Professors: How the Lynk experience works.
Three Mount Holyoke professors, writing in Peer Review, share the case study of how the College institutionalized ways for students to connect curriculum and career.
In a new article, three Mount Holyoke College professors—Eleanor Townsley, Becky Wai-Ling Packard, and Eva Paus—share the story of how the College's innovative Lynk experience came to be.
Their article, "Making The Lynk at Mount Holyoke: Institutionalizing Integrative Learning," appears in an issue of the Association of American Colleges and Universities' magazine Peer Review that focuses on the central role faculty leadership plays in creating "necessary experiences that cross disciplines, units, and campus boundaries to promote integrative learning."
The authors show how many independent efforts were aligned to create the comprehensive curriculum-to-career initiative, The Lynk.
"Our goal was to create conditions for learning in which students could connect multiple experiences, disciplines, and interests, and translate those experiences in confident, adaptive, and flexible ways," the professors wrote.
Meeting that goal, as the article details, took vision, planning, persuasion, and patience during The Lynk's gestation. In summer 2013, the College began implementing The Lynk, leading students through four levels of curriculum-to-career progress: goal setting, professional development, practical experience, and "the launch" into postcollege life.
Over the past two years, faculty support and student involvement have increased, and The Lynk has become an integral part of each student's Mount Holyoke College experience.