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Sophomore College
Returning Sophomore College faculty from last year included Ramón
Saldívar, vice provost for undergraduate education; John Bravman,
associate dean of engineering; Gail Mahood, professor of geological and
environmental sciences; Condoleezza Rice, provost and professor of political
science; and Robert Weisberg, vice provost for faculty development and professor
of law. Joining them were President Gerhard Casper, professor of law; Anne
Fernald, associate professor of psychology; and Jones.
Kwame Nkrumah Cain is one of the many success stories to emerge from the program.
Last fall, in Rice’s course on “The Fall of Communism and the New World
Order,”
Cain played the role of president of the United States, trying to sort out where
Russia belonged in the new world order. This month he is about to embark on two
quarters of study at Oxford University, where he will work one-on-one with a
tutor and be expected to turn out a 10-page research paper every week.
Like Cain, three of this year’s five recipients of Mellon Minority
Undergraduate
Fellowships are graduates of the seminars, as are seven of the 25 students
receiving Chappell-Lougee grants for undergraduate research. Another 19 juniors
who attended last year’s Sophomore College will study overseas this year.
“It is the greatest program I’ve had at Stanford,” Cain says.
“Getting a chance
to ask questions in class and actually speak with a professor outside of class
was a new experience that inspired me and opened all these doors.”
Cain says the door to Rice’s office is always open for her former students,
and
he credits his interest in international relations to the simulation exercises he
was introduced to in her seminar.
Another Sophomore College instructor who takes a hands-on approach to studies is
Mahood. Her students experienced “Living on the Edge: An Introduction to the
Geologic Hazards of California” firsthand when they spent two days hiking
through
a hydrothermal area with steam vents and bubbling mud pots and camping by a
trout-fishing stream.
“Their final project was a presentation on the outcrop which required each
of
them to become an expert in some field of geology,” Mahood said.
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