"I love teaching ELI because.... by the end of the semester, I can see how they [students] have blossomed, how they have come alive, and more important, they can see how they have developed as students." Judith Balfe Director of Marketing and Recruitment School of New Resources The College of New Rochelle

Judith, how long have you been at The College of New Rochelle?

I’ve been at the College for 18 years. I came to the School of New Resources  New Rochelle Campus as a student in January of 1986. By the following fall I was working as a receptionist. In October 1987 I applied for the brand new position of Assistant for Retention and started that position in December. In late 1988 I became Acting Administrative Assistant, graduated in January 1989 and became Administrative Assistant.

I left the College in June 1989 and worked for the New York Public Library while I pursued my Masters in Career Counseling and Development at CNR. I graduated in May of 1991 and came back to work at the College for the Dean’s office in New Resources as Coordinator of Academic Support, where I stayed until November 1997. I then became Director of Marketing for the School of New Resources. I also received my Masters in Communication Arts from CNR in 1997. In 2004 I became Director of Marketing and Recruitment.   

In my current position I do a little bit of everything: marketing, going out into the communities, and helping in the preparation of marketing and advertising publications. I am on the Editorial Committee of Quarterly and often write for the magazine. I set up recruitment schedules for New Resources, and I still do a lot of hands on recruiting. I really enjoy meeting new people and talking about our program.

You also teach in the School of New Resources?

Yes, I have been teaching since 1991, and most of that time I have been teaching Experience, Learning and Identity, which is an entry level liberal arts course. It introduces the new and returning student to the world of academics and the liberal arts. I love teaching this course because I love working with the students who are new to college, or to our program. I feel it’s a really integral part of their entry into higher education, and so many of them feel unsure of themselves; they have little or no self-confidence. By the end of the semester, I can see how they have blossomed, how they have come alive, and more important, they can see it, too. In January of 2004 I began teaching extension courses in Far Rockaway, Brooklyn and found teaching there to be one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.

One of the unique aspects of the curriculum of SNR is the course called: Experience, Learning and Identity. Tell us what it entails.

In the ELI course we cover the different disciplines that are found in the liberal arts. For example, we read from the works of Plato, German poet and novelist Herman Hesse, and the great thinkers on education in the twentieth century, John Dewey and Paulo Freire.

Also, in all of our main seminar courses, such as Experience, Learning and Identity, students are required to do a Life Arts Project. They design a project that relates their own life experiences to the key elements of the liberal arts curriculum. These projects may reflect past or current experiences, and the learning that has resulted due to these experiences. They may relate to the students family, community, and/or their work. The projects are presented to the other members of the seminar, and include annotated bibliographies, photo essays, simulations, case studies, analysis, interviews, and questionnaires.

In the Experience, Learning and Identity seminar, for example, the project consists of an educational autobiography, which allows the student to identify their previous learning, and validates their life experiences; a paper that reflects the ambitions and goals of the individual student; a degree plan, which enables the student to have a clear idea of where their college plan is taking them, and an integrative paper, in which the student summarizes the readings, discussions, homework and projects that have occurred over the semester, and allows them to reflect upon the learning they have accrued during the course.

How long does it take the average student in SNR to complete their undergraduate degree?

There is really no average student.  It can take from one semester for students with transfer credits to twenty years, if they stop and start again. It may take adult students longer to finish because some are attending college part-time and have full-time jobs and families. Some of our students, for example, need to take time off to have a baby, get married, or because their job schedules have changed. Many are also caregivers for family members.

However, I have found that they are very resilient. I have seen some students doggedly finish, no matter what else is happening in their lives. I have had several pregnant women in my classes. In two instances, one missed only one class, and the other didn’t miss any at all.

As a teacher it must be wonderful to see how your students have progressed in school and then go onto graduate.

Yes it is. I really have the best of all worlds when it comes to my work here at CNR. I get to go out and talk to people about the program and have them enroll in the School of New Resources, and then I get to teach some of them in the program I so strongly advocate.  And after they graduate, I may even get to write about them in Quarterly magazine.  It’s a great professional life.