Queen's University - BISC program case study

Transformative learning at the Queen’s castle

For many students, the transition from high school to university brings with it new ways of thinking, learning and perceiving the world. Add the opportunity to live and study in a renovated 15th-century English castle with field trips to continental Europe, and it’s easy to realize why Queen’s University’s First-Year Program at the Bader International Study Centre (BISC) is the choice of students from across Canada and up to 10 other countries.

“Leaving home to study at the BISC has been a life-changing experience,” says Erika Lamon, of Brockville, Ontario, who is spending the 2011-2012 academic year at the castle. “My professors are incredible, the classes are small, and field studies are booked for every weekend. In the first few months, I’ve already been to the Swami Narayan Temple, the Spanish film festival and a production of Dr. Faustus at Shakespeare’s Globe!”

Erika’s transformative experience is reiterated by other students who have returned to their home universities to complete undergraduate studies. Fourth-year Queen’s student Kevin Imrie, from Grand Forks, B.C., studied at the Castle in 2008-09. “It was an incredible opportunity to expand my horizons and engage first-hand with the foundations of my discipline,” he says. “The small classes, extremely supportive atmosphere and chance to interact with learning materials helped me to come back and make my time as an undergraduate a successful one.”

Established in 1994, the BISC program is the only one of its kind in Canada, where students spend a full year studying abroad in highly interactive classes that are capped at 30. The degree-level courses – accredited by Queen’s and eligible for admission scholarships – span a broad range of subjects across the humanities and social sciences. Through classroom work, field studies and cultural-studies excursions, students gain an international perspective, a strong grounding in communication skills, core degree requirements and a sense of social and global awareness from the very beginning of their undergraduate studies.

This is at the heart of the Centre’s mandate, says BISC executive director Bruce Stanley, a 30-year veteran of international education. “For me, education must be radicalizing and transformative. Studying abroad at a place as unique as the BISC can really challenge students and push the envelope.”

History professor Scott McLean has taught Hist 125: The Emergence of Modern Europe at the Centre for the past 10 years. “Primary source materials form a regular feature of how the class engages with the various historical subjects we examine, both in seminar readings and the occasional ‘show and tell’ where I might give each student an original Second World War newspaper to read and discuss, or a series of original letters to interpret,” says Dr. McLean.

“Handling original documents provides a rich experience which can perhaps only be superseded by the field studies component of the course. Each field study is integrated into the course through assignments, seminars and informal discussions, creating a varied and innovative way for students to engage with the subject under examination.”

Located in East Sussex, south of London, Hertsmonceux Castle was purchased by Drs. Alfred and Isabel Bader in 1993 and donated to Queen’s – Alfred’s alma mater – with the stipulation that it become a centre of international education. It was extensively renovated and enrolment has steadily climbed since its opening.

As well as offering the popular First-Year Program, Dr. Stanley envisions the Centre as a starting point for a variety of international education experiences. For example, this past summer two new summer field schools focused on biodiversity research and British archaeology, taking advantage of the unique geographical location that provides an unparalleled experiential learning environment.

For first-year students, the Centre will continue to offer a stimulating, vigorous academic program with clear goals that challenge students both pedagogically and in an applied way. That unique experience seems to have a lasting impact: students who spend their first year at the Castle achieve higher grades, on average, than their classmates in subsequent years of their undergraduate education.

It’s a win-win scenario that provides faculty with unparalleled teaching resources and students with the kind of stimulating environment where learning never ends.

For more information: go to the BISC website.