New Pathways Program
Enhance Your Education with Residential Learning Communities!
In addition to our popular lifestyle communities, STAR and Wellness, Emerson students have the opportunity to enroll in an innovative program that enhance first-year Learning Communities (LCs), with linked courses and activities focused on engaging interdisciplinary themes. These programs help new students develop intellectual and social networks with other students as well as with members of the faculty and staff who share common interests. Students enrolled in New Pathways LCs complete General Education requirements while exploring engaging topics: creative writing, service learning, performance studies, and new media design. Our instructors work together to model inquiry, engage ideas, and challenge students to make connections in the liberal arts tradition. All four New Pathways LCs are clustered around selected Institute First Year Seminars, combining intensive liberal arts study and experiential learning.
The New Pathways Program challenges students to think outside the box of the traditional curriculum. For example, students enrolled in the Writers' Block LC pursue literary and philosophical inquiry in the classroom, participate in informal writing workshops in a themed residential area, and create the Writers' Block Literary Anthology. Other LCs include Digital Culture (New Media design and cultural studies), Leadership Through Service (service learning and social advocacy), and Performing Cultures (performance studies and critical inquiry). True to Emerson's heritage, excellence in writing and public speaking are core pursuits. With an eye to the future, all New Pathways LCs utilize online technologies to connect our classrooms to the world and our students to each other.
- New Pathways Learning Communities feature:
- Closely-knit working groups of faculty members and peers
- A variety of living-learning opportunities within residential clusters
- Small, first-year seminars linked to related liberal arts courses
- Topically-designed writing courses
- Fulfillment of General Education requirements
- Enhanced faculty advising
- Integrated online learning environments
New Pathways provides an exciting opportunity to enhance your education through participation in learning communities of students and faculty who will challenge you to think in new ways and to make the most of your General Education requirement. If small classes, making connections, and becoming immersed in the community appeal to you, then New Pathways might be the right choice.
Steven Himmer
Director, New Pathways Program
