Back to School: Higher Education at Reed College

Last weekend I had the great privilege of visiting three of my former students on the Reed College campus. Blake is just starting his sophomore year, Tara, having taken a gap year, is now starting as a freshman, and Abigail is in transition gleaning lots of great opportunities on the Reed campus with her boyfriend and paving a creative new path that will include  time at home in Ashland working on her studies and time exploring further studies in the field of business or education. What fascinated me about spending time with these three young people was how open and enthusiastic they are about all aspects of their educations. 

Tara's typewriter is used for her Poetry Store activities.
It takes me back to my 1962 Olympia. 

Reed College Library...but the kids are on computers!

More like the Steve Jobs' model, theirs is not anything like what I had back in the sixties when my portable typewriter like Tara's "vintage" one and the hallowed halls of Wheelock's library helped me navigate classes from freshman year's Human Growth and Development to senior year's Elementary Mathematics and sent me forth into my chosen field of teaching at Noddin Elementary School. No, these kids are sampling everything from Intro to Poetry to Quantum Physics. The problem seems to be they can't find the time to fit all the classes they want to sample into their schedules! As former "home-schoolers", they learned well to question the rules and assumptions and to seize every opportunity for new learning. 

Reedies Fall 2012...for clothes, anything goes!

Campus Activities

Tara at the End of Her First Week

Three months ago, Tara was walking Camino de Santiago. Before that she was WWOOFing in Spain on an organic farm and before that, as I recall, she was cross country skiing in Denmark. And actually the night before this picture was taken Tara was at Bagbee Hot Springs with a bunch of kids from her dorm...and she doesn't even look tired! Ah to be young again!

Off they go...Tara and, Rosey, her new roommate from Newton, MA.

I look forward to staying in touch with Blake, Abigail and Tara this year; I know I'll be surprised by what they learn and experience through hard work and creative exploration.