Yosemite class takes students on history trek.
With a couple of long weekends spent at Yosemite and the publication of students’ writings into a book, a University of Nevada, Reno, history class called “Yosemite Issues and Environmental History” transcends the usual classroom learning concept.
The idea is to get “academics to come out of the ivory towers and work on community projects,” says UNR history instructor Jennifer Huntley-Smith, who devised the course with the help of veteran history professor Bill Rowley.
“This class … confirmed something I had a hunch about originally, that is how effective going into the outdoors, into the field, is in helping people learn and grapple with issues of the past,” Huntley-Smith says.
In attempts to expand its outreach into the university community, the Yosemite Institute works with college faculty members to show students the impacts of historical decisions and ideals on such national landmarks as Yosemite. The class covers topics from science to art to religion, politics, land management and class divisions. For example, Huntley-Smith points out, not a lot of people think about how national parks were originally pitched to the public as reserves of land geared for the people who lived and worked there. But these areas became places for societal elites (or at least the upper middle class) to recreate.
“It’s $20 to get through the door,” she says. “Everything’s run through concessions. And only wealthy people who could afford to travel and take time off came to these areas.”
The class, offered as a dual undergraduate/graduate class, costs $625, which includes three university credits for undergrads, transportation and accommodations for two trips to Yosemite. Right now, the class is falling short of its minimum enrollment. The class needs at least 12 students to enroll before July 30. Non-university students can sign up for the class through UNR’s Continuing Education Department, (784-4046).
The value of this kind of class was driven home to Huntley-Smith during last year’s trip to the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir on the Tuolumne River. Students observed that the area used as a water supply for the Bay Area could be viewed in two ways.
“You could look at it as a horrible rape of wilderness," she says. "But another way to think of it is that it’s been saved from tourists … parking lots and concession stands. That is a lesson that would be hard to teach in the classroom."