Duggan teaches courses in the Communication Department at Boston College, and she is core faculty in Medical Humanities and in the First Year Experience program.  Duggan’s fundamental teaching mission is to provide students with academic challenges that captivate and motivate.  To do this, she presents ongoing opportunities for students to explore how relationships shape our lives, and the ways our health (and illness) are influenced by communication processes in relationships.  She teaches research methods, health communication, relational communication, interpersonal communication, and nonverbal communication.  Her commitment to teaching and mentoring students can be seen in the opportunities she creates for mentorship in her writing intensive courses, and in the ways she integrates teaching and research.

 

In her writing intensive courses, she builds opportunities that facilitate students’ opportunities to apply research tools and theoretical explanation.  Often the challenges in writing intensive courses encourage students to recognize their talents and their increased capacity to apply their knowledge and skills when they apply for jobs or to graduate education.  To this end, she encourages them to consider alternative explanations for their conclusions and ask them to address the ways their own experiences shape their conclusions.  Her courses are always grounded in reading original research, in written reflection applied aspects of theoretical concepts, and in explicating the ways concepts are relevant for our everyday lives. 

 

She is committed to bringing research to all aspects of the classroom and to involving students in original research.  She is committed to involving many undergraduate students in research and to cultivating an appreciation for research.  She regularly mentors research assistants under the Undergraduate Research Fellowship program at Boston College.