We have new Fellows!!!!

The MC-Smithsonian Faculty Fellowship program is delighted to announce the 10 new Fellows selected for the 2023 cohort. As always, competition was strong, and the Committee was faced with the tough task of selecting the new cohort.  The group represents wide-ranging interests and a variety of disciplines and will spend the year engaging with the 2023 theme, “The Evolving Role of Museums: Preserving the Past, Portraying the Present, and Shaping the Future.’

Our 2023 SFF Cohort includes:  Ali Alavi (Business, RV), Shayla Atkins (English, TPSS), Elizabeth Fillion  (Psychology, TPSS) ,Diego Hernandez (ELAP, TPSS),  Jenny Hodges (Communications, RV), Roberto Hurtado  (World Languages, RV), Victor Provost (World Music, RV),  Alzira “Lena” Ruano (Photography, TPSS),  Katya Salmi (Sociology, RV) and Katherine Smith (English, GT).

Faculty Fellows will spend the spring 2023 semester focusing on museum learning and pedagogy and will engage with the Smithsonian for a series of  virtual – and hopefully, some in person-seminars and tours led by Smithsonian curators and educators. During the fall 2023 semester, they will implement their new theme-based lessons and assignments that integrate museum objects and collections with required course content. In the Fellowship, students and faculty experiment with time-tested and novel pedagogical approaches to help MC students formulate their own questions, generate knowledge, and develop more sophisticated approaches to critical thinking and problem-solving.

Now entering its 26th year, the MC-Smithsonian Faculty Fellowship is the product of a unique collaboration between the Paul Peck Humanities Institute and the Smithsonian Office of Educational Technology. It is the first of its kind for the Smithsonian Institution and a community college. More than 200 professors have participated in the Fellowship since its inception, guiding well more than 20,000 MC students and their families through various Smithsonian museums as part of the program.

Please help us in welcoming our 2023 Smithsonian Faculty Fellows!