Upper School Intersession 2025

A lot of our current beliefs about the past are not based in science. For instance, a lot of people think that aliens built the pyramids, or that people practiced human sacrifice at Stonehenge. Both of these are popular myths because they make a much more exciting story than the truth! How can archaeologists help people understand more about the ancient world so that we can figure out what’s true?

Join us for a look at the art, science, and technology behind pinball. In this session we’ll look at the evolution of pinball, from the early mechanical games to today’s technological marvels. Learn how artists, designers, and engineers collaborate to create a game, and what pinball can tell us about history and culture.

We’ll spend half of this session examining a pinball machine and its components, discussing why pinball was illegal in many states, and how changes in technology and culture can be observed in the design of a pinball machine. In the other half of the session, we’ll be playing pinball machines from different eras to see how the game has changed over time. We’ll also cover some basic pinball strategies you can use to improve your skills!

Why are humans remains important in archaeology? How can we use the bodies of ancient people to tell us more about their lives - and how can looking at living people today help us understand the way we used to live before technologies like computers and plastic?

Join us for a look at the art, science, and technology behind pinball. In this session we’ll look at the evolution of pinball, from the early mechanical games to today’s technological marvels. Learn how artists, designers, and engineers collaborate to create a game, and what pinball can tell us about history and culture.

We’ll spend half of this session examining a pinball machine and its components, discussing why pinball was illegal in many states, and how changes in technology and culture can be observed in the design of a pinball machine. In the other half of the session, we’ll be playing pinball machines from different eras to see how the game has changed over time. We’ll also cover some basic pinball strategies you can use to improve your skills!

American society has become so politically divided that some people talk seriously about the possibility of a second civil war. How did a once united country get to this crisis point? As a journalist and cartoonist, David Horsey has observed the evolution of politics in the United States since the election of Ronald Reagan. With his political cartoons as satiric guideposts, he will lay out the descending path Americans have taken into the political chasm -- essential knowledge for anyone who wants to understand contemporary political life in the United States.

Structural inequities and racism create significan health impacts on migrants in the United States, including asylum seekers, short-term authorized workers like farmworkers, and unauthorized residents. In this session, we will evaluate some of the social structures that have produced and maintain modern social inequities as well as health disparities. Students will learn to assess the structural processes that are at play for migrant populations, how these processes affect their health, and efforts in the US to reduce these health barriers.

Join us for a look at the art, science, and technology behind pinball. In this session we’ll look at the evolution of pinball, from the early mechanical games to today’s technological marvels. Learn how artists, designers, and engineers collaborate to create a game, and what pinball can tell us about history and culture.

We’ll spend half of this session examining a pinball machine and its components, discussing why pinball was illegal in many states, and how changes in technology and culture can be observed in the design of a pinball machine. In the other half of the session, we’ll be playing pinball machines from different eras to see how the game has changed over time. We’ll also cover some basic pinball strategies you can use to improve your skills!

Museums curate and display human remains in order to research the past and to educate the public. But it has come to light that many of the individuals on display might not have considered the museum to be their ideal final resting place. Adding in individual and indigenous voices problematises the concept of curation of human remains, but many archaeologists see us on a path we can’t retreat from without radically changing the field. Museum visitors also expect to see skeletons, and most find it part of their education - and often inspires them to go into research of medicine. Additionally, ancient cultures and modern society have radically different views of the afterlife, consent, and burial practices that are often at odds with each other. In this session we’ll learn about and debate these differing views.

Key questions: How can we as curators and archaeologists balance these different value systems? Do the dead have a voice, and what would they argue for? What are some of the arguments for and against keeping human remains on a case-by-case basis? How can we develop more complex arguments than "I wouldn't want that to happen to my body" when all of our ideas of our bodies are different?

Part of a series: “Ethical issues in archaeology." Students are invited to attend one or more sessions in this series by Stacy.

In this session, we will be viewing images of ancient human remains and will be discussing death.

Join us for a look at the art, science, and technology behind pinball. In this session we’ll look at the evolution of pinball, from the early mechanical games to today’s technological marvels. Learn how artists, designers, and engineers collaborate to create a game, and what pinball can tell us about history and culture.

We’ll spend half of this session examining a pinball machine and its components, discussing why pinball was illegal in many states, and how changes in technology and culture can be observed in the design of a pinball machine. In the other half of the session, we’ll be playing pinball machines from different eras to see how the game has changed over time. We’ll also cover some basic pinball strategies you can use to improve your skills!