JACKSON, Tenn. — March 2, 2010 — In a new series of podcast interviews, 51社区 faculty members who have taken recent research leaves talk about their work and how their research enhanced their scholarship and teaching.
Faculty research leaves are a component of Union鈥檚 faculty development program, which provides resources for faculty members to spend time away from the classroom pursuing research projects.
鈥淭he Christian intellectual tradition is a stream, and we need to encourage our faculty to step into it,鈥� said Barbara McMillin, associate provost and dean of instruction. 鈥淒on鈥檛 be on the shoreline. Step into it and be a contributing scholar in your discipline.鈥�
The podcast interviews are designed to show how many different ways the research leave can be used. In recent years, some faculty members have traveled the world to conduct research, while others have stayed close to home and used the time away from their classrooms to read and reflect on future projects.
Among the podcasts already produced are interviews with:
- George H. Guthrie, the Benjamin W. Perry Professor of Bible, who in 2005 spent a semester at Tyndale House in Cambridge, England, to work on several projects, including a commentary on 2 Corinthians.
- Patricia L. Hamilton, associate professor of English, who used a 15-month leave to publish two academic articles on British women novelists from the 1750s.
- James Patterson, university professor and associate dean of the School of Christian Studies, who took a semester of leave time to research J.R. Graves, considered to be the father of Landmarkism in Baptist history.
- Gavin T. Richardson, associate professor of English, who during his leave completed a 25-page research paper examining the reverse image of an ancient Roman coin.
- Bobby C. Rogers, professor of English and writer-in-residence, who used his one-year research leave to finish a poetry collection that won the Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize from the University of Pittsburgh Press.
More interviews will be posted as additional faculty members complete their leave time. The podcasts are available at .