Summer Course with Paul Smith’s College
Excelsior has partnered with Paul Smith’s College, located in the breathtaking Adirondack Mountains, on a 3-credit course that features a one-week immersive experience for learning outdoors, connecting with other Excelsior students, and gaining practical skills.
In the course SUST 300 Humans, Health and the Environment: A One Health Approach, you’ll explore the complex relationships between human, animal, and environmental health. You’ll spend one week at Paul Smith’s College in between two weeks of the online coursework. At Paul Smith’s, you’ll connect theory with nature and passion with practice through the lens of the One Health philosophy that recognizes the interconnectedness of human, animal, and environmental health.
Whether you’re a future health leader, an eco-advocate, craving purpose-driven exploration, or simply a lover of nature, this course is for you. Step outside the ordinary.
About Paul Smith’s College
Known as the “College of the Adirondacks,” Paul Smith’s College is a private institution offering associate, bachelor’s, and master’s programs in areas like hospitality, culinary arts, forestry, recreation management, and ecological restoration. Students enjoy hands-on instruction in small classes lead by dedicated instructors in New York’s 6-million acre “forever wild” Adirondacks.
How to Get Started
1. Review the FAQs
Review the FAQs below.
2. Excelsior Students
Contact your academic advisor at advising@excelsior.edu to learn more or to register for this course.
3. Not an Excelsior student?
Contact Admissions and apply today.
FAQs
The course costs $2,751. This includes tuition, and meals and housing for the one-week residential field experience. The cost of the course does not include travel to the field experience or gear you may need to purchase for the field experience. This is a ZTC (Zero Textbook Cost) course with no additional costs for course materials.
- Weeks 1-4 (June 30-July 26, 2025): Self-paced course readings and activities.
- Week 5 (July 27–August 2, 2025): Online Foundation: Modules on One Health principles, ecosystems, plant and animal health, and water pollution.
- Week 6 (August 3–9, 2025): Residential Field Experience: Field activities including plant identification, zoonotic disease studies, water quality assessments, and farm visits.
- Week 7 (August 10–16, 2025): Online Integration: Development of final StoryMap projects synthesizing course knowledge.
- Week 8 (August 17-August 24, 2025): Student reflection activity.
- Plant identification and ethnobotany.
- Zoonotic and vector-borne disease studies.
- Water quality sampling and pollution impact analysis.
- Farm visits to explore sustainable agriculture.
- EcoPsychology and mindfulness activities.
Previous outdoor skills and experience are not required, but this is an active course. We ask that students inform us in advance of the need for any necessary accommodation. Students can request an accommodation through the Student Support Office at studentsupport@excelsior.edu.
Boot Fitting Instructions: To prevent blisters, make sure boots are broken in well before the week at Paul Smith’s College. Waterproof the boots and consider wearing thin nylon socks under thick socks if you get blisters easily.
