Independent projects and internships underway

VIS Exhibition Topics Spring 2010

A major feature of The VIS Academic Program for high school juniors and seniors is Exhibition, an independent study capstone class. Long-established VIS connections with people and organizations around Ladakh benefit internships that allow students to delve deeper into local communities, and contribute to the work of organizations and local society. Research is often undertaken jointly with SECMOL students. Final exhibition projects include written as well as audio/visual components, and are presented to students, teachers and mentors at SECMOL, and to various communities back at home. Students currently in Ladakh have chosen their exhibition topics, and this month will be devoted to research and internships to culminate in presentations at the SECMOL campus at the end of April. For more information on exhibitions, and the VIS Academic Program, see www.vermontis.org.

Laura Yurkosky (Thetford Academy): Nomadic Culture. Laura aims to explore the changing lifestyles of the nomadic groups in Ladakh, covering ideas such as nomadic settlements, schooling of children, and family traditions. She will speak with members of nomadic and semi-nomadic communities.

Nora McKay (Middlebury UHS): Amchi Medicine. Nora plans to focus on amchi medicine, specifically on the herbs and their uses as well as other healing techniques. She will be in contact with local amchis and organizations such as the Ladakh Society for Traditional Medicine.

Dan Noel (Whitcomb HS): Building Ladakhi Homes. Dan plans to build a scale model of an actual Ladakhi home, and investigate whether any aspects of that building or the process it required might be improved with modern techniques.
Schuyler Klein (Middlebury UHS): Ladakhi Construction/Sustainable Building. Schuyler intends to research the traditional building techniques used in Ladakh as compared with modern techniques employed, and to create a model and/or sketches of such buildings and the processes they require.

Marga Kempner (Burlington HS): Family Structure. Marga will study issues of family including structure, changes caused by modernization and the demand for higher education and jobs, and possible domestic issues and their solutions. She will collect drawings of families from her interview subjects.

Emery Boudreau (Burr & Burton Academy): Climate Change. Emery will investigate the causes and effects of climate change in Ladakh, with a specific focus on pollution and CO2 emissions. She will interview local NGOs and collect thoughts from locals.

Nicole Tamayo (S. Burlington HS): Global Warming. Nicole will focus on the effects of global warming on village life, specifically with regard to water supply. She will collect villager's thoughts on the issue during home stays, and will interview NGOs in Leh.

Bo Attley (Leland & Gray HS): Appropriate Technology. Bo will research how appropriate technologies have been employed traditionally in Ladakh, and which new methods are now used. He aims to intern with a local NGO.

Pheylan Martin (The Sharon Academy): Pheylan will research local beliefs about paranormal activity. He will gain a stronger sense of Ladakhi culture as defined by local views about spirits, ghosts, and superstitions.

Mikey Piscitelli (The Sharon Academy): Tibetan Refugee Escapes. Mikey will interview Tibetans who fled Tibet and learn how they accomplished their journeys. He will collect stories from the older residents of Choglamsar and maybe second-hand stories from their children in some cases.

Ella Hayslett (The Sharon Academy): The Ladakhi Language. Ella will design a course outline with lesson plans for potential visitors to Ladakh who wish to learn the basics of the language. She will meet with a local language scholar and practice her Ladakhi language skills in villages in order to better understand which items would be most useful in an introductory course in Ladakhi.

Max Hausslein (Burr & Burton Academy): Arbory in Ladakh. Max will research which types of trees are grown in Ladakh, how they can grow in Ladakh’s harsh, dry climate, and which other trees might be introduced successfully into the Ladakhi landscape.

Ali Riggen (U32 HS) : Midwifery. Ali plans to investigate the birthing process, and perhaps how traditional and western approaches compare. She has visited one NGO with a women's health program thus far, and will continue to interview NGOs, doctors and individuals.