STONY BROOK

New Day Dawns On Campus

College classes open in Southampton

By Kate Maier

(01/18/2007)    Excitement is in the air at Stony Brook Southampton as university officials set about rebuilding the curriculum at the newly acquired 82-acre campus.

    Long Island University transferred Southampton College, whose undergraduate program it had closed, to the State University at Stony Brook on Oct. 3. The date was later than anticipated, but this semester 26 courses will be offered, six of which high school students can take for a $100 registration fee.

    Each course will count as three nonmatriculated credits at the State University at Stony Brook. An open registration at the Southampton campus this week ends tomorrow.

    According to Matthew Whelan, Stony Brook Southampton’s assistant provost for admissions and financial aid, “we will continue to accept registrations on a first-come, first-served basis through the first few days of class, or until the classroom is at capacity.”

    Undergraduate and mixed-level graduate classes are open to the surrounding community, State University at Stony Brook students, and high school students. Because the new campus is part

of the State University system, its prices are far below what they would have been at Long Island University.

    For example, a three-credit graduate writing workshop with Robert Reeves, the former head of Long Island University’s Master of Fine Arts creative writing program, will cost $864, while at Long Island University the cost would have been $2,370.

    Mr. Reeves will head the same M.F.A. program at Stony Brook Southampton, which, according to Martin Schoonen, the interim dean, will probably be used as a model for other fine arts majors in the future.

    Shirley Strum Kenny, the president of the State University at Stony Brook, is “very interested in the arts and how to move that forward,” said Mr. Schoonen at a meeting last Thursday. Although the core curriculum at the college, which will be solidified by March, will center on environmental sustainability, public policy, and natural resource management, Ms. Kenny has expressed an interest in the arts and what contributions from East Enders could mean for programs at Stony Brook Southampton.

    Mr. Schoonen spoke of tapping the surrounding area for faculty adjuncts, and to fill teaching positions in the arts. “We could have some top-notch classes,” he said.

    “One of the things I would love to convey to the community is that there is a tremendous opportunity for the East End to build something that is going to get national recognition,” he added. What “we don’t want to do is replicate what we already have at Stony Brook. If anything we want to complement it.”

    With a projected enrollment of 3,000 or fewer, the campus will offer a decidedly different vibe than its larger counterpart. According to Mr. Schoonen, however, admissions standards will remain just as high, if not higher.

    “It has the flavor of an honors program,” he said. “Class sizes are going to be different here,” and will be based upon an interdisciplinary core.

    Unlike at the main campus, “courses will not be identified with any particular department,” paving the way for specialized courses like “rivers of the world” that “you can’t teach at Stony Brook, because there’s too many departments,” he said.

    With the “recognition and support of the SUNY system, [Mr. Schoonen] is building a nationally known name in a curricular campus setting where it’s interdisciplinary,” said Mr. Whalen, who added that administrators will “scour the country for the best and brightest students across majors and disciplines.”

    Degree programs will be in place, Mr. Schoonen said, by the end of the year.

    So far, the Master of Fine Arts in creative writing, marine science, and “sustainability” programs have been announced, and a team of faculty members is working out the details of the curriculum to be presented in March. Students should be able to start taking courses for matriculated credit next year.

    Plans are in the works to move a collection from the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center in Springs, which Stony Brook also owns, to the campus, and to offer related lectures at the college. The writers conference formerly held at Southampton College, which met at the Stony Brook campus last summer, will return to Southampton this year, and Pianofest concerts will once again be staged at the Southampton campus as well.

    A master building plan, which Mr. Schoonen said will be Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design-certified, is expected to be finished within the next 18 months, and, while the details have not been ironed out, revamping the fine arts building and theater, equipping the dormitories and other campus buildings with fiberoptic cables, and finishing a new library are just some of the improvements slated for the near future.

    Mr. Schoonen’s vision is “not the traditional ‘lost in the stacks’ kind of library,” but something more technologically connected. Accessibility to the campus will be greater than ever — because it is a state school, many facilities, including the library, will be open to the public.

    “The threshold for using facilities at Stony Brook is nil. The same rules that apply at Stony Brook apply here,” Mr. Schoonen explained.

    Besides opportunities in continuing and higher education that the school will offer, officials at the college have already responded to requests from South Fork educators for professional development opportunities. “That’s a no-brainer,” said Mr. Schoonen. “Teachers need new ideas.”

    He said the college will offer certificate programs for teachers. This spring, a course called “Teacher’s Rights: Litigation, Liability, and the Law” will be taught by Susan F. Alevas. Roger Rosenblatt, Robert Reeves, Jules Feiffer, and Lou Ann Walker will teach creative writing seminars, and other courses, including marine science offerings, “Atlantic Maritime History,” and “Prospects for the Planet Earth,” will offer a taste of the upcoming curriculum.

    With any luck, Mr. Schoonen’s vision of a “small, intimate campus setting with top-notch, world-class faculty,” and with “students that are ideologically in tune with eco-friendly corporations” will be realized sooner rather than later. His hope is to have the campus running at full capacity within five years.

    With a growing national reputation as one of the best and most affordable colleges in the country, “Stony Brook as an empire is moving up,” he said. “Across the board, as Stony Brook as a whole goes up, Southampton goes up too.”

Scholarships For Native Americans

    Beginning this year, the State University at Stony Brook is awarding four-year scholarships to Native Americans who meet the school’s admissions requirements. The Native American People Scholarships will be presented to graduating high school seniors and transfer students. They cover tuition, room and board, fees, supplies, and health insurance. Recipients can pursue any field of study available at either Stony Brook or Stony Brook Southampton.

    “The Native American people have an extraordinary legacy in the East End communities,” said Shirley Strum Kenny, the university’s president. She said that she hopes the scholarship will offer a valuable educational resource to “neighbors” of the college, including members of the Shinnecock Nation in Southampton.

    “This scholarship is a tremendous first step in fulfilling a 250-year-old promise to provide advanced educational opportunity for Long Island’s native peoples,” said Harry Wallace, the chief of the Unkechaug Nation in Mastic. “I welcome the opportunity to make this scholarship a permanent fixture in the academic life of Stony Brook University and the Unkechaug Nation.”