High school psychology teachers from California to Maine will be at Clark from Monday, July 26, to Wednesday, July 28, to attend the sixth annual American Psychological Association-Clark University Workshop for High School Teachers.

The APA Teachers of Psychology in Secondary Schools (TOPSS) and the American Psychological Foundation collaborated with the University to develop the workshop, which included presentations by TOPSS members and Clark psychology professors. In total, twenty-five high school teachers from around the country will participate in the workshop.

“It is our pleasure to host this workshop again this year,” said Clark’s Associate Provost and Dean of Research Nancy Budwig.  “Because of Clark’s strong connection to this discipline, and interest in innovative ways to combine cutting-edge scholarship and teaching, we are delighted to serve as a meeting place in order to help foster the promotion and advancement of excellence in the teaching of precollege psychology.”

Workshop participants attended sessions on the history of psychology, developmental psychology, well-being, and involving high-school students in research. Dana Dunn, professor of psychology and director of Learning in Common (LinC) of Moravian College, will meet with attendees and deliver a lecture, “The Social Psychology of Disability: A Medium for Broadening Students’ Horizons Regarding Attitudes,Prejudices, and Intergroup Relations.”

The idea for a workshop for high-school teachers grew from the vision and generosity of Clark alumnus Lee Gurel, who studied psychology at Clark and was granted a bachelor’s degree in 1948.  “Psychology is central to our lives,” explains Gurel. “And if taught at the secondary school level, this subject can get at issues that are essential—and often neglected—in our culture.”

Clark University played a prominent role in the development of psychology as a distinguished discipline in the United States, and was the birthplace of the APA in 1892.

Last fall, leading scientists from around the world gathered at Clark for “Great Minds Come to Clark: Freud Revisited,” a series of lectures, symposia and events marking the centennial of the renowned 1909 Clark Conferences organized by President G. Stanley Hall. At Clark, Sigmund Freud delivered his landmark Five Lectures on Psychoanalysis, his only speaking engagement in the United States. The 1909 conferences attracted many pioneering minds of the time, including Franz Boas, Carl Jung, Sandor Ferenczi, and A.A. Michelson.