AMHERST — When she was growing up, Claudia Hermano’s family moved a lot — from New York to California, around that state, back to New York, to Texas and Boston.
While Hermano attended Hampshire College, her father had just lost his job and moved to Boston to accept another, her mother in New York and her brother was preparing to move to Japan. So when Hermano thought about what she wanted to focus on for her final project — the core of Hampshire’s educational model — her family situation seemed natural.
“I was thinking about what I wanted to do, what would be the most fulfilling work, what would make my heart happy,” she said. So she created seven books filled with photographs she took on weekends visiting her family. “Kind of embracing our separation.”
Hermano’s was one of the scores of “Division III” projects on showcase at Hampshire College as the academic year winds down. From inquiry into the effects of public health pamphlets to visual art projects, students at Hampshire work on an ambitious independent project during their time at the school, with close advising from faculty. That pedagogy is what sets Hampshire apart. And as the school charts an uncertain path forward amid fiscal uncertainty, it is what the college hopes to keep alive.
“It’s pretty rare in the world of undergraduate education,” said Annie Rogers, a professor of psychoanalysis and clinical psychology. “And in that sense it should be preserved.”
It has been a semester of turmoil at Hampshire, where senior leadership announced on Jan. 15 that they were searching for a partner institution in order for the college to survive financially. That, and the board of trustees’ subsequent decision to admit only 77 students in fall 2019, caused anger on campus, leading to a 75-day student sit-in at the president’s office and the ultimate resignation of the school’s top leaders.
The school’s trustees have now voted to change course and pursue independence through fundraising. But the decision to admit only a tiny class next academic year led to deep layoffs. Only 600 students will be on campus next year, half as many as this past academic year.
With Div III projects being presented in that context, many said that the end of this semester — normally a joyous and relieving time — has become bittersweet for students and faculty alike.
“They were working in the face of a lot of adversity here,” said Pamela Stone, an alumna herself who is the director of the college’s “Culture, Brain and Development Program.”
Over the years, Stone has advised more than 100 Div III projects. She said that educational model isn’t for everyone. But for those who would feel “completely suffocated” in a traditional, ridgid higher education environment, it’s perfect, she said. Students are encouraged to take courses across a wide range of disciplines, and often take on very ambitious projects.
“That’s the beauty of Hampshire,” Stone said.
Stone added that the model prepares students for big things later in life. The school ranks 39th in the percentage of graduates who go on to finish doctoral degrees, and boasts influential alumni in a large number of fields, from business to film.
“Hampshire was so essential to my development as a scholar,” said Avalon Mercado, a student whose project looked at the effect of antioxidants on certain cells in the body called “mast cells.”
Mercado was drawn to the subject because she herself has a mast cell disease. She was curious to see how antioxidants might affect those cells, under various circumstances, when somebody has the condition mastocytosis, which causes the accumulation of mast cells in the body.
The project took two years of intense research, she said. And while it is hard to make sweeping conclusions, she said that she did find that antioxidants have potential as a treatment for mastocytosis.
Mercado wants to eventually become a physician’s assistant and work in immunology, and she said she’s confident that the school’s educational philosophy has helped prepare her for that.
“It allowed me to take on a project that I don’t think I could do anywhere else,” she said. “This was entirely my research.”
The Div III process is incredibly challenging, Stone said. Students are already under pressure during their last semester, and the crisis on campus only added to that, she said.
“This has been a crazy semester for all of us, to say the least,” said Marlon Becerra, a student whose project was an analysis of the crisis that played out during his last semester on campus. He was a member of the Hamp Rise Up protest movement, and was also involved as an elected member of the school’s financial committee.
In a packed room filled with more than 40 people, including a former trustee and current lead fundraiser for the school, Becerra laid out the outlines of what happened on campus over the semester before suggesting several steps Hampshire could take moving forward.
Among those suggestions: changing the academic model to be more research-intensive on contemporary issues like climate change; providing on-campus housing for faculty and staff; naming alumni and faculty to senior leadership positions; increasing student employment on campus; and attracting nonprofits, think tanks and other organizations to set up shop on campus to work with students.
A bell rang in the background across campus all day as students celebrated the completion of their Div III projects. It is a long-standing tradition at the school, signaling the end of a student’s long journey down Hampshire’s unique educational path.
“For me, there’s just a joy in the accomplishment,” said Rogers, the professor of psychoanalysis and clinical psychology. “And thope that there will be … another set of Div III’s. That this process will be able to continue.”
Dusty Christensen can be reached at dchristensen@gazettenet.com.