In recent collaborations among the university and faculty involved with Teagle Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities grant to offer a certificate. The development of the foundation is to have humanities more integrated with various technical programs and tracks at TAMUT to be more integrated with the humanities. The Program of Learning and Community Engagement (PLACE) is an annual program of talks with this year’s Transformative Texts: Personal Responsibility hosted by Dr. Doug Julien and Dr. Michael Perri in the series of events throughout the semester. The PLACE Common Reader Book Club meets every Tuesday throughout the remainder of the semester and more information is on the TAMUT website about upcoming guest keynote speakers and events.

Dr. Doug Julien has been a full-time professor of the English department at Texas A&M University-Texarkana for thirteen years. He obtained his doctoral degree from the University of Minnesota for comparative studies in discourse and society and his passion for world literature, and literary theory with a concentrated fascination with continental philosophy, and critical theory. The inspiration to pursue a career in higher education stems from folks from his life as an undergraduate and graduate student. “I take my students to a place of learning,” said Dr. Julien, encouraging students to connect with their department’s faculty.

The East Texas Writing Project was developed to give local educators around the ArkLaTex area supplemental tools and opportunities to integrate contemporary writing pedagogies into their classrooms to implement a new way of engaging the classroom with the materials. “We have a bunch of new writers making their way into literature,” said Dr. Julien.

With the current trajectory of technological advancements, Dr. Julien shared his thoughts on the usage of artificial intelligence may have potential concerns in education and the workforce. “We should be mindful of not having technology use us,” he said rather than being an assistive tool as time progresses while retrospectively evaluating past innovations just like literature.