Small Undergraduate Classes Supporting Student Research and Co-Curricular Learning
The Doyle Dialogue Seminars, which fostered dialogue on diversity and difference through upper-level, small group courses, have evolved into our current support of the Learning, Equity, Access, and Pedagogy (LEAP) initiative, which began during the 2022-2023 academic year. While the Doyle Seminars provided rich opportunities for faculty and students to engage with questions of difference, the LEAP program now carries forward this mission by focusing on department-wide efforts to create inclusive, accountable academic environments. Through this shift, the Doyle Program continues to promote deep learning and engagement with difference, now on a broader scale.
Doyle Seminars were small, upper-level classes that fostered dialogue on diversity and difference through student research and co-curricular learning. Doyle Seminars focused on a range of topics addressing critical questions of national, social, cultural, religious, moral, and other forms of difference. Previous seminars welcomed guest speakers and sponsored class outings around Washington, DC.
Doyle Seminars allowed Georgetown faculty to deepen learning and dialogue on difference through faculty development and teaching support. The program provided allocated funding for faculty to support learning inside and outside the classroom.
Faculty Development – All Doyle Seminar faculty participated in faculty workshops designed to equip them with resources on inclusive pedagogy. The faculty workshops helped instructors to think of ways to draw in differing perspectives through experiential learning opportunities such as guest speakers and outside course outings. It also served as a space for cross-disciplinary collaboration on teaching methods.
Allocated Funding – The Doyle Seminar program provided participating faculty with a grant of $2,000 for course enrichment activities. Past Doyle Seminar faculty applied the funds toward invited guests, outings to local museums or performances, and film screenings, among other activities.
Teaching Support – A Doyle Seminar Graduate Academic Assistant served all courses and focused on supporting student research projects. The Berkley Center Director of Student Programs also provided faculty consultations on course preparation and inclusive pedagogy as requested.
Doyle Seminars allowed Georgetown students to deepen learning and dialogue on difference through experiential learning, small class sizes, and research projects.
Experiential Learning – Doyle Seminar students benefited from different perspectives offered by guest speakers, outings to local museums or performances, film screenings, and other opportunities. Past students participated in a wide range of activities, including a medieval music performance, a Chinese tea ceremony, and a trip to the U.S. Supreme Court to watch oral arguments.
Small Class Sizes – All Doyle Seminars were capped at 15 students. The small class size and seminar format encouraged close student-faculty collaboration and created an inclusive space for students to engage in challenging conversations on diversity and difference.
Research Projects – Doyle Seminar students could more deeply explore how forms of difference interact to shape our world through a final research project. Students were given a unique opportunity to develop research skills, guided by faculty and a dedicated Doyle Seminar Graduate Academic Assistant.
Testimonials Slider
To meet the goals of the Doyle Seminar, students in Policing in the Contemporary World were encouraged to formulate final research projects in a variety of forms that could be accessible to an audience outside the classroom. Some students produced conventional research papers, though other projects included a YouTube video, two podcasts, a website, and an art project.
Amrita Ibrahim
In many ways, my Doyle Seminar was the most fulfilling teaching experience of my career so far, as every class we ended up having such meaningful discussions and debates about immigration, refugees, displacement, xenophobia, and more. At another level, meeting the other Doyle instructors earlier in the semester was formative for my own teaching: I built connections with two professors working on the issue of migration in different fields, and even co-led a joint class excursion to a museum.
Evan Jewell
I think Professor Uelmen's Doyle Seminar has been so valuable in allowing us to really dig deep within our own reflection and then when we encounter things that we don’t necessarily agree with, learning how to interact with that and communicate with differing perspectives or values.
Alexander Afnan
Political psychology is inevitably influenced by the increasingly sharp divisions in the large world. Through Doyle support I was able to place greater emphasis on both the psychological foundations of these divisions and constructive solutions to resolving them. Doyle support also enabled the students to achieve more integrated and better developed research projects, through the additional constructive and critical feedback they received on their reports.
Fathali Moghaddam
Race and Politics was by far one of my favorite courses I have taken at Georgetown...This Doyle Seminar actively made me reconstruct my notions of the world and, most importantly, catered to the love for learning I believe can get lost with high-stress tests and busy work.
Maya Silardi
September 22, 2022
Georgetown students explored creative approaches to adapting LGBTQ+ historical materials into performance through the spring 2022 class Performing LGBTQ+ History (TPST 242), co-taught by Michael T. Williams, artistic advisor to co-curricular theater, and Sivagami Subbaraman, founding director of Georgetown’s LGBTQ Resource Center.
April 25, 2022
Georgetown students learned a critical and empathetic approach to homelessness and expanded their journalism skills through the class Media and Social Justice, a Doyle Seminar taught by Ann Oldenburg, assistant director of the Journalism Program at Georgetown University, in fall 2021.
December 15, 2021
Students used gender as a prism for investigating Jewish cultural formation and tradition in late antiquity and the modern era as a part of Judaism and Gender, a Doyle Seminar taught by Julia Watts Belser in fall 2020.
July 28, 2021
Students combined critical and creative thinking to explore the storytelling of migration as part of Performing Migration, a Doyle Seminar taught by Devika Ranjan (SFS’17) in spring 2021.
April 7, 2021
Writing for Feminist Studies in Religion, Sarah Kurzweil (C'21) explores Jewish female identity in artwork by Chloe Wise. Research for the piece originated in a Doyle Seminar taught by Berkley Center Senior Research Fellow Julia Watts Belser in fall 2020.
December 2, 2020
How can animated films engage critical themes of diversity and inclusion? That was precisely the question at the center of Intermediate Animation, an art class taught by Elyse Kelly as a Doyle Seminar in spring 2020.
