The Magnolias Curriculum Project

Since 2012, over 90 Wake Forest faculty have enhanced their teaching and engagement with sustainability issues by participating in the annual Magnolias Curriculum Project. No prior experience with sustainability-related issues in the classroom or in research is necessary, and faculty at all ranks and career stages are welcome. This innovative approach to curricular change, modeled on the nationally renowned Piedmont Project (Emory University), provides faculty with an intellectually stimulating and collegial experience to pool their expertise.

The workshop explores how we can meaningfully integrate sustainability—broadly defined—into our classrooms. Although we start by taking a close look at Wake Forest University and the larger Piedmont region, we invite participants to engage in local to global comparisons.

The Magnolias Project kicks off with a two-day workshop each May that offers opportunities to extend research and teaching horizons across disciplines and create new networks with fellow colleagues.  Following the workshop, faculty participants prepare discipline-specific course materials on their own over the summer. They reconvene in early August to discuss their insights and experiences. Participants receive a stipend of $500 upon completion of a new or revised syllabus.