also noted that all leave-term students living in College housing are required to be on a Dartmouth Dining Services meal plan and are supposed to be working or conducting research (or a combination thereof) for an average of 30 hours per week.
Although students generally enjoyed their Hanover FSP, most suggested that staying on campus is something that would be better to do only after exploring the possibilities outside the Dartmouth community. Tsen remained in Hanover his junior winter after spending his sophomore winter at the University of California at San Diego surfing and playing rugby and his junior fall on the LSA in Barcelona.
At times, however, the rationale for spending an off-term in Hanover goes beyond the academic realm and into the meteorological.
Cahill, a resident of Southern California, preferred the milder Hanover summers. He described the heat back home as unbearable, with temperatures reaching 110 degrees.
"This year [the heat] was killing cows," he said.
