Professor Kisha Daniels and Duke undergraduate student Selena Collins’ collaborative service-learning course, Critical Pedagogy of Hip Hop, connects Duke students and Durham Public School middle and high schoolers. Working in partnership with public school educators, Duke students create engaging learning environments that celebrate language, critical thinking and social justice through hip hop music. Rooted in relationship-building and student empowerment, the course work confirms how community-based, collaborative learning can strengthen student engagement and inspire the next generation.

Episode Credits

Senior Editor and Producer: Cara August, Trinity Communications

Audio Editor and Mixer: Marc Maximov

Music Composition: André Mego, T’20 | MMS’21

Production Sponsor: Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University

Recording Date and Location: May 2025, Bryan Center Studios

Duke faculty Pedro Lasch and UNC faculty Sherrill Roland’s artistic collaborations ask: How does art reclaim our humanity? After spending ten months in prison for a crime he didn’t commit and for which he was exonerated, Roland returned to his art practice not just to heal, but to challenge. Through a fellowship with Lasch’s Social Practice Lab — which brings together scholars, artists, and activists — Roland created the exhibit “Processing Systems: Numbers,” a reckoning with how we see, name and remember those impacted by the criminal justice system. Lasch has spent nearly two decades using mirrors to interrogate the politics of perception and power. His ongoing series, Black Mirror / Espejo Negro, layers iconic European paintings with pre-Columbian sculptures onto darkened glass, letting the mirror reflect and challenge our views on their history. These two artists do not make art that just hangs on walls, but that asks us to reimagine the world in which we live.

Episode Credits

Senior Editor and Producer: Cara August, Trinity Communications Audio Editor and Mixer: Marc Maximov Music Composition: André Mego, T’20 | MMS ‘21 Production Sponsor: Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University Recording Date and Location: May 2025, Bryan Center Studios

Since their first meeting six years ago, Alec Greenwald from Duke University and Yolanda Dunston from North Carolina Central University have been united in a shared vision: Supporting public schools that serve as hubs of opportunity, healing and innovation. Through the university-assistance framework, Duke and NCCU act as a unified partner for local public schools, providing targeted support based on direct input from the school’s community, including its students, families and teachers. The partnership helps facilitate the integration of university-assisted academic programs and social services, and demonstrates how when universities join together, they can use collective resources to strengthen local communities.

Episode Credits

Senior Editor and Producer: Cara August, Trinity Communications

Audio Editor and Mixer: Marc Maximov

Assistant Content Editor: K’Mari Peede, Dr. MAC Fellow, Trinity Communications, Summer 2025

Music Composition: André Mego, T’20 | MMS ‘21

Production Sponsor: Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University

Recording Date and Location: June 2025, Bryan Center Studios

Professor Shaundra Daily and Trinity ’25 alumna Reagan Razon’s collaborative research is rooted at the intersection of computer science, education, access, and innovation. Their community engaged programs include the student-led nonprofit CS Sidekicks, which brings CS education and mentorship directly to Durham Public Schools, and the L.I.F.T. Lab, where students explore engineering concepts through the light of their personal experiences. These programs aren’t just teaching technical skills — they are rewriting the code on how research can spark lasting change.

Episode Credits

Senior Editor and Producer: Cara August, Trinity Communications

Audio Editor and Mixer: Marc Maximov

Music Composition: André Mego, T’20 | MMS ‘21

Production Sponsor: Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University

Recording Date and Location: April 2025, Bryan Center Studios

Professor Adam Rosenblatt and undergraduate student Shreya Joshi’s collaborative research uses oral history and visual storytelling to document Durham’s independent comics scene. From in-depth interviews with self-published creators and small-press artists, to exploring the key spaces that sustain the local indie comics community — like the Durham Public Libraries —this community-engaged research preserves the stories, places, people and culture that shape North Carolina’s creative pulse.

Episode Credits

Senior Editor and Producer: Cara August, Trinity Communications

Audio Editor and Mixer: Marc Maximov

Music Composition: André Mego, T’20 | MMS ‘21

Production Sponsor: Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University

Recording Date and Location: March 2025, Bryan Center Studios

Faculty team Maria Tackett and Nicole Schramm-Sapyta's seven-year project is transforming our understanding and responses to the needs of people navigating Durham’s criminal justice and healthcare systems. Working with student researchers and in collaboration with the Durham County Detention Facility, Justice Services Center, and Duke Health, they’ve compiled one of the most comprehensive datasets of its kind, covering over 23,000 individuals with mental health diagnoses who were locally incarcerated between 2014 and 2023. This year, the project has expanded to include personal interviews and focus groups centering the voices of those who have experienced incarceration while managing mental illness or substance use disorders. The goal? Better interventions, support for smart policy decisions, and stronger partnership between health and criminal justice systems in Durham and beyond.

Episode Credits

Senior Editor and Producer: Cara August, Trinity Communications

Audio Editor and Mixer: Marc Maximov

Music Composition: André Mego, T’20 | MMS ‘21

Production Sponsor: Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University

Recording Date and Location: April 2025, Bryan Center Studios

Episode 6: Mathematics and Biology professor Veronica Ciocanel and student Daniel Block (T’24) discuss their shared experience of being math students at Duke, what it means to let go of a project’s ownership and how to use the scientific method to investigate the existence of the Tooth Fairy.

Credits

Senior Editor and Producer: Cara August, Trinity Communications

Audio Editor and Mixer: Marc Maximov

Music Composition: Grace Davis, T’26

Production Sponsor: Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University

Recording Date and Location: April 2024, Bryan Center Studios

Full Transcript: https://trinity.duke.edu/news/duets-episode-6-research-never-really-finished

Episode 5: Asian American & Diaspora Studies professor Eileen Chow and student Huiyin Zhou (T’24) discuss the fruits of inter-generational collaboration, the power of collective poetry writing and the different kinds of intimacies that emerge from being able to comfortably switch between languages.

Credits

Senior Editor and Producer: Cara August, Trinity Communications

Audio Editor and Mixer: Marc Maximov

Music Composition: Grace Davis, T’26

Production Sponsor: Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University

Recording Date and Location: April 2024, Bryan Center Studios

Full Transcript: https://trinity.duke.edu/news/duets-episode-5-living-both