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by Stephen Collins '74 Environmental issues are an increasingly important and popular field of study, and evidence suggests that among the proliferating academic programs available, Colby's is getting noticed. Top students are coming to Mayflower Hill to enroll in the program, and foundations and individuals have shown a willingness–and even an eagerness–to support the program. A foundation that gave scholarships to 10 Massachusetts high school seniors who were planning to study environmental science took notice this spring when three of their scholars chose Colby. The foundation, Northeast Educational Services, Inc., contacted Colby to find out more–and to invite the College to apply for a grant. This summer the foundation approved a proposal titled "Enhancing Environmental Education through Field-Based Learning," which will improve the usefulness of the Perkins Arboretum as an outdoor laboratory and will fund environmental curriculum development. In September the College learned that the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation approved a proposal for several hundred-thousand dollars "to strengthen the environmental studies program at Colby." That proposal incorporates student research assistantships, new off-campus research partnerships for students, a lecture series to bring outside experts to Colby and a coordinator to help arrange and manage student internships in environmental studies. Earlier this year, The Hollis Foundation, Robert Rudnick '69 and Vicky Kleinman P '83 all established endowed fellowships for summer research assistants. Colby's emphasis on teaching through research, which was simultaneously recognized and supercharged with a $500,000 National Science Foundation Award for Integration of Research and Education in 1998, gets reinforced any time a student can spend the summer working as a research assistant with a professor. Now, the Hollis Foundation Student Research Fund, the Jana C. Rudnick Student Research Fellowship in Environmental Sciences and the Ralph and Jack Kleinman Student Research Fellowship (named in honor of Mrs. Kleinman's deceased son, Jack '83, and late husband, Ralph) give Colby students those opportunities in perpetuity as the earnings of those endowments pay for student stipends each year. Many students need the income of a summer job to earn money for school and expenses, explains Vice President for Development and Alumni Relations Peyton R. Helm. These endowed positions combine the best elements of a paying summer job and a valuable academic opportunity as students work side by side with a professor. "There's a great need for these positions in the sciences as well as in social sciences and the humanities," Helm said. |
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