Humanities grant funds teacher education

The Center for the Humanities will use a $25,000 National Endowment for the Humanities grant to fund a joint project with the Madison Metropolitan School District.

Steven Nadler, professor of philosophy and center director, says the “Expanding the Humanities” workshops will provide a forum to discuss the content of the high school humanities curriculum, with an emphasis on subjects not widely represented in high school courses.

“This is a truly collaborative initiative,” Nadler says. “The project brings scholars and teachers together to read and explore new material in the humanities. The long-term result of these intensive workshops should be a far richer classroom experience for the teachers and their students and a greater sense among UW humanities faculty of how to make their specialized research more accessible and relevant to a wider public.”

Art Rainwater, Madison school superintendent, adds: “This project offers an exceptional professional development opportunity to MMSD’s high school teachers as they search for new and engaging ways to help our students meet and exceed state and local content standards across multiple curricular areas.”

The program will sponsor three interdisciplinary workshops in the humanities for the academic year 2000-01. UW–Madison faculty and Madison high school teachers will participate in reading and discussion groups in three broad areas: Philosophy: ideas and values; art, culture and society; and gender, race and ethnicity.

“These are not lectures or UW faculty-led seminars, but discussion groups with assigned readings that will provide opportunities for UW faculty and MMSD teachers to learn together,” Nadler says.

Phillip Certain, dean of the College of Letters and Science, says UW–Madison established the center this year with the goal of increasing visibility of the humanities both on campus and within the community.

“Workshops like these, which are an effective way to demonstrate the importance of the humanities in secondary education, are also an outstanding vehicle for dialogue between the university and the community,” Certain says.

For further information, contact Joan Strasbaugh (608) 263-3409; info@humanities.wisc.edu.