Overview

Scott Peters joined the Department of Education at Cornell University in August of 1999. He holds a B.S. in Education (1983) from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, an M.A. in Public Policy (1995) from the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, and a Ph.D. in Educational Policy and Administration (1998), also from the University of Minnesota. Before his graduate study, Peters` served for ten years (1984-1993) as Program Director of the University YMCA at the University of Illinois, where he worked with students, faculty, staff, and community members on a variety of civic education and community development initiatives. Dr. Peters` book, The Promise of Association: A History of the Mission and Work of the YMCA at the University of Illinois, 1873-1997 (Champaign, IL: University YMCA, 1998), examines the ways that people who have been engaged in the organization throughout its history have pursued and integrated personal and public ideals and ends.

Research Focus

Dr. Peters` research program is centered on a critical examination of the social, political, and cultural identities, roles, purposes, and work of academic institutions and professionals. He pursues and contextualizes his research in two related lines of inquiry: a historical line that focuses on the origins and early development of the national land-grant system's agricultural extension work, and a line that utilizes narrative inquiry to analyze and interpret the civic engagement experiences and public purposes and work of contemporary land-grant scholars and extension educators. A key theoretical and practical problem his research seeks to address is that of the dilemma of the relation of expertise and democracy in the academic profession.

Instruction Focus

Dr. Peters` teaches two related graduate courses that focus on the history, philosophy, politics, theory, and practice of community education, organizing, and development, with special attention to complex relationships and tensions between democracy, science, and education. He also teaches a research design and methods course on narrative inquiry and analysis in social science and action research.

Additional Links

• Profiles of Practitioners: Stories from the Field
• Profiles of Practitioners: Stories from the Field
• Link to CALS Research portal
• Link to CALS Impact statements

Selected Publications

• Peters, S.J. and Alter, T.R. (under contract) Critic and Leader as Well as Servant: Higher Education`s Roles in the Public Work of Democracy. East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press.
• Peters, S.J., Alter, T.R., and Schwartzbach, N. (2008). Unsettling a settled discourse: Faculty views of the meaning and significance of the land-grant mission. Journal of Higher Education Outreach and Engagement, Vol. 12, No. 2, pp. 33-66.
• Peters, S.J. (2008). Reconstructing a democratic tradition of public scholarship in the land-grant system. In David W. Brown and Deborah Witte (eds.), Agent of Democracy. Dayton, OH: Kettering Foundation Press.
• Peters, S. J. (2007). Changing the story about higher education's public purposes and work: Land-grants, liberty, and the Little Country Theater. Ann Arbor, MI: Imagining America (Foreseeable Futures Position Paper #6, published by Imagining America: Artists and Scholars in Public Life [www.imaginingamerica.org]).
• Peters, S.J., O'Connell, D., Alter, T.R., and Jack, A. (Eds.) (2006). Catalyzing change: Profiles of Cornell Cooperative Extension educators from Greene, Tompkins, and Erie Counties, New York. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Cooperative Extension.
• Peters, S.J. (2006). Every farmer should be awakened: Liberty Hyde Bailey`s vision of agricultural extension work. Agricultural History, Vol. 80, No. 2: 190-219.
• Morgan, P.A. and Peters, S.J. (2006). The foundations of planetary agrarianism: Thomas Berry and Liberty Hyde Bailey. Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, Vol. 19, No. 5: 443-468.
• Peters, Scott J., N. R. Jordan, M. Adamek, and T. R. Alter. (Eds.). (2005). Engaging Campus and Community: The Practice of Public Scholarship in the State and Land-Grant University. Dayton, OH: Kettering Foundation Press.
• Peters, Scott J. (2005). Extension Agencies. In B. Feintuch and D. H. Watters (Eds.), The Encyclopedia of New England (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press), pp. 38-40.
• Peters, Scott J., H. Gregoire and M. Hittleman (2004). Practicing a Pedagogy of Hope: Practitioner Profiles as Tools for Grounding and Guiding Collective Reflection in Adult, Community, and Youth Development Education. In R. Vince and M. Reynolds, eds., Organizing Reflection. Ashgate Publishers.
• Peters, Scott J. (2004). Educating the Civic Professional: Reconfigurations and Resistances. Michigan Journal of Community Service-Learning, Vol. 11, No. 1, pp. 47-58.
• Peters, Scott J. (2004). The Country Life Commission: Reconsidering a Milestone in American Agricultural History. Agricultural History, Vol. 78, No. 3., pp. 289-316.
• Peters, S.J. (2003). Reconstructing civic professionalism in American higher education. Journal of Higher Education Outreach and Engagement, Vol. 8, No. 2: 183-198.

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