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Freshman Jordan Spellman (front) says participating in the
Martín-Baró Scholars program, USF’s newest living-learning community,
has helped him make the transition to college and San Francisco.
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Living-Learning Communities Foster Success
Freshman Jordan Spellman takes half of his classes with a group of 30 other first-year students with whom he also lives in the west wing of Hayes-Healy Hall. They take field trips together, do community service, and often continue class discussions back in their dorm rooms. For Spellman, who is from Hawaii, being part of the Martín-Baró living-learning community has given him just the college experience he was looking for.
“San Francisco is a big jump from Hawaii,” Spellman said. “USF is a small school, but it is an even smaller school when you add this program to it. I applied to a lot of Jesuit schools, and decided that I would choose USF if I could be part of this program”
The Martín-Baró Scholars Program, founded this year by the College of Arts and Sciences, is USF’s newest living-learning community. The programs are becoming increasingly popular for students looking to live in residence halls with people of shared interests and, in many cases, learn together in classes created specifically for them.
The Martín-Baró program is a two-semester long, community-based learning program focused on issues of citizenship, social justice, and diversity. The program is named for Ignacio Martín-Baró, S.J., who worked for social justice and the poor in El Salvador until he was killed by the country’s military in 1989.
More than 130 students this year are part of living-learning communities such as Erasmus, Saint Ignatius Institute, Phelan Multicultural Community, and the Global Living Community in Lone Mountain Hall (which does not have a formal academic component). Residence Life Director J.J. Thorp said more interest-based living communities will be added next year.
“Research shows these programs help students be successful in college,” he said. “Students who are involved outside of class tend to do better, and students who have contact with faculty outside of class tend to do better. These students are more likely to have higher grade point averages, to graduate in four years, and to express satisfaction with the university.”
The Martín-Baró program has brought together a diverse group of 31 students—men, women, African American, white, Asian American, Latino, and natives of 13 states—who share an interest in social justice and community service. Spellman and the other Martín-Baró students live on the fourth and fifth floors of the west wing of Hayes-Healy and take an eight-unit, program-specific class focusing on social sciences, public speaking, and writing. They have also tutored at Sacred Heart School, participated in the Golden Gate Park cleanup, and worked with the San Francisco AIDS Foundation and Habitat for Humanity. The program has brought in dozens of outside speakers and taken the students to Bay Area organizations to learn about everything from predatory lending to city politics. As part of a class community project, students are now organizing a memorial dedicated to Fr. Martín-Baró to be built at the top of the Lone Mountain staircase.
Program coordinator Lorrie Ranck said the students have also developed passionate independent interests. “The students in the program this year went to the School of the Americas protest, some will be going abroad next year and serving as (Resident Advisors). They have really stretched their boundaries.”
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