Teaching Sociology

Biomedical socialization and premed culture have been shown to promote reductionist and depersonalized approaches to understanding human difference, a serious problem in contemporary health care. In 2015, the Association for American Medical Colleges (AAMC) launched a new version of its Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) that included material from sociology, providing sociology departments an unprecedented opportunity to instruct premed students on contextualizing human difference and being sensitive to the diverse trajectories of people in the health care system. This article describes a large, public research institution’s introductory sociology course for premeds and draws on the students’ reflective writing to show how premeds valued the complexity, critical perspective, open-minded capacity, and conceptual approaches that sociology had to offer. In applying the sociological material to their experiences or impressions of the medical field, premed students felt that sociological instruction would help them become a more socially minded and critically engaged doctor.

Study-abroad and international-student programs are commonly understood to transform their participants into “global citizens” possessing “cross-cultural competencies.” Similar benefits are anticipated from “internationalization at home”—defined as any on-campus, internationally related activity—whereby international students engage with and thus enrich the lives of domestic students. In this article, we reflect on a research project tied to two coursework units, in which largely domestic undergraduate students undertake qualitative research with or about international students. When developing the project, we postulated that the researcher–informant engagement that characterizes qualitative research mirrors that required for effective domestic–international student engagement. In describing engagement, we utilize research on experiential learning, which suggests that experiences can become knowledge only through reflection, analysis, and synthesis. We examine the ways that cross-cultural engagement and experiential learning gained through students’ qualitative research might lead to the realization of the anticipated benefits of internationalization at home.

This conversation explores emerging debates concerning teaching to and about marginalized populations often left out of “representative” data sets. Based on our experiences studying, teaching, and belonging to some of these unrepresented populations, we outline some strategies sociologists may use to transform the limitations of data sets traditionally labeled as representative into tools for delivering core sociological concepts. In so doing, we argue that sociologists may respond to increasing critiques of “representative” data by using these critiques to facilitate critical thinking skills and methodological awareness among students. In closing, we encourage sociologists to consider the challenges and opportunities presented by increasing awareness of unrepresented populations within our classrooms and the broader social world.

It is well documented that interaction between diverse students encourages positive learning outcomes. Given this, we examine how to enhance the quantity and quality of student diversity in university classrooms. Drawing on sociological theory linking life experiences with ways of knowing, we investigate how to increase classroom diversity by considering when, where, and how courses are scheduled and delivered. Our focus on structural features of academic scheduling and classroom offerings in relation to compositional diversity is unique, complementing established individual-level approaches for diversity enhancement. Using data from 96 Introduction to Sociology courses offered at the University of British Columbia between 2004 and 2014, we demonstrate that course structure has significant influence on a variety of student diversity measures (age, academic year, student major, country of origin, domestic or international status, and gender). We conclude by discussing ways instructors can employ sociological insights to optimize the pedagogical possibilities and challenges of diverse classrooms.

Common concerns for many instructors of introductory college courses are that their students do not prepare for or attend class, are minimally engaged, and exhibit poor reading comprehension and writing skills. How can instructors respond to these challenges? Research finds that frequent testing improves the learning outcomes of students. Can it motivate better studying habits and expand their engagement with the class? This article assesses an experimental design comparing student perceptions and responses to low-stakes, daily written exams versus dispersed, high-stakes major exams in two introductory sociology classes. The objective of the experimental design was to test how daily exams incentivize compliance with assigned readings and class attendance as well as enhance students’ experience and engagement within the class. My findings suggest that low-stakes frequent exams are a more effective method to generate these outcomes compared to infrequent high-stakes exams.