Fall Quarter 1995 marked a season of change for Peninsula College. That year, Alice Derry, Kate Reavey, and Diane Doss introduced the first Learning Community course to Peninsula College, guided by the vision of Jean McGregor and Barbara Leigh Smith of the Evergreen State College. The course, Regions of the Olympics and of Ourselves brought distribution requirements, Introduction to Biology and English 101-- Beginning Composition, together with an elective course titled Literature of the Olympic Peninsula, and began a more intentional focus on bringing natural science and humanities courses together to better serve the students at this unique college, where mountains, rivers, and the sea come together as seamlessly as discrete disciplines in such a course.

This was the first of five Learning Communities that encouraged systems-thinking in a rapidly changing world. A decade later, when Dr. Dwight Barry joined the faculty at Peninsula College, he collaborated with Derry, Reavey, and artist Linda Larsen to teach Landscapes of Home: A Natural History of the Elwha Watershed (2005), which combined Art 104, Environmental Science 101, composition, and literature. The Center of Excellence, founded and led by Barry, continues to support scholarship, research, and partnerships that further education, collaboration, and publication. The Environmental Humanities branch of the Center will serve as another bridge to the vital work students and collaborators are engaging in across the Peninsula and beyond.