Page 1: http://learn.uvm.edu/study-abroad/oaxaca/ - “Oaxaca Semester Abroad”

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Oaxaca Semester Abroad Spring Semester 2016Benefits of Oaxaca Semester Abroad In today’s globalized world, the unique skills and experiences offered by participating in a semester study abroad program are invaluable. Employers and graduate schools increasingly are looking for graduates with cross-cultural and field-research experience. Plus, the personal growth and learning that occurs while studying in another country and culture are immeasurable. Oaxaca, Mexico is a bio-diverse and culturally rich environment for learning. Read more by Dean Cynthia Belliveau, faculty member for the Food Systems track, in her blog post, “Oaxaca Study Abroad Program Demystifies the Stereotypes of Mexico.” The Oaxaca Semester Abroad program offers Spanish Language Immersion and three diverse but interrelated academic tracks for students in a variety of majors:

Food Systems, Global Health, and Arts and Sciences (Botany and Music).

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Examples of Student Independent Student Research Projects in Oaxaca:

Gender and Cultural Self-Empowerment A Suburban Solution: The Effects of Neoliberal Economics on the Social and Aesthetic

Character of Oaxaca City Exportation of Mexican Cactus: Questioning Scale Perspectives on the Oaxacan Education System and its Role in Career and Employment Women, Community and Migration

Zapatista Influence & Rebel Youth in Urban Oaxaca and many more…

Example Field Excursions during the Oaxaca Semester Abroad Program:

Women’s Weaving Center Sustainable Agriculture Center Migrant Shelters Alternative Technologies The Fundación Oaxaqueña de Equinoterapia (FOE)

For more information on Oaxaca, visit www.oaxaca-travel.com.

Page 4: http://learn.uvm.edu/study-abroad/oaxaca/program-overview/ - “Program Overview”

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Program Overview Dates: 2016 Program dates: January 11, 2016 – April 16, 2016

Prerequisite: Two semesters of college Spanish (or equivalent) and instructor permission. Students may choose to have a Spanish proficiency test in lieu of language proficiency requirement and will be required to share the results.

Spanish: Students earn UVM credit and develop conversational skills so that they may interact in Spanish with the Oaxacan community.

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Who Will BenefitStudents with a variety of interests will benefit from the Oaxaca Semester Abroad program, from those who want to experience immersion in another culture to those who want to study abroad with UVM faculty and earn UVM credit! The program has three separate tracks designed to help students meet distribution requirements and fulfill the requirements of their major and/or minor.

Students will build their resumes with transferrable skills, including cross-cultural and field-based research experience.

Family HomestaySmall groups of students (two or three students per group) will live with families in Oaxaca City. Students will get a first-hand view of Mexican culture and a chance to practice their Spanish.

Academic ProgramsCourses will enable students to develop a better understanding of the economic, political, cultural, agricultural, historical and artistic forces influencing life today in Mexico. Course instruction is in English except for Spanish language courses. Students will enjoy smaller class sizes with experts and peers.

The Spring 2016 semester abroad course offerings include the following:

Anthropology of Music in Oaxaca (3 credits) Botany of Oaxaca (4 credit) Conversational Spanish at Solexico Language and Cultural Center (3 credits) Food, Culture and Health in Oaxaca (5 credits) Global Health in Oaxaca (3 credits) Maximizing the Oaxaca Experience (2 credits) Networks and Communities of Oaxaca (3 credits) Oaxaca Field Study Seminar and Independent Project (3 credits) Tropical Farming and Gardening in Oaxaca Mexico (2 credits)

Sample excursions and field trips planned as part of the coursework include:

Colonias, City markets Guelatao Sierra Juarez Santa Maria Yavesia Santa Ana del Valle COVORPA and San Andres Chicahuaxtla Zimatlan, Ixtlan

UVM Study Abroad Procedures and Pre-Departure Orientation

Students will follow standard UVM Study Abroad Approval procedures through the Office of International Education.  For more information, please contact UVM Continuing and Distance Education at learn@uvm.edu or 802-656-2085.

Tuition and FeesStudents who are accepted to the program will pay a non-refundable deposit of $500 to reserve their place. In addition to tuition, students will pay a program fee of approximately $6,000 that covers housing, two meals a day and excursions. Students must also pay the comprehensive fee and any other applicable university fees. Airfare is not covered in the program fee. Students will purchase required books before departure.  Please note that the program fee is subject to change.

Regional SettingOaxaca provides an ideal setting to learn about the challenges of sustainable livelihoods in a rapidly changing world. It is the most culturally and biologically-diverse of Mexican states with sixteen different languages spoken in addition to Spanish, and environments as varied as desert, pine forest, and tropical rain forest. The indigenous peoples of today are descendants of ancient civilizations that left grand cities like Monte Albán and legacies for humanity like the domestication of corn. A “culture of corn” persists here, characterized by high levels of agricultural biodiversity, a connection to the land, and community traditions.

Development and globalization pose significant challenges to the social and ecological sustainability of the region. Oaxaca is the second-poorest state in Mexico, and has one of the highest rates of emigration to other regions of Mexico and North America. Extractive industries like logging are undermining its distinctive ecosystems and the sustainability of the local communities. The discovery of genetically-modified corn in the Sierra Juarez has placed Oaxaca at the center of a global controversy over the challenges that biotechnology represents for traditional agriculture.

In the midst of these changes, the region has become a site of vigorous indigenous rights activism; the Zapotecs and Mixtecs are experiencing a cultural and political renaissance, and are advocating for control over land, culturally-appropriate education, and community self-determination. These movements, a by-product of globalization, are creating new opportunities for indigenous organizing and assertion.

The long-term consequences of these trends are not yet clear, but many Oaxacan communities are demanding self-determination, respect for local tradition, and sustainable community programs as an alternative to traditional economic development plans.

For information on Oaxaca, visit www.oaxaca-travel.com

Page 5: http://learn.uvm.edu/study-abroad/oaxaca/letter-to-parents/ - “Letter to Parents”

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Letter to Parents

Greetings UVM Parent,

We want to take this opportunity to tell you about our experiences with the Oaxaca Semester Abroad program. Oaxaca is the most culturally and biologically diverse of Mexican states. It provides an ideal setting to live and learn about the challenges of two-thousand-year-old indigenous cultures in a rapidly changing world. Issues and solutions relating to migration, food and agriculture, social justice, and community development are not only to be studied, but wholly experienced.

Our program is based in beautiful, colonial Oaxaca City, where students live with local families. Courses include anthropology, botany, community development, Spanish, geology, and nutrition and health. We travel throughout the state to learn about alternative medicine, archaeology, politics, history, immigration policy, and environmental issues. Using Oaxaca as our classroom, each course offers field-based, hands-on opportunities to learn about Oaxaca’s incredible diversity of indigenous cultures, arts, and landscapes. The program also includes field trips and community stays in indigenous villages, and in-depth service-learning opportunities.

The semester-long program in Oaxaca is designed to help your son or daughter fulfill UVM distribution requirements and/or major and minor credits. The 18-credit program is unique in that it offers UVM credits with UVM selected instructors and UVM financial aid, so this study abroad program fits seamlessly in your student’s UVM education. In other words, your son or daughter will not have to go to another university to study abroad and then worry about instructor quality and transferring credits back to UVM.

As we can attest, the program offers intellectual, emotional, and practical experiences that students rarely encounter on campus. Students make life-long friends with each other and with the people of Oaxaca. If your son or daughter is curious about the world and serious about studying, believe us when we say Oaxaca is the place to go.

If this description sounds like the type of learning experience that would benefit your student, please encourage him or her to submit an application soon because this year’s class will fill fast. In order to apply, students must have successfully finished two semesters of Spanish at the college level by the end of fall semester, or contact Continuing and Distance Education about special permission for a language exemption.

You can fill out an application here. Students who are accepted are also eligible for scholarship awards of up to $1,000, based on financial need. If you have any questions, please contact UVM Continuing and Distance Education at learn@uvm.edu or 802-656-2085.

Sincerely,

Oaxaca Semester Abroad

Page 6: http://learn.uvm.edu/study-abroad/oaxaca/courses/ - “Program Tracks”

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Program Tracks The Oaxaca Semester Abroad program provides students with an intriguing and empowering study abroad experience. Over the years, more than 150 students have participated in this innovative program and returned to the University of Vermont rejuvenated and inspired to create change in both their own lives and throughout the world.

Students can select from one of three course tracks:

Food Systems Arts and Sciences Global Health

These are the course offerings for the 2015 Oaxaca Semester Abroad program and are subject to change.

Core CoursesAll students participating in the Oaxaca Semester Abroad program will complete the first portion of the program as one cohort.

Conversational Spanish at Solexico Language and Cultural Center (3 credits)Professor: Norma Aguilar-GaytanAll students will participate in a Spanish language course offered at the Solexico Language and Cultural Center in Oaxaca. Upon arrival in Mexico students will have the opportunity to take a placement test to see which level of Spanish will be adequate to meet their needs. Language courses are focused on conversation and immersion in the Mexican culture.

Maximizing the Oaxaca Experience (2 credits)Professor: Oliver Fröhling, M.A.This course is designed to facilitate successful navigation of Mexican culture and  the Oaxacan community, by reflecting on issues such as cultural assumptions, judgments, reactions to cultural differences, privilege, and other factors related to cross-cultural learning.

 

Networks and Communities of Oaxaca (3 credits)Professor: Oliver Fröhling, M.A.Oaxaca, Mexico has been described in a myriad of ways: as a state with indigenous characteristics, as a primary tourist destination with its quaint colonial capital, as one of the most underdeveloped places in Mexico, as a haven for alternative collective practices, or, since 2006, as the home of Mexico’s next revolution. This course surveys how “Oaxaca” as a place is constructed by multiple agents embedded in multiple networks, exploring the multiple layers and connections of different groups that together make up the place called Oaxaca. As such, we will place emphasis on communities, government agencies and collective actors as agents in controlling and shaping their place through various means of territorial control, within connections and networks created through professional associations, NGOs, social movements, circuits of capital and symbolic circulation. This course will draw on geographical and social theory in order to provide students with the tools to make sense out of complex phenomena. The

course will use lectures, field visits, assignments, and interactive techniques in the classroom in order to facilitate learning.

Oaxaca Field Study Seminar and Independent Project (3 credits)Professor: Jonathan Treat, M.A.The purpose of the Field Study Seminar is for students to explore a topic of personal interest that will create new learning and understanding of community, culture, and place, the themes of the semester-long study in Oaxaca. Students will identify an area of focus and develop a specific topic, develop a plan that will guide the study, and acquire skills to successfully carry out their study. This is an opportunity for students to take ownership of their learning and focus on their particular interests. Students will publish their work on a public Wiki and present their studies at a student-run seminar. Community partners in Oaxaca will provide consultation, feedback, and resources. Students will meet for weekly seminars as well as individual appointments with the instructor.

Following the completion of the core courses, students will break apart to complete the following tracks:

 

Arts and SciencesAnthropology of Music in Oaxaca (3 Credits)Professor: Sergio Navarette, Ph.D.Focusing on the concept of music as culture and using a theoretical framework to understand the ways music and society influence each other, this course will give a general overview of Mexican music history, using mapping of folk music to understand the contemporary scene of music practicing in rural and urban Oaxaca.

Botany of Oaxaca (4 Credits)Professor: Michael Sundue, Ph.D.At the southern tip of the North American continent, Oaxaca harbors unique botany, whose heritage can be traced across continents. The Botany of Oaxaca course is an opportunity to explore the geography and ecology of these plants as we learn to spot characteristics and identify them, as well as explore the different indigenous perceptions of the forests and their plants.

 

Food SystemsTropical Farming and Gardening in Oaxaca (2 credits)Professor: Vern Grubinger

This two-week course emphasizes field experience to explore food production, marketing, and historical and contemporary factors affecting Oaxaca’s food systems. This course will further explore the role and relevance of different scales of farming, the effect of external forces on local agriculture, and different approaches to improving the food system in Oaxaca. The course will consist of field visits to various sites in and around Oaxaca.

Food, Culture, and Health in Oaxaca (5 credits)Professors: Teresa Mares, Ph.D., Cynthia Belliveau, Ed.D., and Jean Harvey, Ph.D., R.D.

The first two parts of the course with Professors Teresa Mares and Cynthia Belliveau will explore the intersection of food and culture with a consideration of Oaxacan cuisine, or the ingredients, methods, techniques, and traditions of Oaxaca. Students will investigate how all elements of the food system, from farming to cooking to eating, impact Oaxacan cuisine today and how movement of people and ingredients has impacted the way Oaxacans eat.

The last part of the course with Professor Jean Harvey will examine how the Oaxacan food system influences the health and nutritional status of the people of Oaxaca. Students will further explore the food environment in both rural and urban Oaxaca as a way to understand the nutrition transition in Mexico. Finally, students will compare and contrast food assistance and nutrition interventions in both the U.S. and Mexico that are designed to ameliorate nutrition and health disparities.

 

Global HealthGlobal Health in Oaxaca(3 Credits)Professors: Burton Wilcke, Ph.D. and Oliver Fröhling, M.A.

This course takes a multidisciplinary approach to learning about interrelated Global Health themes in the unique and diverse state of Oaxaca, Mexico. The in-class coursework and field experiences focus on four interconnected public health fields—Infectious Diseases, Nutrition, Built Environments, and Climate Change, with a focus on making links between these topics.

Nutrition and Health in Oaxaca (4 credits)Professors: Cynthia Belliveau, Ed.D. and Jean Harvey, Ph.D., R.D.This part of the course will examine how the Oaxacan food system influences the health and nutritional status of the people of Oaxaca. Students will further explore the food environment in both rural and urban Oaxaca as a way to understand the nutrition transition in Mexico. Finally, students will compare and contrast food assistance and nutrition interventions in both the U.S. and Mexico that are designed to ameliorate nutrition and health disparities.

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