racism

I teach preaching at Drew Theological School. Two sets of questions guide my pedagogy. One involves hermeneutics: I compel my students to ask, ‘How does “preaching” manifest beyond our words and in the larger world?’ and ‘Why should we pay attention to what others have to say?’ The other set ...

My friend Chuck Melchert took a significant risk once when we were playing a round of golf together. Chuck retired after serving as Dean of the Presbyterian School of Christian Education, and he knows more about teaching than just about anybody I know. He also sits in on my classes ...

As I followed the #FergusonSyllabus twitter conversation just before this semester began, I considered ways to address race in a new way in my pastoral care course.  Unmasking structures of suffering and developing anti-racist pastoral care practices are already important to both my research and my pedagogy.  What is different ...

“The asceticism of teaching is the willingness to teach the students you have rather than the students you wish you had.” The rigor and conviction of Patricia O’Connell Killen’s claim about teaching as a practice has impacted my approach to the classroom more than anything else in the ...

Due to the racial and religious homogeneity of my institution, which is predominantly white and Christian (the University of Findlay, in rural Ohio), I have unconsciously focused on issues of greatest concern to my students, especially in the beginning of my teaching career – and this has not included race. This ...