Muffet Trout, PhD, associate professor in the School of Education and a fellow at the Minnesota Institute of Trauma-Informed Education at the University of St. Thomas, spent the month of June in Germany as an invited international guest lecturer at Technische Universitat Darmstadt (TUD).
The relationship with TUD began several years ago, when a German professor in teacher education visited St. Thomas and observed Trout’s EDUC 330 course on the Psychology of Teaching and Learning. Since then, Trout and her German counterpart have co-taught virtual sessions of EDUC 330 each semester, bringing St. Thomas and TUD students together to discuss pedagogy and educational perspectives across cultures.
The guest lectureship gave Trout the opportunity to share in person a classroom method she developed for EDUC 330. While in Germany, Trout also delivered talks on multiculturalism and sustainability in education from a U.S. perspective and discussed opportunities for students interested in studying abroad. TUD provides scholarship support for international experiences, opening future possibilities for German students to study at St. Thomas.
Trout’s lectureship was the result of a growing partnership between the College of Arts and Sciences, the School of Engineering and the School of Education at St. Thomas and was supported through collaborations in Germany built by Dr. Susanne Wagner, associate professor of German in Modern & Classical Languages. Wagner developed a five-year program for engineering majors who then have an internship in Germany. She also helped to resurrect the German language K-12 licensure program at the School of Education.
