IDEALS Symposium Spotlight: Robert Foster and Joshua Patterson from the University of Georgia

This is part of a series featuring IDEALS research awardees presenting at the IDEALS Research Symposium in Atlanta on September 13–14
Dr. Robert Foster is Lecturer in Religion and New Testament, Department of Religion, University of Georgia
Joshua Patterson is a Doctoral Candidate, Institute of Higher Education, University of Georgia
Presentation title: The Transformative Power of Religious Coursework?: Exploring Student Expectations and Attitudes about Religious Diversity and Interreligious Cooperation for Positive Social Change
Abstract: This study indicates that a variety of institutional characteristics have significant impacts on students’ reported curricular decisions that engage them in curriculum that enhances their experience of religious pluralism and diversity. Such factors include high research activity and the religious affiliation of the institution. Surprisingly, the pre-college student worldview does not play a significant role in such curricular choices. And, while many within the discipline of religion studies believe that enrolling in religion courses is likely to have a significant, positive impact on development of religious diversity and ecumenical worldview, the findings of this study do not necessarily support this intuition.
Q1: Why are you interested in worldview diversity and/or interfaith engagement?
Robert Foster: Problems like ecological sustainability, poverty, and women’s rights, whether local, national, or global, require people of different worldviews to work together on such concerns. Such cooperative effort can, simultaneously, provide opportunity to celebrate and honor the real differences in worldview and religion that prove so meaningful to each person that they know they cannot abandon their intellectual and/or religious traditions.
Problems like ecological sustainability, poverty, and women’s rights, whether local, national, or global, require people of different worldviews to work together on such concerns.
Q2: How do your personal research interests align or intersect with IDEALS research? In what unique ways do your personal research interests extend the work of IDEALS?
Joshua Patterson: As a researcher working at the intersections of religion and higher education, IDEALS research presents a fascinating opportunity to use social scientific data and methods to explore students’ exploration of their own worldviews and the worldviews of others. I am also interested in the impact of institutional religious affiliation on various student experiences, and IDEALS provides fruitful data to explore that question. I believe that by having a background in scholarship and teaching within religious studies, and recent experience in higher education scholarship, I bring a unique and integrative perspective to the work of IDEALS.
I believe that by having a background in scholarship and teaching within religious studies…I bring a unique and integrative perspective to the work of IDEALS.
Q3: Who is the key audience for your IDEALS-related research? How do you see this audience leveraging IDEALS research to increase understanding/engagement of worldview diversity and interfaith engagement?
Our particular research encourages conversations among religious studies scholars about the place of interfaith engagement within the field of religion. College administrators may use our research to build a case for increased administrative support for curriculum designed to promote worldview diversity and/or interfaith engagement. Religion faculty may look for more and different opportunities to shape their teaching with interfaith engagement in mind. By fostering more conversations on interfaith engagement within religious studies, even faculty for whom interfaith engagement is part of their research or teaching can help others develop critical professional practices around interfaith engagement that is intellectually and academically rigorous.
By fostering more conversations on interfaith engagement within religious studies, even faculty for whom interfaith engagement is part of their research or teaching can help others develop critical professional practices around interfaith engagement that is intellectually and academically rigorous.
About the Symposium
The IDEALS Research Symposium will occur on September 13–14 in Atlanta. The Symposium will be a unique gathering where scholars and campus educators can come together to explore cutting-edge research with an emphasis on practical application, build a community of practitioners who have shared learning and language from the IDEALS project, and work to make meaning of the information together.
The gathering will highlight the work of the IDEALS Research Awards, bridge research with campus practice, and feature nationally renowned speakers, including IFYC’s Dr. Eboo Patel, and the Co-Principal Investigators for IDEALS, Dr. Matthew Mayhew and Dr. Alyssa Rockenbach. The program will include engaging and interactive workshops, in-depth discussions of IDEALS findings, and ample opportunities for networking and connecting with peers at other campuses.
