Getting here:
I heard out about COA through my college counselor during the application process (I’m unsure of how he found out about COA, but he’s amazing!) After hearing about COA, I did thorough research online, learned more about the Human Ecology degree, visited the college in-person and realized that continuing my interdisciplinary education (I was in an IB high school before this) was something I wanted and would put me in a great spot once I graduated college. COA is positively unique and was one of the schools that stood out the most to me on my application list.
Being a person with multiple interests, I also loved that at COA accommodates paving your own course of study and figuring out how everything is interconnected along the way. Add that to the small community and three amazing sources of nature in COA’s backyard, (on an island, next to a national park and by the beautiful Atlantic Ocean) and I was sold!
Classes
Freshman Year
Fall 2019 - Introductory Entomology, College Seminar: Truth, Music Fundamentals
Winter 2019 - Methods of Community Development, Nature, Humans and Philosophy, Politics and the Supreme Court
Spring 2020 - Learning a Language on Your Own, Dramatic Writing, Human Ecology Core Course
Sophomore Year
Fall 2020 - International Wildlife Policy and Protected Areas, Scenes and Songs, Sustainable Strategies
Winter 2021 - Introduction to the Legal Process, Animals and Ethics, Polar Ecology
Spring 2021 - World Percussion, Environmental Law, Worlds Beyond the Human: Multispecies Justice
Junior Year
Fall 2021 Performance and Ecology: What can Theatre Do?, Kinetic Sculpture, Equity and Social Justice in Education
Winter 2022 - Introduction to Economics and the Economy, Environmental History, Dissecting Popular Music
Spring 2022 - Conservation Biology, The Cold War: Later Years, Intro to Natural Resource Management
Favorite class:
All of my favorites in the past two years:
Art - Dramatic Writing (SP-20), Scenes and Songs (FA-20), World Percussion (SP-21) and Performance and Ecology: What can Theater Do? (FA-21), Kinetic Sculpture (FA-22), Dissecting Popular Music (WI-22)
Business - Sustainable Strategies (FA-20)
Animals and the Environment - Nature, Humans and Philosophy (WI-20), Animals and Ethics (WI-21), Environmental Law (SP-21), Worlds Beyond the Human: Multispecies Justice (SP-21), Environmental History (WI-22)
My approach to human ecology:
Art + empathy and expression + philosophy + environmental studies = Human Ecology