On May 5, The Dartmouth Editorial Board published a piece titled “Verbum Ultimum: Real Term, Real Education” in which it addressed the deficiencies in course offerings and academic resources provided by the College during sophomore summer. As a required on-term for most undergraduates, sophomore summer serves both as part of a system to work around shortages in on-campus housing capacity, and as a way for sophomores to develop deeper connections with members of their own class, enjoy the beautiful Hanover summer landscape and take on leadership roles within the organizations they participate in. However, while sophomore summer is in so many ways a unique experience, it is still one that the College mandates and expects its students to treat seriously. By not supplying the same level and variety in course offerings or options for academic engagement, the College is counterproductively limiting the depth of that experience.
I recently had the opportunity to engage in a profound discussion regarding the current framework and potential of a liberal arts education with a Dartmouth alumnus, Richard McArdle Tu’86. Beyond strengthening my faith in the liberal arts, McArdle, who is heavily involved with the Center for Professional Development and the Tuck School of Business, shared with me his vision of what sophomore summer could be, and how a new model could reinforce Dartmouth’s liberal arts advantage and better prepare students for professional success.
The experiential learning program envisioned by McArdle details a reconfigured sophomore summer in which Dartmouth’s undergraduate body collaborates with the three graduate schools: Tuck, the Thayer School of Engineering and the Geisel School of Medicine. The first part of the program would involve running all Dartmouth sophomores through the Tuck Bridge program, not meant to pressure students to pursue a career in business, but simply to provide a way to develop a fundamental understanding of marketing, data and spreadsheet modeling, organizational behavior, basic finance, communication skills and other important tools. For four weeks, students would be divided into 20 sections of roughly 55 members, in which team-building exercises, experiential learning and common objectives would enable the creation of new relationships and affinity groups. These sections would work together towards a culminating activity, building to the second part of McArdle’s proposal, an experiential learning project. With the CPD joining in to advise students on career plans based on their current studies and aspirations, sophomores would then select a pathway, stemming from their major or general interests ranging anywhere from energy and sustainability to healthcare to investment banking or even to film studies. Each pathway group would benefit from connections to faculty or experts in relevant fields, fostered by the three graduate schools and the vast Dartmouth alumni network. Dartmouth organizations like the Rockefeller Center, Dickey Center and Digital Arts, Leadership and Innovation Lab would be heavily involved, and Dartmouth-wide programming could include panel discussions, conferences and other opportunities to aid students in their development and in the completion of their projects.
I do not know how feasible this initiative is, what it would take to implement, and how far the administration would go in considering it. What I do envision, however, are clear benefits. A sophomore summer as outlined by McArdle would provide a distinct and meaningful experience, one that expands access to graduate resources, one that fosters the development of relationships across diverse groups, and one that is truly unique to Dartmouth. Besides these positives, however, lies an even deeper potential solution to some of Dartmouth’s biggest problems.
For one, mandatory immersion into the program would help solve the lack of exposure of underprivileged groups to professional career support. It would underline the importance of building connections and of taking advantage of some of Dartmouth’s unparalleled resources, and it would create a more even playing field where students from vastly diverse socioeconomic, ethnic and social groups are propelled to interact and work towards a common objective. The experiential learning program could reduce some of Dartmouth’s highly-criticized exclusivity and allow its students to focus on an experiential project and really spend time thinking about their futures, without the demands of a so-called rigorous academic program serving as a distraction.
Besides bringing more sophomores together, the proposed model could enhance Dartmouth’s liberal arts framework, alleviating career-related stress and better utilizing the alumni network. Knowing that they will learn real skills to aid them in pursuing a career, students could feel far more confident studying whatever they are truly interested in, worrying less about connecting each class to their future professional plans and feeling less like they’ll need to reach out to hundreds of alumni to come to the rescue with jobs and opportunities. With well-developed connections among their class, a strong foundation of fundamental tools and the shared history of such a unique experience, students would hopefully be encouraged to think outside the box, to pursue creative pathways and to begin their lives outside of Dartmouth well-prepared and self-assured.
While I want it to work, I do not know if this plan will. But whether the experiential learning program devised by McArdle succeeds in being implemented, sophomore summer definitely needs a revamp. Moreover, Dartmouth’s current educational model needs a revamp. It needs more people thinking of innovative solutions, more administrators, faculty, alumni and students dedicated to improving the academic and professional resources provided by the College, and it needs more of us demanding a better and more competitive education, one truly conducive to building the success we know we are capable of achieving.
