Attending Amherst College has completely changed the way I learn. Being that Amherst has an open curriculum, I can select courses that I am genuinely interested in and passionate about. The open curriculum also creates a more rich environment within each class because each student in that class chooses to be there.
I’ve heard about many different ways Amherst students use the open curriculum to their benefit. Personally, I’ve devised a perfect system to ensure I am fulfilling my major’s distribution requirements and taking advantage of the open curriculum. I am a double major studying Psychology and Education Studies. Every semester students must take four courses. My rule of thumb in choosing those courses is that in the fall semester, I’ll usually take two Psychology classes, one Education Studies class, and a class that interests me and has nothing to do with my majors. In the Spring semester, I flip it. I usually take two Education Studies classes, one Psychology class and another class that doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with my majors. Those “outlier” classes have become a staple in my learning routine, and I can even say that my favorite class since I’ve been here has been an “outlier” class.
Last fall semester, I took an Art History and European Studies course called “Vampires, Witches and Monsters.” This class became one of my absolute favorite classes at Amherst. Being a Psychology major, many of my assignments include a lot of reading. These assignments usually include articles, journals, and research. When I got to my Vampire, Witches and Monsters class, it allowed my mind to think differently. Of course, we were reading novels, but we were also reading poems, watching films, and doing visual analyses on paintings, drawings and sketches. The assignments given to us by our professor were also very unique. The first awesome assignment that comes to mind is when our professor asked us to find and take a picture of something that seemed “monstrous” on campus. To fulfill this assignment, I went with a classmate to the Beneski Museum; we searched their collection of dinosaur footprints until we found the biggest one and finally took a picture of my foot next to the dinosaur footprint. We submitted this as our homework for the next class.
These kinds of assignments were fun, but our final project was the best part of this class. Each student was able to pick “one monstrous thing” and do a “deep-dive” into the history and depictions of this monster. I chose El Diablo Cojuelo, a big presence in Dominican Folklore. My family is from the Dominican Republic, and being able to research and learn about my culture was amazing.
This class helped solidify my desire to always have an “outlier” class as it helps me explore new interests and learn new things.
