Friday Forum – Jonathan Pollack

“Cost-cutting vs. Community:
The Challenges and Opportunities of Teaching Southeast Asia at a Community College”

Dr. Jonathan Z. S. Pollack
Chair of the Department of History
Coordinator of the Arts and Humanities Pre-Major
Madison Area Technical College

Federal financial-aid programs have imposed increasingly strict guidelines for courses that are part of students’ academic programs and therefore aidable. Students at two-year colleges often need significant remediation in math, English, and science. As a result, courses in Southeast Asian history are defined as “non-program” courses for a growing number of students, and enrollments are falling as a result. Concurrently, the Madison area’s growing Hmong community is a natural audience for courses in the history and culture of this area. This talk will describe how UW—Madison and Madison Area Technical College can navigate these challenges to create more opportunities for education in Southeast Asia at the community-college level.

Dr. Jonathan Pollack is the Chair of the Department of History and Coordinator of the Arts and Humanities Pre-Major at Madison Area Technical College.

This event is free and open to the public. This event is free and open to the public. A recording will be available on the CSEAS YouTube channel following the event.