George Bagley
College of Sciences
Radio and Television

Year Awarded: 2009

Teaching Philosophy

If there is a paramount object to teaching, it should be community. Community leads to confidence among my students that the course will be dynamic, will add to their own intellectual growth, while simultaneously ensuring that each point of view will be respected, all assumptions lying at the heart of the complex contract of teaching.

I look each term to cultivate a legitimate regard for all my students, a sincere desire to see them succeed in the course. If I really care about my students, if my concern for them is more than simple lip service, they will quickly discover this and invest themselves accordingly. This is particularly true in large classes where students can easily slip into anonymous oblivion.

I also seek in my classes to provoke. If I pose to students impotent interrogations of text material or the qualities or components of this or that particular principle, I’ve done little to promote their intellectual curiosity. Any learning will be mired in rote practice, discourse practically non-existent. If, on the other hand, I cause them to momentarily examine their casual convictions I’ve opened the door to critical re-articulation of those convictions. Most student responses begin viscerally, which is the perfect moment to help them appreciate higher dialectic thought, and since provocations, responses and discussion are very public, available to each member of class, one’s discovery becomes the unique product of exchange.

I know there are no perfect strategies for effective teaching. Each term, each new set of students demands its own unique considerations, and if I manage to lead my students toward intellectual curiosity and an understanding of the rewards of intellectual exchange, I discover within myself my own true potential to teach and learn, and my own reward for my small role in the exchange.