Caltech's New Integrated Core Kicks Off with a Road Trip
The cohort in front of the Crowley Lake Columns, natural stone columns made of volcanic ash found on the floor of Long Valley Caldera near Bishop, California. Credit: Paul Asimow
by Andrew Moseman
This fall marks the beginning of Caltech’s integrated core program, an alternative take on the Institute’s traditional core curriculum. In this two-year trial of the integrated core, students will explore the connections between the sciences through the theme of energy, studying how pushing the boundaries between science, engineering, and sustainability can lead to solutions to some of the world’s most pressing challenges.
Before the school year officially began, the 20 students who elected to take on this new version of the core joined Paul Asimow, the Eleanor and John R. McMillan Professor of Geology and Geochemistry and one of the leaders of the integrated core program, along with three other faculty members, two graduate TAs, and two staff cooks on a road trip to the Sierra Nevada mountain range in eastern California.
There, they visited natural sites such as the Crowley Lake Columns and Mammoth Mountain as well as wind, solar, and geothermal power installations. Asimow says the trip was meant to give the cohort a chance to bond, allow them to appreciate the world around them and see energy at work in both technological and natural ways.
