The School of Social & Behavioral Sciences and the Department of History is hosting a regional Reacting to the Past faculty workshop April 3-4. The conference is jointly sponsored with the Barnard College Reacting to the Past Program.

Reacting to the Past is an award-winning pedagogy involving complex, collaborative role-playing games in which students seek to attain victory objectives while grappling with key texts in the history of ideas. Faculty and administrators attending the conference will learn about Reacting to the Past by participating in intensive two-day workshops on a particular game.

There will be discussions of a more general character on student motivation, teaching, liberal arts education and the problems and possibilities of the pedagogy, in addition to game sessions. Participants are encouraged to attend all game and plenary sessions.

The Reacting to the Past method was originated by Mark Carnes at Barnard College and has since expanded under the support of a consortium of 40 colleges and universities.

Andrew Keitt, Ph.D., professor of history, says the goal of the workshop is to introduce the technique to faculty at UAB and at other schools in the region. Carnes will lead faculty participating in the conference in an abbreviated version of a reacting game “Rousseau, Burke and the Revolution in France 1791.” In addition, faculty will attend a series of three plenary sessions on topics including, “The Classroom Experience,” “Curricular Considerations: Course Objectives, Class Sizes and Syllabi,” and “Reacting to the Crisis in General Education.”

The conference also will bring together a panel of experts to work on a game in development titled “The Struggle for Civil Rights: From Birmingham to Memphis.”

Contact Keitt at 934-7083 or akeitt@uab.edu for more information or visit www.barnard.columbia.edu/reacting/conference/uab.