The internship that puts you in front of a P7 class

In a school hall in Dundee, a chain of paper bridges winds across the floor. Each one has been assembled by a group of pupils. Each one carries photographs and stories from the city: Dundonians, their families, the places they come from.

The pupils are eleven and twelve years old. They are about to start secondary school. And the questions they have been working on are not small ones. Why is the world changing so fast? How do I make connections with new people? How should adults respond to what children think?

The project in question is Localising Philosophy, run by Dr Dominic Smith from Philosophy and Dr Anna Robb from Education, in partnership with Morgan Academy, its cluster primary schools and Dundee City Council. It began in 2018 and has now worked with over 2,000 pupils. In September 2026 it was the subject of a full-page feature in Scotland on Sunday.

It also, every year, provides internships to recently graduated University of Dundee students.

Philosophy, out of the tutorial room

The project works with P7 pupils as they prepare to move up to secondary, and follows them into S1. The idea is simple: the jump between primary and secondary is a big one, and philosophy gives pupils a way of thinking and talking about it.

Rather than just talking, though, the sessions also use art. Monoprinting, model-making or the bridges themselves. The Tay Bridge disaster has been used as a way into questions about technology and risk. The Tay Bridge is not just any choice. Dr Smith’s most recent book, Bridging Benjamin, is about a set of radio broadcasts made by the German philosopher Walter Benjamin between 1927 and 1933. One was about the Tay Bridge disaster of 1879, when the bridge gave way in a storm whilst a train was crossing it. 

Benjamin never came to Dundee. He was in Germany in 1932, about to lose his radio work, and he chose a bridge collapse on the Scottish coast as his subject. None of the recordings survive. All that is left are the typescripts — a broadcast we only have in broken form, which, as Dr Smith argues, is true of bridges and of acts of communication generally. You can read more about that in Benjamin’s bridges: philosophy, technology and a Dundee disaster.

Interns who have worked on the project say the same thing: the pupils were already doing philosophy. They just didn’t have a word for it.

“It became apparent to me how pervasive philosophical thinking is among young people, even though they might not have that name for it.”

Claire Black, Art and Philosophy graduate

Increasingly, the questions the pupils want to ask are about technology.

“I found engaging with young people interesting because it made me consider their fears of the future of technology, and that if the future is what awaits younger people, then shouldn’t they have more of a voice when considering what it looks like?”

Ben Kelman, Philosophy graduate

Eva Milne, who graduated in English and Philosophy in 2026, has a younger brother in primary school.

“It’s comforting to know he’s part of a generation being taught not just how to use technology, but how to understand it.”

Eva Milne, English and Philosophy graduate, 2026

What our graduates get out of it

Localising Philosophy is not something that Dundee philosophy graduates simply undertake. It is something they help run. They join the project as volunteers, plan sessions, and stand up in front of a class of P7s to put art and philosophy into practice.

For some, it confirms a career.

“It has allowed me hands-on experience working with young people and teaching, as well as an opportunity to solidify my own learning in philosophy by sharing my knowledge with others.”

Dani McFawns, English and Philosophy graduate, 2024

For others, it is the thing an interviewer asks about.

“Ever since participating in the project it has been the most interesting part of my CV, getting asked questions about what it entails and the experience of working with children and philosophy.”

Irene Chapman, Art and Philosophy graduate 

Eleanor Oliver used it in a job application before she had even finished reflecting on it.

“I found that this project was one of the most professionally empowering and personally rewarding opportunities I have gained through the University of Dundee.”

Eleanor Oliver, Art and Philosophy graduate

And for people who arrive in Dundee from elsewhere, it can be the point at which the city stops being somewhere you study and becomes somewhere you know.

“I feel more connected to a local community — something I have never felt before in the uni. I think this is the most precious experience for me to have.”

Locky Zhou, international Philosophy graduate

Dov Cer, who graduated with First Class Honours in Philosophy and Psychology in 2026, put the practical case plainly: the project resulted in teacher training offers from several Scottish universities, and something concrete to talk about when going instead for a role on the path to clinical psychology. Dov also described what it was like to go back for the follow-up visit to the secondary school, and find pupils who remembered the  group fondly. 

Tim Hulsbos found out something about himself.

Tim added a second point: a university should do this, because it makes the place feel less intimidating and more like it belongs to everyone in Dundee, which it does. 

Where it goes next

Dr Smith and Dr Robb have already taken the project to other schools across Scotland, and want to expand it further, building bridges from topics and events pupils already know to the biggest questions: ecological legacy, political legacy, what an economy built on AI owes the people who live in it. The pupils doing this thinking now are the ones who will live with the answers. 

If you are thinking about studying philosophy, this ongoing project is worth knowing, because philosophy at Dundee is not only a subject you can find on campus, in the tutorials rooms or the lecture theatres. It is something you can be sent out to do, in a school hall, with a group of twelve-year-olds who are struggling to name the questions they are interested in, a name you can help introduce them to: philosophical questions.

Find out more about studying Philosophy at Dundee.