In 1925, Duke University awarded nearly 200 degrees to its first graduating class. That number has grown steadily over the years with Duke awarding 5,100 degrees in May.
But the figures don’t reflect the growing number of people who are experiencing a Duke education beyond the traditional classroom, whether in the local community or across the world in a massive open online course.
Today, Duke faculty members are exploring many ways to share knowledge beyond the physical campus, from face-to-face conversations to newspapers distributed across the country and even the global reach of social media. It’s part of the university’s mission of service to society to engage with broader audiences locally, nationally and globally.
“If we expect the public to understand and value universities, it is our responsibility to find ways to communicate the interest and excitement of the scholarship and pedagogy that goes on within the walls of academia,” Provost Sally Kornbluth said. “By making the communication and dissemination of these academic activities a core piece of Duke’s mission, the university has greatly increased the chances that the fruits of scholarship will be translated for societal good.”
- Laurent Dubois - Bringing Duke and Durham Together
- Stephen Kelly - Educating Across the Country
- Negar Mottahedeh - Finding a Global Reach
For Laurent Dubois, his classroom extends into the Durham community through Forum for Scholars and Publics, a program geared toward advocating for the role of knowledge in society.
Last fall, Dubois, the Marcello Lotti Professor of Romance Studies and History, took on the role of faculty director for the Duke-led program. Both on campus and in Durham, the Forum for Scholars and Publics hosts presentations, readings and panel discussions aimed at interacting with local community members on a personal level to generate idea exchanges between the university and those not directly tied to it.
Since last September, the group has sponsored nearly 30 events on campus and in Durham, from talks about politics and the 2014 World Cup to the meanings, causes, and treatments of addiction. Sessions are streamed live and saved to YouTube so viewers can participate anywhere.
“As advocates in society, it’s important for universities to go beyond campus to help others understand what’s going on and how faculty contribute in important ways,” Dubois said. “Communicating complex ideas to the public doesn’t mean we have to give up on the depth of what we do. It means we can make people feel like they can join the conversation, and when they do that, there are all sorts of experiences and knowledge to add.”
One of the benefits of the Forum for Scholars and Publics, Dubois said, is its ability to create relationships between Duke faculty, experts from outside the institution and the public. That kind of work complements important “traditional” avenues for academics to share expertise through classroom teaching or in academic journals. By hosting discussions and speaking with local Durham residents, Dubois said he hopes to make the work of Duke faculty more approachable and important to those outside campus.
“All universities have sets of values about research that are really important to maintain,” he said. “There is also a set of values universities embody by being present and public in order to strengthen scholarship and how people can understand it.”
Even as professors shift into the local community to share expertise, many are increasingly sharing knowledge across the country.
Each year, Duke faculty publish about 500 print op-eds and web commentaries in addition to about 450 appearances across television and radio. From regional newspapers to national television broadcasts on CNN, faculty members have the opportunity to share research like never before.
“Writing op-eds is a logical extension of the courses I teach,” said Stephen Kelly, visiting professor of the practice of public policy and Canadian studies at the Sanford School of Public Policy. “They’re a vehicle where I can do my small part to educate my fellow citizens.”
In the past two years, Kelly has written more than a dozen op-eds that have run in a variety of print publications, from the “Des Moines Register” to the “Toronto Globe and Mail” to the “New York Times.” In each case, he’s opined on current topics that fall within his areas of expertise like energy issues and border disputes.
Taking anywhere from a weekend to six months of research and writing to complete, Kelly said crafting opinion pieces amplifies his enjoyment of education. He can go from teaching 15 students in a classroom to reaching millions through a newspaper circulation.
Kelly’s work on op-eds also aids his teaching on campus. In 2012, he began work on a piece for the “New York Times” about Machias Seal Island, which is claimed by both the U.S. and Canada, and is similar to a territorial dispute between China and Japan over islands in the East China Sea.
“My research was meant to buttress my op-ed, but I learned so much about the island and managed to get primary source documents, I decided to use it as a lesson for a class,” Kelly said. “It’s a real issue in the world that needs to be solved, and often getting students to think about these things can provide ideas just as good as people working in the State Department.”
Global Reach with 140 Characters
A similar connection between students and outside interests thrust Negar Mottahedeh into the global platform of social media.
As an early adopter of Twitter in 2008, Mottahedeh, an associate professor with Duke’s Program in Literature, found a strong connection to others from the online community where users share thoughts and updates in 140 characters or less. She watched students use the Internet and other chat channels on sites like Facebook and was inspired to make social media central to teaching and learning. She created a Twitter-based film festival that allowed students and anyone else from around the world to comment and share thoughts on movie clips and held a roundtable discussion on Twitter.
“If students tweeted from my classroom, they weren’t just participating online, but learning to teach others who may not be as fortunate to be here, on campus, learning in our classrooms,” Mottahedeh said.
In the years since the 2009 film festival, Mottahedeh [@negaratduke on Twitter] has become more active on Twitter, where she’s able to share her academic expertise on topics like Iranian cinema or social media and revolution. She mixes personal and professional aspects online, sharing books she’s reading, notes from lectures and interacts directly with academics and others around the globe. This fall, she’s teaching a course about cultural and historical aspects of the “selfie” photo.
Mottahedeh, who has about 3,000 followers on Twitter, is among just over 70 Duke faculty active on Twitter, a growing trend across college campuses.
“Faculty are becoming interested in building their public presence using digital tools to extend their reach as a public intellectual, and some are also realizing the benefits of using social media tools to enhance the classroom experience,” said Cara Rousseau, manager of social media and digital strategy at Duke. “Platforms like Twitter allow faculty to connect with alums they taught, peers at other institutions and the media.”
This summer, Mottahedeh compiled a series of tweets from 2009 about the Iranian election protests to share online. Her Twitter footprint includes insight and context for the event as well as interactions with people all over the world.
“I realized my feeds are a public place where I can connect with people for whom my research is most relevant,” she said. “I wouldn’t have thought of this in a million years, that I’d be in touch with thousands of people daily. It’s changed me as a teacher.”