Longwood Seminar (LSEM 54) [Honors] – Fall 2017
Longwood Seminar, fondly referred to as LSEM, is one of Longwood’s most unique aspects for new students. Required for all freshman, LSEM is anything but a standard gen ed class. Students are divided into LSEMs grouped by major, or, as it was in my case, by those who are honors students. The classes are taught not only by a teacher or representative of the group’s focus, but also by an upperclassman “peer mentor”. This gives new students an opportunity to make friends and connections with the group of people they’ll be learning alongside for the next four years or longer.
The way I understood LSEM was that it was really a “college 101” class, or, more specifically, “Longwood 101”. In each of our (fairly casual) classes, we discussed topics ranging from how to cope with stress from homework and moving to college to how Longwood and the city of Farmville cooperate with one another to all the resources Longwood provides for its students, like library services and free counseling.
The only homework we had were short reflections due every few weeks on some of the topics from class or some other related subject. Below is one such example of this. For this reflection, we were asked to visit one of the places on campus and learn a little about it, from personal thoughts, facts about its history, and by talking to others in the building. I chose Bedford Hall, the art building, for my reflection. It’s one of my favorite places on campus and I think that really shows in what I wrote.
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Open in new tab By the time LSEM ended, it felt like more than just a class. We were a family with shared experiences from our first semester at college, which took us from being classmates to being friends.