back to Hampshire College Education Writing

The Experimental Program In Education and Community

Peter Christopher Document Archive

EPEC at Hampshire College (An archived description from 1996, not an official page of the college or the program currently)

 

Inviting staff, faculty, alumns, and students of Hampshire as well as friends from outside the College to participate in collaborative, cross-generational learning

The Experimental Program complements the more traditional forums that typically make up a college education. It embraces community-based learning experiences that is individualized, but not isolating; it emphasizes personal growth and technical skills, as well as academic expertise. Many participants share a common philosophy of experiential, student-led education. Some of the EPEC courses are sponsored by older students, who are providing opportunities for younger students to engage in joint research. Other EPEC courses are cosponsored by several students who are learning collaboratively without an expert. The experiment is student-driven, but it does not avoid faculty contact. It uses faculty as resources rather than authority figures.

EPEC's first program has been EPEC courses. This fall, 14 courses have a total of 101 students. Programs proposed for the future are student contract facilitators, community meals, and peer advising groups.

A Few Remaining Original Hampshire College EPEC Archival Documents are (many others lost):

  • A Letter To an EPEC course participant
  • Chris Kawecki's Orientation Banquet Speech, Sept 2, 1996 which explains some of the context at Hampshire into which EPEC fits.
  • Fall 1996 Course Catalog
  • October 10 Coordinator's Progress Report
  • Spring 1997 Course Titles
  • The Basics as written in our September 1996 brochure:
    • EPEC Courses
    • Community Meals
    • Integrated Living-Learning
    • Student Contract Facilitators
    • Peer Groups
  • Some Questions and Answers, from the September 1996 brochure
  • The proposal for the Lemelson Program in Invention, Innovation and Creativity to cosponsor the EPEC Course Applied Sustainable Agriculture
  • Our May, 1996 Proposal to Hampshire
  • The Basics as conceived in about April 1995:
    • Housing and Community Meals
    • Peer Advising Groups
    • Orientation Groups -- a Description for one of these groups
    • How to get involved
    • Student-led courses
  • Notes from a talk I gave in September, 1995 at Hampshire on Hampshire and Johnston: The Genesis of the ideas about RD
  • Paper on Johnston and Hampshire.
  • What is the Radical Departure (Omen Article)
  • A short description of Chris Kawecki's RD Philosophy
  • "The Radical Departure" Memo 1
  • Ends and Means: Being a Prof, Version .3
  • The Meaning of Education, Version .2
  • Some email we've written -- the email lists are no longer active.
  • A kind-of course, proposed by Chris for everyone in RD: To Know is Not Enough, and Not to Know is Not Enough
  • The actual public memo and a different version, not adopted because it was too philosophical and reportedly "didn't say anything".
  • Letter to Hampshire by Chris K. About personal vs individualized education
  • Part of Jerry Mintz's 1965 thesis at Goddard College, On Starting A School
  • An old list of proposed learning activities
  • An interesting paper on cults, just to keep us honest!
  • Some of our founders.
  • We are also associated with (and were born as a twin of) the Alternative Higher Education Network

Here are several documents about the Experimental Program (unfortunately just early drafts):

 

Last modified: Sun Nov 17 20:56:54 1996