In this episode, we talk with Geography professor and education abroad program leader Brian Grabbatin.
Brian's discipline offers students new information and perspective on the world around them: in the natural world around the college, in the study of human and physical geography in the classroom and abroad as he takes them overseas to countries they've never visited before.
We talk about firsts and the stress and excitement of travel in the mind and the body. What is it like for students to begin to explore our world through his classes and as tourists? What does he do to help them succeed in these explorations? We talk about his own experience as a first generation college student as a young man and what that brings to his teaching.
Join us for a rich conversation about teaching practice that helps build the "messy networks" of interconnected knowledge that students slowly construct as they progress in one of his Geography courses.
Listen to Episode 8 here or stream it from Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
Welcome to Barcelona!
Here are some pictures of the first MTC trip to Barcelona, Spain. Students have also traveled to London and leave for Costa Rica in May of 2025!
Brian mentions showing clips in class from Anthony Bourdain's trip to Tanzania, especially the famously beautiful and intricate doorways. Here are some of the links that he uses to show students a part of the world few of them have learned about before.