River School “Follow Your Passion” Self-directed Study/Internship Description
Follow your passion! Yes, we mean it. We want students to have first hand experiences out in the community to supplement their classroom-based learning. This time, ten hours per week, is theirs to use as they wish. However, there are some guidelines to work within:
At least 50% of the afternoon time over the semester must be community involvement time. Students can decide whether to put a lot of time into this for an intensive block, or spread it out over the semester. They can either volunteer, do an internship or have a job (yes, paying jobs are ok!) that will expose them to new ideas, skills, and experiences. We’d suggest a maximum of seven hours out of the ten a week, so students don’t get too overloaded with this.
We will have a list of places in Belfast that are interested in having River School students come work with them. Examples might be: The Green Store, local schools or daycare centers, Come Boating!, Belfast City Parks/Green Town projects, Belfast Bay Watershed trail building projects, All About Games, Senior Spectrum, the Belfast Historical Society, Penobscot Marine Museum, Waterfall Arts, etc.
Use Follow Your Passion time to do just that: practice an instrument and/or take lessons, take a dance class, attend a lecture, do research on the web for a project, organize a protest, teach a class, go for a nature hike, read at a poetry slam, etc. Students can organize their time as they see fit. Students need to check their plans for this time with their advisor.
Students need to keep track of how they use their time each week by either keeping a journal to record what they did and write a bit about it, or by keeping a log of what they did, where they did it, and how long they did it for.
Advisors will look at journals/logs regularly, and help students seek out experiences and contacts to build on their learning. At the end of the semester, students will have an impressive set of first-hand experiences to look back on.
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