Halls of ivy - with callouses

MILFORD n Independence Day took on a whole new meaning for one recent Delaware Valley grad this week. Donald Bickmann, resident of Milford and student of Delaware Valley since 9th grade, took off from Newark Airport for the country’s most selective school of higher education, Deep Springs College. He will be there for a two year all-expense-paid male-only educational experience unparalleled anywhere in the country or world. By the afternoon of July 4, Bickmann arrived on what you may call his “campus.” His home and place of study is actually in the middle of California’s High Desert on a cattle ranch and alfalfa farm, tens of miles from the nearest sign of civilization. Calling this school unconventional would be a drastic understatement. Deep Springs exists on three pillars: academics, labor, and self-governance. The total population is 26 students. This small group controls nearly every aspect of their life through their student government: what they want to eat, what they want to study, who they want to admit, what they can and cannot do, and so on. When he isn’t hitting the books, Bickmann will be doing a minimum of 20 hours per week of hard labor on the school’s fully functional ranch which, other than endowments, is its sole source of income to keep the school operational. Despite hundreds, soon to be thousands, of applicants a year, the college only admits between 11-15, making it one of the hardest colleges in the world to get into. Bickmann is the first Delaware Valley student to apply and get accepted at the college which has produced less than 1,000 alumni in its 90 year history. Graduates range in occupations from Congressmen to physicists to composers. Founder L.L. Nunn is quoted on the college’s Web site as saying to the first graduating class, “You came to prepare for a life of service, with the understanding that superior ability and generous purpose will be expected of you.” Bickmann was a starting varsity football player, vice-president of the high school’s student council, and member of the Model United Nations and Scholastic Bowl clubs at Delaware Valley. After his two years of liberal arts education at Deep Springs, Bickmann says he will most likely follow the path of most graduates in attending one of the country’s most prestigious schools, such as Harvard and Yale. He plans on studying epistemology and political philosophy. Bickmann says just a couple months ago he would have never imagined the very possibility of what he has now undertaken.