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Researching Foreign Aid with the Help of The Thomas H. Kean ’53 Fellowship
By Kanav Sahani, V Form
Researching Foreign Aid with the Help of The Thomas H. Kean ’53 Fellowship
Thomas H. Kean ’53 Fellowship:
The Class of 1962, at their 25th Reunion in 1987, established the Thomas H. Kean ’53 Fellowship Program to honor Tom Kean, their teacher, advisor, mentor, and friend. The purpose of this fellowship is to enable students to explore important public policy topics and to embark upon exemplary lives of public service in the spirit of Governor Kean.
Kean Fellowships will be conferred upon a small number of highly well-qualified students who propose and undertake independent research and study in the field of public service, exploring meaningful domestic public policy issues. Once selected, and on the basis of their topic, Fellows will work with a faculty mentor and find meaningful connections with academicians and leaders in the field of public policy. The Fellowship will engage the students in cutting-edge topics and in a manner that is serious and capitalizes upon what they have learned at St Mark’s.
I chose to attend the economics policy academy at Georgetown University because it teaches a unique combination of economics and political science and how to use this knowledge to solve real-world problems. I find these topics interesting because they have so much influence on how the world works, so once I found this course online, I knew I would want to join it. My interest in the more political side of the world started with the social justice class I took with Dr. Worrell during the spring semester of my sophomore year. In addition, my interest in the economic side started with learning about the legendary investor Warren Buffet. Following his story on how gained investing fame by sticking to his strategy has increased my interest in the finance and economic sectors.
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Deep Work in Practice at St. Mark’s (Part 3)
By Dr. Colleen Worrell, Director of The Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning
Deep Work in Practice at St. Mark’s (Part 3)
Deep Work is a skill that the Center is hoping to build into each student’s “learning 
playbook.” The first two LEO articles (Make Deep Work Your Super Powerand Productivity, Neuroscience, & Deliberate Practice) aimed to introduce the term and core concepts to the St. Mark’s community. This third article focuses on deep work from the perspective of two St. Markers, 6th Former Sophie Haugen, and Classics teacher, Dr. Harwood. Each of them responded to the following questions:
- What are some ways that you deliberately practice deep work at (or beyond) St. Mark’s?
- What is the value of deep work?
- What recommendations do you have for St. Marker’s who’d like get started with deep work?
Sophie Haugen, 6th Former:
I am not an expert on “doing” deep work, but I do try to practice it and I have learned about its importance, especially as a student at St. Mark’s where our schedules and lives are extremely packed and do not easily enable us to practice deep work all the time. Last year, I fell into a multi-month-long rut of frustration and lack of satisfaction from everything I was doing in my academic courses. I was putting in excessive time and what I perceived to be effort and hardwork but was not seeing the results in my grades or my actual understanding/engagement with the material. (more…)
Make Deep Work Your Superpower: Deep Work and School (Part 1)
By Dr. Colleen Worrell, Director of the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning
Make Deep Work Your Superpower: Deep Work and School (Part 1)
Want to learn complicated things quickly, be more productive, and generate higher quality work? Make Deep Work your superpower.
“Deep work” is a term coined by Georgetown University professor Cal Newport to refer to the ability to “focus without distraction on a cognitively demanding task” (“Cal Newport on Deep Work”). In his newest book, Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World (NY: Grand Central Publishing, 2016), Professor Newport argues persuasively that the ability to do deep work is the superpower of the 21st century. By training your ability to focus and by actively carving out time “for real intense focused work,” Newport argues that we can train our brains and cultivate habits that build a (more…)
LEO 