Rebecca Todd Peters - Wabash Center

Wabash Center for
Teaching and Learning in Theology and Religion

In 2002-03 I participated in a Wabash Center colloquium for Pre-Tenure Faculty at Church-Related Institutions. Each participant was admitted to the colloquy based on their proposal for a teaching project. The work that I did on this project led to a redesign of our senior seminar at Elon and the addition of a sophomore level research/methods course to our required curriculum for the major. A description of my project follows:

“Examining the Role of the Senior Seminar as a Capstone Course in Religious Studies”
Dr. Rebecca Todd Peters, Elon University Project

I propose to redevelop the Senior Seminar in Religious Studies at Elon University in ways that will create a true capstone experience for our majors.

Background Over the last eleven years, this course has been one of the ongoing challenges of the department, as students and faculty have never been satisfied with the course. Over the years each member of the department has taught it in a variety of different ways. No one has yet figured out what to “do” with the Senior Seminar. Learning goals Based on the history and difficulty of this course in the department, I have the following learning goals for this project:

create a course that will interest and engage the student\
create a course that reflects serious and deep engagement with the discipline of religious studies
create a course that models/teaches independent learning and responsibility
create a course that builds on their previous coursework
create a course that requires students to both synthesize and apply their knowledge of the discipline

Method(s)

incorporating colleagues input

Knowing the history and experience of this course, and students participation in it, will only help me in redesigning it for the future. While it remains to be seen whether I will develop a course that I will teach on an annual basis, or develop a course outline that can be taught by my colleagues as well, in either case this course is a central aspect of the major.

incorporating student input

I have talked with some students about the course and I think it will be beneficial to solicit student input from seniors who have taken the course. While student input is important on the level of simple information gathering, it is also critically important in terms of generating student investment in the course.

surveying other programs

In addition to the collective wisdom that exists within the Religious Studies department at Elon, it will also be instructive and thought-provoking to survey other religious studies programs and to examine the kind of requirements that they have for their majors. I plan to select three or four very different models and talk with the professors who teach those courses about their experiences. In this way I hope to gather some anecdotal data about what works, what does not, and why.

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