Sarah Whittemore and her participation in FYSM 142: "The Cost of Living Literature of Moral Decision Making”

During my sophomore year I was a member of the Tutorial College where I enjoyed the privilege of designing an independent project. I took this opportunity to become immersed in the Hartford community. What began as an idea to tutor students in an after-school program radically changed into the reality of being the co-facilitator of the School Improvement Committee at The Greater Hartford Classical Magnet School. My time at GHCMS exposed me to a new side of education very different from my own background. This experience ignited my enthusiasm for educational public policy, school administrational work and achieving better educational standards for lower socio-economic families.

I have continued my community outreach in Hartford during my junior year in my mentor project for Dan Heischman's class “The Cost of Living: Literature of Moral Decision Making.” With regard to my project, I have been very lucky that Dan has fully supported all of my ideas and really let me run with it until I was happy with the plan. All mentors are given the option of creating a project for their seminar or the First Year Program in general, so I took this as an opportunity to share some of my positive experiences working in Greater Hartford magnet schools with my mentees (Trinity students enrolled in this seminar). I have been very lucky to work with Debra Avery, an 8th grade history teacher at the Learning Corridor whose class has participated in a series of case studies developed by my seminar students over the course of the semester. Using the moral and ethical issues we discuss in seminar as a base for their case studies, my mentees worked in groups or 2 or 3 to create an interactive presentation for the 8th graders.

  Andrea and Alfonso, Sarah's mentees, working with Debra Avery's eight grade students at The Greater Hartford Classical Magnet School on a project focused on socio-economics.

I created my project because I believe that one of the best means of demonstrating what you have learned is to share your knowledge with others. At Trinity we are fortunate to have the Learning Corridor as an excellent resource and it will provide the ideal opportunity for my mentees to get into the community and share what they are learning. At this time all of my mentees have presented and I have been continually impressed with their presentations and the positive reaction from the 8th grade students. Presentations have covered topics ranging from the morality of key issues in the 2004 presidential election to socio-economics and women’s suffrage.  I think this learning experience has been unique and beneficial for the students from the Learning Corridor and from Trinity.