A good professor can inspire his students in many ways -- but motivating them to give up spring break?
Half of the students in religious studies professor Thomas Sheehan's Sophomore College class, Ethics and Empire, were so moved by his vivid descriptions of politics, civil war and peasant life in El Salvador that they organized a spring break trip to see the country firsthand. Megan Knize and Jessica Jenkins, both '03, applied in January for a grant from the office of John Bravman, '79, MS '81, PhD '85, vice provost for undergraduate education. They learned in February that they'd been given full funding and, with about a month to spare, started buying plane tickets and updating passports.
Six members of the class, plus Sheehan and two Stanford students with experience in the country, spent a week in the tiny peasant town of Guarjila, where American John Giuliano runs a youth center called Los Tamarindos (named for the sturdy tamarind fruit). The students lived with local families, attended school with the kids and came back with a lot to think about. "It was such a good chance to apply what we'd learned in the class," recalls Knize. "It really added weight to it."
Several members of the group are raising funds for Los Tamarindos. As for Jenkins, she's going right back -- to study in San Salvador this fall.
