815 North Broadway
Saratoga Springs,
New York, 12866
SKIDMORE PHONE
518-580-5000
Skidmore College Today
Mission
The principal mission of Skidmore College is the education of
predominantly full-time undergraduates, a diverse population of talented
students who are eager to engage actively in the learning process. The
college seeks to prepare liberally educated graduates to continue their
quest for knowledge and to make the choices required of informed,
responsible citizens. Skidmore faculty and staff create a challenging
yet supportive environment that cultivates students' intellectual and
personal excellence, encouraging them to expand their expectations of
themselves while they enrich their academic understanding.
In keeping with the college's founding principle of linking theoretical
with applied learning, the Skidmore curriculum balances a commitment to
the liberal arts and sciences with preparation for professions, careers,
and community leadership. Education in the classroom, laboratory, and
studio is enhanced by cocurricular and field experience opportunities of
broad scope.
Underpinning the entire enterprise are faculty members' scholarly and
creative interests, which inform their teaching and contribute, in the
largest sense, to the advancement of learning.
The college also embraces its responsibility as an educational and
cultural resource for alumni and for a host of nontraditional student
populations, and for providing educational leadership in the Capital
District and beyond.
As a result of a commitment to the principles affirmed in the Mission
Statement cited above, faculty and students are engaged in a variety of
initiatives focused on collecting information about both teaching and
student learning. Student work is periodically collected and used
anonymously for assessment purposes. Information gathered from reviews
of student work helps faculty members determine if students are
learning what the curriculum is designed for, whether changes need to be
made in courses or pedagogy, and what improvements need to be made in
the curriculum. Assessment results are analyzed and used, therefore, to
improve the Skidmore teaching and learning experience for both students
and faculty.
The
Setting
A lively city combining historical charm with modern culture and a
cosmopolitan atmosphere, Saratoga Springs is a popular place among
Skidmore students year round.
Ceded to the Dutch by the Indians in 1694, the city takes its name from
the Indian "Saraghtoga" ("place of swift water"). Its reputation as one
of the world's leading spas grew steadily through the nineteenth
century, as it increasingly became known as the home of the nation's
oldest thoroughbred racetrack and social center for elite society.
Today Saratoga is best known as a resort, cultural, convention, and
entertainment center revolving around horse racing, outdoor recreation,
classical and popular music, dance, and theater. The city is well known
for its restored Victorian mansions, which attract students of art and
architecture. The Saratoga Spa State Park, with its springs and mineral
waters, is of more than recreational interest to biology students, and
the wealth of rock formations in the region brings geologists from
around the world. The city's convention facility brings conferences and
exhibitions from across the state and nation.
With the growth over the past two decades of the Saratoga Performing
Arts Center, the city has greatly increased its offerings as an
important cultural center. Located in the state park, SPAC is the summer
home of the New York City Ballet and the Philadelphia Orchestra, as well
as the venue for top rock and jazz musicians. Distinguished theater
companies and chamber music groups perform in SPAC's Little Theater.
Saratoga Springs is also known for the variety of its revitalized
downtown area—a collection of shops, restaurants, galleries, and
coffeehouses with an appeal to people of virtually all interests. Recent accolades have added to the city's national recognition. In 2002
the National Trust for Historic Preservation named Saratoga Springs one
of its "Dozen Distinctive Destinations" for the year. In 1999
Sports Illustrated named Saratoga Race Course one of the world's top 10
sporting venues. In 1997 Saratoga Springs was recognized by American
Heritage Magazine with its "Great American Place" award. In 1996 the
National Trust for Historic Preservation honored the city with a "Great
American Main Street" award.
The area's historical tradition includes the Saratoga Battlefield, scene
of the pivotal 1777 clash between the Colonial and British armies that
led directly to the end of the American Revolution. Dozens of landmarks
celebrate the area's role in American history. The Saratoga Historical
Society and Walworth Museums, housed in the Canfield Casino in Congress
Park, feature exhibits and period rooms highlighting the city's
fascinating past.
The Campus
Set in what was at the turn of the twentieth century a beautiful park of summer
residences, Skidmore's campus encompasses more than 650 acres of wooded
land at the northwest edge of Saratoga Springs. Land for the campus—now
named the Jonsson Campus—was given to Skidmore College by Trustee J.
Erik Jonsson and his wife, Margaret, in the early 1960s, when it became
apparent that Skidmore was outgrowing its original Scribner Campus in
downtown Saratoga Springs. Since 1964, when ground was broken for the
first new structure on the Jonsson Campus, forty-nine buildings have
been constructed on this site. While strikingly contemporary in
architectural style, the campus buildings honor human scale and reflect
Skidmore's Victorian heritage in numerous aesthetic details.
Among the college's more recent construction projects is the Frances
Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery, which opened in fall 2000,
and the renovation and expansion of Case College Center.
Carefully planned to preserve the natural beauty of the setting, the
campus was designed to provide for both students and teachers a feeling
of freedom and wide horizon. From the covered walkways uniting the
residential, academic, and social centers on campus, the prevailing
views are to the mountains, woods, and fields, and into the center
campus "green." The Jonsson Campus maintains the advantages of a small
college where students and teachers meet often and informally and where
academic resources are readily at hand.
The
Faculty
Skidmore's size and its student-faculty ratio are two of the keys to
creating an academic environment that fosters close associations and the
exchange of ideas among faculty and students. About 2,200 full-time
students bring an unusually wide range of academic and cultural
experiences to the campus, and a student-faculty ratio of 11:1 assures
each student the chance for the close faculty attention that enhances
the liberal arts experience.
Teaching, at Skidmore, is not merely the imparting of knowledge. It is
the key to helping students develop their creative abilities, talents,
and values; to enriching them as human beings; to integrating
scholarship and cocurricular offerings with career goals; and to
preparing them for lives of productive contribution to society and of
continuous study and inquiry. The abilities to think and analyze
clearly, to express oneself effectively through speaking and writing, to
discern and value excellence, and to serve society are the hallmarks of
a Skidmore education.
The members of the Skidmore faculty are well known for the range of
education, research, and experience they bring to the classroom. Though
they are prolific in their writing, productive in their research, and
outstanding in their creative endeavors, their emphasis is always on
teaching, on translating the richness of their experiences into
meaningful learning and inspiration for their students. Numbering approximately
200 full-time faculty, Skidmore's teaching faculty represent some of the top
graduate schools in the nation and the world. Over 93 percent of the
Skidmore faculty hold the Ph.D. or the highest degree in their
field.
Beyond their academic interests, the Skidmore faculty are known for
taking a personal interest in their students, offering the added word of
encouragement, the extra time outside the classroom, or the open mind
for questions—all of which contribute to the extra incentive a student
needs. These attitudes have helped create a campus known for its warmth
and sense of community.
The
Academic Program
As a highly selective liberal arts college, Skidmore is firmly committed
to providing men and women with a superior grounding in the arts,
humanities, sciences, and social sciences. Skidmore students also have
the opportunity to pursue career-specific fields such as business,
education, and social work. This blend of the theoretical and the
practical makes Skidmore uniquely responsive to both student needs and
those of the increasingly interdependent world in which we live.
At Skidmore, the theme of creativity carries throughout and across the
traditional liberal arts disciplines and preprofessional offerings. The college's emphasis on creative thinking
has led to one of the nation's pioneer efforts in establishing a truly
cross-disciplinary first-year experience, the required Liberal Studies 1
course. The cross-disciplinary relationships formed in that experience
continue in Liberal Studies 2 courses and infuse departments and
programs throughout the college, both among faculty and between faculty
and students—often leading to close research and artistic
collaborations.
The Skidmore curriculum provides a creative intellectual foundation for
every student. Students pursue connections among an unusually wide range
of disciplinary perspectives and embark on their careers well prepared
to take full advantage of the diversity of opportunities they will
encounter in the complex modern world. As practiced at Skidmore College, the liberal arts produce a
transformational educational experience and promote lifelong
learning.
Skidmore offers more than sixty degree programs, including majors in
both traditional liberal arts disciplines and preprofessional areas. The
curriculum's flexibility allows students to major in one field and minor
in another (an English major with a business minor, for example), pursue
an interdepartmental major combining two disciplines, or design
self-determined majors.
Facility with contemporary digital technologies and with the retrieval
and interpretation of information is fostered through a series of
courses that incorporate computer resources in the learning process and
through special workshops.
The internship program complements this flexibility through
"exploratory" and "professional" learning opportunities off campus.
Students are encouraged to test their skills through internships in
government, industry, communications, and nonprofit organizations at the
local, state, and national levels. Many students intern with alumni, who
are generous with their time and support of the internship program.
Beyond the Skidmore campus, students may take advantage of courses
offered at other Capital District colleges through the Hudson-Mohawk
Association of Colleges and Universities, which includes such
institutions as Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Union College, and the
State University of New York at Albany. Cooperative programs include one
in engineering with the Thayer School at Dartmouth College; a Washington
Semester coordinated through American University; a semester at the
Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole; an ecosystems semester at
Biosphere 2 in Arizona; an M.B.A. program with Clarkson University; and
an M.A.T. affiliation with Union College.
The Office of International Programs organizes a wide range of
opportunities abroad for students and faculty. The office provides
administrative oversight for Skidmore's programs in Paris; London; Madrid and Alcalá, Spain; and Beijing (an emerging program). In addition, the office oversees other
Skidmore affiliations in many regions of the world.
The college operates under a semester calendar with fifteen-week fall
and spring semesters. Skidmore's summer program includes two five-week
academic sessions and other study options.
