Last summer seven Bennington College students, self-selected from Elizabeth Sherman's Biology of Marine Animals class, set foot onto the island of Grand Cayman, primed for an adventure. One concentrating in literature, two in the social sciences, one in architecture, one in biology, one in childhood studies/biology, and one "undecided." Accompanied by Sherman, they traveled to a remote northwest point on the island with one purpose: to study coral reefs. Or, as Sherman calls it, "to be embedded in the ecosystem." That ecosystem became a classroom-"doing" science, as Sherman calls it. Starting scuba diving lessons here in the States before the trip, the group earned their diving certificates 48 hours after arriving on the island. With expert dive masters at the start of the line and the end of the line and with a protective teacher in the middle "between the students and the sea," the seven students and their scuba tanks submerged deep into the Caribbean.

Splashdown. An intensive, scientific study was underway. Among the questions addressed during this weeklong, for-credit course in coral reef biology: What environmental factors affect the health of coral reefs? Why are reef fish so colorful? How is fish diversity quantified? What are the costs and benefits of "cleaning symbiosis," a complex relationship between predators and their prey, in which the would-be prey become helpmates?

Making two dives daily, the group was swept along with the rhythm of the eagle ray and meandered between schools of Creole wrasses. "Once you go down there, you are changed forever," Sherman says. "With the flip of a fin you can be almost anywhere in an instant. It shakes up your perceptions of time and space." What the students experienced each day underwater, they discussed and analyzed at night on dry land. With individual students taking on the role of facilitators, they came to their conclusions based on what they saw, as well as the scientific reading and note taking that they were required to do simultaneously.

Sherman chose Grand Cayman because the dive operations make preservation of the coral reefs a top priority. "The first thing the instructors teach students is how to achieve and maintain 'buoyancy' while diving," Sherman explains. "Otherwise, a flailing fin or arm can 'ding' the coral, causing damage." And divers don't even think about breaking off a tiny piece of coral as a souvenir. "The government's rules are very clear," Sherman laughs. "Take home nothing but memories-leave nothing but bubbles."

"There's a reason Liz Coleman likens science to a 'performing art' at Bennington," Sherman says. "This trip was a dramatic example of what we do. We need a context for what goes on in the classroom, otherwise there's no understanding of history, of how scientific fact emerges in the first place." The science faculty is planning more of these intensive, field-immersion classes, and already another one taken place: Biology faculty member Kerry Woods took six students to the Sonoran Desert in Arizona for his class, Desert Ecology.

As for the one student who went on the Grand Cayman trip and was undecided about her focus? The decision's been made. She's committed to becoming a marine biologist, and her next Field Work Term was spent at a shark lab in Bimini.