Teaching and Learning
Reject Automated Grading of Student Writing (John Warner, Inside Higher Ed, June 15, 2023): Reading and responding to their writing is the job. It’s a line that people who believe in the importance of writing, critical thinking and communication should not cross, no matter how proficient or efficient the AI seems.
How to Make Your Assignments and Activities More Equitable (Beckie Supiano, Chronicle of Higher Education, June 15, 2023): Tackling the structural barriers first-generation and working-class students face.
Has It Become Harder to Connect With College Students? (Jeffrey R. Young, EdSurge, June 13, 2023): A 55-minute podcast with Bonni Stachowiak, host of the weekly podcast “Teaching in Higher Ed” touching on issues such as Covid, technology, and other things that can make it harder to connect with students.
Creating Classroom Community Agreements (Jesica Siham Fernández, Inside Higher Ed, June 14, 2021): The author argues that they provide the best way to cultivate critically compassionate learning communities.
‘Nobody Wins in an Academic-Integrity Arms Race’ (Ian Wilhelm, Chronicle of Higher Education, June 12, 2023): How artificial intelligence is changing the way colleges think about cheating.
Prospective College Students Increasingly Say They Feel Unprepared for Higher Education (Emma Hall, Chronicle of Higher Education, June 12, 2023): A growing share of high-school students say they feel unprepared for college, academically and emotionally, and are choosing not to enroll right away — suggesting that long-term effects of the pandemic are stunting college enrollment.
Confusion in the Classroom (Megan Zahneis and Beckie Supiano, Chronicle of Higher Education, June 9, 2023): Vaguely worded legislation in Florida and Texas is already affecting how professors teach. Critics of these bills say that they are intentionally vague and misleading in order to encourage self-censorship and self-policing among professors and administrators.
How Grading Alternatives Measure Student Learning (downloadable “Trends Snapshot” from the Chronicle of Higher Education on “ungrading” and other non-traditional grading approaches.
AI and Higher Ed
Caught Off Guard by AI (Beth McMurtrie and Beckie Supiano, Chronicle of Higher Education, June 13, 2023): Professors scrambled to react to ChatGPT this spring – and started planning for the fall.
Student Voice
Students Trust Professors More than Presidents or DEI Officers on Dealing with Racism (Scott Jaschik, Inside Higher Ed, June 13, 2023): A survey of students by Edelman found that they trust professors more than their presidents or DEI officers “when it comes to responding to systemic racism and racial injustice in this country.”
The Liberal Arts
Can a College Class Teach You How to Lead a Meaningful, Joyful Life? (Steven Mintz, Inside Higher Ed, June 16, 2023): In critiquing two books on “designing” a meaningful life, Mintz comes to the following conclusion: the value of a college class comes in its shared intellectual experience; intense engagement with masterworks of literature, art, music and moral and political philosophy; and, above all, the importance of exploring those works “with peers whose origins, interests and ambitions differ from their own.”
Higher Ed
The Toyota Corolla Theory of College (Sanjay Sarma and Luke Yoquinto, The Atlantic, June 15, 2023): Higher-education institutions should consider pursuing a strategy that consists in investing in students and teachers while stripping away obstacles in their path.
Affirmative Action
The Supreme Court Is Poised to Rip ‘the Bandage Off the Wound’ in Admissions. Healing Would Mean Many Reforms (Eric Hoover, Chronicle of Higher Education, June 13, 2023): Race-conscious admissions programs were never an adequate remedy for the vast racial and socioeconomic inequities in higher education, a new report from Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce explains.
On the Bookshelf
Readers of the Chronicle of Higher Education have been recommending some summer reading (old favorites).
Tracie Marcella Addy, Derek Dube, Khadijah A. Mitchell, and Mallory SoRelle, What Inclusive Instructors Do: Principles and Practices for Excellence in College Teaching, recommended by Eli Collins-Brown, director of the Coulter Faculty Commons at Western Carolina University: “I’m an instructional developer as well as an instructor, and there are very practical actions that an ID can take to help an instructor create more inclusivity in their classroom.”
Kelly A. Hogan and Viji Sathy, Inclusive Teaching: Strategies for Promoting Equity in the College Classroom, recommended by Kate D’Auria, an associate professor of education and faculty learning-communities coordinator at Bucks County Community College, in Pennsylvania: The book has “many ideas for rethinking our practices and implementing practices that help students feel connected and succeed at higher rates. I have used it for faculty book groups, and the response has been very enthusiastic. I will continue to share it with my colleagues.”
Flower Darby, Isis Artze-Vega, Bryan Dewsbury, and Mays Imad, The Norton Guide to Equity-Minded Teaching, recommended by Flower Darby, an associate director in the Teaching for Learning Center at the University of Missouri: “I learned A LOT (as I knew I would) from the author team conversations and from reading and editing my co-authors’ research-packed contributions. In particular, I learned about ways to motivate racially and culturally diverse students who are leading complex lives, the importance of trust and belonging to facilitate deep engagement and learning, and the challenges yet real value of critical reflection on student feedback and our own identities.”
Have a short article or some news related to teaching and learning at your institution that you’d like to share with colleagues? Send your contribution along to us. Also, please email Colleen Monahan Smith (smith@glca.org) if you have colleagues who would like to receive this weekly report.
Steven Volk (steven.volk@oberlin.edu), Editor
GLCA/GLAA Consortium for Teaching and Learning
Co-Directors:
Lew Ludwig (ludwigl@denison.edu)
Colleen Monahan Smith (smith@glca.org)