Professors’ ENG101 revamp among first Overcoming Status Quo winners

October 2, 2024

Professors asking students to examine emotions in their English 101 writing courses

Campbell University English professors Dr. Eric Dunnum and Dr. Sherry Truffin were looking for a way to make their English 101 courses distinctive from other schools and more relevant to today's students. Their idea: have students write about emotions and mental well-being (with a focus on happiness and sadness) and incorporate a variety of disciplinary perspectives (psychology, biochemistry, religion and theology, to name a few) into that writing.

In short, mold their curriculums to increase student interest and motivation and, in turn, make them better writers in an age when too many are turning to generative AI to put words to page.

Their plan is the kind of outside-of-the-box thinking that Executive Vice President Dr. John Roberson and his recently formed committee are looking for, and the idea has made Dunnum and Truffin among the first recipients of Campbell's "Overcoming the Status Quo" awards.

"One of the challenges, as we get more students with dual enrollment and students coming in with transfer credits, is that more and more students are taking [ENG 101] in high school or community college before they come here. So we wanted to make this course that everybody offers unique to Campbell and give it some added value," said Truffin, who credited the idea and legwork to Dunnum. "Let's make this a more attractive class at Campbell, something that will possibly attract more beginning students."

Truffin said the revamped course connects with Campbell University's hallmarks of character, initiative and calling, as well as belonging and well-being.

"Taking an interdisciplinary approach to topics like emotions and mental health - topics that are more in the spotlight since the pandemic - will, we think, make it more interesting to our students," Truffin said. "We've already started with happiness narratives and having students define happiness and reflect on their personal lives. We'll move on to an academic synthesis [combining multiple sources and ideas in writing], and then we'll get into sadness and its impact."

Truffin and Dunnum hope to eventually connect English 101 readings and assignments to other campus-wide initiatives - to "demonstrate the benefits of interdisciplinary thinking and a liberal arts education." They also hope the course will lay the groundwork for a revised version of English 102 and a distinctive Campbell first-year writing program.

Their idea was among several honored with an "Overcoming the Status Quo" award this year, an initiative launched by Roberson to get faculty and staff to come up with new ways to make Campbell University better and more attractive to future students and potential employees. The awards come with a monetary prize ranging from $500 to $2,000, made possible by a $50,000 gift recently from an anonymous donor.

"Status quo frequently implies a state of affairs that is fixed, stagnant or unchangeable," Roberson said. "Across the higher education landscape, many institutions are desperately clinging to their status quo, providing yesterday's answers to today's realities and tomorrow's challenges and opportunities. Institutions holding to an antiquated status quo are on a path to non-relevance at best and self-destruction at worst. Campbell University can no longer accept - and certainly not embrace - its version of status quo."

- This story is the first in a series of upcoming features on winners of the first "Overcoming the Status Quo" awards

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