CHASS Names Second Cohort of Faculty Fellows to Advance Critical Thinking

The College of Humanities and Social Sciences (CHASS) has selected nine professors for the second cohort of Faculty Fellows, who will work to advance the teaching of critical thinking.

“We are pleased to continue our CHASS Fellows program and in this second cohort, we are assembling thought leaders in the college who are committed to advancing and expanding the work of teaching critical thinking to our students,” said Denis Provencher, associate dean for interdisciplinary affairs and partnerships, which is sponsoring the program.

This year’s program supports faculty as they collaborate across disciplines to explore new ideas, approaches and tools for fostering interdisciplinary critical thinking during their summer and fall 2025 fellowship. Each fellow receives $2,000 — for travel, research, or additional compensation — to complete their fellowship project. The projects center on teaching students to read a classic paper in the fellow’s specific teaching area as an argumentative essay.

The CHASS Faculty Fellows for summer/fall 2025 are:

• Christian Doll and Chelsey Dyer, Sociology and Anthropology
• Steven Greene, Political Science
• Matt Hettche, Philosophy and Religious Studies
• Anne McLaughlin, Psychology
• Kristin Mahony-Atallah, Psychology
• Shaun Respess, Philosophy and Religious Studies
• Roy Schwartzman, Communication
• Bethany Van Scooter, English 

Philosophy professors Gary Comstock and Irina Mikhalevich, who are leading this year’s program, said the fellows will examine how thinkARGUMENTS, an online immersive platform for critical thinking and civil discourse, can be integrated into their classes to strengthen students’ analytical skills.

Two of thinkARGUMENTS’ strategies — Mastery Learning and Argument Mapping — guide students through a step-by-step process, gradually building their skills. Students must demonstrate proficiency through quizzes before advancing to the next level.

Comstock noted that this year’s program tackles a pressing concern: a global study of more than 100,000 college graduates revealed that 49% do not demonstrate proficiency in critical thinking. Additionally, research indicates that students participating in the thinkARGUMENTS course improve their critical thinking skills by nearly an entire letter grade. 

“We aim to ensure that all students who come through CHASS have this skill because hiring managers are looking for it in job candidates,” Comstock said.

The potential impact of the fellows program is evident in CHASS’s First-Year Writing Program. English professor Bethany Van Scooter will incorporate critical thinking and argument mapping into her sections of ENG 101, a required course for all NC State students.

“This is a big step toward our ultimate goal of ensuring every CHASS student graduates with strong critical thinking skills,” said Comstock.

Provencher added, “Bethany’s work exemplifies the reach and impact we hope to achieve with this cohort.”

The nine fellows will participate in training sessions for thinkARGUMENTS. These sessions will consist of 10 online hours during the summer and six in-person hours (in four 90-minute meetings) in the fall.

Fellows will also produce one discipline-specific critical thinking module, teach it in at least one of their classes, and make it available for general use. The result is a resource that will be available to other faculty, on- or off-campus, interested in enhancing their critical thinking teaching.