Come Together, Right Now!
Being a community college student in Connecticut has a lot more to offer than meets the eye. There are many resources at different colleges throughout the state that are available for Housatonic students.
Not many students know this, but being a part of Housatonic means we are have access to not only our library but other state school’s libraries as well. Any book HCC does not have that another state school has can be obtained via Interlibrary Loan.
The other college will ship the book to HCC so it can be checked out of our library.
Ivy Rodriguez, a Liberal Arts majo,r says, “The ILL really helped me by saving money on books for papers and research. Without this program I would most likely have to go out and buy these book that I would only use one time.”
Having colleges like Yale right by us also lets us have access to amazing resources.
At Yale alone we have free access to a bunch of cool and helpful things!
In the medical library at Yale there is a brain museum in the basement called the Cushing Center. All you have to do to access it is enter the medical library, sign in as a visitor, then ask for the Cushing Center’s access card.
This one place is pretty cool because you get to be in a room full of brains in jars, fetuses, and other creepy human remains. The room is also pretty private and does not have a lot of foot traffic, so most likely you will have this whole room to yourself.
Photo taken by author at The Cushing Center in Yale’s Medical Library.
In the same building we have access to the Medical Historical Library. This contains rare medical books, journals, photographs and so on.
If you plan on going their to study it may be a little hard due to the fact that it looks like you are at Hogwarts. It is very majestic, which could be a little distracting.
Another awesome thing about being so close to Yale in their art museum.
The Yale Art Gallery is a great resource for art classes, art majors, and for cultural studies. They have exhibits that show different aspects of smaller tribe cultures. One African exhibit includes jewelry, pottery, and figurines that are meant to represent the people and aspects of their cultural rituals such as “coming out” practices.
The gallery also includes a whole modern art section, which is art that began in the 20th century. The modern art section can be helpful because it is more relatable to us because it was created during our lifetime.
Christine Altieri, a librarian at the Stratford Library, says there’s another resource available to students, “You are not restricted to taking classes just in your community college.”
If you need to take a class for your major’s requirement, and Housatonic does not have the class you want to take available to you OR a time that fits into your schedule, you can take it at another community college.
Altieri says, “Since you have already paid your application fee, you don’t have to again for another Connecticut community college.”
You do need to apply, but as long as you are in good standing with your college, you will be allowed to take classes at a different college and transfer your grades to meet graduation requirements.
There are many more resources that are available to students. As the community colleges continue to grow, the resources that will become available to students will also grow.