Summer sessions shines with new courses, internships, and mini sessions
Virginia Tech Summer Sessions 2015 opens today with close to 8,800 students enrolled in more than 1,000 classes during one or both of the six-week semesters.
The last day to add a course for Summer I is May 28. The session runs through July 2. Students can still register through July 9 for the Summer II session which begins July 7 and runs through August 13.
Summer sessions provide another pathway for students to earn course credit with a host of core courses and electives offered through a variety of course deliveries that include: face-to-face on-campus classes; online courses; hybrid courses (partially online with a face-to-face component on campus); study abroad and undergraduate research experiences; and internships.
Two new initiatives that will be introduced during the 2015 summer session are a mini sessions pilot program and the Washington Entrepreneurs’ Summer Session. Mini sessions are condensed three-week courses offered face-to-face, online, or abroad. These classes will run from May 26 to June 12 during Session I and from July 27 to August 13 in Session II.
“The summer sessions offer a chance for non-majors to take the courses, and the mini session in particular could be a way of getting the exposure without committing to the regular six-week sessions,” said Betsy Bannan, instructor for digital photography.
Students can also benefit from mini sessions by completing required credits, clearing their schedule for other semesters, or simply learning something new, Bannan said.
“I think my favorite thing has been continuing my learning over the course of the summer,” said Meryl Friedrich, a graduate student in fish and wildlife conservation who participated in the 2014 summer sessions on campus in Blacksburg. “A lot of times you take the summers off mentally and taking classes has really kept me alert and focused.”
