Category: Courses and Instruction

Summer Field School Draws Together a Broad Range of Collaborators and Students Across Disciplines

Summer Field School includes 8 students from Michigan Tech and Northern Michigan; 3 Instructors; 3 generations of property owners; 6 visiting heritage professionals; 5 great days on the banks of Lake Superior; PLUS a dog and a resident turkey (!) all combined for an exciting place-based learning experience!

What does MTU History Associate Professor of History Sarah Fayen Scarlett get when she takes on leadership of the 2024 Vernacular Architecture Forum (VAF) annual conference planning committee? Well, perhaps a few headaches between now and 2024. But also, several unique opportunities to engage in local fieldwork documenting everyday buildings and their cultural meanings for people in the Keweenaw—past, and present.  She’s sharing the opportunities this responsibility brings with Upper Peninsula students and professionals. Together they’re working on publishing a conference guidebook featuring local vernacular architecture and conference tour sites. Themes include exploring cultural identity, environmental change, industrial communities, and contemporary heritage practice. Scarlett’s “Barns and Beaches” field school gave upper peninsula college students a great applied learning experience.

Image of Summer Field School students documenting Kemppa Farm
NMU student Tori Conquest takes a break from documenting the c. 1907 animal barn at Kemppa Farm in Misery Bay. Photo S F Scarlett

Barns and Beaches Field School Uses the Keweenaw Community As A Classroom

The Summer Field School attracted students in a variety of fields such as history, anthropology, folklore, and material culture studies. The June class included two Michigan Tech Social Sciences majors, an incoming Industrial Heritage & Archaeology grad student, four Northern Michigan University anthropology students, and an MTU graduate student as a teaching assistant. The four-week 3-credit course was team-taught by Scarlett, Keweenaw National Historical Park Historical Architect John Arnold (Industrial Heritage PhD 2017), and Finlandia University Finnish Studies Associate Professor and folklorist Hilary Virtanen. The instructors contributed their expertise in documenting everyday buildings and cultural landscapes. They mentored students in the collection of information from people associated with such places.

The group of eleven formed an instantly cohesive team. Their skills and interests were well-matched for the task at hand: to document and create materials describing a Finnish American homestead farm in the Misery Bay area of Toivola and an adjacent summer cottage built in the 1940s. Both properties had remained in the families that established them.

Students Develop Field Work Skills

Image of Lieutenant Dan the Turkey
Kemppa Farm resident “Lieutenant Dan” the turkey (along with Ruby the little black dog!) kept the crew on their toes around the campsite! Photo Hilary Virtanen.

During the second week, the class met at the Kemppa farm in Misery Bay, Toivola. Students camped in the farm’s front pasture, thanks to the owner and steward of the property’s heritage Luann Hayrynen. This made it convenient for students to document the Kemppa family farm and the neighboring summer cottage, Dell Shack. This intensive fieldwork was augmented by a visit to the Hanka Homestead Farm, a Finnish American homestead farm museum in Baraga County affiliated with the Keweenaw National Historical Park (KNHP) as well as lecture and demonstration visits from area professionals including KNHP staff historian Jo Holt, landscape architect Steve DeLong, Park superintendent Wendy Davis, and MTU’s geospatial scientist Dan Trepal.

Students and instructors precisely measured, photographed, and created field drawings of buildings. They conducted oral history interviews of occupants and their family members to gain insights into the history of the sites’ developments over time and their cultural significance to the families and their neighbors. And they investigated materials offered for examination by the study participants, including family photographs and documents that helped solve building history mysteries. All of this activity generated a vast amount of data. Over the final two weeks, students converted raw data into computer-generated architectural floor plans of each selected building. They deepened their understanding of the properties’ histories with creative research with archival documents, deep geological and cultural historical data, and even aerial and satellite photographs of the Misery Bay area over time.

Read about Robert Hazen’s experience as an undergraduate student in the Summer Field School

Image of a Hay Barn built in 1907
c. 1907 Hay Barn. Photo John Arnold.

Students Present Findings to the Local Community

Students acquired skills in historical architecture documentation and interpretation. They learned to conduct semi-structured oral history interviews. And they wrote interpretive content for use in the 2024 VAF guidebook. The first week centered on intensive readings, lectures, and in-class fieldwork skill-building activities in the Archaeology Lab. One highlight was a virtual visit from Professor Emerita Carol MacLennan on Indigenous land use in the Keweenaw.

During the final week of class, students prepared a group presentation of their findings for local community members at the Misery Bay School. The goals of this culminating event were to spread the word about the upcoming conference and our work at the Kemppa Farm and Dell Shack, but also to have another opportunity to learn more about these properties from people who have their own important perspectives: long-term neighbors. As a result, many stories and memories were shared over refreshments between students, property owners, and neighbors. These relationships will continue to develop as preparation for the VAF conference continues.

For more information about or to participate in the VAF conference in 2024 please contact Dr. Scarlett at sfscarle@mtu.edu.


Green Film Series begins 10th Year with Name Change and $700 Donation!

Solar Panel

2020 marks the 10th Year of the Green Film Series, renamed ‘Sustainability Film Series’ at the suggestion of two graduate students serving on the film selection committee. Jessica Daignault (CEE PhD candidate) and Ande Myers (CFRES MS student) suggested the new name as they felt it would sound more relevant to more people.

The Sustainability Film Series recently received a $700 donation from the Keweenaw Food Coop as part of their Bring a Bag Campaign which donates the savings from not having to purchase paper bags for customers, to local community organizations or programs.

“Purchasing public film screening rights can cost $250 to $500 for just one film, so this donation will be very helpful!”

Joan Chadde, film series coordinator, and director of the Michigan Tech Center for Science & Environmental Outreach

The film series is co-sponsored by the Lake Superior Stewardship Initiative, Michigan Tech Great Lakes Research Center, Keweenaw Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, Keweenaw Land Trust, Michigan Tech Department of Social Sciences, and the Michigan Tech Sustainable Futures Institute.

Films are shown from 7 to 8:30 p.m. on the third Thursday of each month,  in G002, Hesterberg Hall, Michigan Tech Forestry Building, January through May. Enjoy coffee, refreshments and facilitated discussion. (Save a dime, bring you own mug). There is no admission to the film but a $5 donation is suggested 

Film Schedule

  • Jan. 16 – “Saving the Dark” (57 min.) 80% of the world’s population lives under light-polluted skies. What do we lose when we lose sight of the stars? Excessive and improper lighting robs us of our night skies, disrupts our sleep patterns and endangers nocturnal habitats. Saving the Dark explores the need to preserve night skies and ways to combat light pollution
  • Feb. 20 – “Banking Nature” (90 min.) A provocative documentary that looks at efforts to monetize the natural world—and turn endangered species and threatened areas into instruments of profit. It’s a worldview that sees capital and markets not as a threat to the planet, but as its salvation—turning nature into “capital” and fundamental processes like pollination and oxygen generation into “ecosystem services”
  • March 19, 6 p.m. – “Saving Snow” (57 min.) and “Between Earth & Sky,” (58 min.). The World Water Day opening event follows skiers, snowmobilers, sled dog guides and others who love and/or depend upon winter across the Midwest and Alaska who are struggling with a warming climate
  • April 16 – “Seed: The Untold Story” (94 min.). For 12,000 years, humans have been cultivating seeds and building empires. In the last century, 94% of our seed varieties have been lost. As many irreplaceable seeds are nearing extinction, high-tech industrial seed companies control the majority of the world’s remaining seeds
  • May 21 – “Seven Generations River,” (27 min.). A new Great Lakes documentary reveals how a Native American tribe, the Pokagon Band of the Potawatomi Indians in SE Michigan, is adopting scientific methods to preserve and protect its traditional culture and the river on which it relies. While never removed from their ancestral lands, the Pokagon are seeing their way of life fractured by encroaching development and land-use changes.

Information Session on Ghana Study Abroad, Tonight

In a row, Americans and Ghanians play hand drums at a cultural event.Kari B. Henquinet (SS/PHC) invites Michigan Tech students to enroll in her course as a visiting professor in Accra, Ghana during the summer 2019 term.

Hear all about the program at the Ghana Study Abroad Information Session at 7 p.m. tonight (Oct. 9) in Fisher 126. Henquinet is partnering with University Studies Abroad Consortium (USAC), a long-standing study abroad partner of Michigan Tech, to teach SS 3910, Histories and Cultures of Africa. Students may take other courses for Michigan Tech credit in the program.

Additional information on the program is available online.

Dean’s Teaching Showcase: Roman Sidortsov

Roman Sidortsov
Roman Sidortsov

This week, the Deans Teaching Showcase recognizes Roman Sidortsov, assistant professor in Social Sciences. Sidortsov studied at universities in Russia, the US and Great Britain and his credentials include a JD, LL.M in environmental law, and a PhD in polar studies/geography. His research explores energy justice, risk governance, and comparative energy and environmental law and policy in the Arctic.

Dean Bruce Seely in the College of Sciences and Arts identified Sidortsov for accomplishments in Global Issues, a demanding first-year gen-ed course offered by Social Sciences. Seely’s interest was piqued by Sidortsov’s student rating score of 4.53 in a class where very good instructors average 3.8 to 4.0.

Global Issues fits a well-known pattern, in which students in large format, non-major, required courses rate faculty lower than teachers in smaller courses for majors. But Sidortsov, who joined Social Sciences in 2016, seems to have found ways to overcome the initial resistance students exhibited to this type of course. “Virtually every Tech student,” he noted, “comes with a desire to succeed” regardless of their major. So he begins class by asking students “about their vision of success in the classroom, upon graduating from Michigan Tech and several years after graduation.”

Then he works to reconcile his ideas of success with those of his students. “For the second year in a row,” he reported, “my search for the golden mean ended with developing a capacity to think critically in the global context.”

Importantly, this approach shows students the importance and relevance of the Global Literacy and Information Literacy learning goals his class addresses. Instead of wondering why the course matters, students come to see the value of critical thinking in the class, in their majors, in their professional careers, “and in terms of civic engagements, whether it be winning an argument in a boardroom or not falling for a false narrative on social media.”

Thus, his students understand not only why this course matters now, but also the importance of critical thinking as a life-long learning skill. He added that it is a “privilege to be one of the people who gets to start the bright women and men who come to Michigan Tech on this path. Thus, I do my best to make this process relevant, useful and entertaining.”

One strategy he employs are class exercises, such as a discussion concerning the risks associated with nuclear power plants from the points of view of three different stakeholder groups. In another exercise focused on different types of human migration, Sidortsov asks students to develop criteria for locating a research and development center. He added he is fortunate “to utilize my experience of growing up in a foreign country, as well as my professional experiences prior to joining academia. I draw on personal experience often, whether to excite students about study abroad or to save them from afternoon sugar comas.”

He concluded that “sharing a vision of success with your students and working toward it is perhaps the most important and enjoyable strategy that I have employed at Michigan Tech.” His insight matches the recognition that students respond to courses, exercises and faculty who engage with students enthusiastically, opening not only the course content but themselves as persons to the students. He certainly seems to be on to something.

Sidortsov will be recognized at an end-of-term luncheon with other showcase members, and is now eligible for one of three new teaching awards to be given by the William G. Jackson Center for Teaching and Learning this summer, recognizing introductory or large-class teaching, innovative or outside-the-classroom teaching methods, or work in curriculum and assessment.

Local High School Students Learn Historical GIS with the Keweenaw Time Traveler Team

TimetravelerCareers that incorporate geospatial technologies are among the fastest-growing nationwide. That’s why Michigan Tech and Eastern Michigan University have teamed up on the NSF-funded GRACE Project to introduce high school students to GIS techniques and tools that can be used to tackle community issues.

This summer, eleven students from CLK and Houghton high schools are working as paid interns with researchers in the Department of Social Sciences and the Great Lakes Research Center to help build the Keweenaw Time Traveler, an NEH-funded project directed by Assistant Professor Don Lafreniere (SS). This innovative online historical atlas will allow users to pinpoint data about changes in the built, social, and natural environments of the Copper Country. The students have joined our team of “Time Travelers,” which includes graduate students in the Industrial Heritage and Archaeology program as well as undergraduates from departments across Michigan Tech. Together, they are learning to use GIS to identify, digitize, and follow changes in thousands of buildings and features from 1888-1950.

Timetraveler2

During the six week program, students are exploring the many exciting opportunities provided by mobile geospatial technologies by participating in interactive hands-on field trips, including an afternoon in Lake Linden with Carol MacLennan (SS) exploring the vast milling and processing systems that once studded the western shore of Torch Lake, a related trip on the Agassiz Research Vessel learning about the changing shoreline and water quality, and a day conducting active data collection with mobile tablets and GPS in Calumet to capture the students’ perspectives on how to improve non-motorized transportation in conjunction with the Keweenaw National Historical Park’s Complete Streets initiative. The student interns, who are paid through the GRACE project, will present their work in a final celebration on August 11th in GLRC 2020.  Details forthcoming.  The Keweenaw Time Traveler is co-directed by Sarah Fayen Scarlett (SS) and John Arnold (SS)

Summer Field School Joins Forest Service’s “Passport in Time”

Coalwood lumber camp c.1900

This year’s archaeological field school at Coalwood logging camp, run by Prof. LouAnn Wurst, has been included in the U.S. Forest Service’s “Passport in Time” (PIT) program. PIT is a volunteer cultural heritage resources program sponsored by the Forest Service, with partners including some State Parks and Historicorps. This year’s dig at Coalwood will have Wurst overseeing 10 volunteers from 1-5 Aug. in excavations at the camp’s boarding houses.

For mor information on the PIT program and this year’s offering, click here.

Study Abroad in Cumbria, England

England

Frontiers and Fortresses is preparing for its sixth year of discovery, learning and fun in northwest England.  2015 program dates are July 14 – August 12. The program is based at the University of Cumbria’s Carlisle campus, with five day trips to locations throughout northern England and southern Scotland and one longer four day, three night trip to the medieval city of York.
All students take three courses, SS 3560 – History of England I, SS 3920 – Archaeology of the North, and SS 3960 – International Experience.  All of the courses build upon each other, providing interactive, hands on learning, in the course of four weeks students will visit 10 castles, 4 cathedrals, 6 monasteries and multiple Roman and prehistoric sites in the Lake District and the Boarder regions of England and Scotland.
More information may be obtained by contacting Dr. Blair directly, cblair@mtu.edu, or by attending the information session  on Wednesday October 29 from 5:30 – 6:30 in Fisher 129.  Frontiers and Fortresses, 4 weeks, 3 courses, 9 credits and a lifetime of memories.

 

Frontiers and Fortresses blogs summer school

Carlisle Castle, Carlisle, UK
Carlisle Castle, Carlisle, UK

This year marks the fifth year that Prof. Carl Blair has run the Frontiers and Fortresses summer study abroad program in Cumbria, England, and the first year that he has had the students blog their experiences.  The Track B summer program has just wrapped in Carlisle, their base of operations, but you can read all about the experience through the four-week experience on their Weebly blog.

Peace Corps Ranks Michigan Tech Tops in the Nation—Again

Erica JonesFor the ninth year in a row, Michigan Technological University ranks as the number one university nationwide for the number of Peace Corps Master’s International (PCMI) students currently serving as Peace Corps volunteers. Michigan Tech has 32 graduate students overseas, earning the University top spot on the Peace Corps’ annual ranking of PCMI and Paul D. Coverdell Fellows graduate schools.

“We have an amazing group of students who enter our program each year from all walks of life,” said Kari Henquinet, director of Michigan Tech’s PCMI program. “They are not only dedicated academically, but also able to apply what they have learned to problem solve and work collaboratively on the ground. Our Master’s International programs are set up to produce scientists and professionals who think creatively, understand social problems and function in multiple cultures. Our graduates go on to work for places like USAID, environmental engineering firms, and non-profit groups such as Doctors Without Borders.”

Read more at Michigan Tech News, by Jennifer Donovan.