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Posted April 28, 2015 by
Tags: OnCUE

As any professor knows, real life sometimes crashes your party. Events on campus or around the world can require a change of lesson plans. That has been the case in my classes all year. I was teaching courses in Urban Studies during the unrest in Ferguson and the Eric Garner death in New York City. Today, I’ve had to ask myself what questions I would want students in my Chicago course to ask about events in Baltimore. What questions are they now ready to ask and to begin to answer? How has the class prepared students to engage with the death of Freddie Gray and the unfolding protests and riots in the city?

Below are a few brief ideas on teaching the Baltimore riots in my Chicago course.

These will be the leading questions in my class today. This wasn't how I drew up the class session when we started the course in March, but it will help our students to grapple with today's news and to see the connections between what they're learning in class and what goes on beyond our campus.