students report hearing piano music late at night, even when no one is in the building. Academics Hollins offers small classes with a 9:1 student-teacher ratio in a variety of majors. The most popular majors are English, psychology, studio art, business, and biology. Currently Hollins offers graduate programs in dance (M.F.A.), creative writing (M.F.A.), children's literature (M.A., M.F.A.), liberal studies (M.A.L.S.), playwriting (M.F.A.), screenwriting and film studies (M.A., M.F.A.), and teaching (M.A.T.). , Hollins offers a graduate-level certificate in Children's Book Illustration. Hollins was one of the first colleges in the nation to establish a study abroad program, launching Hollins Abroad-Paris in 1955. Approximately half of Hollins students have an international learning experience. Hollins runs its own programs in London and Paris; non-Hollins students are free to apply to the Hollins Abroad-London and-Paris programs. Hollins students can also study through Hollins-sponsored programs in Argentina, Germany, Ghana, Ireland, Italy, Greece, Japan, Mexico, Spain, South Africa, and in various other countries through the School for Field Studies. Hollins also sponsors an annual service-learning project in Lucea, Jamaica. In January, or J-Term, students follow their own independent course of study with a sponsoring professor, take off-campus internships, or study abroad with other Hollins students. The innovative 4-1-4 calendar, established in 1968, was one of the first in the nation. Hollins's peer tutoring center is known as the Center for Learning Excellence and includes the Writing Center, which offers students support and feedback on their writing interests, and the QR Center, established in 2002, which offers support to students enrolled in quantitative courses. Curriculum A liberal arts school, Hollins has designed its own Education through Skills and Perspectives (ESP) general education requirement program. Rather than focusing on the usual math, science, English, and history booklist of required courses, Hollins requires each student to take a variety of skills classes (writing, oral communication, applied quantitative reasoning, and applied research techniques) and perspectives classes (aesthetic analysis, creative expression, ancient and/or medieval worlds, modern and/or contemporary worlds, social and cultural diversities, scientific inquiry, and global systems and languages). These requirements can be completed in as few as 8 courses but aim to help the students explore other fields of study while rounding out their basic understanding of the world. Hollins offers majors in the fields of studio art, art history, biology, business, chemistry, classical studies, communication studies, dance, economics, English, environmental studies, film, French, gender and women's