In Spring 2022, PEWS Associate Director Melissa Jacquart was awarded a Whiting Public Engagement Fellowship, which celebrates and supports faculty in the humanities who embrace public engagement as part of the scholarly vocation.
The Whiting Public Engagement Program (WPEP) is a distinctive national grant founded to champion the public humanities in all forms, and to highlight the roles scholars play in collaborative work to deploy the humanities for the public good.
Partnering with the Greater Cincinnati STEM Collaborative
Melissa Jacquart‘s Bringing Philosophy to Science Fairs project will pilot an after-school Philosophy & Science Fair Club for 7th and 8th-grade students in Cincinnati. Jacquart will partner with the Greater Cincinnati STEM Collaborative to create lesson plans designed to introduce students to the philosophical and other humanistic aspects of science by identifying a theme, such as space exploration or climate change, and then deploying philosophical methods of inquiry to deeply investigate it. For example, students may consider how scientists’ intellectual context and world views impact the scientific method and process of discovery, or the role trust plays in the public’s understanding of scientific findings. Over the course of fifteen weeks, students will develop individual projects related to the shared theme and informed by philosophical discussion. The club will culminate with each student entering their project in the Southwest Ohio Science and Engineering Expo Science Fair, one of the nation’s largest student science fairs.
Please complete this form for updates and information on Melissa Jacquart’s “Philosophy & Science Fairs” project with the University of Cincinnati Center for Public Engagement with Science! This includes information on the future (2023/2024) workshop on how to deploy the model developed in this project in your own local context.