Hi, and welcome to my corner of the woods! I'm Lauren, a '27 from Munger, Michigan. Outside of academics, I'm a member of the Ledyard Canoe Club, the Dartmouth Organization of Rural Students, and Dartmouth Sports Analytics. I can't wait to share stories from my final year at Dartmouth with all of you!
I took this class as part of Dartmouth's first year writing requirement. We read a pro cyclist's life narrative, discussed research papers on controversial topics in sports, and wrote our own papers on a contentious sports technology of our choice. I really enjoyed this course's emphasis on discussion, and the small class size!
This was my first class in the classics department, which was super exciting as a classical studies major! We learned about the ancient Olympics and the connections between athletics and other aspects of ancient Greek society. I loved the final project in this class, which involved creating an argument about how the ancient pentathlon was scored!
To conclude my language requirement, I took Latin 3! This class was super exciting because we began to read ancient texts and poetry. We also took a class trip to the Rauner Special Collections library so we could physically handle and read some manuscripts. And as an added bonus, Latin counts as a prerequisite for my classical studies major!
As a part of my language study abroad in Italy, I also took a class on Italian history and culture! We went on field trips to the Colosseum and the Roman Forum, participated in walking tours of Rome, and watched a lot of great cinema in this class! I loved it so much that I decided to minor in Italian.
This class, in addition to being a pre-requisite for my major, was super interesting! I loved learning about archaeology through hands-on projects and lectures that felt like TED Talks.
My favorite course on my Italian LSA+ in Rome is focused on Italian literature, which we are studying in a reverse-chronological order! It has been incredibly fun to see different topics and styles evolve over time and to learn from the works of the best writers.
I’m absolutely loving this hands-on introduction to paleography, and the fact that my class meets at Rauner every day! I can’t wait to hear from our guest lecturers, too, and I’ll be sure to share those experiences on the blog. All in all, Latin 10 was a great way to get back into the language after a term away in Rome.
I signed up for this Latin class after the FDOC (first day of class), and I'm so glad I added it to my sophomore summer schedule! Our class is combined with GRK 30.08 History and Structure of the Greek Language, and it has been incredibly interesting to compare the ancient languages and learn a bit of Greek.
FallIvrea, Italy
This term, I'm interning with the Olivetti Leadership Institute in Ivrea, a small town in northern Italy.
WinterHanover, NH
For my second off-term, I'm back on campus! I'm keeping myself busy by working, spending time with friends, and working on my to-be-read list.
I signed up for this course to complete my final distributive requirement for graduation, and it has turned out to be one of my most rewarding classes! It’s been fascinating to explore a region of the world I hadn’t formally studied before. As a bonus, the lectures are incredibly engaging and I always leave class feeling like my perspective has been broadened.
SummerMunger, Michigan
This summer, I'm spending time at home working on post-graduate applications and hanging out with my family. I'm also working remotely for the Hood Museum and spending a lot of time traveling to visit Dartmouth friends across the country!
I'll be the first to admit that I'm not really a science person. Although I enjoyed my biology and chemistry classes in high school, I haven't spent much time at Dartmouth exploring STEM courses. But to complete my distributive requirements, I needed to take a science course and a lab, and EARS 1: How the Earth Works checked both of those boxes.
I have quite a few friends majoring in Earth Science, a few of whom went on the department's off-campus program called the "Stretch" this past fall. The program involves a two-month trip across the western United States and Canada in which students collect and analyze data in the field, which my friends told me was one of the highlights of the Dartmouth experience so far. When I looked at the course catalogue this winter in search of a science credit, EARS 1 came highly recommended.
Taking an introductory course during the spring of my third year on campus was a welcome break from upper-level seminars for my majors in Classical StudiesandItalian. I haven't taken a lecture-style course in a while, and I was excited to swap in readings and Socratic seminars for problem sets and labs.
Safety gear (like hard hats) is provided to students for each EARS 1 lab!
EARS 1 covers a lot of topics: plate tectonics, volcanism, earthquakes, mountain building, ocean trenches, erosion, glaciers, and more. I expected the material to feel dense, but a lot of it is taught within a place-based New England context, which makes the concepts easier to grasp. Another thing that's been helping me understand the material is treating it like a story. Continents colliding and oceans opening up is inherently dramatic, and it's fun to lean into that.
Outcrops like this one can tell stories about our environment long before humans lived in the Upper Valley!
Something that really surprised me was how much I started noticing about the world around me outside of class. After learning about glacial erosion, every drive in the Upper Valley became a sort of mini-lab. A week spent studying sedimentary rocks has made me pause and examine outcrops on hikes around campus. I didn't expect EARS 1 to have such a tangible impact, but I'm happy it did.
My favorite aspect of the course is definitely the lab component. Once a week, twenty of my classmates and I pile into two of the Earth Science department's vans and head out to explore the environment around us. We visited a nearby dam to look at a rock outcrop, a stream a few miles away from campus to measure its discharge rate and sediment transport, and Pine Park right in Hanover to talk about the impacts of glacial erosion. These afternoon excursions are a welcome break in my week, and they push me to pay closer attention to landscapes I would normally pass by without a second thought.
There was never a single "aha!" moment of clarity when I knew that Dartmouth was right for me, yet now, it is impossible for me to imagine having chosen anywhere else.
From a tight-knit study abroad cohort to intimate classroom moments and inspiring literary talks, French has grown far beyond a minor — becoming a thread that runs through the most meaningful parts of her Dartmouth life.
Green Key weekend at Dartmouth was filled with concerts, free food, live music, reunions, and spontaneous moments with friends. Read on to hear why this weekend reminded me what makes spring term at Dartmouth feel so special.
Amid the whirlwind of a ten-week term, the quietest moments — studying in the sun, cooking with a friend, running through Pine Park — turn out to be the ones worth savoring most.
One of my absolute favorite classes I've taken at Dartmouth has been Cinematography I, which completely changed the way I watch films and think about storytelling. Read on to hear more about my experience!
