PLL Internal Report Summary

Religion and Public Life offers opportunities for the public to engage with the complexities of religion’s influence on civic life. Due to COVID and the proliferation of online events and courses, we’ve witnessed massive growth in our reach, and we plan to continue to leverage the resources of Harvard Divinity School’s faculty, affiliates, and networks to offer meaningful content to grapple with the power of religion.

Advancing Religious Literacy with Secondary School Educators

Foundational to RPL programming is our ongoing support to secondary educators who are introducing a cultural studies approach to teaching religion in U.S. high schools and community colleges.

The RLPI offered its first, fully online, asynchronous Summer Institute in 2021, drawing 22 participants from 9 states and from Canada, and Russia. The program provided seven modules for educators, with learner centered introductions to critical pedagogy and religious literacy case studies through analysis of power, peace, and conflict frameworks. RPL staff and HDS graduate students provided real-time responses and individual feedback to each participant who completed the course. A second fully online, free Summer Institute for educators will be held in July 2022, with 30 participating in both self-paced and live online sessions, and another 40 in the asynchronous course.

This year, the team introduced three unique opportunities to explore principles of religious literacy applied to specific topics: imagination and the arts, place-based knowledges and Indigenous rights, and climate justice. Each workshop took the format of an asynchronous online module and a live workshop featuring RPL Fellows as guest facilitators. This successful pilot engaged more than 50 educators from 12 states within the United States.

The three asynchronous modules are available for educators to access, on their own time, for professional development and to strengthen classroom experiences for youth.

A sampling of responses from participating educators:

“I am highly impressed by the intersectional and inclusive materials that have been incorporated in the modules.”

“I am enthusiastic about these workshops, and I am grateful for the opportunity to participate, and not only participate, but to be included and to be seen.”

“The mix of readings, videos, and discussion boards was effective. I also appreciated a diversity of voices speaking to imagination from their different contexts. The [multimedia content] was especially welcomed because many teachers could instantly see how to use it in a classroom application.”

HarvardX Massive Online Open Courses: Nearly One Million Students Enrolled Globally

RPL’s highly successful Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) were relaunched for a sixth year, with updated content and with combined enrollment over the lifetime of the courses now approaching one million.

The 45,120 registrants joining the courses since the October 2021 relaunch included 16,198 participants in the Religion, Conflict, and Peace course. Overall, 987,298 people have registered to participate in these courses since their launch in 2016. Within the World Religions through Its Scriptures series, the Christianity, Buddhism, and Islam modules remained the most popular, followed by Religious Literacy. This year, the popular Religion, Conflict, and Peace course added new content that highlighted a hermeneutics of citizenship framework and work in cultural activism.

Given the continued high participation levels, RPL supported four yearlong graduate students to engage with and monitor active discussion boards across the courses. Their ongoing engagement enhances learner experience while providing RPL with deeper insight into the audiences that enroll in these courses.

Participants had this to say about their experience of the courses in general and the new content in particular:

“It has been enriching and overwhelming all mixed together. I have been challenged in ways I cannot explain. My eyes open to a world I know little about. Again, thank you, and, to all the responders, you help me grow.”

“Thank you for making this class so transformative. It was. You are the reason I believe I can make my own corner of the world a little better.”

“The course has exceeded my expectations; I want to thank you for the level and depth of the material covered during the course. The topics on the discussion board invited me to reflect in depth with others with different perspectives. Thanks to this, the world does not seem so big and far away.”

“Thank you for bringing this course and making it accessible to learn. I am grateful for the efforts to make this a diverse class, addressing many issues, and remaining respectful and hopeful about the future of religion and peace.”

Access the free Massive Online Open Courses.

Weather Reports

In partnership with Harvard Divinity School’s Center for the Study and World Religions and the Planetary Health Alliance, RPL hosted Weather Reports, a fall series of online public conversations with HDS Writer-in-Residence Terry Tempest Williams. Simultaneously, Diane Moore taught a fall course, Weather Reports Seminar: Conversations in a Climate of Uncertainty. RPL staff also supported Terry Tempest Williams in hosting a post-event series of “fireside chats” to continue discussions between Terry and interested HDS students.

The overarching focus of this coordinated effort was to explore how we might recast this moment in time as one of meaning rather than despair. How do the arts and acts of imagination allow us to see the glittering edges of uncertainty as places of possibility instead of portals of anxiety? And where do we find the strength to creatively confront all that is breaking our hearts?

The 10-week online conversation series hosted by Terry Tempest Williams featured conversations with poets, writers, public servants, theologians, biologists, scholars, and activists who are engaged in the spiritual reckoning and awakening surrounding climate collapse, sacred land protection, and planetary health. Highlights included:

• A Burning Testament to Climate Collapse, with filmmaker Lucy Walker
• The Climate of Sacred Land Protection, with Gwich’in activist Bernadette Demientieff
• The Climate of Grief, with poet Victoria Chang
• The Climate of Compassion for All Beings, with professor Janet Gyatso
• The Climate of Consciousness, with writer Michael Pollan
• The Climate of Resistance, with novelist Chloe Aridjis and global activist Wanjira Mathai
• The Climate of Attention, with New Yorker staff writer Elizabeth Kolbert
• The Climate of the Future, with novelist Kim Stanley Robinson

The series attracted 3,902 live attendees and nearly 14,000 views online. These conversations continue in classrooms and in our programming, including through the climate track within the CRPL and in the professional development modules for secondary school educators.

Launching Joint Certificate in Religion and Society

Beginning in the fall of 2022, a new jointly sponsored certificate will invite professional and lifelong learners to learn religious literacy theory and methods and explore their application. Since 2008, Harvard Divinity School and Harvard Extension School have partnered on sponsoring the Religious Studies and Education graduate certificate for Harvard Extension students. In 2013, the partnership was amended to allow HDS students to earn the certificate as part of their HDS degree program.

The new joint certificate expands the reach of this opportunity to a broader audience of experienced professionals. Made up of four courses, the content will advance the public understanding of religion from two different entry points: one place-based, one professions-based.

One teacher in the RPL network will be selected to receive a full scholarship sponsored by Harvard Extension School toward the completion of the certificate.