Image: Owl of Athena.
Course Policies
To teach is to learn twice.
- Joubert, Pensees, 1842.
Teaching is a touchstone of my career. It is a practice that extends beyond the classroom, and includes advising and mentoring long after students have finished a particular course or program of study. I was fortunate to learn from superb professors, and their example is the starting point for my own approach to teaching, advising and mentoring.
At both the graduate and undergraduate levels, I am committed to teaching in a manner that meets the highest standards of education. Following Socrates, I see the role of educator as gadfly and midwife. As gadflies we prod each other to critically reflect on our prior understandings. As midwives we facilitate one another's personal and intellectual development. I say we because this is a process of dialogue and mutual disclosure that transcends one's formal role as a professor or student.
In the same vein, I am committed to higher education as a means of freeing people from uncritical belief and unreflective behaviour. By developing capacities for authentic self-expression, critical thinking, ethical discernment and self-governing actions, I help empower others to reflect and act for themselves, to discriminate between better or worse accounts of the world, and to deliberate democratically about the ends and means for the common good. This is a goal that is especially relevant to a diversifying society in a globalizing world -- a world of cultural contrasts, political conflict, economic inequality, environmental degradation, war and terror. Taking this approach has also made my teaching a personally rewarding experience. Teaching not only hones the capacities of my students, it also challenges and refines my own insights and capabilities.
Emphasizing critical thinking, methodological rigour and theoretical sophistication, I strive to facilitate the scientific and ethical development of students. My pedagogy combines dialogic presentations, active learning, objective testing, reflective writing, and research projects. I set rigourous standards and expectations by requiring attendance at all lectures, assigning a substantial reading load, insisting on complete preparation before class sessions, and frequently evaluating student work and progress.
I use seminar-style presentations and small group activities to create a classroom environment with extensive opportunities for interaction and discussion. My training in meeting facilitation is very helpful in this regard. With respect to individual students, I function as an intellectual coach, motivating them to achieve their personal best, exceed prior horizons of understanding, and internalize knowledge in a way that continues to inform their lives after they finish their coursework. Altogether, I find this approach promotes a high degree of personal commitment and self-respect in my students. And that results in the overall high quality of their work in my courses.
Using the links in the sidebar, you can select downloadable pdfs of my course policies and syllabi.
If you are a professor (or soon will be), I hope these documents will prove helpful to you in your own teaching practice. If you come across a teaching practice you think I should know about, please don't hesitate to contact me. I'm always open to new ideas and techniques. If you are a student of mine (or are thinking about it), I hope this section maps out what its like to be in one of my courses. And if you have suggestions about the syllabi or course policies, please do share them with me. Each year I make substantive improvements to my courses based on the feedback I recieve from colleagues and students.
I do have a personal story that lies at the heart of why I take teaching so seriously...and enjoy it so much!
My little scandal is that I dropped out of the University of Minnesota as an undergraduate. I was a messed up kid working through family issues, and I did not make my education a priority. Afterwards, I puttered around with finishing but never made a commitment. And then something remarkable happened. A professor I admired had kept an eye out for me. One day, he pulled me aside as we passed on the compass bridge crossing the Mississippi. He said, 'Come back. The world needs committed people with talent'.
Now I was a tad shocked. Dropping out is not much of a confidence builder. Yet here was one of the world's most admired scholars, and he saw something more.
So I became one of many kids without prospects whose life was redirected by the dedication of a few professors. It was Mulford Sibley (Political Science) who first helped me put my academic life in order. He was followed by other professors who had an equally profound impact on me -- Robert Ross (Religious Studies), Terry Ball (Political Science), Roger Miller, Eric Sheppard, Helga Leitner and Fred Lukerman (all in Geography), and Mary Midgley (Philosophy).
One of their many influences was their dedication to teaching. And here I mean teaching broadly understood, as both instructing and mentoring. They modeled excellence, and through their example taught me the value of teaching. As importantly, they did not pit teaching against research, but concieved of them as mutually reinforcing. They went far beyond the facts of a topic, and taught with theoretical and methodological rigour, weaving together the strands of research and teaching into whole cloth.
What my professors' shared was the practice of academic coaching. They demanded the highest standards of scholarship, and combined that with supportive guidance on how to be a scholar. I could not have been more fortunate.