Meet Jamie Baxley. She's from a small, southern town, and came to the College because of the many opportunities she had heard would be available. Studying Classics wasn't on her radar at the time, but all it took was one course and she was hooked. Now, she's thriving in this major and preparing to teach Classics in the future.
"I can't even remember how it happened, but I ended up registered for a course in Roman civilization my freshman year," Jami says. "Right away, I was telling myself 'this is really cool.' I took another Classics course the next semester and I knew for sure that this was what I wanted to do."
Prior to her first summer at the College, she applied to be a research assistant. "I was in a classical archaeology course, and the professor put up a flier advertising the opportunity. I never thought I'd have a chance as a freshman, but I applied and got it. So, I ended up in Greece that summer working on a fascinating project at the National Museum in Athens with the Linear B tablets. They date back to 1500 B.C. Very few people have ever seen these tablets let alone touched them, and there we were handling them and photographing them."
Back on campus, Jami continued working on that project as an independent study. "I did a lot of post-processing of the images we took, which meant becoming proficient with the software we're using. It involves massive amounts of data."
Based on that project, Jami has traveled to two national conferences to present some of that research.
Through the Classics program, Jami has not only gotten important opportunities, but she's also been given practical guidance for her future.
"That's the thing about this major. I've gotten valuable experiences that I never could have imagined, but it's also given me the confidence to know that I'll be well prepared for what I do next."
