I’ve taught 11 classes of “Philosophical Perspectives,” a year-long humanities sequence in the core curriculum of the University of Chicago. In these classes, I’ve experimented with various styles of teaching and assignments. Fundamental to my teaching philosophy is the idea that the goals of teaching in the humanities ought to be transformative: the main objective isn’t to impart facts but to cultivate intellectual virtues, such as curiosity, critical thinking, or creativity, and to encourage students to reflect on their core values and beliefs. As transformative education is not just an intellectual but also an emotional and personal experience, its goals can only be met when the students believe that their learning experience is authentically theirs. This is why I want my students to not just be participants but co-authors of the class. I want them to understand that we’re inventing the class together. Recently, this approach led us to rethink the essay assignment and to the creation a new kind of assignment, the collective essay. I’ve written about this experience for The Boston Globe (the archived article can be found here). I also wrote a piece on the nuts and bolts of the assignment for The Important Work and the Daily Nous (which can be found here). I will use this same assignment for a graduate-level course on metaphilosophy that I’ll be teaching in the spring of 2027. Given that many educators have asked me for a syllabus that includes the collective essay assignment, I decided to include it on this page.