The Proctor en Segovia Winter 2015 group’s first week in Spain is full of activity. Students start building relationships with their host families, discover natural spaces along the border of the city, participate in a diverse array of afternoon activities and begin their study of Spanish language, history and literature!
As Geometry students will tell you, the midpoint formula will give you the midpoint of a line segment. For us, that means finding the midpoint of the academic year: January 21. Midterm grades have been shared with students for the Winter Trimester. Classes are in full swing. Some students are thriving, while others are working through various challenges. Learning Skills tutorials, extra help sessions, and Math First Aid are being utilized.
Over the last seven days we have learned and grown a lot as a group during our canoeing expedition, led by our experienced river guide Jeff Renfro with Desert Sports. This trip was a true expedition, having to strap all we needed to live on into our canoes and set off into the isolation that is Big Bend National Park.
Today is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. It is a national holiday that celebrates the work of Dr. King during his lifetime, and recognizes the legacy he left behind. It is a day when communities have the opportunity to gather and dialogue about how we have grown and how we must continue to grow. It is a day when we decided to press the pause button on our classes and instead dive head first into conversations about race, equality, and justice at Proctor, and in the world at large.
Compared to Proctor’s quaint country campus in New Hampshire, the City of Aix en Provence seems like a page from a Hemingway novel with its cobbled streets, bustling cafés, and vibrant nightlife.
Being thrust into this foreign city we soon constructed our own definitions of the phrase “Experiential Learning”. My definition being an inability to communicate and a reliance on various hand signals all of which causes local patrons to erupt in laughter.
The moment that inspires: Patriots, Rangers, or a JV Girls’ Hockey Team?
The New England Patriots and their defeat of the Ravens was a contest described by Bill Pennington of the NYT as, “…a malevolent affair that seems to put both teams in a foul mood.” Still, the Patriots thrilled their fans with yet another Brady engineered comeback last Saturday with trick plays and tricky line-ups. A berth in the A.F.C. Championship game was secured just about the same time Proctor’s JV Girls’ game was winding down at Proctor.
On Sunday January 18, the Proctor Ski Area will host 19 nations and over 15 colleges in addition to some of the best ski academies, prep schools and ski clubs. The FIS race will be an internationally scored race featuring some of the finest talent in the east. In the first of two make-up races from the regularly scheduled New Year’s Eve FIS Festival at Proctor, well over 400 racers have submitted entries to the race, making it one of the biggest races Proctor will host all year.
After the winter break, our group has begun to return to life on Mountain Classroom. We quickly jumped right back into our responsibilities without hesitation. The first few days we were reintroduced to our classes. We have to be able to manage our time wisely with our homework and our daily routine. Even though we have just gotten back we are pretty independent with the jobs that each of us are assigned every day. We take turns being cooks, who make the delicious meals, and being the leader of the day, who keeps track of the groups timeliness and makes sure the rest of the jobs get done without any problems. As our group grows closer and becomes more dependent on one other in these roles, we are also learning just how independent we can be.
