New shades of thinking: Meet UCalgary’s second Transdisciplinary Graduate Programs cohort

Some of today’s most complex challenges do not fit neatly within the boundaries of a single discipline. That idea is central to the University of Calgary’s Transdisciplinary Graduate Programs, where students can pursue master’s or PhD degrees through a transdisciplinary approach. This fall, the programs welcomed their second cohort of graduate students. 

Made up of 20 new students, the cohort reflects the same diversity of academic and professional experience that defined the inaugural cohort. Students come to the program from fields as varied as law, social work and engineering, alongside backgrounds in business, politics, city planning, psychology, biological anthropology, non-profit leadership and music.

For Dr. Jenny Godley, PhD, associate dean of Transdisciplinary Scholarship with the Faculty of Graduate Studies, that diversity is central to the kind of scholarly community the program is designed to build.

“We are creating a community of early career transdisciplinary scholars who are working together to tackle the ‘wicked problems’ of the world,” says Godley.

She says the continued interest in the program also reflects a growing demand for graduate education that gives students space to work across traditional academic boundaries.

“We believe that our program will serve as a model for other universities hoping to enhance their transdisciplinary graduate education offerings,” Godley says.

Starting with the problem, not the discipline

For students entering the program, learning begins from a different starting point.

“In a transdisciplinary environment, the problem becomes the starting point rather than the discipline,” says Dr. Victoria Fast, PhD, an instructor in the program.

Rather than beginning within the theories and methods of one field, students are encouraged to consider what knowledge a problem calls for, whose expertise can help make sense of it, and whose experiences need to be part of the conversation. The mix of academic and professional experiences within the second cohort is not simply a reflection of who is enrolled in the program; it becomes part of the learning itself.

“The diversity in the room becomes part of the curriculum,” says Fast.

Students are exposed to approaches that may sit well outside their own training, creating opportunities for unexpected connections to emerge. A musician, for example, may help an engineer see a problem differently, while a student trained in law may prompt someone from another discipline to reconsider how they think about evidence or the systems surrounding a problem. 

During the transdisciplinary block week course, one analogy that emerged from the students compared that process to watercolour painting. “We’re the water in a watercolour painting,” says Fast, recalling the idea. “Our role is not simply to bring different colours together, but to help them mix and create something new.”

As academic co-leads with the Institutes for Transdisciplinary Scholarship, both Godley and Fast emphasize and advocate for impact that starts with collaboration and community-engaged research and scholarship.

Different backgrounds, different ways of thinking

For Carlos Foggin, BMus’16, MMus’26, a first-year PhD student in transdisciplinary research, joining the program offered an opportunity to unite several areas of knowledge around a question rooted in his own professional practice.

Drawing on his experience as a liturgical organist, Foggin is interested in how tacit and embodied knowledge is learned, shared and sustained within communities, using improvisational organ music in Christian worship as a case study. His work sits at the intersection of music and religious practice, while also drawing from anthropology and performance studies. 

“What has already changed the way I think about my research is understanding that transdisciplinary research is not simply about bringing different academic disciplines together,” says Foggin. “It begins with a problem that matters to a community and asks how research can contribute to addressing it.”

Foggin hopes to deepen his understanding of how knowledge developed through participation and experience can be sustained over time. While his research is grounded in liturgical music, he sees broader relevance in how similar forms of knowledge are passed on in areas such as education, professional training, craft and performance. He also sees opportunities to apply that learning beyond academia through his work as an organist, teacher and researcher, including collaboration with the Catholic Bishop’s Office and church musicians in the Diocese of Calgary.

“I am increasingly thinking about the research not simply as an academic study of a musical practice, but as an opportunity to a way to explore what this particular tradition can reveal about how people learn through practice and experience more broadly,” he says.

For first-year PhD student Sheizana Murji, the program offers a way to examine how professional work is changing as artificial intelligence reshapes both the work itself and the ways people traditionally learn to do it well.

Drawing on her background as a lawyer, Murji is interested in how professionals continue to develop and exercise sound judgment as familiar routines and learning experiences evolve. Her work explores how professional learning, organizational context, responsibility and trust intersect as professional work changes.

“For me, the transdisciplinary opportunity is in bringing those different forms of knowledge together to develop a fuller understanding of what responsible adaptation could look like,” says Murji.

She is continuing her professional work while completing her PhD so that research and practice can continue to inform one another. That same approach is already shaping how she works through complex questions, giving her more space to explore a problem before settling on where it might lead.

“I am used to wanting to define the issue, organize the information and move toward an answer,” Murji says. “This process is teaching me to work differently, to explore more openly, stay curious longer, and let conversations and reading reshape the direction as I go. The path is definitely not linear, which can be uncomfortable, but it is also what makes it exciting and enriching.”

Where different perspectives lead next

As the program’s second cohort begins its first year, the range of questions, experiences and perspectives graduate students bring with them is already shaping how transdisciplinary learning takes place. By starting with complex problems rather than a predetermined disciplinary lens, the program creates space for students to learn from one another, work alongside communities and professionals, and develop new ways of approaching the challenges they hope to address. For this new cohort, that work is only beginning.

Explore UCalgary’s transdisciplinary graduate programs at transdisciplinary.ucalgary.ca.