Faculty Profile: Alex Nalbach, Global Studies

Keeping a class of more than 800 students, faculty, staff and lifelong learners awake, captivated and interested about the history of the Mediterranean is no easy feat. However, Alex Nalbach, Semester at Sea’s Global Studies professor, seems to have mastered it. Using a combination of energetic speaking, creative PowerPoint presentations (complete with moving graphics and sound effects) and an expertise of the subject matter, Nalbach has managed to make learning about the Mediterranean--from B.C. to present day--fun.

Nalbach is an independent scholar currently writing a book about the history of the world. For 10 years, he taught history seminars at the university level. This summer, he is teaching a 75-minute class every day Semester at Sea is sailing—23 lectures in all. He spent more than six months preparing the material and quite a while researching how to give engaging interactive lectures.

Most students and lifelong learners rank Nalbach as one of the best instructors on the voyage. Watch the accompanying Q & A video with Nalbach to hear his thoughts on the importance of Global Studies to the Semester at Sea experience. And look for more faculty profiles in upcoming
blogs.

Storm Trackers

Can the ocean really help predict if a hurricane is forming?



Students in Prof. Dan Horn’s Physical Oceanography class are figuring it out. The Semester at Sea class focuses on an ocean’s various aspects, including some biological components and its waves, currents, climate and erosion. One important factor is tracking water temperature to determine hurricane development.

“Water surface temperature controls global weather and this time of year it controls hurricane development,” Horn explains.

Horn and his students have been deploying buoys into the Atlantic Ocean that they will track via the Internet to check the likelihood of hurricanes forming. Click on the video to watch the latest buoy deployment. To follow the progress of the buoys, click on the following link: http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/phod/dac/gdp_track.html and enter "WMO #62938" to see how the buoys are tracking water temperatures so far.

Bunkering in Gibraltar

Everyone aboard the MV Explorer got a glimpse of Gibraltar during an early morning pit stop to fuel the ship before it took off for Italy and the rest of the Mediterranean voyage. The ship passed through the Strait of Gibraltar and into the Mediterranean Sea before bunkering in Gibraltar for much of the day. The area was sprinkled with oil tankers and a couple of other cruise ships, stopping for fuel before a long voyage. The MV Explorer sailed off from Gibraltar around 4 p.m. today. It is scheduled to reach Civitavecchia, Italy on Wednesday, July 1.

Spain in Review

This blog post and the one below will give you a glimpse of Spain as many Semester at Sea participants experienced it. Be sure to check out the slideshow on Spain on the Semester at Sea website: www.semesteratsea.org

Dispatches from Spain

Amazing architecture, interesting foods, a laid-back atmosphere, and friendly, helpful people are the lasting impressions many Semester at Sea students take from their four days in Spain.

A Spanish sunrise greeted students upon the MV Explorer’s arrival in Cadiz, Spain on June 24. Students were hustling to get off the ship after just over a week at sea. During the four days in Spain, they traveled extensively throughout Spain’s Andalucia region. Many fanned out across the city of Cadiz. Others toured the white town region around Ronda. Many headed north to Sevilla to visit that city’s famous cathedral and Alcazar palace. They tried out their Spanish (or sign language), discovered new foods (bull’s cheek) and, through their explorations, absorbed Spain’s beauty, history, architecture, people and its culture.

Here are some dispatches from the students’ experiences and travels.


Rudy Shaffer, Portland State University, OR
I really liked this trip to Spain. The “White Town Route” tour to Ronda was really amazing. The buildings were gorgeous and sit atop this winding hill that we walked up to reach the town. The village [of Ronda] was so small. I was just so fascinated by it and wondered what it would be like to grow up in a town with one little market, one church.
I also did a hike at Grazalema Natural Park. We hiked for two hours to reach the top and the view was so amazing that we were able to see France, not clearly, but it was there in the distance. It was so beautiful to see Spain from this perspective.
I found that with each trip and tour I took I felt like the world just gets bigger and bigger. The more you go out and explore, the more you realize how much you don’t know about the world. That forces you to be adaptable, I think. And that just makes me want to learn more.
We also went to a really good tapas place in Sevilla and I tried octopus. I couldn’t believe I did that. We shelled the shrimp with its eyes and just tried different things. I feel like that was the whole point of being here, to try new things.



William Moore, Marquette University, WI
I stayed in Cadiz for this trip and walked around the city. I discovered the local churches and had a chance to go inside and really take time to look around them. I took suggestions from the locals here for restaurants and places to see. That’s what I came here for, to see the local surroundings. …I like walking around a city by myself. I didn’t want to go to tourist spots. By walking around I think it’s a better way to experience the city, especially since I want to relate it to my classes. I think my experience in the cities will definitely help me with my classes more because I have something to relate them to now. …In Cadiz, I felt really at home walking through the streets. I was comfortable asking people for the time and the good places to eat and things to see and do. I saw lots of similarities with America with how the people are with their children and who they choose as their icons. It was nice just to see that we may be 10,000 miles away but we have similar thought processes about some things.



Devika “Dev” Ghai, Whittier College, CA
This was my first time to Spain. It’s just been amazing. I can’t believe it’s gone by so quickly. I stayed in Cadiz for much of it. Cadiz is just beautiful and so picturesque. There’s a real sense of nostalgia when you look at the older buildings and the narrow, cobblestone streets; you just want to soak it all up. The city really has its own atmosphere, which was nice.
The thing that most surprised me about Spain was the food. I expected it to be spicier, but the flavors were much more subtle. I think I was comparing it to the Mexican food I normally have in L.A. I thought since Spain had an influence on Mexico the foods would be very similar, but that’s not the case. It’s simple food, but really good. I loved the seafood and the bread, olives, and cheese. Each day I came to appreciate it more. And I learned that my perception of Spain being more Latin was not true; Spain is much more European than I thought.
I also visited Algeciras and Porto de Santa Maria for the tour of the Rafael Alberti museum. It was fun to learn about Alberti, how he was exiled from the country after the civil war and just looking at his paintings and poems and then walking around the town that was his inspiration. My time in Algeciras was also wonderful. I saw a Spanish bullring from the first time. Then, I walked into a restaurant in that town. It was pretty quiet in the restaurant and the, all of a sudden, the waiters started dancing in these synchronized movements and told us to join them, so we did. We were all dancing in the restaurant, in the middle of the afternoon, in Algeciras, for about 20 minutes. That was definitely one of the highlights of my trip.
Now, I’m looking forward to seeing if my preconceptions of Italy will match the reality there.



Nhesthy Ong, Kainan University in Taiwan
I went to Barcelona with a group of about 10 people. I wanted to go there because it’s the second most visited destination in Europe; it’s second to Paris, according to websites. So, I kind of wanted to know why. And it was incredible; it’s a fun city. I’ve been to Paris before and Barcelona is equal to Paris. The architecture was great. Seeing all the architecture and art of Antoni Gaudi and seeing the park. Sometimes, it didn’t feel like I was in Spain because so many people spoke English, but the experience was good. I liked seeing a big city and then coming back to Cadiz and seeing the other side of Spain, more relaxed and laid back. Barcelona was too globalized, like every big city. Personally, I prefered Cadiz and the smaller, more authentic, laid back side of Spain.


Jennifer Paige, Winston-Salem State University, NC
I visited Cadiz, Algeciras, and Sevilla and I saw Flamenco dancing and the wonderful architecture and older buildings. When we got here I was ready to get off the ship and eat some food, especially after hearing the lecture from David Gies. I was also really curious to see how Spanish people would look and dress. Maybe because of the traditional pictures I’ve seen, I had in my mind that they would dress a certain way, but they dressed just as normal and you and me.
I also loved seeing the sense of community here. It was nice to watch how parents interacted with their children and see people taking their time. In America everyone is rushing around saying “I gotta go. I gotta go.” In Spain, it was laid back, calm and relaxed. I liked that. And the architecture was beautiful. It was Spain to me, just as I imagined it might be: Old buildings with so much history there. It was really wonderful. …And the sunflowers, fields of sunflowers on the train ride to Sevilla. Just yellow, as far as the eye could see. Just gorgeous.
I also met so many nice, patient people here who were so willing to help you when they knew you were making and effort to try to speak their language. Even if all I could speak was high school Spanish, it was something. In Sevilla, I chatted for a while with a man using a little bit of my Spanish, a little bit of his English and lots of trading our dictionaries back and forth, but we learned a bit about each other. And I tried bull cheek and shark. The bull cheek was a little tangy, but I liked it. …The whole point is to try new things.

Bienvenidos a Espana

When the MV Explorer docks in Cadiz, Spain tomorrow morning, every passenger who attended any of the Explorer Seminars by Interport Lecturer David Gies will be more than prepared.

"It was like attending a history lesson on Spain with additional information on food," said Joe Coleman, a lifelong learner, who attended each of Gies' three seminars.

Over the course of three evenings, Gies quickly dispelled the misconceptions of Spain as solely about siestas, vino, bullfights, Flamenco dancing, strict religion, spicy food and the Francisco Franco dictatorship. Instead, he explained that country’s complex and rich history, dating back to 1100 B.C., through its nearly four decades of dictatorship, to its present day democracy.

“Spain is a layer-cake of history, beginning with the ancient indigenous peoples, and building upon centuries of influence and conquest by numerous populations,” Gies told a standing-room only audience during the first of his three seminars.

Woven throughout Gies’ historical timeline were descriptions, and discussions, of Spain’s art, architecture, culture and, of course, its food and nightlife.

Dustin Farivar, a senior at the University of Colorado at Boulder, got a greater sense of the sites he could see on his trip to Sevilla. Gies' talks "made me realize some of the hidden wonders of Sevilla," Farivar said.

Gies is a professor of Spanish literature at University of Virginia and was the university’s first academic dean for Semester at Sea. He will take on that role again for the Fall 2010 voyage.

By the end of Gies’ three seminars, people had a good sense of how to navigate their way through Spain and had much to look forward to.

"I've not been to Spain before and this has me completely fascinated about what I will see in my trip to Sevilla, Granada and Cordoba," said Coleman, a retired judge from Seattle. "It was a wonderful lesson for me."

Gaining New Perspectives

Visiting the United States had not been high on Fernanda Lima Sento Se’s priority list. That was before she set sail with Semester at Sea as its Interport Spanish student.

After two weeks of living with more than 700 U.S. college students—and making a number of friends—Fernanda returns to her home in Spain tomorrow with a much greater interest in the U.S.

“I’ve really enjoyed meeting so many different people and I’m looking forward to going to visit the different cities where they are from,” said Fernanda, who lives on the Spanish island of Mallorca and attends university in Barcelona.

In return, Fernanda hopes the stories she’s told about life among Spanish college-age students will inspire her U.S. peers to discover the different personalities of her countries many cities and provinces.

“People thought Spain was much less cosmopolitan than it really is,” she said. “They asked me a lot of questions about bull fights and partying and there is much more to Spain that that.”

In a recent Explorer Seminar (one of 16 information classes open to students), Fernanda spoke to curious students about life in Barcelona, the museums, and what makes each of the different provinces special. “Every little town has its own personality; they are all so distinct with their own customs and traditions,” said Fernanda, 22.

Fernanda admits that she is not the typical Spanish student. She was born to Brazilian immigrants who who settled in Mallorca after retiring from a professional traveling dance company. She studied in a British-run primary/secondary school where she took French and German. She speaks Portugese with her family, Spanish, English, French, German and two Spanish dialects—Catalan (in Barcelona) and Mallorquin (on Mallorca).

However, if there is a new face of Spanish youth, Fernanda may be part it. Most of her friends span the spectrum of Spain—German immigrants in Mallorca, northern African and South American immigrants and students in Barcelona, young adults with a long family history in Spain.

“People in Spain come from so many different places now and the country is changing in so many ways,” she said.

Fernanda hopes to show some of her new U.S. friends her Spain if they have a chance to meet while Semester at Sea is in the country.

First Land Spotting

The MV Explorer's captain graciously (and slightly) diverted the ship so everyone aboard could view land--the first siting since Semester at Sea (SAS) departed Halifax on June 16!

By 7 p.m. shipboard time (19h00), the islands of Corvo and Flores were in clear view. An added bonus was a quick lesson about the islands from SAS's geology teacher Dan Horns:

• These two islands are volcanic and part of the Azores, a Portugese archipelago in the Atlantic.
• The islands sit aside the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, a submarine ridge that separates the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates.

So, upon viewing and passing the islands, Semester at Sea's summer 2009 voyage officially entered Europe.

Bridge Tours Bring Special Surprises

Every day, there are three scheduled tours of the MV Explorer's bridge, the room from which the ship is commanded. Normally, the tours are standard. However, every once in a while there are special, spontaneous events. One day, a report of an approaching iceberg prompted the captain and his senior crew to remap the ship's route.

Yesterday's 4:30 p.m. bridge tour turned out to be much more eventful than anticipated.

Here is an entry from living learning coordinator Zabrina Andres and what she and her group saw during their tour:

"Shortly after Alfonso Song, the second officer, explained the mechanics, engineering, and steering of the ship, one of the Semester at Sea students spotted a distant spray of white foam directly ahead of us. Her eyes were the sharpest of the group, as the rest of us had to wait, straining our eyes, to see the spray again.

A whale!

Alfonso and another crew member interrupted the tour to take the vessel off auto-pilot and steer slightly starboard to avoid hitting the oncoming whale. We actually got to see the ship's instruments in action. Our group of 15 squealed over the whale sighting and clambered around the compartment to take pictures.

Then, we got another bonus as someone else spotted dolphins heading our way. There were about 20 of them in several groups leaping through the waves toward the ship, seeming to follow the whale. As they got closer, we realized the dolphins were actually teaching their babies to jump, as the distinctly smaller animals jumped in perfect sync next to their mothers.

It was, without a doubt, the best bridge tour ever!"

--Zabrina Andres
Living Learning Coordinator, Health Promotion
Semester at Sea--Summer 2009 Voyage

Building Community Aboard the MV Explorer

One of the benefits of being in a confined space (in this case, a ship) with a group of people one sees constantly (800-plus students, lifelong learners, faculty, staff, and their family members) is that a community forms which makes the program work well. On Semester at Sea voyages there are a multitude of opportunities to develop community. The “Building Community…” theme is an ongoing blog series about the events that occur that help create the overall shipboard community.

Read today's entries directly below: “Discovering Shabbat”; “Dining with Lifelong Learners”; and “Appreciating Commonalities”.

And check back for future blog stories about the flourishing community on the Semester at Sea Summer 2009 voyage.

Discovering Shabbat

Nearly 30 students attended the first Shabbat dinner of the Summer 2009 voyage to share in and learn about the Jewish tradition. The small group of students, living-learning coordinators, and a few lifelong learners, shared challah bread and wine and discussed the tradition that begins the Jewish Sabbath each week.

“People came to share about their Jewish faith and quite a few people were there to learn about it,” said Becky Kenemuth, a living-learning coordinator on the voyage. Kenemuth, who is Jewish, explained Shabbat and its traditions and led the prayers in both Hebrew and English.

Lissa Place, the living-learning coordinator who specializes in religion and spirituality, led the program with Kenemuth. “I think [the dinner] was a time for people to reflect on their own family traditions and to take time to rest, have a meal together that wasn’t rushed, and really talk and learn from one another,” Place said. “It’s an important time for all to connect.”

Dining with Lifelong Learners

One privilege of being a lifelong learner aboard the Semester of Sea voyage is an invitation to dine with the ship’s captain. The 17 lifelong learners enjoyed that opportunity recently as they got to know the captain and other senior crew members, received tips on traveling through Italy by the ship’s Italian engineer and spent time together getting to know one another.

“I found it really wonderful to have that experience and learn more about the ship and the people who operate it,” said Carol Larson, the lifelong learner coordinator and a first-time full voyager on Semester at Sea.

The lifelong learner program is open to anyone above college age who is interested in a more educational traveling experience. Lifelong learners take classes alongside undergraduate students and interact with students to form an inter-generational learning community.

Check back to read more about the lifelong learners and the important role they play in the voyage’s inter-generational community.

Appreciating Commonalities

As a young African-American woman traveling abroad to Europe, Jennifer Paige is very aware of what makes her different and how that will make her stand out in the countries she will visit during the summer voyage.

She relishes the opportunities to connect with other African-American women and share experiences, hopes, fears, and commonalities. One recent hang-out session with a few classmates wound up being a fruitful conversation that included Assistant Executive Dean Dia Draper and Lissa Place, a living-learning coordinator on the voyage. The group of seven women, talked for nearly an hour about everything from how they all came to be on the same voyage together, and finding financial to afford it, to sorority life and caring for their hair while traveling.

“It’s nice to have someone here to fall back on and to know that there are faculty here who can relate to me,” says Paige, who attends Winston-Salem State University.

Another important topic to Paige and her classmates was how to encourage other African-American students in the U.S. to consider study-abroad programs. “It’s amazing to me that so many African-American people I spoke to at home don’t know what being “abroad” means. It’s something I’m really hoping to change; to get people want to travel.”

For now, Paige is looking forward to her traveling learning experience.

A Diverse Experience for All Aboard

This summer, the Semester at Sea voyage has one of the most diverse groups of students in the program’s history. That is due in part to the nearly two dozen Diversity Abroad scholars who have embarked on the SAS Summer 2009 voyage.

This is the second year the Institute for Shipboard Education (ISE), the parent organization of Semester at Sea, has awarded these diversity scholarships to students. The first scholarships were given for the Fall 2008 voyage.

ISE partnered with diversityabroad.com in the spring of 2008 after a chance meeting between SAS Director of Marketing, Cody Hartley, and Diversity Abroad founder, Andrew Gordon. The two men sketched out a plan for the partnership, shook hands on the agreement, and went to work on the program. The goal: to award merit-based scholarships primarily to students of color who show promise and interest in studying abroad. Ultimately, the intent is to increase access to Semester at Sea’s global educational opportunities for students from diverse and economically disadvantaged backgrounds.

For Nexus Cook, a senior from Temple University, the experience has meant learning from people with very different perspectives than her own as well as experiencing people from other countries with different cultures.

“Even being on this trip for two days has already really opened my eyes to how differently how people think about and approach issues simply because they come from different parts of the country,” said Nexus. “I’m learning so much already and hopefully am teaching people things too.”

Diversity Abroad was created to increase the number of underrepresented students who study abroad. This year’s group of scholarship recipients is the largest number of students to participate in the program.

“We had planned to give out 10 scholarships for the summer voyage, but ISE expanded the program to award 22 scholarships to acknowledge the incredible pool of applicants,” said Hartley.

More than 50 applicants applied for the scholarships through ISE and Diversity Abroad. Participants were accepted based on review of their answers to the essay question: “Why is it important to me to study abroad with students from diverse backgrounds?” Each of the 22 students received partial scholarships for the voyage.

As part of their role as Diversity Abroad scholars on the voyage, the students will work on several projects to examine issues of diversity aboard the MV Explorer, within the SAS Summer 2009 program, at the ports and in the countries they visit, and provide suggestions on how to further improve the program.

“We can’t look outside the hull of the ship for diversity without first being able to find diversity within the ship,” said Dia Draper, assistant executive dean for the SAS Summer 2009 voyage. “I think it’s important to ISE that many different types of students get this experience in order to better reach diverse populations for the program. As an educational institution that’s the greatest gift we can give any of these future leaders.”

To learn more about the Diversity Abroad scholars, visit the Semester at Sea website where you can view their video essays and follow their blogs. Visit: www.semesteratsea.org/admission-and-aid/financial-aid-scholarships/diversityabroad-scholarship.php

What Makes Studying on the MV Explorer Special

When many people think about studying abroad in college, they envision a single-point study program. While these study-abroad programs can be valuable experiences, there is something uniquely different and life-changing about the opportunity to learn on a moving vessel that travels between multiple countries and which allows for great and deep comparative learning, research and experiences.

Following are some aspects of why learning on the MV Explorer and through Semester at Sea is such a unique and worthwhile academic and life experience for college students:

• The students’ international experience begins the moment students step foot on the ship. The MV Explorer is staffed by an international crew of 220 members who represent 22 nationalities and hail from countries that include India, Ghana, Jamaica, the Ukraine, Austria, the Philippines, Italy, Croatia, Greece, Portugal, Guyana, Romania, Hungary, Nicaragua and more. The ship is led by a Croatian captain, has a Greek staff captain, an Italian chief engineer, a Ukranian safety officer, Filipino chef and chief housekeeper, and a lone American serves as the chief purser.


• Being on a moving vessel allows students to learn how to be responsive and nimble, whether it is adjusting to the rolling of the sea or the quick changes in time as they cross the Atlantic Ocean.


• Learning on Semester at Sea is kinetic. As they travel on the ocean, students gaze upon a horizon and witness the vastness of the ocean, something they may have never realized or appreciated before. As the ship pulls in to port, the students’ first view of the city is magical. This experience sets the tone for the students’ first three-dimensional view of everything they’ve been studying while at sea.


• When they step off the ship and on to land, learning becomes very tangible with each street they travel. Students begin to connect the real-life architecture, monuments and customs to the in-class discussions of histories and civilizations.


• Each SAS voyage fulfills Thomas Jefferson’s ideal of the academical village, where shared learning is infused in daily life. Living and learning aboard the MV Explorer is a microcosm of Jefferson’s model. Here the academic and student community live and learn side-by-side as they travel the world. This provides numerous opportunities for intense and engaging discussions, deeper reflection, and exchanges that would rarely take place on a land-based campus or even a single-point study abroad program.


• Students have access to some of the brightest and talented academic minds culled from across the nation. Some of the top academic scholars bring their work, passions and lessons to the Semester at Sea community to challenge students and enhance their understanding of our multicultural and complex world.

Fast Friendships Lead to Travel Buddies

They call themselves “The Hotel-less Bunch”--a trio of SAS voyagers who landed at the Nova Scotia airport at 2 a.m. on embarkment day and settled there for several hours before sharing a cab to the port to check-in for their journey.

The threesome formed fast bonds in that short time, linked by their shared interest in exploring issues of human rights and social justice while learning about the cultures of nine different countries in just two months.

“We found that we had quite a few mutual interests—in international rights, children’s issues, and other areas—and a lot of time together to talk about them,” said Belinda Wilson, a mother of three from Tennessee, who recently returned to college after more than 20 years and enrolled in the SAS voyage upon the insistence of her children.

Wilson and fellow airport SAS holdovers--Wan Wang of UC Berkeley, and Josh Hernandez, who’ll be transferring to MIT in the fall—decided to travel together on a few trips. After 40 minutes of pouring over the SAS field program booklet during check-in, the trio decided on 10 trips together, one in each country.

“This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for me and I want to make sure I experience places and people and things that I may not get another chance to do,” said Hernandez, a physics major.

Wang, who would like a career with UNICEF, and Wilson, an English and international studies, selected several outings to children’s orphanages. “We really want to immerse ourselves as much as we can in the countries while we have the chance,” said Wilson. “What better way to do that than to be as close to the children and the families as possible.”

Embarkation Day—SAS Summer 2009

More than 700 students from across the U.S. and a handful of other countries dragged their bags and themselves through an early morning check-in to embark on the MV Explorer and their two-month journey on Semester at Sea.

Woven within the long lines that snaked along the port of Halifax are stories of instant friendships, many “firsts” for the SAS experience, and eager global explorers. Read on to find out more about the students who make up the 99th voyage of Semester at Sea.

A Voyage of Firsts

Semester at Sea may be nearing its 100th voyage, but the Summer 2009 experience marks many firsts for this global study-abroad program. It is the first voyage to:

• Have full enrollment;
• Have 300 colleges and universities represented on a single voyage;
• Have the most diverse student body, with 20% being students of color;
• Use small discussion groups as part of the learning process;
• Have living-learning coordinators with specialties that include leadership; academic success, religion and spirituality, intercultural affairs, and health and wellness;
• Sail to Bulgaria.

SAS Summer 09 Deans Ensure Parents that Students Will ‘Stand Upright and Scan the Heavens’

Several hundred parents toured the MV Explorer and met with Semester at Sea co-deans Michael Joseph Smith and Mike Zoll, along with other SAS officials and volunteers, to quell their nerves and hear about the voyage during a pre-board parent tour and “orientation”.

“Our goal is to create a shipboard community of exemplary teamwork and cooperation in pursuit of an integrated learning experience,” Dean Smith, the voyage’s academic dean, told the more than 200 parents gathered in the ship’s student union.

Smith and Zoll, the executive dean, are the SAS trip’s primary administrators. Together, they have constructed a dynamic program that draws upon the talents of an experienced faculty and staff and is certain to inspire students, challenge their perceptions, and expand their knowledge of and appreciation for the cultures, histories and artifacts they encounter on the 67-day voyage.

In addition to calming parents’ nerves about sending their children off to sea on a global journey, the deans noted the challenges students will encounter in expanding their capacity for empathy and their imaginations for experiences.

“We are a purposeful community,” Zoll told parents, emphasizing the points of noted educator Ernest Boyer’s principles for a successful college community. “It is a place where the intellectual life is central and where faculty and students work together to strengthen teaching and learning on the campus.”

As executive dean, Zoll oversees all student life issues and community affairs on the ship and voyage. On land, he is the Vice President of Enrollment and Student Affairs for Semester at Sea/Institute for Shipboard Education and brings more than two decades of leadership experience in higher education to his role.

Dean Smith sets the theme of the voyage—“Human Rights and Social Justice in the Mediterranean”—as the main academic administrator. He oversees all courses and academic work, ensuring its rigor and thoughtfulness. He is a professor of political and social thought at the University of Virginia, where he teaches courses on human rights, political thought, ethics, and international relations. During this summer’s voyage he is teaching a course on ethics, human rights and world affairs.

Smith sent parents off into the night with the words of Enlightenment philosopher Immanuel Kant, who concludes a section of an essay that discusses the wisdom of opening one’s eyes beyond a small vision to one that is open to scanning the heavens.

“I hope that all of us on this journey will indeed stand upright and scan the heavens,” Smith told the parents. “Surely, an ideal place to do this, will be this summer, on the decks of the MV Explorer as we sail the sea celebrated by poets from ancient times to the present.”

Meet the SAS Summer 2009 Community

The SAS Summer 2009 community is a diverse group of students, lifelong learners, faculty and staff. In fact, our voyagers are the most diverse group of any Semester at Sea journey.

Of the more than 700 students who will embark on the MV Explorer tomorrow in Halifax for the two-month voyage, 20% are students of color and 25 are international students from countries that include Canada, China, Bahamas, Pakistan and South Africa. There are also 22 “Diversity Abroad” scholars on this voyage, the first-ever scholarship resulting from a recent partnership between Semester at Sea and www.diversityabroad.com.

Our faculty and staff hail from various universities and cities from around the U.S. with vast amounts of academic experience and traveling experience. Several faculty members are repeat SAS voyagers. Most are sailing for the first time. A few are making their first voyage out of the continental U.S. They have been working independently for months together as a group for several days to prepare curriculum, programs, and exercises to be ready for students upon their arrival tomorrow.

Check back for future blogs to learn more about the dynamic students, faculty, lifelong learners, and staff who will part of this global experience.

Welcome!! Read on and visit regularly.

Welcome to the Semester at Sea-Summer 2009 voyage blog. Check here regularly and often to learn about the exciting and life-changing experiences that students and lifelong learners aboard the ship will encounter this summer. Meet new SAS faculty and staff. Hear from the deans of the summer voyage. And, learn something new about life in the Mediterranean countries Semester at Sea will visit.