CFP: Beyond the Paper: Alternative Assignment Design for Interdisciplinary Majors: 2026 AAPT-APA Teaching Hub

The American Association of Philosophy Teachers (AAPT) and the APA Committee on the Teaching of Philosophy (CTP) seek presenters for a session on “Beyond the Paper: Alternative Assignment Design for Interdisciplinary Majors” at the AAPT-APA Teaching Hub at the 2026 APA Eastern Division meeting, January 8–9, in Baltimore, Maryland. The AAPT-APA Teaching Hub is a collaborative meeting space hosting a series of interactive workshops and conversations designed specifically for philosophers and created to celebrate teaching within the context of the APA divisional meetings. The Teaching Hub aims to offer a range of high quality and inclusive development opportunities that address the teaching of philosophy at all levels.

SESSION GOALS: This session is designed to explore alternative ways of constructing philosophy assignments for college classrooms. Frequently, philosophy assignments fall into one of three categories—papers, presentations, or exams. While these traditional modes of evaluation have significant pedagogical benefits, there are many other types of assignments that might be more beneficial for students who do not intend to pursue graduate careers where argumentative writing and speaking skills will be most important. Students with backgrounds in design, fine art, creative writing, music, engineering, computer science, and so on might be better served with and more excited by assignments that play to and advance their existing skillsets and interests.

Additionally, in the era of ChatGPT, it may be helpful to more heavily rely on assignments that can’t be as easily forged by AI. Creative assignments, including those with visual, video, creative writing, collaboration, or design elements, might be helpful even for students who don’t have interests in the arts. Finally, many philosophical topics tend to inspire deep personal reflection and artistic expression, and we would do well to encourage our students down these pathways.

This session is intended to bring together philosophy teachers who are interested in designing experimental, interdisciplinary assessments. We are especially eager for proposals that 1) encourage student creativity and 2) appeal to non-majors and students in other disciplines.

We welcome proposals on any topic related to this theme, including (but not limited to) the following:

• What lessons can be learned from other disciplines (e.g., design, fine art, creative writing, music, engineering, computer science, etc.) that can help us to more effectively bring students into meaningful philosophical and personal exploration?
• What sorts of assignments beyond papers, exams, and presentations can help communicate philosophical content and develop philosophical skills? 
• How can we design assignments that encourage non-major interest and facilitate interdisciplinary outcomes? 
• How can those assignments be philosophically rigorous while maintaining accessibility and meaning for non-major students?
• Which critical lenses are worth bringing to bear on the question of assignment design? How can these lenses help inform the types of assignments we design and how we deploy them within syllabi? 
• How do these types of assignments play out in a classroom environment? What practical requirements are necessary for their implementation?
• How might these assignments help mitigate the rise of AI in the philosophy classroom?
• What are the pitfalls of deemphasizing papers, exams, and presentations? What are the tradeoffs?

FORMAT: Rather than a traditional paper presentation, Teaching Hub sessions are expected to be highly interactive. Proposals should indicate how audience members will participate in the session. The primary goal for the Teaching Hub is for attendees to walk away with something concrete to deploy in their own classrooms/teaching context. 

What does the Teaching Hub mean by “highly interactive”? This includes (but is not limited to) the following:

• Presenters focusing less time on arguments for teaching some content or teaching a particular way, and more time on what it would actually look like to teach that content or teach in that way.
• Presenters thinking of the audience as their students and themselves as the facilitator/teacher. How could you cover the same content in a way that your audience participates in active learning activities during the session time?
• Presenters offering and demonstrating clear, practical examples of teaching methods, classroom activities, policies, practices, etc.
• Presenters conceptualizing of themselves as a facilitator, not giving traditional philosophical only talk-style presentation. 

DEADLINE FOR PROPOSALS: August 1, 2025

SUBMISSIONS:

• Proposals should be sent to Jordan Kokot ([email protected]) and/or Pol Pardini ([email protected]) by August 1, 2025, with the subject line “Beyond the Paper: AAPT-APA TH 2026.”
• In the body of the email, please include your name, institutional affiliation (if any), position (if any), and email contact information.
• Submissions/proposals will be expected to align with the AAPT’s forthcoming AI policy, which at the minimum will discourage the use of AI and require that AI use be cited.
• Attached to the email, please include anonymized submission of 500–750 words (.doc, .docx, or .pdf) detailing the following: (1) describe the focus of your session, (2) an overview of how you plan to use your session time, including how you will make the session highly interactive, and (3) what you hope the audience will take away from your session.
• We aim to select presenters by August 15, 2025.

Questions about this session should be directed to Jordan Kokot and/or Pol Pardini at the above email addresses. For general information about the AAPT-APA Teaching Hub, please visit the Teaching Hub page. For specific information about the Teaching Hub at the 2026 Eastern APA meeting in Baltimore, please contact co-chairs Rebeccah Leiby ([email protected]) and Savannah Pearlman ([email protected]).