Students to dig for roots of Catholic thought

St. Joe's College offers unique program aimed at first-year students

- Photo by Ramon Gonzalez Third-year theology students Angela Bokenfohr and Brittney White study at St. Joseph's College of the University of Alberta. This fall the college will launch a new program to help 40 first-year students begin to understand Catholic intellectual traditions.

By RAMON GONZALEZ
WCR Staff Writer
Edmonton

St. Joseph's College and the University of Alberta's Faculty of Arts are developing a new program that will bring the Catholic intellectual tradition to incoming first year students.

Academia, as the program is called, is an integrated program of first year courses and seminars aimed at exploring and discussing key themes in the relationship between Western Culture and Catholicism.

The program will accept a total of 40 students in special course sections for Academia of classics, history, philosophy and English literature. Throughout the year it will offer at least two special seminars limited to 20 students to explore the relationship between these courses and the Catholic intellectual tradition.

St. Joseph's College is offering the program as a way to deepen its participation in the university's academic life, noted Rob Curtis, a music student serving as the recruitment coordinator for the Academia program.

Catholic perspective

"This program is an opportunity for the college to reach out into a deeper partnership with the faculty of arts and to offer a Catholic perspective that sort of touches on a cross-section of the students' experience at university rather than isolated courses here and there."

The program is also an attempt to offer first year students smaller class sizes and an easier transition from high school to university, Curtis added.

"For five of their classes, those 40 students in Academia will get to know their group a little better and they'll have a constant group of colleagues from class to class," he said. "There will be more personal interaction with fellow students, professors and advisors."

For the past few weeks Curtis has been talking to guidance counsellors and high school students across Alberta about the program. "My mission is to get the word out," he said from Calgary.

The program is open to all newly admitted first-year BA students. Students who apply for admission to Academia will be accepted on a first come, first served basis. There is no further fee to enroll.

As an affiliated college of the University of Alberta, St. Joe's teaches courses in applied ethics, philosophy, religious education and theology at the undergraduate level for credit within the faculty of arts. It has further developed courses directed to students in the faculty of education who intend to teach in the province's Catholic school system.

Other important areas of teaching at St. Joseph's are philosophy, science and religion, bioethics, social justice, as well as marriage and sexuality. In total, more than 50 courses in Christian theology and a dozen courses in philosophy are listed for credit in the faculty of arts.

Tim Hartnagel

"The basic idea (behind Academia) is to allow interested first year BA students to be in a smaller group of up to 40 students who would take several of their basic core BA courses together in designated sections and then also to do a seminar course here with us," explained Tim Hartnagel, dean of St. Joseph's College.

"The purpose of the seminar course would be to do some critical reflection on some of the themes that come up in those basic core humanities courses and their relationship to the Catholic intellectual tradition of the West."

Common themes

All courses that are part of the program are courses that students would need to fulfill their BA requirements and will be taught by faculty of arts professors. They include English 112, which is a Western literature and language course, Philosophy 101 and 102, both basic philosophy courses, and Classics and History 110, which is a Western civilization course.

Course instructors will try to identify common themes that run across these courses and then St. Joseph's will use those themes as discussion material in its special seminars.

"The seminars are called Catholic studies and those seminars will take material from the basic core humanities courses that the students have been in and critically reflect on them and try to do some integration among those themes with the Catholic intellectual tradition," Hartnagel explained.

Small community

"That's the academic part but this is also a way of giving students an experience of a smaller learning community in the midst of this big huge university where a number of students right from high school have trouble taking advantage of what's here because they get lost in the large anonymity particularly of large first-year courses."

The program will also offer students opportunities to participate with other Academia students and staff in a variety of social, cultural and recreational activities. There is also an optional residential community available at St. Joseph's.

The Academia program itself is one year but an optional second will be offered to those interested.

"If they finish the first year and they are interested they can go on to a second year where the focus will be a little different and there will be fewer cohort courses for them; there will be two courses and two seminars," Hartnagel explained.

Ethics and justice

"The second year is going to focus more on ethics and social justice and they will be doing some community service-learning activities as well."

Hartnagel emphasized that Academia is being developed in cooperation with the faculty of arts.

"We couldn't do this on our own because we don't admit our own students," he said. "You have to be admitted into the University of Alberta and in the faculty of arts in your first year to be able to take our courses and to do this particular program."

The concept behind the Academia program has been around for quite awhile and has been used in a variety of ways in other universities, Hartnagel said.

"The focus of this notion is to try to form community with a smaller group of students and faculty that allows for more interaction both in and outside the classroom."

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