Harvard Law School professor Charles Ogletree, who served as a mentor to both President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama when they studied law at Harvard, will be teaching a course titled, "Understanding Obama," during the 2013 spring term.
According to a description outlined in the schools' course catalog, the class will focus on how race, religion and politics have impacted Barack Obama as a leader.
"We will explore his views as a biracial child, his time as a student at Harvard Law School, the successes and failures of his political campaigns, and the way religion and his views on faith nearly derailed his campaign. Finally, time will be spent analyzing the challenges he faces as president of the United States in establishing both his domestic and global policies," the description states.
Obama graduated from Harvard Law School in 1991 and Ogletree says his mentorship of the president during that time will not be part of the course, which has also been described as a reading group.
"They'll be reading both critical and positive issues about Obama — of what's happened in terms of the way the race and religion have been viewed during his candidacy, his presidency, and how it affects the larger country; and some other classic reading on issues of law and justice," Ogletree said in an interview.