Montgomery College Professor Selected for Smithsonian Fellowship to Explore Civil Disobedience and Ethics

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. Lowrie will use the fellowship to develop a project on civil disobedience, leadership, and ethics that connects museum artifacts to contemporary questions in criminology.

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. Lowrie's 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.

"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 represents a significant integration of museum resources into community college education, particularly in fields like criminal justice where ethical questions are paramount. By connecting historical artifacts to contemporary issues, the fellowship helps bridge the gap between academic theory and real-world application, preparing students to become more thoughtful leaders and practitioners.

The selection highlights the growing importance of interdisciplinary approaches in higher education, especially at community colleges that serve diverse student populations. For more information about the MC-Smithsonian Faculty Fellowship, visit the Paul Peck Humanities Institute's fellowship page on the Montgomery College website. The partnership's longevity and scale demonstrate how sustained collaboration between cultural institutions and educational providers can transform learning experiences for thousands of students.