The Honors College e-Newsletter is pleased to introduce Jeffrey Hughes, Associate Professor of Plant Biology and Natural Resources, who this fall taught HCOL 195 M, Discovering a Sense of Place: Modern Day Thoreau in the Honors College's sophomore seminar program. In addition to his teaching and research, Professor Hughes is director of the Field Naturalist Graduate Program in the Department of Plant Biology. He is also affiliated with Rubinstein School of Environment and Natural Resources. Professor Hughes has written extensively on forest ecology, communities, and ecosystems. He is the author of two books presently under review, Survival Skills Handbook for Frenzied Environmental Crusaders, and with A. P. Devine, How to Build a Grizzly Bear: a slightly unorthodox guide to ecological principals. This e-Newsletter interview with Professor Hughes is the third in our ongoing series of talks with faculty teaching in the Honors College sophomore seminar program.
Welcome, Professor Hughes. To begin, would you say a word or two about your academic background and research interests?
Sure. About a million years ago I majored in French and minored in Philosophy at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. I then "worked" as a flyfishing guide, a phlebotomist, a prep school teacher, a nursing home orderly, and a Peace Corps Volunteer before returning to school, this time at the University of Alaska. After three semesters of science courses, bracketed by ranger adventures at Denali and Glacier Bay National Parks, I headed south to Miami of Ohio for a Masters in Applied Ecology and a PhD in Forest Science at Cornell.
And your research interests?
I never quite know how to explain my research interests because they drift into many different disciplines. One consistent theme, however, seems to center on developing and applying creative problem solving strategies to environmental decision-making. I'm especially drawn to events and issues that disrupt (or are presumed to disrupt) the ecological status quo. And there are plenty of disruptions to study! - climate change, suburban sprawl, exotic species, forest harvest, road building, run off from upslope cornfields into streams and lakes are but a few. Understanding how natural systems work is essential, as is understanding the "the people factor." That's what my book, Environmental Problem Solving: a how-to guide, is all about.
What appealed to you about the Honors College to offer a sophomore seminar in the college?
Well, for the last fifteen years or so I have been thinking that UVM needs something like an Honors College to celebrate what an honors college should be about -- thinking and wondering, challenging yourself and others, exchanging ideas. I was delighted when President Fogel and Bob Taylor made it happen. I've been part of four Honors College seminars now and I leave each class energized. The students are so interesting and interested! And I am constantly impressed by their willingness to ask hard questions of themselves and others, and to do so respectfully. The world would be a better place if we had more of that.
I notice in your seminar description that you say your course is not for "grade grinds; it is for intellectual adventurers." Could you explain what you mean and the kind of student you are looking for?
I look for free thinkers who are willing to challenge the status quo respectfully, even if they haven't yet. That takes a great deal of courage (or rebelliousness) because most of us have been trained that success is achieved by doing the right thing - that if we do what we're told, the way we're told to do it, we'll be "good" students. There are so many incentives for playing by the rules and jumping through the hoops that are arbitrarily set by teachers or other persons of authority, however. Mindlessly spitting back to teachers pre-approved thought patterns yields good grades, but does that foster intellectual growth or excitement? Students are caught in the middle, of course: they may grouse about the pointlessness of marching lockstep to the teacher's drum, but they're smart enough to know that "doing education by the numbers" is a road to good grades.
From your experience are there one or two things that distinguish one kind of student from the other, and how do you know?
By stating up front to the students who show up in my class what the class is about, the folks who want to spend the semester with us make a decision to follow this path. If they're not quite ready, they'll know that. (Not so long ago I was a grade grind myself, so I understand the pressures and expectations and value systems that drive the need to do whatever it takes to get good grades).
I have a great deal of respect for students who have somehow mustered the discipline to get good grades. But it's worth remembering that those we most revere - the Martin Luther Kings, Chief Seattles, Ben Franklins, and Rosa Parks - are remembered not for their grades but for their open questioning of accepted "truths" and realities, and for sharing that questioning with others in an effective way. That is what makes Thoreau's writings such a gift to us. Others before him undoubtedly had similar questionings, but to our great benefit, Thoreau shared his in beautifully crafted prose.
We can't attribute natural talent or genius to every student we have in the Honors College. Some time in high school many of our students have dedicated themselves in one way or another to getting the grades they needed to graduate at the top of their classes and be eligible for the Honors College.
That is true, and those students should be proud of their accomplishment. But I am only talking about my course. Students won't discover their "sense of place" by listening to me lecture, or by accumulating information and spitting it back, or by writing reflections that say what I want them to say. Students in my "Discovering Sense of Place" seminar know that only they can find their place.
Interestingly, in classes outside the Honors College, it tends to be the "best" students who are most resistant to leaving their academic comfort zones. I guess that's to be expected, for they've long been rewarded for playing the system in a dutiful way.
How do you challenge them to move outside of their comfort zones, and how do you contend with the resistances and how do you measure the success of that effort?
I try to create situations where they need to think or wonder or observe in different ways. Usually I do it by posing a thematic question without taking sides, then asking them, "What do you think about that?" For example, I tell them about an informal survey I conducted where I counted two hundred students coming out of a large lecture, recording how many students immediately unleashed their cell phones. After giving them a chance to guess the results aloud, I tell them how many took out cell phones (117). "What do you think about that? Has use of cell phones changed our sense of place?" After a bit, I might mention that most summer camps disallow use of cell phones and iPods. "Why do they do that? What is gained? What is lost?" If the discussion slows, I might wonder aloud if it matters that cell phone users aren't connecting to the people around them when they text or talk with someone far away. Raising questions, and then letting students ruminate aloud in a seminar forum, seems to work well at getting people to reflect on their actions and beliefs.
One writer whose work you read in the seminar is the Vermont poet, David Budbill. He is well known not only for his poetry, but for his 'Lake Woebegone-like' fictional creation of Judevine, a small town in northern Vermont which exists only in his imagination. Could you talk briefly about Budbill's work and how you use it in your class?
I agree that Budbill, Thoreau, Judevine, and Walden Pond seem to have little in common at first glance, for the characters in Judevine are a hardscrabble, tough-luck lot - quite different from Thoreau's elitist intellectualism. But Budbill and Thoreau are both writing about place: Budbill explores the human community sense of place; Thoreau targets the individual and his relationship to the physical sense of place. Thoreau, and the fictitious characters in Judevine, are all searching for meaningfulness and purpose so they can live their lives as best they can. The question then becomes, 'what can we learn from them'? This business of searching for purpose is what I think finding a sense of place is all about. It is one thing we have in common, and in some existential way, why we are here. As rough and tumble as Budbill's characters appear to be, they have figured out some things about life that many of the rest of us - even the rich, educated and privileged -- have either forgotten or never understood. We can learn from them, just as we can learn from Henry David Thoreau.
In another of our readings, Zorba the Greek, the same question can be asked: what does this book have to do with Thoreau or finding sense of place? It has everything to do with both. In Zorba, the bookish narrator searches for his place through reading, writing, and cerebral analysis. Zorba, his polar opposite, finds his place by following his heart. Over the course of several months, Zorba has a profound influence upon the narrator, instilling a zest for life that had been missing. There are many different ways of learning or knowing or discovering, and all of them can help us find our sense of place.
I see that one of the things you do in your course is to get your students outside the traditional classroom setting. Where do you go, and why is this important to do?
One of the things we explore in seminar is the extent to which the physical landscape and the people around us define our sense of place and purpose. The answer varies from person to person, of course, so each of us must search and figure that out for ourselves. One of my goals in the seminar is for students to believe that they can figure out a lot of things through observation and reflection. It is for this reason that I require each student to spend one hour a week in Centennial woods, at a place called appropriately enough the 'sit' spot. I ask them to go there with only their journal and pen, and to record whatever moves them. The idea of 'taking time out' becomes an important pathway to knowing.
To follow up on what you are saying, you say at another place in your seminar description that your course "embraces an age-old way of knowing-observation, exploration, personal reflection, and willingness to challenge the way you've always thought." Is this the kind of knowing that you are talking about?
Yes. I remind students that UVM is our place, a community that is rich in interesting people, ideas, and history. And buildings are more than just bricks and mortar, for each has a story. Part of "sense of place" is familiarity and knowing what is around you. In the same way that a Vermonter might be overwhelmed by New York City, a New Yorker might feel the same about UVM. Knowing a place and its stories builds self-confidence and creates a sense of belonging, something we all crave. People who feel sufficiently grounded and settled in their "place" are more able to step out of their comfort zones to explore and figure things out. When that happens, their genius has a chance of shining through.
A famous National Academy of Science scientist described students with the greatest potential in more or less that way: 'the best ones are those who grew up on a farm. To keep the farm running, they have had to figure things out by doing. If they don't have the exact part they need to get the job done, then they adapt and use what is available to make do.'
And finally, do you have a place that is special to you?
I do and it has always been an outdoor place. There is a lake in Maine that is special for me, and there are a couple of places in Alaska about which I feel the same way. Closer to home, Shelburne Farms brings me joy and peacefulness.
I've noticed that my idea of "specialness" has shifted a bit over these last few years. The shift is towards recognizing that people, especially family and friends, are integral parts of my special places. This broadening of my "place" has surprised me somewhat, for all of my earlier special places have been marked by an absence of people. It's too bad it has taken me so long to figure out the obvious, but it's always a great adventure leaving one life chapter behind and starting a new one. Talking with and learning from the Honors College students has been part of that.