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Views of the Bell Tower at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Views of the Bell Tower at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Six new interdisciplinary, team-taught courses will be offered across the College beginning in fall 2017 in disciplines ranging from physics and astronomy to public policy to art.

Dean Kevin Guskiewicz issued a call for proposals for faculty last fall, and a selection committee chose the following courses:

  • “Climate and Energy Transitions,” taught by Gerald Cecil (physics and astronomy) and John M. Bane (marine sciences).
  • “Art and Fashion from Rome to Timbuktu,” taught by Victoria Rovine (art) and Herica Valladares (classics).
  • “Geography for Future Leaders: People, the Planet and You,” taught by Elizabeth Havice and Diego Riveros-Iregui (geography).
  • “The Lived Experience of Inequality and Public Policy,” taught by Candis Watts Smith (public policy) and GerShun Avilez (English and comparative literature).
  • “Ordinary Differential Equations within the Modern Scientific Method,” taught by Roberto Camassa and Richard M. McLaughlin (mathematics).
  • “Healing in Literature and Ethnography,” taught by Michelle Rivkin-Fish (anthropology) and Jane Thrailkill (English and comparative literature).

These new team-taught courses provide an opportunity to offer fresh, multifaceted approaches to complex issues in a way no single instructor could, Guskiewicz said.

“We hope these grants will help eliminate some of the barriers that can discourage interdisciplinary teaching,” he said. “This was a pilot project, and we expect to provide more opportunities for innovative courses in the future.”


Published in the Spring 2017 issue | The Scoop

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