September Events

Constitution Day Celebration - September 17th, 2024

Mark Whitters at the Upshur Institute celebration

On September 17th, the Upshur Institute for Civic Education hosted a luncheon celebrating recent award recipients followed by a workshop with Sphere Institute exploring strategies to build a culture and practice for facilitating meaningful and equitable conversations.

In their workshop titled, "Constitutional Conversations: Fostering Viewpoint-Diverse Civil Discourse in Your Classroom", John Snoad, Senior Manager and Scott Alford, Manager of Initiatives at Sphere Education Initiatives, led attendees in discovering and exploring strategies to build a culture and practice for facilitating meaningful and equitable conversations through viewpoint-diverse civil discourse.

Award recipients Mark Whitters (Lecturer; pictured top right), Mary-Elizabeth Murphy (Faculty; bottom left), Alexis Braun Marks (Faculty), Matt Jones (Lecturer) and Zuzana Tomas (Faculty; bottom right) delivered remarks at the reception and were honored for their projects to prepare Eastern Michigan University students for the intellectual demands of democratic participation through critical inquiry and engagement in History and other Social Studies disciplines.

Promoting Civil Discourse and Celebrating Constitution Week at EMU

UICE Director Brigid Beaubien and Michigan journalists Finley and Henderson

UICE Director Brigid Beaubien and Southeast Michigan journalists Nolan Finley and Stephen Henderson

Southeast Michigan Journalists Nolan Finley and Stephen Henderson inspired thought-provoking conversation on the value of civil discourse and understanding diverse viewpoints during the Upshur Institute for Civic Education's constitution week celebration on September 19th, 2024.

During their presentation in the Student Center Auditorium, Finley and Henderson emphasized the significance of civility in discussions, especially during elections years, as well as the importance of learning to listen to different perspectives.

Teaching in Turbulent Times

All tenure track faculty and lecturers are invited to attend this program providing support and strategies for instructional staff in addressing in our classrooms the challenges of the 2024 election, and other stressful local, national, and world events.

Teaching in Turbulent Times event flyer

2024-2025 Award Recipients

The Upshur Institute for Civic Education at Eastern Michigan University has awarded funding to faculty and lecturers for projects to prepare Eastern Michigan University students for the intellectual demands of democratic participation through critical inquiry and engagement in History and other Social Studies disciplines.

Winners of the 2024-2025 UICE Awards are:

Kristopher Phillips

Kristopher Phillips: "Founding an Eastern Michigan University Ethics Bowl Team."

Ann Blakeslee

Ann Blakeslee: "Engaging with Democracy through Writing."

Ashley Johnson Bavery

Ashley Johnson Bavery: "Puerto Rico: Exploring the United States Democracy."

First Round Award Recipients Announced

Established in September, UICE-EMU promotes innovative teaching and learning methods in History and social studies. The UICE investigates and tests new ways to apply and adapt approaches to history and social studies teacher training courses at EMU and helps foster a new generation of informed and engaged citizens and innovative educators at the high school and college levels to benefit students in Michigan and beyond. The Institute grounds itself in producing citizens with strong civic knowledge, skills, dispositions, and capacities.

The award program aims to support projects that:

Projects could develop Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement through:

Course development plans that encourage greater student engagement and offer the opportunity for transformative learning experiences;
Collaborative and/or interdisciplinary work around democratic engagement;
Research projects, including conducting experiments and/or demonstrations;
Projects related to the scholarship of teaching and learning;
Community engagement experiences (local or global);
Team-based or problem-based learning;
Large group debates;
Peer teaching;
Roleplaying or game-based learning;
Place-based pedagogies;
Faculty learning communities.

Selected proposals receive up to $4,500, which must be spent during the 2023/2024 Academic year.

Winners of the inaugural UICE Awards are:

Mark Whitters

Mark Whitters (Lecturer): "Rethinking Civic Education in High Schools: A New Strategy, Part I."

Mary Elizabeth Murphy

Ashley Bavery

Mary Elizabeth Murphy, Ashley Bavery, Alexis Braun Marks (Faculty): "You Are Welcome Here: "EMU's Afghan Refugee Oral History Project."

Zuzana Tomas

Zuzana Tomas (Faculty): "Cultivating Teacher Candidates' Critical Global Citizenship through Innovative, Community-Engaged Study Abroad."

Grand Opening of the Upshur Institute for Civic Education (UICE)

The Department of History & Philosophy was delighted to host the Grand Opening of the Upshur Institute for Civic Education (UICE), which is a result of a major gift the Department received last year from History professor emerita Jiu-Hwa Upshur.

The UICE Grand Opening coincided with Michigan’s Constitution Week, taking place at 4 p.m. on Thursday, September 21 in the Student Center Ballroom. The Keynote Speaker was Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, who was first elected in 2018 and re-elected in 2022. Secretary Benson spoke on the importance of civic education and Constitution Day, a federal observance. Watch a video of the Grand Opening and Secretary Benson's address here.