Students who are interested in global
issues and global questions and
diversity around the world but who also
want to take a local perspective and
think about what's happening in their
own communities and here on campus,
and connect those two pieces together.
This is a great program to make those
connections. My name is Jessica Piekielek.
I'm a cultural anthropologist and
I teach in SOU's Sociology and
Anthropology program. My name is Mark
Shibley and I'm chair of the Sociology
Anthropology program. I'm Larry Gibbs, I'm
an assistant professor of Sociology in the
Sociology and Anthropology department
here at SOU. My name is Chelsea Rose, I'm
a research archaeologist with the
Southern Oregon University Laboratory of
Anthropology. We have a dynamic program
unique in some ways in that we bring
together two disciplines - Sociology and
Anthropology. We take all of the
strengths from both of those disciplines
and merge them into something that's
unique for students. What I'm most
excited about here is the way that we
mentor students using the tools of those
disciplines to really work on projects
that they care a lot about that make a
difference in their lives and have an
impact on the communities that they're
part of, and we work really hard on that
in our program and I'm really proud of
that - 
and I'm really excited about the kind of
opportunities that opens up
for our students. What makes it fun
teaching at SOU is that over time you
build these relationships - that
you give students skillsets that go
beyond the classroom so it's good when
you can do research or you talk about
social issues and you see students there
their faces light up and they're excited
to just do work. So that's one of
the assets of the SOU community. I
decided to come here to Southern Oregon
for the sociology department because it
has small class sizes, and right away one
of my professors really wanted to see
what I was interested in.
I ended up getting a job as a research
assistant within the first two months
that I joined this program. We've had a
lot of students do their senior thesis
or capstone and get it published, or be
able to take that research on with them
when they go into grad school. So because
of the fact that we are actually real
archaeologists here on campus embedded
in this program, there's a lot of
opportunities that maybe students
wouldn't get elsewhere. I just love the
professors here. They just do such a
great job immersing you in the
curriculum, but also giving you
real-world experience and giving you
practical experience so that way
whenever you get your degree you can go
out in the real world and be prepared to
to go out there and get a job. And they
tell us that it that it's excellent so I
can list off many students who have
graduated from here that have plugged in
to jobs in the community
in those fields based on the capstone
work they've done here. ...they may decide
to come to this program... I believe is
their desire to focus on diversity and
inclusion. Of course our students are
very interested in that here because sou
is located in a beautiful region and
students want to come here, study at the
University and kind of be a part of
what's going on in the landscapes around
us. So we kind of come at that from a
Social Science perspective. Our
Environmental Studies program which is
excellent here, kind of comes at it from
from a natural science point of view. I
would say one of the greatest
opportunities I've had working with
professors is working with Chelsea Rose
over at SOULA. Working with her has really
made me critically think about how we
view and interpret race in an ethnicity
when it comes to our history and what
we're lacking or what we could actually
improve on. We are able to bring our
students out in the field, they can get
their hands dirty in the lab. They're
working on cleaning, analyzing, and
there's a lot of opportunity for
students to kind of have ownership over
a piece of their own research. I think
that if you want to be
a part of a community at the school that
you're at and if you want to feel
supported by your peers and by your
professors then SOU is a great choice
for you. If you want to explore your
passions and shape your classes around
what you're interested in, I think that
the sociology and anthropology
department offers every opportunity to
do that.
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