The Socrates Project Mentorship Seminar is a half-year seminar course that provides experiential learning in philosophy in conjunction with a teaching assignment to lead tutorials and mark assignments in PHLA11H3. This course is designed for a select number of returning Socrates Project participants chosen to mentor new Project participants. These students will solidify their teaching/grading skills and advise new participants in the Project. The seminar course will further enhance their philosophical abilities in an extension of PHLD88Y3. Roughly 75% of the seminar will be devoted to a more in-depth study of the topics taken up in the PHLA11H3 Introduction to Ethics. Students will write a seminar paper on one of these topics under the supervision of a UTSC Philosophy faculty member working in the relevant area, and they will give an oral presentation on their research topic each semester. The remaining 25% of the seminar will focus on the further exploration of the methods and challenges of teaching philosophy, benchmark grading, and grading generally and, most distinctively, issues of mentorship of new participants to the Socrates Project.
Note: The teaching component of the Socrates Project will consist of the following components. Students will optionally attend two 1-hour PHLA11H3 lectures each week, and teach one tutorial of approximately 25 students, meeting with them for 1 hour every other week. Students will grade papers, hold office hours, and meet with the relevant professor as needed as well as provide mentorship to new participants in the Socrates Project.