West Virginia University’s flexible and eclectic summer schedule will serve thousands of students without the traffic hassles. Course selection ranges from adventures in the wilderness, immersion in other cultures, hundreds of online classes, and the always popular general education courses.

WVU offers a flexible summer term, which allows students to take courses in 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9 or 12 weeks. This enables students to work or travel in the summer and still take classes.

The flexibility also provides faculty the opportunity to experiment in the summer with unique courses that would be difficult to offer during the academic year. For example, Native American Studies Program is taking a group of students to Alaska to become immersed in an Eskimo culture and the Religious Studies Program is taking a class to Amish country for a different immersion experience.

Other highlights in the summer term include:

Place: Appalachia – this course allows artists to explore how their work is influenced by geography through an outdoor field experience in West Virginia;

• Intensive Russian and Chinese–these courses provide an excellent opportunity to focus on language every day for 12 weeks;

• Wilderness Immersion Native American Ecology – Joseph Candillo, a tribal member of the Pascua Yaqui Tribe, will teach student about the environment in the same way Native Americans traditionally came to understand it;


• Robotic Application – engineering students literally have a hands-on experience to learn how math and computer programming can be used to solve engineering problems by using robotic kits;

• Writing Appalachian Ecology, Long-Term Reflections on Environmental Biology – this course is a fusion of science and writing to teach students how to communicate scientific research for a broader audience; and

• Women in the Movies – an online class that also fulfills one of two general education curriculum requirements.

Last year, more than 11,000 students enrolled in at least one summer course, according to Sue Day-Perroots, dean of Extended Learning, Students have embraced the convenience of online classes even as they take an additional on-campus course. This summer more than 600 sections of online courses are scheduled.

“Summer is a great time for students to catch up or get ahead,” said Day-Perroots. “Not only do we offer the general education courses required of all students, we have encouraged the faculty to create unique educational experiences that students will remember the rest of their lives.”

The full schedule is searchable online at http://courses.wvu.edu. For non-WVU students interested in taking a class, visit http://summer.wvu.edu.

-WVU-

lr/04/10/12

CONTACT: Sue Day-Perroots, dean of Extended Learning
304-293-6444, sue.day-perroots@mail.wvu.edu
or
Lynn Reinke, director of Communications
304-293-2684, lynn.reinke@mail.wvu.edu

Follow @WVUToday on Twitter.