High School Seminars

Jennifer Ostojski, Visiting Assistant Professor of Political Science, Colgate University

Popular culture plays an important role in global politics. Unlike traditional spaces of politics and policymaking, popular culture is something we all engage with on a daily basis. Its purpose is not only to entertain us, but it also reflects and impacts global politics today. They all show, create, and criticize political and societal processes, identities, conflicts at home and abroad.  In this seminar, students will examine a variety of popular culture areas, including movies, television shows, and literature. Together, we will assess what we actually learn from popular culture in the framing of our social and political world.

Cory Duclos, Director of the Keck Center for Language Study, Senior Lecturer in Linguistics, Colgate University

This course will explore the way that our brains process and learn a new language. Sessions will explore the research behind language learning, including second language acquisition theory, the role of technology, and the importance of literary studies. Students will gain some practical application for how they can improve as language learners.

Sam Mathews, Assistant Director of Outdoor Education, Colgate University

Have you ever wanted to climb a wall like Spiderman? Take this course and learn how to tie knots, use ropes to belay (hold) other climbers and move up the wall using good technique. At the end, you'll know what rock climbing is really like - not just how it is in the movies or on social media. This class guarantees great fun and that you will be hungry for dinner!*

*Students in this class will not eat at the regular time, they will meet at the climbing wall, climb for 1.5 hours and eat afterwards. A signed Wall Waiver is required for participation.

Sara Dougherty, Greenhouse Superintendent, Colgate University

Come tour and learn about plant science at the Colgate University Greenhouse! Meet with our Greenhouse Superintendent, Sara Dougherty, and learn about how she manages our collegiate, state-of-the-art greenhouses and what types of plant research projects are taking place here at Colgate. Take a tour of our biology department's conservatory collections, learn about plant conservation efforts, and plan on getting your hands dirty with a quick plant propagation work-shop. No prior horticulture or botany experience necessary - all are welcome here!

Abby Palko, Director of the Residential Commons Program, Colgate University

A small country, a huge diaspora, and a new immigration destination; what does it mean to be Irish? We will read and discuss formative Irish myths, explore Irish political history, and examine stories the Irish tell about themselves. We will pay attention to moments of social upheaval and transition, considering the transformative impact of the arrival of Christianity, the pressure that Cromwell's plantations and the Great Hunger exerted on Irish emigration, the role of religious affiliation in the 20th-century fight for independence, and contemporary expansions of our understanding of Irish identity.

Gabriel Sosa Castillo, Assistant Professor of Mathematics, Colgate University

In the first session we will discuss how different ancient cultures (the Maya, the Indians, the Chinese, the Romans and the Arabs) developed ways to write numbers, what  these ways of writing numbers have in common, how are they different, and how did the modern world settle/agree upon using the number system that we use now (i.e. why does everybody understand 3,047 as the same quantity).

In the remaining sessions we will explore how number systems would have been developed by societies with the same level of abstraction, creativity and higher level thinking as humans, if they did not look like humans.