CANTON -- Starting this fall, some first-year St. Lawrence University students will spend the first semester of college in London, as SLU launches one of its First-Year Program courses there.

All first-year students participate in the First-Year Program at St. Lawrence, which the university cites as helping students excel in their first year of college life.

The program centers on living-learning communities in which students share a course that acts as an introduction to the liberal arts with a focus on the development of critical thinking and communication skills.

Participants in the London First-Year Program will live together and take one course together. Each student will also take three additional courses. An enrollment of about 15 students is anticipated.

Led by St. Lawrence faculty members with extensive experience teaching in international programs and in the First-Year Program, all of the courses will use the city as their classroom, encouraging students to understand the subjects they study by immersing themselves in the history, culture, and life of London.

St. Lawrence's First-Year Program focuses on developing the writing, speaking and research skills that students will need during and after college. Additionally, the program's professor becomes the students' academic advisor.

Associate Professor of Film and Representation Studies Richard Jenseth will direct the program. He has taught in the First-Year Program and is a past director of the University's semester program of study in London.

For several years, St. Lawrence has offered a program in France for second-semester first-year students with no proficiency in the French language. The program begins with a two-week immersion in Quebec, continues in Rouen and includes a short stay in Senegal - introducing students to three different French-speaking cultures.

More information is available on the Center for International and Intercultural Studies website.