Meet our Faculty

DR. Christopher Martin

Professor
Director, Centre for Mindful Engagement
Okanagan School of Education

Tell us your story.

I’m originally from Newfoundland. Before moving into academia, I was a licensed teacher, teaching grades K through 12, as well as a principal and vice-principal. I’ve taught in higher education in both the UK and Canada. I’ve also worked a lot of jobs outside of formal education, including construction, ecological field research, business management, as well as sales and service. I have lived in both very small communities (as small as 45 people) and large cities (London, UK) . I think these many experiences have informed a lot of what I find interesting and important about both philosophy and education.

Please briefly summarize your research area or educational leadership activities.

My research area is the philosophy of education. Broadly speaking, it’s a field that addresses enduring philosophical questions/problems in the educational domain. What makes something educationally worthwhile? How should we allocate educational opportunities in society? What moral obligations do teachers have towards their students? These are just a few of the many questions that interest philosophers of education. My focus has been on getting a better understanding of what education is as a concept and the role of deliberation in deciding what our educational values ought to be. More recently, I have been interested in the nature of educational institutions and the role they should have in matters of justice and political stability across civic life.

What excites you the most about teaching?

The learning. That’s not glib. Many of the topics/issues/arguments that we explore in my class are challenging, interesting and consequential for society. But what’s even more interesting is learning about what students themselves make of those same topics/ideas, and how their thinking evolves as they spend time interpreting and parsing them. So I try to build the educational process around the student’s intellectual independence, with opportunities for them to practice that independence. Any class has the potential for a new argument or idea.

I try to build the educational process around the student’s intellectual independence, with opportunities for them to practice that independence. Any class has the potential for a new argument or idea.

Another aspect is that teaching never gets boring. Some of the best advice I’ve been given about teaching was that “it’s easy to decide that you enjoy teaching when everything’s going according to plan, but it’s rarely going to go the way you intended. And that’s okay! Sometimes the plan goes completely sideways. If you walk out of that classroom and find yourself immediately thinking, reflecting and planning about how you’re going to take another shot at it so that it goes better — that’s a good sign that teaching’s for you.” There’s a lot of truth in that, I think.

How do you involve or partner with students in your teaching and research?

To elaborate on what I said above, I try to structure the educational process in a way that helps students see that what they think matters and that the development of their point of view matters. Planning for that process starts with: “If I were to take on a topic or idea and investigate it, what would it look like to be treated in a way that helps me get better at that investigation while also respecting my intellectual agency?” That’s one way to describe philosophy as a practice. So, what I hope someone sees in my classroom is a bunch of people practicing philosophy together.

What do you love about UBC Okanagan?

The general sense that there’s lots of potential and flexibility to make a positive contribution to the long-term growth of the campus.