A Peek Inside Duke Classrooms

Shared experiences, and real-world situations, promote learning across spaces and disciplines

Junior Bianca Ingram, center, coaches Alia Montañez, 12, on vocabulary and lyrics.
As part of Kisha Daniel’s Critical Pedagogy of Hip Hop class, students worked with sixth graders at Neal Middle School in Durham to create hip hop songs. Junior Bianca Ingram, center, coaches Alia Montañez, 12, on vocabulary and lyrics.

Duke’s spring 2024 semester is almost in the books. Here is a photo and video essay offering a peek inside Duke classrooms – although in some cases, classes were outdoors or off campus entirely.

In one course, students helped sixth graders in a Durham middle school with their vocabulary through hip hop lyrics, while in another, in front of the Chapel, students competed in a race with robots they built. Scenes from an acting class show how students explore human connection through movement.

Altogether, the images show a range of spaces and disciplines.

Lived Experience of Race and Racism



The Rev. Benjamin Chavis, Duke’s inaugural environmental justice and racial equity fellow, delivers a lecture on environmental racism (a term he coined in 1982), during this course he co-convened with public policy professor Jay Pearson.  

Critical Pedagogy of Hip Hop


Brazilian rapper Dudu de Morro Agudo performs for Duke students and Deja Simms’ class at Neal Middle School in Durham. It was part of education professor Kisha Daniels' service learning course where students worked with the sixth graders on hip hop songs.

Senior Corali Francisco, right, coaches Johan Ruiz, a sixth grader in Deja Simms’ class at Neal Middle School, on vocabulary and lyric writing to create an original hip hop song.

Acting

Students learn about the fundamentals of acting realism through exercises (such as in the video), scene study and text analysis in this class taught by Johann Montozzi-Wood, assistant professor of the practice of theater studies.

Happiness & Purpose


First-year students engage in a workshop led by senior Katy Turner, as part of What Now? The Duke Guide to Happiness, Purpose and Well Being, an ethics seminar course.

Fusion Fitness


Senior Elisha Tan (foreground) and other students in Maria Finnegan’s Fusion Fitness for Women course work on muscular endurance and core strength in a circuit workout. 

Finding a STEM Identity


First-year students in the SPIRE Fellows Program, which centers on inclusivity and support for underrepresented groups in STEM fields, participate in discussions on Abele Quad during this half-credit course. The course asks students to investigate diversity within STEM subjects.

Philosophy and Neuroscience


Felipe De Brigard, associate professor of philosophy, teaches Philosophy and Neuroscience in the Reuben-Cooke building.

Students during a group discussion in the Philosophy and Neuroscience class

Robot Studio


Students in mechanical engineering professor Boyuan Chen’s (in the blue blazer) robot studio course compete in a robot race in front of the Chapel. They spent the semester making robots without wheels that could walk.