Together . . . - Poly Prep Country Day School

Learning on the Islands: Charlie Cullen ’08, Reid Pierce ’08, Park Cannon ’09, Hillary Dalldorf ’09, Sophia Porotsky ’08, Mae Carlson ’08
T R E T U R N T O g a l a p a g o s
he first time Science Department chair Sandy
Bornstein went to the Galapagos Islands, it was the trip
of a lifetime. She had no idea she would soon be turning
it into the course of a lifetime.
In summer 2005, shortly after returning from her
first Galapagos trip, sponsored by a Williams Chair
grant, Bornstein made a presentation for the Science
Department.
Around the same time, fellow science teacher
Suzanne Wolbers was energetically pursuing travel
options for students. She found a company that runs
educational tours and took a teachers’ trip offered
over winter break. Conversations between the two
soon spurred the idea of returning to Galapagos with
students and turning the experience into a course on
evolutionary theory.
“Since Suzanne had success with the company for
her trip to Costa Rica, we started seriously thinking
about the possibility of going back to Galapagos
with students and making it a class,” Bornstein said.
“Everything we experienced during our first trips to
the islands seemed perfectly suited for the field trip
component of a course.”
And so it began—a summer elective for credit. A
first for Poly, and a first for Bornstein. While all new
courses require substantial planning, this one was
unique in both the scope of its development and the
unusual timing.
“We wanted to ensure that the students would be
ready for the trip, which meant a significant amount of
reading,” Bornstein said. “And we had to find a way to
make sure there was time enough to prepare and make
our way through the material before we set out on the
trip.”
The students began coursework in the spring
and met in the summer a few times before the July
excursion. The teachers engaged their class in
writing-to-think activities, which involve presenting
students with material slightly beyond their normal
range and then helping them implement strategies for
comprehension.
“Galapagos was for Darwin the centerpiece of his
evolutionary theory,” Bornstein said. “So, it was logical
for students in the course to know Darwin first.”
The coursework incorporated reading and analysis
of texts including a special issue of Natural History
magazine on Darwin’s work and modern evolutionary
theory, as well as Jonathan Weiner’s Pulitzer Prize–
winning The Beak of the Finch: A Story of Evolution in Our
Time. Bornstein thought that Weiner’s book provided
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