Montgomery College criminal justice professor and program coordinator Bridget Lowrie has been selected for the 2026 MC-Smithsonian Faculty Fellowship cohort, a yearlong academic partnership that connects college classrooms with Smithsonian collections, scholars, and digital resources. The 2026 fellowship theme, "Fostering a Culture of Critical and Ethical Learning to Shape Future Leaders," will focus on leadership and ethics in a rapidly changing world. This matters because it represents a significant opportunity to bridge academic theory with tangible historical evidence, particularly in fields like criminal justice where questions of power, fairness, and accountability are paramount.
The MC-Smithsonian Faculty Fellowship, housed in the College's Paul Peck Humanities Institute, grew out of a collaboration with the Smithsonian Office of Educational Technology and the Smithsonian Learning Lab. The initiative, the first of its kind between the Smithsonian and a community college, has involved 256 Montgomery College faculty and more than 26,000 students and their families since 1998. The importance of this sustained partnership lies in its unique model of making world-class museum resources accessible to community college students, democratizing high-level academic and cultural engagement.
Lowrie will use the fellowship to develop a project on civil disobedience, leadership, and ethics that connects museum artifacts to contemporary questions in criminology. Her proposal includes potential partnerships with the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the National Museum of the American Indian, as well as virtual artifact collections that help students examine the intersections of disability, protest and justice. The implication is a more grounded, object-based pedagogy that moves beyond abstract theory. "As an attorney and criminal justice professor, I see students wrestling every day with questions about power, fairness, and accountability," Lowrie said. "Working with Smithsonian collections on civil disobedience and social movements will give them concrete objects, stories, and images to ground those conversations, not just abstract theories."
The interdisciplinary fellowship is open to faculty from all three Montgomery College campuses. Fellows participate in seminars with Smithsonian curators and educators, explore on-site and virtual exhibitions, and design projects that embed museum resources into their courses. Lowrie's students will begin engaging with the fellowship project in fall 2026 through class visits, virtual collections, and research assignments focused on leadership, ethics, and civic engagement. This matters because it directly impacts student learning, providing them with unique resources to critically examine the ethical dimensions of leadership and justice. For more information about the fellowship program, details are available on the Paul Peck Humanities Institute fellowship page.
