With several new faculty-initiated programs launching this
year, Undergraduate Education Dean Steve Nowicki was looking Thursday to drum
up additional interest in classroom experiments that connect students and professors
with real world problems.
Speaking to the Arts and Sciences Faculty Council, Nowicki
updated faculty on both Duke Immerse and Duke INtense Global, two different
programs that Nowicki said share features allowing deeper academic exploration
than a typical single course can provide.
The programs have the potential to "eliminate the
little buckets in student lives that separate academics from other parts of
their lives," Nowicki said. "This is like the Focus program on steroids,"
Nowicki said.
Two Duke
Immerse pilot projects this spring will put faculty and a collection of
students together for the semester before "pulling up stakes" and
going abroad for several weeks of global study. One project, led by historians Bill Chafe and Karin Shapiro,
will connect study of the American Civil Rights Movement with that of the
anti-apartheid campaign in South Africa.
The other, led by Suzanne Shanahan of Kenan Ethics, will explore refugee
issues before splitting the class into two; one group will go to Nepal to work
with Bhutani refugees and the other will head to Cairo for engagement with
Iraqi refugees.
Duke INtense
Global, which launched this fall, emphasizes an integrated connection of
language and culture studies with both coursework and civic engagement
activities over a two or three semester period, during which students split
their time at Duke and abroad with more flexibility than a typical study abroad
program allows. One project led by Edna Andrews of
Slavic Studies sends students to St. Petersburg; Leela Prasad of Religion is
leading students in a second program to India.
"What these programs share is they provide a broad
space for innovation in the classroom that allows faculty and students to more
fully integrate course work with real world problem," Nowicki said.
But they are experiments, involve a small number of students
and have presented a variety of expected and unexpected challenges in the
launch, he added. Asked how these
programs could grow into something that would make a wider and more significant
impact on Duke education, Nowicki said that he doesn't yet know the answer. "We can't send students to India
for free all the time. We can do it a little bit for a few students and see if
it is worth it. Part of this
experiment is learning how it could develop into a larger initiative."
But the larger lesson may just be that Duke needs to support
innovative faculty initiatives that link research to the classroom. Nowicki noted that both programs were
faculty initiated. He concluded
the session with an impassioned request for faculty members to continue
developing new classroom ideas.
"What I like about these projects is they deeply
connect faculty teaching interests with research interests," he said.
"This is what we do at Duke.
If we accomplish that we accomplish something very important for a
research university, and it's good for the faculty, too."
In other discussion at the Arts and Sciences Faculty
Council, faculty approved a new renumbering scheme
for undergraduate classes.
Effective fall 2012, courses numbered 0-99 would include
first year seminars and house courses; 100-199 covers introductory and
foundation courses; 200-299 identifies courses above introductory level; and
courses above 400 mark advanced undergraduate courses, capstone classes and
honors theses.
Trinity College Associate Dean Ingeborg Walther said the
change required an accompanying minor adjustment of school policy concerning
graduation requirements, since they are based in part on the numbering scheme.
The new language grants departments greater authority and flexibility to set
graduate requirements for majors, with a minimum of 10 courses for a
departmental major and 14 courses for an interdepartmental major.