Summer Program in Philosophy

I was terrified the first question on my AP Calculus exam would be “What is calculus?” I could do any problem they threw my way, so teachers labeled me “good at math,” but I had no idea why I performed those steps or why they worked. For me, teaching philosophy was the same. By 2021, I’d won a few awards for excellence in teaching. I knew I was good in a classroom. I also knew—the same way I knew it in calculus—that deep down, I had no idea what I was doing. Luck and likability had a lot more to do with my evaluation scores than I cared to admit. I began to wonder about the systems that had made it possible for me to be a “good teacher” the same way I had been “good at math” many years ago. Institutes of higher education exist to teach, yet teaching training is frequently missing at worst or an afterthought at best; where it is available, it is often too broad to be useful or so specialized as to be inaccessible. Moreover, many institutional incentive structures make investing in teaching a bad use of professional time and money. In this talk, I’ll discuss what I see as the structural challenges to developing innovative, impactful teaching, and how we—both as individuals and collectively—can address those challenges to ensure that both students and their teachers enjoy the benefits of genuine excellence in teaching.

Rebeccah Leiby is the Hoffberger Ethics Fellow with the University of Baltimore’s Hoffberger Center for Ethical Engagement. She received her Ph.D. in Philosophy from Boston University in 2022, alongside a Graduate Certificate in Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights Studies. Her research is primarily concerned with political philosophy and the unique questions posed by projects of transitional justice, which seek to establish norms for post-conflict social and political stability. A lifelong science fiction enthusiast, Dr. Leiby has recently contributed chapters on political philosophy to The Expanse and Philosophy (2021) and Dune and Philosophy (2022) in The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. She is fond of – but not particularly skilled at – all manner of video games, especially the Tomb Raider Survival Trilogy, which allows her to live out her wildest fantasy of being a humanities academic who can also do a pull-up.

Alexandra Grundler works on and teaches Aesthetics and Ethics at Auburn University. She received her PhD in 2021 from the University of California, Santa Cruz. She is especially interested in what kinds of habits regarding beauty contribute to life’s overall flourishing. She loves to dance, sing, and spend time in nature.

Dr. James Garrison serves as assistant professor of philosophy at Baldwin Wallace University. He has previously served as a visiting assistant professor at the University of Puget Sound, Consortium for Faculty Diversity fellow at Scripps College, and teaching fellow at the University of Bristol. He obtained his doctorate in philosophy from the University of Vienna in 2015, after having undertaken exchange fellowships at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and Peking University. His teaching and research includes work in ethics, aesthetics, social and political philosophy, and intercultural philosophy. Working under the guidance of Professor Roger Ames at the University of Hawai’i during his graduate studies, he developed his forthcoming book, "Reconsidering the Life of Power" (State University of New York Press).

Dave Concepción teaches feminist ethics, environmental ethics, first year seminars, and other courses at Ball State University [BSU], including "Stance: An International Undergraduate Philosophy Journal." He has received BSU’s Diversity Advocate Award and Outstanding Faculty Service Award, and is one of only two people to ever receive all four of BSU’s top university-wide teaching awards. National recognitions include the American Association of Philosophy Teachers’ [AAPT] Lenssen Prize for research about the teaching of philosophy and the American Philosophical Association’s [APA] Prize for Excellence and Innovation in Philosophy Programs. He is a past president of the AAPT and a past chair of the APA Committee on Teaching. Currently, he is the editor-in-chief of AAPT Studies in Pedagogy. As co-designer of the only national level teacher training in the field of philosophy, he leads workshops around the country to help other philosophy teachers innovate. His current research focuses on inclusive pedagogy.

Randall Curren is Professor and Co-Chair of Philosophy and Professor of Education (secondary) at the University of Rochester. He was the Ginny and Robert Loughlin Founders’ Circle Member at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton (2012-2013) and held concurrent research professorships at the Royal Institute of Philosophy (London) and the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues at the University of Birmingham (England) in 2013-2015. His recent and forthcoming works include Patriotic Education in a Global Age, with historian Charles Dorn (University of Chicago Press, 2018), Living Well Now and in the Future: Why Sustainability Matters, with geologist Ellen Metzger (MIT Press, 2017; Beijing Normal University Press, 2021, in Chinese), and the Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Education (2022). His current projects are focused on well-being in education and education for civic friendship.

Michael Randall Barnes is a Postdoctoral Associate at the Rotman Institute of Philosophy at Western University. In Fall 2022, Prof. Barnes will join the Humanising Machine Intelligence project (and the Machine Intelligence and Normative Theory (MINT) Lab) at the Australian National University. Michael received his PhD from Georgetown University in 2019, and a teaching degree from the University of Toronto in 2012. His interests in philosophy range from philosophy of language to applied ethics, and his main work now concerns the complexities of online speech. Michael has published articles in various academic journals, is a contributor to a number of anthologies, and is the co-author of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry on 'Hate Speech.'

Ashley Pryor (Geiger) is an interdisciplinary artist and scholar (Ph.D. Philosophy, The Pennsylvania State University, 2000), who lives and works in Toledo, Ohio. Her current scholarship is focused on articulating a conceptual ground for community-engaged arts. “The Holding Project” a collaboration with artists Barbara Miner, MFA and Lee Fearnside, has been widely exhibited in Northwest, Ohio in partnership with the Toledo Lucas County Library. Pryor will be presenting the Holding Project to the International Visual Literacy Association in Finland in August 2022. Along with her interdisciplinary scholarship in the humanities, Pryor has participated in three Artists Labs through The Kolaj Institute, her collage work was recently exhibited in Birr, Ireland, and August, and the Limner and Manifest Galleries. Her works have appeared in numerous online print publications. She was the recipient of the 2021 Arts Commission Merit award to support her work bringing collage arts to incarcerated people at the Toledo Correctional Institution through the Inside/Out Prison Exchange Program. Pryor was the recipient of the 2021 Edith Rathbun Award for Community Engagement. A long time practitioner of improvisation, Pryor regularly integrates improvisational games into her teaching in the humanities and is currently writing an article on the subject.

Anthony Weston is Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at Elon University, where his work and teaching centered on the transformative possibilities of philosophy as a form of inventiveness and imagination. His signature courses included “Millennial Imagination”, “Environmental Visions”, and Philosophy of Pedagogy, along with “Life in the Universe” (co-taught with an astronomer). He was an affiliated faculty member in Environmental Studies and taught in the Honors and General Studies programs as well. In 2002 he was honored as Elon’s Teacher of the Year and in 2007 as Scholar of the Year. Alongside his continuing writing projects, much of his current work is on designing and building a nearby agrarian intentional community, Common Ground Ecovillage. His other interests include hiking, singing, astronomy, strategy games, and – lately – grandfathering.

Kimberly Van Orman in an instructional consultant with the Institute for Teaching, Learning and Academic Leadership at the University at Albany, focusing on effective course design, critical thinking, fostering student engagement and helping students with deep learning practices, including Team-Based Learning (TBL). Dr. Van Orman has a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University at Albany and has taught philosophy at institutions including the University at Albany, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institution, Siena College and Bennington College.

Ann J. Cahill is Professor of Philosophy at Elon University, and is the author of Overcoming Objectification: A Carnal Ethics (2010, Routledge) and Rethinking Rape (2001, Cornell University Press). Working at the intersection of feminist theory and philosophy of the body, she has published on topics such as miscarriage, beautification, and sexual ethics. Her co-authored article on teaching argumentation won the Lenssen Award, given to the best article on teaching philosophy over a 2-year period, in 2014. She has been working on a variety of pedagogical approaches to improving discussion skills, and is thrilled to be continuing that work at Hamilton College this summer.

Eric Yang is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Santa Clara University. He received his Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of California, Santa Barbara. His main research area is in metaphysics, philosophy of mind, and epistemology. But his initial interest in philosophy arose from studying the history of thought, and so his favorite classes to teach are courses in the history of philosophy; and he strongly believes that the ideas and approaches of “dead philosophers” have much to contribute to the discussions occurring today. Aside from philosophy, he used to work as a session guitarist, with a bent towards jazz-fusion, funk, and the blues.

Daniel Collette is a visiting professor of philosophy at Marquette University. He received his Ph.D. from the University of South Florida where he was recognized by the provost for outstanding teaching. He favors experiential learning and actively seeks innovative ways to integrate these methods into the classroom, including a recent interest in virtual reality. His research focuses on the intersections of ethics, philosophy of religion, epistemology, and political thought in early modernity. While his research and publications are primarily in early modern philosophy, Existentialism was his first “philosophical love” - an affection that remains strong.